Nancy Driscoll Foundation

The Nancy Driscoll Foundation is a small, closely held family foundation (EIN 82-4044627) based at Thomas Driscoll's home address in Mount Shasta, CA, run day-to-day by Executive Director/Treasurer Nathan Johnston with no dedicated grants staff. Its IRS-linked profile flags it as "preselected only" with application_instructions left blank — historically, giving has been relationship-driven rather than proposal-driven, and there is no public LOI, portal, or grants page anywhere in the record. The board mixes two distinct networks: contemplative/conscious-philanthropy figures (Lynne Twist, co-founder of the Pachamama Alliance and author of "The Soul of Money"; Roshi Joan Halifax, founder of Upaya Zen Center in Santa Fe) and senior leadership of Driscoll's, the Watsonville berry company (Miles Reiter and Joshua Nicholson both sit on the Foundation's board and hold senior roles at Driscoll's), pointing to a personal/family connection rather than a professional grants program. That board composition explains the grant pattern: the single largest gift on record, $2,000,000 to Upaya Zen Center Inc. "supporting social services," tracks directly to Roshi Joan Halifax's own organization. Everything else in the record is hyper-local to Siskiyou County — a $250,000 gift to the Community Foundation of the North State for schools and playgrounds, a $5,000 gift to the Siskiyou Outdoor Recreation Alliance, a $4,000 gift to Breast Cancer Prevention Partners, and a standing scholarship fund for local high schoolers. As of this writing (August 2026), the door is explicitly closed: the Foundation's own website states it "is not soliciting or accepting new grant requests" following Tom Driscoll's death in spring 2024, with the Board saying it expects to be able to speak to the Foundation's future only by late 2026. First-time applicants should not treat this as an open human-services funder despite its NTEE classification. The realistic paths in are (1) a warm introduction through a board member's existing network — Upaya Zen Center, Pachamama Alliance, or Driscoll's corporate philanthropy — or (2) the separately administered Tom and Nancy Driscoll Foundation Scholarship at the Community Foundation of the North State, which is the only channel with a defined, recurring public process. There is no evidence of an LOI-to-full-proposal-to-site-visit pipeline; gifts appear to be single-decision board actions.

Giving here is erratic and pass-through in nature: contributions received in a given year are typically disbursed as grants in that same or the following year rather than built into a stable endowment payout. FY2019 is the clearest example — a $2,000,000 contribution came in and $2,096,400 went out the same year (a 105% payout ratio), almost entirely accounted for by the single $2M gift to Upaya Zen Center. FY2020-FY2022 were then near-dormant: total giving fell from $68,557 (2020) to $39,080 (2021) to just $7,025 (2022), while assets shrank from $178,870 to $64,208 as the Foundation ran down to a near-empty shell with officer compensation ($60,000 in 2020, $32,500 in 2021) exceeding grants paid in both years. FY2023 brought a fresh $1,700,000 contribution and $307,035 in total giving, with $250,000 of that going to the Community Foundation of the North State. FY2024 shows a much larger inflection: assets jumped to $5,784,805 on $5,037,093 in revenue — consistent with an estate-related bequest following Tom Driscoll's death — though the Foundation's grants-paid figure for that year is not yet available in filed-990 data; third-party aggregator Cause IQ estimates roughly $400,000 in 2024 grants. Grant sizes span a wide range across the tracked record: from a $4,000 gift to Breast Cancer Prevention Partners and a $5,000 gift to the Siskiyou Outdoor Recreation Alliance, up to $250,000 (Community Foundation of the North State) and the outlier $2,000,000 Upaya Zen Center gift — effectively a bimodal pattern of small local checks under $10,000 and rare six-to-seven-figure signature gifts. Geographically, tracked grantee data shows 100% of dollars to California recipients, concentrated in Siskiyou County (Mount Shasta-area recreation, schools, scholarships) with occasional statewide California gifts (Breast Cancer Prevention Partners is San Francisco-based) and a notable out-of-state exception (Upaya Zen Center, Santa Fe, NM) tied to a board member's own organization. No formal program-area budget split is published; the IRS classifies the Foundation under Human Services/Recreation (NTEE N19), but its own mission language on the 2019 return — "supporting social services" — plus the recreation and education gifts suggest three real throughlines: local outdoor recreation/community infrastructure, education/scholarships, and occasional large wellness- or contemplative-practice-adjacent gifts.

The defining recent event is Thomas Driscoll's death in spring 2024. Since then, the Board — Executive Director Nathan Johnston plus directors Miles Reiter, Joshua Nicholson, Lynne Twist, Roshi Joan Halifax, and Treasurer Bernadette Ackerman — has been focused on stabilizing the Foundation rather than active grantmaking. The Foundation's own website states plainly that it "is not soliciting or accepting new grant requests" and that the Board anticipates being able to "speak to their future" only by late 2026, framed around advancing Tom and Nancy's vision of "a world grounded in integrity, courage, well-being, and loving connection." Financially, this transition shows up clearly in the numbers: total assets rose from $2,478,987 at the end of FY2023 to $5,784,805 at the end of FY2024 on $5,037,093 in FY2024 revenue, consistent with estate assets flowing into the Foundation. No specific FY2025 or FY2026 grants were identified in web search, consistent with the stated pause. The Tom and Nancy Driscoll Foundation Scholarship, administered separately by the Community Foundation of the North State for Siskiyou County graduating seniors, is likewise currently listed as "Application cycle CLOSED." The last confirmed public gifts on record predate the transition: $250,000 to the Community Foundation of the North State (FY2023, for community giving to schools and playgrounds), $5,000 to the Siskiyou Outdoor Recreation Alliance for a Mt. Shasta Nordic Center snowcat groomer (December 2022), a $4,000 gift to Breast Cancer Prevention Partners, and the Foundation's largest documented gift, $2,000,000 to Upaya Zen Center Inc.

The single most important tip right now, as of August 2026, is not to invest time drafting a proposal: the Foundation's own website explicitly states it is not soliciting or accepting grant requests, and the Board does not expect to speak to its future direction until late 2026 at the earliest — check tomnancydriscollfoundation.org before doing anything else. Historically, even when active, this was never an open-RFP funder: the IRS-linked profile flags it as "preselected only" with no application instructions, no LOI process, and no grants portal, so a cold submission to a generic address is unlikely to be read by anyone with decision authority (the Executive Director of record is Nathan Johnston). When the Foundation does reopen, the realistic path in is relational, not transactional: the board draws from two identifiable circles — Siskiyou County/Mount Shasta community organizations (schools, outdoor recreation, local health) and the contemplative-philanthropy network around Lynne Twist (Pachamama Alliance) and Roshi Joan Halifax (Upaya Zen Center), whose own organization received the Foundation's largest gift on record ($2M). Organizations with an existing relationship to a current board member, or work that visibly overlaps with Upaya Zen Center's social-services mission, contemplative practice, women's empowerment, outdoor recreation/conservation, or Siskiyou County education, are the closest fit to demonstrated giving. The one channel that remains reliably open on a recurring cycle is the Tom and Nancy Driscoll Foundation Scholarship, administered by the Community Foundation of the North State (530-244-1219, info@cfnorthstate.org) via the Universal Scholarship Application portal, for Siskiyou County graduating seniors — an income-based track (2.5 GPA minimum, FAFSA or CA Dream Act verification) and a merit-based track (3.0 GPA minimum). That cycle is currently closed; check each fall/winter for reopening. A common mistake to avoid: treating this as a mid-size, professionally staffed human-services funder because of its NTEE classification. In reality it is a personal family vehicle with fewer than five tracked grants across seven fiscal years and no communications staff, so the highest-leverage move during the current pause is a low-cost relationship touch — for example, supporting or attending an event already tied to a board member's organization (Upaya Zen Center, SORA's Nordic Center) — rather than a formal written proposal.