Chicago Community Trust

The Chicago Community Trust mobilizes people, ideas, organizations and resources to advance equity, opportunity and prosperity for all.

In 2019, the Trust launched a ten-year strategic plan focused on addressing the region’s racial and ethnic wealth gap. The three-part strategy to close this gap centers around growing household wealth, catalyzing neighborhood investment and building collective power. In addition to this work, the Trust will continue to address the critical needs of the region and maximize the impact of philanthropic giving.

The Chicago Community Trust was founded in 1915 by Norman Wait Harris, founder of the Harris Trust and Savings Bank, and his son Albert Wadsworth Harris.[6]  The founders were inspired by The Cleveland Foundation, the world’s first community foundation, which was established the year before.[6]  Most of the Trust’s funding during 1915–1930 focused on relief and humanitarian work for residents impacted by Chicago’s rapid industrialization. The Trust awarded its first grant in 1916, to United Charities for $5,000. The first major gift was from James A. Patton, “the grain king,” for $1 million in 1924.[6]  The first bequest of $30,687 came two years later from the estate of Alex Demond.[6]  In the early 1920s, the Trust commissioned landmark social surveys that identified the needs of those incarcerated at the Cook County Jail, immigrants, children with disabilities, single women, veterans, and the elderly.[6]

During the Great Depression in the 1930s, Frank Loomis, executive director of the Trust, and Edward L. Ryerson Jr., Trust Executive Committee member, coordinated multiple relief drives through the Governor’s Commission on Unemployment and Relief and the Emergency Welfare Fund of Cook County. These drives raised $22 million from 1930–1933 and inspired the creation of multiple campaigns and funds, including the precursor to the United Way of Metropolitan Chicago.[6]  The Trust made a grant to the 1933 Century of Progress world’s fair in Chicago, which was visited by nearly 40 million people.[7]

Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, the Trust funded multiple cultural institutions and projects, including a design for the downtown lakefront along Grant Park and the creation of the Chicago Botanic Garden. It provided critical funds to schools, nurseries, and day care centers after the Our Lady of the Angels School Fire in 1958. In 1964, John G. Searle and Frances C. Searle became, and remain, the largest donors in the Trust’s history when they created the first Searle Fund at the Trust.

In 1976, the Trust awarded $3 million in grants to the Leadership Council for Metropolitan Open Communities to oversee the Gautreaux Housing Program. Considered the nation’s first “housing mobility program,” Gautreaux placed 7,100 low-income families into mixed-income neighborhoods.[8]  In 2001, the Trust co-founded the Partnership for New Communities,[9] which supported the largest and most ambitious public housing redevelopment in the country.[10]  From 2000–2014, the Trust incubated several nonprofits, including Voices for Illinois Children and the IFF (formerly Illinois Facilities Fund). It also funded the Harris Theater for Music and Dance, 12th World Summit of Nobel Peace Laureates, Millennium Park, and the Burnham Plan Centennial.

From 2014–2015 the Trust celebrated its Centennial by partnering with multiple nonprofits and cultural institutions to organize new events in Chicago. In 2014, the Trust founded On the Table,[11]  an annual one-day forum designed to elevate civic conversation and spark collective action. More than 250,000 people have participated since 2014, and more than 30 communities have replicated On the Table events. In 2015, the Trust partnered with the Chicago Public Library’s “One Book One Chicago” program,[12]  Chicago Ideas Week,[13] and the Chicago Humanities Festival to foster civic dialogue. Also, in 2015, it announced the SMART Growth Program[14] – a capacity-building program for Cook County’s small arts and cultural organizations.

The Trust offers multiple ways for donors and their professional advisors to partner with the Trust including donor advised funds, endowment funds, supporting organizations, impact investing, and charitable estate planning services. The Trust also has the ability to facilitate gifts of complex assets ranging from business interests to real estate.

The Trust’s governing board is the Executive Committee which is made up of 17 community leaders who provide strategic and fiduciary oversight. The Trust’s structure includes both trust and corporate entities. The trust entity, The Chicago Community Trust, serves solely Cook County and administers the majority of its assets under the 1915 Declaration of Trust. Chief executives of Bank of America, BMO Harris Bank, JPMorgan Chase & Co., Northern Trust, and US Bank serve as trustees for these funds. The Trustees Committee also appoints members of the Trust Executive Committee and advises on development and community relations matters.[15]

The corporate entity, The Chicago Community Foundation, has a broader geographic area of concern and offers flexibility with respect to the funds’ investment management and grant making. The Trust’s Executive Committee serves as the board of directors for The Chicago Community Foundation.[16]

As of September 30, 2019, the Trust’s consolidated assets totaled more than $3.3 billion. During the 2019 fiscal year, the Trust received $472 million in new gifts and made combined grant commitments totaling more than $369 million.

The Trust awards discretionary to organizations in Cook County, DuPage County, Kane County, Lake County, McHenry County, and Will County that benefit residents of the Chicago region that fulfill the charitable purposes of the Trust. The Trust also accepts applications from agencies that have a nonprofit fiscal sponsor. Each grant opportunity will have additional criteria for funding.[17]

The Trust partners with three foundations that serve communities beyond Cook County, the county in which Chicago resides.

• The Community Foundation for McHenry County
• The Lake County Community Foundation
• The Community Foundation of Will County

• Silicon Valley Community Foundation, another community foundation in the United States

• Chicago Community Trust Excellence in Dance Initiatives Records at Newberry Library