Thousands of nonprofits face loss of tax-exempt status

"We would be very disappointed if this many organizations doing good work go defunct because of this," said Ron Cretaro, executive director of Connecticut Association of Nonprofits.

Cretaro suspects that many groups on the state's list no longer exist or do not have any staff to realize they are not in compliance.

"Is this going to reduce the number significantly, my guess is yes," he said, adding with the Oct. 15 filing deadline, "I hope there will be a lot of scrambling soon to fill this out."