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Texas · Nonprofit

BURIED ALIVE PROJECT

BURIED ALIVE PROJECT (Texas) receives grants from 18 organizations whose IRS filings report $1,125,112 to it, the largest being COMMUNITIES FOUNDATION OF TEXAS INC ($232,500). 7 of them have funded it in more than one year.

Revenue FY2024
$270k
Funders on record
18
Grants received
$1.1M
Net assets
$1k
7/18 repeat funderspeak grant-dependency 81%
01What it does

What Buried Alive Project does

Mission

The Buried Alive Project works to eliminate life without parole sentences handed down under federal drug laws through transformative litigation, legislation and humanization. We use statistics and stories to educate the public and amplify the voices of those directly impacted. The human element is rarely addressed but necessary to drive change needed to reform the criminal justice system. By engaging people across the country, this project will harness americas collective interest, passion, and direct experience of this issue into concrete change.

As stated on its FY2024 Form 990.

Program

  1. The personal journies of our co-founders (who have all been directly impacted by the criminal legal system) gives us a unique lens and expertise in helping advance the movement to transform this nation's criminal legal system. The Buried Alive Project provides pro bono legal representation for people serving life sentences in prison under outdated federal drugs laws. Our efforts have saved the lives of dozens of people set to die in prison. With every freedom we secure, we are pushing forth a movement of power, dignity, and human potential that this nation needs to thrive.

    $251,187 spent
    100% of program spending

The program described on its FY2024 Form 990. Program spending in total: $251,187.

02The organization over time

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.

100 = 20192019 Revenue 100 ($807k) Expenses 100 ($512k) Net assets 100 ($233k)2020 Revenue 42 ($341k) Expenses 79 ($403k) Net assets 73 ($172k)2021 Revenue 68 ($552k) Expenses 75 ($386k) Net assets 144 ($337k)2022 Revenue 68 ($552k) Expenses 103 ($530k) Net assets 154 ($359k)2023 Revenue 18 ($142k) Expenses 94 ($482k) Net assets 8 ($19k)2024 Revenue 34 ($270k) Expenses 56 ($288k) Net assets 1 ($1k)
201920202021202220232024
Revenue (34)Expenses (56)Net assets (1)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 2022 to 2023, from $359k to $19k (−95%).

$233k
$172k
$337k
$359k
$19k
$1k
201920202021202220232024
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.

2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
2024
ContributionsProgram revenueInvestmentOther

100% of BURIED ALIVE PROJECT’s revenue is contributions — more reliant on donations than three-quarters of its peers (94% for the typical peer).

This organization
Typical peer · 2,778 orgs

Surplus & reserves

Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 3 of the last 6 reported years ran a deficit.

$295k
’19
−$62k
’20
$166k
’21
$22k
’22
−$340k
’23
−$18k
’24
0.1
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.

201920202021202220232024
Listed333333
Joined·+0+0+0+0+0
No longer listed·00000
03Who funds it

Who funds it, year by year

2019 → 2023: the base broadened from 3 funders to 6 funders, grant income fell $250k → $115k.

9 of 18 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 35% 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 BURIED ALIVE PROJECT’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

BURIED ALIVE PROJECT has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 21% of grant income, and it takes 3 funders to reach half.

the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 3 funders to its left

41% 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 BURIED ALIVE PROJECT.

21%
largest funder
59%
top three
~7
effective funders

Largest funder’s share by year: 2019 92% · 2020 87% · 2021 39% · 2022 27% · 2023 43% — 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

25% of BURIED ALIVE PROJECT's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 39% give in more than one year at all.

first grant+1y+2y+3y

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

BURIED ALIVE PROJECT draws 51% of its grant income from funders outside Texas, across 7 states in all.

VT
NY
IN
CA
VA
DC
TX

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

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

Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $392k arriving through sponsors registered in 7 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

BURIED ALIVE PROJECT's revenue fell 66% between 2019 and 2024.

Operating margin−7% · bottom quartile
Months of reserve0.1mo · bottom quartile
Revenue growth (annualized)−20% · bottom quartile

this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 2,538 crime & legal nonprofits $100k–$1M, FY2024

Organizations like BURIED ALIVE PROJECT

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 Texas

Nationally

05Profile & governance

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

Where the money goes

87% of spending goes to programs.

Program 87%Management 5%Fundraising 8%

Governance

3
board members
67%
independent
–Conflict-of-interest policy–Whistleblower policy–Document retention✓Board reviewed the 990–Audited financials

Public support

80%

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 BURIED ALIVE PROJECT: 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 BURIED ALIVE PROJECT?
BURIED ALIVE PROJECT (Texas) receives grants from 18 organizations whose IRS filings report $1,125,112 to it, the largest being COMMUNITIES FOUNDATION OF TEXAS INC ($232,500). 7 of them have funded it in more than one year.
How many funders does BURIED ALIVE PROJECT have?
IRS filings report 18 organizations giving $1,125,112 in grants to BURIED ALIVE PROJECT, 7 of which have funded it in more than one year.
Who is the largest funder of BURIED ALIVE PROJECT?
COMMUNITIES FOUNDATION OF TEXAS INC is the largest funder on record, with $232,500 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
How can an organization like BURIED ALIVE PROJECT find more funders?
Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Texas. 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 Buried Alive Project →

These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2024 (financials across 2019–2024), and the filings of 18 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