Buffalo Jewish Federation
Legal name: Jewish Federation Of Greater Buffalo Inc
Nonprofit profile at a glance
- EIN
- 160743210
- IRS 990 coverage
- 2010–2025
- Official website data refreshed
- Sep 2026
- Forms available
- Form 990 2025
- Location
- Williamsville, NY, United States
- Phone
- 716-463-5050
- Rating
- 85
- Verdict
- STRONG
- Rating confidence
- Moderate
- Sector
- Federated Giving Programs
- Affiliation
- Judaism
Reported finances
- Revenue
- $6,072,082
- Expenses
- $8,230,481
- Assets
- $34,922,045
- Liabilities
- $176,673
Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2025. Amounts in USD.
Leadership & pay
22 people listed
Executive titles in this filing
- Blaine Schwartz (President)
- Deborah Goldman (Vice President)
- Marc Brown (Vice President)
- Marjorie Bryen (Immediate Past President)
- Miriam Abramovich (Executive Director)
Highest reported compensation
- Miriam Abramovich (Executive Director): $184,932 total reported compensation
Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2025. Names and roles reflect this filing, not necessarily current officeholders.
Overview
Mission
Our mission weaves threads of Jewish connection: creating welcoming opportunities for Jews and their loved ones to celebrate, learn, explore, and connect with Jewish life, Jewish people, Jewish ideas, Israel and Jewish community in meaningful ways; we raise and allocate resources: raising and distributing funding to support Jewish life locally, in Israel, and around the world; we convene and represent Jewish Buffalo: convening Jewish agencies and forging partnerships with civic, legislative, business and faith partners, educating, advocating, and serving as the voice of Jewish Buffalo; we Secure Jewish Life: fostering a sense of collective Jewish identity, working to end antisemitism, and ensuring that Jewish Buffalo remains secure, resilient and flourishes for generations to come.
What it reported doing in 2025
The Federation serves to disburse grants and allocations to beneficiaries including allocations to affiliates.
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.
The verdict
STRONG - 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 expenses are high relative to revenue.
Rating breakdown
- Financial Efficiency: 93
- Transparency & Controls: 71
- Accountability: 97
- Sustainability: 42
- Growth: 100
Detailed rating inputs
Financial Efficiency
- Mission deployment rate: 100%; rating input score 100
- Program expense ratio: 95.8%; rating input score 96
- Fundraising efficiency: $13.51 raised per $1 spent on fundraising; rating input score 46; 46th percentile among comparable filings
Transparency & Controls
- Consistency checks: 100%; rating input score 100; 63rd percentile among comparable filings
- Pay-setting controls: 2 of 6 controls in place; rating input score 33
- Compensation committee: Missing
- Independent consultant: Missing
- Other Form 990s reviewed: Missing
- Written employment contract: Pass
- Compensation survey or study: Missing
- Board or committee approval: Pass
- Foreign activity oversight: Limited
- Grant itemization coverage: Limited
- Major donor itemization: Limited
- Related-party transparency: Limited
Accountability
- Independent voting board: 95.5%; rating input score 95; 26th percentile among comparable filings
- Governance controls: 8 of 8 controls in place; rating input score 100
- 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: Pass
- Independent financial-statement audit: Pass
Sustainability
- Operating margin: -35.5%; rating input score 2; 2nd percentile among comparable filings
- Total-asset coverage ratio: 4.24; rating input score 78; 78th percentile among comparable filings
- Liabilities to assets ratio: 0.01; rating input score 83; 83rd percentile among comparable filings
- Officer compensation ratio: 2.2%; rating input score 74; 74th percentile among comparable filings
Growth
- Program expense growth: 4.7% per year; rating input score 100; 34th percentile among comparable filings
- Revenue growth: 5.3% per year; rating input score 100; 40th percentile among comparable filings
- Asset growth: 6% per year; rating input score 100; 39th percentile among comparable filings
Details
- What they do: Mission, programs, and operating context captured from the official website.
- Where the money goes: 100% of revenue deployed · 95.8% of spending went to programs
- Governance: 21 of 22 board members independent · 8 of 8 filing controls reported
- Programs: 1 filed program accomplishment · $7.9M in reported program spending
- Leadership: top reported pay $185K · 22 people listed · 2 of 6 pay-setting controls reported
- Consistency: 24 of 24 current checks pass
- Schedules: 5 filed schedules · includes executive pay
- Filing history: 16 filing years from 2010 to 2025
- Contacts: How to reach this organization
- Money network: 1 filed money-flow record
- 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.
- Moderate — Financial Efficiency: Fundraising efficiency scored 46/100.
- High — Sustainability: Operating margin scored 2/100.