Grantmakers › Hawaii

Friends of Hawaii Charities Inc

Honolulu, HI · EIN 99-0334032. Reported 184 grants totalling $3,356,389 to 118 organizations across tax years 2020-2023, 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:

1. What kind of organization it is. For Friends of Hawaii Charities Inc, the IRS classifies it as a fundraising and fund-distribution organization (NTEE T123).
2. How spread out its giving is. 118 distinct organizations, with 39% 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. 27% of one year's grantees are funded again the next, across 2 year-to-year transitions. That is below the 57% median for grantmaking charities, and well below the 67% private foundations manage. A list that turns over this much is one a newcomer can realistically join.

How big are its grants?

The median reported grant is $8,730. Half of what it reported fell between $6,000 and $12,252; the smallest was $5,000 and the largest $600,000. If you are asking for materially more than the top of that range, you are asking the wrong organization.

2 of those grants were non-cash -- goods, property or services worth $648,025 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.

57 of 118 (48%) 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.

• Hawaii Community Foundation $600,000 · 2022
  PARTNERSHIP TO HELP HAWAI'I'S FAMILIES TRANSITION OUT OF POVERTY, TO SUPPORT COMMUNITY-BASED SERVICES IN THEIR CARE FOR KPUNA AND THEIR CAREGIVERS; AND TO INCREASE THE HEALTHY DEVELOPMENT OF UNDER-RESOURCED CHILDREN AGES 0-5
• World Golf Foundation $50,000 · 2022
  OUR MISSION IS TO UNITE THE GOLF INDUSTRY AROUND INITIATIVES THAT PROMOTE, ENHANCE THE GROWTH OF AND PROVIDE ACCESS TO THE GAME WORLDWIDE, WHILE PRESERVING GOLF'S TRADITIONAL VALUES AND PASSING THEM ON TO OTHERS.
• Sustainable Molokai $42,128 · 2021
  THESE FUNDS WILL BENEFIT BOTH OUR FOOD BANK/FOOD PANTRY PROGRAM AND A COMMUNITY EVENT CALLED AHA PIO THAT BRINGS TOGETHER ALL PUBLIC AND PRIVATE SCHOOL STUDENTS TOGETHER TO SHOWCASE THEIR WORK THAT EXEMPLIFIES HAWAIIAN VALUES AS SET FORTH BY THE BOARD OF HAWAIIAN EDUCATION. FOR THE FOOD BANK/FOOD PANTRY, $25,000 WILL GO TO PURCHASING OF MOLOKAI-PRODUCED FOOD FOR DISTRIBUTION. $5,000 WILL SUPPORT OUR COMMUNITY EDUCATION EVENT.
• Common Grace $38,276 · 2020
  THE FUNDS WILL BE USED TO PARTIALLY IMPLEMENT THE MENTORING PROGRAM WITHIN ONE SCHOOL PARTNERSHIP. TYPICALLY, ONE SCHOOL PARTNERSHIP TRAINS AND PAIRS 8-12 HIGH SCHOOL MENTORS WITH ONE MENTEE EACH AT A NEARBY ELEMENTARY SCHOOL. SCHOOL PARTNERSHIPS REQUIRE FUNDS FOR TRAINING, MENTORING SESSIONS, PROGRAM IMPLEMENTATION, AND EVENTS.
• Hawaii Foodbank Inc $35,346 · 2021
  HAWAII FOODBANK'S OHANA PRODUCE PLUS (OPP) PROGRAM DISTRIBUTES DONATED AND PURCHASED FRESH PRODUCE, DAIRY PRODUCTS, BAKED GOODS, AND OTHER FOOD TO CHILDREN, THE ELDERLY, DISABLED INDIVIDUALS, LOW-INCOME FAMILIES, HOMELESS/HOUSELESS, VETERANS, AND OTHERS IN NEED ON OAHU. TO CONTINUE TO SERVE THOSE IN NEED, HAWAII FOODBANK RESPECTFULLY REQUESTS $15,000 FROM THE FRIENDS OF HAWAII CHARITIES TO SUPPORT DIRECT DELIVERY OF THE OPP PROGRAM ON OAHU.
• Aloha Harvest $29,340 · 2020
  ALOHA HARVEST IS THE LARGEST FOOD RESCUE AND REDISTRIBUTION ORGANIZATION IN THE STATE, WITH A MISSION TO ELIMINATE HUNGER AND FOOD WASTE BY RESCUING QUALITY EXCESS FOOD TO FEED THE HUNGRY IN HAWAII. WE ARE PROPOSING TO EXTEND OUR EMERGENCY RESPONSE BY EXPANDING OUR FOOD RESCUE & DISTRIBUTION EFFORTS WITH OUR NETWORK OF DONORS AND SOCIAL SERVICE AGENCIES AND ESTABLISH A MORE SUSTAINABLE AND COST-EFFICIENT FOOD ASSISTANCE PROGRAM ON OAHU.

What kind of organizations it funds

By each recipient's own IRS classification, for the 103 of 118 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.

Giving by year

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

92% of its giving went to organizations in Hawaii. 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.

Down to the city

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.

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 $8,730 -- 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 Hawaii.
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.

Where these numbers come from

Everything above is taken from Friends of Hawaii Charities Inc's own Form 990 Schedule I filings, which the IRS publishes in bulk. We used 4 returns (tax years 2020-2023). Nothing here is scraped, inferred or estimated.

Address of record on the latest return: 735 Bishop Street Suite 320, Honolulu, HI, 96813.

EIN 99-0334032 · See the original filings on ProPublica · How we build this

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