Angels Among Us Inc.

Angels Among Us Inc. is a small, all-volunteer family-style private foundation run out of Garden City, Idaho by an unpaid, all-female board -- President Angie Harrison, Vice President Kirsten Heffner, Treasurer Susan Thometz, and a rotating Secretary role (Linda Morris/Amber Mallet) alongside Member Teresa Tavelli -- with zero officer compensation reported in any filing year. Its own IRS data lists NO SUBMISSION DEADLINES and instructs only that an application 'include sufficient information for the trustees to evaluate the needs of the applicant,' with no restrictions or limitations on awards once approved. This is a relationship-driven, rolling-review funder rather than a competitive RFP grantmaker: the 156 tracked grants since inception show heavy repetition -- the Roman Catholic Diocese of Boise, St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology, Fellowship of Catholic University Students (FOCUS), Idaho Youth Ranch, St. Alphonsus Foundation, Haiti180, Bishop Kelly Foundation and Genesis Community Health Inc. each appear with exactly 4 recorded grants apiece, indicating durable multi-year renewal relationships rather than one-off gifts. First-time applicants are effectively trying to enter a fairly closed circle of long-standing partners built around Catholic social teaching: pregnancy support, addiction recovery, homelessness, Haiti-focused humanitarian work, and Catholic higher-education/formation networks. The foundation's own grantee page groups its portfolio into social services/housing, international/faith-based, crisis and victim services, food security, media/education, and youth/family services -- a useful checklist for positioning a new proposal. Given the median award of $10,000 and typical range of $240-$233,403 (per the foundation's own typical-grant-size data), a realistic entry point for an unfamiliar organization is a modest, tightly scoped request in the $5,000-$25,000 band, framed around a specific, evidence-backed need rather than general operating support. Organizations with a genuine Idaho/Treasure Valley presence, a Catholic institutional identity, or a tie to the foundation's recurring faith-formation grantees have the clearest path to being taken seriously, with the expectation that funding could scale toward six-figure, multi-year support only after that relationship is established.

Angels Among Us reports total assets of $9,856,501 (FY2024), down slightly from a peak of $10,752,559 in FY2023, after rapid growth from just $10,752 in assets in FY2012 and $2.72M in FY2020. Total giving has swung with contribution inflows rather than following a steady payout rate: $1.45M given in FY2019, $1.88M in FY2020, $2.17M in FY2021, a peak of $4.3M in FY2022 (on $8.0M of contributions received that year), then $2.19M in FY2023 (on $5.0M contributed). The foundation's own typical-grant-size metrics show a median grant of $10,000, a mean of $40,755, and a range from $240 to $233,403 across 46 recently tracked awards -- meaning the bulk of individual checks are modest even though cumulative, multi-year totals to top recipients run far higher. Across the 156-grant/$12.6M lifetime dataset reviewed, an estimated ~65% of dollars ($8.16M) went to religious-purpose grantees, led by the Roman Catholic Diocese of Boise ($4,206,625 across 4 grants -- by far the largest single relationship), St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology ($1,861,652), St. Alphonsus Foundation ($687,108), Bishop Kelly Foundation ($441,108), and Salt & Light Radio ($185,749). Education-purpose giving totals roughly $1.79M (~14%), dominated by Fellowship of Catholic University Students/FOCUS ($1,453,581) and smaller five- and six-figure gifts to Newman Catholic Campus Ministries and the Augustine Institute ($100,000 each). Humanitarian-purpose giving totals roughly $2.09M (~17%), led by Idaho Youth Ranch ($825,000) and Haiti180 ($680,561), with healthcare (Genesis Community Health, $353,906) and housing/legal categories making up the remaining ~4%. Geographically, of the grants with state data, Idaho recipients account for 102 of roughly 140 categorized grants (~73%), with small numbers reaching Colorado (8), Ohio (6), and single-digit counts in California, New York, Tennessee, Connecticut, Arizona, Missouri and Wyoming -- reflecting the Haiti180/St. Luke Foundation for Haiti international thread and a handful of national Catholic-network institutions.

The database's suggested peers were matched purely on asset size (~$9.85-9.86M) and shared NTEE code (Philanthropy & Grantmaking) rather than mission -- none disclose a website, giving totals, or focus-area detail in available records, so this table should be read as an asset-band comparison only, not a true mission-aligned peer set.

What distinguishes Angels Among Us from this asset-matched cohort is transparency and specificity: it is the only one of the six with a public website, a published grantee list, a downloadable application, and an explicit typical-grant-size disclosure ($240-$233,403, median $10,000). Grant seekers researching any of these unnamed-website peers should expect to rely on IRS Form 990 filings alone, whereas Angels Among Us offers a direct, if informal, application channel -- a meaningful practical advantage for applicants trying to build a first relationship.

No dated news articles, press releases, or board-transition announcements for Angels Among Us Inc. surfaced in web search for 2025-2026; the same five-person volunteer board (Angie Harrison as President since at least the earliest filings reviewed, with Heffner, Thometz, Morris/Mallet, and Tavelli rotating slightly between Secretary and Member roles) appears consistently across every filing year available. The most concrete recent signal is financial: total assets held roughly flat between FY2023 ($10.75M) and FY2024 ($9.86M) after the foundation's largest-ever payout year in FY2022 ($4.3M given against $8.0M contributed), suggesting a normalization period following an unusually large contribution/giving cycle rather than a change in strategy. Third-party grant trackers (Zeffy) list the foundation's Education-category program with a last-tracked award in 2024 and its Religious-category program with a last-tracked award in 2022, which may indicate a shift in emphasis toward education-linked, faith-formation organizations (the FOCUS/Augustine Institute/St. Paul Center cluster) -- though this could equally reflect incomplete third-party data rather than an actual change in payout mix, since the foundation's own FY2023 total-giving figure ($2.19M) postdates that tracker's last-Religious-award date. The single largest known relationship in the foundation's history remains the Roman Catholic Diocese of Boise, which has received $4,206,625 across four recorded grants -- over a third of the entire $12.6M in lifetime tracked giving -- making it the foundation's flagship institutional partner. No new grant programs, geographic expansions, or application-process changes were identified; the download-application and contact pathways on aauinc.org appear to be long-standing, static features of the site.

Because Angels Among Us has no submission deadline and reviews applications on a rolling basis via its own downloadable form (available at aauinc.org, alongside a separate Financial Assistance Application listed on its Public Disclosure page for individuals rather than organizations), applicants should not wait for an announced cycle -- submit when the project is ready and follow up directly. The foundation's own instructions are minimal by design: include sufficient information for the trustees to evaluate the needs of the applicant, which in practice means a tight narrative of who is being served, what the specific need is, a budget, and evidence of impact -- not an elaborate logic model or multi-year strategic plan. Given the no-restrictions-or-limitations-on-awards language on file, funds can be requested for general operating, program, or capital use; there is no indication a restricted-use request is favored over unrestricted support. The clearest alignment signal across the grantee list is Catholic identity and/or an Idaho Treasure Valley service footprint -- organizations like Catholic Charities of Idaho, Bishop Kelly High School Foundation, St. Vincent De Paul, and Boise Rescue Mission recur specifically because they combine both. National or international organizations without an explicit faith-based or Idaho tie (the Haiti180/St. Luke Foundation for Haiti pattern being the exception) appear far less often. A common mistake to avoid: requesting an amount near the foundation's outlier six- and seven-figure grants (e.g., the $4.2M cumulative Diocese of Boise relationship) as a first ask -- those totals reflect years of renewal, not single awards, and the realistic single-grant ceiling for a new applicant is closer to the $233,403 maximum on file, with the $10,000 median being the more typical starting point. Because the board is small, unpaid, and directly involved (contact is routed through Angie Harrison per IRS contact records, phone (208) 853-1279), a warm introduction or a concise, personally addressed cover letter referencing shared Catholic-network or Treasure Valley ties is likely to carry more weight than a mass-distributed proposal.