How The Chronicle’s Annual Survey of Big Grant Makers Was Compiled

The Chronicle of Philanthropy’s 18th annual survey of the nation’s largest private foundations examined financial information from 181 grant makers.

Of those, 89 completed a questionnaire The Chronicle sent them. Information on the other foundations came from their informational tax returns, which federal law requires them to make public.

In 2009 combined assets at 80 foundations that provided two years of data topped $153-billion, up 5 percent from 2008.

The 10 wealthiest foundations accounted for nearly $91-billion of those assets, or 60 percent.

Removing the country’s largest grant maker from the survey, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, in Seattle, the nine other wealthiest foundations still held 49 percent of assets of foundations in the survey.

Appearing in the survey results for the first time is the Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust, in New York, which is now among the top 15 largest foundations in the country, with $2.7-billion in assets at the end of March 2009, the most recent fiscal year for which figures are available.

Ms. Helmsley, who died in 2007, left her estate, estimated to be worth $5.2-billion, to charity.

Making the Cut

Foundations were eligible for inclusion in the Chronicle’s survey because they were among the 150 largest private grant makers either by assets or by the amount they gave in the most recent fiscal year for which data were available.

The Chronicle’s researchers determined which organizations qualified from data supplied by the Foundation Center, in New York. To be included in the survey, grant makers had to hold assets of at least $228.6-million or have awarded at least $18.9-million in grants in the fiscal year ending in 2008, the most recent year for which all the foundations had audited financial information.

The Chronicle also included foundations that met at least one of those standards in the 2009 fiscal year.

Ninety-two foundations that met one of those requirements did not take part in the survey, but The Chronicle used data from their most recently completed Form 990-PF, the informational tax returns filed with the Internal Revenue Service, to provide a better picture of the state of foundation giving.

Because the fiscal year for many grant makers closed at year’s end, 2009 data provided by foundations in many cases is just an estimate and has not necessarily been audited.

The foundation survey was compiled by Noelle Barton and Emma L. Carew, with assistance from Alissa Moen.