California · Nonprofit
Youth United for Community Action
Youth United for Community Action (California) receives grants from 31 organizations whose IRS filings report $3,899,287 to it, the largest being THE SAN FRANCISCO FOUNDATION ($910,500). 13 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 52% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
- Revenue FY2025
- $662k
- Funders on record
- 31
- Grants received
- $3.9M
- Net assets
- $2.7M
What Youth United for Community Action does
Mission
Youth United for Community Action (YUCA), a grassroots community organization created, led, and run by young people of color, the majority from low-income communities, provides a safe space for young people to empower ourselves and work on environmental and social justice issues to establish positive systemic change through grassroots community organizing.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Programs
The Higher Learning Program was launched in June 1997 to serve the growing number of high school aged youth. The Higher Learning Program (HL) was initiated by high school youth in East Palo Alto to help support and develop young people as active leaders in the community. As a result, HL EPA brings high school aged youth together in a healthy and safe environment where they can identify and explore issues affecting them as young people and as members of their communities. Once an issue has been identified, the youth research and evaluate the root causes of the specific issue and develop/implement action plans to productively address this issue. This year there were two campaigns, a housing justice campaign and an environmental justice campaign.
$205,000 spent45% of program spendingDeveloping Leaders: Since its inception, YUCA believes that the people who are most affected should be the driving force to determining and bringing about their own solution. YUCA was founded on the belief that the most effective youth program should include the intense involvement of young people at all levels of the organization. As a result, representing our constituency, YUCA is led and run at all levels entirely by young people of color, majority low-income, majority women, thus providing an opportunity for us to define our own needs, determine our own vision, and implement it. Through intense leadership development that is grounded in real-time community organizing, young people at YUCA prove that youth are not just the promise of the future, but all the possibilities of the present.
$205,000 spent45% of program spendingOrganizing the Community: As a community, East Palo Alto has a rich history of movement. It is a history borne out of struggle and the self-determined imagination of the Black Power movement whose struggles led by other peoples of color are also driven by. But the spirit of organizing is well and alive in our community. These are the footsteps that young people from YUCA follow in order to carve our own paths. Young people from YUCA are principled fighters and leaders who put our words and ideals to action. Since 1994, YUCA youth have taken on pressing community issues - whether it is environmental racism, tenant rights, or juvenile justice. YUCA youth currently work on two campaigns: 1) to promote environmental health, justice, and anti-displacement principles in land use planning policies, and 2) to promote thriving school environments aiming to increase high school graduation rates and preparing students for college or career.
$45,516 spent10% of program spending
The 3 programs described on its FY2025 Form 990, listed largest first by expense. Program spending in total: $455,516.
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 2020 to 2021, from $486k to $2.3M (+380%).
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: 2019 20% · 2022 7% · 2024 6% · 2025 13%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
67% of Youth United for Community Action’s revenue is contributions — about as donation-reliant as the typical peer (83% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 0 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
Dalila Adofo
Board Chair
As listed on its FY2025 Form 990.
The chief executive listed changed between the FY2018 and FY2019, and between the FY2023 and FY2024 filings.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 3 funders to 7 funders, grant income rose $115k → $364k.
10 of 31 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 52% 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 Youth United for Community Action’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 31 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
Youth United for Community Action has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 23% 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
60% 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 Youth United for Community Action.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 48% · 2018 79% · 2019 86% · 2020 40% · 2021 21% · 2022 32% · 2023 37% — 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
50% of Youth United for Community Action's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 42% 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
52% of Youth United for Community Action's grant income arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors, whose addresses record where the money is held rather than where the donor is. Of the $1.9M that is directly attributable, 83% of it comes from California 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 7 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
Youth United for Community Action holds deeper cash reserves than three-quarters of the 3,482 youth development nonprofits its size.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 3,482 youth development nonprofits $100k–$1M, FY2025
Organizations like Youth United for Community Action
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 California
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
80% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
81%
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 Youth United for Community Action: 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 Youth United for Community Action?
- Youth United for Community Action (California) receives grants from 31 organizations whose IRS filings report $3,899,287 to it, the largest being THE SAN FRANCISCO FOUNDATION ($910,500). 13 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 52% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
- How many funders does Youth United for Community Action have?
- IRS filings report 31 organizations giving $3,899,287 in grants to Youth United for Community Action, 13 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of Youth United for Community Action?
- THE SAN FRANCISCO FOUNDATION is the largest funder on record, with $910,500 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like Youth United for Community Action find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in California. 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 FY2025 (financials across 2017–2025), and the filings of 31 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