Makeway Foundation (formerly Tides Canada Foundation)

The Makeway Foundation, previously titled the Tides Canada Foundation, is a Vancouver, Canada-based nonprofit associated with the Tides Nexus, a collection of center-left pass-through grantmaking and fiscal sponsorship nonprofits based in San Francisco, California. Despite its name, Makeway Foundation is an IRS-designated 501(c)(3) public charity and files annual Form 990 reports in the United States; it is also registered as a “public foundation” in Canada. ^{1 2}

Background

The Makeway Foundation, then Tides Canada Foundation, rose to prominence around 2010 when journalist Vivian Krause revealed that the group had quietly funneled $15 million to 36 Canadian activist groups to protest construction of oil pipelines from the Alberta tar sands to refineries in Texas, much of which originated with the Tides Foundation in the United States.^{3 2}

The Makeway Foundation serves as a pass-through for other environmentalist donors, including the Swiss-based Oak Foundation, which moved $700,000 through it to Tides Canada in 2009 “to raise the visibility of the tar sands issue and slow the expansion of tar sands production by stopping new infrastructure development.” Krause ultimately discovered that some $300 million had flowed from American foundations to Canada’s environmentalist groups between 2000 and 2012.³

In 2019, the Foundation launched an in-house donor-advised fund, ImpactDAF, to channel more money into left-wing activism as part of a new development in philanthropy called “impact investing.” The minimum to open an account is $1 million. All grants are measured against UN Sustainable Development Goals.⁴

Tides Foundation has been described as an organization that “washes” away the paper trail between its grants and the original donor. ⁵  Tides Founder Drummond Pike stated, “Anonymity is very important to most of the people we work with,” to describe the intentions of Tides’ donors.⁶

Leadership

President & CEO

Joanna Kerr is the president and CEO of Makeway Foundation as of 2024. Joining the Foundation in 2019, she previously served as the head of Greenpeace Canada, worked for ActionAid International in South Africa, and was the executive director of the Association for Women’s Rights in Development (AWID). She serves as board chair for the Canada-based Equality Fund and is the International Board Chair of World Animal Protection. ⁷

Board of Directors

According to its 2022 Form 990, Makeway’s board of directors includes the following individuals: ⁸

• Denise Williams (Board Chair)
• Aerin Jacob (Secretary)
• Maxine Ifill (Treasurer)

Funding

Financial Overview

Makeway Foundation is a Vancouver, Canada-based nonprofit associated with the Tides organizations in San Francisco. The Foundation is an IRS-designated 501(c)(3) public charity and files annual Form 990 reports in the United States; it is also registered as a “public foundation” in Canada.

In 2018, the Foundation reported total revenues of $1.9 million, total expenditures of $3.7 million, and net assets of $45.3 million. It paid out $2.7 million in grants to other nonprofits. ⁹

According to its 2022 990 form, the Foundation reported a revenue of $34,151,325, expenses at $20,088,236, and total assets of $68,839,302. ¹⁰

In December 2025, Makeway was one of multiple organizations that received a grant from Yield Giving, the philanthropic initiative started by MacKenzie Scott, the ex-wife of Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos. In 2025 alone, Scott, through Yield Giving, donated over $7.16 billion to philanthropies and other charity organizations around the world. ¹¹

Tides Canada Initiative Society

The Makeway Foundation is closely connected with the Tides Canada Initiatives Society, a Canadian nonprofit equivalent to a U.S.-based 501(c)(3) public charity, whose primary activity involves “programs focused on environmental conservation, education and research, leadership development, civic engagement, capacity building and social welfare programs.” ¹²

In 2018, all paid grants for the Makeway Foundation, then titled Tides Canada, went to the Tides Canada Initiatives Society: ¹³

• $1,364,500
• $1,288,099
• $92,490
• $254,811
• $25,097