How much does Wheless Foundation give?

Wheless Foundation reported 47 grants totaling $688,500 in its FY2025 IRS filing. It funded between 23 and 38 organizations a year over FY2018 to FY2024.

What does Wheless Foundation fund?

By grant dollars over FY2018 to FY2025, its largest causes are Health (22%), Human Services (13%), Religion (12%).

Who are Wheless Foundation's largest grantees?

By total granted over FY2018 to FY2025: Northwest Louisiana Food Bank ($280k), Community Renewal International Inc ($225k), Team Gleason Foundation ($180k).

Does Wheless Foundation fund new organizations?

In FY2024, 8% of the organizations it funded were first-time grantees.

Does Wheless Foundation accept unsolicited applications?

Its most recent filing reports that it accepts unsolicited grant applications.

Which funders back the same organizations as Wheless Foundation?

Its strongest co-funders, measured against what their size predicts, include Community Foundation of North Louisiana, Grayson Foundation Inc, The Powers Foundation Inc.

Where is Wheless Foundation based?

Wheless Foundation is based in LA.

Wheless Foundation

Wheless Foundation at a glance

· Private foundation

Wheless Foundation

Its FY2025 filing reports that it accepted unsolicited grant applications.

$689k

Granted FY2025still arriving

Grants FY2025still arriving

States reached

$45k

Largest

01What it funds

01100% classified

What it funded, over time

Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year, FY2018 to 2025.

Health$966kHuman Services$544kReligion$519kFood & Nutrition$480kEducation$365kPublic Safety & Disaster$336kCommunity Improvement$225kRecreation & Sports$190kOther$0

02FY2025 · 47 grants

Where the money goes

Grants by size, and the largest recipients.

By grant size · FY2025

Under $10k12 grants · $54k
$10k–50k35 grants · $635k

$10,000

Median grant

States reached

$11M

Total assets

Largest grants
Recipient	Amount
ST MARK'S EPISCOPAL CATHEDRAL	$45,000
FOOD BANK OF NORTHWEST LOUISIANA	$35,000
GLEASON INITIATIVE FOUNDATION	$35,000
CHURCH OF THE HOLY CROSS	$30,000
TISCH BRAIN TUMOR CENTER AT DUKE	$30,000
CHASTAIN PARK THERAPEUTIC RIDING	$30,000
DURHAM ACADEMY INC	$30,000
YMCA	$30,000
COUNCIL ON ALCOHOLISM AND DRUG ABUSE OF NW LA	$30,000
UNC HEALTH FOUNDATION	$30,000
GREATER NEW ORLEANS FOUNDATION	$20,000
VAIL VALLEY MEDICAL CENTER	$20,000
ASSISTANCE DOGS OF THE WEST	$20,000
MIT	$20,000
CHIMP HAVEN	$15,000

02The need

Does the money reach high-need areas?

Each grant placed by the hardship in its grantee’s ZIP, against the area’s typical level.

show:

Its human-services grants (FY18–25, $386k) land where the poverty rate runs at 17%, against an area that typically sits at 13%. 46% of those dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Its grants spread fairly evenly across need levels.

grant to an above-average-need area below average· circle size = grant amount

How this is measured

Matched: human-services grants are those whose grantee’s IRS cause code is Human Services. Placed by people below the poverty line in the grantee’s ZIP, averaged from the tracts in that ZIP.

Which US states its grants reach

How this is measured

US grants placed by each grantee’s ZIP, which can differ from where services are delivered. Need from public data (U.S. Census/ACS, CDC PLACES, Eviction Lab, USDA), shown as context about the area, never attributed to the funder’s giving.

03Its grantees

repeat funding

Who it funds again

Organizations funded in more than one year, against those funded once.

96%of every dollar goes to organizations it has funded before.

$4.1M · 41 repeat orgs$156k to everyone else

Grantees it renews have grown median revenue +47% since the first grant, against +9% for those funded once.

41 repeat relationships: 34 still active in FY2025, 7 since wound down; 9 grantees were first funded in FY2025 (too recent to call).

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

Total granted

$4.1M

$81k

Median revenue growth · since first grant

+47%

+9%

Still filing today

59%

70%

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2025, 88% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $75k went to new ones.

RenewedFirst-time

Where new relationships form · theme of each grantee’s first grant

EducationHuman ServicesAnimalsCommunity ImprovementArts & CultureHealthOther

How this is measured

First-time means a grantee’s first year in the filing window; renewed means funded in an earlier year too. The renewed share climbs naturally as a portfolio matures, so the signal is a year that bucks it (a wave of new grantees). The earliest year is left-censored: relationships that predate the data read as new. Theme is the grantee’s IRS cause.

Backed again, and grew

NL
NORTHWEST LOUISIANA FOOD BANK
8× · 2018–2025 · $280k · revenue +31%
CR
COMMUNITY RENEWAL INTERNATIONAL INC
8× · 2018–2025 · $225k · revenue +95%
TG
TEAM GLEASON FOUNDATION
6× · 2020–2025 · $180k · revenue +182%

Funded once

TG
The Glen Retirement System
one grant, 2024 · $20k · revenue +9%
HS
HUMANE SOCIETY OF LOUISIANA INCgraduated
one grant, 2018 · $10k · revenue +65%
CA
CUMBERLAND ACADEMY OF GEORGIA INCgraduated
one grant, 2018 · $10k · revenue +26%

How this is measured

Repeat means funded in two or more distinct years. Growth and survival are read from each grantee’s own subsequent IRS filings.

04Its field

Closest unfunded matches

The nonprofits that most resemble its grantees but are not funded by it, scored along the direction from the rest of the field toward the portfolio. A resemblance in what they say they do, not a recommendation.

Loyola University

Loyola University New Orleans, a Jesuit and Catholic institution of higher education, welcomes students of diverse backgrounds and prepares them to lead meaningful lives with and for others; to pursue truth, wisdom, and virtue; and to work…

Education

Louisiana Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals

Dedicated to the elimination of animal suffering by providing care and basic medical services for homeless and unwanted animals with the mission to promote, protect, and advance the well-being of louisiana's companion animals.

Animals

University of New Orleans Foundation

The University of New Orleans Foundation's mission is to promote the well-being and advancement of the University of New Orleans and all the colleges, schools, departments, and divisions comprising it, and to develop, expand, and improve…

Education

Humane Society of South Mississippi

The mission of the humane society is to save and enhance the lives of pets through cooperative and innovative approaches to adoption, spay/neuter, sheltering and community engagement.

Animals

Louisiana Alliance for Nonprofits

To strengthen, promote, and build the capacity of louisiana's nonprofit sector through education, advocacy, and member services.

Philanthropy

Lsu Health Sciences Foundation in Shreveport

The sole mission of the foundation is to support, enhance and assist the lsu health sciences center at shreveport in its many endeavors.

Philanthropy

Animal Care Sanctuary

Animal care sanctuary's lifesaving mission as a no kill organization envisions a community that promotes turning compassion into action for companion animals by: 1.) adopting healthy pet companions into loving homes. 2.) promoting the…

Animals

Louisiana State Bar Association

The mission of the louisiana state bar association is to assist its members in the practice of law, assure access to and aid in the administration of justice, assist the supreme court in the regulation of the practice of law, uphold the…

—

Louisiana Spca Foundation Inc

To be operated exclusively for the benefit of, to perform functions of and to carry out the purposes of the louisiana society for the prevention of cruelty to animals, which operates to prevent cruelty to animals.

Animals

Goodwill Industries of North La Inc

Enhance the dignity and quality of life for individuals, families, and communities by eliminating barriers to opportunity and helping people in need reach their fullest potential through employment and workforce development…

Employment

Nevada Humane Society

To care for pets, find them homes and save lives.

Animals

Humane Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals

The primary mission of the humane society is to end animal cruelty, neglect and overpopulation in south carolina.

Animals

How this is measured

The grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Lsu in Shreveport Foundation Inc; the most unlike its peers is Savannah College of Art and DesignInc. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.

04the grantee network

44 grantees tracked through their own filings, 2017–2025.

Each grant beside the grantee’s revenue from every source, year by year.

How this is measured

Counted here: distinct organizations funded across 2017 to 2025, not grant rows in a single year, so this will not match the grant count on the cover. 44 of the 65 grantees resolved in that span have returns of their own we could reconcile.

Each grantee is resolved to its own IRS returns. Association, dated; never a causal claim.

Load-bearing (≥25% of a budget)

Early backer (in before they grew)

42/44

Grantees still filing

30/44

Grew since first funded

Where the money sits, by cause and then by grantee

Other$2,715,200Human Services$566,200Food & Nutrition$280,000Education$245,000Community Improvement$235,000Animals$170,000Arts & Culture$140,000

Each grantee by its size and the funder’s share of it; top left is load-bearing

Grantee by grantee: a decade per organization, before and after funding

A decade per grantee: revenue shaded, grants as bars, all rows on one timeline.

Co-funders

Grantmakers whose grantees overlap with this funder’s far more than size alone predicts. Closer means stronger alignment; arcs show where they also fund each other. Here they form a tightly interlocked group: most of these funders back each other's grantees too.

Community Foundation of North LouisianaLA40.4× affinity17 shared granteesties to 11 of 11Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: Community Foundation of North Louisiana · Grayson Foundation Inc · The Powers Foundation Inc · Willis-Knighton Medical Center · American Electric Power Foundation · The Alta and John Franks Foundation · Carolyn W & Charles T Beaird Family Foundation · Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Louisiana Foundation · The Crow Foundation · United Way of Northwest Louisiana · The Frost Foundation · Arthur J Gallagher Foundation

How this is measured

Affinity is a Gamma-Poisson posterior co-funding rate, re-centered on the typical rate, so thin evidence shrinks toward no signal. Overlap is association, not proof of shared intent.

How much its grantees rely on government

Each dot is one organization Wheless Foundation funds: left to right is the share of its income from government, bottom to top the share from Wheless Foundation. Bigger dots raise more.

2024

’20’21’22’23’24’25

no gov moneyreceives it· size = income

0get no government money at all

17report government grants on their 990 we could not trace to a source (not plotted)

0rely on government for over half their income

⤢ axis zoomed · 0–90%

typical government reliance, FY20–25

How this is measured

Government income is each org’s traced federal awards (USASpending grants and contracts) plus state payments (open checkbooks) as a share of its total revenue (IRS Form 990); the self-reported government-grant line (990 line 1e) is carried for cross-check: a grantee that reports government grants we could not trace to a source is left off the chart rather than shown as receiving none. An association, not a claim that a grant caused the public funding. Coverage is precision-first, a floor rather than a census; state records exist for 9 states, so a grantee outside them shows no state figure (dimmed) rather than a false zero. Federal award amounts are obligations, which can span years, so a single-year share is indicative. 990 filings lag 12 to 24 months.

05Through Plinth

Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus

How do I get to Wheless Foundation?

Find your warmest path to Wheless Foundation through trustees and officers whose names appear on both boards. Search for your organization and Plinth traces the shortest route it can evidence.

Each link is a name appearing on two organizations’ public IRS 990 filings, matched on that name and, where the filings support it, on location. A same-state match has geographic support, which is a second matching feature rather than confirmation that the two are one person; a cross-state one is the likeliest to be two people who share a name. Every hop shows its tier, low-confidence and distant paths are held back rather than guessed, and it is worth confirming the person before you use the introduction.

Play a game based on Wheless’ filings →

More from the funding graph

The unnamed billions

grants reported with no recipient in the public record

The regranting layer

51% of grant dollars land in the regranting layer

The DAF merry-go-round

$9.7B circulates between donor-advised funds

The endowment market

who holds foundation money, and what just moved

The camps

funders cluster by geography, not ideology

By state

where grant money is based, and what stays home