May 30, 2011 | Read Time: 1 minute
Although increasingly known for its public-policy work, the Boston Foundation also has overhauled its approach to grant making in a bid for greater effectiveness.
About $300-million of the $800-million foundation’s assets are unrestricted, allowing the foundation to fully control about $17-million checking number of its grant-making each year. (Donors to the foundation steer the rest of the $82-million that the foundation distributes annually.)
In September 2009, the foundation announced that the majority of its discretionary grants would go to general operating support at charities, rather than pay for specific programs. The foundation also said it would make fewer, but larger grants, and steer them to charities working in its target areas—education, health, neighborhoods, arts and culture, and the economic competitiveness of the Greater Boston region. The foundation will allow charities to apply for funds on a rolling basis, rather than a timetable set by the foundation.
The average discretionary grant is already about $75,000, up from $50,000 when the program was announced, and Mr. Grogan expects the average to hit $100,000 within a few years.
