Persistence Foundation Inc.

Persistence Foundation Inc. (EIN 14-1797449, Buskirk, NY) is best understood not as a conventional grantmaker but as an operating foundation that funds and runs its own single conservation program: preservation and restoration of historic barns and agricultural landscape in the northeastern Hudson River Valley, specifically Rensselaer and Washington Counties. The IRS record lists exactly one program — 'Preservation & Restoration of Historic Barns & Landscape,' with $126,757 in reported program expenses — and the foundation's own database record shows grants_paid of $0 across every fiscal year on file (2010-2022). Independent aggregators (Instrumentl, Grantable, Impala) confirm this pattern continued through 2024, with $0 in grants distributed despite $200K-$240K in annual 'total giving' — money that funds the foundation's own restoration work rather than third-party grants. Multiple directories describe the foundation as not accepting unsolicited proposals, with any support being invitation-only.

The practical implication for outside applicants: this is not a foundation to approach with a cold LOI or standard proposal. There is no visible track record of funding external nonprofits, no grants page, and the application_instructions field in its own IRS-sourced record is blank ('__none__'). The foundation is small and closely held — its five uncompensated officers/directors (President Constance Kheel, Treasurer Constance Madigan, Secretary Elizabeth Frank, Vice President Susan Crile, and Directors Alane Chinian and Peg Olsen) appear to be a founder-led, volunteer board rather than a staffed grantmaking operation. Constance Kheel, the founder and president, has personally documented roughly 180 early barns in the Hoosick Falls area and is the public face and driving force of the organization.

Organizations working on farmland conservation, historic agricultural structure preservation, or land-use planning in the Hudson Valley region should treat Persistence Foundation as a peer or potential collaborator rather than a funding prospect — think co-hosted events, technical knowledge-sharing on timber-frame restoration, or joint advocacy with regional land trusts, rather than a grant request. Any outreach should go through a warm introduction (a shared land trust, a preservation society, or a mutual contact in Rensselaer/Washington County conservation circles) and should lead with shared mission alignment, not a funding ask.

Persistence Foundation's financials show a strikingly flat, self-contained pattern. Total assets have held in a narrow $3.4M-$3.7M band for over a decade: $3,410,217 (FY2010) to $3,651,384 (most recent, 2025 estimate), with intermediate years clustering tightly ($3,431,512 in 2011; $3,493,361 in 2014; $3,626,185 in 2019; $3,508,757 in 2022). There is no evidence of asset growth or decline beyond normal market fluctuation and small annual contributions.

Annual 'total giving' (IRS Form 990-PF qualifying distributions) has ranged from $137,212 (2010) to $241,584 (2014), with recent years running $202,458-$215,267 (FY2019-FY2022) and web sources citing $235K in qualifying distributions for 2024. Critically, none of this is third-party grantmaking: grants_paid is $0 in every fiscal year recorded (2010-2022), and Instrumentl independently confirms $0 in grants distributed for 2024. The entire giving figure represents direct program spending on the foundation's own barn restoration and landscape conservation work, plus associated administrative costs.

Revenue is modest and variable, ranging from $7,609 (2010, a low-contribution year) to $394,937 (2013). Contributions received swing from as little as $50 (2010) to as much as $305,610 (2013) and $252,121 (2019), suggesting the foundation relies on periodic infusions — likely from Kheel family or closely connected donors — rather than a diversified fundraising base. Net investment income is typically minimal or zero, occasionally spiking to $108,721 (2021) in strong market years. Officer compensation is $0 across all years, reinforcing that this is an all-volunteer board.

By geography, 100% of documented program activity is concentrated in Rensselaer and Washington Counties, NY, within the broader Hudson River Valley — there is no evidence of giving outside this footprint. By program area, funding is 100% concentrated in historic barn/agricultural landscape preservation; no other program area, grant category, or dollar breakdown exists in the record because there is only one program and no external grant recipients to segment.

Persistence Foundation sits squarely in the middle of this asset-size peer cluster (all five comparison foundations hold $3.59M-$3.74M in assets, essentially indistinguishable from Persistence's $3.65M), which is unsurprising since these appear to be a database-matched cohort of similarly-sized small Environment-category private foundations. What differentiates Persistence Foundation is transparency and activity signal: it has a live, content-rich public website (persistencefoundation.org and the related nipmoosebarns.org) documenting a specific, named restoration project, while three of the five peers have no public website on record at all. That transparency, however, cuts against grant seekers — it makes clear this is a self-operating foundation with no history of external grants, whereas the peers' funding posture is simply unknown and unverified. For a grant seeker, none of these six foundations should be assumed to be actively soliciting outside proposals without direct confirmation.

No 2025 or 2026 news, press releases, or grant announcements were found for Persistence Foundation Inc. in web searches — this should be read honestly as an absence of recent public activity rather than a gap in research. The most substantive recent-era coverage is a Times Union feature on founder and president Constance Kheel, who has spent years documenting roughly 180 early timber-frame barns in the Hoosick Falls area and noted that at least 10 of those she originally catalogued have since been lost to demolition or collapse — underscoring the urgency she attaches to the foundation's mission, even though it hasn't translated into new public initiatives recently.

The foundation's signature achievement, full restoration of the three Historic Barns of Nipmoose (the Scottish Barn, German Barn, and Corn Crib) on a 123-acre farm in Buskirk, is complete and now operates commercially as a wedding and event venue (listed on The Knot, WeddingWire, and Hudson Valley Sojourner). This suggests the foundation's major capital project has concluded and the venue itself may now be a modest revenue source, but no announcement of a follow-on restoration project, new land acquisition, or expanded grant program was located.

Leadership has been stable: Constance Kheel (President), Constance Madigan (Treasurer), and Elizabeth Frank (Secretary) appear as officers across multiple years of the database record with no indication of turnover, and all remain uncompensated. Grant seekers should not expect a near-term announcement of a new open funding cycle based on current signals.

The single most important fact for any prospective applicant: Persistence Foundation has not distributed a third-party grant in any year on record (2010-2022 in the internal database, and independently confirmed at $0 for 2018-2024 by Instrumentl and other aggregators). Foundation directories explicitly describe it as not accepting unsolicited proposals and funding by invitation only. Do not submit a cold LOI, RFP response, or generic proposal — there is no processing mechanism for one, and the foundation's own record leaves application_instructions blank.

If you are working in farmland conservation, historic barn/timber-frame restoration, or agricultural land-use planning specifically within Rensselaer or Washington County, NY (or the broader Hudson River Valley), the more productive path is relationship-first, not proposal-first: connect through regional land trusts, the Hudson River Valley National Heritage Area network, or historic preservation organizations that may already have ties to Constance Kheel or the foundation's board. A phone call to 518-944-4414 or an email to tpf@persistencefoundation.org to introduce your organization's work and ask whether the foundation is currently considering any external partnerships is far more appropriate than a formal application.

Common mistakes to avoid: treating this as a typical small family foundation open to general nonprofit grant requests (its total giving figures can look inviting until you notice grants_paid is $0); assuming 'Environment' NTEE classification means broad environmental grantmaking (its actual focus is narrowly historic barns and farmland, not conservation broadly); and pitching capital projects unrelated to barn/agricultural-structure preservation, which fall outside its demonstrated interest entirely.

If any dialogue does open, align language tightly to the foundation's own framing — 'preserving America's largest antiques' (barns), 'timber-framed structures,' 'agricultural heritage,' and 'farmland conservation and land use planning' — since this is the vocabulary the foundation and its founder consistently use in public materials.