Pelican Media
Nonprofit profile at a glance
- EIN
- 942472387
- IRS 990-EZ coverage
- 2022–2025
- Forms available
- Form 990-EZ 2025
- Location
- San Francisco, CA, USA
- Phone
- 4153622420
- Rating
- 72
- Verdict
- SUPPORTED
- Rating confidence
- Moderate
Reported finances
- Revenue
- $87,140
- Expenses
- $73,615
- Assets
- $189,386
- Liabilities
- $1,043
Source: IRS Form 990-EZ. Selected filing: tax year 2025. Amounts in USD.
Leadership & pay
7 people listed
Executive titles in this filing
- Laura Lent (President)
People named in this filing
- Laura Lent (President)
- Marilee Gaffney (Director)
- David Kennedy (Director)
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
To produce films with environmental themes
What it reported doing in 2025
Distribution: Contracted with Norse Key Studios for international distribution of Dark Circle, Wild Parrots, Pelican Dreams and Cold Refuge. Screened Nagasaki Journey in Rio De Janeiro, Berlin and Las Vegas, and paired it with Dark Circle at a screening in Los Alamos NM.
Operating model
- Revenue model
- Cannot be determined from the filing. The filing does not provide enough consistent revenue detail to tell how this nonprofit funds its work.
- 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 - A large share of available resources goes toward mission work and the filed numbers largely add up. Program spending has declined or grown slowly and revenue has declined or grown slowly.
Rating breakdown
- Financial Efficiency: 73
- Transparency & Controls: 82
- Sustainability: 62
- Growth: 0
Detailed rating inputs
Financial Efficiency
- Mission deployment rate: 68.4%; rating input score 68
- Program expense ratio: 81%; rating input score 81
Transparency & Controls
- Consistency checks: 100%; rating input score 100; 51st percentile among comparable filings
- Major donor itemization: Limited
Sustainability
- Operating margin: 15.5%; rating input score 67; 67th percentile among comparable filings
- Total-asset coverage ratio: 2.57; rating input score 71; 71st percentile among comparable filings
- Liabilities to assets ratio: 0.01; rating input score 27; 27th percentile among comparable filings
- Officer compensation ratio: 0%; rating input score 56; 56th percentile among comparable filings
Growth
- Program expense growth: -16% per year; rating input score 0; 22nd percentile among comparable filings
- Revenue growth: -17.4% per year; rating input score 0; 17th percentile among comparable filings
- Asset growth: -8.6% per year; rating input score 0; 19th percentile among comparable filings
Details
- Where the money goes: 68.4% of revenue deployed · 81% of spending went to programs
- Governance: Filed governance answers
- Accomplishments: 6 filed program accomplishments · $60K in reported program spending
- Leadership: top reported pay $0 · 7 people listed
- Consistency: 7 of 7 current checks pass
- Schedules: 2 filed schedules
- Filing history: 4 filing years from 2022 to 2025
- Contacts: How to reach this organization
- Money network: Resolved incoming and outgoing counterparties from filed money flows.
- 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 — Growth: Program expense growth scored 0/100.
- High — Growth: Revenue growth scored 0/100.
- High — Growth: Asset growth scored 0/100.
- High — Sustainability: Liabilities to assets ratio scored 27/100.
- Review — Sustainability: Officer compensation ratio scored 56/100.