Funders › New York

Ralph C Sheldon Foundation Inc

Jamestown, NY · EIN 16-6030502. Reported 357 grants totalling $12.2M to 115 recipients across tax years 2021-2025. This foundation did not tell the IRS it funds only preselected organizations.

Does this foundation accept applications?

Yes -- on its own tax return. Form 990-PF asks every private foundation whether it makes grants only to organizations it selects itself. Of the 91,758 foundations in our data that made a grant and answered, 78% said yes -- and applying to those is wasted effort. Ralph C Sheldon Foundation Inc did not check that box on its most recent filing, which puts it in the minority that is at least open to being approached.

How big are its grants?

The median grant is $9,750. Half of everything it gave fell between $815 and $37,000; the smallest was $102 and the largest $768,066. If you are asking for materially more than the top of that range, you are asking the wrong foundation.

Every organization it funded

This is the complete list from its filings, largest first. Recipients are grouped by name and state as they were written on the returns, so an organization entered under two different names appears twice. Years funded is the number of separate tax years in which that name received money.

81 of 115 (70%) received money in more than one year over the 5 years we hold.

Measured the way we measure every foundation -- what share of one year's grantees are funded again the next -- this one retains 80%, across 4 year-to-year transitions. The median foundation retains about 67%, so this one is unusually consistent. This measures how often it paid the same organizations again. It says nothing about whether it would consider a new one.

What the money was for

Taken verbatim from the purpose field of its filings. This is the closest thing to a statement of what this foundation cares about, in its own words.

• Chaut Lake & Watershed Mgmt Alliance $768,066 · 2023
  CLWMA WAS PASS-THROUGH FOR JEFFERSON PROJ.2023 LAKE & WATERSHED PROJECTSDIRECTOR/STAFF UNRESTRICTED GRANTS
• National Comedy Center $326,750 · 2024
  OPERATING SUPPORTDIRECTOR/STAFF UNRESTRICTED GRANTS
• Chautauqua Co Land Bank Corp $300,750 · 2021
  LAND BANK SUPPORTDIRECTOR/STAFF UNRESTRICTED GRANTS
• Reg Lenna Center for the Arts $282,736 · 2023
  NEW THEATER SEATSOPERATING SUPPORTDIRECTOR/STAFF UNRESTRICTED GRANTS
• Jamestown Center City Development Corp $252,000 · 2023
  THEZONEDIRECTOR/STAFF UNRESTRICTED GRANTS
• Chautauqua Institution $224,500 · 2023
  BELLINGER HALL RENOVATION PROJECTANNUAL FUND DRIVEDIRECTOR/STAFF UNRESTRICTED GRANTS

What kind of organizations it funds

By the activity category the IRS assigns each recipient, for the 179 grants where we could match the recipient to a registered organization. The categories are the IRS's. The match, made from the name and address on the return, is ours.

Giving by year

Tax years, not calendar years, and the most recent year is usually incomplete -- filings arrive about a year late, so a low final year means late paperwork rather than a foundation winding down.

Already committed for future years

Form 990-PF has a separate schedule for grants approved but not yet paid. Ralph C Sheldon Foundation Inc has 47 of them, worth $7,739,461. This is the one part of the filing that looks forward rather than back.

Where its money goes

100% of its giving went to organizations in New York. If your organization is based elsewhere, look in the recipient list for grants to your area before writing.

Funders that support the same organizations

These funders gave to organizations this one also funded -- some private foundations, some community foundations and other grantmaking charities. Shared grantees are a sign of overlapping priorities and nothing more: they do not show that any of these funders would consider a new organization. Each page says what its filings show.

How to approach this foundation

1. Check you are its size. The median grant is $9,750. A request many times that size asks for something it has rarely or never given.
2. Check you are in its geography. Its giving is concentrated in New York.
3. Read the recipient list above for organizations like yours. If nothing on it resembles your work, that is a real answer, and a cheap one to get.
4. Look up the current filing before writing. The 990-PF names the foundation's officers and, where one exists, its application procedure. We link it below.

Related guides

Where these numbers come from

Everything above is taken from Ralph C Sheldon Foundation Inc's own Form 990-PF filings, which the IRS publishes in bulk. We used 5 returns (tax years 2021-2025). Grant figures are from its returns. Matching recipients to registered organizations, their IRS classifications, the retention rate and the funders that support the same organizations are our own calculations, described in how we build this.

Address of record on the latest return: 217 North Main Street, Jamestown, NY, 14701. This is the address the foundation gave the IRS; many small foundations file through an accountant or a bank trust department, so it may not be where post to a programme officer should go.

EIN 16-6030502 · See the original filings on ProPublica · How we build this

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