Colorado Youth Congress
Nonprofit profile at a glance
- EIN
- 824121769
- IRS 990 coverage
- 2021–2024
- Forms available
- Form 990 2024
- Location
- Denver, CO, USA
- Phone
- 7207672619
- Rating
- 69
- Verdict
- SUPPORTED
- Rating confidence
- Moderate
- Sector
- Civil Rights, Social Action, Advocacy N.E.C.
Reported finances
- Revenue
- $515,460
- Expenses
- $577,795
- Assets
- $497,943
- Liabilities
- $19
Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2024. Amounts in USD.
Leadership & pay
10 people listed
Highest reported compensation
- Ananas Khogali Mustafa (Deputy Director): $117,886 total reported compensation
- Jason Romero Jr (Executive Dir.): $98,228 total reported compensation
Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2024. Names and roles reflect this filing, not necessarily current officeholders.
Overview
Mission
Colorado Youth Congress (CYC) is a statewide community that cultivates the healing and leadership of young people to guide us all into a future grounded in justice and wellbeing.
What it reported doing in 2024
CYC works with young people across Colorado to transform ourselves, our communities, and the broader systems that shape our lives. Our program is rooted in healing, identity, leadership, and action. Through regional hubs, statewide retreats, wellness sessions, peer connection, and youth-led Theory of Social Change projects, members study the issues impacting their communities and build the skills to address them through organizing, advocacy, art, storytelling, and healing justice. We believe that when young people are supported in their own healing, connected to community, and given real tools to lead, they can help create a future where justice, wellbeing, and collective care are not just ideas, but everyday practices.
Operating model
- Revenue model
- Donor-supported. 83% of the money available for current operations came from contributions and gifts.
- 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.
The verdict
SUPPORTED - The filed numbers largely add up and most voting board members are independent. A relatively small share of available resources goes toward mission work and a relatively small share of total spending goes to programs.
Rating breakdown
- Financial Efficiency: 48
- Transparency & Controls: 86
- Accountability: 86
- Sustainability: 28
- Growth: 100
Detailed rating inputs
Financial Efficiency
- Mission deployment rate: 52.7%; rating input score 53
- Program expense ratio: 46.9%; rating input score 47
- Fundraising efficiency: $6.85 raised per $1 spent on fundraising; rating input score 26; 26th percentile among comparable filings
Transparency & Controls
- Consistency checks: 92.3%; rating input score 92; 16th percentile among comparable filings
- Pay-setting controls: Limited
- 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; 63rd percentile among comparable filings
- Governance controls: 6 of 9 controls in place; rating input score 67
- 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: Missing
- Independent financial-statement audit: Fail
Sustainability
- Operating margin: -12.1%; rating input score 15; 15th percentile among comparable filings
- Total-asset coverage ratio: 0.86; rating input score 38; 38th percentile among comparable filings
- Liabilities to assets ratio: 0; rating input score 83; 83rd percentile among comparable filings
- Officer compensation ratio: 37.4%; rating input score 4; 4th percentile among comparable filings
Growth
- Program expense growth: 33.6% per year; rating input score 100; 92nd percentile among comparable filings
- Revenue growth: 9.9% per year; rating input score 100; 66th percentile among comparable filings
- Asset growth: 27.8% per year; rating input score 100; 89th percentile among comparable filings
Details
- Where the money goes: 52.7% of revenue deployed · 46.9% of spending went to programs
- Governance: 7 of 7 board members independent · 6 of 9 filing controls reported
- Programs: 1 filed program accomplishment · $271K in reported program spending
- Leadership: top reported pay $118K · 10 people listed
- Consistency: 27 of 28 current checks pass · 1 finding to review
- Schedules: 4 filed schedules · includes major donors
- Filing history: 4 filing years from 2021 to 2024
- Contacts: How to reach this organization
- Money network: 2 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.
- Staff and benefit plans: Retirement and health plans the organization files with the Department of Labor, and the people in them.
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.
- Review — Financial Efficiency: Mission deployment rate scored 53/100.
- Moderate — Financial Efficiency: Program expense ratio scored 47/100.
- High — Financial Efficiency: Fundraising efficiency scored 26/100.
- Review — Accountability: Governance controls: 2 of 8 not reported.
- High — Sustainability: Operating margin scored 15/100.
- Moderate — Sustainability: Total-asset coverage ratio scored 38/100.
- Moderate — Transparency & Controls: Schedule A contributions reconciliation did not reconcile in the filed values.
- High — Sustainability: Officer compensation ratio scored 4/100.
- High — Grant Readiness: Automatic revocation: this organization had its federal tax-exempt status automatically revoked.