What does Tunnel to Towers’ IRS Form 990 for 2023 show line‑by‑line about program expenses, salaries, and related‑party transactions?
Executive summary
The Stephen Siller Tunnel to Towers Foundation’s publicly posted 2023 Form 990 is available online and is the primary source for any line‑by‑line accounting of program expenses, executive compensation, and related‑party transactions [1] [2] [3]. Independent charity reviewers cite very high program spending (CharityWatch reports about 93% of cash expenses on programs) but the reporting accessible in the provided sources does not allow reproduction here of every single Form 990 line item; the underlying PDF must be inspected for verbatim line‑by‑line figures [4] [1].
1. Where the authoritative numbers live and how to read them
The foundation’s actual Form 990 for 2023 is hosted on charity repositories and on Tunnel to Towers’ own site, and those PDF pages contain the line‑by‑line Part I and Part III rollups of revenue, expenses by function, and “Compensation of Officers, Directors, Trustees, Key Employees, Highest Paid Employees, and Independent Contractors” that readers must consult for exact line entries [1] [2] [3]. Aggregators such as ProPublica and Instrumentl also index these filings and digitize key fields for search and comparison, but the PDF remains the canonical line‑by‑line document [5] [6].
2. Program expenses: high program ratio reported, but the granular line items require the PDF
Public summaries and watchdogs emphasize that Tunnel to Towers allocates a large share of cash expenses to programs — CharityWatch cites a 93% program spending figure and a 7% overhead figure for the reporting year — which corroborates the foundation’s claim of low fundraising/administrative ratios [4] [3]. That percentage is a program/overhead summary derived from the Form 990 and audited statements; however, the exact Part III program service descriptions and Part IX functional expense lines (salaries, grants, mortgage‑free home construction costs, event expenses, etc.) are located on the Form 990 PDF pages themselves and are not reproduced in full by the supplied snippets [1] [2]. To verify line‑by‑line amounts for each program category, consult the full Form 990 PDF posted by the organization or on the IRS/ProPublica mirror [1] [5].
3. Salaries and top compensation: partial transparency and limits in public summaries
CharityWatch and other evaluators note that the charity meets transparency benchmarks, but also that publicly available summaries sometimes lack a complete breakout of all employee salaries under $100,000 because IRS Form 990 only requires listing of officers, directors and certain highly compensated employees [4]. ProPublica’s Nonprofit Explorer and Instrumentl extract executive compensation where reported, but the sources supplied do not print the specific dollar amounts for the top three salaries from the 2023 filing in the material provided here [5] [6]. The Form 990’s compensation table (Part VII) in the PDF is the required place to read exact salaries, benefits, and deferred compensation entries [1].
4. Related‑party transactions and disclosures: what to look for and what the record shows
Form 990 requires disclosure of business dealings with insiders on Schedule L and narrative explanations in Schedule O when applicable; the assembled sources reference full filings but do not include an excerpted Schedule L in the snippets available here [1] [7]. The absence of cited Schedule L entries in charity‑watch summaries does not prove there are none — it means the publicly quoted summaries provided do not extract or flag them — so a line‑by‑line check of Schedule L in the foundation’s 2023 PDF is necessary to confirm any related‑party payments, loans, or leases [1].
5. How to verify and what competing narratives exist
Tunnel to Towers promotes low overhead and program impact on its financials page and highlights program achievements such as mortgage‑free homes and run/climb events, an emphasis that aligns with high program ratio claims [3] [2]. Independent reviewers give favorable ratings but also caution about the IRS’ disclosure thresholds and the need to inspect the PDF schedules for complete salary and related‑party detail [4] [5]. For journalists or donors demanding a literal line‑by‑line readout — every Part I line, each functional expense in Part IX, each entry in Schedule L and Part VII salaries — the most reliable method is to open the foundation’s posted 2023 Form 990 PDF and transcribe those specific lines directly from the form [1] [2].