The NoVo Foundation, co-run by Warren Buffett’s youngest son Peter and wife Jennifer, has long been one of the more idiosyncratic big family foundations on the scene. It has also been something of a lightning rod: In 2020, NoVo surprised many of its grantees by scaling back women’s rights and girls’ empowerment funding, a move that drew sharp criticism at the time given its major grantmaking footprint in that space. But what’s been going on since then, and what does Peter Buffett have to say in hindsight about what happened in 2020?
Over the years, NoVo has backed an eclectic mix of causes, from girls’ empowerment and antiviolence work to Indigenous rights and grassroots organizing. But lately, the foundation has been channeling a significant portion of its resources toward one region: New York’s Hudson Valley, a place that Peter and Jennifer Buffett have called home.
Through NoVo in Kingston, a dedicated local branch focused on Midtown Kingston and the broader Hudson River Valley, the foundation is bankrolling what amounts to a massive philanthropic bet on the region. Looming above NoVo is kingmaker Warren Buffett, now 95, worth roughly $150 billion. The Buffett family’s tremendous wealth gives NoVo the ability to invest in ways few other foundations can. In that sense, the Buffetts stand out. But NoVo isn’t the only grantmaker putting a philanthropic bullseye on Upstate New York — other notable funders like Tom Golisano and the Ralph C. Wilson Jr. Foundation have done the same.
Recent NoVo grants have poured into local institutions, community development efforts and long-term initiatives to address the needs of historically marginalized groups. Add to that continued support for Native communities, and the picture that emerges is of a Buffett-backed foundation trying to seed deep, place-based change while still keeping one foot in its traditional issue areas.
It’s a big swing — and one worth watching — for a couple of major reasons. One is the sheer magnitude of money waiting in the wings. The foundation boasted $720 million in assets and close to $170 million in grants in 2023. But with the Oracle of Omaha aiming to funnel the bulk of his fortune into his children’s foundations after his passing, NoVo is poised to receive an influx of resources that could dwarf even its present financial position, which has seen it receive, and give away, amounts in the nine-figure range each successive year for about a decade.
As for what happened in 2020, Peter Buffett now acknowledges that the foundation mishandled its communication during that moment, but emphasizes that the shift was never meant to be permanent or an abdication. NoVo’s longstanding work to advance women and girls, with a focus on women and girls of color, continues through the Tides Foundation’s Advancing Girls Fund, of which NoVo is the primary funder.
“In 2020, we made a short-term decision to [pivot to] one-year funding given the time we were in and the internal adjustments that needed to be made,” Buffett told Inside Philanthropy. “The work continues, as you mentioned, through the Tides Foundation, and I believe we’re still the largest funder in that sector.”
Now, with a focus on the Hudson Valley, the NoVo Foundation is testing how far a big, billionaire-backed foundation can go in reshaping a place and its future. Here are a few other things to know about NoVo’s big bet on Upstate New York, as well as how its women and girls’ funding and other priorities currently shape up.
How NoVo got started, and its preference for under-the-radar work
Born in Omaha like his investment legend father, Peter Buffett is a musician and author who has released multiple albums, composed for film and television, and written books exploring the intersection of wealth, culture and social responsibility. He left Stanford to pursue music, using proceeds from the sale of his grandfather’s farm to fund his early art. His wife, Jennifer, once named to our Most Powerful Women in Philanthropy list, has long been an advocate for social justice and equity. Among her efforts, she helped lead a $100 million partnership between Nike and NoVo known as Girl Effect, announced in 2008, which sought to test and scale models of economic empowerment for adolescent girls in the developing world.
The couple’s philanthropy began in earnest back in 1997, when Warren and Susan Buffett asked them to take charge of a charitable fund, NoVo. Early on, Jennifer’s giving centered on the environment, the arts and social services in Wisconsin. Things shifted in 2006, when Warren Buffett announced he would give away the bulk of his $44 billion fortune.
The biggest share of Warren Buffett’s philanthropy has so far gone to the Gates Foundation, where he sat on the board for years, but he has also set aside significant amounts for the four foundations run by his children: Peter’s NoVo, son Howard’s Howard G. Buffett Foundation, and the Susan Thompson Buffett Foundation, as well as the Sherwood Foundation, both helmed by daughter Susie Buffett. A few years later, in 2010, Warren Buffett and Bill Gates launched the Giving Pledge, rallying fellow billionaires to commit at least half their wealth to charity. This summer, Warren Buffett donated an additional $6 billion of Berkshire Hathaway stock to the Gates Foundation and his children’s charities — his biggest annual donation since he began giving away his fortune. This brought Warren Buffett’s overall giving to the charities to over $60 billion, per Reuters.
As NoVo now describes it, the foundation’s work centers on supporting movements led by Black, brown and Indigenous girls and women, while also advancing regenerative bioregional communities, Indigenous knowledge, food justice, and place-based efforts in New York’s Hudson Valley. Across these focus areas, NoVo emphasizes trust-based philanthropy, long-term systemic change and the belief that small, intentional actions can set powerful transformations in motion.
In a series of email conversations with Buffett, he expressed reluctance to be more public precisely because of the foundation’s work, which he frames as deliberately understated. “Because our work touches many vulnerable populations, we prefer to do what we do quietly,” he said, emphasizing the principle of trust-based philanthropy. Talking publicly about grants and initiatives, he said, “puts a spotlight on the work in ways that are not always welcome. It’s imperative that I do my best to honor that.”
Swinging big in the Hudson Valley
About two hours north of Midtown New York City, the local arm of the NoVo Foundation, NoVo in Kingston, is turning the Midtown section of Kingston, New York, into a proving ground for big-donor-driven, place-based, high-impact giving. With a mix of ambitious real estate projects, community programs and youth-centered initiatives, the foundation is betting that concentrated philanthropic resources can transform a single region — while aiming to keep historically marginalized residents at the center of the story.
NoVo in Kingston builds on a gradual escalation of the foundation’s investments in the region, including the 2013 purchase of the former Gill Farm and its transformation into the Hudson Valley Farm Hub, a nonprofit center for regenerative agriculture located on approximately 1,600 acres of prime farmland. The space hosts and supports research, provides farmer training and supports sustainable food distribution.
The foundation also backs The Metro, a 70,000-square-foot former furniture factory and hall of records, being repurposed into a community learning hub slated to open in 2026. Designed with environmental sustainability in mind, The Metro aims to foster creativity, entrepreneurship, and local workforce development, while serving as a gathering place for the broader community.
NoVo’s approach echoes other high-profile philanthropic bets on local infrastructure across upstate New York, like that of Ed Mitzen in Albany, who has put money and sweat equity into revitalizing historic buildings and businesses, or of Tom Golisano in Rochester, who committed $360 million for organizations in Western New York. These cases also underscore the outsized role the ultra-wealthy can play in shaping the future of local regions and cities.
NoVo’s footprint on the ground in Kingston extends beyond The Metro. The Broadway Bubble and Community Hub at 718 Broadway combines a low-cost laundromat with a community space offering free classes and events, now enhanced with a fenced green space and playground. Meanwhile, the Greenkill House at 127 Greenkill Avenue serves youth aged 16 to 24, providing educational and career opportunities in partnership with the Boys & Girls Club of Ulster County.
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Women and girls, Native support and looking ahead
Regarding the controversial pullback in 2020, Peter Buffett was eager to make it clear that NoVo’s women and girls work continues through Tides Foundation and the Advancing Girls Fund. According to 2023 tax records, NoVo made a gift of nearly $23 million to Tides Foundation to support the Advancing Girls Fund, with more than $24 million going to the fund the year prior.
The Advancing Girls Fund aims to center the voices and leadership of adolescent girls and young women of color — guided by extensive conversations with more than 200 grantees and insights gathered from NoVo’s earlier convenings. Its strategy emphasizes intersectional and gender-expansive approaches, long-term systems change, and collective power-building.
Buffett said that while NoVo’s strategy temporarily shifted, the foundation’s “orientation never wavered.” He did acknowledge poor communication around the change, amplified by the social and political upheavals of 2020, which he thinks contributed to a “perfect storm for anti-NoVo sentiment — specifically as it relates to power and privilege.” Buffett added, “As is usually (always?) the case, the deeper story is more complex and it points to the complexity of the power dynamic inherent in philanthropy. But that’s a story for another day.”
The NoVo Foundation also remains focused on supporting Native American groups, preserving culture, strengthening local economies, and addressing systemic inequities. In 2023, the foundation directed significant funding to organizations working in these areas. Among the recipients were the First Nations Development Institute (a $1 million gift), which promotes economic development and cultural preservation, and the Seventh Generation Fund for Indigenous Peoples (a total of some $2.5 million), which supports initiatives that empower Indigenous communities both in the U.S. and globally.
Other recent seven-figure-plus NoVo Foundation gifts include funding for the Just Transition Fund, which aims to support communities hardest hit by the transition from coal; Magic Canoe, a nonprofit collaborative that works to build a bioregional movement across Salmon Nation through storytelling; and Kashif Filmmaking Incubator, which aims to develop stories with BIPOC, LGBTQIA+, gender nonconforming and disabled filmmakers.
Looking ahead, the stakes around NoVo’s giving are only set to grow. As things currently stand, Warren Buffett’s passing will set in motion an experiment in family giving at unprecedented scale, especially if his stipulation that his children’s foundations spend down his fortune within a decade remains in place.
That windfall would give Peter and Jennifer Buffett unprecedented capacity to scale existing programs, launch new initiatives and deepen their influence in the Hudson Valley, where the foundation is already reshaping Midtown Kingston. For now, NoVo is laying the groundwork, but when that bequest arrives, the foundation could transform the landscape of American philanthropy.
