· Private foundation
Whitney Foundation
Its FY2020 filing reports that it funds preselected organizations and did not take unsolicited requests; check the foundation's own site before ruling it out.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2017
- Under $10k15 grants · $61k
- $10k–50k6 grants · $125k
- $50k–250k3 grants · $220k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| MINNEAPOLIS FOUNDATION | $100,000 |
| WALKER ART CENTER | $70,000 |
| WAYZATA COMMUNITY CHURCH | $50,000 |
| MINNESOTA HISTORICAL SOCIETY | $30,000 |
| GEORGE W BUSH FOUNDATION | $30,000 |
| Individual grant recipient | $20,000 |
| INNER CITY TENNIS | $20,000 |
| ST CLOUD STATE UNIVERSITY FOUNDATION | $15,000 |
| MINNEAPOLIS COMMUNITY AND TECHNICAL COLLEGE | $10,000 |
| TIPTON MUSIC MINISTRIES | $5,000 |
| NAT'L MUSEUM OF RACING & HALL OF FAME | $5,000 |
| CITIZEN'S LEAGUE | $5,000 |
| MOFAS | $5,000 |
| THE RETREAT | $5,000 |
| INTERNATIONAL FOUNDATION INC | $5,000 |
Do your dollars go where the need is?
Each grant placed by the hardship in its grantee’s ZIP, then read against the area’s typical level.
Dollar for dollar, your grants (FY17–17) land where the poverty rate runs at 11%, against an area that typically sits at 10%. 95% of your dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of your grants land in higher-need ZIPs.
Matched: human-services grants are those whose grantee’s IRS cause code is Human Services. Placed by people below the poverty linein the grantee’s ZIP, averaged from the tracts in that ZIP; grantee ZIP can differ from where services are delivered.
US grants placed by each grantee’s ZIP, which can differ from where services are actually delivered. Need from public data — U.S. Census/ACS, CDC PLACES, Eviction Lab, USDA — shown as context about the area, never attributed to your giving.
The map has a center of gravity: the average direction from the rest of the sector toward the organizations the foundation funds — the shape of its giving. Scoring every nonprofit along that direction surfaces the ones that look most like the portfolio. These are the closest matchesthat aren’t grantees — a resemblance in what they say they do, not a recommendation.
To be the leading voice of medicine to make minnesota the healthiest state and the best place to practice.
To provide the highest level of stewardship for university donors through professional management and oversight of the university of minnesota foundation's assets by creating a focused investment environment with clarity of purpose,…
MCF is a vibrant philanthropic community connecting, strengthening and mobilizing the power of philanthropy to advance prosperity and equity.
The minnesota chamber of commerce proactively leads the business community statewide to: advance pro-business, responsible minnesota public policy that creates jobs and grows the econony; provde member services to address evolving business…
The University of New Haven is a student-centered comprehensive university with an emphasis on excellence in liberal arts and professional education. Our mission is to prepare our students to lead purposeful and fulfilling lives in a…
The fsmb serves as the voice for state medical boards, supporting them through education, assessment, research and advocacy while providing services and initiatives that promote patient safety, quality health care and regulatory best…
The minnesota business partnership's mission is to maintain a high quality of life for all minnesotans by ensuring that the state's economy remains strong, globally competitive and its prospects for growth bright by working with elected…
Led by minnesota state university students, we are the inclusive voice for all future, current, and former students. we actively work to represent and support minnesota state university students and advocate at a campus, state, and federal…
Provide an independent forum for those who dare to read, think, speak, and write to advance the professional, literary, and scientific understanding of sea power and other issues critical to global security.
Mcad provides a transformative education within a community of support for creative students of all backgrounds to work, collaborate, and lead with confidence in a dynamic, interconnected world.
The primary mission of furman as a liberal arts institution is to provide a distinctive education in fine arts, humanities, social sciences, mathematics and the sciences, as well as selected professional disciplines.
To attract, recruit, advance, and retain attorneys of color in the twin cities through education and collaboration with member organizations.
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is The Minneapolis Foundation and the most unlike its peers is National Museum of Racing Inc. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
12 grantees tracked through their own filings, 2017–2025.
Each one resolved to its own IRS returns and tracked year by year — your grant beside their revenue from every source. Association, dated; never a causal claim.
Counted here: distinct organizations you funded across 2017–2025, not grant rows in a single year — so this will not match the grant count on the cover. 12 of the 22 grantees resolved in that span have returns of their own we could reconcile; the rest are funded organizations whose filings we could not track year by year.
Where your money sits — by cause, then by grantee
Each org by its size and your share of it — top-left is where you’re load-bearing
Go grantee by grantee — a decade per org, and how each moved after you funded them
A decade per grantee — revenue shaded, your grants as bars, all rows on one timeline.
- Who funds THE MINNEAPOLIS FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds WALKER ART CENTER ↗
- Who funds THE GEORGE W BUSH FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds MINNESOTA HISTORICAL SOCIETY ↗
- Who funds INNERCITY TENNIS FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds ST CLOUD STATE UNIVERSITY FOUNDATION INC ↗
- Who funds CITIZENS LEAGUE ↗
- Who funds FREEDOM INSTITUTE INC ↗
- Who funds NATIONAL MUSEUM OF RACING INC ↗
- Who funds MITCHELL HAMLINE SCHOOL OF LAW ↗
- Who funds URBAN SQUASH TWIN CITIES ↗
- Who funds Ed Allies ↗
The grantmakers whose grantees overlap with yours far more than size alone predicts. Each orbits closer the stronger the alignment; the arcs between them show where they also fund each other. Here it reads as a tightly interlocked camp — most of these funders back each other's grantees too.
Open a dossier: Saint Paul & Minnesota Foundation · The Minneapolis Foundation · Mortenson Family Foundation · Fr Bigelow Foundation · Charities Aid Foundation America · The Blackbaud Giving Fund · National Philanthropic Trust · Morgan Stanley Global Impact Funding Trust Inc · Vanguard Charitable Endowment Program · Donor Advised Charitable Giving Inc · Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund · American Online Giving Foundation Inc
Affinity is a Gamma-Poisson posterior co-funding rate, re-centered on the typical rate, so thin evidence shrinks toward no signal. A research starting point: overlap is association, not proof of shared intent.
Government reliance of your grantees
Every dot is one organization Whitney Foundation funds. Left–right is the share of its income from government; up–down is the share from you. Bigger dots raise more. Filter to federal or a single department — and drag the year to watch it move.
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 your grant caused the public funding. Coverage is precision-first — a floor, not 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 12–24 months.
Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus
How do I get to Whitney Foundation?
Find your warmest path to Whitney 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.