LibGuides: Nonprofit Research: Financial Information

Grants

Grant Connect This link opens in a new window
Provides information on Canadian and US foundations, corporate giving programs, and government grantors. Note that this product requires use of VPN to connect from off campus: https://www.yorku.ca/computing/vpn-choice.html

Canadian Online Resources

CRA - Charities Listings
The Canada Revenue Agency maintains a searchable list of Canadian charities called the Charities Listings, which can be used to confirm whether a charity is registered under the Income Tax Act and is therefore eligible to issue official donation receipts; and to view a charity's contact information and Registered Charity Information Return, which includes financial information and activities.

U.S. Online Resources

GuideStar: National Database of Nonprofit Organizations
Form 990s come from two sources: the IRS and the organizations themselves. The database contains more than 5 million Form 990 images provided by the IRS, and new images arrive from the IRS monthly.

Form 990 images received from the IRS are posted in the "Forms 990 & Docs" tab of the filing organization's GuideStar nonprofit report.
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To view the 990s, you must create an account and sign in.
Foundation Center: Form 990 Search Tool
The Foundation Center's IRS Form 990 lookup tool provides PDF copies of U.S. nonprofits' annual returns. Check out the Nonprofit Coordinating Committee of New York's document on How to Read the IRS Form 990.

Canadian Charities & Registered Charity Information Return

Once you have used the Charities Listings to find a registered charity, you can access the charity's Form T3010, Registered Charity Information Return. All registered charities are required to fill out a return each year and submit it to the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA).

Note
It is the charity's responsibility to ensure that the return is filled out completely and accurately. The CRA posts the return as received and has not necessarily verified its content. If you have questions, or would like more details about a charity's return, please contact the charity.

The return includes the following information about the charity:

contact information, including website address;
a general account of the charity's activities; and
financial information such as income and expenditures, assets, and liabilities.

The return may give you an idea of how much of its resources it devotes to charitable activities.

U.S. Charities & Form 990

"Form 990 is the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) form entitled Return of Organization Exempt from Income Tax. This federal form must be filed annually by tax exempt organizations. However, some organizations such as churches are exempt from filing, and small organizations are allowed to file Form 990-EZ. The information provided on Form 990 is public information and is available from the website guidestar.org." Source: Accounting Coach

Form 990s provide information on the filing organization's mission, programs, and finances.

Since these forms are public information, you can find them through Guidestar. Alternatively, you can do a simple Google search for the name of the organization that you are looking for, plus "form 990" to find them published online. For example, searching "united way form 990" would give you these results.