The Cleveland Foundation, based in

Cleveland Cleveland is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Cuyahoga County. Located along the southern shore of Lake Erie, it is situated across the Canada–U.S. maritime border and approximately west of the Ohio-Pennsylvania st ...

Ohio Ohio ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. It borders Lake Erie to the north, Pennsylvania to the east, West Virginia to the southeast, Kentucky to the southwest, Indiana to the ...

, is the world's first

community foundation Community foundations (CFs) are instruments of civil society designed to pool donations into a coordinated investment and grant making facility dedicated primarily to the social improvement of a given place. Community foundations are a global pheno ...

and one of the largest today, with assets of $2.8 billion and annual grants of more than $100 million. The Cleveland Foundation partners with donors to improve the lives of residents in Cuyahoga,

Lake A lake is often a naturally occurring, relatively large and fixed body of water on or near the Earth's surface. It is localized in a basin or interconnected basins surrounded by dry land. Lakes lie completely on land and are separate from ...

and Geauga counties, now and for generations to come. The Cleveland Foundation is made up of more than 800 funds representing individuals, families, organizations and corporations. The current president and chief executive officer is Lillian Kuri. The foundation was established in 1914 by Frederick Harris Goff, a well-known lawyer and banker at the Cleveland Trust Company, who sought to eliminate the "dead hand" of organized philanthropy, where charitable dollars were trapped in outdated, irrevocable wills. Frederick Harris Goff led from 1914 to 1919. Raymond C. Moley led the foundation from 1919 to 1923. Carlton K. Matson, 1924–1928. Leyton E. Carter led the Foundation for 25 years, from 1928 to 1953. From 1953 to 1967, J. Kimball Johnson. James A. Norton, 1968–1973, left the foundation upon State of Ohio Governor John J. Gilligan’s invitation to serve as chancellor of the

Ohio Board of Regents The Ohio Board of Regents was created in 1963 by the Ohio General Assembly to: provide higher education policy advice to the Governor of Ohio and the Ohio General Assembly; develop a strategy involving Ohio's public and independent colleges and ...

. Barbara Haas Rawson served as interim director, 1973–1974. Homer C. Wadsworth, 1974–1983. Steven A. Minter, who had served as the commissioner of public welfare for the State of Massachusetts and first under secretary of the

US Department of Education US or Us most often refers to: * ''Us'' (pronoun), the objective case of the English first-person plural pronoun ''we'' * US, an abbreviation for the United States US, U.S., Us, us, or u.s. may also refer to: Arts and entertainment Albums * ...

, was CEO from 1984 to 2003. Ronald B. Richard, with experience in the U.S. Foreign Service, the CIA, and the private sector, led the foundation from 2003–2023.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cleveland Foundation Organizations based in Cleveland Philanthropy 1914 establishments in Ohio Community foundations based in the United States Non-profit organizations based in Ohio Organizations established in 1914 United States National Medal of Arts recipients