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Iowa · Nonprofit

AMES PUBLIC LIBRARY FRIENDS FOUNDATION

AMES PUBLIC LIBRARY FRIENDS FOUNDATION (Iowa) receives grants from 9 organizations whose IRS filings report $436,839 to it, the largest being COMMUNITY FDN OF GREATER DES MOINES F/K/A GREATER DES MOINES COMMUNITY FDN ($309,729). 4 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 98% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.

Revenue FY2026
$769k
Funders on record
9
Grants received
$437k
Net assets
$4.3M
4/9 repeat funderspeak grant-dependency 52%
01What it does

What Ames Public Library Friends Foundation does

Mission

Support for ames public library

As stated on its FY2026 Form 990.

Program

  1. The foundation raises funds for various library projects, programs and materials for the ames public library.

    $183,200 spent
    100% of program spending

The program described on its FY2026 Form 990. Program spending in total: $183,200.

02The organization over time

The organization over time

Each line starts at 100 in 2017, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2017, 50 means half. The number beside each label in the key is where it ended. The shaded band is where the middle 50% of its peers' revenue would sit, given their growth.

100 = 20172017 Revenue 100 ($307k) Expenses 100 ($284k) Net assets 100 ($779k)2018 Revenue 156 ($479k) Expenses 144 ($410k) Net assets 111 ($864k)2019 Revenue 96 ($294k) Expenses 99 ($282k) Net assets 113 ($878k)2020 Revenue 84 ($259k) Expenses 103 ($293k) Net assets 107 ($836k)2021 Revenue 703 ($2.2M) Expenses 101 ($287k) Net assets 394 ($3.1M)2022 Revenue 111 ($341k) Expenses 73 ($207k) Net assets 363 ($2.8M)2023 Revenue 109 ($334k) Expenses 109 ($310k) Net assets 388 ($3.0M)2024 Revenue 152 ($466k) Expenses 169 ($480k) Net assets 409 ($3.2M)2025 Revenue 173 ($529k) Expenses 121 ($343k) Net assets 455 ($3.5M)2026 Revenue 251 ($769k) Expenses 103 ($292k) Net assets 554 ($4.3M)
'17'18'19'20'21'22'23'24'25'26
Revenue (251)Expenses (103)Net assets (554)Peer revenue range

Balance sheet

Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2020 to 2021, from $836k to $3.1M (+267%).

$780k
$870k
$878k
$836k
$3.1M
$2.8M
$3.0M
$3.2M
$3.5M
$4.3M
'17'18'19'20'21'22'23'24'25'26
Total assetsTotal liabilities

How it's funded, over time

Each bar is one year's revenue split into where it came from, and every bar is the same height — these are shares, not amounts, so a year that raised twice as much looks the same size. Hover a bar for the split.

2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
2024
2025
2026
ContributionsProgram revenueInvestmentOther

67% of AMES PUBLIC LIBRARY FRIENDS FOUNDATION’s revenue is contributions — more donation-reliant than the typical peer (57% for the typical peer).

This organization
Typical peer · 25,057 orgs

Surplus & reserves

Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 2 of the last 10 reported years ran a deficit.

$23k
’17
$70k
’18
$12k
’19
−$34k
’20
$1.9M
’21
$134k
’22
$24k
’23
−$14k
’24
$186k
’25
$478k
’26
26
months of
reserve

Leadership and staff

The officers, directors, trustees and key employees listed on each return. Joined and no longer listed compare each filing with the year before, matching people by surname and first initial; a year after a gap, or a roster under three people, has no comparison.

'17'18'19'20'21'22'23'24'25'26
Listed15151414131515131314
Joined·+6+5+5+8+5+6+0+6+1
No longer listed·665936260
03Who funds it

Who funds it, year by year

2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 1 funder to 5 funders, grant income rose $15k → $174k.

4 of 9 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 98% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.

From the IRS filings of AMES PUBLIC LIBRARY FRIENDS FOUNDATION’s funders (the co-funder graph). Association, not causation. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.

How concentrated its funding is

AMES PUBLIC LIBRARY FRIENDS FOUNDATION leans on a few funders — its largest provides 71% of grant income and the top three 98%; half comes from just 1 funder.

the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 1 funder to its left

99% of the income these shares are computed over arrives through pass-through sponsors or from payers whose filings do not say what kind of payment it is. Concentration is still measured over all of it, because the money is real; what it does not support is a claim about how many institutions have chosen to fund AMES PUBLIC LIBRARY FRIENDS FOUNDATION.

71%
largest funder
98%
top three
~2
effective funders

Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 100% · 2018 76% · 2019 53% · 2020 71% · 2021 69% · 2022 98% · 2023 87% — diversifying over time.

“Effective funders” = inverse Herfindahl index (1 / Σ shareᵢ²) — the number of equal-sized funders that would give the same concentration. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.

How long its funders stay

43% of AMES PUBLIC LIBRARY FRIENDS FOUNDATION's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 44% give in more than one year at all.

first grant+1y+2y+3y+4y

Share of funders still giving k years after their first recorded grant, pooled across every acquisition cohort. A funder counts as retained in a year only if it made a grant that year. Measured to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving — a funder cannot be counted as lapsed in a year most filers have not reached.

Where its funders are

98% of AMES PUBLIC LIBRARY FRIENDS FOUNDATION's grant income arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors, whose addresses record where the money is held rather than where the donor is. Of the $8k that is directly attributable, 50% of it comes from funders outside Iowa, across 3 states.

WI
IA
TN

In-state vs out-of-state, by year

’19
’20
’21
’22
’23
Iowa out of state home

Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $429k arriving through sponsors registered in 4 states is excluded from the map and the split above: a sponsor holds money on a donor’s behalf, so its registered address would place those dollars somewhere no donor need ever have been. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.

04Its place in the field

Against its field

AMES PUBLIC LIBRARY FRIENDS FOUNDATION runs a healthier operating margin than three-quarters of the 1,238 education nonprofits its size.

Operating margin62% · top quartile
Months of reserve26.1mo · top quartile
Revenue growth (annualized)11% · above the median

this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 1,238 education nonprofits $100k–$1M, FY2026

Organizations like AMES PUBLIC LIBRARY FRIENDS FOUNDATION

Organizations whose mission and program text most resemble this one, by semantic similarity over every organization in the US filings — the closest peers, and often the clearest route to shared or prospective funders.

In Iowa

Nationally

05Profile & governance

Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.

Where the money goes

63% of spending goes to programs.

Program 63%Management 31%Fundraising 6%

Governance

12
board members
100%
independent
✓Conflict-of-interest policy✓Whistleblower policy✓Document retention✓Board reviewed the 990–Audited financials

Public support

72%

Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.

Screen this organization

A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for AMES PUBLIC LIBRARY FRIENDS FOUNDATION: IRS status (Business Master File, Publication 78, auto-revocation), the OFAC sanctions lists, the Internal Revenue Bulletin, and California registration, with the Rev. Proc. 2018-32 §8.01 reliance elements stated element by element. Generated from the current files at the moment you download it.

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Screens are triage, not determinations; a source that cannot be read reports not screened, never clear. Screen this nonprofit · How the screen works · on the API as GET /api/screening/{ein}?format=pdf

Questions and answers

Who funds AMES PUBLIC LIBRARY FRIENDS FOUNDATION?
AMES PUBLIC LIBRARY FRIENDS FOUNDATION (Iowa) receives grants from 9 organizations whose IRS filings report $436,839 to it, the largest being COMMUNITY FDN OF GREATER DES MOINES F/K/A GREATER DES MOINES COMMUNITY FDN ($309,729). 4 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 98% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
How many funders does AMES PUBLIC LIBRARY FRIENDS FOUNDATION have?
IRS filings report 9 organizations giving $436,839 in grants to AMES PUBLIC LIBRARY FRIENDS FOUNDATION, 4 of which have funded it in more than one year.
Who is the largest funder of AMES PUBLIC LIBRARY FRIENDS FOUNDATION?
COMMUNITY FDN OF GREATER DES MOINES F/K/A GREATER DES MOINES COMMUNITY FDN is the largest funder on record, with $309,729 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
How can an organization like AMES PUBLIC LIBRARY FRIENDS FOUNDATION find more funders?
Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Iowa. The funding by cause and by state pages list the largest funders for a given area and how to approach them.

Play a game about who funds Ames Public Library Friends →

These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2026 (financials across 2017–2026), and the filings of 9 funders that report grants to it. “On record” means captured in the filings we have parsed — a funder that does not e-file, or whose grant detail is not itemized, will not appear. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind. Trends on this page end at FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving; later years are shown and marked, and move no figure. Data on this page was exported October 22, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing