Total Assets (2011): $6,334,099
Total Assets (2002): $28,161,128[1]
Total Giving (2011): $7,205,000
Total Giving (2002): $2,002,811
Prominent Grants:$235,000 in 2002 to the National Resources Defense Council. $685,000 in 2003 to the Tides Foundation & Tides Center.
Summary: The HKH Foundation is named for Harold K. Hochschild, former executive head of the American Metal Company. The Foundation professed allegiance to one overriding philanthropic imperative: “to create new possibilities in pursuit of meaningful and lasting change” in a society where social and racial injustice are widespread. In this effort to create new possibilities, the Foundation sought to “convene, challenge and enable visionaries, advocates and activists across our areas of grant-making.” These areas included environmental protection, safeguarding civil liberties, peace and security, civic engagement, and protecting the commons. Further, HKHF long reserved a portion of its philanthropy for groups and causes in the Adirondack region of upstate New York.
Among HKHF’s notable grantees are 350.org, American Civil Liberties Union, the Center for American Progress, the Center for Media and Democracy, the Greenpeace Fund, the League of Conservation Voters, the National Security Archive, and more.
A member of the Peace and Security Funders Group, HKHF concluded its grant-making by the end of 2012. Harriet Barlow, an HKHF board member, stated that money used to build an endowment is, in effect, out of circulation and “is not nearly as effective in sustaining the common good as money that’s in circulation.” Thus, the foundation spent out and closed down by the end of 2012.