Boston Bar Foundation
Boston, MA · EIN 04-6111344. Reported 161 grants totalling $8,391,107 to 52 organizations across tax years 2020-2024, on Form 990 Schedule I.
Does this grantmaker accept applications?
Its tax return does not say, and we will not guess. Private foundations file Form 990-PF, which asks outright whether they fund only organizations they select themselves -- 78% say yes, and that one answer is what lets the rest of this site tell you which foundations are worth approaching. Grantmaking charities like this one file a regular Form 990 instead, and the IRS never puts the question to them. Anyone claiming to know the answer from the filing is inventing it.
Three things in the filing do bear on it:
- What kind of organization it is. For Boston Bar Foundation, by its IRS classification it raises and distributes funds for crime & legal (NTEE I128).
- How spread out its giving is. 52 distinct organizations, with 28% of the dollars going to the largest single recipient. That is genuinely spread out -- the mark of a funder making many independent decisions rather than underwriting one institution.
- How much its list changes. 94% of one year's grantees are funded again the next, across 4 year-to-year transitions. That is well above the 56% median for grantmaking charities, and above the 67% median for private foundations. It describes the organizations it already funds, not whether it would consider a new one.
How big are its grants?
The median reported grant is $22,500. Half of what it reported fell between $12,500 and $45,000; the smallest was $5,250 and the largest $500,000. If you are asking for materially more than the top of that range, you are asking the wrong organization.
Every organization it funded
This is the complete list from its filings, largest first. Recipients are grouped by the EIN the filer reported, not by name, so an organization that was typed differently in two years appears once rather than twice.
| Organization | Location | Total received | Grants | Years funded | Last |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Greater Boston Legal Services Inc | Boston, MA | $2,310,000 | 6 | 5 | 2024 |
| Boston Bar Association | Boston, MA | $981,676 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Volunteer Lawyers Project of the Boston Bar Association Inc | Boston, MA | $915,347 | 6 | 5 | 2024 |
| Political Asylum Immigration Representation Project Inc | Boston, MA | $474,000 | 6 | 5 | 2024 |
| Metrowest Legal Services Inc | Framingham, MA | $464,000 | 6 | 5 | 2024 |
| De Novo Center for Justice and Healing Inc | Cambridge, MA | $365,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Massachusetts Correctional Legal Services | Boston, MA | $345,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Massachusetts Law Reform Institute Inc | Boston, MA | $235,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Rian Immigrant Center Inc | Boston, MA | $225,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Veterans Legal Services Inc | Boston, MA | $152,500 | 3 | 3 | 2024 |
| Urban Revival Inc | Jamaica Plain, MA | $150,000 | 6 | 5 | 2024 |
| Womens Bar Foundation of Massachusetts Inc | Boston, MA | $147,500 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Lawyers for Civil Rights Inc | Boston, MA | $135,000 | 6 | 5 | 2024 |
| Lawyers Clearinghouse on Affordable Housing and Homelessness Inc | Boston, MA | $129,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Massachusetts Advocates for Children Inc | Boston, MA | $113,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Northeast Legal Aid Inc | Lawrence, MA | $90,000 | 3 | 2 | 2024 |
| Northeast Legal Aid Inc | Lynn, MA | $80,000 | 3 | 3 | 2022 |
| Youth Advocacy Foundation Inc | Boston, MA | $70,000 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| Veteran's Legal Services | Boston, MA | $65,000 | 2 | 2 | 2021 |
| Childrens Law Center of Mass Inc North Shore Childrens Law Project | Lynn, MA | $64,500 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Womens Lunch Place Inc | Boston, MA | $62,500 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| La Colaborativa Inc | Chelsea, MA | $57,500 | 3 | 3 | 2024 |
| Pine Street Inn Inc | Boston, MA | $55,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Project Citizenship Inc | Boston, MA | $55,000 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| CASA Myrna Vasquez Inc | Boston, MA | $52,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Boston Foundation Inc | Boston, MA | $50,000 | 1 | 1 | 2023 |
| Center for Law and Education Inc | Boston, MA | $47,500 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| Asian Task Force Against Domestic Violence Inc | Boston, MA | $45,000 | 2 | 2 | 2024 |
| Third Sector New England Inc | Boston, MA | $40,000 | 2 | 1 | 2024 |
| Saheli Inc | Burlington, MA | $39,000 | 3 | 3 | 2024 |
| Second Step Inc | Newtonville, MA | $37,500 | 3 | 3 | 2024 |
| Mabel Center for Immigrant Justice Corp | Boston, MA | $35,000 | 2 | 1 | 2024 |
| Suffolk University | Boston, MA | $30,134 | 2 | 1 | 2024 |
| Massachusetts Immigrant and Refugee Advocacy Coalition Inc | Boston, MA | $30,000 | 2 | 1 | 2024 |
| Alternatives for Community and Enviroment Inc | Roxbury, MA | $25,000 | 2 | 2 | 2024 |
| Health Law Advocates Inc | Boston, MA | $25,000 | 2 | 2 | 2024 |
| Victim Rights Law Center Inc | Boston, MA | $25,000 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| International Institute of New England Inc | Boston, MA | $20,000 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| Reach Beyond Domestic Violence Inc | Waltham, MA | $17,500 | 2 | 2 | 2023 |
| Familyaid Boston Inc | Boston, MA | $15,000 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| Justice for Housing Inc | Boston, MA | $15,000 | 2 | 2 | 2023 |
| Dove Inc | Quincy, MA | $14,000 | 2 | 2 | 2024 |
| Massachusetts Legal Assistance | Boston, MA | $12,000 | 1 | 1 | 2021 |
| ACLU Foundation of Massachusetts Inc | Boston, MA | $10,700 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| Arts & Business Council of Greater Boston Inc | Boston, MA | $10,000 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| Disability Law Center Inc | Boston, MA | $10,000 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| Housing Families Inc | Malden, MA | $10,000 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| Welcome Project Inc | Somerville, MA | $10,000 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| Immigrant Family Services Institute Inc | Mattapan, MA | $7,000 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| Baystate Reentry Network | Prides Xing, MA | $6,000 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| Harborcov Inc | Chelsea, MA | $6,000 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| Brazilian Worker Center Inc | Allston, MA | $5,250 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
34 of 52 (65%) received money in more than one year over the 5 years we hold. Remember the $5,000 floor: an organization funded every year at $3,000 shows up here as never funded at all.
What the money was for
Taken verbatim from the purpose column of its filings, largest first. This is the closest thing to a statement of what it funds, in its own words.
- Boston Bar Association
SUPPORT PRO BONO AND PUBLIC SERVICE PROJECTS THAT ENGAGE LAWYERS IN OUR COMMUNITY - Massachusetts Law Reform Institute
INCREASING ACCESS TO JUSTICE - Legal Assistance Corp
CIVIL LEGAL AID DIRECTORY
What kind of organizations it funds
By the activity category the IRS assigns each recipient, for the 40 of 52 recipients we could match to a registered organization. The categories are the IRS's, not ours -- Schedule I reports the recipient's EIN, so this is a lookup rather than a name match.
Giving by year
| Tax year | Grants reported | Total | Median grant |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | 20 | $1,280,970 | $30,000 |
| 2021 | 24 | $1,454,650 | $25,000 |
| 2022 | 27 | $1,446,556 | $22,500 |
| 2023 | 34 | $1,769,847 | $20,500 |
| 2024 | 56 | $2,439,084 | $20,000 |
Tax years, not calendar years, and the most recent year is usually incomplete -- Form 990 arrives about a year after the year it covers, so a low final year means late paperwork rather than a grantmaker winding down.
Where its money goes
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Funders that support the same organizations
These grantmakers and private foundations gave to organizations this one also funded. 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 grantmaker
- Look for a published programme first. Unlike most private foundations, organizations of this kind often do run open, deadlined grant cycles with written guidelines. Its own website is the authority on that; this page is the authority on who it has actually paid.
- Check you are its size. The median reported grant is $22,500 -- and because grants under $5,000 need not be reported, it very likely writes smaller cheques than this page can see.
- Check you are in its geography. Its giving concentrates in Massachusetts.
- Read the recipient list for organizations like yours. If nothing on it resembles your work, that is a real answer and a cheap one to get.
Related guides
Where these numbers come from
Everything above is taken from Boston Bar Foundation's own Form 990 Schedule I filings, which the IRS publishes in bulk. We used 5 returns (tax years 2020-2024). Grant figures are from its returns. Recipient classifications, the concentration and retention figures and the funders that support the same organizations are our own calculations from them, described in how we build this.
Address of record on the latest return: 16 Beacon Street, Boston, MA, 02108.
EIN 04-6111344 · See the original filings on ProPublica · How we build this
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