Earlier this year, ILWU Local 8 worked with local activists to stop a rail-clogging coal export facility from being built at the Port of Portland. They thanked the Mayor for withdrawing his support for the ill advised project. The local opposition to coal is now moving to divestments of public money and retirement funds.
Multnomah County and the city of Portland are poised to join the international divestment movement against fossil fuels companies.
The Board of County Commissioners will vote on a divestment resolution Thursday morning, Sept. 24, followed by a City Council vote in the afternoon. The measures would pledge both governments to stop buying interests in 200 of the world’s oil, gas and coal companies with the largest fossil fuel reserves.
The movement is designed to stigmatize fossil fuel companies and highlight their role in contributing to climate change, much like the 1980s campaign to divest from South African companies pressured that regime to abandon its racist apartheid system.