Raul Tijerina Jr Foundation

The Raul Tijerina Jr Foundation (doing business as the Raul & Hortensia Tijerina Foundation) is a lean, all-volunteer family trust based in Kingwood, TX, administered day-to-day by Lynn Stanley Private Foundation Services in Houston and governed by a five-person board — Boris A. Hidalgo (CEO/Board Chair), Carlos A. Lozano MD (VP/Director), Bryan S. Duffy (Director), Robert Galloway (Director), and John Dramberger (Secretary/Treasurer) — none of whom draw compensation. That volunteer structure signals a mission-driven, relationship-based funder rather than a staffed program office with rigid RFP cycles. Its mandate is narrow and non-negotiable: 501(c)(3) organizations operating programs specifically within Cameron, Hidalgo, Starr, or Willacy counties in the Rio Grande Valley. Applicants outside that four-county footprint are ineligible regardless of mission fit, though the grantee list shows the foundation will fund organizations headquartered elsewhere (Teach For America, national universities) as long as the funded activity serves the Valley. The foundation explicitly favors 'ripple effect' grants — investments whose benefits extend past the direct recipient — and 'seed money' for initiatives with a credible path to sustainability, over open-ended general operating requests, even though many historical grants were in fact coded general support. First-time applicants are preferred over repeat grantees unless an existing grantee is meeting an ongoing critical need, so seekers should not assume a first award guarantees future renewal. There is no formal RFP deadline; letters of inquiry are accepted year-round by mail, and a compelling LOI may be invited to submit a full four-tab application packet. Because the board reviews applications directly (rather than program staff), proposals should speak in plain, outcome-oriented language rather than grant-jargon, and should make explicit how the request advances the founder's stated priorities: youth, education and literacy, health and wellness, community development, culture/arts/heritage, and environmental conservation. Given the foundation's small size (~$694K-$869K in annual giving) and volunteer governance, personal introductions through Valley-based intermediaries or board contacts are likely to carry more weight than cold mail submissions alone.

Across the dataset's grantee history (151 recorded grants totaling $2,419,710, averaging $16,025 per grant), the foundation's own reported typical grant size is a median of $15,000 (average $14,341) with a range of $2,000 to $50,000 across 41 sampled awards. The top 50 grantees account for $2,028,584 — about 84% — of all recorded giving, showing a fairly concentrated portfolio rather than hundreds of tiny gifts spread thin. Higher-education and scholarship-linked institutions are the single largest bloc: University of Texas Rio Grande Valley ($161,702 across 4 grants), Texas A&M University ($137,000/4), University of Texas at Austin ($126,000/4), TSTC Foundation ($70,000/2), UT-San Antonio ($24,000/4), UT Pan Am ($30,000), Texas State University ($17,000), and Guadalupe Regional Middle School tuition assistance ($35,000) together total roughly $620,700 — about 26% of total recorded giving — reflecting the founder's literacy/education priority. Health and human-services organizations (Texas Children's Hospital $70,000, Food Bank of the Rio Grande Valley $50,000, Friendship of Women, Alzheimer's Disease & Related Disorders, Access Esperanza Clinics) and youth/community groups (Children's Museum of Brownsville $96,620, Teach For America $85,000, Boy Scouts of America, Boys & Girls Club of Mission, Special Olympics of Texas) make up most of the remainder, each typically in the $20,000-$40,000 band. Geographically, of the 151 grants 142 went to Texas-based recipients, with only 9 to out-of-state organizations (CA 3, IL 2, MA 2, DC 1, AL 1) — almost certainly national nonprofits running Valley-based programs. On the balance sheet side, total assets grew from $10.29M in FY2011 to $12.67M in FY2023 (roughly 1.8% CAGR, driven mostly by investment income rather than new contributions — the foundation received $0 in new contributions in every filed year from 2019-2023). Annual total giving rose from $604,438 (2011) to $868,755 (2023), while grants actually paid out have fluctuated in a tighter $518,883-$694,470 band, indicating the difference is largely administrative/program costs layered onto the giving total.

These five peers were matched purely on asset size (all cluster within $30K of Tijerina's $13,025,997 in total assets) and shared NTEE code (Philanthropy & Grantmaking), not on geography or program focus — none has a public website, application guidelines, or disclosed giving pattern in available records, which is typical of small, closely-held family foundations that give only to relationships the trustees already know. Tijerina stands out from this peer set precisely because it publishes a real website with eligibility rules, a named administrator, and a downloadable application checklist — a meaningfully higher transparency bar that makes it one of the more approachable funders in its asset tier for organizations without an existing board connection.

No dedicated press coverage or announcements were found for 2025 or 2026; this foundation does not appear to issue news releases, consistent with a small, uncompensated-volunteer-board trust that operates primarily through direct mail LOIs rather than public communications. The most recent verifiable financial disclosure in the dataset is fiscal year 2023, showing $694,470 in grants paid, $868,755 in total giving, and $12,674,342 in total assets — up from $11,326,530 in assets in FY2020, reflecting investment recovery after 2020's market dip (that year's net investment income was just $133,195 versus $608,074 in FY2023). Third-party grant databases (GrantForward, Cause IQ, Instrumentl) show the foundation's public profile content was refreshed around April 2025, though the underlying grants data those aggregators cite was last updated mid-2024, meaning FY2024 and FY2025 990-PF filings were not yet reflected in secondary sources at the time of this research. Governance has been stable: the same five board members (Boris A. Hidalgo as CEO/Chair, Carlos A. Lozano MD, Bryan S. Duffy, Robert Galloway, John Dramberger) recur across the full multi-year people history in the dataset with no turnover indicated, and none draw a salary. Grant seekers should treat the foundation's own grantee list — anchored by repeat, multi-year support to University of Texas RGV, Texas A&M, UT Austin, TSTC, and the Children's Museum of Brownsville — as the best available signal of current activity in the absence of fresh news coverage.

There is no submission deadline — letters of inquiry are accepted year-round, so time your outreach to your own program calendar rather than a foundation cycle, but budget for review lag since a five-person volunteer board (not paid staff) evaluates every submission. Submit by mail only, addressed to the Tijerina Foundation c/o Lynn Stanley Private Foundation Services, Inc., 4265 San Felipe, Suite 1100, Houston, TX 77027-2913 — there is no email address or online portal in the public record, so do not rely on a website contact form. Assemble the required four-tab packet exactly as specified: Tab 1 a cover letter on your organization's history, mission, and target beneficiaries; Tab 2 the grant application form executed (signed) by both your chief executive officer and your board chairperson; Tab 3 a detailed description of the proposed project; and Tab 4 your organization's current annual operating budget. Do not staple, bind, or tab the physical document — applications in any other format, or missing required attachments, are automatically declined, so formatting compliance matters as much as content. Frame the ask around a specific, time-bound initiative with measurable outcomes rather than general operating support — mirror the foundation's own vocabulary of 'ripple effect' (benefits reaching beyond your direct beneficiaries) and 'seed money' (catalytic funding with a path to sustainability after the grant ends). Size the request within the foundation's demonstrated range: median award $15,000, range $2,000-$50,000; asking well outside that band without strong justification is a common misstep. Emphasize Valley-wide reach across all four counties (Cameron, Hidalgo, Starr, Willacy) over narrowly local programming, and if you're a first-time applicant, say so explicitly — the foundation states a preference for new grantees over automatic renewals. Since the foundation received zero new contributions in every filed year 2019-2023 and relies entirely on investment income, do not expect it to fund large capital campaigns; its check size and posture fit program and seed grants, not major capacity expansion. If awarded, plan staff time for a six-month interim report and a twelve-month final report, and note that willingness to report rigorously is itself part of what the foundation says it evaluates when weighing an applicant's fiscal controls and governance.