South Dakota · Nonprofit
RURAL AMERICA INITIATIVES
RURAL AMERICA INITIATIVES (South Dakota) receives grants from 34 organizations whose IRS filings report $3,778,534 to it, the largest being BLACK HILLS AREA COMMUNITY FOUNDATION ($1,051,838). 15 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2025
- $8.4M
- Funders on record
- 34
- Grants received
- $3.8M
- Net assets
- $14M
What Rural America Initiatives does
Mission
Rural America Initiatives is a community-based, non-profit agency serving american indian children and families in and around western south dakota with culturally sensitive family services, comprehensive child development, parent support and advocacy, referrals, and group mentoring.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Programs
Headstart-the organization is the grantee with the american indian programs branch of headstart and operates two centers in rapid city and two centers in crow creek. The purpose is to operate a headstart program for native american children 4 to 5 years of age, and their parents, helping with the transition of moving from the reservation; as well as an early headstart program for children 0 to 3, and their parents.
$6,606,627 spent$16,084 earned by the program88% of program spendingPregnancy prevention programs: ateyapi: thinking about the future is a program providing mentors to teach sexual abstinence and lakota culture at middle schools in rapid city.ateyapi: it's your game - keeping it real is a teen pregnancy prevention evidence-based program for american indian youth.
$779,118 spent10% of program spendingAna language - preservation of the lakota language which is rapidly diminishing. Many native american parents have lost the ability to teach their children the lakota language. The language, when it is taught, is presented like a "foreign language". No system exists for children in rapid city to learn their native language at a young age, in a natural way. Our project is an attempt to remedy these circumstances.
$125,423 spent2% of program spending
The 3 programs described on its FY2025 Form 990, listed largest first by expense. Program spending in total: $7,511,168.
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 2017 to 2018, from $7.3M to $9.7M (+33%).
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 50% · 2018 85% · 2019 83% · 2020 89% · 2021 89% · 2022 73% · 2023 69% · 2024 94% · 2025 91%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
99% of RURAL AMERICA INITIATIVES’s revenue is contributions — more reliant on donations than three-quarters of its peers (60% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 2 of the last 9 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.
Board chair
Carol Marshall
Chairperson
As listed on its FY2025 Form 990.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 5 funders to 9 funders, grant income rose $173k → $1.3M.
12 of 34 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 39% 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 RURAL AMERICA INITIATIVES’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 34 funders by total. 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
RURAL AMERICA INITIATIVES leans on a few funders — its largest provides 28% of grant income and the top three 63%; half comes from just 2 funders.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 2 funders to its left
52% 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 RURAL AMERICA INITIATIVES.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 44% · 2018 71% · 2019 49% · 2020 68% · 2021 32% · 2022 54% · 2023 78% — growing more concentrated.
“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
46% of RURAL AMERICA INITIATIVES's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 44% 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
RURAL AMERICA INITIATIVES draws 60% of its grant income from funders outside South Dakota, across 12 states in all.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $1.5M arriving through sponsors registered in 8 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
RURAL AMERICA INITIATIVES's funding base is broadening — from 5 funders to 9 as grant income climbed.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 2,299 community improvement nonprofits $1M–$10M, FY2025
Government funding RURAL AMERICA INITIATIVES receives
Grants and contracts to this organization from federal (USASpending) and state checkbooks, reconciled to its EIN. $65.2M on record.
- Department of Health and Human Services$65.2M
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 RURAL AMERICA INITIATIVES
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 South Dakota
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
89% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
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 RURAL AMERICA INITIATIVES: 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 RURAL AMERICA INITIATIVES?
- RURAL AMERICA INITIATIVES (South Dakota) receives grants from 34 organizations whose IRS filings report $3,778,534 to it, the largest being BLACK HILLS AREA COMMUNITY FOUNDATION ($1,051,838). 15 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does RURAL AMERICA INITIATIVES have?
- IRS filings report 34 organizations giving $3,778,534 in grants to RURAL AMERICA INITIATIVES, 15 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of RURAL AMERICA INITIATIVES?
- BLACK HILLS AREA COMMUNITY FOUNDATION is the largest funder on record, with $1,051,838 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like RURAL AMERICA INITIATIVES find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in South Dakota. 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 Rural America Initiatives →
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 34 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