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Big Green Table Grant Eligibility

WHO CAN APPLY

  1. Your organization is a match for unrestricted funding if...

    You strengthen community access to fresh, local food, in at least one of these ways:

    (1) You grow food, including urban farms, community gardens, school gardens, hydroponic growing sites, or any other active food growing operation!

    (2) You help people grow their own food. Home and community growing programs, gardener and/or farmer training, garden education, and/or supplying growers with seeds, tools, and know-how.

    (3) You move fresh, local food to (or within!) your community. You connect local and regional growers to the people who need food access, through farm shares, food hubs, mobile markets, co-ops, or community-led distribution.

    If one of these is your organization's core mission, you are eligible to apply for an unrestricted grant. If you have a dedicated program that meets this criteria inside a broader organization, you are eligible for a restricted grant in support of that program.

    A note on the third path, moving food, we look for a few things that keep this rooted in local food systems rather than general hunger relief: sourcing from small and mid-size growers in your region rather than national commodity surplus, a focus on fresh food, a channel that creates ongoing access rather than one-time handouts, and real roots in the community you serve.

  2. Your program must align to one of four pillars:

    Health, Hunger, Habitat, or Humanity.

    Every Big Green Table grant sits inside one of four pillars. To be eligible, you name the one that best fits your work and commit to reporting on an outcome and a few numbers within it:

    (1) Hunger. Getting fresh food to people who need it and helping communities control more of their own food supply.

    (2) Health. Changing what people eat and how they feel, including the mental health benefits of engaging in gardening.

    (3) Habitat. Caring for land, soil, and growing spaces. Includes urban greening, air quality, and environmental education.

    (4) Humanity. Belonging, culture, young leaders, and community power through food.

    You must apply within one pillar, which determines the cohort you apply within and the short list of outcomes you will be asked to report on.

  3. Corporate eligibility requirements

    One of the following must apply:

    (1) A nonprofit corporation in good standing with the state in which it is incorporated.

    (2) A governmental entity or tribal government.

    (3) Registered to solicit charitable contributions as applicable.

    (4) An organization operating under a fiscal sponsorship that meets the requirements outlined below.

  4. Fiscally sponsored organizations

    If you are a nonprofit organization that does not yet have 501c3 status and your fiscal sponsor meets the following minimum requirements, you are eligible to apply:

    (1) Fiscal Sponsor has been in existence for at least 5 years.

    (2) It has at least $1,000,000 in assets.

    (3) It has sponsored other organizations previously.

    (4) You have had a fiscal sponsor agreement in place for at least 6 months prior to the application date.

    (5) Your fiscal sponsor’s fees are less than 10% of the total granted amount.

    *Fiscal sponsors of more than one grantee may be subject to additional eligibility or reporting requirements.

  5. Additional requirements

    Tax Classification – an organization must meet one of the requirements of Section 170(c)(2)(B) of the Internal Revenue Code (“Code”):

    (1) An entity organized or created in the United States or its possessions, or under the laws of the United States, any state, the District of Columbia or any possession of the United States, and organized and operated exclusively for charitable, religious, educational, scientific, or literary purposes, or for the prevention of cruelty to children or animals: 509(a)(1) public charities and 509(a)(2) organizations.

    (2) A church, synagogue, mosque, or other religious organization.

    (3) A war veterans' organization or its post, auxiliary, trust, or foundation organized in the United States or its possessions (501(c)(19).

    (4) A civil defense organization created under federal, state, or local law.

    (5) A nonprofit volunteer fire company.

    (6) A domestic fraternal society, operating under the lodge system, but only if the contribution is to be used exclusively for charitable purposes.

    (7) A nonprofit cemetery company if the funds are irrevocably dedicated to the perpetual care of the cemetery as a whole and not a particular lot or mausoleum crypt.

    (8) A state or United States possession (or political subdivision thereof), or the United States or the District of Columbia, if made exclusively for public purposes; This includes federally recognized Indian tribes and their political subdivisions (IRC 7871). It also includes public schools and universities.

  6. Non-eligible organizations, programs, or projects

    (1) Food work with no local growing or sourcing and no community building, such as warehouses redistributing national surplus, grocery retail, or large-scale logistics.

    (2) Umbrella organizations.

    (3) Projects to “add a garden.”

    (4) Organizations with racially discriminatory practices.

    (5) Private foundations and private operating foundations.
    (6) Groups that participate in partisan politics.

    (7) Type III Supporting Organizations under Section 509(a)(3)(B)(iii).

    (8) Foreign organizations.

    (9) Terrorist organizations.

    (10) Re-granting organizations.

    (11) For profit entities.

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