The Dallas Foundation Crosses the $1 Billion Milestone in Giving

On Thursday, the foundation announced it has awarded more than $1 billion to Dallas-area nonprofit organizations that work to improve the lives of North Texans. It crossed that historic mark after nearly a century of philanthropic partnerships and grantmaking.

“Although the impact to date has been significant, we are truly just getting started," said the foundation's president and CEO, Matthew Randazzo.

For nearly a century, The Dallas Foundation—Texas’ first community foundation—has impacted causes that have helped communities thrive across North Texas. And now it’s reached an historic milestone in giving.

On Thursday, the foundation announced it has awarded more than $1 billion to Dallas-area nonprofit organizations that work to improve the lives of North Texans. That eye-popping total reflects almost a century of philanthropic partnerships and grantmaking.

Matthew Randazzo

Since it was established in 1929, the foundation has navigated the Great Depression, a world war, and endless cycles of need and fulfillment, while generations of its leaders have served and passed the torch. But its mission has remained the same throughout: “to improve lives and make progress throughout North Texas.”

After all that history—and in partnership with families, fundholders, and businesses—the foundation has achieved this week’s historic breakthrough.

“Many of the grant investments that contributed to this $1 billion milestone are visible across Dallas’ landscape, while others can be seen in the upward trajectory of test scores for third graders across Dallas ISD, in vibrant early learning classroom settings, and inside hospitals, food banks, and homeless shelters,” Matthew Randazzo, the foundation’s president and CEO, said in a statement. “Although the impact to date has been significant, we are truly just getting started.”

The foundation believes that significant investments in communities can result in transformative change. Here are just a few examples where the foundation has served as a philanthropic partner, facilitating charitable donations that supported these community-focused efforts:

• The design, structural engineering support, and project management of the Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge
• Booker T. Washington High School for the Visual and Performing Arts
• Letot Girls Residential Treatment Center
• The Katy Trail
• The Dallas Police Memorial

The Dallas Foundation said it’s also directly invested board-directed grants to the following community entities, along with “thousands of other nonprofits” that serve Dallas residents:

• Dallas Museum of Art
• Commit!
• University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center
• The Dallas Opera
• Spay Neuter Project
• Dallas Public Library
• Dallas Children’s Advocacy Center
• The Old Red Courthouse
• Texas National Guard Family Support Foundation

The foundation said it also played a pivotal role in incubating or launching the following organizations in Greater Dallas:

• Nurse Family Partnership
• TexProtects
• Social Venture Partners Dallas
• Bonton Farms
• Bachman Lake Together Family Center

“While we’re proud of all that the foundation has invested in and accomplished, the important role of philanthropy has never been greater,” Randazzo said. “And there’s still much to do in this city, where we have the third highest rate of child poverty in the nation; where there’s a 20-year gap in life expectancy for individuals who live in Fair Park versus those who live in Highland Park; and where a minimum-wage worker paying fair market rent for a one-bedroom apartment will pay 87% of his income in rent alone. It’s clear there is a lot of work remaining to make Dallas a more equitable place for all.”

$1.4M in impact funding announced just last month

POETIC is one of the Community Impact grant recipients, with a mission of "equipping girls who have experienced child maltreatment, commercial sexual exploitation and sex trafficking to find their voices, reclaim their narratives and persist forward." [Image: POETIC]

POETIC is one of The Dallas Foundation’s Community Impact grant recipients, with a mission of “equipping girls who have experienced child maltreatment, commercial sexual exploitation, and sex trafficking to find their voices, reclaim their narratives, and persist forward.” [Image: POETIC]

Just last month, the foundation announced that it had awarded more than $1.4 million in funding to 27 Texas organizations and initiatives focused on “driving meaningful results for children and families.” The funding came through the foundation’s 2022 Community Impact Fund Grants.

To learn more about The Dallas Foundation, you can go here.