Location Seattle, Washington Founder Dorothy Bullitt | Website bullitt.org Founded 1952 | |
 | ||
Key people Denis Hayes, President and CEO Similar Rockefeller Brothers Fund, The Kresge Foundation, Tides, David and Lucile Packard, Ceres | ||
The Bullitt Foundation is a foundation established in 1952 by Dorothy S. Bullitt, a prominent Seattle businesswoman and philanthropist who founded King Broadcasting Company in Seattle. Its assets as of the end of 2010 were in excess of US$104M.
After Dorothy Bullitt died in 1989, the foundation inherited 28% of the stock from King Broadcasting Company.
In 1992, the Bullitt Foundation hired internationally recognized conservationist Denis Hayes as President. Soon thereafter, it began to broaden the Board beyond family members and decided to devote the Foundation exclusively to protecting and restoring the environment of the Pacific Northwest.
The Foundation's mission is "to safeguard the natural environment by promoting responsible human activities and sustainable communities in the Pacific Northwest" by making grants to nonprofit organizations.
In 2008, Denis Hayes wrote the following: "the Foundation looks for high risk, high potential payoff opportunities to exert unusual leverage. It has a special interest in demonstrating innovative approaches that promise to solve multiple problems simultaneously. It searches the world for successful projects and policies that can be adapted to the Pacific Northwest. It strives to build the intellectual foundations and political support needed for sweeping innovation.
Operationally, the Bullitt Foundation has moved to a more proactive, streamlined, and collaborative approach to its work, seeking a true partnership with its grantee community. We will work closely with our colleagues in the field to devise strategies, identify opportunities, and help find needed resources to move the environmental agenda forward.
The Foundation focuses on root causes rather than symptoms. It prefers to prevent problems rather than cure them. It seeks to identify the most talented individuals and most effective organizations and empower them to respond to the most important issues facing the region."
In 2010, Hayes' compensation from the Foundation was $259,673, with an additional $64,757 contributed to benefit plans of which he was the beneficiary. Median compensation for the head of similar sized nonprofits in the region is $143,272.
In 2009, the Foundation began developing the Bullitt Center, which is seeking to meet the ambitious Living Building Challenge and aims to be the most energy efficient commercial building in the world.
As of January 2015 the board consisted of: Michael Allen, Salley Anderson, Rod Brown, Harriet Bullitt, Maud Daudon, Howard Frumkin, Denis Hayes, Erim Gomez, Martha Kongsgaard, Michael Parham, Bill Ruckelshaus, Doug Raff, and Maggie Walker.