Local foundations, unrestricted money & getting found

A hard truth that’s actually good news: much of the best money for a small nonprofit — local grants, unrestricted operating support, donor-advised gifts — can’t be applied for in the usual sense. It flows through relationships and through funders who find you. So your highest-return “grant writing” is often making yourself findable.

Local money: community foundations

Nearly every region has a community foundation, and many run application-based grant rounds through local affiliates, field-of-interest funds, and giving circles. (For example, one state’s community foundation operates 53 local affiliates, each with an annual community-grant program and roughly two-month decisions — a model repeated in different forms across the country.) Because these fund organizations in their own geography, your entry point is the one covering your service area — which is exactly the kind of local match the funding app can find for you. Get on the radar: attend their grantseeker office hours, meet the program officer, apply to the local round.

Donor-advised funds: you can’t apply — so cultivate

DAFs granted $64.6 billion in FY2024, and it’s growing fast — but grants follow donor recommendations, not applications. What a small org can do: cultivate individual donors who hold DAFs, keep your IRS record spotless (sponsors verify against IRS data before releasing grants), and be findable and claimed on Candid.

Unrestricted operating money is scarce — and gated

Truly unrestricted money for tiny orgs is rare and usually invitation-based. Ben & Jerry’s Foundation gives up to $30,000 in unrestricted grants — but only to constituent-led organizing groups; it explicitly does not fund direct services, so most of this audience shouldn’t apply. Regional grassroots funders (like one that covers 11 Southern states with general operating support) take an “organizational summary” to get on their radar rather than an open application. And the trend is toward funders doing the homework themselves — trust-based philanthropy — which is exactly why a complete Candid profile and clean IRS filings are your best investment.

Community-foundation and regional-funder examples are illustrative of how these funder types work — search for the ones serving your area. Candid also reports that a Gold Seal of Transparency earns nonprofits under $1M a free year of Candid Premium; confirm current terms on candid.org.