Sacramento correspondent Brian Joseph had an interesting post on the Register‘s OC Watchdog blog last week about the explosive growth of the San Clemente-based Surfrider Foundation. Confirming with a group that follows the membership and money generated by nonprofits, Joseph reported that Surfrider has quadrupled in size since they started the battle against extension of the 241 Foothill-South toll road.
In 1997, before the toll-road controversy, Surfrider reported revenues of about $1 million. In 2007, the most recently available year on the nonprofit disclosure site Guidestar, Surfrider reported $4 million in revenues. During that time, staff salaries have increased by more than 500 percent, expenses by nearly 400 percent and public donations have jumped from $337,000 in ’97 to $3 million a decade later, Joseph reports…Â DetailsÂ