Northwest Professional Dance Projec Dba Northwest Dance Project

Nonprofit profile at a glance

EIN
202012406
IRS 990 coverage
2011–2024
Forms available
Form 990 2024
Location
Portland, OR, USA
Phone
5034217434
Rating
76
Verdict
SUPPORTED
Rating confidence
Moderate
Sector
Performing Arts Schools

Official website

Reported finances

Revenue
$978,811
Expenses
$1,469,177
Assets
$1,363,289
Liabilities
$421,585

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

Leadership & pay

7 people listed

Executive titles in this filing

  • JANIE GOLDENBERG (PRESIDENT)

Highest reported compensation

  • SARAH SLIPPER (ARTISTIC DIR): $190,856 total reported compensation
  • SCOTT D LEWIS (EXEC DIR/PRE): $166,075 total reported compensation

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

Overview

Mission

Nw dance project celebrates, supports, and represents excellence in dance. Nw dance project is dedicated to creating and performing inspired, original contemporary dance works from the field's most talented choreographers from around the world and to providing the finest dance training available for all. We perform, educate, create, cultivate, and strive for diversity, equity, and inclusion while engaging and deepening public appreciation and support of dance.

What it reported doing in 2024

- 201st season - maintained and managed our professional performance company of diverse dancers (eight employee dancers) and raising salary levels for all. - raised salaries for all staff members and maintained all employee's benefits. - created and premiered twelve new dance works from twelve choreographers. - conducted eight unique, ticketed public performances in three different venues. Four of the shows were performed by our company of employee dancers over multiple nights. The remaining four shows were the conclusions of dance education and training programs. - held our four-week summer professional and pre-professional dance training programs (move + summer dance platform) for 48 aspiring dancers. - maintained our unique and innovative dancers of color initiative (doci) which provides responsive and flexible financial and other forms of direct support to young dancers of color participating in our educational programming. - enriching the lives of our local constituents with dance, movement, and creative expression through educational and outreach programing for adults and youth, including offering 34 classes per week and our dance moves outreach program serving underserved youth. - helped lead "pdxdance" - a collective of ten portland-area dance companies and organizations dedicated and working to raise professional dance awareness and engagement in the community. Programs: dance creation, performance, touring dance education and training dance outreach fundraising administration

Operating model

Revenue model
Earned-program. 65% of the money available for current operations came from fees and other program revenue.
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

SUPPORTED - 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 some filing-based governance responses are negative or unanswered.

Rating breakdown

  • Financial Efficiency: 85
  • Transparency & Controls: 70
  • Accountability: 74
  • Sustainability: 17
  • Growth: 100

Detailed rating inputs

Financial Efficiency

  • Mission deployment rate: 100%; rating input score 100
  • Program expense ratio: 87.3%; rating input score 87
  • Fundraising efficiency: $1.93 raised per $1 spent on fundraising; rating input score 5; 5th percentile among comparable filings

Transparency & Controls

  • Consistency checks: 100%; rating input score 100; 63rd percentile among comparable filings
  • Pay-setting controls: 1 of 6 controls in place; rating input score 17
    • Compensation committee: Missing
    • Independent consultant: Missing
    • Other Form 990s reviewed: Missing
    • Written employment contract: Missing
    • Compensation survey or study: Missing
    • Board or committee approval: Pass
  • Foreign activity oversight: Limited
  • Grant itemization coverage: Limited
  • Major donor itemization: Yes; rating input score 100
  • Related-party transparency: Limited

Accountability

  • Independent voting board: 83.3%; rating input score 83; 19th percentile among comparable filings
  • Governance controls: 5 of 8 controls in place; rating input score 62
    • Conflict-of-interest policy: Pass
    • Whistleblower policy: Fail
    • Document-retention policy: Pass
    • 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: Pass

Sustainability

  • Operating margin: -50.1%; rating input score 3; 3rd percentile among comparable filings
  • Total-asset coverage ratio: 0.93; rating input score 40; 40th percentile among comparable filings
  • Liabilities to assets ratio: 0.31; rating input score 24; 24th percentile among comparable filings
  • Officer compensation ratio: 24.3%; rating input score 10; 10th percentile among comparable filings

Growth

  • Program expense growth: 2.1% per year; rating input score 100; 27th percentile among comparable filings
  • Revenue growth: 1.4% per year; rating input score 100; 21st percentile among comparable filings
  • Asset growth: 7.9% per year; rating input score 100; 51st percentile among comparable filings

Details

  • Where the money goes: 100% of revenue deployed · 87.3% of spending went to programs
  • Governance: 5 of 6 board members independent · 5 of 8 filing controls reported
  • Programs: 1 filed program accomplishment · $1.3M in reported program spending
  • Leadership: top reported pay $191K · 7 people listed · 1 of 6 pay-setting controls reported
  • Consistency: 27 of 27 current checks pass
  • Schedules: 5 filed schedules · includes major donors and executive pay
  • Filing history: 14 filing years from 2011 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.

Key Signals

Signals prioritize questions for review. They are not findings of misconduct.

  • High — Financial Efficiency: Fundraising efficiency scored 5/100.
  • Review — Accountability: Governance controls: 2 of 7 not reported.
  • High — Sustainability: Operating margin scored 3/100.
  • Moderate — Sustainability: Total-asset coverage ratio scored 40/100.
  • High — Sustainability: Officer compensation ratio scored 10/100.
  • High — Sustainability: Liabilities to assets ratio scored 24/100.