The Sun Publishing Company

Nonprofit profile at a glance

EIN
561187623
IRS 990 coverage
2010–2023
Forms available
Form 990 2023
Location
Chapel Hill, NC, USA
Phone
9199425282
Rating
70
Verdict
SUPPORTED
Rating confidence
Moderate

Official website

Reported finances

Revenue
$2,755,614
Expenses
$3,201,782
Assets
$1,439,755
Liabilities
$56,690

Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2023. Amounts in USD.

Leadership & pay

5 people listed

Executive titles in this filing

  • Seymour Safransky (President)
  • Lewis Lipsitz (Vice President)

Highest reported compensation

  • Robert Bowers (Publisher): $197,700 total reported compensation
  • Seymour Safransky (President): $75,097 total reported compensation

Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2023. Names and roles reflect this filing, not necessarily current officeholders.

Overview

Mission

The magazine is an ad-free monthly magazine which publishes an eclectic mix of personal essays interviews fiction poetry and photographs.

What it reported doing in 2023

Founded in 1974 The Sun is one of North Carolinas oldest and most widely read literary magazines. More than 40,000 subscribers enjoy our interviews personal essays fiction poetry and photography each month and an additional 10,000 magazines are distributed to newsstands in the United States and Canada. The Sun is reader-supported and free of advertising and has been publishing for fifty years. Our goal is to publish writing and photography that fosters compassion through greater awareness of our shared experience. We want to offer both established and emerging artists an opportunity to risk a closer examination of the truth and to reach a wider audience. Writing from The Sun has won the Pushcart Prize been featured in Best American Essays and Best American Short Story anthologies and has been on National Public Radio. Upon awarding The Sun its independent press award for best writing Utne called the magazine an "intimate forum where some of the finest contemporary writers share their most polished and provocative prose." In addition to publishing a monthly magazine The Sun has also published eight books. Paper Lanterns is eclectic collection of quotes from the back of the magazine. In The Mysterious Life of the Heart contributors explore the enigma of intimacy and relationships. Our Best of The Sun anthologies feature the finest writing from the magazines first two decades. Four in the Morning and Many Alarm Clocks bring together founder and editor emeritus Sy Safrankys best essays and journal entries. And Sunbeams our first collection of quotations offers ten years worth of inspiring words from The Sun. We have an ongoing commitment to provide free subscriptions to libraries community colleges and prisons throughout the country. In addition we regularly provide free subscriptions to prisoners who write to request one. Our hope is to reach readers who are unable to afford the magazine or who live in areas where literary resources are scare. In 2023 we were able to provide over 1200 subscriptions to community colleges prisoners prison libraries and other non-profit organizations.

Operating model

Revenue model
Other-operating. 71% of the money available for current operations came from other operating revenue.
Distribution model
Cannot be determined from the filing. The filing does not provide enough consistent spending detail to tell whether the nonprofit works directly or through others.

The verdict

SUPPORTED - A large share of available resources goes toward mission work and the filed numbers largely add up. Few specific pay-setting methods are documented in the filing; unanswered boxes are not proof of absence and fundraising costs are high for each dollar raised.

Rating breakdown

  • Financial Efficiency: 82
  • Transparency & Controls: 65
  • Accountability: 67
  • Sustainability: 22
  • Growth: 60

Detailed rating inputs

Financial Efficiency

  • Mission deployment rate: 92.8%; rating input score 93
  • Program expense ratio: 79.9%; rating input score 80
  • Fundraising efficiency: $7.81 raised per $1 spent on fundraising; rating input score 29; 29th percentile among comparable filings

Transparency & Controls

  • Consistency checks: 100%; rating input score 100; 62nd percentile among comparable filings
  • Pay-setting controls: 0 of 6 controls in place; rating input score 0
    • Compensation committee: Missing
    • Independent consultant: Missing
    • Other Form 990s reviewed: Missing
    • Written employment contract: Missing
    • Compensation survey or study: Missing
    • Board or committee approval: Missing
  • Foreign activity oversight: Limited
  • Grant itemization coverage: Limited
  • Major donor itemization: Yes; rating input score 100
  • Related-party transparency: Limited

Accountability

  • Independent voting board: 75%; rating input score 75; 13th percentile among comparable filings
  • Governance controls: 5 of 9 controls in place; rating input score 56
    • Conflict-of-interest policy: Pass
    • Whistleblower policy: Fail
    • Document-retention policy: Pass
    • CEO compensation review process: Pass
    • 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: Fail

Sustainability

  • Operating margin: -16.2%; rating input score 10; 10th percentile among comparable filings
  • Total-asset coverage ratio: 0.45; rating input score 15; 15th percentile among comparable filings
  • Liabilities to assets ratio: 0.04; rating input score 75; 75th percentile among comparable filings
  • Officer compensation ratio: 8.5%; rating input score 33; 33rd percentile among comparable filings

Growth

  • Program expense growth: 1.3% per year; rating input score 100; 21st percentile among comparable filings
  • Revenue growth: -0.4% per year; rating input score 0; 12th percentile among comparable filings
  • Asset growth: 0% per year; rating input score 100; 13th percentile among comparable filings

Details

  • Where the money goes: 92.8% of revenue deployed · 79.9% of spending went to programs
  • Governance: 3 of 4 board members independent · 5 of 9 filing controls reported
  • Programs: 3 filed program accomplishments · $2.6M in reported program spending
  • Leadership: top reported pay $198K · 5 people listed · 0 of 6 pay-setting controls reported
  • Consistency: 40 of 42 current checks pass · 2 findings to review
  • Schedules: 5 filed schedules · includes major donors and executive pay
  • Filing history: 13 filing years from 2010 to 2023
  • 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 — Transparency & Controls: Pay-setting controls scored 0/100.
  • High — Financial Efficiency: Fundraising efficiency scored 29/100.
  • Review — Accountability: Governance controls: 3 of 8 not reported.
  • High — Sustainability: Operating margin scored 10/100.
  • High — Growth: Revenue growth scored 0/100.
  • High — Sustainability: Total-asset coverage ratio scored 15/100.
  • Moderate — Transparency & Controls: Functional expense sum did not reconcile in the filed values.
  • Moderate — Transparency & Controls: Part IX AllOtherExpenses column sum did not reconcile in the filed values.
  • Moderate — Sustainability: Officer compensation ratio scored 33/100.