Snap! The Texas oil companies that are the chief backers of Prop 23’s bid to scrap climate regulations in California are now facing shareholder scrutiny of their political spending. Shareholders of Los Angeles-based Occidental Oil also filed a resolution demanding that the company evaluate the costs and benefits of that company’s controversial political spending.
Laura Campos, Director of Shareholder Activities at the Nathan Cummings Foundation, which filed the resolution requesting improved disclosure and accountability on political spending at Tesoro, explained: “As shareholders, we’re concerned that Tesoro’s support for the highly controversial Proposition 23 could lead to a decrease in shareholder value by damaging the company’s reputation and negatively impacting the business environment in a state where Tesoro has significant operations.”
The Unitarian Universalist Association filed the shareholder resolution at Valero. Treasurer Tim Brennan said, “Our values compel us to protect the planet … Valero’s extraordinary support for Proposition 23 delays the country from tackling an urgent human, environmental and economic concern.”
Shareholder resolutions can only force corporations to explain and re-evaluate their activities, not change them — which seems odd, since shareholders actually own the company.
Prop 23 is also an object lesson in what’s wrong with our proposition process. Props are often knee-jerk populist responses to recent events; Prop 23 feeds on job anxieties to repeal a law that’s never been shown to hurt job growth, and Prop 22 marks local anger at having budgets dinged by a impoverished state. Trouble is, the props stay on the books forever, where they have unforeseen effects: take Prop 13 as but one example. They’re poorly written by people who aren’t experts in public policy — viz. Prop 19. And like Prop 23 and Prop 8 before it, they’re often primarily funded by out-of-state interests.
Note, too, that the biggest supporters of Prop 23 are corporations, while the opponents are mainly individuals and nonprofits.
The recent spate of shareholder resolutions suggests that the oil companies’ individual financial backers don’t want their money spent in our election. But it’s unlikely that their efforts will have much effect.
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