What line items in Tunnel to Towers’ audited financial statements correspond to home construction, remodeling, and mortgage payoffs?
Executive summary
The Stephen Siller Tunnel to Towers Foundation’s audited financial statements present home-building and mortgage-relief activity within the formal financial reporting framework—principally in the statements of activities, the statement of functional expenses and the accompanying notes to the financial statements (where program details and accounting classifications are explained) [1]. Public-facing summaries from the charity highlight delivery of mortgage-free homes as a core program, but the exact phrasing of the audited line items that capture home construction, remodeling and mortgage payoffs is found in the foundation’s audited reports and notes rather than in summary webpages [2] [1].
1. Where the audited reports record program activity and why that matters
The independent audit covers “statements of financial position… and the related statements of activities, functional expenses, and cash flows” for the reported years, meaning program spending shows up as reductions in net assets and in functional expense lines categorized as program services [1]. That structure is standard: charities report programmatic expenditures in the statement of activities and break out program versus support costs in the functional expense schedule; Tunnel to Towers’ audited package therefore is the authoritative source for pinpointing which line item correspond to construction, remodeling and mortgage payoffs [1].
2. What the foundation’s public materials say about homes and mortgage-free gifts
Tunnel to Towers explicitly markets that it has “delivered 50 mortgage-free homes” and celebrates mortgage-free home delivery as a named program in multiple audited disclosures and fiscal summaries [2] [3] [4]. CharityWatch and Charity Navigator also reference the foundation’s published audited statements when evaluating program spend and governance, underscoring that home/mortgage programs are material to the charity’s mission and therefore disclosed in formal filings [5] [6].
3. Typical accounting classifications to look for in the audits (and where to find them)
The audited PDFs hosted on the foundation site contain the detailed line items and notes that will identify whether construction, remodeling and mortgage payoffs are booked as (a) direct program service expenses (often labeled “Program services – Home construction/mortgage relief” or similar), (b) capital expenditures or additions to property and equipment when the foundation retains title to assets, or (c) grants or program-related investments if T2T transfers funds to contractors or homeowners (the audit covers these classifications in the notes) [1]. To confirm exact wording and amounts, the reader must consult the specific audited financial statements and notes linked on the foundation’s site for each fiscal year (for example the 2023 audit and prior-year audits) [1] [2] [3].
4. What public databases add and their limits
ProPublica’s Nonprofit Explorer and the foundation’s Form 990s provide machine-readable filings and tax-schedule detail that can help triangulate how mortgage payoffs and home grants appear on tax returns (e.g., as grants, program service expenses, or fixed-asset purchases), but those tax schedules do not replace the explanatory notes in audited financial statements that disclose accounting policy and program descriptions [7] [8]. Independent charity evaluators cite the audited statements to produce program-spend ratios—the fact that CharityWatch reports Tunnel to Towers spends a high share of cash on programs reflects the materiality of the home program but does not substitute for line-by-line audit detail [5].
5. Practical next step and transparency caveat
The audited financial statements available on Tunnel to Towers’ website are the authoritative place to find the exact line-item labels and amounts for home construction, remodeling and mortgage payoffs; the 2023 audited financials and earlier year audit PDFs linked on the foundation’s financials page should be consulted directly to read the statement of activities, functional expenses and the accounting notes that disclose how each program cost is classified [1] [9]. This analysis does not invent line-item labels beyond what the foundation’s audited reports actually show; without parsing the audit PDFs here, this report cannot quote a verbatim ledger line or numeric breakdown and therefore points readers to the specific audited documents for precise line-item language and amounts [1] [2].