Public charities comprise the largest portion of 501(c)(3) charitable organizations. These organizations receive broad public support, and contributions made to them are tax-deductible.

Public charities operate across the full range of social action, including social services, health care, education, arts, and civic engagement. Public charities are funded in a variety of ways, the two main categories being earned revenue, which includes fees, government contracts, and sales, and donative revenue, which includes public contributions and grants.

Religious congregations are public charities. There are an estimated 3,675 religious congregations in Arizona, of which 3,394 are registered with the IRS. However, congregations are not required to file a yearly 990 return; therefore, aggregate data on congregation revenues is unavailable. For more information about this type of public charity, please see Congregations.

Top Public Charities

The largest nonprofit organization (and public charity) in Arizona is Banner Health, which in 2012 reported total revenues of $4.22 billion. Excluding health and mental care, the largest Arizona nonprofit organization in 2012 was Creative Testing Solutions, with $215.40 million in total revenue. However, Muscular Dystrophy Association is the largest donative nonprofit in the state: with $152.12 million in reported revenue in 2012, nearly all of the organization's revenue came from contributions.

Public Charities: Reported Revenues and Income Sources

The health care sub-sector accounts for the vast majority of reported nonprofit revenues, more than all other sub-sectors combined. With $1.63 billion in revenues, Education is the largest subcategory after Health Care, and Other Human Services is the third largest, at $0.96 billion. As the chart below illustrates, 89 percent of health-care revenues are earned, versus all other nonprofit sub-sectors, which average 41 percent earned income.

Many nonprofits are seeking to find a better balance between earned income and philanthropic sources as a way to increase sustainability. The chart to the right illustrates the percentages of earned vs. contributed revenue by sub-sector.

Religious congregations are not required to file a form 990, therefore, revenues for the religion sub-sector are highly under-reported.

Charitable contributions to churches are estimated to be higher than the total revenue of the human services subsector, which would make religion the largest subsector after health care. Read more in the section Congregations.