Washington, D.C. · Nonprofit
The Ciesla Foundation
The Ciesla Foundation (Washington, D.C.) receives grants from 40 organizations whose IRS filings report $2,985,498 to it, the largest being WILLIAM S & INA LEVINE FOUNDATION INC ($1,025,000). 15 of them have funded it in more than one year.
Three funders worth looking at
Grantmakers with no record of funding this organization, ranked by how strongly the co-funder graph and the mission embeddings agree. The evidence is in section 03.
- The Shimon Ben Joseph Foundation Dba Jim Joseph Foundationshared funders
- Academy Foundationportfolio match
- Chicken & Egg Films Incportfolio match
The organization over time
Each line starts at 100 in 2017, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2017, 50 means half. The number beside each label in the key is where it ended.
How it's funded, over time
Each bar is one year's revenue split into where it came from, and every bar is the same height — these are shares, not amounts, so a year that raised twice as much looks the same size. Hover a bar for the split.
Government-grant reliance: 2017 18% · 2018 5% · 2019 7% · 2021 67% · 2022 1%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 5 of the last 8 reported years ran a deficit.
reserve
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 7 funders to 10 funders, grant income fell $258k → $193k.
10 of 40 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 12% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.
From the IRS filings of The Ciesla Foundation’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 40 funders by total. Association, not causation. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How concentrated its funding is
The Ciesla Foundation has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 34% of grant income, and it takes 3 funders to reach half.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 3 funders to its left
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 58% · 2018 54% · 2019 81% · 2020 48% · 2021 66% · 2022 60% · 2023 52% — diversifying over time.
“Effective funders” = inverse Herfindahl index (1 / Σ shareᵢ²) — the number of equal-sized funders that would give the same concentration. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How long its funders stay
22% of The Ciesla Foundation's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 38% give in more than one year at all.
Share of funders still giving k years after their first recorded grant, pooled across every acquisition cohort. A funder counts as retained in a year only if it made a grant that year. Measured to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving — a funder cannot be counted as lapsed in a year most filers have not reached.
Where its funders are
The Ciesla Foundation draws 98% of its grant income from funders outside Washington, D.C., across 14 states in all.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $356k arriving through sponsors registered in 9 statesis excluded from the map and the split above: a sponsor holds money on a donor’s behalf, so its registered address would place those dollars somewhere no donor need ever have been. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
Funders to approach
Grantmakers that don’t fund you yet, surfaced two ways: they back organizations that share your funders, or their grantees resemble your mission. The ones both signals agree on come first. Your 40 funders put you under-funded among the 400 organizations that share them.
- The Shimon Ben Joseph Foundation Dba Jim Joseph Foundationshared fundersCA · backs 65 organizations that share your funders
- Academy Foundationportfolio matchits grantees resemble your mission
- Chicken & Egg Films Incportfolio matchits grantees resemble your mission
- Gerson Family Charitable Trustportfolio matchits grantees resemble your mission
- Perspective Media Initiatives Incportfolio matchits grantees resemble your mission
- The Kronhill Pletka Foundationportfolio matchits grantees resemble your mission
- Catapult Film Fundportfolio matchits grantees resemble your mission
- The Rogovy Foundationportfolio matchits grantees resemble your mission
- International Documentary Foundation Incportfolio matchits grantees resemble your mission
- Winkler Lowy Foundationportfolio matchits grantees resemble your mission
- Arie and Ida Crown Memorialshared fundersIL · backs 123 organizations that share your funders
- Jewish Community Foundation of Greater Metrowest NJshared fundersNJ · backs 118 organizations that share your funders
From the co-funder graph (funders backing at least two comparable organizations, shrunk for grantee count, donor-advised and mega-funds excluded) and the universe embeddings. A research starting point; overlap is association, not a guarantee of fit.
Organizations like The Ciesla Foundation
Nonprofits whose mission and program text most resemble this one, by semantic similarity over the universe of US filings — the closest peers, and often the clearest route to shared or prospective funders.
In Washington, D.C.
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
82% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
54%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for The Ciesla Foundation: IRS status (Business Master File, Publication 78, auto-revocation), the OFAC sanctions lists, the Internal Revenue Bulletin, and California registration, with the Rev. Proc. 2018-32 §8.01 reliance elements stated element by element. Generated from the current files at the moment you download it.
Screens are triage, not determinations; a source that cannot be read reports not screened, never clear. How the screen works · on the API as GET /api/screening/{ein}?format=pdf
Questions and answers
- Who funds The Ciesla Foundation?
- The Ciesla Foundation (Washington, D.C.) receives grants from 40 organizations whose IRS filings report $2,985,498 to it, the largest being WILLIAM S & INA LEVINE FOUNDATION INC ($1,025,000). 15 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does The Ciesla Foundation have?
- IRS filings report 40 organizations giving $2,985,498 in grants to The Ciesla Foundation, 15 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of The Ciesla Foundation?
- WILLIAM S & INA LEVINE FOUNDATION INC is the largest funder on record, with $1,025,000 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like The Ciesla Foundation find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Washington, D.C.. The funding by cause and by state pages list the largest funders for a given area and how to approach them.
These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2024 (financials across 2017–2024), and the filings of 40funders that report grants to it. “On record” means captured in the filings we have parsed — a funder that does not e-file, or whose grant detail is not itemized, will not appear. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind. Trends on this page end at FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving; later years are shown and marked, and move no figure. Data on this page was exported August 27, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing