Arkansas Audubon Society Trust
Nonprofit profile at a glance
- EIN
- 237305199
- IRS 990-EZ coverage
- 2025–2025
- Forms available
- Form 990-EZ 2025, Form 990-N 2012
- Location
- Fort Smith, AR, USA
- Rating
- 49
- Verdict
- MIXED
- Rating confidence
- Moderate
- Sector
- Natural Resources Conservation and Protection
Reported finances
- Revenue
- $42,026
- Expenses
- $14,775
- Assets
- $371,082
Source: IRS Form 990-EZ. Selected filing: tax year 2025. Amounts in USD.
Leadership & pay
6 people listed
People named in this filing
- Ragupathy Kannan (Chairman)
- Lynn Foster (Trustee)
- Cherrie Lee Phillip (Trustee)
Selected names, not a complete roster or a statement of current roles. Open leadership details for the complete filed list.
Source: IRS Form 990-EZ. Selected filing: tax year 2025. Names and roles reflect this filing, not necessarily current officeholders.
Overview
Mission
The trust awards grants to fund research, conservation, and education projects with priority given to birds in Arkansas.
What it reported doing in 2025
The organization maintains transparency by issuing semiannual reports published publicly on their website https://arbirds.org/Trust/Reports.aspx and through regular engagement with the public. Grantees, their awards, and their research are publicly noted in the trust reports, and the grantees present, publish, or perform work furthering conservation, education, and ecological research. The organization regularly solicits requests for grants and engages with colleges, schools, researchers, and conservation groups to seek proposals for grants to further their work. The investment funds are structured to ensure long-term sustainability of the charitable programs, not for private gain, and only to further the impact of funded conservation, education, and research efforts. Some of the research papers written by students funded in part by the Arkansas Audubon Society Trust may be found at https://arbirds.org/Trust/Papers.aspx. For 2025, the Trust funded a variety of research, education, and conservation work. Patrick Barnes (Undergraduate, ATU) was awarded $700 for investigating ectoparasite communities in bluebird nests. Ella Bollinger (MS, ATU) was awarded $546 for her study on how biting insects influence Corticosteroid levels in nestling bluebirds. Jonothon Cantu (MS, UNT) was given $500 for tagging kestrels to investigate causes of winter mortality. Mason Dillard (MS, ATU) made $500 for studying the impact of grassland management in bird communities. Dustin Kohler ((MS, ATU) was given $1300 for researching habitat use in Cerulean Warblers. Victoria Langham (MS, UNT) got $500 to help with fuel costs in her study of delayed plumage maturation in Painted Buntings. Jacob Wyco (PhD, ASU) made $1500 for his study on feather mite recolonization in Prothonotary Warblers.Zach Campell (Ph.D, ASU) was awarded $500.00 to support his work on attitudes on conservation strategies in Arkansas. Colin Dobson won $1000.00 for his work on Prothonotary Warblers and their wetland habitats in Arkansas. Christian Machen was granted $520.00 to help him study the effects of urbanization on screech owls in Northwest Arkansas
Operating model
- Revenue model
- Cannot be determined from the filing. The filing does not provide enough consistent revenue detail to tell how this nonprofit funds its work.
- Distribution model
- Transfer-based 990-EZ. The 990-EZ reports grants or member benefits, but it does not separate enough spending to show the nonprofit’s full delivery mix.
The verdict
MIXED - The filed numbers largely add up and revenue comfortably covers expenses. A relatively small share of available resources goes toward mission work and reported officer compensation is a large share of total spending, which may reflect staffing concentration.
Rating breakdown
- Financial Efficiency: 11
- Transparency & Controls: 100
- Sustainability: 79
- Growth: NotEnoughData
Detailed rating inputs
Financial Efficiency
- Mission deployment rate: 18%; rating input score 18
- Program expense ratio: Limited
Transparency & Controls
- Consistency checks: 100%; rating input score 100; 51st percentile among comparable filings
- Major donor itemization: Yes; rating input score 100
Sustainability
- Operating margin: 64.8%; rating input score 94; 94th percentile among comparable filings
- Total-asset coverage ratio: 25.12; rating input score 97; 97th percentile among comparable filings
- Liabilities to assets ratio: Limited
- Officer compensation ratio: 0%; rating input score 56; 56th percentile among comparable filings
Growth
- Program expense growth: Limited
- Revenue growth: Limited
- Asset growth: Limited
Details
- Where the money goes: 18% of revenue deployed
- Governance: Filed governance answers
- Accomplishments: 1 filed program accomplishment
- Leadership: top reported pay $0 · 6 people listed
- Consistency: 6 of 6 current checks pass
- Schedules: 3 filed schedules
- Contacts: How to reach this organization
- 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.
Key Signals
Signals prioritize questions for review. They are not findings of misconduct.
Grant-readiness screening is separate from the live rating, not a measure of program quality. Review the source records before making a grant decision.
- High — Financial Efficiency: Mission deployment rate scored 18/100.
- Review — Sustainability: Officer compensation ratio scored 56/100.
- High — Grant Readiness: Automatic revocation: this organization had its federal tax-exempt status automatically revoked.