Nonprofits filing IRS Form 990 realize that the information therein will ultimately become public knowledge. The New York State Charities Bureau website, Guidestar, Charity Navigator, and a slew of other very well-known online sources tend to be the go-to sites for donors, grantors, and community watchdog groups. A relatively-new entrant to this field, ProPublica, after many legal battles, has recently obtained machine-readable Form 990 data directly from the IRS. Whereas many of the existing sites aggregate certain aspects of Form 990 data, most of their usefulness comes in the form of PDF copies of filed 990’s. ProPublica’s Nonprofit Explorer takes a step beyond PDF’s and offers searchable, smart information that can be used for salary studies, cost analyses, data aggregation, and other meaningful purposes.
It’s refreshing to see technological advancements and public disclosure helping nonprofit organizations. Check out Nonprofit Explorer. It may be worth a look.
If you would like to learn more about this topic, please contact:
Kenneth R. Cerini, CPA, CFP, FABFA
Managing Partner
Ken is the Managing Partner of Cerini & Associates, LLP and is the executive responsible for the administration of our not-for-profit and educational provider practice groups. In addition to his extensive audit experience, Ken has been directly involved in providing consulting services for nonprofits and educational facilities of all sizes throughout New York State in such areas as cost reporting, financial analysis, Medicaid compliance, government audit representation, rate maximization, board training, budgeting and forecasting, and more.
