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North Carolina · Nonprofit

NORTH CAROLINA CENTER FOR PUBLIC POLICY RESEARCH INC Carolina Beacon

NORTH CAROLINA CENTER FOR PUBLIC POLICY RESEARCH INC Carolina Beacon (North Carolina) receives grants from 7 organizations whose IRS filings report $572,500 to it, the largest being COLUMBUS FOUNDATION ($362,500). 3 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 94% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.

Revenue FY2025
$185k
Funders on record
7
Grants received
$573k
Net assets
$19k
3/7 repeat funderspeak grant-dependency 100%
01What it does

What NORTH CAROLINA CENTER FOR PUBLIC POLICY RESEARCH INC Carolina Beacon does

Mission

An independent source of factual news and information for the people of North Carolina, established to inform and engage the people and support their effective citizenship.

As stated on its FY2025 Form 990-EZ.

Program

  1. In this year, we continued to support the pilot program for The Carolina Beacon News Program; we allocated $150,000 to The North Carolina Longform Magazine to execute the implementation of this pilot program. The North Carolina Longform Magazine was contracted as a consulting partner for this work. Through this program we established reporting bureaus to across the state of N.C. These reporting bureaus provide factual news and information for the people of North Carolina. As a corollary to this effort, the Carolina Beacon contracted with the NC Local News Workshop to provide training and resource development for Report for America fellows in North Carolina, several of whom worked in the Carolina Beacon News Program.

    $171,563 spent
    100% of program spending

The program described on its FY2024 Form 990-EZ. Program spending in total: $171,563.

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.

100 = 20172017 Revenue 100 ($168k) Expenses 100 ($374k) Net assets 100 ($304k)2019 Revenue 88 ($148k) Expenses 67 ($253k) Net assets 11 ($35k)2020 Revenue 110 ($184k) Expenses 57 ($212k) Net assets 2 ($7k)2021 Revenue 77 ($129k) Expenses 20 ($74k) Net assets 21 ($62k)2022 Revenue 67 ($113k) Expenses 25 ($94k) Net assets 27 ($81k)2023 Revenue 119 ($200k) Expenses 73 ($272k) Net assets 3 ($8k)2024 Revenue 89 ($150k) Expenses 40 ($150k) Net assets 3 ($8k)2025 Revenue 110 ($185k) Expenses 46 ($174k) Net assets 6 ($19k)
'17'19'20'21'22'23'24'25
Revenue (110)Expenses (46)Net assets (6)

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 $81k to $8k (−90%).

$306k
$35k
$7k
$62k
$81k
$8k
$8k
$19k
'17'19'20'21'22'23'24'25
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
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
2024
2025
ContributionsProgram revenueInvestmentOther

Surplus & reserves

Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 4 of the last 8 reported years ran a deficit.

−$207k
’17
−$105k
’19
−$28k
’20
$55k
’21
$18k
’22
−$72k
’23
$0
’24
$11k
’25
0.4
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.

201720192020202120222023
Listed91191899
Joined··+0+9+1+0
No longer listed··20100
03Who funds it

Who funds it, year by year

2017 → 2023: the base held at 1 funder, grant income rose $8k → $200k.

3 of 7 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 95% 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 NORTH CAROLINA CENTER FOR PUBLIC POLICY RESEARCH INC Carolina Beacon’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

NORTH CAROLINA CENTER FOR PUBLIC POLICY RESEARCH INC Carolina Beacon leans on a few funders — its largest provides 63% of grant income and the top three 94%; half comes from just 1 funder.

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

97% 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 NORTH CAROLINA CENTER FOR PUBLIC POLICY RESEARCH INC Carolina Beacon.

63%
largest funder
94%
top three
~2
effective funders

Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 100% · 2018 94% · 2019 100% · 2020 100% · 2021 100% · 2023 100% — 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.

Where its funders are

94% of NORTH CAROLINA CENTER FOR PUBLIC POLICY RESEARCH INC Carolina Beacon'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 $32k that is directly attributable, 76% of it comes from North Carolina funders.

DE
NC

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

’17
’18
’19
’20
North Carolina out of state home

Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $541k arriving through sponsors registered in 2 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

Organizations like NORTH CAROLINA CENTER FOR PUBLIC POLICY RESEARCH INC Carolina Beacon

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 North Carolina

Nationally

05Profile & governance

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

Public support

27%

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

Footprint & structure

Files a return copy in 1 state

NC

Screen this organization

A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for NORTH CAROLINA CENTER FOR PUBLIC POLICY RESEARCH INC Carolina Beacon: 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 NORTH CAROLINA CENTER FOR PUBLIC POLICY RESEARCH INC Carolina Beacon?
NORTH CAROLINA CENTER FOR PUBLIC POLICY RESEARCH INC Carolina Beacon (North Carolina) receives grants from 7 organizations whose IRS filings report $572,500 to it, the largest being COLUMBUS FOUNDATION ($362,500). 3 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 94% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
How many funders does NORTH CAROLINA CENTER FOR PUBLIC POLICY RESEARCH INC Carolina Beacon have?
IRS filings report 7 organizations giving $572,500 in grants to NORTH CAROLINA CENTER FOR PUBLIC POLICY RESEARCH INC Carolina Beacon, 3 of which have funded it in more than one year.
Who is the largest funder of NORTH CAROLINA CENTER FOR PUBLIC POLICY RESEARCH INC Carolina Beacon?
COLUMBUS FOUNDATION is the largest funder on record, with $362,500 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
How can an organization like NORTH CAROLINA CENTER FOR PUBLIC POLICY RESEARCH INC Carolina Beacon find more funders?
Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in North Carolina. 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 NORTH CAROLINA CENTER FOR PUBLIC POLICY RESEARCH INC Carolina Beacon →

These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2025 (financials across 2017–2025), and the filings of 7 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