Weeden Foundation Grant

The Weeden Foundation Grant supports biodiversity conservation initiatives worldwide. It prioritizes projects that protect endangered species, restore habitats, and promote sustainable practices. The foundation funds 501(c)(3) organizations or their international equivalents, focusing on areas such as bird conservation, marine wildlife protection, and systemic support for environmental policies. Applicants must submit a Letter of Inquiry four weeks before the application deadline, and the foundation does not fund multi-year grants or projects outside its focus areas.

NOTE: The Foundation requires that new applicants complete a Letter of Inquiry (LOI) which is due 4 weeks before the application deadline. Please complete the “New Applicants” form to submit your LOI. You will receive a confirmation email when your form is complete. We will review your application and get back to you with a reply. If the work proposed is of interest and/or fits into one of our program areas, we will invite a full proposal.
The Foundation embraces the protection of biodiversity as its overarching priority.
Frank Weeden, the Foundation’s founder and original benefactor, established the Weeden Foundation to address the impact of growing human populations and overuse of natural resources on the biological fabric of the planet. Since his death in 1984, the Foundation has helped preserve more than 6 million acres of biologically important habitat worldwide and provided financing for the first debt-for-nature swap in Bolivia in 1992, a strategy that is now widely used by international conservation organizations. Program efforts have supported projects in environmentally sensitive regions of the western United States, Alaska, Russia, Bolivia, Chile, Peru, Columbia, Ecuador, Belize, Namibia, Mexico, and various Caribbean nations.
Focus Areas
On a more general scale the Foundation supports the following focus areas.
Bird Conservation
Our goal in the Bird Conservation program area is to conserve wild birds and their habitats throughout the Americas. In particular we seek to fund grantees that work to prevent bird species extinctions and to prevent declining populations of bird species from becoming endangered.
Systemic Support program at the U.S. national policy level for wildlife corridors, the Endangered Species Act, and additional wilderness designation.
Specific objectives include:
support the Endangered Species Act through litigation, lobbying, grassroots campaigns and public education generally, promote organizations providing support for groups engaged in wilderness protection, land conservation, endangered species protection, wildlife corridor issues, and management of public lands, an improve federal and state support for environmentally sustainable practices, wilderness designations, and wildlife corridors.
Global Biodiversity
Specific objectives are to
protect global temperate rainforests,support creation of wildlife corridors, land acquisition and protection for endangered species and, support projects that involve indigenous peoples in the process and stewardship of conservation projects.
Environmental Education
The Foundation’s Environment Education program area focuses on supporting grantees that will provide future leaders with the tools to effect environmental policies. These policies complement the other grantees of the Foundation including biodiversity and habitat protection. Sustainable environmental policies must include both immediate actions as well as education to anticipate and to prevent future environmental impact.
Marine Wildlife Conservation
The Marine Wildlife Conservation Program Area focuses on helping to protect endangered marine species in the Americas through research, advocacy, policy change, and habitat conservation.
To address the adverse impact of economic and human population growth on biodiversity, the Foundation’s grantmaking includes both Consumption and Population programs.
The Foundation’s Sustainable Consumption program currently focuses on promoting greater use of environmental paper. Grantmaking in this area aims to broaden the market for environmental papers and packaging through markets campaigns, shareholder activism, consumer-targeted education, and dialogue with the corporate sector. This year we have expanded our packaging program to include efforts to reduce plastics in the waste stream, through strategies such as eliminating single use plastic disposables by promoting reusable packaging for grocery stores, take-out, and delivery.
The Foundation’s International Population program area is focused on reducing population growth rates in countries recognized for their rich biodiverse landscapes and that have a total fertility rate exceeding replacement levels. To achieve this goal, the Foundation funds groups that facilitate initiatives related to family planning, women’s education and women’s empowerment in countries with such rich and recognized biodiversity. The Foundation also supports advocacy efforts addressing global population growth in the context of environmental sustainability.

Eligibility

We only fund 501 (c)(3) organizations or its international equivalent.
The Foundation protects biodiversity directly in four geographical program areas.Alaska – In Southeastern Alaska, we focus on the Tongass National Forest by maintaining Clinton-era Roadless Rule protections and expanding other protections such as wilderness designations.California Floristic Province – The California Floristic Province grantmaking, primarily in Northern California, focuses on the protection of salmon, land, wildlife corridors as well as the restoration of rivers.Montana – Focused in the High Divide in SW Montana this program area mainly aims to identify and protect wildlife corridors, reduce livestock-carnivore conflict, and to expand critical habitat for endangered species.Chilean Patagonia – The Foundation promotes the expansion and institutionalization of private land conservation initiatives, with a focus on protecting endangered watersheds, and counters threats such as dams, industrial forestry, salmon aquaculture, and mining projects.

Ineligibility

We don’t do multi-year grants. Given the Foundation’s diverse interests and notwithstanding the above, it is sometimes easier to state what is of little interest to the trustees. These include:preservation of what is frequently called the “working landscape”, museums, capital construction, animal rights, growth management, toxic contamination, films and videos, wildlife rehabilitation, government-based projects, faith-based organizations, solid waste, energy (with the exception of dams), universities, student fellowships, and basic scientific research.