Feed America First
Legal name: Feed America First of Tennessee
Nonprofit profile at a glance
- EIN
- 621821057
- IRS 990 coverage
- 2015–2024
- Official website data refreshed
- Sep 2026
- Forms available
- Form 990 2024
- Location
- Murfreesboro, TN, US
- Phone
- (931) 265-5878
- Rating
- 82
- Verdict
- STRONG
- Rating confidence
- Moderate
- Sector
- Food Banks, Pantries
- Affiliation
- Christianity
Reported finances
- Revenue
- $26,312,706
- Expenses
- $25,723,881
- Assets
- $6,326,020
- Liabilities
- $1,932,821
Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2024. Amounts in USD.
Leadership & pay
11 people listed
Executive titles in this filing
- DAVID SPEER (PRESIDENT)
Highest reported compensation
- MIKE WOMACK (EXECUTIVE DI): $87,880 total reported compensation
Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2024. Names and roles reflect this filing, not necessarily current officeholders.
Overview
Mission
To provide food to those who feed the hungry.
What it reported doing in 2024
The faf vision "hunger will cease to be a problem in america when we all refuse to allow our neighbors to go hungr." accomplishments towards this goal in 2023 include: 1. Distributing 9,509,359 pounds of wholesome food to our local partners inpacting an estimated 40,000 families monthly. 2. Food distribution to 125+ local agencies within our footprint of southern Kentucky, middle Tennessee and northern portions of Alabama and Mississippi. Those agencies are composed of local volunteers who know their neighbors and can respond quickly to an immediate need. Communities are stronger when neighbors help neighbors. 3. Coordinating approximately 2,500 volunteers to help manage the food storage, portioning and distribution process. 4. Distributing enough food for 7.924,465 hearty meals with a highly productive staff of 12 while maintaining an overhead of approximately 2%: an estimated 98% of contributions went to our core mission of feeding the hungry.
Operating model
- Revenue model
- Donor-supported. 99% 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.
- Includes noncash contributions: Reported contributions include donated property or goods.
The verdict
STRONG - A large share of available resources goes toward mission work and the filed numbers largely add up. Some filing-based governance responses are negative or unanswered and program spending has declined or grown slowly.
Rating breakdown
- Financial Efficiency: 95
- Transparency & Controls: 87
- Accountability: 74
- Sustainability: 38
- Growth: 20
Detailed rating inputs
Financial Efficiency
- Mission deployment rate: 95.8%; rating input score 96
- Program expense ratio: 98%; rating input score 98
- Fundraising efficiency: $102.17 raised per $1 spent on fundraising; rating input score 85; 85th percentile among comparable filings
Transparency & Controls
- Consistency checks: 94.4%; rating input score 94; 22nd 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: 90.9%; rating input score 91; 23rd percentile among comparable filings
- Governance controls: 4 of 8 controls in place; rating input score 50
- Conflict-of-interest policy: Pass
- Whistleblower policy: Pass
- Document-retention policy: Fail
- CEO compensation review process: NotApplicable
- Other executive compensation review process: Fail
- Form 990 shared with the board: Pass
- Board meeting minutes documented: Pass
- Audit committee oversight: Missing
- Independent financial-statement audit: Fail
Sustainability
- Operating margin: 2.2%; rating input score 43; 43rd percentile among comparable filings
- Total-asset coverage ratio: 0.25; rating input score 6; 6th percentile among comparable filings
- Liabilities to assets ratio: 0.31; rating input score 46; 46th percentile among comparable filings
- Officer compensation ratio: 0.3%; rating input score 91; 91st percentile among comparable filings
Growth
- Program expense growth: -1.9% per year; rating input score 0; 6th percentile among comparable filings
- Revenue growth: -1.5% per year; rating input score 0; 5th percentile among comparable filings
- Asset growth: 25.5% per year; rating input score 100; 94th percentile among comparable filings
Details
- What they do: 3 programs and campaigns described on the official site · 5 operating locations identified
- Where the money goes: 95.8% of revenue deployed · 98% of spending went to programs
- Governance: 10 of 11 board members independent · 4 of 8 filing controls reported
- Programs: 1 filed program accomplishment · $25.2M in reported program spending
- Leadership: top reported pay $88K · 11 people listed
- Consistency: 31 of 32 current checks pass · 1 finding to review
- Schedules: 6 filed schedules · includes major donors
- Filing history: 10 filing years from 2015 to 2024
- Contacts: How to reach this organization
- Money network: 1 filed money-flow record
- 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.
- Review — Accountability: Governance controls: 3 of 7 not reported.
- High — Growth: Program expense growth scored 0/100.
- High — Growth: Revenue growth scored 0/100.
- High — Sustainability: Total-asset coverage ratio scored 6/100.
- Moderate — Sustainability: Operating margin scored 43/100.
- Review — Transparency & Controls: Schedule G fundraiser detail did not reconcile in the filed values.
- Moderate — Sustainability: Liabilities to assets ratio scored 46/100.