North Carolina · Nonprofit
Urban Survivors Union
Urban Survivors Union (North Carolina) receives grants from 16 organizations whose IRS filings report $393,613 to it, the largest being COMMUNITY INITIATIVES ($96,000). 9 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2018
- $182k
- Funders on record
- 16
- Grants received
- $394k
- Net assets
- $17k
What Urban Survivors Union does
Mission
Urban Survivors Union (USU) is a grassroots coalition of former and active drug users dedicated to ensuring respect, dignity, and social justice for our community. We contest the dominant culture's misguided attitudes and biases about drug use, sex work, drug users, and sex workers. USU stands for new unity and direction for people who use drugs and people who sell sex. Our programs are centered on improving conditions for people who use drugs qand sell sex as well as their families and communities.
As stated on its FY2018 Form 990-EZ.
Program
Leadership Development/Training - We have a series of trainings that we use to teach effective leadership development. We accomplish leadership development through local and national trainings, webinars, conferences, and retreats. We grew our coverage from 4 user unions to 28 user unions across the country. Apathy 2 Action"(A2A) is USU's organizing and leadership development program developed using the social ecological model. A2A builds leaders and brings marginalized individuals into the problem solving process.We provide leadership opportunities and opportunities to begin working as organizers and advocates. One piece of the magic is when people come in as passive recipients of service and stay as active organizers.
The first program described on its most recent Form 990-EZ.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2022: the base narrowed from 4 funders to 2 funders, grant income fell $73k → $730.
3 of 16 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 18% 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 Urban Survivors Union’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 15 of 16 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
Urban Survivors Union has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 24% 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
96% 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 Urban Survivors Union.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 55% · 2018 43% · 2019 36% · 2020 33% · 2021 45% · 2022 99% — 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
10% of Urban Survivors Union's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 56% 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 FY2022, 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
Urban Survivors Union draws 100% of its grant income from funders outside North Carolina, across 6 states in all.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $72k arriving through sponsors registered in 3 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.
Organizations like Urban Survivors Union
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 North Carolina
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Public support
0%
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 Urban Survivors Union: 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 Urban Survivors Union?
- Urban Survivors Union (North Carolina) receives grants from 16 organizations whose IRS filings report $393,613 to it, the largest being COMMUNITY INITIATIVES ($96,000). 9 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does Urban Survivors Union have?
- IRS filings report 16 organizations giving $393,613 in grants to Urban Survivors Union, 9 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of Urban Survivors Union?
- COMMUNITY INITIATIVES is the largest funder on record, with $96,000 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like Urban Survivors Union find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in North Carolina. 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 Urban Survivors Union →
These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2018 (financials across 2018–2018), and the filings of 16 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