Mental health has long been a neglected issue area among funders. The money designated for mental health usually went to hospitals. But, during the last decade, we have seen funders taking this area more seriously, and considering its issues independently of physical health issues.
During the last 18 months, the combination of the pandemic and the George Floyd uprising has created a massive rethinking of mental health as a critical recovery issue for funders, community members, and government agencies, which brought us to question: Can we benchmark this shift?
In this report, Access Philanthropy examines the state of mental health funding in Minnesota between 2015 to 2018*, the years in which the most recent funding data is available. We compared these data to the 2009-2014 mental health grant data we collected for an earlier report. It should help determine changes, when new data become available for 2019-2021.
For the 2015-2018 timeframe, we discovered three major mental health funding shifts in the past decade.
Family foundation involvement in mental health funding increased in the past decade, albeit more sporadically than the overall funding patterns.
A growth in funding going to facets of life previously not recognized as mental health subjects, such as, race, gender, physical health care, housing, socioeconomic status, and climate change. Ten years ago, such intersectionality was nowhere to be seen. Primary funding areas were simply substance abuse treatment, mental health counseling, and addiction service. Today, top areas include art and culture, employment training, and housing.
Unfortunately, in rural communities, we found very little new funding. Most mental health recipients are still located in the Metro Area. There is some good news: More Greater Minnesota funders are supporting mental health, but still very few dollars.
Takeaways
- Many new mid-sized and smaller family foundations
- Among the top 10% of funders: Luther, Alkire, Marbrook, Beverly, and Edwards Memorial
- Among the top 25%: Pohlad, KAHR, Marbrook, Open Hands, Raft, and Wuertle
- Otto Bremer Trust; More than 20% of the Trust’s total giving went for Mental Health, in both amount and # of grants
- Many Donor-Advised Funds awarding mental health grants
- Still very few Greater MN Mental Health organizations; notably, Mayo, some MATC, Central MN, and Sexual Assault Services of Brainerd
- Addiction Services is a top focus area, though not among the very top donors
- Children-related Services received the most grants
*Source: Foundation Directory Online, the sector’s most up-to-date, complete information on grantmakers. We filtered by the topic areas of Mental and behavioral disorders and Mental health care, Minnesota geographic focus, from 2015 to 2018, and grant amounts from $1,001 to $10,000,000,000 to avoid employer matching programs.
Top Grantmakers by # grants
- St. Paul & Minneapolis
The Minneapolis Fdn* - Marbrook Fdn*
- Otto Bremer Trust*
- Greystone Fdn
- Saint Paul & Minnesota Fdn*
- Wurtele Fdn
- Greater Twin Cities UW*
- Medica Foundation
- Pohlad Family Foundation
- Catholic Community Fdn of MN Greater MN
Greater MN
- Otto Bremer Trust*
- Blandin Foundation*
- Duluth Superior Area Cmty Fdn*
- Northland Foundation
- Mayo Clinic*
- CommunityGiving
- Crow Wing County UW*
- Minnesota Coalition Against Sexual Assault
- Carl and Verna Schmidt Fdn
- Greystone Fdn
7 Cnty Metro Area Suburbs
- The Minneapolis Fdn
- Otto Bremer Trust*
- Saint Paul & Minnesota Fdn*
- Hugh J. Andersen Fdn*
- Greater Twin Cities UW*
- Richard M. Schulze Family Fdn
- Marbrook Fdn
- MN Community Foundation
- Catholic Community Fdn of MN
- Hardenbergh Foundation
Cities with Most Recipients
-
- Edina (114)
- Wayzata (70)
<Rochester (55)
- Golden Valley (54)
- Eagan (49)
- Bloomington (44)
- Oakdale (44)
- Duluth (40)
- Hopkins (39)
Top Subjects
- Mental health Clinics & Counseling
- Addiction Services (in and out-patient)
- Crisis Intervention<l/i>
- Family, Youth and Children
- Housing and Residential Care
- Advocacy
- Employment Training & Vocational rehabilitation
- Education
- Arts & culture
Top Recipients
| Recipient | # grants | Subject | Subject location | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Persons with a Disability MN Adult & Teen* </td > | 165 </td > | Addiction services </td > | Mpls </td > | Washburn CC* </td > | 119 </td > | Addiction services </td > | Mpls </td > | Tree House </td > | 104 </td > | Counseling </td > | Edina </td > | Tubman </td > | 82 </td > | Crisis </td > | Mpls </td > | The Retreat* </td > | 70 </td > | Addiction services </td > | Wyz </td > | Guild Inc. </td > | 58 </td > | Addiction services </td > | StP </td > | NAMI </td > | 57 </td > | Advocacy </td > | StP </td > | Hazelden </td > | 51 </td > | Addiction services </td > | Stp </td > | People Inc.* </td > | 49 </td > | Support Services </td > | Eagan </td > | Canvas Health* </td > | 44 </td > | Addiction services </td > | Oakdale STP/MPLS </td > |
*Among top grantmakers by $
Analysis
| Top Funders | # grants, # organizations, top subjects | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Minneapolis Foundation & Donor Advised Funds </td > | 195 grants to 43 organizations. 65 Addiction Counseling; 82 Mental Health Care: Counseling (49) and Clinics (33); 37 Housing & Employment </td > | Otto Bremer Trust </td > | 141 grants to 93 organizations, one quarter Mental Health Care, evenly split by Clinics and Counseling; Others included Crisis Intervention (8); Housing & Employment (5); Addiction Treatment; Advocacy, and Education </td > | Marbrook Foundation </td > | 90 grants to 59 organizations, mostly Arts & Culture. Environment and Education shared the remaining grants </td > | Greystone Foundation </td > | 48 grants to 27 organizations, mostly Arts & Culture. Education dominated the remaining grants </td > | Saint Paul & Minnesota Foundation </td > | 47 grants to 24 organizations, about half Mental Health Care, evenly split by Clinics and Counseling. Also, Housing & Employment (8), and Addiction services (8), evenly split by Treatment and Counseling </td > | Medica Foundation </td > | 28 grants to 24 organizations, half Mental Health Care, evenly split by Clinics and Counseling. Advocacy and Housing & Employment dominated the remaining grants </td > | Pohlad Family Foundation </td > | 27 grants to 15 organizations, half Clinics. Advocacy and Housing & Employment dominated the remaining grants </td > | Richard M. Schulze Family Foundation </td > | 24 grants to 22 organizations, two-thirds Mental Health Care, evenly split by Clinics and Counseling. Housing & Employment dominated the remaining grants </td > | Wurtele Foundation </td > | 24 grants to 24 organizations, more than half Arts & Culture. Education and Housing & Employment shared the remaining grants </td > | Hugh J. Andersen Foundation </td > | 18 grants to 6 organizations, half for Advocacy, the rest evenly split by Crisis Intervention and Housing & Employment </td > | Hardenbergh Foundation</td > | 17 grants to 7 organizations, evenly split by Clinics and Housing & Employment </td > | Charlson Foundation </td > | 16 grants to 8 organizations, all Housing & Employment </td > | F. R. Bigelow Foundation </td > | 15 grants to 11 organizations, mostly Crisis Intervention and Addiction Treatment, others include Mental Health Care Clinics & Counseling, and Advocacy </td > |
Addiction Services: Counseling: Out-patient services; Treatment: In-patient facilities
Advocacy: Associations
Arts & Culture: Predominantly theaters and media for mental health
Crisis Intervention: Mental distress brought on by a traumatic experience, i.e. sexual abuse, death of a child, torture, domestic violence (includes temp. shelters)
Education: School programs
Housing & Employment: Homelessness, Supportive Housing (not temp. shelter) and skills training
Mental Health Care: Clinics & Hospitals: Medical Facilities; Counseling: Therapy and social programs
Persons with a disability: i.e. Autism, Dyslexia
Small Family Foundations
Since 2015, the majority of small family foundation’s have focused their Mental Health funding general mental health care and counseling initiatives that provide a range of services, such as Guild Incorporated and Washburn Center for Children. The others focused on addiction and substance abuse treatment. Addiction services viewed with an intersectional lens.
Sauer Family Foundation
Charlson Foundation
Mortenson Family Foundation
The Beverly Foundation
Haggerty Family Foundation
George Family Foundation
Head Family Foundation
Wurtele Foundation
Patrick & Aimee Butler Family Foundation
The Luther Family Foundation
Addiction services viewed with an intersectional lens.
The Wurtele Foundation funded several arts and culture organizations’ addiction services initiatives. Patrick & Aimee Butler Family Foundation funded addiction services provided by groups serving marginalized and at-risk communities including immigrants, youth, women, and persons with a disability. Geographically, these small foundations focused entirely on organizations in the seven-county metro area, with no recorded funding for those in Greater Minnesota.
Report Writers and Researchers Mary Anne Welch
Laura Wilson
Jana simmons
Steve Paprocki hanks to the rest of the AP team for suggestions, ideas, edits and helping keep the doors open