Portland Divests!

Today was an historic day in Portland, Oregon. From today, the city will no longer invest in corporations that build pipelines, sponsor private prisons, and sell tap water in plastic bottles. No more Wells Fargo, Caterpillar, Nestle, Walmart, or Amazon. This is the culmination of many years of research, labor, meetings, rallies, protests, and struggle by social justice and environmental activists and scholars. I attended the City Council meeting today to document the testimonies of people who want the city to stop investing in Wall Street corporations. I don't think I've ever been in a room with more gravitas in terms of education, commitment, dedication, and knowledge. Speakers included physicians, leaders of many faith groups, Native American water protectors, old friends from the Occupy movement, retired city officials, environmentalists, and elders who have worked for justice all their lives. The City Council voted unanimously to divest. 

The main photo shows a man (I missed his name) who rolled out a long list of instances in which economic pressure changed corporate behavior. I’m also adding as extras a shot of the crowd (every seat was filled and people were standing) and a picture of Hyung Kyu Nam, a high school teacher who has devoted his life to this issue for the past decade. He is one of my local heroes.

We follow San Francisco, Seattle, and a few other west coast cities in adopting this policy. Now if we could just get the city to instruct the police to quit killing Black people and traumatizing protesters. There's always more work to do, but today was a good day for climate justice.