GrantmakersColorado

Aspen Skiing Company Environment

Aspen, CO · EIN 84-1428863. Reported 61 grants totalling $721,194 to 33 organizations across tax years 2021-2024, on Form 990 Schedule I.

33organizations funded
$10,000median reported grant
$721,194granted, 2021-2024
60%of grantees funded again the next year
10%of dollars to its largest recipient

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:

  1. What kind of organization it is. For Aspen Skiing Company Environment, the IRS classifies it as a private independent foundation (NTEE T22Z).
  2. How spread out its giving is. 33 distinct organizations, with 10% 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.
  3. How much its list changes. 60% of one year's grantees are funded again the next, across 3 year-to-year transitions. That is about the 57% median for grantmaking charities -- noticeably lower than the 67% private foundations manage. Organizations like this one rotate more of their list each year, which is where an opening for a newcomer tends to be.

How big are its grants?

The median reported grant is $10,000. Half of what it reported fell between $10,000 and $13,890; the smallest was $5,750 and the largest $24,813. If you are asking for materially more than the top of that range, you are asking the wrong organization.

Schedule I only reports grants over $5,000. Form 990 requires a charity to list recipients it paid more than that and lets it omit the rest, so every grant-size figure on this page describes the grants it reported, not all of them. Its real median is lower and its real recipient count is higher. This is also why these numbers cannot be compared with the private-foundation figures elsewhere on this site -- Form 990-PF has no reporting floor, so the two are different populations rather than two samples of one.
$5,000 - $10,000
11 grants
$10,000 - $25,000
50 grants

16 of those grants were non-cash -- goods, property or services worth $213,275 in total. In-kind giving is real support but it is not a cheque.

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.

OrganizationLocationTotal receivedGrantsYears fundedLast
Wilderness WorkshopCarbondale, CO$69,813442024
350 ColoradoBoulder, CO$60,000442024
Western Environmental Law CenterBuena Vista, CO$55,000332024
Aspen Center for Environmental StudiesAspen, CO$40,000332023
Protect Our WintersBoulder, CO$40,000332024
Roaring Fork Outdoor VolunteersCarbondale, CO$39,500332024
Conservation Colorado Education FundGrand Junction, CO$30,000332024
Nfria Wserc Conservation Center IncPaonia, CO$27,500332024
The Arts Campus at WillitsBasalt, CO$23,400332023
Colorado Fourteeners InitiativeLakewood, CO$22,500222022
The Farm CollaborativeWoody Creek, CO$21,360112023
Big PivotsArvada, CO$20,000222023
CandidNew York, NY$20,000222024
Colorado Rocky Mountain SchoolCarbondale, CO$20,000222022
High Country NewsPaonia, CO$20,000222022
Safe Passages Roaring ForkAspen, CO$20,000222024
Middle Colorado Watershed CouncilRifle, CO$18,775112024
EcoflightAspen, CO$18,000222024
Western Colorado AllianceGrand Jct, CO$15,500222022
Red Hill CouncilCarbondale, CO$13,890112023
Western Colorado Alliance for Community Action$13,000112024
Aspen Public RadioAspen, CO$10,000112022
Community Office for Resource EfficiencyAspen, CO$10,000112023
Independence Pass FoundationAspen, CO$10,000112024
Riverview$10,000112024
Roaring Fork High SchoolCarbondale, CO$10,000112023
Roaring Fork Valley Wildfire Collaborative$10,000112024
Rocky Mountain Community RadioBoulder, CO$10,000112021
The Alliance for Collective ActionDenver, CO$10,000112023
Trout Unlimited IncArlington, VA$10,000112021
CleerCarbondale, CO$8,000112022
High Country News$8,000112024
Basalt Regional LibraryBasalt, CO$6,956112023

17 of 33 (52%) received money in more than one year over the 4 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.

What kind of organizations it funds

By each recipient's own IRS classification, for the 19 of 33 recipients we could match to a registered organization. These are assigned categories, not our guesses -- Schedule I reports the recipient's EIN, so this is a lookup rather than a name match.

Environment
9 orgs
Education
3 orgs
Arts & Culture
2 orgs
Recreation & Sports
1 org
Philanthropy & Grantmaking
1 org
Community Improvement
1 org
Animal Welfare
1 org

Giving by year

Tax yearGrants reportedTotalMedian grant
202111$109,700$10,000
202215$178,063$10,000
202319$220,156$10,000
202416$213,275$10,500

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

96% of its giving went to organizations in Colorado. Community foundations and federated funds are usually the most geographically bounded funders there are -- being outside the footprint is normally disqualifying in a way that a weak programme fit is not.

Colorado
$650K
New York
$20K
Virginia
$10K

Down to the city

Carbondale, CO
$161K
Boulder, CO
$110K
Aspen, CO
$108K
Buena Vista, CO
$55K
Paonia, CO
$48K
Basalt, CO
$30K

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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 the strongest signal available that two funders have overlapping priorities -- and a funder already backing your peers is a far warmer prospect than one that merely lists your cause.

Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund17 shared recipientsColorado Gives Foundation14 shared recipientsDonor Advised Charitable Giving Inc13 shared recipientsAspen Community Foundation12 shared recipientsVanguard Charitable Endowment Program9 shared recipientsNational Philanthropic Trust8 shared recipients

How to approach this grantmaker

  1. 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.
  2. Check you are its size. The median reported grant is $10,000 -- and because grants under $5,000 need not be reported, it very likely writes smaller cheques than this page can see.
  3. Check you are in its geography. Its giving concentrates in Colorado.
  4. 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

Foundations funding education in ColoradoEvery funder in this group, ranked

Where these numbers come from

Everything above is taken from Aspen Skiing Company Environment's own Form 990 Schedule I filings, which the IRS publishes in bulk. We used 4 returns (tax years 2021-2024). Nothing here is scraped, inferred or estimated.

Address of record on the latest return: Po Box 1248, Aspen, CO, 81612.

EIN 84-1428863 · See the original filings on ProPublica · How we build this

This is history, not an open call. Form 990 is published about a year after the tax year it covers. Nothing on this page is a deadline. It is a record of who this organization has actually funded, which is the best available predictor of who it will fund next.

Is something here wrong about your organization? Email hello@funderscope.com and we will correct it.