Thursday, November 12, 2026

The San Francisco Foundation announced that Anthropic has committed $50 million to a donor-advised fund at the foundation, with grants to Bay Area community organizations, focused on San Francisco, to be made by the end of 2027.

The first four grants, totaling $500,000, go to the SF-Marin Food Bank, GLIDE, the Interfaith Winter Shelter, and the San Francisco Firefighters Local 798 Toy Program.

Anthropic, which is based in San Francisco, said it is relying on the foundation's local knowledge to help choose recipients.

At the 20th annual Stand Up for Heroes benefit on Nov. 9, craigslist founder Craig Newmark made a five-year, $28 million pledge that brings his giving to the foundation to $100 million over the past decade.

The show at Lincoln Center raised a record $5.9 million for veterans, service members, military families, and caregivers.

Since 2007, the event has raised $123 million for the foundation.

ArtsFund and Allen Family Philanthropies awarded $10 million to 745 arts and culture organizations with budgets under $1 million, in grants of $2,500 to $25,000, reaching 37 of Washington's 39 counties.

The partners also renewed the program for 2027 with another $10 million, bringing five-year funding to $50 million.

To keep the program low-burden, there are no reporting requirements from grantees.

Native Americans in Philanthropy said Indigenous youth both designed the fund's framework and decided the awards, more than doubling last year's $720,000 pilot.

One-year grants come in three tiers: $25,000, $65,000, and $100,000.

The fund is backed by Newman's Own Foundation, Novo Nordisk, the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation, the Bezos Family Foundation, and the Annie E.

Casey Foundation.

Today in Chicago, cybersecurity researcher and ethical hacker Alissa Knight delivers the lunch keynote on threats facing philanthropy and nonprofits, including ransomware, third-party risk, AI, and data security.

Morning workshops include a funder-grantee AI governance framework, a data cleanup lab, an incident-response tabletop for grantmakers, and a session on designing grants systems that support learning, not just reporting.

Friday's breakfast plenary explores making accessibility a design standard across grantmaking systems, data platforms, and AI-enabled tools, with speakers from the MacArthur Foundation and Borealis Philanthropy.

The lunch plenary features Jim Fruchterman of Tech Matters, drawing on his book Technology for Good, and a panel with MacArthur President John Palfrey and the Annie E.

Casey Foundation's Chigozie Okorie on what philanthropy owes the people whose data it collects and uses.

The conference will also make a special announcement about TAG2027.

The 2026 "Philanthropy in Focus" report, covered Nov. 11, puts ultra-high-net-worth giving at $250 billion in 2025, up nearly 32% since 2022.

A June survey of 569 Goldman Sachs private clients, family businesses, and family offices found that 41% plan to increase giving over the next three years, and only 12% cited tax deductions as a reason to give.

The firm's donor-advised fund reported that the average grant among its U.S. clients grew from $17,500 in 2016 to $77,500 in 2025.

The report also says humanitarian aid contributions are running 44% below their 10-year average.

This afternoon's TAG talks include "Beyond the (Tech) Stack: What it Takes to Build an Organizational AI Platform," "If We Started Today: Designing an AI-Native Grantmaker," and "The AI Journey at 3 Foundations," with executives from the Joyce Foundation, the Kauffman Foundation, and Lumina Foundation.

A session called "The Great AI Debate" is also on the agenda.

The Reynolds Journalism Institute published Civic Share on Nov. 11, a shared search and research hub where journalists, nonprofits, and advocates can upload and find open-records responses, datasets, legal filings, and reporting.

The pilot topic is data centers.

Every upload carries the contributor's name and source, and members agree to credit the work and link back.

AI agents help organize news on chosen topics, and beta testers in the Institute's Innovation Fellowship receive a stipend.

A Thursday session, "From Fragmentation to Flow: Seeing the PDC in Action," is set to walk through the Philanthropy Data Commons, an open-source, consent-based service that lets organizations share application and grantee data across systems.

For funders tired of duplicate forms, it is one of the more concrete interoperability projects in the sector.

Alissa Knight keynote today; Friday plenaries on accessible tech and data stewardship, plus a TAG2027 announcement.

A Candid webinar.

Virtual sessions, live or on demand.

A free Council on Foundations session.

A Candid peer learning exchange.

An NTEN community call.

An NTEN community call.

Grants of $500K to $2M for AI in city services.

A Candid webinar that includes a prompt library.

Open to all.

An NTEN community call.

A donor-advised fund, or DAF, is a charitable account at a sponsoring organization, often a community foundation or a national DAF sponsor.

The donor contributes cash or stock and can usually take a tax deduction at the time of that contribution.

Later, the donor recommends grants to nonprofits.

The sponsor legally owns the money and issues the grants; the donor advises, but does not write the check directly.

That is the structure behind Anthropic's $50 million commitment.

The money sits in a fund at the San Francisco Foundation, which handles the details and brings local expertise to the recommendations.

The grant agreement, payment, and any reporting terms come from the community foundation or DAF sponsor, not the original donor.

Some donors pick every grantee.

Others, as in this case, lean on the sponsor's knowledge of the community.

A DAF grant can be simple and unrestricted, or it can carry the donor's preferences.

Ask early who decided the award, who to thank, and what, if anything, you need to report.

If you receive or hope to receive DAF-funded grants, those three facts are often different people and documents.

The Washington arts program has no reporting requirements and, this year, focused on organizations with budgets under $1 million.

If you run a similar program, check whether your forms and reports still match the flexibility of the money.

Before the week ends, jot down who you call if email, a grants system, or a vendor is compromised, and which grantee data lives with which third parties.