A banner at a Milwaukee demonstration in 2019 to call attention to climate change. A group of Wisconsin Retirement System members have been campaigning to persuade the State of Wisconsin Investment Board to get out of its fossil-fuel holdings, asserting they are risky investments in light of climate change. (Isiah Holmes | Wisconsin Examiner)
A retired technical college teacher in Milwaukee, Anne Steinberg says she appreciates the pension she gets every month and the state agency that manages the pension fund assets.
But she also believes the State of Wisconsin Investment Board (SWIB) could do much better if it made one big change: getting out of any fossil fuel-related investments.
“They’re investing for the long term, and we don’t think fossil fuels are good for the long term,” Steinberg says.
A few years ago, she and a group of other Wisconsin State Retirement System members began a project to learn more about SWIB’s fossil fuel holdings. Over the last year they’ve been trying to persuade the board’s investment managers to divest them.