Princeton Area Community Foundation

Princeton Area Community Foundation

Founded in 1991, the Princeton Area Community Foundation channels philanthropic capital from donors across Central New Jersey into a pooled investment portfolio designed to sustain the region's nonprofits. The foundation prioritizes donor-advised funds, scholarships, and discretionary grant programs — deploying capital through vehicles like the Fund for Women and Girls, All Kids Thrive, and The Bunbury Fund. Its funding reaches early-stage education and social-service ventures here, rather than national-scale initiatives. The foundation's pooled portfolio is structured as a diversified venture capital allocation spanning seed, start-up, and expansion stages. While specific underlying holdings are not publicly cataloged, the investment strategy targets general venture exposure. The governance architecture bolsters this institutional approach: former Investment Committee Chair Andrew K. Golden and current Trustee Theo Kim both hold senior roles at the Princeton University Investment Company, one of the most closely watched endowments globally. This personnel overlap imports large-endowment portfolio construction discipline into a community-foundation chassis. Board composition further anchors the foundation in regional corporate and academic infrastructure. Vice Chair Michael Ullmann is a retired Executive Vice President and General Counsel of Johnson & Johnson. Trustee Peg Forrestel serves as Director of Community Impact at the same firm. Trustee Aamir A. Rehman sits on the board of Mercer County Community College. The organizational membership in the Council of New Jersey Grantmakers extends the foundation's reach across the state's philanthropic landscape, while its partnership with the Center for Nonprofits supports local capacity-building. PACF's structural differentiator is the institutional-investment spine inside a hyperlocal grantmaker. Rather than outsourcing its investment function to a generic OCIO provider, the board taps Princeton University's endowment talent directly — creating a governance layer that most community foundations cannot replicate and that rarely appears in an organization with donor-advised-fund complexity.