Utah · Nonprofit
FRIENDS Of Great Salt Lake
FRIENDS Of Great Salt Lake (Utah) receives grants from 27 organizations whose IRS filings report $1,185,052 to it, the largest being The Community Foundation of Utah ($588,202). 21 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 68% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
- Revenue FY2025
- $391k
- Funders on record
- 27
- Grants received
- $1.2M
- Net assets
- $1.0M
What FRIENDS Of Great Salt Lake does
Mission
The mission of FRIENDS is to preserve and protect the Great Salt Lake Ecosystem and to increase public awareness and appreciation of the lake through education, research, advocacy, and the arts.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Program
The mission of this organization is to protect the lake. Programs in support of our mission include, education, advocacy, research and the arts
$264,972 spentof which $26,495 as grants$362,961 earned by the program100% of program spending
The program described on its FY2024 Form 990. Program spending in total: $264,972.
The organization over time
Each line starts at 100 in 2018, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2018, 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 2023 to 2024, from $824k to $0 (−100%).
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.
Government-grant reliance: 2019 10% · 2020 7% · 2021 3% · 2022 1% · 2023 0% · 2024 5% · 2025 7%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
93% of FRIENDS Of Great Salt Lake’s revenue is contributions — more donation-reliant than the typical peer (88% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 1 of the last 8 reported years ran a deficit.
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.
Chief executive
Lynn De Freitas
Executive director
As listed on its FY2025 Form 990.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 3 funders to 14 funders, grant income rose $51k → $152k.
6 of 27 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 68% 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 FRIENDS Of Great Salt Lake’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 26 of 27 funders by total. 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
FRIENDS Of Great Salt Lake leans on a few funders — its largest provides 50% of grant income and the top three 68%; half comes from just 2 funders.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 2 funders to its left
69% 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 FRIENDS Of Great Salt Lake.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 60% · 2018 36% · 2019 37% · 2020 77% · 2021 66% · 2022 58% · 2023 20% — 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
40% of FRIENDS Of Great Salt Lake's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 78% 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
68% of FRIENDS Of Great Salt Lake'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 $377k that is directly attributable, 53% of it comes from Utah funders.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $808k arriving through sponsors registered in 5 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
FRIENDS Of Great Salt Lake holds deeper cash reserves than three-quarters of the 2,433 environment nonprofits its size.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 2,433 environment nonprofits $100k–$1M, FY2025
Government funding FRIENDS Of Great Salt Lake receives
Grants and contracts to this organization from federal (USASpending) and state checkbooks, reconciled to its EIN. $125k on record.
- Environmental Protection Agency$125k
Federal grants vs contracts are distinguished; state line items keep their reported category. Matched by name + geography (the BMF), so coverage is partial and precision-first.
Organizations like FRIENDS Of Great Salt Lake
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 Utah
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
69% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
98%
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 FRIENDS Of Great Salt Lake: 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 FRIENDS Of Great Salt Lake?
- FRIENDS Of Great Salt Lake (Utah) receives grants from 27 organizations whose IRS filings report $1,185,052 to it, the largest being The Community Foundation of Utah ($588,202). 21 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 68% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
- How many funders does FRIENDS Of Great Salt Lake have?
- IRS filings report 27 organizations giving $1,185,052 in grants to FRIENDS Of Great Salt Lake, 21 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of FRIENDS Of Great Salt Lake?
- The Community Foundation of Utah is the largest funder on record, with $588,202 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like FRIENDS Of Great Salt Lake find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Utah. 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 2018–2025), and the filings of 27 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