Serviam Foundation Inc.

Serviam Foundation Inc. is a small, uncompensated family foundation run by the Taylor family (Richard G. Taylor Jr., Aleta E. Taylor, Brian Taylor, Teri Taylor, Jill Schneider/Merzeau, and Christine Wefers all serve as unpaid trustees) out of Saddle River, New Jersey. With $5.4M in assets and only one grantee documented in Granted's database — a $2M gift to Holy Name Medical Center Foundation — this is a closed-circle, relationship-driven funder, not a competitive grants program. Public reporting confirms the foundation "only makes contributions to preselected charitable organizations and does not accept unsolicited requests for funds," which directly contradicts the generic "Submit application online" flag in aggregated foundation data. First-time applicants should treat any online application language with skepticism until confirmed directly by phone (201-327-1282). The foundation's signature act — a $3M pledge that named an ICU wing after itself at Holy Name Medical Center in 2021 — reveals its real preference: large, legacy-defining capital gifts to institutions the Taylor family has a personal or community tie to, not recurring program grants to a broad nonprofit portfolio. There is no public evidence of an LOI process, board application cycle, or staff program officer; Charity Navigator cannot even confirm a working foundation website (the domain associated with this EIN in third-party data, serviamfoundation.org, appears to actually belong to a different, Kansas-based organization of the same name). For grant seekers, the realistic path in is not a cold application but relationship-building: connections through Bergen County, NJ civic and philanthropic circles, Holy Name Medical Center's institutional network, or shared board/community ties to the Taylor family. Organizations pursuing this funder should be prepared to make the case for a transformational, named-gift-caliber ask (six to seven figures) tied to healthcare, community service, or faith-aligned human services in the greater NJ/NY area, rather than a modest annual program grant. Given the single-grantee dataset and the pandemic-driven origin of its largest gift, first-time outreach should lead with mission alignment and personal connection, not a generic proposal.

Serviam Foundation's giving has been highly variable and concentrated. Total giving by fiscal year: $3,702 (2013) → $47,404 (2014) → $402,719 (2019) → $659,301 (2020) → a peak of $2,106,138 (2021, driven almost entirely by the $2M Holy Name Medical Center Foundation grant paid that year toward the $3M ICU pledge) → $1,325,296 (2022) → an estimated $1,080,638 in the most recent available filing (per third-party 990 aggregation), against $197,293 in total revenue that same year, meaning the foundation is drawing down principal to sustain giving. Total assets have moved inversely to giving: $834,439 (2013, inception) → a high of $7,651,951 (2020) → $5,397,450 (most recent), reflecting both strong net investment income in 2020-2021 ($2.88M and $1.42M respectively) and the payout of the ICU pledge. Grants paid (distinct from total giving, which includes administrative costs) tracked closely: $0 (2013), $15,000 (2014), $365,900 (2019), $639,150 (2020), $2,000,000 (2021), $1,292,645 (2022). Granted's grantee database contains exactly one recorded recipient — Holy Name Medical Center Foundation, $2,000,000 across a single grant, 100% of tracked dollars and 100% of tracked recipients going to New Jersey — which is consistent with a foundation whose giving is dominated by one or a handful of large, relationship-based gifts rather than a diversified grants portfolio. No breakdown by program area is available beyond the general-charitable purpose coded for the Holy Name gift and the foundation's NTEE classification as "Philanthropy & Grantmaking" (T99), which itself signals a pass-through/family-giving vehicle rather than a direct-service program funder. Given the data available, prospective applicants should not expect a median grant size in the tens of thousands — the only confirmed data point is a single seven-figure institutional gift, and the foundation's own giving-to-asset ratio (giving roughly 20-40% of assets in peak years) suggests it makes infrequent, large distributions rather than many small ones.

Serviam sits in a cohort of similarly-sized (~$5.4M in assets) private foundations, all classified under Philanthropy & Grantmaking, that Granted's data groups together — notably all cluster within roughly $5.397M-$5.398M in assets, an unusual coincidence suggesting they were sampled from a similar filing-threshold band rather than selected for programmatic similarity.

Unlike Serviam, none of these peers have a public website on file in Granted's data, and none surfaced independent news coverage during this research pass — Serviam is distinguished mainly by its one large, well-documented institutional gift (the Holy Name ICU naming) and active NJ press coverage, while its peers appear to be lower-profile family vehicles with no discoverable public giving footprint. Grant seekers should not assume these peers are more accessible; small family foundations and trusts of this size overwhelmingly give by invitation or personal relationship rather than open application, and the near-identical asset totals suggest they were likely established around the same time with comparable funding structures (e.g., a single large initial contribution followed by investment growth).

The single most significant, well-documented event in Serviam Foundation's history remains the March 31, 2021 announcement (NJBIZ, ROI-NJ) of its $3 million pledge to Holy Name Medical Center in Teaneck, NJ, funding a new 19-bed, 9,800-square-foot intensive care unit that opened April 5, 2021 and was named the "Serviam Foundation ICU" after co-founders Aleta and Rich Taylor. Rich Taylor's quote at the time — "Serviam is Latin for 'I Will Serve.' This was a way to deepen our concern for others and turn it into meaningful action" — ties directly to the foundation's Latin motto and its origin in the family's response to COVID-19-era hospital staff efforts. Granted's grantee data confirms $2,000,000 of that pledge was paid to Holy Name Medical Center Foundation in fiscal year 2021 (total giving that year: $2,106,138), with the remainder presumably disbursed across adjacent fiscal years. No new grantee announcements, leadership changes, or program launches specific to this NJ foundation were found in 2025-2026 web search results. The most recent financial signal is a Form 990-PF-derived figure of roughly $1.08 million in charitable disbursements in the latest available filing year, against $197,293 in total revenue — indicating continued giving at a level below the 2021 peak but still well above the foundation's pre-2019 baseline (annual giving was under $50,000 as recently as 2014). No public record of new named gifts, additional Holy Name Medical Center support, or new institutional partners beyond the single documented grantee was located. Given the lack of a confirmed, foundation-specific website and no dedicated press office, prospective applicants should not expect visible "annual report" style updates; the most reliable ongoing signal is the foundation's IRS Form 990-PF, filed annually and searchable via ProPublica's Nonprofit Explorer under EIN 46-3877411.

Do not search for or expect a formal online application — despite generic database metadata suggesting one exists, no LOI process, RFP, or grant portal for this specific EIN could be confirmed through IRS filings, Charity Navigator, ProPublica, or NJ press coverage; multiple sources instead confirm this is a preselected-giving foundation. The single most productive move for an eligible organization is building a genuine relationship footprint in Bergen County, NJ, where the foundation is headquartered (61 Twin Brooks Rd / PO Box AY, Saddle River, NJ 07458), or within the Holy Name Medical Center network, which is the only institution with a confirmed, sustained relationship to the Taylor family. Because the foundation's only documented major gift was healthcare infrastructure tied to a deeply personal motivation (recognizing frontline staff during COVID-19), organizations should lead with a compelling, specific human story and a tangible, visible outcome (e.g., a named space, program, or unit) rather than a generic program-support pitch — this foundation appears to respond to legacy and recognition opportunities, not routine operating grants. Given the giving pattern (near-zero to modest annual giving most years, punctuated by one outsized $2-3M capital gift), applicants should calibrate the size of any ask realistically: a request in the low tens of thousands is unlikely to match what this foundation has actually funded, while a transformational capital or naming-opportunity request in the six-to-seven-figure range is more consistent with its track record. A common mistake would be treating Serviam like a mid-size open-cycle foundation and submitting a cold LOI through a generic online form; with no confirmed portal and explicit third-party confirmation that unsolicited requests are not accepted, that approach is likely to go unanswered. If direct contact is warranted, use the listed phone number (201-327-1282) or mail correspondence addressed to Richard G. Taylor Jr., rather than searching for a web-based intake system. Finally, be aware that the website most commonly associated with "Serviam Foundation" in search results and aggregator data (serviamfoundation.org, featuring Managing Director Marci Waters and a Kansas-based donor-advised-fund model) does not appear to be this same foundation — do not use its content, portfolio, or contact form when trying to reach the NJ-based Taylor family foundation, as this risks contacting the wrong organization entirely.