Minnesota · Nonprofit
TRUE FRIENDS
TRUE FRIENDS (Minnesota) receives grants from 108 organizations whose IRS filings report $11,531,327 to it, the largest being CAMP CAMBRIA FOUNDATION ($1,500,000). 69 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2024
- $10M
- Funders on record
- 108
- Grants received
- $12M
- Net assets
- $22M
What True Friends does
Mission
Provide life-changing experiences that enhance independence and self-esteem for children and adults with disabilities.
As stated on its FY2024 Form 990.
Programs
Residential campprogram provides opportunities for people with and without disabilities to enjoy the benefit from year-round, outdoor recreational and leisure activities offered at camp friendship, camp eden wood and camp courage. Traditional camp, resort activities and specialty programs help create new skills, build confidence, improve self-esteem and promote understanding, acceptance, and appreciation for diversity in human beings. Day camp and winter camp programs are also available.
$2,836,177 spentof which $48,705 as grants$2,493,261 earned by the program39% of program spendingEducation and training servicesprogram provides experiential learning and environmental education services for schools, youth at risk, and other nonprofit groups and transitional employment and work related training for people with and without disabilities. High and low ropes courses, zip lines and climbing towers are utilized to build confidence and develop team dynamics.
$2,020,371 spent$1,346,026 earned by the program27% of program spendingTherapy and adaptive ridingprogram provides hippotherapy, therapeutic riding, and horsemanship experiences for individuals with disabilities, both children and adults. The riding therapy takes place at camp courage. Therapy and adaptive riding provides opportunities for individuals of all abilities to experience exceptional equine-assisted activities by facilitating the horse camp programs and special respite programming.
$902,033 spent$326,795 earned by the program12% of program spendingRespite and family servicesprogram provides a break from the daily demands of caring for a child or adult with special needs through the weekend and weekday respite care programs. This program offers children and adults a home-like setting to relax and re-energize.
$1,593,226 spent$444,721 earned by the program22% of program spending
The 4 programs described on its FY2024 Form 990, listed largest first by expense. Program spending in total: $7,351,807.
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 2022 to 2023, from $16M to $22M (+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: 2021 30%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
46% of TRUE FRIENDS’s revenue is contributions — more donation-reliant than the typical peer (11% 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
John Leblanc
President & CEO
As listed on its FY2024 Form 990.
The chief executive listed changed between the FY2017 and FY2018 filings.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 29 funders to 52 funders, grant income rose $494k → $3.1M.
20 of 108 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 17% 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: $7.0M from one payer (the payer shares this organization's board, largest True Friends Foundation). These are real filings, and they are not money TRUE FRIENDS raised.
From the IRS filings of TRUE FRIENDS’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 108 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
TRUE FRIENDS has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 13% of grant income, and it takes 8 funders to reach half.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 8 funders to its left
42% 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 TRUE FRIENDS.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 20% · 2018 30% · 2019 17% · 2020 10% · 2021 14% · 2022 22% · 2023 48% — 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
48% of TRUE FRIENDS's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 64% 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
96% of TRUE FRIENDS's grant income comes from Minnesota funders.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $2.0M arriving through sponsors registered in 12 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
TRUE FRIENDS holds deeper cash reserves than three-quarters of the 303 recreation & sports nonprofits its size.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 303 recreation & sports nonprofits $10M–$100M, FY2024
Organizations like TRUE FRIENDS
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 Minnesota
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
87% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
92%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 1 state
Part of a family of 1 related entity
- True Friends Foundation · exempt
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for TRUE FRIENDS: 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 TRUE FRIENDS?
- TRUE FRIENDS (Minnesota) receives grants from 108 organizations whose IRS filings report $11,531,327 to it, the largest being CAMP CAMBRIA FOUNDATION ($1,500,000). 69 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does TRUE FRIENDS have?
- IRS filings report 108 organizations giving $11,531,327 in grants to TRUE FRIENDS, 69 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of TRUE FRIENDS?
- CAMP CAMBRIA FOUNDATION is the largest funder on record, with $1,500,000 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like TRUE FRIENDS find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Minnesota. 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 True Friends →
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 108 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