Kite Family Foundation

The Kite Family Foundation is a small, family-directed private foundation based in Pennington, New Jersey, with no paid staff, no public application portal, and no published grant guidelines. Its database record explicitly flags `preselected_only: true` and lists application instructions as none — the clearest possible signal that this is a closed, relationship-based giving vehicle rather than an open funder. The five board members (Thomas O. Kite Jr. as President, Stephanie Kite Jones as Secretary, plus Paul C. Kite, David T. Kite, and Sandra Sue Jones), none of whom draw compensation, appear to be directing grants personally rather than through a program officer or formal review committee. The only two disclosed grantees — First Tee Greater Austin ($25,000) and Dell Children's Medical Center Foundation ($13,558), both in Texas and both received as unrestricted general support — point to a personal or family connection to Austin, TX, despite the foundation's New Jersey domicile, and a giving preference for youth development and children's health causes. For an organization this size and this closed, cold outreach through a generic proposal is unlikely to succeed. The realistic paths in are: (1) an existing relationship with a Kite or Jones family member, (2) being a past or current beneficiary in the Austin, TX children/youth space that fits the demonstrated pattern, or (3) a low-key, brief introductory email to kitepub@gmail.com that respects the foundation's clear preference for pre-identified recipients rather than a formal LOI packet. Given both known grants were coded 'unrestricted general' rather than tied to a specific project, the foundation appears to favor trusting grantees with flexible operating support over restricted program grants — a sign it values organizations it already knows well. First-time applicants should treat this as a long-shot, relationship-first prospect, not a competitive open RFP, and should not expect a formal notification of decision, review committee, or published cycle.

Total disclosed giving in the most recent full grantee dataset (FY2023) was just $38,558 across 2 grants, both to Texas recipients: $25,000 to First Tee Greater Austin and $13,558 to Dell Children's Medical Center Foundation — an average grant of $19,279 and a range of $13,558 to $25,000. Both were coded 'unrestricted general' support with no program restrictions. However, financial filings show the foundation's giving is scaling quickly: FY2022 (its founding year) saw $0 in grants paid against $1,000,000 in initial contributions and $982,271 in year-end assets; FY2023 giving rose to $62,983 total (including non-grant charitable expenses) against $3,935,413 in assets and $4,594,963 in revenue (boosted by $1,154,767 in net investment income and $3,426,106 in new contributions); and the most recent available data point (FY2024, via ProPublica) shows charitable disbursements jumping to $151,850 against $4,294,958 in net assets and $1,044,602 in total revenue — a roughly 4x increase in one year. This trajectory — small initial checks scaling into six-figure annual giving as the corpus approaches $4.3M — suggests the foundation is still defining its full grantee roster, and the FY2023 grantee list (Austin-based children's health and youth sports/development) may represent only a fraction of current-year recipients. There is no visible breakdown by program area beyond the observed pattern of children/youth-focused causes, and no disclosed multi-year or geographic diversification beyond Texas. With only two grants on record, drawing firm percentage splits by cause area would overstate precision; the safest read is a concentrated, personally-directed giving pattern rather than a diversified institutional portfolio.

All five peer entities cluster within roughly $2,700 of Kite's $4,294,958 in assets — an unusually tight band suggesting these are algorithmically matched by asset size rather than mission similarity, and none has a public website on file. None of the peers show a disclosed grantee list, application process, or giving total in the available data, which is itself typical of this class of foundation: small, single-family, no-staff vehicles that file the legally required Form 990-PF but otherwise maintain no public grantmaking infrastructure. Kite stands out only in that its EIN-level ProPublica filing and grantee data give a slightly clearer (if still thin) picture than most of this peer set.

No news coverage, press releases, or public announcements were found for this foundation under any search combination — it is a young (tax-exempt since June 2022), unstaffed, family-run entity that does not issue public communications. The most concrete 'recent activity' signal is financial: charitable disbursements rose from $0 in FY2022 (the founding/setup year) to $38,558 in FY2023 to $151,850 in the most recent available filing (FY2024, per ProPublica), while net assets grew from $982,271 to $4,294,958 over the same period, funded by $1,000,000 and $3,426,106 in contributions in 2022 and 2023 respectively plus strong investment returns ($1,154,767 net investment income in FY2023 alone). No leadership changes have occurred — the same five family board members (Thomas O. Kite Jr., Stephanie Kite Jones, Paul C. Kite, David T. Kite, Sandra Sue Jones) have held their roles since founding, all uncompensated. There is no evidence of a new program launch, strategic plan, or public-facing initiative. For a grant seeker, the practical takeaway is that this foundation's 'activity' is best tracked through its annual Form 990-PF filing (via ProPublica or Candid) rather than news monitoring, since it generates no other public trail.

Because the foundation's own data flags it as preselected-only with no published application process, standard cold-outreach grant-writing tactics (formal LOIs, generic proposal templates, program-specific pitch decks) are unlikely to be read or answered — there is no program officer or intake process to receive them. The single realistic strategy is warm introduction: if your organization has any existing tie to the Kite or Jones families, to Pennington, NJ, or — based on the only two disclosed grants — to the Austin, TX children's health or youth sports/development community, lead with that connection explicitly rather than a cold pitch. Both known grants (First Tee Greater Austin and Dell Children's Medical Center Foundation) were unrestricted general-support gifts, not project-restricted, which signals the foundation trusts organizations it already knows rather than evaluating specific program budgets — so a request framed as general operating support, not a narrow project ask, best matches their demonstrated behavior. If outreach is attempted at all, keep it brief and low-pressure: a short email to kitepub@gmail.com introducing the organization's mission and any Austin/children's-health/youth-development alignment, rather than a full proposal packet, respects the scale and informality of this operation. A common mistake would be treating this like a mid-size institutional funder — submitting a lengthy formal application, expecting a published deadline or notification timeline, or citing 'kite.org' as the foundation's website (that domain belongs to the unrelated American Kitefliers Association and has no connection to this foundation or its grantmaking). Given the foundation is still ramping up giving (FY2024 disbursements were nearly 4x FY2023's), it is plausible new relationships are being added, but grant seekers should treat this as a long-shot, low-volume prospect (2 known grants in its most recent fully disclosed year) rather than a core prospect to build a fundraising strategy around.