1. Center on Nonprofits and Philanthropy
The Urban Institute
Finding the Needle in the Haystack: An Analysis of Search Strategies to Identify Community Development Corporations
Sheryl Romeo
Linda M. Lampkin
Center on Nonprofits and Philanthropy
ARNOVA
November 2002
Montreal, Quebec

2. Why A Search Strategy is Needed
Charities of interest located in many codes
Incorrect coding
Categories too broad – need to narrow focus
Save time and improve search results
The Urban Institute
Center on Nonprofits and Philanthropy

3. Community Development Corporations
Indigenous
Local
Comprehensive
Produce Tangible Results
The Urban Institute
Center on Nonprofits and Philanthropy

4. “A private, non-profit, community-based organization that develops and/or finances housing, commercial, industrial, and community facilities; or business enterprises”
The Urban Institute
Center on Nonprofits and Philanthropy

5. Sources of Information
National Congress for Community Economic Development (NCCED)
Forms 990 Filed with the IRS
The Urban Institute
Center on Nonprofits and Philanthropy

6. Search Strategies A Single NTEE Code A Topical Cluster of NTEE Codes
Keyword Searching
Custom-Tailored Search
The Urban Institute
Center on Nonprofits and Philanthropy

7. Datasets Created From
NTEE S20 Community, Neighborhood Development (1,566 organizations)
Housing and Community Development NTEE Major Groups (11,039 organizations)
Keywords (7,105 organizations)
Keyword-NTEE Combinations (5,776 organizations)
The Urban Institute
Center on Nonprofits and Philanthropy

8. Composition of the Datasets
Dataset Description
No. of Organizations
No. of Programs
No. of NTEE Major Groups
No. of NTEE Codes
1: S20 Community, Neighborhood Development
1,566
2,493 1
2: NTEE Cluster: Housing & Community Development
11,039
14,221 2 15
3: Keywords
7,105
9,054 26
339
4: Keywords + NTEE
5,776
7,363 6 76
Total of Unique Organizations
14,659
18,739
The Urban Institute
Center on Nonprofits and Philanthropy

9. Test for Accuracy The Urban Institute Dataset Description No. of CDCs
Precision Rate
1: S20
779
50%
2: NTEE Cluster
7,713
70%
3: Keywords
5,699
80%
4: Keywords + NTEE
5,252
91%
Cumulative Total of Unique Organizations
10,010
The Urban Institute
Center on Nonprofits and Philanthropy

10. Test for Comprehensiveness
Dataset Description
No. of CDCs
Inclusion Rate
1: S20 41
19%
2: NTEE Cluster
134
64%
3: Keywords
176
83%
4: Keywords + NTEE
167
79%
Cumulative Total of Unique Organizations
195
The Urban Institute
Center on Nonprofits and Philanthropy

11. Conclusions
CDCs, a poorly defined group, are best found in the Form 990 database by a combination of NTEE and keyword searching
Similar approaches may help researchers increase the precision and comprehensiveness of their datasets.
Helps overcome limitations of the data
Identifies difficult to define organizational types
The Urban Institute
Center on Nonprofits and Philanthropy