Grants

Spring Cycle Deadlines

• Letter of Intent submission entries between January 1 – February 19 @ 10:00 PM CST
• If invited after LOI review, charitable organizations are asked to submit grant applications entries between March 24 – May 5 @ 10:00 PM CST
• Organizations who received grant funding, progress report due May 13 of the following year

Fall Cycle Deadlines

• Letter of Intent submission entries between July 1 – August 27  @ 10:00 PM CST
• If invited after LOI review, charitable organizations are asked to submit grant applications entries between September 20 – October 29 @ 10:00 PM CST  
• Organizations who received grant funding, progress report due November 12 of the following year

Suppose the DBCT Grant Review Committee has approved an organization’s Letter of Intent and is interested in pursuing your funding request. In that case, you will receive an invitation to apply for the upcoming grant cycle. The invitation will include detailed instructions about how and where to apply.

As a point of reference, once invited, completed full-grant applications must be submitted via our grant interface portal by May 5 (Spring) or October 29 (Fall), depending on the grant cycle you are invited to apply for.

If you receive a grant from The Dana Brown Charitable Trust, you must complete an end-of-year follow-up/progress report within ten months of the initial notice you’ve been awarded a grant. This report is assigned from the grant platform and you must log in to your organization’s site to complete the full or interim report for the grant awarded. Deadlines for progress reports are as follows:

• If you received a grant during our Spring grant cycle (June), your progress report is due on May 13.
• If you received a grant during our Fall grant cycle (December), your progress report is due by November 12.

The Dana Brown Charitable Trust is not an operating charitable foundation. Its purpose is to disburse funds to public charities that are presently recognized as qualified 501(c)(3) organizations for the accomplishment of the Trust’s outlined and directed charitable purposes.

Accordingly, grants will not be made directly to individuals. In addition, the DBCT Grant Review Committee may wish to make grants directly to the charitable organizations that will utilize the funds and, therefore, generally will not consider requests from Supporting Organizations. Grants will not be awarded for feasibility studies. Multi-year grants will be limited based on the original Dana Brown Trust document, and the fulfillment of immediate needs will generally be preferred over long-term possibilities.

Regardless of whether or not your organization receives a grant from the Dana Brown Charitable Trust, you can only submit one Letter of Intent per year. That means if you submit a Letter of Intent for the Spring 2024 grant cycle, you cannot submit another Letter of Intent until Spring 2025.

Additionally, suppose you are invited to submit a full grant application, regardless of whether or not you receive funding. In that case, you can still not submit a new Letter of Intent until the following year.

Finally, if you do receive funding from The Dana Brown Charitable Trust, you may not submit a new Letter of Intent until a full year after you’ve received your final grant-payment from The Dana Brown Charitable Trust. (Example: You receive your last award from The Dana Brown Charitable Trust on 10/01/24, you may not submit another Letter of Intent until after 10/01/25.)

To be invited to apply for funding from The Dana Brown Charitable Trust, you must first submit a Letter of Intent and be asked by the DBCT Grant Review Committee to apply. This form must be completed on The Dana Brown Charitable Trust grant platform.

The Dana Brown Charitable Trust views our journey as a philanthropic adventure where the outcome provides opportunity, support, and growth to our St. Louis Community.

The purpose of Dana Brown Charitable Trust is to provide grants to organizations in the St. Louis area that support financially disadvantaged children (up to age 18) and programs that enable children to expand their knowledge of the world and nature through programs featuring wild animals in the St. Louis, Missouri, Metropolitan area (MSA).