AMHERST — Even though two high-ranking University of Massachusetts officials have indicated divesting from investments in oil and gas is “a logical next step” for the endowment managed by the UMass Foundation, it’s unclear how much influence President Martin Meehan and board of trustees Chairman Victor Woolridge will have on decisions made by the foundation.
The foundation’s Socially Responsible Investing Advisory Committee, made up of faculty, administrators, alumni and students, could respond, over the next three months, to the protests launched by the UMass Fossil Fuel Divestment Campaign against the investment policies, and Meehan and Woolridge’s statements. The week-long protests continued on the Amherst campus Thursday.
“The Socially Responsible Investing Advisory Committee meets when a petition has been filed,” said Raymond Howell, of Howell Communications in Boston, who handles communications for the foundation. “No new petition has been filed by the UMass Fossil Fuel Divestment Campaign.”
The UMass Foundation oversees a $770 million endowment and makes decisions based on advice of the investment committee and professional investment advisers. UMass officials are not releasing details about how much of the endowment’s investments are in fossil fuels.
“Like other university foundations, the UMass Foundation as a matter of policy does not discuss details of its portfolio,” Howell said.
Both Meehan and Woolridge have stated that UMass should divest eventually from fossil fuels, and both have votes as part of the UMass Foundation board. The foundation typically only meets once a year, in December.
“Throughout my career, I have stood for environmental progress and reducing the carbon footprint,” Meehan said in a statement issued by UMass. “Although we find ourselves meeting in a moment of contention, I embrace and I believe that the university leadership broadly shares the goals that the divest-campaign students have been advocating for.”
“We firmly believe that man-made climate change is a situation that we need to address and further believe that we are charting a responsible course,” Woolridge said in a statement.
But neither the UMass president nor the UMass board of trustees can control decisions made by the UMass Foundation, Robert Connolly, spokesman for the UMass president’s office, said in an email.
Connolly said a preliminary view from general counsel Deidre Heatwole is that the UMass Foundation, because it is governed by its own board of directors, has independent fiduciary authority and therefore has the power to make independent decisions on investment matters.
One of the public directors of the foundation, Warren J. Isabelle, principal of Ironwood Investment Management LLC in Boston, said in an email that any questions about the foundation have to be answered by Howell.
Howell said he could not comment on what effect the student protests or public statements will have on the endowment portfolio, or what impact full divestment from fossil fuels would have.
But Howell said a process has been in place, since 2015, that provides a means for petitions to be brought forward.
“Last year, the foundation created the Socially Responsible Investing Advisory Committee to consider petitions, from anyone in the UMass community, for changes in investment policies,” Howell said.
In fact, there can be changes to the endowment. In December, the UMass Foundation announced it would divest from direct investments in coal companies and would continue to evaluate ways to manage the endowment in a manner promoting both environmental sustainability and socially responsible investing.
This came in response to UMass Divest, which submitted a formal petition asking the UMass Foundation to divest in March 2015. Before making a recommendation to the foundation’s board, the Socially Responsible Investing Advisory Committee, created in November 2014, met with representatives of UMass Divest, researched the issue over several months and made a recommendation.
At the time, the foundation’s executive vice president, Charles J. Pagnam, issued a statement that it wanted to be a steward of the environment while maximizing returns on funds donated to endowment for research, academic programs and financial aid.
“We believe this action sends an important message about the urgency of climate change and the university community’s commitment to addressing it,” Pagnam said.
Previously, the UMass Foundation incorporated into its investment policies environmental, social and governance criteria, establishing a social choice endowment option for donors, and became a signatory to the Carbon Disclosure Project, an organizations that provides a system to show its greenhouse gas emissions.
According to the UMass Foundation website, the foundation includes 15 public directors and 10 university-affiliated voting directors, among whom Meehan, Woolridge, UMass-Amherst Chancellor Kumble Subbaswamy and the chancellors at the other UMass campuses.
Scott Merzbach can be reached at smerzbach@gazettenet.com.
