SSU Trustees Vote for Partial Divestment from Fossil Fuels

By Prof. Jane Regan
SALEM, Mass., Oct. 15, 2016 — Despite impassioned pleas from students and faculty, and in spite of recommendations from a special board committee, Salem State University’s Board of Trustees voted on Thursday to only partially divest its investment portfolio from fossil fuel companies.

About 2.3 percent of SSU’s $12 million investment portfolio is invested with fossil fuel companies, according to university spokesperson Nicole Giambusso.

Students and faculty have been calling on the university to divest for almost two years with meetings, forums and a petition signed

A panorama photo shows the faculty, staff and students and members of the Board of Trustees at a meeting in Marsh Hall on October 13, 2016 at Salem State University in Salem, Mass. The meeting was held in part to allow the Board of Trustees to vote on whether or not SSU would fully divest from fossil fuel companies. Photo: Jane Regan

Voting in front of a packed room full of near 100 professors, staff and students, many of whom held signs urging full divestment, the board members approved — voting 11–0 — a measure that would prevent investment in coal and in tar sands, only, but allow continued investment in companies involved in natural gas, oil and other carbon fuels. The board’s vote also approved other recommendations aimed at reducing the university’s carbon footprint.

Board Chairman Paul Mattera justified the partial divestment by saying that, while concerned for the environment, he and the other members are more concerned with the recommendations of their financial advisors, based at Eastern Bank.

“Our fiduciary responsibility, as awful as this may sound, is not to the environment, it is to the university,” he said.

Most of the members of the Salem State University Board of Trustees meeting at Marsh Hall on October 13, 2016, in Salem, Mass., to consider whether or not Salem State University would fully divest from fossil fuel companies. SSU President Pat Meservey is fourth from left, seated next to Board Chair Paul Mattera, seated center with a red tie. Photo: Jane Regan

The crowd attended the Oct. 14 meeting at Marsh Hall to hear how the board would vote on the recommendations of the Trustees Sustainability Special Committee, which called for full divestment.

Completed last month, the report recommended immediate divestment from coal (SSU has no holdings in coal companies) and “to consider further divestment from direct holdings in the balance of ‘Carbon 200’ (Fossil Fuel Free) companies to the extent the advisors believe it is financially prudent with the goal of achieving full divestment in five years.” It also recommended a number of other measures related to greenhouse gas emissions, transportation, waste disposal and education. [See photo of recommendations, below.]

A photo of the recommendations from the Salem State University Board of Trustees Sustainability Special Committee, included as Appendix D of a report completed on September 28, 2016 and considered by the board at a meeting on Oct. 13, 2016, in Salem, Mass. The board approved all of the recommendations except for the highlighted portion. Photo: Jane Regan

But the board’s Finance and Facilities committee in effect countermanded the Sustainability Committee’s investment-related recommendation after meeting with its advisors from Eastern Bank.

Board member Rob Lutts, who is president and chief investment officer for the Salem-based Cabot Wealth Management, explained that there were other ways the university was working to fight climate change, but that the university’s investment advisors felt this wasn’t the moment to sell off investments. He and his committee wrote a new motion which removed the commitment to full divestment and also removed the five-year timeline.

Instead, it called for divestment from any companies involved in “coal and/or tar sands,” for investment in “alternative and/or renewable energy companies, consistent with the parameters of the investment policy,” and recommended revisiting “the issue in five years’ time, or earlier as economic, climate or other circumstances may warrant.” [See photo of motion, below.]

A photo of the original motion put forward by the Finance and Facilities Committee of the Salem State University Board of Trustees at the October 13, 2016, board meeting in Salem, Mass., where members were considering whether or not SSU would fully divest from fossil fuel companies. This version of the motion was NOT approved. Photo: Jane Regan

Students and professors who spoke at the standing-room-only meeting, including Professor Stephen Young, the only faculty member who had served on the sustainability committee, were upset with the last-minute change.

One after another, they reminded the board that climate change effects the country’s and the world’s poorest, and that other universities and institutions have committed to divesting for both environmental and financial reasons.

Professor Noel Healy, a leader of the divestment movement on campus, noted wryly that the board’s watered-down motion rings hollow since “we have zero investment in coal.”

Natasha Manyak, class of 2017, who attended both SSU and University of Massachusetts-Amherst, which recently decided to fully divest, said she was proud of her former alma mater. She asked board members how they could ignore “a moral imperative,” and said she believes failure to commit to full divestment might actually have an immediate financial impact, because it could damage “hundreds of relationships with students and alumni” who might not be inclined to make donations to SSU.

Some of the faculty, staff and students who packed a room at Marsh Hall on October 13, 2016, at Salem State University in Salem, Mass., to participate in a Board of Trustees meeting that was considering whether or not SSU would fully divest from fossil fuel companies. Photo: Jane Regan

Mirwais Anwar, a senior majoring in Biology, criticized the SSU board for having “an investment policy that doesn’t match [SSU’s] stated commitment to students of color,” since climate change “impacts communities of color.”

“Where we put our money as an institution should mirror our policies,” he said, to massive applause.

Professor Avi Chomsky was also critical of the substitute motion, which she said sounded like “climate denial” and asked: “Do not the circumstances warrant [full divestment] now?”

Finally, the student representative to the board, Elizabeth Cabral, spoke up to say that she had not yet met a single student who opposed full divestment. She urged the board to consider including the idea of having divestment as “a goal.”

As she spoke, President Pat Meservey began to write out some changes to the Finance and Facilities Committee’s motion. Cabral and Mattera then huddled around her, and together they came up with new language.

In the end, while still not approving full divestment, the board adopted, 11–0, language that instructs the Finance and Facilities Committee to revisit the issue of divestment not “in five years time,” but at its biannual meetings. The new language also says SSU has “a goal of full divestment” but does not give a timeline.

But Mattera also reminded board members and the audience that he feels no investments should be sold ever be sold unless it is “the right time,” and is “financially prudent,” according to SSU’s investment advisors.

As of October, 2016, at least 612 institutions around the world have committed to divestment, according to the advocacy organization Fossil Free.

In the United States, some colleges and universities have chosen to only partially divest, but others — notably Syracuse University, University of Hawaii, University of Maryland, UMass-Amherst Foundation and Chico State — have committed to full divestment, according to Fossil Free. Many pension funds around the country are also divesting.