Community Alliance with Family Farmers

Nonprofit profile at a glance

EIN
942914745
IRS 990 coverage
2016–2024
Forms available
Form 990 2024
Location
Davis, CA, USA
Phone
5307568518
Rating
79
Verdict
SUPPORTED
Rating confidence
Moderate

Official website

Reported finances

Revenue
$12,430,271
Expenses
$7,372,542
Assets
$7,247,977
Liabilities
$565,823

Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2024. Amounts in USD.

Leadership & pay

17 people listed

Executive titles in this filing

  • PAUL TOWERS (EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR)

Highest reported compensation

  • PAUL TOWERS (EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR): $142,507 total reported compensation

Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2024. Names and roles reflect this filing, not necessarily current officeholders.

Overview

Mission

CAFF's mission is to build sustainable food and farming systems through policy advocacy and on-the-ground programs that create more resilient family farms, communities, and ecosystems. CAFF works with farmers, buyers and food advocates across the State of California.

What it reported doing in 2024

Farm to MarketCAFF connects farms with businesses, providing growers with a suite of practical services - from coordinating institutional purchasing to marketing resources - to ensure supply and demand grow together. From our Farm to Cafeteria Initiative, to our work with the CSA Innovation Network (a partnership with 15 technical assistancee groups), and the "Local Food Systems Response to COVID Network", we provide direct support to farms all across California through direct technical assistance, research, and by sharing valuable resources, Purchasing Collaboratives are groups of school and hospital food service purchasing representatives from the same region, utilizing common distributors and farmers.

Operating model

Revenue model
Earned-program. 69% of the money available for current operations came from fees and other program revenue.
Distribution model
Hybrid. The nonprofit split its reported program spending across 71% for direct work, and 29% for grants.

The verdict

SUPPORTED - The filed numbers largely add up and a large share of total spending goes to programs. A relatively small share of available resources goes toward mission work and some filing-based governance responses are negative or unanswered.

Rating breakdown

  • Financial Efficiency: 66
  • Transparency & Controls: 88
  • Accountability: 90
  • Sustainability: 72
  • Growth: 100

Detailed rating inputs

Financial Efficiency

  • Mission deployment rate: 51.7%; rating input score 52
  • Program expense ratio: 87.1%; rating input score 87
  • Fundraising efficiency: $37.11 raised per $1 spent on fundraising; rating input score 71; 71st percentile among comparable filings

Transparency & Controls

  • Consistency checks: 92.3%; rating input score 92; 8th percentile among comparable filings
  • Pay-setting controls: Limited
  • Foreign activity oversight: Limited
  • Grant itemization coverage: 95.7%; rating input score 96; 25th percentile among comparable filings
  • 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: 6 of 8 controls in place; rating input score 75
    • Conflict-of-interest policy: Pass
    • Whistleblower policy: Pass
    • Document-retention policy: Pass
    • CEO compensation review process: Pass
    • Other executive compensation review process: NotApplicable
    • Form 990 shared with the board: Pass
    • Board meeting minutes documented: Pass
    • Audit committee oversight: Missing
    • Independent financial-statement audit: Fail

Sustainability

  • Operating margin: 40.7%; rating input score 92; 92nd percentile among comparable filings
  • Total-asset coverage ratio: 0.98; rating input score 35; 35th percentile among comparable filings
  • Liabilities to assets ratio: 0.08; rating input score 77; 77th percentile among comparable filings
  • Officer compensation ratio: 1.9%; rating input score 77; 77th percentile among comparable filings

Growth

  • Program expense growth: 26% per year; rating input score 100; 94th percentile among comparable filings
  • Revenue growth: 27.8% per year; rating input score 100; 96th percentile among comparable filings
  • Asset growth: 35.9% per year; rating input score 100; 97th percentile among comparable filings

Details

  • Where the money goes: 51.7% of revenue deployed · 87.1% of spending went to programs
  • Governance: 16 of 16 board members independent · 6 of 8 filing controls reported
  • Programs: 4 filed program accomplishments · $6.4M in reported program spending
  • Leadership: top reported pay $143K · 17 people listed
  • Highest-paid contractors: 2 contractors listed · $307K reported
  • Consistency: 30 of 31 current checks pass · 1 finding to review
  • Schedules: 7 filed schedules · includes major donors and grants
  • Filing history: 8 filing years from 2016 to 2024
  • Contacts: How to reach this organization
  • Money network: 69 filed money-flow records
  • Related organizations: 68 filed related-organization links
  • 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.

  • Review — Financial Efficiency: Mission deployment rate scored 52/100.
  • Review — Accountability: Governance controls: Independent financial-statement audit not reported.
  • Moderate — Sustainability: Total-asset coverage ratio scored 35/100.
  • Review — Transparency & Controls: Domestic grant itemization did not reconcile in the filed values.