RWN Foundation: Sustainable Communities Grants

The Ronald W. Naito MD Foundation offers Sustainable Communities Grants aimed at fostering social equity and environmental sustainability. Since its inception in 2019, the foundation supports nonprofits globally to address climate change, health disparities, and community transformation. With a trust-based approach, grants are unrestricted, enabling organizations to allocate funds according to their unique needs. The foundation values initiatives that promote social justice, economic empowerment, and environmental justice, particularly those benefiting historically marginalized communities.

NOTE: Suspended funding "new" organizations for winter of 2026.
Ron Naito, the Ronald W. Naito MD Foundation continues his legacy of healing by supporting nonprofit organizations that strengthen, protect, and transform our communities and our planet.
Our grants support organizations working all over the world to mitigate the climate crisis, reduce health disparities, and build communities that are socially equitable and environmentally sustainable.
Our grants are trust-based. Because we respect the expertise of our nonprofit partners and understand that they know best how to spend their funds, all of our grants are unrestricted.
Funding Area: Sustainable Communities
Sustainable Communities grants often intersect with our Climate and/or Health Equity funding areas, incorporating social justice advocacy, economic initiatives, climate adaptation, and other human rights and environmental justice initiatives that impact health outcomes, lead to healing, and increase communities’ capacity to thrive.
This includes (but isn’t limited to):
Social justice, civil rights, and anti-hate initiatives that build power, sovereignty, community, and resources for people whose wellness and success are threatened by systemic prejudice or injustice.Triple-bottom-line initiatives that help historically-marginalized communities gain access to sustainable economic power and lasting health benefits.Environmental justice work that impacts the health and success of historically marginalized communities, and that help communities adapt to the impacts of the climate crisis.
All of these are united by healing — of prejudice and hate, of inequities, and of the many social, economic, and environmental factors that adversely impact people’s health and well-being.
Funding Areas
Our grants focus on four key areas of healing.
ClimateHealth EquityOregon Arts & CultureSustainable Communities
Current Funding Trends
Priority areas:
Climate crisis mitigation, especially aggressive efforts to curtail or prevent new greenhouse gas emissionsInternational and domestic long-term health equity initiatives, including systems visioning and market reformsHealth equity initiatives addressing aging and supporting eldersSystemic initiatives and advocacy/policy/litigative work in any of our funding priorities, especially those that protect individuals’ and communities’ rights and wellness
Over-represented areas:
Arts initiativesFrontline services, especially organizations supporting people with mental health or substance use needs and organizations supporting survivors of child abuse and domestic and sexual violenceOrganizations facing federal funding cuts (we are so sorry we can’t support all of you!)
We value these types of work and still seek applications from these categories, but applicants may find these categories slightly more competitive if current trends continue.

Eligibility

To be eligible for Ronald W. Naito MD Foundation funding, your organization must:Be a Section 501(c)3 tax-exempt organization that is classified as a public charity under Section 509(a) 1 or 2 of the United States tax code or have a fiscal sponsor with documented Memorandum of Understanding (MOU).Have an office or affiliate office within the United States and a US EIN. Foreign organizations with active US-equivalency determinations may also be considered.Comply with Ronald W. Naito MD Foundation’s anti-discrimination policy that ensures it does not grant to organizations that discriminate based on race, ethnicity, color, sex, religion, age, national origin, ancestry, citizenship, sexual orientation, gender identity and/or expression, disability, marital status, genetic information, veteran status, or other factors protected by law.If your organization has received a grant from us in the last three years (since Summer 2022), you are eligible to reapply as long as your current grant term will have expired by when funding will be issued and as long as you have checked in with us either by a final grant report or a conversation.

Ineligibility

We don’t fund:Small business incubator/angel-investor organizations.Chambers of commerce or local development authorities or neighborhood associations, or business- or chamber-driven economic development initiatives.Alternative living communities.Disaster relief.Economic initiatives that involve biomass fuels, the harvesting of timber, or other reliance on extractive economies.Environmental justice initiatives that affect only one watershed or community.501(c)4 organizations or any type of organization that private foundations cannot fund without additional due diligence (apologies: we don’t have the staff capacity).Organizations/initiatives that do not have a sustained presence in, or leadership from, the communities they seek to resource.In order to meet IRS rules for private foundations, and to ensure impactful and equitable grantmaking, we will not consider grant requests from:Organizations whose primary constituents are not under-resourced (save in climate, which we regard of global impact). To us, “under-resourced” includes many rural communities, as well as people impacted by racial, gender, orientation, income, age, health, ability, and other biases.Organizations that require clients to meet certain mandates to access services (mandated “volunteering” or classes, proof of employment/job-seeking, membership dues, high barrier shelters, faith requirements or proselytizing, etc).Organizations with messaging or practices that are othering or exclusionary, or that don’t have strong leadership by and buy-in from the communities they are seeking to support or resource.Primarily government-, corporate-, member-, or industry-funded nonprofits, except when there is a specific request that can’t be funded through normal means.Memorial or endowment campaigns, deficit reduction, or debt retirement.Capital projects with budgets over $1 million. Given the size of our grants, we tend not to fund many capital projects.Fraternal organizations, service clubs, labor organizations, neighborhood associations, merchant associations, chambers of commerce, etc.Organizations closely affiliated with or co-branded with a business or celebrity.Section 501(c)4 or (c)6 organizations or 509(a)3 supporting organizations; political organizations or organizations designed primarily to lobby or advance legislation or political candidates.Private foundations. In limited circumstances, private operating foundations may be acceptable. We are also open to funders collaboratives on our issue areas.Individuals, including innovators or creators in areas that we fund.Faith-based organizations, even if the programs being delivered are secular. We apologize: there’s much essential work being done by organizations within faith traditions, but we don’t have the capacity to verify program secularity.Note: We will consider supporting history, heritage, educational, and cultural organizations or projects that explain or interpret a faith community’s experience or traditions as long as that community is historically under-resourced and as long as the organization is open to the public, non-proselytizing, and not based in a school or house of worship.Any cause from which our trustees or their family or business partners would benefit financially, professionally, educationally, or otherwiseAny other activities or organizations for which support would violate IRS regulations governing private foundations.Impact investment opportunities through our grants.