100 signatures reached
To: President Tetlow & the Board of Trustees
Call Fordham University to Divest from Fossil Fuels Urgently
Urgently make a statement to plan to remove all endowment investments from Fossil Fuels.
Fordham University has a responsibility to invest in a sustainable future for its students, stakeholders, and the planet. Fordham has identified fossil fuel divestment as an environmental priority but has not yet presented the University community with an urgent, detailed plan. We call on Fordham University to fully divest our endowment from the fossil fuel industry.
By signing this petition, you are supporting:
Removing Fordham’s endowment money from funding the fossil fuel industry.
Expediting the divestment process that Fordham has already agreed upon.
Student representation within the divestment process.
Click the link below to read our working proposal:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/12BC9KqQQsnggG_sz7wwhbIh9LeJOgj23IazrV4UcfAY/edit?usp=sharing
We welcome engagement and feedback on the proposal.
Endorsed by the following Fordham Clubs: Students for Environmental Action and Justice, The Paper, Fordham Experimental Theater, Beta Alpha Psi, College Democrats, Climate Impact Initiative, and Humanitarian Student Union.
Why is this important?
According to the United Nations, fossil fuels -- coal, oil, and gas -- are the most significant contributors to global climate change, accounting for over 75 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions. Greenhouse gas emissions trap the sun's heat, leading to global warming and climate change. Warmer temperatures are changing weather patterns and disrupting ecological systems. Additionally, the climate crisis disproportionately affects poor and marginalized communities. The lowest-income countries produce one-tenth of emissions but are the most impacted by climate change. These people are vulnerable to health risks, hunger, water scarcity, education, and work-related hazards.
In the United States, an EPA analysis demonstrated that the most severe harms from climate change disproportionately affect vulnerable communities who are least able to prepare for and recover from heat waves, poor air quality, flooding, and other impacts. The fossil fuel industry contributes to public health harms that kill hundreds of thousands of people in the U.S. each year, dispositionally endearing Black, Brown, Indigenous, and poor communities. Extraction, processing, transport, and combustion of fossil fuels generate toxic air and water pollution. Exposure to fossil fuel pollution is linked to negative health impacts for people living near these pollution sources, especially particulate matter and ground-level ozone, which are correlated with respiratory and cardiovascular risks and premature mortality. Fossil fuels depend on and contribute to systemic racism in the United States. Racist practices, including redlining and housing discrimination, longstanding social and racial inequalities, colonization, indigenous genocide and removal, and elected official beholder to corporate power, create a system where the most dangerous impacts of pollution fall most intensely on the most disadvantaged, particularly Black, Brown, Indigenous, and poor communities.
Climate change is the most pressing issue of our generation. Without immediate action, we risk pushing our planet into a position of irreversible damage. Within the past few years, we have witnessed significant increases in sea levels, global temperatures, and extreme weather. From Hurricane Sandy alone, New York City suffered 19 billion dollars in damages, displacing 70,000 residents and causing the death of 44 people. Unless we make changes now, storms of this intensity will increase in frequency and severity. Our Jesuit university is responsible for divesting without delay to show its support against the increasing ailments caused by the climate crisis.