California · Nonprofit
KOUNKUEY DESIGN INITIATIVE INC
KOUNKUEY DESIGN INITIATIVE INC (California) receives grants from 29 organizations whose IRS filings report $6,940,504 to it, the largest being THE CALIFORNIA ENDOWMENT ($1,759,613). 17 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2024
- $3.9M
- Funders on record
- 29
- Grants received
- $6.9M
- Net assets
- $-495977
What Kounkuey Design Initiative Inc does
Mission
Kounkuey design initiative (kdi) is a non-profit design and community development organization. We partner with under-resourced communities to advance equity and activate the unrealized potential in their neighborhoods and cities. We realize this mission through education, research, planning, and built works.
As stated on its FY2024 Form 990.
Programs
Throughout 2024, we focused our efforts on projects that build justice, inclusiveness, and resilience into the public realm and improve health, well-being, and quality of life throughout all neighborhoods. Across nearly 30 active projects in southern california, we developed projects that celebrate the untold histories of overlooked communities through park designs, enable those overlooked communities to collaborate on long-term neighborhood planning, engage youth residents to create long-lasting greener communities through community gardening and planting efforts, mitigate climate change and environmental hazards, make play accessible to children of all ages and backgrounds, and enhance the capacity of local residents to create long-term change in their own communities.working with the county of los angeles department of parks and recreation, kdi created a commemorative toolkit comprised of practical tools that can be deployed at any existing or planned park to ensure representative and inclusive stories are incorporated in the park's designs. Part of the kit is the park audit tool, which the county can use to assess commemorative elements and histories in any given park, and…
$1,908,267 spent$1,686,930 earned by the program100% of program spendingOur work also extended outside of california. In pennsylvania, we oversaw the landscape-related construction of a renovated vare recreation center, a community center in south philadelphia that has been beloved for over 100 years. Over the center's long history, disinvestment took a toll on the integrity of the building and surrounding green space, prompting the city to rebuild. Kdi led the landscape architecture design and helped reimagine this community hub with local residents. Through the engagement process, the community shared the vital role played by a front 'stoop', which is a set of stairs leading up to the front door of a house that serves as an informal meeting space between friends and neighbors. We worked alongside these residents to incorporate this tradition into the site design with a 'community stoop' running alongside the recreation center to act as a threshold space between different programs and to encourage gathering. The new design for vare includes an ada-accessible playground, a community plaza with a splash pad, a full-sized football field, basketball courts, an outdoor classroom, and community artwork woven throughout. The renewed vare recreation center…
$9,163 spent$2,369 earned by the program0% of program spending
The 2 programs described on its FY2024 Form 990, listed largest first by expense. Program spending in total: $1,917,430.
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.
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 $930k to $2.8M (+203%).
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: 2017 24% · 2018 4% · 2019 13% · 2020 15% · 2021 14% · 2022 18% · 2023 61% · 2024 31%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
57% of KOUNKUEY DESIGN INITIATIVE INC’s revenue is contributions — more earned-revenue than three-quarters of its peers (97% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 5 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
Chelina Odbert
Director and CEO
As listed on its FY2024 Form 990.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base narrowed from 7 funders to 6 funders, grant income fell $843k → $279k.
7 of 29 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 10% 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 KOUNKUEY DESIGN INITIATIVE INC’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
KOUNKUEY DESIGN INITIATIVE INC has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 25% of grant income, and it takes 4 funders to reach half.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 4 funders to its left
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 36% · 2018 36% · 2019 55% · 2020 31% · 2021 39% · 2022 40% · 2023 36% — broadly stable.
“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
32% of KOUNKUEY DESIGN INITIATIVE INC's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 59% 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
63% of KOUNKUEY DESIGN INITIATIVE INC's grant income comes from California funders.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $685k arriving through sponsors registered in 6 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
KOUNKUEY DESIGN INITIATIVE INC's revenue grew 85% between 2017 and 2024.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 1,608 international nonprofits $1M–$10M, FY2024
Government funding KOUNKUEY DESIGN INITIATIVE INC receives
Grants and contracts to this organization from federal (USASpending) and state checkbooks, reconciled to its EIN. $25k on record.
- National Endowment for the Arts$25k
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 KOUNKUEY DESIGN INITIATIVE INC
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 California
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
49% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
88%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 1 state
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for KOUNKUEY DESIGN INITIATIVE INC: 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 KOUNKUEY DESIGN INITIATIVE INC?
- KOUNKUEY DESIGN INITIATIVE INC (California) receives grants from 29 organizations whose IRS filings report $6,940,504 to it, the largest being THE CALIFORNIA ENDOWMENT ($1,759,613). 17 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does KOUNKUEY DESIGN INITIATIVE INC have?
- IRS filings report 29 organizations giving $6,940,504 in grants to KOUNKUEY DESIGN INITIATIVE INC, 17 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of KOUNKUEY DESIGN INITIATIVE INC?
- THE CALIFORNIA ENDOWMENT is the largest funder on record, with $1,759,613 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like KOUNKUEY DESIGN INITIATIVE INC find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in California. 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 Kounkuey Design Initiative →
These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2024 (financials across 2017–2024), and the filings of 29 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