{"id":12955,"date":"2015-04-23T08:52:46","date_gmt":"2015-04-23T12:52:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/?p=12955"},"modified":"2015-04-23T08:57:28","modified_gmt":"2015-04-23T12:57:28","slug":"vsu-presidents-committee-votes-to-divest-from-fossil-fuels","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2015\/04\/vsu-presidents-committee-votes-to-divest-from-fossil-fuels.html","title":{"rendered":"VSU President’s Committee votes to divest from fossil fuels"},"content":{"rendered":"

Students, staff, faculty, and administration all say divest from fossil fuels. What will the VSU Foundation do now?\r\nOne year after\r\n\r\nthe committee was appointed 10 April 2014<\/a>, it made a decision\r\n8 April 2015:\r\n

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\r\n<\/a>\r\nS.A.V.E. applauds the decision by the President’s Special Committee\r\non Campus Sustainability to support fossil fuel divestment.\r\nLeadership and stewardship are part and parcel to Valdosta State’s\r\nrole as an institution of higher education and we call on VSU to\r\nhonor these ethos by divesting from fossil fuels, ending its\r\nprofiteering from ecological harm, environmental destruction, and\r\nhuman suffering.\r\n<\/p>\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n

\r\nBenjamin Vieth, the representative of Students Against Violating the Environment (S.A.V.E.)<\/a> on that Committee, sent the above announcement after approval by S.A.V.E.\r\nAmong\r\n\r\nother organizations included on that committee<\/a>,\r\n\r\n\r\nfollowing a November 2013 vote by the \r\nFaculty Environmental Issues Committee (EIC)<\/a>,\r\nthe\r\nFaculty Senate voted 21 November 2013<\/a> for divestment.\r\nThe Student Government Association (SGA)\r\n\r\nvoted 4 March 2014 for divestment<\/a>.\r\n

\r\nEIC, SGA, and S.A.V.E. are on the President’s Special Committee.\r\nI’m not sure about the positions of the other organizations,\r\nwhich include\r\nthe Physical Plant, the Council on Staff Affairs, and the\r\nCenter for Business and Economic Research,\r\nbut it seems like at least one of them must have also voted for\r\ndivestment to reach a majority.\r\n

\r\n\r\n<\/a>\r\nA year may seem like a long time, but fossil fuel divestment is still\r\n\r\nfaster than divestment from apartheid, tobacco, and armaments<\/a>.\r\n

\r\nAs\r\n\r\nthen-SAVE President Danielle Jordan said<\/a> when VSU opened the\r\nsolar canopy at the Odum Library in October 2013,\r\n

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\r\nWe cannot address climate change without decreasing our dependency\r\non fossil fuels and solar is one way we could change that.\r\n<\/p>\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n

\r\nLet’s remember that\r\n\r\ndivestment is about undermining the political power\r\nof the fossil fuel industry<\/a>, as Tim DeChristopher said that same month in\r\nresponse to Harvard President Drew Faust’s excuses for not divesting.\r\n

\r\nAnd that’s already happening, with the regulated-utility-campaign-funded\r\n\r\nGeorgia Public Service Commission\r\nvoting 11 July 2013<\/a> to make Georgia Power buy more\r\nsolar power,\r\nand with\r\nsolar financing bill HB 57\r\n\r\nunanimously passing both the Georgia House and Senate in March 2015<\/a>, waiting\r\nonly on\r\n\r\nfossil-fuel-campaign-funded Gov. Nathan Deal<\/a> to sign it.\r\n

\r\nThere’s even a band of fossil free foundations<\/a>.\r\nEven the Rockefeller Brothers Fund<\/a>, heirs of John D. Rockefeller who started the fossil fuel industry,\r\nare divesting from tar sands.\r\n

\r\nThat leaves at VSU only the VSU Foundation, which actually controls\r\nVSU’s investment fund.\r\nThey were last heard from officially\r\n\r\n29 October 2013, writing in a letter to SAVE<\/a>:\r\n

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\r\nCompliance with your well-intentioned request is impractical for a\r\nnumber of reasons and perhaps even a breach of the fiduciary\r\nresponsibility that all of our trustees take very seriously.\r\n<\/p>\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n

\r\nWhen even the Rockefeller Brothers Fund is divesting,\r\ncan anybody seriously believe that\r\nditching fossil fuels in favor of renewable energy stocks\r\nwould be a breach of fiduciary responsibility?\r\n

\r\n\r\n<\/a>\r\nWhen the rosiest projections for shale gas are only for\r\n\r\n56% increase in 28 years<\/a> and\r\nthe\r\n\r\nLNG export boom is going bust<\/a>,\r\nwhile\r\n\r\nU.S. solar capacity is doubling every two years<\/a>?\r\nFixing climate change is profitable<\/a>.\r\nSolar power\r\n\r\nis going to win<\/a>,\r\njust like\r\nthe Internet did<\/a>.\r\nFiduciary responsibility might have been\r\nbuying fossil fuel stocks might have been selling horse buggies\r\nin 1915, but fiduciary responsibility in 2015 would be selling\r\nfossil fuel stocks and buying renewable energy stocks.\r\n

\r\nAnd that’s not all stewardship is.\r\nLet’s review the \r\nVSU Trustee Handbook<\/a> again:\r\n

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  1. \r\nStewardship\r\n