L.A. Clippers Foundation
/OVERVIEW: This professional basketball team funder primarily supports causes that improve the lives of underserved children and youth in Los Angeles County.
IP TAKE: The L.A. Clippers Foundation’s largest grants support large city- or county-wide initiatives to improve the lives of children and youth. It also awards smaller grants to organizations working in education, health and community development. It maintains only a simple webpage on the larger NBA website and does not accept requests for funding. Without a connection to the team or its staff, it will be difficult to get this funder’s attention.
PROFILE: The L.A. Clippers Foundation, established in 1994, is a philanthropic entity of the Los Angeles Clippers NBA basketball team, which is owned by Steve Ballmer, a former CEO of Microsoft. The foundation’s mission is “to to inspire a child to make a positive difference in their L.A.” This funder makes grants and in-kind donations to organizations in Southern California and pursues efforts to motivate “corporate partners and fans to meet their passion and exceed their investment.” Grantmaking areas include education, public health, housing, food systems and community development. This funder maintains a simple webpage and does not offer extensive information about its grantmaking priorities.
Grants for K-12 Education
K-12 education is a main area of focus for this funder. While the foundation does not name specific goals for its giving in this area, it appears to prioritize programs for underserved K-12 students in Los Angeles County. One grantee, Learn Fresh Education, produces and maintains online learning resources that “leverage students' passion for sports and entertainment to inspire their STEM and social-emotional learning.” Other education grantees include PS Science, another online resource that helps teachers bring “hands-on STEM learning to elementary school children in underserved communities.” The foundation has also supported out-of-school learning programs at organizations including the YMCA of Metropolitan Los Angeles and Think Together, which “works with school districts and local communities to offer extended learning programs for underprivileged and low-income children.”
Grants for Public Health and Mental Health
The L.A. Clippers Foundation does not name priorities for health grantmaking but has demonstrated a commitment to health care access for underserved and underinsured people in Los Angeles County. The foundation partnered with Vision to Learn and Los Angeles Public Schools “to provide free vision screening and glasses for all 600,000+ students.” Another grant went to Antelope Valley Partners for Health, which provides health and mental health services to poor and vulnerable people in Lancaster, California. The foundation has also supported mental health initiatives run by the Mar Vista Family Center and the City of Inglewood Senior Center.
Grants for Community Development
The Clippers Foundation’s grantmaking for community development has focused mainly on the development or revitalization of outdoor spaces for sports and recreation. Leading up to the 2028 Olympic Games in Los Angeles, the foundation “pledged to renovate every public basketball court in Los Angeles” through a $10 million grant to the Los Angeles’s Parks Foundation. Other grants in this area have supported the Play Equity Fund of Los Angeles, the United States Adaptive Recreation Center and the Neighborhood Youth Association of Venice, California.
Important Grant Details
The Clippers Foundation’s grants mostly range from $10,000 to $200,000, although the foundation has made some larger gifts in year past for major collaborations.
Grantmaking is mainly limited to organizations serving communities in Los Angeles County. Only a few national organizations have received support over the past several years
For additional information about past grants, see the foundation’s recent tax filings.
This funder does not run a grant application program, but contact information for the foundation is provided below.
Submit general inquiries to the foundation via email at LAClippersFoundation@clippers.com.
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CONTACT:
L.A. Clippers Foundation
NE 4th St., Ste. 3000
Bellevue, WA 98004
(425) 440-0522
