Spirit of the Sun Inc

Overview

Mission

To work in partnership with Native American communities in urban areas and on reservations to boost the resilience of Native people especially youth and young adults.

What it reported doing in 2025

Indigenous Agriculture: Spirit of the Sun worked towards preserving the cultural practices of Indigenous foodways by growing our traditional bioregional foods and understanding our foods as our medicine through our Healing Foods Project. The Indigenous Agriculture team grows food on our partner farms to be shared with the community through our Native Elders Food Share Program. This work promotes Native and Indigenous selfdetermination and resiliency by addressing systemic environmental injustices and food apartheid through Indigenous foodsystems sovereignty traditional foodways and Indigenous climate justice. Through working with local Native and BIPOC communities we seek to strengthen economic and cultural resilience through Rematriation and ancestral ecological practices soil remediation and knowledge sharing. In 2024 Spirit of the Sun grew and distributed 1000lbs of food to our community members.

Operating model

Revenue model
Donor-supported. 70% of the money available for current operations came from contributions and gifts.
Distribution model
Direct operator. The filing allocates 86% of reported program-service expenses outside its grant, affiliate-payment, and member-benefit lines. This expense classification does not rule out separately announced grant awards.

Nonprofit profile at a glance

EIN
030442292
IRS 990 coverage
2016–2025
Forms available
Form 990 2025, Form 990-PF 2015
Headquarters
Denver, CO, USA
Phone
3033534683
Rating
79
Verdict
SUPPORTED
Rating confidence
Moderate

The verdict

SUPPORTED - A large share of available resources goes toward mission work and the filed numbers largely add up. Some filing-based governance responses are negative or unanswered and expenses are high relative to revenue.

Rating breakdown

  • Financial Efficiency: 76
  • Transparency & Controls: 89
  • Accountability: 72
  • Sustainability: 46
  • Growth: 100

Detailed rating inputs

Financial Efficiency

  • Mission deployment rate: 73.7%; rating input score 74
  • Program expense ratio: 80.5%; rating input score 81
  • Fundraising efficiency: $53.73 raised per $1 spent on fundraising; rating input score 75; 75th percentile among comparable filings

Transparency & Controls

  • Consistency checks: 92.3%; rating input score 92; 19th percentile among comparable filings
  • Pay-setting controls: Limited
  • Foreign activity oversight: Limited
  • Grant itemization coverage: 98.9%; rating input score 99; 52nd percentile among comparable filings
  • Major donor itemization: Yes; rating input score 100
  • Related-party transparency: Limited

Accountability

  • Independent voting board: 66.7%; rating input score 67; 19th percentile among comparable filings
  • Governance controls: 7 of 9 controls in place; rating input score 78
    • Conflict-of-interest policy: Pass
    • Whistleblower policy: Pass
    • Document-retention policy: Fail
    • CEO compensation review process: Pass
    • Other executive compensation review process: Pass
    • Form 990 shared with the board: Pass
    • Board meeting minutes documented: Pass
    • Audit committee oversight: Pass
    • Independent financial-statement audit: Fail

Sustainability

  • Operating margin: 9.2%; rating input score 54; 54th percentile among comparable filings
  • Total-asset coverage ratio: 0.81; rating input score 38; 38th percentile among comparable filings
  • Liabilities to assets ratio: 0.02; rating input score 52; 52nd percentile among comparable filings
  • Officer compensation ratio: 12.8%; rating input score 30; 30th percentile among comparable filings

Growth

  • Program expense growth: 36.9% per year; rating input score 100; 91st percentile among comparable filings
  • Revenue growth: 24.4% per year; rating input score 100; 86th percentile among comparable filings
  • Asset growth: 30.7% per year; rating input score 100; 89th percentile among comparable filings

Details

  • Where the money goes: 73.7% of revenue deployed · 80.5% of spending went to programs
  • Governance: 4 of 6 board members independent · 7 of 9 filing controls reported
  • Programs: 3 filed program accomplishments · $915K in reported program spending
  • Leadership: top reported pay $115K · 6 people listed
  • Consistency: 41 of 42 current checks pass · 1 finding to review
  • Schedules: 4 filed schedules · includes major donors and grants
  • Filing history: 10 annual filings from 2016 to 2025
  • Contacts: How to reach this organization
  • Money network: 4 filed money-flow records
  • Grant readiness: Federal tax and exclusion status, award history, and grant-maker relationships.
  • People: Everyone the filings name, and which of them the filings identify by more than a name.

Leadership & pay

6 people listed

Highest reported compensation

  • Shannon Francis (Executive Director): $114,752 total reported compensation
  • Shania Gonzales (Director of Operations): $30,240 total reported compensation

Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: FY2025.