“Where does the money actually go?” is the right question to ask any nonprofit, and most answers to it are disappointing. You get a pie chart, a percentage, and a phrase like “program services” that could mean almost anything.
We can give you a better answer than that, because we fund one thing.
The short answer: bases
The Seventh Base Foundation provides breakaway bases to youth baseball and softball leagues, schools, and community fields in need. That’s the program. Donations fund the purchase of those bases.
There’s no second initiative competing for the same dollars, no research arm, no unrelated campaign. If you give to us, you are buying safety equipment for a youth field. That’s a narrow mission by design, and the narrowness is what makes the accounting legible.
What each amount buys
Most donation pages ask you to pick a number and leave you guessing what it does. Ours is tied to actual equipment.
$100 — one breakaway base. A single Rogers® Breakaway™ base, installed on a youth field. One bag that releases under a slide instead of stopping a child’s ankle cold.
$200 — a double first base. First base is the busiest and most contested bag in youth baseball, where runner and fielder converge on the same small target at full speed. A double first base gives each of them their own space, cutting collision risk at the point where collisions are most likely.
$600 — an entire field. A complete set of breakaway bases for one diamond. Every bag on that field converted at once, protecting every player who slides on it — home team, visiting team, and every tournament roster that shows up all season.
That last tier is worth pausing on. Six hundred dollars converts a whole field from stationary to breakaway. For a business, a team, a family, or a group of parents pooling together, that’s a reachable number attached to a complete outcome.
What “goes to a field” actually means
Between your donation and a child sliding safely, there’s a specific sequence:
- A league applies. Programs submit an application describing their fields, their athletes, and their current base condition.
- We evaluate. Applications are assessed on demonstrated need for breakaway bases, number of athletes impacted, the program’s own resources and support, and how the organization is structured — is there a board, can someone receive and install the equipment, will it be maintained?
- We notify quickly. Selected organizations are contacted directly, typically within about a week, because leagues plan around season start dates and a slow answer is functionally a no.
- Equipment is funded and delivered. Depending on the field, that might be a Rogers® Original BreakAway™ set, a Change-Up BreakAway™ set, or a configuration with a double first base for younger divisions.
- The bases go in. And every slide on that diamond gets safer from that day forward.
Your donation enters at step four and stays there. It becomes an object on a field.
Why bases are unusually efficient charity
Two features make base funding go further than most giving:
Bases are durable, not consumable. A set funded this spring doesn’t get used up. It serves practices, regular season, tournaments, and All-Stars — this year and for years after. The number of children protected per dollar keeps climbing long after the donation was made.
Fields serve far more kids than one team. A single diamond typically hosts multiple teams across multiple divisions, plus visiting teams and outside tournaments. Converting one field protects a rotating population of hundreds of young athletes.
Compare that to the alternative cost. A single serious sliding injury can mean an emergency room visit, imaging, an orthopaedic consult, possible surgery, weeks of physical therapy, missed work for a parent, and a lost season for the child. That’s the arithmetic behind the estimate that widespread breakaway adoption could save over $2 billion a year in U.S. health care costs — and it holds just as true at the level of a single park.
The accountability details
We’re a registered 501(c)(3). Seventh Base Foundation Inc is a tax-exempt organization, and donations are tax-deductible within the guidelines of U.S. law. Our EIN is 39-4229842.
You get a receipt immediately. An email donation receipt is sent on successful completion of your gift — keep it as your official record for tax purposes.
Financial oversight is built into the board. Our board includes a CPA serving as Audit and Finance Chair, specifically so that oversight isn’t left to good intentions.
Progress is published. Our fundraising progress toward our goal is shown openly on the site rather than buried in an annual report.
Recipients are visible. Programs that receive bases may be featured by the Foundation and become part of our network of supported organizations, so donors can see where equipment went.
Ways to give beyond a one-time gift
Recurring donations let us commit to leagues before a season starts rather than after, because predictable income makes it possible to say yes with confidence.
Field sponsorship ties your gift to a specific diamond — your hometown park, the field where your own kids played, a program in a community you care about.
Corporate and team partnerships are welcome at any scale. We collaborate with schools, leagues, and corporate sponsors to expand access nationwide, which multiplies what any single donation can reach.
In honor or in memory giving is common among our donors — a coach who shaped them, a parent who drove them to every practice, a player who was hurt on a stationary base.
The honest limit
We should say plainly: our capacity is bounded by our funding. There are more leagues that need bases than we can currently equip. Every additional dollar isn’t padding a reserve — it’s the difference between a program getting bases this season or waiting.
That’s an uncomfortable thing to admit and also the most accurate answer to “where does my donation go.” It goes to the next field on the list, and the length of that list is set by how much comes in.