SAVE president Danielle Jordan posted on SAVE’s facebook page about an hour ago:
BIG WIN, SAVE!
The faculty senate voted, unanimously, to support our divestment campaign. They also voted to condemn and reject the BOT response letter.
Way to go, everyone! We’re making progress!
S.A.V.E. never gives up, and the VSU Foundation provided fuel for the fight. -jsq
Dr. William J. McKinney
President
Valdosta State UniversityDear President McKinney,
Thank you very much for agreeing to be a part of our ceremony for the new solar canopy this Friday. We are excited for it, and we are glad that you will be able to come. We definitely appreciate your support, and we hope to have a nice turnout!
As happy as we are about VSU’s continuing efforts to “go green,” I am writing to you in regard to S.A.V.E.’s ongoing fossil fuel divestment campaign and the recent response we received from the Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the VSU Foundation. If you have not yet read the letter, I have attached a copy for your convenience.
We were clearly disappointed to hear that
our request had been denied, but what troubled us the most was the condescending tone used by Mr. Edwards in the last part of his letter. To end his letter on University (not Foundation) letterhead with sarcasm and cavalier dismissal of our concerns is unacceptable, especially as we have acted in a respectful manner throughout this process. Within his response, Mr. Edwards downplays the importance of practicing social responsibility and belittles the validity of past divestment campaigns that have been used to counteract injustices such as South Africa’s Apartheid regime, which represented an inhumane and repressive system that needed to be challenged.
We also find Continue reading
Winning PR by losing initial decisions: SAVE‘s doing it right.
Will Lewis write for The Spectator yesterday, SAVE fails to persuade Foundation,
“Compliance with your well-intentioned request is impractical for a number of reasons and perhaps even a breach of the fiduciary responsibility that all of our trustees take very seriously,” the refusal read.
Here’s SAVE’s request, and here’s SAVE’s president’s comment:
Danielle Jordan, senior anthropology major and president of SAVE, said, “There’s a lot of disappointment but we are not going to stop, we don’t see this as the end of our campaign. It lets us know where we stand with the Board of Trustees.”
The VSU Foundation’s Investment Objectives in the Investment Policy and Guidelines states that “Foundation funds should be invested to produce maximum total return consistent with prudent risk limits.”
On the other hand, the VSU Trustee Handbook says the Mission Statement of the VSU Foundation is: Continue reading
Dr. Richard posted this letter to the editor of the The Spectator, VSU’s student newspaper, on SAVE’s facebook page today. I added the links and the images. -jsq
To the Editor:
I would like to address the VSU community with this letter.
VSU Students, faculty, and staff, did you know that many of the clothes that we admire and purchase in the USA are made in places like Bangladesh? Indeed, some of our most popular brands of clothing, including GAP, Old Navy, and Banana Republic originate there. Perhaps you know that many Bangladeshi clothing manufacturers employ children as young as 12 years old who earn as little as $32 per month despite working up to 14 hours a day? It’s little wonder that so many of us can look so stylish—and for relatively little money.
If you didn’t already know this, does it matter to you now? Are you concerned that the money you spend supports sweatshops in Bangladesh
and elsewhere, perpetuating the misery of millions of our fellow human beings? Undoubtedly many of us are concerned, and we understand that we can make a difference in the world by being more judicious about where we shop. It’s why we choose to buy groceries at worker-friendly Publix rather than Continue reading
A copy of what the VSU Foundation called the “
“well-intentioned request” by
Students Against Violating the Environment (S.A.V.E.).
I added the links and images.
-jsq
October 17, 2013
Dear VSU Foundation and Board of Trustees,
Recent years have brought climate change to the forefront of public discussion.
A newly released report from the United Nations indicates with 95% certainty that humans are the primary cause of the issue. It is our concern that the continuation of our current practices and our dependence on fossil fuels will only result in continued environmental degradation and human struggle. Knowing the impact that anthropogenic climate change has upon our environment, our health, and our economy, we are asking Valdosta State University to take a stand and join in the effort to address this issue, as social responsibility is part and parcel to the role of public institutions.
As a public institution, Valdosta State University has a responsibility to shape the debate about climate change through its voice, and fossil fuel divestment is another medium for that voice. We are asking that VSU immediately Continue reading
Pipeline opposition got written up in the Albany Herald. You haven’t seen many pipeline posts here in the LAKE blog lately because SpectraBusters has its own blog now.
Other recent developments include Florida PSC tentatively approved pipeline, Gertrude Dickinson’s stream of opposition from Sumter County Florida, and schedule of Open House meetings in December required by FERC among the FERC filings about the Sabal Trail pipeline and how to file a comment or become an intervenor with FERC.
Remember Spectra will be haunting the Lowndes County Commission Work Session 9 December 2013.
And if you want to see where Spectra’s gas comes from,
come see
Gasland II at VSU 7PM Thursday 7 Nobemver 2013.
SpectraBusters: We ain’t afraid a no pipeline!
-jsq
The VSU Foundation knows more than 98% of climate scientists,
and also sneers at former divestment from tobacco and apartheid companies.
Nevermind that
fossil fuel divestment is going faster than either of those.
Is it good fiduciary responsibility to stay invested in the stranded investments
of fossil fuel stocks while
solar stocks are skyrocketing?
Is this really how to encourage people to
give to VSU?
Is that how
the alumni
want their investments used?
Seen today on S.A.V.E.’s facebook page, VSU Foundation’s response to S.A.V.E.’s fossil fuel divestment request:
Danielle Jordan, President
S.A.V.E.
Valdosta State UniversityDear Ms. Jordan,
The Investment Committee of the VSU Foundation Board of Trustees has reviewed the request from your organization that securities issued by companies engaged in the production of fossil fuel energy be excluded from the foundation’s endowment portfolios. Compliance with your well-intentioned request is impractical for a number of reasons and perhaps even a breach of the fiduciary responsibility that all of our trustees take very seriously.
The various VSU Foundation endowment portfolios are managed Continue reading
SAVE‘s fossil fuel
divestment request made the
front page of
The Spectator at VSU,
and Danielle Jordan of SAVE was pullquote about fossil fuels
in another front page story, about solar panels on the Odum Library.
The student government didn’t vote to support SAVE’s request, but
many senators said they didn’t understand the subject and the student
government asked to get educated
about
fossil fuels and divestment.
Jordan Barela and Von Kennedy wrote for The Spectator 24 October 2013, Solar panels bring green energy to Odum,
VSU is moving in a greener direction.
A solar canopy was recently built behind Odum Library.
“We cannot address climate change without decreasing our dependency on fossil fuels and solar is one way we could change that.”
—Danielle JordanThe canopy is a 10 kilowatt solar array. The canopy produces energy that goes directly to Odum Library, and does not go to the Georgia Power grid.
Construction of the solar canopy began in September, and was finished earlier this month.
“It is exciting,” Danielle Jordan, president of Students Against Violating the Environment, said. “We cannot address climate change without decreasing our dependency on fossil fuels and solar is one way we could change that.”
The solar panels were manufactured by Continue reading
Students Against Violating the Environment (SAVE) is having
an Earth Day event
5:00pm until 8:00pm today, Friday 26 April 2013 on the VSU front lawn.
Come celebrate Earth Day with us! The event is open to campus and the community. There will be raffles, information tables, speakers, food, and live music. Don’t miss it!
Here’s their facebook event and Flyer.
-jsq
Congratulations to all who worked against the biomass plant:
today was the deadline on its most recent extension,
so it’s gone for now.
Congratulations to WACE and SAVE and NAACP and New Life Ministries
and everyone else who was involved, especially Natasha Fast, Seth Gunning,
and Brad Bergstrom, who were working against it before almost anyone else.
Congratulations to those who were instrumental even though they were not exactly or originally biomass opponents, especially Ashley Paulk, who came out and said what needed to be said, and George Bennett, who was willing to admit in public that he was one of the earliest proponents of the biomass plant but new knowledge caused him to think differently.
A big shoutout to the VSU Faculty Senate, the only traditional non-activist body that went on record as opposing the biomass plant with an actual vote before the extension deadline. The VSU Faculty Senate did what the Valdosta City Council, the Lowndes County Commission and the Industrial Authority Board would not. Go Blazers!
A special strategic mention to Kay Harris and David Rodock of the
Valdosta Daily Times, who came to realize they were not being told the
whole truth by the Industrial Authority.
The VDT even
gave a civics lesson on how to stop the biomass plant.
And a very special mention to the people who did the most to make the
name of biomass mud in the public’s eye:
Brad Lofton, Col. Ricketts, and the VLCIA board.
Without their indoctrination sessions and paid “forum” and stonewalling,
people wouldn’t have been turned against that thing nearly as fast!
Yet it ain’t over until it’s over.
According to David Rodock in the VDT today: Continue reading
