A group of institutional investors has filed shareholder resolutions with 48 US companies including Google, JPMorgan and Walmart to press for annual disclosure of federal and state lobbying.
Investors including Trillium Asset Management, the New York State Common Retirement Fund, the Brainerd Foundation and others are asking the companies to outline their lobbying policies, disclose payments related to lobbying, describe their decision-making processes related to lobbying and report membership in any tax-exempt organization that proposes and endorses legislation.
‘Transparency is fundamental to strong corporate governance and key to the New York State Common Retirement Fund’s engagement with our portfolio companies,’ says New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli, who oversees the $160.7 bn state fund, in a press release. ‘We need sunlight on lobbying operations so we can evaluate potential risks to our investments. Any political spending ‒ including lobbying ‒ made with shareholder dollars should be disclosed.’
The 2014 proxy season marks the fourth year in a row that mass shareholder resolutions related to lobbying disclosure have been issued. Last year 70 investors filed 50 proposals, with 40 of them going to a vote and receiving an average support of 26 percent. In 2012, 20 proposals were voted with an average of 24 percent support and five were voted in 2011, also with average support of 24 percent.
‘The proposals led many companies to improve their lobbying disclosure, leading to settlements and improved disclosure at more than 25 companies, including 3M, Accenture, Amgen, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Endo Health Solutions and St Jude Medical,’ according to the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees pension fund, which helped organize the resolutions.
The resolutions this year will also target IBM, Accenture, Boeing, Altria, Raytheon, Citigroup, ConocoPhillips, ExxonMobil, Time Warner, Bank of America, Yahoo!, Visa, Verizon, Facebook, Morgan Stanley and others.
In the resolution targeting Google, which the investors published in the news release, the search engine giant is asked specifically to reveal any funding of the US Chamber of Commerce. The resolution states that Google ‘reportedly sits on a task force of the American Legislative Exchange Council, which has launched a high priority campaign to repeal renewable energy standards in states.’
Google is asked to ‘review its public policy advocacy and oversight and expand its public disclosure about third-party lobbying.’
