IP Briefing: What's Going on With Philanthropy in Northern California?

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In a sentence: The Northern California philanthropic ecosystem is extremely wealthy and extremely varied, with an array of funders trying to address pressing challenges including climate change and a dearth of affordable housing alongside philanthropic mainstays like science, education and health. 

What’s going on

Northern California is San Francisco and Silicon Valley. It’s also the rural communities and nature of the North Coast and Shasta Cascade areas. It’s a region famous for its progressivism that also contains some of California’s most conservative counties. And it’s a place where some of the biggest challenges of our time are visible in stark relief: extreme economic inequality and devastating climate-change-related disasters. All of this shapes the region’s philanthropy. 

Northern California is home to some of the wealthiest people and most powerful companies in the world, and the region’s philanthropy reflects that. But not all of the philanthropic giving that comes from Northern California goes to Northern California nonprofits. A lot of giving flows out of the region, and community organizations have had to advocate and agitate to encourage more giving to local organizations, especially in Silicon Valley. 

Our State of American Philanthropy report on the region focuses on giving to Northern California organizations and issues. Most of that giving goes to the Bay Area, while nonprofits in the North Coast and Shasta Cascade parts of the region are funded on a much smaller scale. 

New and well-established philanthropy happens side by side in Northern California. Movements for social justice have long influenced the region’s nonprofit and philanthropic organizations, and some Northern California funders have pushed philanthropy to be more participatory and more equity-minded. Other donors have recently amassed fortunes through their entrepreneurship and approach philanthropy with a focus on innovation and individual impact. 

Pressing issues philanthropists are trying to address in Northern California include wildfires, unaffordable housing, and homelessness. As in many regions, funders still give most substantially to education, health, and science. 

By the numbers

The Silicon Valley Community Foundation is the nation’s largest community foundation. It held $12.2 billion in assets in 2020, and made more than 34,000 grants totaling $2.2. billion through DAFs to Northern California organizations from 2014 to 2018, according to data from Candid. 

Key funders

Some of the nation’s largest private foundations are based in and give to nonprofits in Northern California, including the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation and the Packard and Hewlett foundations. 

Sobrato Philanthropies is an important family foundation in the region. More recently established institutional grantmakers include Crankstart and Chan Zuckerberg Initiative

California has a strong network of community foundations, which includes the wealthy Silicon Valley Community Foundation and San Francisco Foundation as well as less-wealthy but highly influential rural community foundations like Humboldt Area Foundation. Northern California is also home to the nation’s longest-standing LGBTQ+ community foundation, the Horizons Foundation

Many of the most famous ultra-capacity donors in the world live in this region, from Mark Zuckerberg to Laurene Powell Jobs. Northern California’s billionaires give through a diverse array of vehicles, including DAFs, foundations, and LLCs. 

Leading corporate funders include Google.org, the eBay Foundation, Salesforce, Cisco Systems, the Blue Shield of California Foundation, and the Wells Fargo Foundation. 

New and notable

Food for thought

“Regional philanthropy is ample. There are really big thinkers with national and global interests. There’s a lot of innovation in the area – on both the donor side and the nonprofit side. At the same time, this is an area where there is great need… There is tremendous potential here… huge potential and huge opportunities around philanthropy because of California’s growing needs.” — Irene Wong, director of local grantmaking for the David and Lucile Packard Foundation.

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