The Alliance Center
Nonprofit profile at a glance
- EIN
- 421622670
- IRS 990 coverage
- 2011–2025
- Forms available
- Form 990 2025, Form 990-T 2020
- Location
- Denver, CO, USA
- Phone
- 3035721536
- Rating
- 77
- Verdict
- SUPPORTED
- Rating confidence
- Moderate
- Sector
- Nonmonetary Support N.E.C.
Reported finances
- Revenue
- $1,944,093
- Expenses
- $2,161,911
- Assets
- $11,002,820
- Liabilities
- $5,306,487
Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2025. Amounts in USD.
Leadership & pay
17 people listed
Executive titles in this filing
- Alison Carlman (Executive Director)
Highest reported compensation
- Alison Carlman (Executive Director): $159,983 total reported compensation
- Mariah Shell (Operations Director): $123,824 total reported compensation
Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2025. Names and roles reflect this filing, not necessarily current officeholders.
Overview
Mission
The Alliance Center brings people together to develop and advance solutions for an inclusive, regenerative future.
What it reported doing in 2025
The Alliance Center is civic infrastructure, stewarding shared space that brings sustainability leaders into proximity and supports ongoing collaboration. The Alliance Center Building itself has served as a living laboratory for advancing clean technologies, and it's also a shared workspace and event space at the heart of Colorado's sustainability ecosystem since 2004. Today it's an all-electric, 8-times LEED-certified historic building that is home to 44 tenant organizations, the majority of which are nonprofits, receiving below-market rent. In 2025, the Alliance Center hosted 127 events reaching 3,700+ attendees. See Schedule OThe Alliance Center also hosts a Hard-to-Recycle station open to the community, diverting nearly 10,000 lbs. of food waste and 2,500+ lbs of hard-to-recycle materials from landfills and earning a 100 ENERGY STAR score against a national median of 50 in 2025.
Operating model
- Revenue model
- Earned-program. 64% 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.
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 expenses are high relative to revenue.
Rating breakdown
- Financial Efficiency: 78
- Transparency & Controls: 70
- Accountability: 100
- Sustainability: 35
- Growth: 60
Detailed rating inputs
Financial Efficiency
- Mission deployment rate: 89.4%; rating input score 89
- Program expense ratio: 80.3%; rating input score 80
- Fundraising efficiency: $6 raised per $1 spent on fundraising; rating input score 20; 20th 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: 100%; rating input score 100; 64th 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: -11.2%; rating input score 12; 12th percentile among comparable filings
- Total-asset coverage ratio: 5.09; rating input score 84; 84th percentile among comparable filings
- Liabilities to assets ratio: 0.48; rating input score 12; 12th percentile among comparable filings
- Officer compensation ratio: 13.1%; rating input score 29; 29th percentile among comparable filings
Growth
- Program expense growth: 8.6% per year; rating input score 100; 53rd percentile among comparable filings
- Revenue growth: -2.4% per year; rating input score 0; 6th percentile among comparable filings
- Asset growth: 1.7% per year; rating input score 100; 21st percentile among comparable filings
Details
- Where the money goes: 89.4% of revenue deployed · 80.3% of spending went to programs
- Governance: 15 of 15 board members independent · 8 of 8 filing controls reported
- Programs: 2 filed program accomplishments · $1.7M in reported program spending
- Leadership: top reported pay $160K · 17 people listed · 1 of 6 pay-setting controls reported
- Consistency: 32 of 32 current checks pass
- Schedules: 6 filed schedules · includes major donors and executive pay
- Filing history: 14 filing years from 2011 to 2025
- Contacts: How to reach this organization
- Money network: 2 filed money-flow records
- Related organizations: 1 filed related-organization link
- 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 20/100.
- High — Sustainability: Operating margin scored 12/100.
- High — Growth: Revenue growth scored 0/100.
- High — Sustainability: Liabilities to assets ratio scored 12/100.
- High — Sustainability: Officer compensation ratio scored 29/100.