Blazer Foundation

The Blazer Foundation is a private endowed family foundation based in Rockford, Illinois, with a precisely defined mission: improving the lives of individuals with mental or physical disabilities in Winnebago County and the adjoining counties of northern Illinois. Founded in 1986 by Cedric W. Blazer — the entrepreneur who built Zenith Cutter Company into a global leader in precision industrial knives employing over 400 people — the foundation carries forward his conviction that people with disabilities deserve a level playing field. Following Cedric's death in 2008, the foundation transitioned from its original CWB Foundation structure to a fully independent charitable entity.

Governance rests with an all-volunteer, six-person board: President James W. Keeling, Vice President Mark Blazer, Treasurer/Secretary Shendet Ismajlaj, and directors Tara Blazer, Patrick Shaw, and John Beck. The presence of two Blazer family members (Mark and Tara) reflects the foundation's commitment to the founder's legacy. No board member receives compensation, and there is no paid grants management staff — the board directly reviews every application. Personal credibility within the Rockford disability-nonprofit community carries significant weight in this environment.

The grantmaking history reveals a strong preference for established organizations with demonstrated track records. RAMP (Regional Access and Mobilization Project) has received four grants totaling $157,000; the Rockford Park District has received three grants totaling $652,000; and Barbara Olson Center of Hope has received three grants totaling over $90,000. Multi-grant relationships are the norm for anchor organizations. That said, one-time grants to first-time applicants appear throughout the grantee list, ranging from $1,600 to $49,955.

The application process is streamlined by foundation standards: there is no Letter of Inquiry (LOI) stage. Applicants submit a full application immediately via the online form at theblazerfoundation.org or by emailing the Word document application to info@theblazerfoundation.org. Hard copy mailed applications are explicitly rejected. If applying for multiple grants within the same calendar year, all requests must be submitted simultaneously.

The board convenes multiple times per year; the current publicly posted deadline is May 12, 2026. Mandatory written follow-up for all approved grants signals a funder that monitors outcomes carefully. Organizations with strong evaluation systems — not just compelling programs — will find this funder a natural fit.

The Blazer Foundation distributes grants from a stable endowment that has held between $16.4M and $18.7M in total assets across the full decade of available IRS data. The endowment base was established in FY2012 when $11.5M in contributions arrived, effectively creating the modern foundation. Since then, total giving has ranged from $454K (FY2021) to $1.44M (FY2020), driven largely by net investment income that has fluctuated between $404K (FY2022) and $1.31M (FY2021). The most recently filed year, FY2023, shows $911,557 in grants paid and $1.025M in total giving — the highest annual grants total on record, confirming an upward trajectory.

Among the 85 grants in the grantee dataset — totaling $3.37M — the average grant is $39,591 and the median is $12,880. These figures diverge significantly because a small number of anchor grants skew the mean upward. The single largest on record is $750,000 to the University of Illinois College of Medicine at Rockford, a research-linked commitment. The Rockford Park District received $652,000 across three grants for therapeutic recreation programming. Excluding these two outliers, the practical range for most grantees falls between $5,000 and $75,000.

By stated purpose, "Charitable" designates the plurality of grants by count, followed by "Social Welfare," "Educational," and "Medical." Medical-purpose grants have gone to Milestone ($127,500 across three grants) and Rosecrance Foundation ($20,000 combined), consistent with the disability mission's healthcare dimension. Notably, several community-enrichment grants — Discovery Center Museum ($42,880 across four grants), Rockford Symphony Orchestra ($5,000), and Klehm Arboretum ($5,178) — suggest modest flexibility for institutions that serve disability-accessible programming as part of a broader community role.

Geographically, 79 of 85 grants went to Illinois organizations concentrated in Winnebago County and the greater Rockford metro. Three grants totaling $60,000 went to the University of the Cumberlands in Kentucky, and three went to Massachusetts recipients — narrow exceptions that likely reflect specific relationship- or research-linked circumstances rather than geographic expansion. New applicants outside Winnebago County and its immediate neighbors should not read these as precedents.

The Blazer Foundation occupies a defined niche as a mid-sized, disability-focused private family foundation in northern Illinois — more geographically targeted than statewide funders and more accessible than most foundations of comparable asset size. The foundation's database peer list is unpopulated, but several regional comparators help calibrate expectations. Figures for peer foundations are approximate estimates based on publicly available IRS Form 990 data.

The Blazer Foundation is notably more accessible than same-scale Illinois disability funders: it accepts full applications directly without an LOI, without requiring prior board invitation, and without a letter of intent stage. This openness is offset by a strict geographic constraint — the Winnebago County mandate eliminates most Illinois disability organizations based outside the Rockford metro. For applicants that do qualify geographically and by mission, the foundation offers lower competition and higher alignment than any general-purpose community foundation in the region.

The Blazer Foundation's most recent publicly documented grant cycle covers FY2022-2023. On January 5, 2023, the board announced it had awarded over $500,000 in grants for the 2022 funding year — a substantial increase from the $355,409 in grants paid in FY2021. IRS records confirm that by FY2023, grants paid reached $911,557, the highest single-year total in the available dataset, representing more than a 2.5x increase over FY2021 in just two years.

The last confirmed leadership change was in May 2020, when the board welcomed a new member and approved $353,000 in grants. The current board composition has been stable since: President James W. Keeling, Vice President Mark Blazer, Treasurer/Secretary Shendet Ismajlaj, and directors Tara Blazer, Patrick Shaw, and John Beck. No board transitions, executive hires, or structural changes have been publicly announced through mid-2026.

The foundation maintains a low public profile consistent with its volunteer-run, family-legacy model. The newsroom at theblazerfoundation.org has not been updated since January 2023, and no press releases or program announcements appear for 2024 or 2025. Social media activity is minimal. The most actionable current information is the May 12, 2026 board review deadline posted on the application page, confirming the foundation remains active.

Among the most recently funded organizations in the IRS record, sustained relationships with GiGi's Playhouse Rockford ($195,123 across four grants), Walter Lawson Children's Home ($139,822 across four grants), and RAMP ($157,000 across four grants) indicate these are core funded partners with ongoing commitments that persist across multiple fiscal years.

Mission alignment is non-negotiable. Every request must connect directly to improving the lives of individuals with mental or physical disabilities in Winnebago County or an adjoining northern Illinois county. Use the foundation's own language — 'mental or physical disabilities,' 'research and development,' 'direct support programs.' Generic human services framing or broad community benefit language will not differentiate your application to a board that has funded in this space for nearly four decades.

Timing and submission mechanics are strict. The board reviews applications multiple times per year; the next posted deadline is May 12, 2026. Submit at least two weeks early to allow for internal revisions. If you plan to request multiple grants in the same calendar year, submit all requests in a single, simultaneous communication — the foundation requires this explicitly, and piecemeal submissions may be treated as incomplete or deferred.

Use the correct channel. Submit online at theblazerfoundation.org/grant-application or by emailing the Word document application to info@theblazerfoundation.org. Hard copy mailed applications will not be reviewed. Note: the foundation's correct website is theblazerfoundation.org — blazerfoundation.org is a separate Pennsylvania school district foundation with a similar name.

Plan for multi-year relationships. The grantee data shows that repeat recipients — RAMP (four grants, $157K), Rockford Park District (three grants, $652K), Milestone (three grants, $127.5K) — account for a disproportionate share of total giving. First-time applicants should explicitly describe long-term program vision and express interest in becoming an ongoing foundation partner.

Evaluation infrastructure matters. Written follow-up reports are mandatory for every approved grant. Proposals that include specific outcome metrics, data collection methods, and a reporting timeline signal organizational readiness and reduce perceived board risk. This is a board that monitors results, not just intentions.

Relationship-building works. With no paid program staff, board members are accessible through the Rockford disability-nonprofit community. Warm introductions from established grantees — RAMP, GiGi's Playhouse Rockford, United Way of Rock River Valley, or any multi-grant recipient — carry meaningful credibility with a volunteer board that values community trust above all.