Illinois · Nonprofit
BENTON INSTITUTE FOR BROADBAND & SOCIETY
BENTON INSTITUTE FOR BROADBAND & SOCIETY (Illinois) receives grants from 14 organizations whose IRS filings report $3,749,031 to it, the largest being The Pew Charitable Trusts ($2,099,456). 5 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2025
- $1.6M
- Funders on record
- 14
- Grants received
- $3.7M
- Net assets
- $3.1M
What Benton Institute for Broadband & Society does
Program
The Benton Institute for Broadband & Society works to ensure that media and telecommunications serve the public interest and enhance our democracy. We pursue this mission by:1. Seeking policy solutions that support the values of access, diversity and equity by working with policymakers, public interest communications advocates and representatives from vulnerable populations communities to affect telecommunications policy;2. Demonstrating the value of media and telecommunications for improving the quality of life for all through research and support of projects that serve as models for change; and3. Providing resources to policymakers and advocates at the federal, state and local levels to inform communications policy debates through daily updates on the field along with analysis and opinion on what's at stake in telecommunications debates.
$1,945,345 spent
The program described on its FY2025 Form 990-PF.
The organization over time
Each line starts at 100 in 2019, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2019, 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.
Balance sheet
Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2019 to 2020, from $4.7M to $4.0M (−14%).
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.
Board chair
Austin Hirsch
Chairman
As listed on its FY2025 Form 990-PF.
Who funds it, year by year
2020 → 2023: the base broadened from 1 funder to 7 funders, grant income rose $10k → $1.1M.
4 of 14 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 2% 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 BENTON INSTITUTE FOR BROADBAND & SOCIETY’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
BENTON INSTITUTE FOR BROADBAND & SOCIETY leans on a few funders — its largest provides 56% of grant income and the top three 83%; half comes from just 1 funder.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 1 funder to its left
Largest funder’s share by year: 2020 100% · 2021 41% · 2022 51% · 2023 61% — 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
33% of BENTON INSTITUTE FOR BROADBAND & SOCIETY's funders are still giving 2 years after their first grant; 36% give in more than one year at all.
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
BENTON INSTITUTE FOR BROADBAND & SOCIETY draws 90% of its grant income from funders outside Illinois, across 7 states in all.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $57k 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.
Against its field
BENTON INSTITUTE FOR BROADBAND & SOCIETY has grown faster than three-quarters of the 1,504 philanthropy nonprofits its size.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 1,504 philanthropy nonprofits $1M–$10M, FY2025
Organizations like BENTON INSTITUTE FOR BROADBAND & SOCIETY
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 Illinois
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for BENTON INSTITUTE FOR BROADBAND & SOCIETY: 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.
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 BENTON INSTITUTE FOR BROADBAND & SOCIETY?
- BENTON INSTITUTE FOR BROADBAND & SOCIETY (Illinois) receives grants from 14 organizations whose IRS filings report $3,749,031 to it, the largest being The Pew Charitable Trusts ($2,099,456). 5 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does BENTON INSTITUTE FOR BROADBAND & SOCIETY have?
- IRS filings report 14 organizations giving $3,749,031 in grants to BENTON INSTITUTE FOR BROADBAND & SOCIETY, 5 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of BENTON INSTITUTE FOR BROADBAND & SOCIETY?
- The Pew Charitable Trusts is the largest funder on record, with $2,099,456 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like BENTON INSTITUTE FOR BROADBAND & SOCIETY find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Illinois. The funding by cause and by state pages list the largest funders for a given area and how to approach them.
These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2025 (financials across 2019–2025), and the filings of 14 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 14, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing