New York · Nonprofit
PUBLIC POLICY LAB INC
PUBLIC POLICY LAB INC (New York) receives grants from 15 organizations whose IRS filings report $4,797,035 to it, the largest being THE SCAN FOUNDATION ($1,778,567). 8 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2024
- $4.2M
- Funders on record
- 15
- Grants received
- $4.8M
- Net assets
- $516k
What Public Policy Lab Inc does
Mission
The Public Policy Lab is a nonprofit innovation lab. Our mission is to design policies and programs that help poor and marginalized Americans build better lives. To do that, we partner with government agencies, philanthropies, and NGOs and the communities they serve to develop more satisfying and effective services through ethnographic research, human-centered design, rapid prototyping, and formative evaluation.
As stated on its FY2024 Form 990.
Program
For the National Science Foundation, and in collaboration with a diverse cohort of entrepreneurial innovators from historically underrepresented communities, PPL is leading a project to co-create and pilot a series of tools and resources to meaningfully increase the nationwide involvement of underrepsented groups in accessing federal seed funding to bring their innovations to market.For the Scan Foundation, we are working on the Public Prospective Longitudinal Understanding Study of 65+ Adults (PPLUS65), an initiative to accelerate policy change and health-systems improvement for and with older Americans, especially those from low-income;rural or geographically underserved; and/or Black, Indigenous,and People of Color (BIPOC) communities. In mid-2024, we will launch a public platform to showcase research data collected and outputs produced, with a goal to help policymakers and systems leaders better incorporate older Americans' needs and preferences into social-scale programs.With SUNY's Office of Higher Education in Prison (OHEP)and CUNY's Institute for State and Local Governance (ISLG), we aimed to strengthen the support network that's available to formerly incarcerated students…
$3,201,861 spentof which $625,484 as grants$3,144,785 earned by the program100% of program spending
The program described on its FY2024 Form 990. Program spending in total: $3,201,861.
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 2019 to 2020, from $227k to $617k (+171%).
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: 2018 24% · 2019 48% · 2021 19% · 2022 9% · 2023 40% · 2024 24%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
26% of PUBLIC POLICY LAB INC’s revenue is contributions — about as donation-reliant as the typical peer (88% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 3 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
Chelsea Mauldin
Exec Dir.
Board chair
Bryan Boyer
Board chair
As listed on its FY2024 Form 990.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 2 funders to 5 funders, grant income rose $13k → $1.1M.
4 of 15 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 12% 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 PUBLIC POLICY LAB 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
PUBLIC POLICY LAB INC leans on a few funders — its largest provides 37% of grant income and the top three 73%; half comes from just 2 funders.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 2 funders to its left
95% 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 PUBLIC POLICY LAB INC.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 77% · 2018 90% · 2019 100% · 2020 96% · 2021 98% · 2022 57% · 2023 67% — 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
20% of PUBLIC POLICY LAB INC's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 53% 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
53% of PUBLIC POLICY LAB INC's grant income comes from New York funders.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $556k arriving through sponsors registered in 4 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
PUBLIC POLICY LAB INC has grown faster than three-quarters of the 1,003 public benefit nonprofits its size.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 1,003 public benefit nonprofits $1M–$10M, FY2024
Government funding PUBLIC POLICY LAB INC receives
Grants and contracts to this organization from federal (USASpending) and state checkbooks, reconciled to its EIN. $2.4M on record.
- National Science Foundation$2.1M
- National Endowment for the Arts$250k
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 PUBLIC POLICY LAB 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 New York
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
73% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
99%
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 PUBLIC POLICY LAB 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 PUBLIC POLICY LAB INC?
- PUBLIC POLICY LAB INC (New York) receives grants from 15 organizations whose IRS filings report $4,797,035 to it, the largest being THE SCAN FOUNDATION ($1,778,567). 8 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does PUBLIC POLICY LAB INC have?
- IRS filings report 15 organizations giving $4,797,035 in grants to PUBLIC POLICY LAB INC, 8 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of PUBLIC POLICY LAB INC?
- THE SCAN FOUNDATION is the largest funder on record, with $1,778,567 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like PUBLIC POLICY LAB INC find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in New York. 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 15 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