Delaware Seaside Railroad Club Inc

Nonprofit profile at a glance

EIN: 205762923
IRS 990-EZ coverage: 2023–2025
Forms available: Form 990-EZ 2025, Form 990-N 2022
Location: Ocean View, DE, USA
Phone: 3029451627
Rating: 66
Verdict: SUPPORTED
Rating confidence: Moderate
Sector: Museum, Museum Activities

Reported finances

Revenue: $81,671
Expenses: $48,740
Assets: $97,465
Liabilities: $125

Source: IRS Form 990-EZ. Selected filing: tax year 2025. Amounts in USD.

Leadership & pay

5 people listed

Executive titles in this filing

John C Hodges (President)
Joseph Dougherty (Vice President)

People named in this filing

John C Hodges (President)
Joseph Dougherty (Vice President)
Robert Schadewald (Treasurer)

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

As stated in DSRC's by-laws: Promote and perserve the history and hobby of model railroading. This is accomplished through the exchange of information, development of relationships, and interaction with the community through train meets, shows, displays, workshops, and presentations. Our purpose is to contnuously educate the public about model railroading - past, present and future.Each year DSRC is visible to the public throuh attendance at parades and public events. The clubhouse houses over 5 operating train layouts in different gauges and is open to the public. Workshops are held to encourage young and old to develop an interest and appreciation of this amazing hobby which has been part of the public landscape for over 100 years. Workshops are hands on to teach skills necessary to build, wire and maintain layouts.DSRC is an all-volunteeer workforce. Members build, modify and maintain all the club's permenant and travelling train layouts, maintain our facilities and interact with th

What it reported doing in 2025

Service to the public: one of our most important service programs is keeping our club open to the public as scheduled on wednesday and saturday (and other times by appointmeent). Visitors see the operating layouts in operation, interact with members, and seek advice and help on matters regarding the hobby. We have magazines and other publications generally free to the public. We also have layouts for children to operate and touch for their experimentation with trains. We get donations from visitors and new members. Over the years we have held classes for school-age groupsss on how to build a layout hands-on. The public can also bring their trains and equpment in for testing and troubleshooting.donations from estates and individuals of trains and equipment, layouts and collections are sold to generate revenues to sustain operations and programs. The club is open to members for cleaning, maintreance of layouts and all the chores necessary to keep the club open.this effort id labor intensive and all time is volunteered by members. The best estimate of costs include an allocation of occuoancy costs based on time spent and space occupied. Usually there are 12 or more members present on wednesday and saturday alone. We estimate 4000 hours are expended and related occupancy costs and maintreance of layouts are estimated at $7,052.the collective activities described in lines 28 - 30 attract vistors, inquiries and financial support necessary to sustain dsrc operations and programs.

Operating model

Revenue model: Donor-supported. 86% 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 program spending has grown recently. A relatively small share of available resources goes toward mission work and liabilities are high compared with assets.

Rating breakdown

Financial Efficiency: 49
Transparency & Controls: 82
Sustainability: 70
Growth: 100

Detailed rating inputs

Financial Efficiency

Mission deployment rate: 39.7%; rating input score 40
Program expense ratio: 65.4%; rating input score 65

Transparency & Controls

Consistency checks: 100%; rating input score 100; 51st percentile among comparable filings
Major donor itemization: Limited

Sustainability

Operating margin: 40.3%; rating input score 86; 86th percentile among comparable filings
Total-asset coverage ratio: 2; rating input score 65; 65th percentile among comparable filings
Liabilities to assets ratio: 0; rating input score 30; 30th percentile among comparable filings
Officer compensation ratio: 0%; rating input score 56; 56th percentile among comparable filings

Growth

Program expense growth: 48.4% per year; rating input score 100; 92nd percentile among comparable filings
Revenue growth: 15.3% per year; rating input score 100; 86th percentile among comparable filings
Asset growth: 30.2% per year; rating input score 100; 90th percentile among comparable filings

Details

Where the money goes: 39.7% of revenue deployed · 65.4% of spending went to programs
Governance: Filed governance answers
Accomplishments: 3 filed program accomplishments · $32K in reported program spending
Leadership: top reported pay $0 · 5 people listed
Consistency: 7 of 7 current checks pass
Schedules: 2 filed schedules
Filing history: 3 filing years from 2023 to 2025
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.

Moderate — Financial Efficiency: Mission deployment rate scored 40/100.
Moderate — Sustainability: Liabilities to assets ratio scored 30/100.
Review — Sustainability: Officer compensation ratio scored 56/100.