League of California
Hesperia, CA · EIN 45-5125583. Reported 51 grants totalling $4,739,500 to 28 organizations across tax years 2021-2024, 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 League of California, the IRS classifies it as a philanthropy support organization (NTEE T19).
- How spread out its giving is. 28 distinct organizations, with 11% 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. 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 $100,000. Half of what it reported fell between $50,000 and $107,500; the smallest was $6,250 and the largest $275,000. 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Community Foundation of Mendocino County Inc | Ukiah, CA | $511,250 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| Shasta Regional Community Foundation | Redding, CA | $405,000 | 3 | 3 | 2024 |
| Ventura County Community Foundation | Camarillo, CA | $400,000 | 2 | 2 | 2024 |
| Placer Community Foundation | Auburn, CA | $365,000 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| Community Foundation Santa Cruz County | Aptos, CA | $285,000 | 2 | 2 | 2024 |
| Community Foundation San Luis Obispo County | Sn Luis Obisp, CA | $259,500 | 2 | 2 | 2024 |
| Santa Barbara Foundation | Santa Barbara, CA | $255,000 | 2 | 2 | 2024 |
| Community Foundation for Monterey County | Monterey, CA | $251,000 | 2 | 2 | 2024 |
| Humboldt Area Foundation | Bayside, CA | $200,000 | 2 | 2 | 2022 |
| Inland Empire Community Foundation | Riverside, CA | $200,000 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| Sonoma County Community Foundation | Santa Rosa, CA | $181,250 | 3 | 3 | 2024 |
| North Valley Community Foundation | Chico, CA | $175,000 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| Community Foundation of the Napa Valley | Napa, CA | $162,500 | 3 | 3 | 2024 |
| San Joaquin Community Foundation Inc | Stockton, CA | $135,000 | 2 | 2 | 2024 |
| Stanislaus Community Foundation | Modesto, CA | $110,000 | 2 | 2 | 2024 |
| Central Valley Community Foundation | Fresno, CA | $107,500 | 2 | 2 | 2024 |
| Sacramento Region Community Foundation | Sacramento, CA | $106,250 | 2 | 2 | 2023 |
| Kern Community Foundation | Bakersfield, CA | $100,000 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| The San Diego Foundation | San Diego, CA | $100,000 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| The West Marin Fund | Point Reyes Station, CA | $100,000 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| Community Foundation of Merced County | Merced, CA | $99,880 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| Tahoe Truckee Community Foundation | Truckee, CA | $90,000 | 2 | 2 | 2024 |
| Community Foundation of San Benito County | Hollister, CA | $50,000 | 1 | 1 | 2023 |
| Lake County Community Foundation Inc | Middletown, CA | $50,000 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| Amador Community Foundation Inc | Jackson, CA | $19,120 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| Los Altos Community Foundation | Los Altos, CA | $7,500 | 1 | 1 | 2023 |
| Marin Community Foundation | Novato, CA | $7,500 | 1 | 1 | 2023 |
| Solano Community Foundation | Fairfield, CA | $6,250 | 1 | 1 | 2023 |
16 of 28 (57%) 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.
- Ventura County Community Foundation
DISASTER RELIEF RECOVERY; RESILIENCE, CAPACITY BUILDING, AND COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT - Community Foundation of Mendocino County
DISASTER RELIEF RECOVERY AND RESILIENCE; RACIAL AND HEALTH EQUITY - Community Foundation of the North State
DISASTER RELIEF, RECOVERY AND RESILIENCE - Placer Community Foundation
DISASTER RELIEF RECOVERY AND RESILIENCE - Central Valley Community Foundation
RESILIENCE, CAPACITY BUILDING, AND COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT
What kind of organizations it funds
By each recipient's own IRS classification, for the 28 of 28 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 year | Grants reported | Total | Median grant |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | 7 | $750,000 | $100,000 |
| 2022 | 5 | $550,000 | $100,000 |
| 2023 | 17 | $987,000 | $10,000 |
| 2024 | 22 | $2,452,500 | $100,000 |
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 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
- 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 $100,000 -- 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 California.
- 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 League of California'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 402275, Hesperia, CA, 92345.
EIN 45-5125583 · See the original filings on ProPublica · How we build this
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