Northlight Foundation Inc.

NorthLight Foundation, established in 2011 by Daniel R. Tishman and Sheryl C. Tishman and headquartered at 100 Park Avenue in New York City, is a private family foundation with a sharply defined environmental justice mission: creating 'a world where the Earth's environment is healthy, protected, and sustained for future generations.' The foundation pursues this through an unusual grantmaking philosophy — deploying risk capital to encourage new and fundamentally different paths to systems change, deliberately investing in organizations and approaches that other funders in the environmental sector are not yet supporting.

Daniel Tishman, a prominent figure in both real estate and environmental philanthropy with deep ties to organizations like NRDC, has structured NorthLight around five programmatic pillars: New Leaders (developing the next generation of diverse environmental advocates), Cross-Issue Collaboration (linking climate work with health, labor, and racial justice), Just Transition (supporting communities moving away from extractive economies), Alaska (dedicated geographic program for Arctic and wilderness conservation), and Public Lands (protecting federally managed lands and waters). Communications work is funded as a sixth, cross-cutting area.

The foundation funds through an explicit environmental justice lens. Signing the Donors of Color Network Climate Funders Justice Pledge formalized a measurable public commitment to BIPOC-led organizations — visible in the grantee portfolio through support for Native Movement, American Indian Community House, and Alaska Conservation Foundation alongside institutional mainstays like NRDC ($571K) and The Conservation Fund ($1M). Amalgamated Foundation received $7.7M across two grants, indicating a pass-through or fiscal sponsorship relationship that distributes funds to multiple downstream grantees.

NorthLight operates strictly as an invite-only funder. The typical relationship progression runs: initial contact via website form → relationship development with foundation staff → alignment assessment → invitation to propose → proposal review → grant decision. The foundation does not publish open RFPs or application cycle deadlines. First-time applicants should budget 12-24 months for the relationship-cultivation phase. Organizations working at the intersection of environmental protection and racial or economic justice — particularly those with genuine BIPOC leadership and community governance — are most competitive. Nearly all documented grants carry the purpose description 'SUPPORT ORGANIZATION'S PROGRAMS & ACTIVITIES,' confirming the foundation's strong preference for general operating support over restricted project grants.

NorthLight Foundation's grantmaking trajectory reflects deliberate endowment spend-down rather than perpetual preservation. After a major $37.2M contribution capitalized the endowment in FY2019 (pushing assets to $108.6M), total annual giving peaked at $11.1M in FY2021 (grants paid: $9.3M) — a deliberate pandemic-era acceleration — before moderating to $10.6M in FY2022 and $8.1M in FY2023 (grants paid: $6.6M). Total assets declined from $108.6M (2019) to $82.1M (2024), a $26.5M reduction, confirming an active spend-down strategy. The FY2023 payout rate of approximately 9.9% is nearly double the IRS minimum 5% requirement.

Typical grant size spans a wide range: minimum $2,500, maximum $2.74M, median $166,667, average $414,732 (based on the foundation's 19-grant internal sample). Across the broader 62-grant grantee dataset totaling $13.6M, the average drops to $219,205 — pulled upward by a handful of very large commitments including Amalgamated Foundation ($7.7M), The Conservation Fund ($1M), The New School ($775K), and Tides Foundation ($666K, likely a fiscal sponsor).

Excluding pass-through vehicles (Amalgamated Foundation, Fidelity DAF at $770K, Tides Foundation), the core environmental grantee cluster runs $150,000–$1,000,000 per organization across multi-year periods. Notable grants: Alaska Wilderness League ($500K), Friends of Katahdin Woods and Waters ($333K), Conservation Lands Foundation ($304K), and New Venture Fund ($250K). Smaller discretionary grants in the $1,000–$25,000 range (Per Scholas at $8K, Girls Inc of Santa Fe at $6K, Outdoor Afro at $10K) make up approximately 15% of grant count but under 2% of dollars, suggesting the foundation distributes a limited number of community or relationship-based awards alongside its major environmental grants.

Geographically, New York-based organizations lead the grantee portfolio (14 grants), followed by California (8), Washington DC (6), Colorado and Virginia (4 each), New Mexico (4), Florida (4), Arizona (2), Massachusetts (2), and Vermont (2). The dedicated Alaska program area adds a distinct geographic concentration not reflected in the above. Virtually all grants are for general operating support.

The foundations below are matched to NorthLight by asset size (~$82M) within the Philanthropy & Grantmaking NTEE category. Note that NorthLight's environmental justice focus makes it distinctive within this asset tier — most comparably sized family foundations in this NTEE category are generalists or multi-issue funders.

NorthLight's ~9.9% payout rate in FY2023 substantially exceeds the IRS minimum 5% distribution requirement and is high relative to foundations in this asset class, which typically hover near the 5-6% mandatory minimum. This reflects its spend-down posture and creates both opportunity (active, well-funded grantmaking) and constraint (finite runway as assets decline toward potential sunsetting). Among environmental funders more broadly, NorthLight occupies a bridge position between traditional land conservation philanthropy (Conservation Fund, Alaska Wilderness League grantees) and frontline climate justice funding (Native Movement, American Indian Community House grantees) — a positioning that distinguishes it from single-sector peers like Patagonia Environmental Grants or dedicated climate justice funds.

The most significant recent announcement from NorthLight Foundation came in late 2025: a partnership with Colby College to launch the Center for Resilience and Economic Impact on the Port Clyde, Maine waterfront, with operations beginning in 2026. Executive Director Maggie Drummond-Bahl — identified in the Colby announcement as the foundation's executive director, a role not previously prominently surfaced in public filings — was quoted describing the project as focused on revitalizing the waterfront for the local fishing community and building broader climate resilience capacity. This partnership suggests the foundation is expanding into place-based, community-scale resilience work in coastal Maine, consistent with its Just Transition and cross-movement collaboration priorities.

In 2024, NorthLight published its 2023 Annual Report, its sixth year documenting grantmaking activity. The report confirmed continued investment in its five programmatic pillars and maintained commitment to the Climate Funders Justice Pledge.

The foundation previously signed the Intentional Endowments Network sustainable investing retirement pledge, aligning its institutional investment practices with its environmental mission — a commitment that extends the foundation's values to endowment management, not just grant distribution.

Leadership as of the most recent 990 filings: Daniel R. Tishman (Director, co-founder), Sheryl C. Tishman (Director, co-founder), Francis W. Beck (Director), and Cara Weinrich (Officer). Maggie Drummond-Bahl serves as Executive Director (per 2025 Colby announcement). No public leadership transitions have been announced. The foundation's FY2024 revenue of $10.1M — a recovery from FY2023's -$337K — suggests improved investment performance, though full FY2024 grant distribution data is not yet publicly available.

The single most important fact about pursuing NorthLight Foundation funding is structural: unsolicited proposals are not reviewed. The foundation operates entirely through relationship-based, invite-only grantmaking. That said, 'invite-only' does not mean inaccessible — it means the pathway to funding runs through conversations and organizational alignment, not application portals.

Initial contact: Use the contact form at northlightfoundation.org or email info@northlightfoundation.org directly. This first communication should be a concise 2-3 paragraph introduction — not a proposal, not a budget request. Describe: (1) what systemic environmental change your organization is working toward, (2) the specific gap your approach fills that other funders in the environmental sector are not addressing, and (3) how community governance and BIPOC leadership manifest structurally in your organization. Do not attach documents. The goal is to open a conversation.

Language alignment: NorthLight's vocabulary is specific. Use: 'systems change,' 'frontline community governance,' 'risk capital,' 'cross-movement collaboration,' 'just transition,' 'BIPOC-led,' 'gap-filling work.' Avoid: 'measurable deliverables' framed as traditional program outputs (the foundation has explicitly flagged monitoring frameworks that replicate oppressive power dynamics), or positioning your work as supplementing government programs.

Programmatic fit: Align with one or more of the five pillars — New Leaders, Cross-Issue Collaboration, Just Transition, Alaska, Public Lands. Alaska-focused organizations should flag this explicitly; the foundation has a dedicated Alaska program and multiple documented Alaska grantees (Alaska Wilderness League, Alaska Conservation Foundation, Native Movement). Organizations linking climate with health equity or labor rights are particularly well-positioned for the Cross-Issue Collaboration pillar.

Timing expectations: Plan 12-24 months from initial contact to first grant. The foundation staff is small; follow up after 4-6 weeks if no response to an initial inquiry. If invited to a call, listen more than you pitch — ask about current priorities and where they see gaps before discussing your program.

Proposal content (if invited): Prioritize organizational leadership bios, a theory of systemic change, budget showing how operating funds will be used, and description of community governance structures. NorthLight's documented grant descriptions are universally 'SUPPORT ORGANIZATION'S PROGRAMS & ACTIVITIES' — always propose general operating support, not project-restricted funding. Grant requests in the $100,000-$500,000 range per year appear most consistent with documented giving patterns for direct environmental grantees.