Children's Law Center Inc
Nonprofit profile at a glance
- EIN
- 521961588
- IRS 990 coverage
- 2009–2024
- Forms available
- Form 990 2024
- Location
- Washington, DC, USA
- Phone
- 2024674900
- Rating
- 76
- Verdict
- SUPPORTED
- Rating confidence
- Moderate
- Sector
- Legal Services
Reported finances
- Revenue
- $15,114,739
- Expenses
- $13,622,465
- Assets
- $14,241,131
- Liabilities
- $850,140
Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2024. Amounts in USD.
Leadership & pay
26 people listed
Executive titles in this filing
- JUDITH SANDALOW (EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR)
Highest reported compensation
- JUDITH SANDALOW (EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR): $228,043 total reported compensation
- BRIAN D SHOOK (CHIEF DEVELOPMENT OFFICER): $226,599 total reported compensation
- LASHANDA ADAMS (LEGAL DIRECTOR): $216,084 total reported compensation
Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2024. Names and roles reflect this filing, not necessarily current officeholders.
Overview
Mission
Children's law center believes every child should grow up with a strong foundation of family, health and education and live in a world free from poverty, trauma, racism, and other forms of oppression. Our more than 100 staff together with dc children and families, community partners and pro bono attorneys use the law to solve children's urgent problems today and improve the systems that will affect their lives tomorrow. Since our founding in 1996, we have reached more than 50,000 children and families directly and multiplied our impact by advocating for city-wide solutions that benefit hundreds of thousands more.
What it reported doing in 2024
Healthy together - unsafe housing, inadequate education, exposure to violence, lack of good health care and other problems related to poverty, trauma and racism can harm children's physical and behavioral health. Through our healthy together program, children's law center partners with pediatricians throughout eight community health centers and clinics to find and fix the root causes of a child's health problem such as advocating for landlords to repair water damage that led to mold which exacerbates a child's asthma. And because health and education are inextricably linked, children's law center also ensures children can start school ready to learn by helping infants and toddlers with developmental delays get support early. When children reach school age, children's law center works with parents and schools to get a child's education back on track from ensuring testing for learning disabilities at an early age to making sure students with disabilities or behavioral health issues have an appropriate plan that meets their learning needs.
Operating model
- Revenue model
- Mixed. Its operating money came from several sources; no one source provided a clear majority.
- Distribution model
- Direct operator. The filing allocates 100% 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.
- Includes noncash contributions: Reported contributions include donated property or goods.
The verdict
SUPPORTED - A large share of available resources goes toward mission work and the filed numbers largely add up. Fundraising costs are high for each dollar raised and some filing-based governance responses are negative or unanswered.
Rating breakdown
- Financial Efficiency: 65
- Transparency & Controls: 79
- Accountability: 95
- Sustainability: 54
- Growth: 100
Detailed rating inputs
Financial Efficiency
- Mission deployment rate: 68%; rating input score 68
- Program expense ratio: 74.8%; rating input score 75
- Fundraising efficiency: $5.59 raised per $1 spent on fundraising; rating input score 23; 23rd percentile among comparable filings
Transparency & Controls
- Consistency checks: 100%; rating input score 100; 62nd percentile among comparable filings
- Pay-setting controls: 3 of 6 controls in place; rating input score 50
- Compensation committee: Pass
- Independent consultant: Missing
- Other Form 990s reviewed: Pass
- Written employment contract: Missing
- Compensation survey or study: Missing
- Board or committee approval: Pass
- Foreign activity oversight: Limited
- Grant itemization coverage: Limited
- Major donor itemization: Yes; rating input score 100
- Related-party transparency: Limited
Accountability
- Independent voting board: 100%; rating input score 100; 66th percentile among comparable filings
- Governance controls: 8 of 9 controls in place; rating input score 89
- Conflict-of-interest policy: Pass
- Whistleblower policy: Pass
- Document-retention policy: Pass
- CEO compensation review process: Pass
- Other executive compensation review process: Fail
- Form 990 shared with the board: Pass
- Board meeting minutes documented: Pass
- Audit committee oversight: Pass
- Independent financial-statement audit: Pass
Sustainability
- Operating margin: 9.9%; rating input score 67; 67th percentile among comparable filings
- Total-asset coverage ratio: 1.05; rating input score 38; 38th percentile among comparable filings
- Liabilities to assets ratio: 0.06; rating input score 81; 81st percentile among comparable filings
- Officer compensation ratio: 11.6%; rating input score 15; 15th percentile among comparable filings
Growth
- Program expense growth: 1.8% per year; rating input score 100; 18th percentile among comparable filings
- Revenue growth: 5.1% per year; rating input score 100; 45th percentile among comparable filings
- Asset growth: 11.1% per year; rating input score 100; 69th percentile among comparable filings
Details
- Where the money goes: 68% of revenue deployed · 74.8% of spending went to programs
- Governance: 18 of 18 board members independent · 8 of 9 filing controls reported
- Programs: 4 filed program accomplishments · $10.2M in reported program spending
- Leadership: top reported pay $228K · 26 people listed · 3 of 6 pay-setting controls reported
- Highest-paid contractors: 2 contractors listed · $224K reported
- Consistency: 36 of 36 current checks pass
- Schedules: 8 filed schedules · includes major donors and executive pay
- Filing history: 15 filing years from 2009 to 2024
- Contacts: How to reach this organization
- Money network: 8 filed money-flow records
- Related organizations: Filed and resolved organization relationships.
- 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.
- High — Financial Efficiency: Fundraising efficiency scored 23/100.
- Review — Accountability: Governance controls: Other executive compensation review process not reported.
- Moderate — Sustainability: Total-asset coverage ratio scored 38/100.
- High — Sustainability: Officer compensation ratio scored 15/100.