The pension fund for Colorado’s state workers voted Monday night to support legislation that would require it to divest of $137 million in investments with companies that do business in Sudan.
The legislation is sponsored by House Speaker Andrew Romanoff, D-Denver, and 75 other lawmakers. It would require all public pension funds in Colorado to pull their funds from companies “whose revenues are funding the regime in Khartoum who are killing people,” Romanoff said.
The Colorado Public Employees’ Retirement Association voted unanimously in a special meeting to support the legislation, PERA executive director Meredith Williams said.
“This is a first for the PERA board in my seven years,” he said. “We’ve never had an issue where we’ve had this horrific genocide taking place.”
Romanoff said about a half-million people have been killed in Sudan – more than are invested in PERA. Another 2 million have been raped or tortured.
Williams said that while divestiture can be complicated, pulling funds out of Sudan is becoming a national trend.
In fact, he participated in the board meeting vote via conference call from the East Coast, where he has been meeting with representatives from other public funds ordered to divest.
Romanoff said winning PERA’s support is significant for the Colorado proposal, which he hopes will be adopted by Congress and other states.
“The board was never opposed to the concept,” Williams said of PERA, which manages a $38.25 billion portfolio.
“It was just a matter of with that much money in securities invested around the world, some of them were held in a unique fashion, commingled if you will with other holdings.”
Romanoff said the legislation targets specific companies that do business in Sudan, a list of which can be found at www.sudandivestment.org.
The University of Colorado Board of Regents voted in December to divest assets in companies with ties to Sudan.
After screening about 85 percent of CU’s investments, officials identified about $360,000 in such holdings.
Those investments – securities owned in funds managed by Vanguard – are Rolls-Royce Ltd. Group and China Petrochemical.
Capitol bureau chief Jeri Clausing can be reached at 303-954-1555 or jclausing@denverpost.com.
