Millstone Fund

The Millstone Fund is a Greater Cincinnati family foundation that grew from a $2.97M endowment in 2019 to more than $160M in assets after a transformative $108M contribution in fiscal year 2021. Led by Alonzo T. Folger IV as President and Jeremy F. Simpson as Chairman, the fund operates within three tightly defined pillars — health, education, and the arts — and directs virtually all funding to organizations serving residents of Greater Cincinnati, encompassing Hamilton County, Ohio, and Northern Kentucky's Boone, Kenton, and Campbell counties.

What distinguishes Millstone from peer grantmakers of comparable asset size is its deliberate relationship orientation. The two-cycle structure (March awards via October 1 LOI and December 15 application; September awards via April 1 LOI and June 15 application) is preceded by a mandatory LOI stage, and staff — particularly Grants and Partnerships Lead Elle Folger — are accessible for pre-submission conversations. The fund explicitly welcomes pre-LOI dialogue on innovative ideas, a clear signal that relationship-building carries weight before formal applications arrive.

New applicants should position initial requests in the $20,000–$30,000 range, the fund's stated sweet spot for unsolicited program and operating support. Requests exceeding $50,000 require advance staff approval and are typically reserved for organizations with existing multi-cycle track records as Millstone grantees. The 2025 grant cycles confirm this pattern: awards of $250,000–$500,000 went almost exclusively to established regional organizations with prior relationships.

The fund applies a consistent equity lens across all three pillars. Applications that identify demographic disparities in access or outcomes and present evidence-informed interventions to close those gaps resonate strongly with reviewers. This isn't an optional framing element — the fund's stated commitment to 'creating a more equitable community' functions as a substantive criterion across every grant type.

Ideal first-time applicants are established Cincinnati or Northern Kentucky nonprofits with several years of operating history, a specific measurable project that fits cleanly within one of the three pillars, and a credible track record of impact. Organizations working at the intersection of mental health and education, or arts and youth development, are particularly well-positioned given the fund's thematic emphasis and recent grantee history.

Millstone Fund's grantmaking history reveals a foundation in rapid maturation, with giving patterns that have transformed dramatically since the $108M endowment event in FY2021. The IRS/990-based grantee database documents 83 grants totaling $3,385,000 across the fund's early years, with an average of $40,783 per grant. The fund's own stated 'typical unsolicited grant' of $20,000–$30,000 applies to new-relationship program requests; established grantees routinely receive $50,000–$300,000+.

Historical grant range: $10,000 minimum (stated floor) to $300,000 (ProKids' 'A Chance at a Childhood' campaign), with a median around $30,000–$40,000 for program grants. The top 50 historical grantees cluster around $20,000–$60,000 for most organizations, with capital and multi-year commitments reaching $110,000–$300,000.

The 2025 grant cycles mark a clear scaling event. March 2025 top awards: $300,000 to Family Nurturing Center of Kentucky; $300,000 to Strategies to End Homelessness; $283,000 to The Health Collaborative; $250,000 each to Addiction Services Council, Great Parks Forever, and Valley Interfaith Community Resource Center. September 2025 escalated further: $500,000 to CityLink Center; $300,000 to Beech Acres Parenting Center.

By sector, the historical portfolio skews heavily toward health and human services (approximately 60–65% of total dollars), with education at roughly 20–25% and arts at 10–15%. Geographic split: approximately 90% Ohio (Hamilton County) and 10% Northern Kentucky. Of 83 documented grants, 75 went to Ohio grantees and 8 to Kentucky.

Total giving has grown sharply: $264,567 in FY2020 → $760,492 in FY2021 → $3,690,016 in FY2022. The 2025 cycle, with multiple $250K–$500K awards across two cycles, suggests annual giving now likely exceeds $5–6M. Net investment income in FY2022 was $3,089,951 on $130.7M in assets; the current $160M endowment likely generates $4–5M annually at similar return rates, supporting the observed increase in payout. The fund receives zero external contributions — it operates exclusively from endowment returns, making it a stable, perpetual funding source for Greater Cincinnati nonprofits.

Millstone Fund's $160.7M in assets places it within a peer cohort of similarly capitalized Philanthropy & Grantmaking foundations, though its concentrated geographic focus on a single metro area is unusual at this asset tier.

Among peer foundations with comparable assets, Millstone stands out for its unusually accessible and structured application process — a public LOI portal on grantinterface.com, published biannual deadlines, a named program contact, and explicit guidance on grant sizing. Many foundations in this asset tier operate as purely discretionary or invitation-only grantmakers with no public application pathway. Millstone's open (though staged) LOI process makes it substantially more accessible to the broader Greater Cincinnati nonprofit ecosystem. Its geographic concentration also means the full grantmaking budget flows to a single metro area, creating meaningful funding density for organizations in its service region and giving well-aligned Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky nonprofits disproportionate access relative to peers seeking dollars from national foundations of similar size.

The most significant recent development is the substantial scaling of Millstone Fund grant awards throughout 2025. The March 2025 cycle distributed funds to at least 29 organizations, with top awards including $300,000 each to Family Nurturing Center of Kentucky and Strategies to End Homelessness, $283,000 to The Health Collaborative (a cross-sector collaboration award), and $250,000 each to Addiction Services Council, Great Parks Forever, and Valley Interfaith Community Resource Center. These award sizes represent a 5–10x increase over the fund's historical per-grant averages.

The September 2025 cycle escalated further: CityLink Center received $500,000, the largest single grant documented in the fund's history; Beech Acres Parenting Center received $300,000. The 24-organization September cohort reflects the fund's continued investment in human services addressing homelessness, addiction recovery, and family stability.

In May 2025, home52 received a $50,000 grant for its Transportation program serving older adults — an example of the fund's attention to social determinants of health and aging-in-place infrastructure.

Arts and education programming received consistent attention: the Cincinnati Institute of Fine Arts ($25,000) and CPS International Jazz Festival via Lachey Arts ($48,000) were March 2025 recipients. Leadership at Millstone has been stable, with no announced transitions. Alonzo T. Folger IV (President), Jeremy F. Simpson (Chairman), Valerie Folger (Treasurer), and Elle S. Folger (Secretary and Grants & Partnerships Lead) continue in their respective roles. The fund received its IRS ruling in August 2019 and became a major philanthropic force in the region following the $108M endowment contribution in FY2021.

The single highest-leverage action is emailing Elle Folger (efolger@millstonefund.org) before submitting your LOI. She is the Grants and Partnerships Lead and the fund explicitly invites pre-submission contact to confirm organizational and project alignment. Use this conversation to validate that your project fits current priorities, receive informal positioning guidance, and establish a human relationship before your formal submission enters the queue. Treat the LOI as the formalization of an existing dialogue, not a cold first contact.

For LOI content, anchor the narrative squarely within one of the three pillars — health, education, or arts — and be specific about which aspect of the fund's stated priorities you're addressing: mental and developmental health for children and youth (health); creative, high-quality learning and arts access (education/arts); or cross-organizational collaboration toward shared goals (any pillar). Projects bridging two pillars are viable but need a clear primary designation.

Equity framing is non-negotiable. The fund explicitly prioritizes organizations 'demonstrating their ability to create a more equitable community.' Your LOI should name the specific demographic or geographic disparities your organization addresses, quantify them where possible with local data, and describe how your intervention measurably reduces those disparities. This framing belongs in the opening paragraphs, not appended to the conclusion.

For first-time applicants, calibrate your request at $20,000–$30,000. Respecting this range signals awareness of the fund's process and reduces friction at intake. A successful smaller grant creates the relationship record that unlocks larger multi-cycle awards — the progression from Upspring (2 grants, $60,000 total) to Bethany House Services (3 grants, $94,000 total) to larger established grantees receiving $250,000+ is the typical arc.

Capital requests should only come from established Millstone grantees or organizations with very strong community credibility — the fund explicitly states 'preference goes to established grantees with demonstrated community success' for capital funding. If you're new to Millstone, begin with a project, program, or innovation seed grant.

Avoid requesting support for religious operations, endowments, animal-focused work, political activities, or anything serving populations outside Greater Cincinnati — these are categorically ineligible regardless of how the project is framed. Build a complete evaluation follow-up report after each funded grant period; it is required before submitting a new LOI for the same need, and the fund expects at least two years between same-need requests.