Rockfish Wildlife Sanctuary Inc

What it reported doing in 2025

The Rockfish Wildlife Sanctuary has had another busy year, continuing to care for hundreds of injured and orphaned wild animals until they can be released back into their natural habitat. In 2025, RWS cared for 880 patients and gained 1 new non-releasable education ambassador animal. RWS was staffed by 1 executive director, 3 wildlife rehabilitators, 1 facility manager, 3 interns, and 13 volunteers during the busy season of April through September. All personnel working on-site with wildlife are permitted at the state and federal levels. We were staffed from 7am to 7pm each day during our busy season, 7 days per week, and volunteers put in more than 4,000 hours of time. We received about 3,220 wildlife hotline calls as well throughout 2025. People contact our hotline with questions about wildlife or needing advice on how to help a wild animal in crisis. Our staff provides help connecting with volunteer transporters if the rescuer needs help getting an animal in need into our professional care. Our volunteer transporters drove over 4,000 miles cumulatively to help pick up new patients, transfer patients between other permitted wildlife care facilities, and bring them to release sites when ready. We release wildlife on private rural lands with permission from the property owner, occasionally opting for a "soft-release" where we provide additional food and monitoring until we are confident in the animal's ability to care for itself in the wild. In addition to the continued success of our rehabilitation program, education continued to be a major program during 2025 and crucial to our mission. Our website is frequently updated and provides wildlife coexistence information, animal crisis advice, and quick ways to contact us for professional help. We presented 43 educational programs as well, including both on- and off-site outreach programs featuring our education ambassador animal team. We continued bi-monthly educational emails as well, engaging our community and supporters with wildlife information and updates about current patients at RWS. Our paid summer internship program was another success, representing our commitment to training the next generation of wildlife rehabilitators and conservationists. We expanded the program to include additional part-timeinterns as well. Our confluence of wildlife rehabilitation and public education constitute our continued progress towards forging a brighter future for wild animals and humans alike.

Financial Efficiency

• Mission deployment rate: 60.2%; rating input score 60
• Program expense ratio: 78.7%; rating input score 79
• Fundraising efficiency: $13.13 raised per $1 spent on fundraising; rating input score 44; 44th percentile among comparable filings

Transparency & Controls

• Consistency checks: 100%; rating input score 100; 63rd 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: 100%; rating input score 100; 64th percentile among comparable filings
• Governance controls: 5 of 7 controls in place; rating input score 71
  • Conflict-of-interest policy: Pass
  • Whistleblower policy: Pass
  • Document-retention policy: Pass
  • CEO compensation review process: NotApplicable
  • Other executive compensation review process: NotApplicable
  • Form 990 shared with the board: Pass
  • Board meeting minutes documented: Pass
  • Audit committee oversight: Missing
  • Independent financial-statement audit: Fail

Sustainability

• Operating margin: 23.9%; rating input score 77; 77th percentile among comparable filings
• Total-asset coverage ratio: 2.26; rating input score 68; 68th percentile among comparable filings
• Liabilities to assets ratio: 0; rating input score 71; 71st percentile among comparable filings
• Officer compensation ratio: 0%; rating input score 78; 78th percentile among comparable filings

Growth

• Program expense growth: 13.3% per year; rating input score 100; 67th percentile among comparable filings
• Revenue growth: 9.4% per year; rating input score 100; 59th percentile among comparable filings
• Asset growth: 8.9% per year; rating input score 100; 51st percentile among comparable filings