Wellsprings Family Foundation

Wellsprings Family Foundation is a small, entirely family-run private foundation based in Santa Fe, NM, founded in 2015 by the Douglas family. All four officers — Deborah Douglas (President), David Douglas (Secretary/Treasurer), Katherine Douglas Martel (VP), and Emily Douglas Neal (VP) — draw zero compensation, and there is no professional program staff, no published grant guidelines, and no online application portal (Instrumentl and CauseIQ both list zero live grant opportunities). This profile — unstaffed, uncompensated, no public LOI form — is the clearest signal available: giving is relationship- and referral-driven rather than competition-driven.

The grantee history reinforces this. Of 66 grants tracked, a handful of organizations account for most of the dollars through repeat, multi-year funding: Flying Kites received 5 separate grants totaling $460,000, Cradles to Crayons received 5 grants totaling $220,000, Starfish Greathearts Foundation USA received 5 grants totaling $215,000, and Epiphany School received 5 grants totaling $150,000. This is a foundation that identifies a small set of trusted partners and renews them year after year rather than running an open competitive cycle.

First-time applicants should not expect to find a submission form. The most productive paths are: (1) a warm introduction through one of the foundation's existing grantees or intermediaries — New Venture Fund (a fiscal sponsor for several of the international grants) and United Way of Santa Fe County (a local NM community intermediary) both function as connective tissue to this funder; (2) a direct, personal written inquiry to the Santa Fe address or (505) 988-5642, addressed care of contact Kevin Shortill; or (3) alignment with one of the foundation's three recurring themes — international child health/WASH, New Mexico early-childhood development, or general operating support to established Boston/DC-area institutions. Given the typical first-year grant size (many relationships start at $10,000–$25,000 before scaling), a modest, well-targeted initial ask is more realistic than a large one.

Wellsprings Family Foundation gave $511,000 across 16 grants in FY2025 (average ~$31,900/grant), up from $389,600 across 11 grants in FY2024, $485,000-$493,058 across roughly 16 grants in FY2023, $400,000 across 13 grants in FY2022, and $300,000-$311,485 across 12 grants in FY2021. The foundation's own typical-grant-size data (drawn from FY2022 filings) shows a median grant of $20,000, an average of $30,769, and a range of $10,000 to $100,000 — figures that align closely with the cumulative grantee-level data: across 66 tracked grants totaling $1,905,000, the average is $28,864.

Giving is concentrated among repeat partners. The top five recipients by lifetime total are Flying Kites ($460,000 across 5 grants, supporting general operations and its 'Launch Pad Initiative'), Cradles to Crayons ($220,000/5 grants, low-income children), Starfish Greathearts Foundation USA ($215,000/5 grants, child healthcare access in South Africa), Growing Up New Mexico ($150,000/4 grants, early childhood development), and Epiphany School ($150,000/5 grants, general support). Beyond the top tier, funding splits into three recognizable buckets: international WASH/health (New Venture Fund, Daughters of Charity International, Presbyterian Church programs in Niger, US Water Partnership, Transform International in Malawi), New Mexico early-childhood/community work (Growing Up New Mexico, United Way of Santa Fe County), and general operating support to established Northeast/DC institutions (Washington National Cathedral, Dacor Bacon House, Emma Willard School, Center for Religious Understanding).

Geographically, grant count skews toward Massachusetts (20 grants), DC (14), New York (8), Pennsylvania (6), and New Mexico (5) — consistent with the foundation's stated geographic_focus of MA, DC, PA, and NY, likely reflecting where Douglas family members live or maintain ties, plus a homebase commitment to Santa Fe/NM. Assets grew from $4.6M at founding (2015) to $8.8M-$9.9M (2023-2025), while the payout ratio has held near 5.2%-5.5% of assets — close to the IRS-mandated minimum distribution for private foundations, indicating a steady, formula-like giving pace rather than aggressive draw-down.

Wellsprings Family Foundation sits within a cluster of small private foundations carrying almost identical asset bases (~$9.9M), all filed under the same 'Philanthropy & Grantmaking' NTEE category in the underlying data. None of the peer records include public annual-giving or application-process detail, so those columns reflect what is (and isn't) publicly disclosed rather than confirmed non-disclosure by the funders themselves.

These peers are matched primarily by asset size rather than programmatic focus — all fall in the generic 'Philanthropy & Grantmaking' NTEE bucket, whereas Wellsprings' own grant history reveals distinct, disclosed program themes (early childhood, international WASH, general operating support). That specificity, combined with its transparent 990-PF grant-level detail, makes Wellsprings comparatively easier for a prospect researcher to profile than most of its true asset-tier peers, even though it offers no formal application channel of its own.

The most recent filing (fiscal year ending December 2025, submitted March 23, 2026) shows total revenue of $671,042 and total expenses of $515,087, with $511,000 (99.2% of expenses) distributed as charitable grants across 16 awards — up sharply from $389,600 across 11 awards in FY2024. Net assets have grown steadily from about $4.6 million at the foundation's 2015 founding to roughly $9.9 million as of the 2025 filing.

No leadership changes were identified: the same four Douglas family officers (Deborah Douglas as President, David Douglas as Secretary/Treasurer, Katherine Douglas Martel and Emily Douglas Neal as Vice Presidents) have held their roles since inception, and all continue to serve without compensation. Targeted web searches for foundation news and announcements returned no foundation-specific press coverage; most search results surfaced unrelated organizations that share the 'Wellspring' name, including Wellspring Philanthropic Fund (a much larger, unrelated funder that announced in 2024 it will sunset by 2028) and Wellspring House, a Massachusetts nonprofit — neither connected to this foundation.

The absence of public announcements is itself informative: this is a low-visibility, unstaffed family foundation that does not issue press releases or maintain active public communications about its grantmaking, reinforcing that relationship-based intelligence (via grantee networks or direct written inquiry) is more valuable than monitoring news channels for this funder.

There is no open application process to game — no LOI portal, no downloadable guidelines, and no listed deadline (Instrumentl and CauseIQ both confirm zero live grant opportunities, and the foundation's own record leaves application_instructions blank). Treat Wellsprings as an invitation/referral funder and plan accordingly:

• Get a warm introduction. The strongest lever is a connection through an existing grantee or intermediary. New Venture Fund has fiscally sponsored at least two of Wellsprings' international WASH/development grants, and United Way of Santa Fe County is the one local NM community intermediary in the grant history — either could plausibly make an introduction for a values-aligned NM or global-health nonprofit.
• Match one of the three recurring themes exactly. Grant purposes cluster tightly around (1) international child health/WASH in Africa and the developing world (Kenya, Niger, Malawi, South Africa), (2) New Mexico early-childhood development (echoing the 'Launch Pad Initiative' language used for Flying Kites), and (3) general operating support to established Boston-area or DC-area institutions the family already has ties to (schools, a cathedral, a scholarship fund). Proposals outside these lanes have no track record with this funder.
• Size the ask to their pattern, not your budget. The median historical grant is $20,000 and the range runs $10,000-$100,000; a first-time relationship should aim toward the lower end, since the largest relationships (Flying Kites, Cradles to Crayons) were built through 4-5 renewed grants over multiple years rather than one large initial gift.
• Reach out directly and personally. Since there's no staff or portal, a concise written letter to the Santa Fe address (302 E Coronado Rd, Santa Fe, NM 87505) or a call to (505) 988-5642, addressed care of Kevin Shortill, is the most realistic path to getting on the family's radar — a mass-distributed generic LOI is unlikely to land.
• Expect general operating support requests to outperform project-specific asks — the large majority of the grant history is coded 'GENERAL SUPPORT,' suggesting the family prefers funding organizations' core missions over discrete restricted projects.