Wesley Family Foundation

The Wesley Family Foundation is a small, family-directed private foundation with $8.4 million in assets and no public application process — which means your strategic approach must be fundamentally different from the way you would approach an open-application funder. This is a preselected-only grantmaker: the board decides who receives funding, and there is no published portal, no LOI template, and no posted deadline.

Your first move is relationship-based, not proposal-based. The foundation is managed by two family members — Kimberly A. Wesley (President/Director) and Michelle R. Wesley Licata (Vice President/Treasurer/Director) — operating out of 30100 Chagrin Blvd, Suite 301 in Pepper Pike, Ohio. There is no dedicated program staff, no grants manager, and no website with application guidelines. The listed phone number is (440) 314-6325, and the foundation's care-of contact is Joseph Wesley, suggesting a broader family involvement in grantmaking decisions.

Before investing any time in a written proposal, determine whether your organization has an existing connection to the Wesley family or to any past grantee. The foundation's giving is concentrated in Ohio and Florida, which suggests personal ties to both states. If you have a board member, donor, or community partner who knows the Wesley family, that warm introduction is your most important strategic asset.

If no direct connection exists, consider a brief, one-page letter of introduction sent to the Pepper Pike office — not a full proposal. Describe your organization's mission, the specific project you are seeking funding for, and why it aligns with the foundation's apparent interests. Keep it to one page. Family foundations of this size rarely want a 30-page narrative from an organization they have never heard of.

The Wesley Family Foundation's giving history reveals a mid-sized family foundation with fluctuating but meaningful annual distributions and a growing asset base. The foundation was established in 2014–2015, with an initial corpus of approximately $5 million. Over the past decade, assets have grown to $8.37 million (2024), a 67% increase that reflects both investment returns and periodic contributions.

Annual charitable disbursements have varied significantly year to year:

• 2024: $399,282 in charitable disbursements (from $3.09M revenue — a strong investment year with $2.93M in asset sales)
• 2023: $184,546 in grants paid (a quieter year; $216K total revenue)
• 2022: $497,805 — the peak giving year, nearly 3x the 2023 level, possibly including a large one-time grant
• 2021: $357,000 in grants paid ($471K revenue)
• 2020: $343,916 in grants paid (despite only $36K in investment income — the foundation was distributing from corpus)
• 2019: $266,000 in grants paid ($404K revenue)
• 2018: $320,980 in grants paid ($1.33M revenue, including $804K in contributions received — the last year outside gifts flowed in)

The five-year average (2019–2023) is approximately $329,000 in annual giving, from a pool of roughly 15 grants per year. Typical grants range from $5,000 to $90,000, with a median of $25,000 and an average of approximately $23,800. This means most grants are in the $10,000–$30,000 range, with occasional larger awards pushing toward $90,000.

Officer compensation is consistently $0 — the Wesley family directors take no salary, which means functionally all non-administrative expenses flow to charitable purposes. Administrative costs (accounting fees, professional fees, taxes) appear modest, typically $20,000–$25,000 annually.

The 2022 spike to nearly $500,000 in disbursements — compared to the $184,000 low in 2023 — suggests the foundation may make lumpy, discretionary grants (perhaps a capital campaign gift or a multi-year pledge paid in one installment) rather than maintaining a fixed annual giving budget.

The Wesley Family Foundation operates in a crowded landscape of small-to-mid-size Ohio family foundations with similar asset levels and grantmaking profiles. The table below positions Wesley against its closest peers — all Ohio-based T20 (Private Grantmaking) foundations with assets between $5M and $12M.

Key observations: Wesley's annual giving (~$329K average) is above the median for its asset-size cohort, reflecting a payout rate of approximately 3.9% — reasonably generous for a private foundation (the IRS minimum distribution requirement is approximately 5% of net investment assets, which for Wesley would be around $358K based on its 2023 filing). The foundation's average grant size of $23,800 is higher than several peers (Sterling at $8,486, Signet at $14,932), suggesting a preference for fewer, more meaningful grants rather than broad spray-and-pray giving.

The Chas E. Schell Trust stands out as an outlier with an open application process and dramatically higher average grants ($123K), but it is a single-purpose education trust — not a family-directed discretionary fund. Among true family foundations in this asset bracket, preselected-only grantmaking is the dominant model (5 of 7 peers), which means the Wesley Family Foundation's closed application approach is the norm, not the exception.

The Wesley Family Foundation's most notable recent development is a significant rebound in both assets and giving in 2024. After a relatively lean 2023 (assets at $5.7M, giving at $185K), the 2024 filing shows a dramatic jump: total assets reached $8.37 million (a 47% increase) and charitable disbursements rose to $399,282 — more than double the prior year. Revenue hit $3.09 million, driven almost entirely by $2.93 million in capital gains from asset sales.

This asset growth pattern — from $5.7M to $8.4M in a single year with minimal outside contributions ($0 in gifts received) — indicates strong investment performance and/or a strategic portfolio repositioning. The foundation appears to have liquidated significant equity positions at a gain, which simultaneously boosted reportable income and available distributable assets.

A leadership transition has also occurred. Joseph O. Wesley, who served as President/Director from 2014 through 2020, no longer appears on the 2023 or 2024 filings. Kimberly A. Wesley has assumed the presidency, and Michelle R. Wesley's title expanded from Vice President/Director to Vice President/Treasurer/Director (and her surname now appears as Wesley Licata on the 2024 filing). This generational transition may signal evolving priorities — though the foundation's preselected-only posture and lack of public communications make it difficult to confirm any programmatic shifts.

The 2022 filing included an Expenditure Responsibility Statement — a Schedule H attachment required when a private foundation makes grants to organizations that are not public charities (such as other private foundations, foreign organizations, or for-profit entities with charitable purposes). This is the only year in the foundation's history with such a filing, suggesting an unusual or one-off grant to a non-standard recipient in that fiscal year.

The foundation maintains no website, no social media presence, and no public communications beyond its IRS filings. The previously listed website (wesleyfamily.org) belongs to Wesley United Methodist Church in Hadley, Massachusetts — a completely unrelated entity.

The Wesley Family Foundation does not accept unsolicited applications. There is no portal, no published guidelines, no deadlines, and no grants page. If you are considering approaching this foundation, here is what to know:

1. This is a relationship-driven funder. The foundation has two directors (Kimberly A. Wesley and Michelle R. Wesley Licata) and no staff. Every grant decision is made by the family. A warm introduction from someone the Wesley family knows and trusts is exponentially more effective than a cold submission.

2. Keep your initial outreach to one page. If you cannot secure a personal introduction, send a brief letter (not an email, not a full proposal) to: Wesley Family Foundation, c/o Joseph Wesley, 30100 Chagrin Blvd, Suite 301, Pepper Pike, OH 44124. Include: who you are, what you do, why their support matters, and one specific project with a dollar figure. Family foundations of this size do not want to read a 20-page narrative from an unknown organization.

3. Ask for $10,000–$30,000 on first approach. The foundation's median grant is $25,000. While grants up to $90,000 have been made, those likely go to organizations with established relationships. An initial ask in the $10,000–$25,000 range is most likely to be considered.

4. Demonstrate Ohio or Florida connections. The foundation's geographic focus is Ohio and Florida. If your organization serves communities in either state — particularly the Greater Cleveland/Cuyahoga County area where the foundation is headquartered — lead with that geographic fit.

5. Timing is uncertain — be patient. With no published cycle, the foundation likely makes grant decisions at board meetings held one to four times per year. The gap between your outreach and a response (if any) could be months. Do not follow up aggressively.

6. Check your IRS classification. The 2022 Expenditure Responsibility filing suggests the foundation has made at least one grant requiring ER — meaning they are capable of funding organizations beyond standard 501(c)(3) public charities. However, this appears to be the exception. Being a publicly-supported 501(c)(3) in good standing eliminates the ER paperwork burden and makes you an easier grantee for a foundation with no staff.

7. Do not rely on the listed phone number for a cold call. The number (440) 314-6325 appears in public records but may route to a personal line. A physical letter is more appropriate for an initial contact with a family foundation that maintains no public presence.