Goode Family Foundation

The Goode Family Foundation is a small, entirely family-run private foundation based in Norfolk, Virginia, with $11.57 million in assets (FY2024). Its board consists solely of Goode family members and one longtime associate — Christina L. Goode (President), Susan S. Goode (Treasurer), Martha M. Goode (Vice President), David R. Goode and Shirley C. Baldwin (Board Members) — all serving without compensation across every filing year in this dataset. There is no program staff, no RFP process, and no formal proposal template: the foundation's own IRS filing instructions state simply that funding requires "an informal letter stating purpose and need for request," with no submission deadlines, restricted to 501(c)(3) organizations.

The clearest signal in the data is that this is network-driven, not process-driven, philanthropy. Patriarch David R. Goode is the retired Chairman, President, and CEO of Norfolk Southern Corporation, and his personal board affiliations — trustee of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, emeritus trustee of the Thomas Jefferson Foundation (Monticello), and council member of the Focused Ultrasound Foundation — line up directly with entities in the foundation's own grantee history. First-time applicants without some connection to the Goode family's civic and cultural circles in Hampton Roads or Roanoke face a materially harder path than an organization introduced through an existing trustee relationship.

Geographically, this is a hyper-local funder: 90 of 95 tracked grants (95%) went to Virginia organizations, split between two clusters tied to the family's railroad history — Hampton Roads (Norfolk/Virginia Beach, Norfolk Southern's headquarters) and Roanoke (Norfolk & Western Railway's historic base). A small number of Florida grants (e.g., Studios of Key West) appear to be relationship exceptions rather than a stated geographic program.

Most top grantees — Elizabeth River Project, Virginia Museum of History & Culture, CHKD, Thomas Jefferson Foundation, the Hermitage Museum — received 3-4 separate grants rather than a single gift, indicating the foundation's real strength is multi-year, renewed relationships rather than one-time awards. First-time applicants should treat an initial grant as the opening of a long-term relationship, not a transaction, and expect that stewardship and follow-up matter as much as the initial ask.

Giving has grown roughly tenfold in a decade: total giving rose from $91,472 (FY2014) to $252,469 (FY2015) to $576,538 (FY2019) to $889,589 (FY2020) to $1,362,739 (FY2021) to $1,406,717 (FY2022) to $2,202,818 (FY2023), tracking a parallel rise in assets from $3.5 million to $11.57 million and in annual revenue to $2.79 million (FY2024). Grants paid directly to charities followed the same curve: $65,000 (2014) to $2,060,000 (2023).

On a single-year basis, the foundation's own reported typical grant size (most recent snapshot, 20 grants) is: minimum $7,000, maximum $100,000, median $31,250, average $39,350. Across the fuller historical grantee record in this dataset — 95 tracked grants totaling $4,596,500 — the average climbs to $48,384 per grant, pulled up by a handful of anchor, multi-year relationships: Elizabeth River Project ($600,000 across 3 grants), Virginia Museum of History & Culture ($360,000/3), CHKD ($300,000/3), and Thomas Jefferson Foundation ($300,000/4).

By program area, the $4.596 million in tracked historical giving breaks down as: Arts & Culture ~37% ($1.70M — museums, symphony, opera, stage company, PBS), Environment ~25% ($1.14M — Elizabeth River Project, Virginia Aquarium, Norfolk Botanical Garden, Nature Conservancy, Virginia Zoo), Health & Human Services ~21% ($987K — CHKD, Samaritan House, Up Center, YWCA, Eastern Virginia Medical School), Education ~13% ($575K — Thomas Jefferson Foundation, Roanoke College, Hollins University, The Williams School), and roughly 4% split between religious/historic-preservation causes (Christ & St Luke's Episcopal Church, Old Island Restoration Fund).

Geographically, 90 of 95 grants (95%) went to Virginia recipients, with only 5 grants tracked in Florida. This is functionally a single-state funder with two metro clusters (Hampton Roads and Roanoke) rather than a broad regional or national program.

The Goode Family Foundation sits squarely in the middle of this asset-size peer band ($10.4M-$11.8M), but stands out for transparency: it is the only one of the six with a public asset website, disclosed application instructions, and a documented, growing giving trend. Most of its size-matched peers are opaque single-family trusts with no discoverable grant program, meaning a grant seeker's odds of successfully engaging any of them cold are likely lower than with Goode, which at least publishes clear (if informal) application guidance.

No dedicated 2025-2026 news coverage specific to this Norfolk, VA foundation (EIN 46-1574279) was found; search results are dominated by unrelated, similarly-named organizations (a Pittsburgh Goode Family Charitable Foundation, an Idaho car-dealership-affiliated Goode Motor Education Foundation, and an ALS-focused Goode Foundation), which grant seekers should be careful not to conflate with this entity.

The most concrete recent signal is structural rather than a press announcement: the foundation's FY2024 return shows total assets reaching $11,571,939 and revenue of $2,791,546, continuing an unbroken growth trend from $7.75M in assets in FY2019 — a near-50% increase in five years. Governance has been notably stable, with the same five family members (Christina L. Goode as President, Susan S. Goode as Treasurer, Martha M. Goode as Vice President, David R. Goode and Shirley C. Baldwin as Board Members) holding identical roles, uncompensated, across every filing year captured in this dataset — no leadership turnover to report.

The one dated-but-unconfirmed data point of note is patriarch David R. Goode's continued personal philanthropic activity outside the foundation itself: he serves as a trustee of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, an emeritus trustee of the Thomas Jefferson Foundation, and joined the council of the Focused Ultrasound Foundation (which received a $10,000 grant from this foundation, per its own grantee records). These personal affiliations are the best available leading indicator of where the family's philanthropic attention — and by extension the foundation's giving — is currently focused, in the absence of a formal newsroom or annual report.

Because the Goode Family Foundation has no program staff and no online application portal, the single most important tactic is securing a warm introduction. David R. Goode's own trustee and council affiliations — Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Thomas Jefferson Foundation, Focused Ultrasound Foundation — mirror organizations already in the grantee history; if your organization shares a board member, donor, or civic connection with any current or past Goode grantee (Elizabeth River Project, CHKD, the Hermitage Museum, Roanoke College, etc.), lead with that connection explicitly.

Skip the formal grant-proposal template. The foundation's own stated process calls for "an informal letter stating purpose and need for request" — a concise one-to-two-page letter naming your 501(c)(3) status, the specific project or need, and a dollar ask, addressed to the foundation at 3 Commercial Place, Norfolk, VA 23510, or by phone at (757) 629-2610. There is no stated deadline or grant cycle, but because review runs through a small, unstaffed family board, expect informal and potentially slow turnaround rather than a published decision date — a polite check-in after 60-90 days is reasonable.

Anchor your ask in the foundation's demonstrated priorities: arts & culture (~37% of tracked historical giving), environment (~25%), and health/human services (~21%) together account for over 80% of dollars. A generic ask outside these lanes, or from an organization outside Hampton Roads or Roanoke, VA (95% of grants stay in-state), is a weak fit regardless of merit.

Size the request realistically: the median tracked grant is $31,250, with a typical range of $7,000-$100,000; requests above $100,000 are atypical and historically reserved for anchor, multi-year institutional relationships like Elizabeth River Project ($600,000 cumulative) or the Virginia Museum of History & Culture ($360,000 cumulative). A common mistake is treating this like a large staffed foundation with a formal LOI-to-full-proposal pipeline or online grants management system — no such portal exists (the foundation's website, goode.org, sits behind a bot-verification wall and shows no public grants page). Because most top grantees receive 3-4 grants over time, plan your first ask as the opening move in a multi-year relationship: a brief, genuine impact update after receiving funding will matter more here than a polished formal report.