Good Karma Foundation

Good Karma Foundation is a small, family-run private foundation (IRS ruling 2009) led by three uncompensated officers — President Vasudev Narayanan, Secretary Leslie Vandyke, and Director May Wong — with no professional program staff and, per its own Form 990-PF, 'NO FORMAL APPLICATION HAS BEEN DEVELOPED.' That single fact should reset expectations: this is not a funder with an RFP calendar, portal, or program officer to court through a standard proposal pipeline. Grantmaking flows through personal relationships and direct knowledge of grantees, evidenced by a small, repeat-recipient circle in the foundation's own backyard — Pacifica Resource Center, Pacificans Care, and Center for Domestic Peace are all Marin/Pacifica-area organizations that have received grants across multiple recent years ($10,000-$20,000 each).

At the same time, the foundation's IRS filing carries an explicit legal restriction: funds are 'to be used for educational and charitable purposes in the state of Kerala in India.' That mandate is not cosmetic — in FY2024 the single largest grant ($200,000 of $265,000 total, roughly 75% of that year's giving) went to HRDS India, dwarfing every domestic grant combined. Prospective applicants effectively fall into two tracks: (1) India/Kerala-focused charitable or educational organizations, who should lead directly with that geographic alignment since it maps to the foundation's chartered purpose and its largest recent check; and (2) small community-service nonprofits with a physical or personal tie to Marin County/Pacifica, California, who can point to the precedent set by the three repeat local grantees.

A one-off $25,000 grant to the University of South Carolina in 2024 suggests occasional openness to unaffiliated causes, but with only one data point it reads as an outlier tied to a personal connection (alumni, family, or board tie) rather than a new open program area. First-time applicants outside Kerala and Marin County should treat an approach as a long shot absent a warm introduction.

Given the absence of a formal process, the practical path is a short, direct letter or phone call to the foundation (12 Locksly Ln, San Rafael, CA 94901; (415) 456-7400) explaining the organization's work, the funding need, and — critically — its tie to Kerala or to the Marin/Pacifica community, rather than a full grant proposal package.

Total assets grew from $65,358 (2012) to $6,271,181 (2024), essentially flat through 2019 ($10,105) before a sharp five-year climb: $1,544,865 (2020) to $2,779,602 (2021) to $3,955,415 (2022) to $5,249,091 (2023) to $6,271,181 (2024). That growth is driven almost entirely by fresh contributions, not investment performance — contributions received were $1,245,100 (2021), $1,217,250 (2022), and $1,250,000 (2023); net investment income has been minimal to zero most years, peaking at just $83,876 in 2023.

Grantmaking is a small, volatile fraction of that asset base. Grants paid: $0 (2012), $64,823 (2013), $120,000 (2014), $200,000 (2015), $515,000 (2019, a historical outlier more than double any other year), $0 (2020), $8,000 (2021), $40,000 (2022), $40,000 (2023), and $265,000 across 5 grants (2024). The 2024 figure implies an average grant near $53,000, but the distribution is bimodal: one $200,000 mega-grant (HRDS India) against four smaller grants averaging about $16,250 ($25,000 University of South Carolina; $20,000 Pacifica Resource Center; $10,000 Pacificans Care; $10,000 Center for Domestic Peace). Strip out the India grant and the domestic median is $10,000-$20,000, matching the platform's own top-recipient data for an earlier filing year: Pacifica Resource Center $20,000 (1 grant), Pacificans Care $18,000 (2 grants), Center for Domestic Peace $10,000 (1 grant) — $48,000 total, $12,000 average, all California.

Payout rate relative to assets is low: $265,000 on $6.27M assets is roughly 4.2% for 2024, versus near 0-1% in 2020-2021. Geographically, the domestic grantee base is entirely California-concentrated (Marin County/Pacifica), with the 2024 University of South Carolina grant the sole exception on record; internationally, Kerala, India recipients (HRDS India) command by far the largest individual checks. No program-area breakdown exists beyond the single NTEE classification 'Philanthropy, Voluntarism & Grantmaking' (T20) and this informal India/California split.

This peer set is asset-matched almost to the dollar (all approximately $6.27M), which is itself a signal that these five foundations were selected as size-cohort peers within the same 'Philanthropy & Grantmaking' NTEE category rather than as programmatic peers — none of the five publish a website or any public application information. That makes Good Karma unusually transparent by comparison: it maintains a public website and a stated (if narrow) geographic mandate. For applicants, the practical takeaway is that Good Karma is more approachable on paper than its size-matched peers, but its lack of a formal application and its Kerala/Marin-County concentration mean the realistic addressable opportunity is narrower than the $6.27M asset figure alone would suggest.

No independent press coverage, leadership announcements, or program launches surfaced for Good Karma Foundation of San Rafael, CA in searches covering 2025-2026; results for 'Good Karma Foundation' news instead surfaced an unrelated India-based nonprofit of the same name running 'Shayya' and 'Wicksdom' initiatives, plus a scattering of 990-derived nonprofit-database profiles. The clearest signal of recent activity is the foundation's own IRS Form 990-PF data: FY2024 filings show a jump to $265,000 in total giving across 5 grants, up sharply from $40,000 in both FY2022 and FY2023 and from just $8,000 in FY2021. The FY2024 grant slate — $200,000 to HRDS India, $25,000 to the University of South Carolina, and $10,000-$20,000 each to three Marin County-area nonprofits (Pacifica Resource Center, Pacificans Care, Center for Domestic Peace) — is the newest concrete evidence of the foundation's priorities.

Leadership has been stable across all available filings: Vasudev Narayanan (President), Leslie Vandyke (Secretary), and May Wong (Director), all uncompensated, with no reported turnover. Total assets have grown for five straight years, from $1.54M (2020) to $6.27M (2024), funded by roughly $1.2M-$1.5M in annual contributions each year — evidence the foundation is being actively funded by its founders/donors rather than winding down. Absent any news presence or communications function, the FY2024 990 filing is the best available proxy for 'recent activity,' and it points toward a foundation entering a more active grantmaking phase after several years of minimal payout.

Good Karma Foundation states directly on its IRS filing that 'NO FORMAL APPLICATION HAS BEEN DEVELOPED' — treat this as a direct-outreach funder, not a competitive-application one, and skip the search for a portal, LOI form, or deadline calendar.

• Lead with geography, not general mission language. The foundation's chartered purpose is 'educational and charitable purposes in the state of Kerala in India,' and its largest 2024 grant ($200,000 to HRDS India) shows that mandate is actively honored. If your organization operates in or serves Kerala, state that in the first sentence of any outreach.
• If you're a California nonprofit, emphasize proximity to Marin County/Pacifica. Three of the foundation's five most recent domestic grantees (Pacifica Resource Center, Pacificans Care, Center for Domestic Peace) are based in or near San Rafael/Pacifica, where the foundation itself is headquartered (12 Locksly Ln, San Rafael, CA 94901). This reads as a founder-driven local-giving pattern rather than an open statewide program.
• Contact by phone or mail first, not through a portal: (415) 456-7400, or via '% Vasudev Narayanan' at the San Rafael address. No application_form_url, grants_page_url, or public contact email is on file, reinforcing that this is a relationship-first funder.
• Do not expect a rolling or annual deadline. Grant totals have swung from $0 (2020) to $515,000 (2019) in the same decade, meaning giving is likely tied to the officers' personal review of opportunities rather than a fixed cycle.
• Keep any pitch short and personal rather than a formal packet. With an all-volunteer, uncompensated three-person board and no evidence of program staff, a multi-page application is likely to go unread; a one-page letter describing the need, the amount requested, and the Kerala or Marin County tie fits how this foundation appears to operate.
• Common mistake to avoid: treating this like a large institutional funder because of its $6.27M asset base. Actual annual payout is modest (about 4.2% of assets in its most active recent year, near 0% in others) and concentrated in very few grants — budget for a request in the $10,000-$25,000 range unless your work is Kerala-focused, where six-figure grants have precedent.