Nebraska · Nonprofit
OMAHA ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY
OMAHA ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY (Nebraska) receives grants from 30 organizations whose IRS filings report $7,044,222 to it, the largest being Collective For Youth ($3,781,737). 14 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2024
- $82M
- Funders on record
- 30
- Grants received
- $7.0M
- Net assets
- $312M
What Omaha Zoological Society does
Mission
The Omaha Zoological Society's mission is to inspire, educate, and engage people to serve as life-long stewards for animals, their habitats, and their conservation.
As stated on its FY2024 Form 990.
Programs
Omaha Zoological Society operates and maintains omaha's henry doorly zoo and aquarium. The zoo sits on 160 acres and houses approximately 1,035 animal species including mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, fish, and invertebrates. It boasts natural, immersive exhibit spaces, including asian highlands, bay family children's adventure trails, scott african grasslands, suzanne and walter scott aquarium, owen sea lion shores, hubbard gorilla valley and orangutan forest, the world's largest indoor desert covered by a transparent glazed geodesic dome, lied jungle (america's largest indoor rainforest), and the world's largest nocturnal exhibit. During 2024, 76,453 memberships were sold, and the total visitors to the park, participants in education programs, and event attendees was 1,707,195.
$69,640,902 spentof which $2,062,737 as grants$25,543,622 earned by the program94% of program spendingOmaha's henry doorly zoo and aquarium's center for conservation and research conducts valuable conservation science research in the areas of veterinary medicine, reproductive sciences, genetics, nutrition, and behavioral husbandry and welfare. The scientific teams conducting research in 2025 included seven veterinarians, six ph.d. Scientists and post-docs, two master's level researchers and eight additional technical staff. These teams were actively participating in multiple research projects that led to the publication of manuscripts in peer-reviewed journals. In addition, our researchers presented at international conferences and scientific meetings, and gave invited talks and lectures at universities, scientific conferences, and industry meetings. Omaha's henry doorly zoo and aquarium supported several conservation projects focusing on north america, south america, asia, madagascar, mainland africa, and the oceans. Support not only included financial contributions to the projects but staff expertise and time with direct participation and leadership in conservation efforts for the rescue, propagation and restoration of coral reefs through secore, breeding and release of salt…
$2,641,084 spent$148,648 earned by the program4% of program spendingOmaha Zoological Society's educational initiatives are local, national, and internationally focused. More than 2,750 educational programs were conducted in 2024. This programming, which included day camps, classes, distance learning classes, campouts, and on-grounds programming reached over 72,500 individuals. In addition, interpretive programs at the zoo and wildlife safari park reached over 893,000 guests.the zoo also has conservation-oriented education programs in veterinary medicine, reproductive sciences, molecular genetics, nutrition, and animal management and husbandry in the grewcock center for conservation and research. Programming includes high school students through our zoo academy program at the zoo, undergraduate experiences and research opportunities, as well as graduate and post-graduate professional training programs. In addition, the zoo's professional staff participate in a range of offsite education programs which cover a broad spectrum from lectures at universities to longer duration professional training programs in specific scientific or conservation techniques, as well as supporting primary and secondary school conservation education programs.
$2,059,074 spent$2,106,648 earned by the program3% of program spending
The 3 programs described on its FY2024 Form 990, listed largest first by expense. Program spending in total: $74,341,060.
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 $300M to $334M (+11%).
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 3% · 2018 4% · 2019 3% · 2020 16% · 2021 15% · 2022 4% · 2023 4% · 2024 4%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
50% of OMAHA ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY’s revenue is contributions — about as donation-reliant as the typical peer (67% 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
Luis Padilla
President & CEO
Board chair
Mogens Bay
Chairman
As listed on its FY2024 Form 990.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 5 funders to 8 funders, grant income rose $469k → $555k.
7 of 30 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 8% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.
Left out of every figure on this page: $133M from one payer (an institutional transfer, not a grant programme, largest Omaha Zoo Foundation). These are real filings, and they are not money OMAHA ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY raised.
From the IRS filings of OMAHA ZOOLOGICAL 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
OMAHA ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY leans on a few funders — its largest provides 54% of grant income and the top three 81%; half comes from just 1 funder.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 1 funder to its left
68% 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 OMAHA ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 90% · 2018 71% · 2019 76% · 2020 53% · 2021 70% · 2022 38% · 2023 73% — 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 OMAHA ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 47% 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
89% of OMAHA ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY's grant income comes from Nebraska funders.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $586k 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.
Against its field
OMAHA ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY is better cushioned than half of the 235 animals nonprofits its size.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 235 animals nonprofits $10M–$100M, FY2024
Government funding OMAHA ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY receives
Grants and contracts to this organization from federal (USASpending) and state checkbooks, reconciled to its EIN. $1.7M on record.
- Institute of Museum and Library Services$1.1M
- Department of the Interior$521k
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 OMAHA ZOOLOGICAL 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 Nebraska
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
93% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
94%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Part of a family of 1 related entity
- Omaha Zoo Foundation · exempt
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for OMAHA ZOOLOGICAL 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 OMAHA ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY?
- OMAHA ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY (Nebraska) receives grants from 30 organizations whose IRS filings report $7,044,222 to it, the largest being Collective For Youth ($3,781,737). 14 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does OMAHA ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY have?
- IRS filings report 30 organizations giving $7,044,222 in grants to OMAHA ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY, 14 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of OMAHA ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY?
- Collective For Youth is the largest funder on record, with $3,781,737 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like OMAHA ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Nebraska. 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 FY2024 (financials across 2017–2024), and the filings of 30 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