USAC passes resolution calling for reevaluation of company investment

The undergraduate student government unanimously passed a resolution Tuesday calling for UCLA and the University of California to divest from companies that invest in private prisons.

The resolution states that by investing in companies that benefit from prison labor, the UC and UCLA support a private prison system composed of a disproportionate number of people from minority backgrounds.

The resolution calls for the Associated Students UCLA Board of Directors to reevaluate the companies in which the Undergraduate Students Association Council invests. The document asks the UCLA Foundation, a private business entity that organizes investments for the university, to divest from corporations that profit from the prison industrial complex.

The resolution also calls for UCLA and the UC Board of Regents to institute a “socially responsible investment” screening process to prevent university investments that support such corporations. Specifically, the resolution asks the UC and UCLA to stop doing business with certain companies, such as Wells Fargo and American Express, that invest in the prison industrial complex.

USAC External Vice President Maryssa Hall, who brought the resolution to the council, said she hoped it will start a conversation with UCLA administrators and the UC Office of the President about disclosing the origins of the UC’s and UCLA’s investments, as they are currently unavailable to the public.

Both UC Berkeley and UC Santa Barbara passed similar resolutions within the past year.

Sophie Armen, an alumna of UCSB, asked USAC councilmembers on Tuesday night to take responsibility in passing the resolution and challenged them to pass it faster than UCSB’s undergraduate student government.

“It’s not a divisive issue, it’s a human issue and (passing it) is the right thing to do,” Armen said.

Councilmembers passed the resolution in less than 10 minutes without any major amendments or objections.

The UC takes into account multiple factors when investing, including the social and financial effects of its investments, said UC spokeswoman Dianne Klein.

The regents approves all University investments. The UC has previously divested from companies, including some that produce tobacco or guns, to make socially responsible decisions, Klein said.

The primary concern is to ensure that people in the University get the most out of its investments, Klein said.

During Tuesday’s meeting, about 30 students went to the council meeting to show their support for the resolution. Several gave personal testimony about the content of the resolution.

Devin Murphy, chief of staff for the USAC Office of the President, said that he sees the prison industrial complex as perpetuating an unjust system that marginalizes minority populations, especially black and Latino communities.

“I’m tired of talking about the dynamics on why African American men are not here. (It’s because) they are in prison,” Murphy said. 

USAC President John Joanino said he thinks the resolution serves as a stepping stone in identifying the relationship between the incarceration rates of black and Latino individuals and their representation in higher education.

“I think this shows who has access to (primary school) education and later higher education,” Joanino said.

For every 100,000 prisoners in California in 2010, there were about 5,500 black incarcerated men, compared to 1,146 Latinos, 671 non-Latino whites and 43 Asian men, according to the Public Policy Institute of California.

The resolution claims that the disproportionate number of people from minority backgrounds makes the prison system a “modern form of slavery” and that investing in certain companies makes the University “complicit in the perpetuation of the previously­ mentioned form of modern day Jim Crow.”

Hall said discussions about the resolution began in fall quarter. The Afrikan Student Union authored the document and campus organizations such as the Harambee Council at UCLA, the Incarcerated Youth Tutorial Project and the Student Coalition Against Labor Exploitation voiced their support.

Multiple USAC offices and community organizations, such as the Alliance for Equal Opportunity in Education and the Community Coalition of South Los Angeles, endorsed the resolution.

Joanino said he thinks the resolution addresses the lack of diversity on UCLA’s campusdiscussed throughout the year.

“(Now is an) important time as student leaders are trying to advocate for accessible and diverse university,” Joanino said.

In the fall, USAC passed a resolution in support of the Invest in Graduations, Not Incarceration; Transform Education, or IGNITE, campaign, which aims to address the relationship between incarceration rates and higher education opportunities among black and Latino communities.

Hall said she hopes the USAC resolution will get the attention of ASUCLA and the UCOP.

“As a higher education institution, the entire campus community should see this small step as a move in the right direction,” Hall said.