Blue Meridian Partners is a nonprofit funding collaborative headed by the Edna McConnell Clark Foundation (EMCF) in partnership with several other left-leaning grantmaking organizations. The organization was founded in 2016 with the intent of making large investments in organizations that promote youth anti-poverty and social assistance programs, with the goal of such donations underwriting planning to scale up such organizations. ¹ In addition to the Edna McConnell Clark Foundation, the organization is supported by several other donor organizations including some of the largest left-leaning advocacy funding organizations in the United States such as The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, and the Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Foundation. ²

Background

In a press release dated January 2016, Nancy Roob, the CEO of the Edna McConnell Clark Foundation, announced that the foundation was incubating a new funding project called Blue Meridian Partners with the intention of making large-scale investments to support the long-term growth of nonprofit organizations. The foundation launched Blue Meridian Partners alongside nine other partners. The founding partners included six general partners giving over $50 million to the new organization: The Ballmer Group, The Edna McConnell Clark Foundation, Stanley and Fiona Druckenmiller, The Duke Endowment (with a focus on North Carolina and South Carolina), George Kaiser Family Foundation (with a focus on Tulsa, Oklahoma), and The Samberg Family Foundation. Four other organizations committed over $10 million to the organization including: The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, The JPB Foundation, the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, and the Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Foundation. ³

Blue Meridian Partners also gained prominence in 2020 for being featured in Billionaire Mackenzie Scott’s “116 Organizations Driving Change.”  Scott, the billionaire ex-wife of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, rose to prominence in 2020 by announcing that she would give away most of her vast fortune to left leaning advocacy groups, many of which focused on race and gender issues. ⁴

Since its founding in 2016, Blue Meridian Partners was spun off from the Edna McConnell Clark Foundation and established as a separate 501(c)(3) organization, with Nancy Roob, the president and CEO of the Clark Foundation also serving as CEO of Blue Meridian Partners. Roob, along with other officers at Blue Meridian Partners including Charles Harris and Ralph Stephano, are all employed full time by the Clark Foundation. Roob earned over $700,000 in compensation from the foundation in 2017. ⁵

Donor Organizations

Blue Meridian Partners has expanded its list of funding partners to sixteen since it was founded. Partners of the organization as of December 2020 included:⁶

• The Druckenmiller Foundation
• The Edna McConnell Clark Foundation
• Ballmer Group, Philanthropy
• Arrow Impact
• The Samberg Family Foundation
• The Sergey Brin Family Foundation
• The David Tepper Charitable Foundation, Inc.
• The Duke Endowment
• George Kaiser Family Foundation
• The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation
• The JPB Foundation
• MacKenzie Scott
• The Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Foundation
• Aviv Foundation
• Eugene and Marilyn Stein Family Foundation
• Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

Donation Recipients

Blue Meridian Partners makes large contributions to a select number of organizations annually; most of the gifts range from ten to twenty million dollars. Organizations funded by Blue Meridian include:⁷

• The Nurse Family Partnership
• Year Up
• Tulsa Community Foundation
• Center for Employment Opportunities
• The Bail Project
• The Duke Endowment

1. “Overview.” Blue Meridian Partners. Accessed December 29, 2020. https://www.bluemeridian.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Blue-Meridian-Intro-Overview-2020.pdf
2. Roob, Nancy. “Announcing Blue Meridian Partners and More.” Edna McConnell Clark Foundation. January 29, 2016. Accessed December 29, 2020. https://www.emcf.org/news-perspectives/story/announcing-blue-meridian-partners-and-more-1/
3. Roob, Nancy. “Announcing Blue Meridian Partners and More.” Edna McConnell Clark Foundation. January 29, 2016. Accessed December 29, 2020. https://www.emcf.org/news-perspectives/story/announcing-blue-meridian-partners-and-more-1/
4. Scott, MacKenzie. “116 Organizations Driving Change.” Medium. July 28, 2020. Accessed December 29, 2020. https://medium.com/@mackenzie_scott/116-organizations-driving-change-67354c6d733d
5. “IRS Form 990.” Blue Meridian Partners. 2018. Accessed December 29, 2020. https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/display_990/815086187/07_2019_prefixes_77-82%2F815086187_201809_990_2019071216485636
6. “Overview.” Blue Meridian Partners. Accessed December 29, 2020. https://www.bluemeridian.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Blue-Meridian-Intro-Overview-2020.pdf
7. “IRS Form 990.” Blue Meridian Partners. 2018. Accessed December 29, 2020. https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/display_990/815086187/07_2019_prefixes_77-82%2F815086187_201809_990_2019071216485636