Phalarope Foundation

Phalarope Foundation is a small, professionally administered private trust (EIN 04-6729068, IRS ruling June 1993) run out of Kozusko Harris Duncan, a Manhattan trusts-and-estates law firm serving ultra-high-net-worth families — not a staffed foundation with program officers. Its own filings mark it 'preselected_only': it does not solicit or accept unsolicited applications. Both trustees, Rebecca H. Dent (a Kozusko Harris Duncan partner, compensated roughly $5,000-$6,000 a year) and Sabrina Guth (uncompensated), constitute the entire decision-making body. There is no dedicated foundation website, grants portal, or published RFP. A domain called phalarope.org that surfaces in web searches belongs to an unrelated Savannah, GA global-health nonprofit — grant seekers should not confuse the two or email that site's contact address expecting a response from this funder.

Despite the closed process, the 69-grant public record (2012-2024, roughly $975,000 disbursed) shows a consistent giving personality: overwhelmingly general, unrestricted operating support to small, frontline organizations serving Central American and Caribbean immigrant and diaspora communities, alongside adjacent civil-rights, environmental-justice, and mental-health groups. Its two largest relationships — Refugees International ($160,000 across 4 grants) and Hondurans Against AIDS ($135,000 across 4 grants, including a named 'ONECA Program and Casa Yurumein Project' tied to Garifuna community work) — each span multiple years, indicating the foundation builds long, quiet relationships with a small trusted roster rather than funding one-off projects.

For any organization not already in that roster, the realistic path in is not a cold letter of inquiry — it is proximity to the funder's existing network: warm introduction through a current grantee such as Alianza Americas, Refugees International, or the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, or through the philanthropy-advisory relationships Kozusko Harris Duncan maintains with its private clients. Organizations doing direct-service or advocacy work with Central American/Caribbean immigrant communities, environmental justice in historically underserved neighborhoods, or small-scale arts, mental-health, or legal-aid programs in New York, Illinois, or New Hampshire fit the demonstrated pattern best.

Across 69 tracked grants from 2012 through 2024, Phalarope Foundation disbursed roughly $975,000, averaging $14,130 per grant. A separate typical-grant-size measure (12 sampled grants) puts the median at $10,000, the average at $20,417, and the range at $10,000-$50,000 — consistent with the broader pattern of grants clustering between $5,000 and $40,000, with a handful of larger, multi-year commitments. Refugees International received $160,000 across 4 grants (a $40,000 average per grant), and Hondurans Against AIDS received $135,000 across 4 grants (about $33,750 average) — the two largest relationships in the file. Most other grants are single awards of $5,000-$10,000 to smaller community organizations.

Geographically, despite the trust's Ohio mailing address and New York legal administration, grantees concentrate in New York (19 grants), Illinois (18), the District of Columbia (6), Florida and Massachusetts (5 each), New Hampshire (5), California and Minnesota (3 each), and Texas and Louisiana (1-2 each) — matching the foundation's own stated geographic_focus of NY, IL, and NH.

Annual grants-paid figures show a clear arc: $230,000 (2012), $240,000 (2013), a mid-decade peak of $315,000 (2014), $286,000 (2015), $270,000 (2019), a record $330,000 (2020, a pandemic-era high), then a decline to $245,000 (2021), $200,000 (2022), and $170,000 (2023), before ticking back up to $210,000 (2024). That is a 48% drop from the 2020 peak to the 2023 trough. Meanwhile total assets grew from $2.48 million (2012) to $3.74 million (2024), a 51% increase driven almost entirely by investment gains (net investment income of $1.08 million in 2023 alone) rather than new contributions — the foundation received only one outside contribution, $500,000 in 2021, in the entire 2012-2024 window. This is an endowment-preserving payout pattern, not an aggressive spend-down.

By purpose, the large majority of grants are tagged simply 'General' (unrestricted operating support). Named project grants are rare and modest: the GHRAD project at Northern Illinois University Foundation ($50,000/3 grants), Montez Press Radio at Wave Farm ($20,000/2 grants), and Fall River MoCA support routed through Southcoast Community Foundation ($20,000/2 grants).

Phalarope Foundation sits at the small end of the private-foundation spectrum, both in assets and in giving discipline (invitation-only, general-support grants to a stable roster). The peer set below uses publicly reported ranges from IRS/990 sources and should be read as directional rather than exact, since none of these funders publish detailed strategy documents.

Even among invitation-only peers, Phalarope is unusually small and unusually quiet — it has no communications staff, no annual report, and no public strategy statement, whereas mid-size peers like Unbound Philanthropy and General Service Foundation at least publish focus-area descriptions and periodic open LOI cycles. Organizations that can't get a warm introduction to Phalarope's trustees are better served applying to these larger, still-invitation-heavy peers, which publish more signal about timing and fit even when they don't accept unsolicited proposals.

There is no public news coverage, annual report, or press activity for Phalarope Foundation (EIN 04-6729068) in 2025 or 2026 — consistent with its history as an unstaffed family trust with no communications function. The most recent verifiable event is the filing of its FY2024 Form 990-PF on November 7, 2025, which reported total assets of $3,736,383 (down from $3,932,010 in 2023), total revenue of just $104,266 (versus $1,178,564 the prior year), and grants paid of roughly $210,000. The steep revenue drop reflects the normalization of investment income after 2023's outsized $1.08 million net investment gain, not a change in mission or giving strategy.

No leadership changes were found: Rebecca H. Dent and Sabrina Guth remain the foundation's only listed trustees across every filing reviewed, with Dent continuing in her role as a partner at Kozusko Harris Duncan. No new program areas, geographies, or grantee categories appear to have been added recently; the grantee list and purpose tags in the most recent filings mirror the pattern established in earlier years.

One important caveat for anyone researching this funder: a same-named organization, "Phalarope" (Phalarope Inc., Savannah, GA), was announced in November 2025 as one of more than 80 awardees under the $250 million "Action for Women's Health" global initiative, and separately signed an agreement to launch a maternal-health pilot in Chiquimula, Guatemala. That organization — a grant recipient focused on Indigenous maternal health, led by Dr. Miriam Rittmeyer — is entirely unrelated to the Ohio-based Phalarope Foundation covered in this report, despite the coincidental name and the fact that this funder's on-file contact email traces back to that other organization's domain. Grant seekers should not treat that news as activity by this foundation.

There is no formal application process to optimize for: application_form_url, opportunities_url, and grants_page_url are all empty in this foundation's record, and its own filing lists application_instructions as none while marking it a preselected-only funder. Do not submit a cold letter of inquiry to the Kozusko Harris Duncan c/o address expecting a response — the 2012-2024 grant history shows no evidence that unsolicited outreach has ever converted into funding. Equally, do not email the mrittmeyer@phalarope.org address associated with this record; it belongs to the unrelated Phalarope Inc. of Savannah, GA and will not reach this foundation's trustees.

The most productive strategy is indirect: build visible, credible work in the space this funder already supports — direct service, advocacy, or legal aid for Central American or Caribbean immigrant and diaspora communities; environmental justice in historically underserved urban neighborhoods; or small-scale mental-health, legal-aid, or arts programming in New York, Illinois, or New Hampshire. Because several of the foundation's grantees are themselves coalition or network organizations (Alianza Americas, Refugees International, the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights), joining or partnering with those networks is a more realistic entry point than a direct approach, since referrals from trusted grantees appear to be how this small, relationship-driven funder expands its roster.

When and if an introduction does happen, come prepared with a general-operating-support case rather than a narrowly scoped project proposal — the large majority of this funder's grants are tagged simply 'General.' Keep the ask modest and realistic: most individual grants fall between $5,000 and $20,000, with only its longest-standing relationships (Refugees International, Hondurans Against AIDS) reaching $30,000-$40,000 per grant. Emphasize continuity and trust over innovation or scale — this funder rewards multi-year relationships (4+ consecutive years with its top recipients) far more than one-time, high-impact asks. Given the foundation's small and shrinking recent payout ($170,000 in 2023, $210,000 in 2024, down from $330,000 in 2020), set expectations accordingly and do not treat this as a primary funding source to build a budget around.