A Petition to Express Displeasure with US Foreign Policy Through a Highly Symbolic Act
This petition asks the Denver Board of Education to ask its appointees to the Denver Public Schools Retirement System to pursue divesting the Retirement System holdings of major defense contractors as a way to indicate displeasure with current US policy.
We, the undersigned residents and taxpayers in Denver, or members of the Denver Public Schools Retirement System, ask the Denver Board of Education to instruct its two appointed members to the Retirement System to investigate the possibility of divesting Retirement System investments in the following military contractors:
General Dynamics Corp. and United Technologies Corp. Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, and Raytheon.
We believe that said military investments can be replaced with investments in neutral companies not directly benefiting from the current international environment.
We further believe that such disinvestments can be done without compromising the soundness of the funds available to Denver Public Schools Retirement System nor departing from the fiduciary guidelines and requirements of DPSRS.
Certainly we do not believe that such disinvestments will negatively impact the servicemen and women valiantly serving their country in far off lands.
We do, however, wish to send a distinct message to the political authorities responsible for conducting the Iraq war , that it is unpopular with the American people and that steps should be taken immediately at the legislative and executive level to reverse the course we are on, a course that is costing lives of many Americans and Iraqis and is bleeding the coffers of public finance.
A parallel inquiry is pending with the DPSRS as to the feasibility of examining the current investment priorities.
We hope that this morally based request is the proper course to take and that the effort involved could be easily replicated with other employee groups around the state and the nation.
Respectfully submitted,
