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Washington, D.C. · Nonprofit

OO PROJECT

OO PROJECT (Washington, D.C.) receives grants from 28 organizations whose IRS filings report $9,936,880 to it, the largest being THE SCHMIDT FAMILY FOUNDATION ($2,570,000). 16 of them have funded it in more than one year.

Revenue FY2025
$3.9M
Funders on record
28
Grants received
$9.9M
Net assets
$4.4M
16/28 repeat fundersgrants exceed reported revenue in one year
01What it does

What Oo Project does

Mission

The mission of the outlaw ocean is to produce high-impact investigative stories on topics such as illegal and destructive fishing practices, ocean dumping and pollution, marine protected areas, and human trafficking and labor abuses that will move international audiences in print, tv, film, and other new media.

As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.

Program

  1. The outlaw ocean project continued it's mission to produce high impact stories on the lawlessness in the ocean. The project produces pieces across a variety of journalistic forms and continues to increase society's awareness on the underreported issues occuring in todays oceans.

    $1,641,679 spent$3,862,117 earned by the program
    100% of program spending

The program described on its FY2024 Form 990. Program spending in total: $1,641,679.

02The organization over time

The organization over time

Each line starts at 100 in 2021, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2021, 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 = 20212021 Revenue 100 ($1.1M) Expenses 100 ($393k) Net assets 100 ($813k)2022 Revenue 189 ($2.1M) Expenses 529 ($2.1M) Net assets 116 ($939k)2023 Revenue 223 ($2.5M) Expenses 773 ($3.0M) Net assets 53 ($427k)2024 Revenue 373 ($4.2M) Expenses 629 ($2.5M) Net assets 268 ($2.2M)2025 Revenue 341 ($3.9M) Expenses 418 ($1.6M) Net assets 540 ($4.4M)
20212022202320242025
Revenue (341)Expenses (418)Net assets (540)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 2024 to 2025, from $2.2M to $4.4M (+102%).

$1.7M
$1.7M
$427k
$2.2M
$4.4M
20212022202320242025
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.

2021
2022
2023
2024
2025
ContributionsProgram revenueInvestmentOther

97% of OO PROJECT’s revenue is contributions — more donation-reliant than the typical peer (88% for the typical peer).

This organization
Typical peer · 2,293 orgs

Surplus & reserves

Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 1 of the last 5 reported years ran a deficit.

$739k
’21
$59k
’22
−$513k
’23
$1.7M
’24
$2.2M
’25
24
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.

20212022202320242025
Listed44444
Joined·+0+0+0+0
No longer listed·0000
03Who funds it

Who funds it, year by year

2019 → 2023: the base broadened from 1 funder to 13 funders, grant income rose $5k → $3.5M.

6 of 28 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 OO 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

OO PROJECT has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 26% 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 OO PROJECT.

26%
largest funder
52%
top three
~8
effective funders

Largest funder’s share by year: 2019 100% · 2020 68% · 2021 26% · 2022 39% · 2023 41% — 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

43% of OO PROJECT's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 57% 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

OO PROJECT draws 90% of its grant income from funders outside Washington, D.C., across 10 states in all.

VT
IL
NY
MA
OH
CA
MD
DE
NC
DC

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

’19
’20
’21
’22
’23
Washington, D.C. out of state home

Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $3.4M 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.

04Its place in the field

Against its field

OO PROJECT runs a healthier operating margin than three-quarters of the 1,074 environment nonprofits its size.

Operating margin57% · top quartile
Months of reserve23.5mo · top quartile
Revenue growth (annualized)36% · top quartile

this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 1,074 environment nonprofits $1M–$10M, FY2025

Organizations like OO 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 Washington, D.C.

Nationally

05Profile & governance

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

Where the money goes

100% of spending goes to programs.

Program 100%Management 0%Fundraising 0%

Governance

4
board members
100%
independent
–Conflict-of-interest policy✓Whistleblower policy–Document retention✓Board reviewed the 990✓Audited financials

Public support

100%

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 OO 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.

A paid feature, included from the $75 plan up. Sign in to download.

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 OO PROJECT?
OO PROJECT (Washington, D.C.) receives grants from 28 organizations whose IRS filings report $9,936,880 to it, the largest being THE SCHMIDT FAMILY FOUNDATION ($2,570,000). 16 of them have funded it in more than one year.
How many funders does OO PROJECT have?
IRS filings report 28 organizations giving $9,936,880 in grants to OO PROJECT, 16 of which have funded it in more than one year.
Who is the largest funder of OO PROJECT?
THE SCHMIDT FAMILY FOUNDATION is the largest funder on record, with $2,570,000 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
How can an organization like OO PROJECT find more funders?
Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Washington, D.C.. 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 Oo Project →

These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2025 (financials across 2021–2025), and the filings of 28 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