The Retire Advocate < Back to Table of Contents February 2025 Pierce County PSARA Committee on the Move Richard Burton Our Pierce County PSARA chapter has gotten underway! We have with tremendous support from PSARA leaders Tim Burns, Karen Richter, Pam Crone, Jessica Bonebright, and Robby Stern. PSARA Executive Board member Lynne Dodson has been chairing the group and was elected to be our delegate to the Pierce County Central Labor Council (PCCLC). Anita Latch and Kit Burns are our alternates to the PCCLC. At our meetings, we’ve had prominent participation from activists in Tacoma Indivisible, UFCW local 367, League of Women Voters of Tacoma- Pierce County, and Retired Public Employees Council (RPEC) of Washing- ton. We are excited about building and adding to these alliances. At our most recent meeting, we made decisions about programs we can put on and campaigns we can help support. These include: Leveling the Playing Field Work- shop. We plan to put on a workshop on this vital topic on March 8. Stay tuned for details. March 18 Lobby Day. We have begun making legislative appointments for Pierce County–area lawmakers for the March 18 PSARA lob- by day and will be turning out as many PSARA activist members as possible. Meetings with Congressmembers. We will be meeting with Congress- members Randall, Strickland, and Schrier – or their office staff – over the next months. We will be pressing them on PSARA’s federal concerns around Social Security and Medicare. As mentioned above, we also plan to articulate our concerns with the contract between ICE and the GEO Group, pertaining to the Northwest Immigrant Detention Center. Social Security Works. A number of members from our new chapter have participated in the strategy meetings about efforts to defend and strengthen both Medicare and Social Security. Tacoma Bill of Rights. UFCW local 367 is likely going to be pushing a municipal initiative in Tacoma, calling for a Workers' Bill of Rights in Tacoma. We hope to help support this effort, which will of course start with signature-gathering. Fighting Senior Center Closures. The City of Tacoma has announced plans to close two senior centers. A campaign to stop the closures at Lighthouse Senior Center and Beacon Activity Center has been launched and PSARA activists will be supporting their efforts. Sadly, Lighthouse, though still open, has no programming. Northwest Immigrant Detention Center. La Resistencia is a wonderful group that has been fighting the ongoing human rights abuses at the Northwest Immigrant Detention Center in Tacoma. The group put on a powerful event in early December– “Melting ICE” – featuring a spectacular and thought-provoking exhibit. The contract between ICE and the GEO group (the private corpo- ration that runs the detention center)is going to expire this September. We will be urging that it not be renewed in meetings with Pierce County Congress- members. Our meetings are held on the second Thursday of the month. New members are always welcome. Richard Burton is PSARA's Co-VP for Outreach < Back to Table of Contents

The Retire Advocate < Back to Table of Contents June 2026 Danger! Republicans Want to Put Big Oil Above the Law On April 17th, 2026, Republicans in Congress introduced sweeping legislation in the House and Senate to give Big Oil immunity and effectively put the industry above the law. The Stop Climate Shakedowns Act of 2026: Prohibits retroactive climate liability lawsuits and other proceedings to implement or enforce an energy penalty law. Dismisses pending lawsuits and proceedings on the date of the bill’s enactment. Voids state energy penalty laws. Affirms that the Federal government maintains the exclusive authority and jurisdiction to regulate greenhouse gas emissions and other interstate environmental standards. https://hageman.house.gov/media/press-releases/rep-hageman-introduces-bill-shield-american-energy-producers-leftist-climate If passed, the proposed law would stop actions by state and local jurisdictions from suing oil companies for costs incurred from climate disasters. Eleven U.S. states — California, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawai`i, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, Rhode Island, Vermont — and the District of Columbia, along with dozens of city, county, and tribal governments in California, Colorado, Hawai`i, Illinois, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Washington, and Puerto Rico, have active lawsuits to hold major oil and gas companies accountable for deceiving the public about their products’ roles in climate change. These cases collectively represent more than 1 in 4 people living in the United States. https://climateintegrity.org/news/view/breaking-federal-bill-would-put-big-oil-above-the-law < Back to Table of Contents

The Retire Advocate < Back to Table of Contents May 2025 We Want to Hear From You! Tell Us About your Experiences with Social Security Have you experienced unacceptably bad results when contacting (or trying to contact) the Social SecurityAdministration (SSA)? Years of underfunding by Congress has left the Agency with 57,000 employees, the lowest staffing in 50 years. At least7,000 more are being cut right now. Offices are being closed. Hold times on the toll-free number are way too long, andthe MySSA website has been crashing. One million disability claims and appeals await decisions, processing times have tripled, and 30,000 applicants die each year while waiting for a final decision. PSARA wants to share powerful personalstories about degraded services and harm to workers and their families with our elected repre- sentatives and/or the press. At the same time, we want to hear from you about what SSA programs and services mean to you and to your family, andwhat would happen if they were lost or further eroded. Retirees, disabled individuals, their spouses and dependent chil- dren, and surviving spouses and children in the event of a worker’s death, all rely on timely and compassionateservice delivery. The same is true for clients who apply for Medicare and Supplemental Security Income. Incomeverifications needed to qualify for other programs, and referrals to these providers, are also vitally impor- tant. Help us save Social Security and restore service delivery. Please share your personal stories with organizer@psara.org . < Back to Table of Contents

The Retire Advocate < Back to Table of Contents February 2026 Moving Closer to the World of Repair: Seattle-King County African American Reparations Committee Anne Watanabe Every day brings more bad news, including attacks on communities of color. It can be overwhelming and discouraging. But we must not overlook the steady progress being made by dedicated organizations such as the Seattle-King County African American Reparations Committee (SAARC). PSARA has issued a policy statement supporting Black reparations -- the need to redress US chattel slavery, Jim Crow, and systemic racism, and their long legacy of harm to Black Americans. Across the nation, federal, state, and local governments have taken steps, albeit slow steps, to achieve reparations. Several years ago, PSARA Executive Board member, civil rights leader, and former King County Councilmember Larry Gossett convened meetings that brought local elected leaders and over 30 organizations in the African American community together to create a reparations movement in the Seattle-King County area. These efforts led to the creation of the Seattle-King County African American Reparations Committee (SAARC). Larry, together with PSARA Executive Board member Claude Burfect, a long-time leader in the Black and labor communities, brought volunteers together to plan and grow SAARC. Both Larry and Claude continue to guide SAARC. SAARC eventually grew into today’s organization, which advocates for Black reparations. SAARC recently published its 2025 Housing and Labor Report. The report focuses on King County, noting that King County has the state’s highest number of Black residents, but “has one of the state’s sharpest degrees of wealth inequality, far exceeding national rates.” The report points out that housing discrimination has been a major factor in creating wealth inequity. Practices such as redlining, underinvestment by local governments and banks, and other forms of discrimination deprived Black communities of home purchases, a major source of generational wealth. A study cited in the report calculated that the financial impact of discriminatory housing practices in King County ranged from $5.4 billion to $15.8 billion from 1950 to 2019. SAARC’s report cites the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) Center for Health Justice, which reported in 2024 that 22 local jurisdictions “have approved a reparations commission or task force, and eleven states have introduced legislation to create one.” The AAMC also cautioned that “reparations, even when broadly defined and not limited to cash payments, are not supported by most of the public,” and that “those committed to health and racial justice must do a better job of connecting the dots between historic injustice and modern-day inequity.” But despite the seeming national lack of support for reparations, a study recently commissioned by SAARC indicates that over 58 percent of King County residents support reparations (compared with 30 percent nationally). Interestingly, the study found that messaging regarding a need to remedy redlining and restrictive covenants received stronger support than did messaging about economic justice. So there is much cause for hope, especially in King County, for repairing the harms of generations of racial discrimination in housing. Furthermore, SAARC’s advocacy has led to state and local government support for a study that is being administered by the Washington State Commission on African American Affairs. SAARC has identified a number of research and policy recommendations; hopefully those will be considered and incorporated into the upcoming state study. SAARC’s “immediate policy recommendations” are for: direct compensatory payments; housing reparations; and county funding for Black/African American entrepreneurs. SAARC has also identified future policy recommendations that address education inequities, health inequities, criminal justice and policing, and environmental racism and displacement. Davida Ingrahm, SAARC Executive Director, notes that SAARC is engaged in building partnerships, including intergenerational partnerships, to identify the policies and common ground that leads all of us into a world of repair. How do we live well together? She urges us to look into the future and focus on what we care about – if we can do that, it is what will happen. Larry’s hope is that Black reparations in the Seattle-King County area will provide a foundation for Black families to build generational wealth through home ownership. He would like to see Seattle become the second city in the nation (behind Evanston, Illinois) to create a robust reparations program related to housing. PSARA will support SAARC in its efforts to achieve these recommendations – so please stay tuned to our newsletter and emails, and please visit SAARC - Seattle/King County African American Reparations Committee to learn more about how we can achieve a future we want. Anne Watanabe is Chair of PSARA's Race and Gender Equity Committee. < Back to Table of Contents

The Retire Advocate < Back to Table of Contents April 2026 Engagement Without Teeth Is Just a Discussion Jeff Johnson On January 29, 2026, the Washington State Investment Board (WSIB) presented an overview of what they do and how they do it during a work session of the Washington State Senate Ways and Means Committee hearing. The WSIB has over $230 billion in assets under management, including 18 pension funds, six Labor and Industry funds, and 16 university funds. The comingled investment fund is where the pension funds are, and they account for $185 billion of the total investment funds. This fund has grown from $80 billion 10 years ago to $185 billion today, making the WSIB one of the largest pension funds in the country. The WSIB has made average returns of 8.4% over the last 20 years, a bit lower if you take out an exceptional and abnormal year, 2021, when the fund made 28.7% in returns. It should be noted that sustainable funds (funds based on environmental, social, and governance criteria) have begun to out-perform traditional funds, such as those invested in by the WSIB. Knowing that, following the work session, the Committee would hear a couple of bills that dealt with divestment of coal assets and ethical investment screens, the WSIB spent some time describing their investment mandate, philosophy, and practices. Washington State law gives the WSIB the “authority to establish policies and procedures designed exclusively to maximize returns at a prudent level of risk.” The WSIB also has “full power over their funds to invest, reinvest, manage, contract, or sell or exchange investments acquired.” The WSIB’s preferred investment philosophy and practice is to hold significant positions in passive equity strategies, meaning that they allow third-party money managers and brokers to choose the investment portfolio for the funds under their care. In fact, the WSIB is proud of the fact that they do not pick and choose companies to invest in but rather have investments across all industries, the country, and the world – “a little slice of everything.” Addressing the issue of divestment from fossil fuels, the WSIB began by stating that they have a “fiduciary obligation to always act in the best interests of their beneficiaries." No one would expect anything less. Specifically, they said, “we do have investment beliefs that touch on this theme of divestment. First, any kind of investment or asset class restraint you put on our portfolio will likely lower returns over time (there is lots of research on that). Second, it will raise costs. And finally, we believe that corporate engagement is really the way to move the needle – you give up your voice if you give up ownership in these stocks.” There is a lot to unpack there, so let’s take a little time to sift through what they said and what they didn’t say. But from the outset, it is important to point out that when you manage the amount of funds the WSIB does, you are never without a voice unless you voluntarily cede it to third party managers. First of all, those of us testifying on the Coal Act are asking that the WSIB divest, prudently and over time, the $2.6 billion they have invested in coal producers. Many of us have further suggested that the WSIB divest from another $5 or $6 billion invested in oil and gas hydrocarbon producers. This is quite different from asking the WSIB to back away from their current asset allocation and climate blueprint/ framework for encouraging corporate hydrocarbon consumers to lower their carbon emissions and develop renewable energy transition plans. No one is asking the WSIB to abandon their climate blueprint work; if anything, we are urging them to be bolder with this work. So, the first thing is to get the WSIB to get rid of existing fossil fuel producer assets and to not purchase any more debt (bank loans, bonds) that finances more fossil fuel extraction. Why do this? To do our part in helping to save the planet – well, sure. But also, because fossil fuels are an underperforming asset. For the past 10 years the value of non-fossil fuel S&P 500 stocks performed four times better than fossil fuel assets. And since 2022 the stock market, as measured by the S&P 500, has nearly doubled (92%) while the value of fossil fuel assets has risen 17%. It's true that an investment’s past performance is no guarantee of its future returns, but the fossil fuel sector is facing long-term competitive risks like never before. Renewable energy, electric vehicles, and electrification are seeing growth around the world and even in the US. The fossil fuel sector’s preferred low carbon technologies don’t work. And the sector’s pivot into producing plastics and petrochemicals is faring poorly. Will divesting from asset holdings of direct producers of fossil fuels lower returns? Perhaps a smidge, particularly if you divest it all at once, but the re-turns will still meet the WSIB’s fiduciary responsibility. And then again, maybe not over the long-term. If you jettison underperforming assets for stronger earning assets over time, you will, in fact, bolster your fund returns. And, if there is a realistic accounting of the financial risk caused by direct fossil fuel assets through climate disaster effects, then just about any other asset would produce safer long-term returns. Will divesting direct fossil fuel assets increase the cost of investing WSIB pension assets? Maybe. A third-party manager would usually charge more for a customized investment portfolio than for one that is just pulled off their shelf. But there are now a great many fossil-fuel strategies “on the shelf” and available to the WSIB. And how much are we really talking about? Financial advisors I have spoken with suggest that the cost of slightly modifying the portfolio should only have marginal costs associated with it. For funds as large as the WSIB, fees for investment products are typically set through negotiation. Given the large portfolio the WSIB brings to the table, to my way of thinking, they could use their financial heft to negotiate a competitive cost. Finally, any increase in management fees would likely be partially or fully offset by superior long-term performance of a fossil-free portfolio as the fossil fuel sector faces long-term challenges, such as declining fossil fuel stock values, increasing social costs due to fossil fuel caused climate disasters, and increasing litigation costs over the damage caused from continued fossil fuel extraction and use. Is corporate engagement, rather than divestment, the best way or the only way to encourage corporations to reduce their carbon emissions and adopt strong renewable energy transition plans? No. But again, let’s be clear what we are talking about. The WSIB is not going to convince Exxon-Mobil to stop extracting oil or natural gas. Unless stopped, they will extract every barrel of oil and every cubic foot of gas that they can profitably extract and sell. However, the WSIB’s divesting from direct fossil fuel producers and not purchasing more fossil fuel debt/loans sends a strong message to other institutional investors that you can earn decent returns on your investment and save the planet at the same time, which will protect long-term returns from the worst climate disasters. Can engagement through voting on corporate shareholder resolutions, discussions with corporate management, and setting strong blueprints for carbon emission reporting and assessing climate risk help change corporate practices? Sure. But the history of corporate engagement over asbestos and tobacco brings into sharp relief how slow and incomplete this process can be. With global temperatures rapidly rising and climate disasters intensifying, we don’t have the luxury of time. The urgency of the climate crisis we face demands that we act thoughtfully but immediately. So, the answer regarding fossil fuels is not to divest or to engage. You have to do both. But we must be clear: engagement without any teeth to back it up , is just a discussion. Finally, the WSIB’s mandate to maximize returns for their pension beneficiaries at a prudent level of risk should not be an excuse for slow-tracking the divestment of direct fossil fuel assets. When the continued extraction and use of fossil fuels increasingly create catastrophic climate disasters, the financial risk of holding fossil fuel assets is exacerbated, making direct investments in fossil fuels categorically imprudent. As British economist John Maynard Keynes said, in addressing the shortcomings of relying on market forces to address economic crises, “In the long run we are all dead.” The WSIB and our unions have the opportunity to acknowledge Keynes’ warning while protecting public employee pensions over the long term and playing an important role in combatting climate change. But this requires not passively investing in direct fossil fuel assets and producers. It requires us to take responsibility for our choices and do some serious picking and choosing. It requires us to act in the best interests of our members, past, present, and future, as well as the planet we live on. Jefl Johnson is a retired president of the Washington State Labor Council and Co-President of PSARA. < Back to Table of Contents

The Retire Advocate < Back to Table of Contents January 2026 Building Community Power Jay Stansell (Reprinted by permission of the Jewish Coalition for Immigrant Justice) While we have all become accustomed to the workshop labels "Know Your Rights" and "KYR," what we really need to teach each other is our collective "Community Power." Though mechanics of KYR remain key, when we invoke those rights today we will likely face illegal ICE response. Knowing our rights is no longer enough. We now teach and celebrate the Community Power that gives strength to our rights. Community Power strengthens each of us and invites others into our work, so that not one, but many, allies and at-risk Community Members come out to nonviolently face, expose and slow ICE enforcement; so that not one but many activists come out to video-record ICE, send text alerts to neighborhood watch groups; so that we speak to agents in large numbers but one voice: "We don't answer questions! Don't open your doors, ICE is present! You are not welcome in this space, in this community! We want you out of here!" And Community Power expands and grows the resistance. Each one of you has someone for whom you are a role model and an example of how to respond to the darkness around us all. Each of you has many more people who look to you for advice, knowledge and information about the challenges we face. We can bring these family, friends, and colleagues into the movement, and keep building our communities of care, compassion and resistance. The propaganda from ICE and the government wants us to believe that ICE is at war with the "worst of the worst" in our communities, that their numbers are so massive and armored that resistance is futile, when we, the people who live in these communities, know that they are attacking day-care workers, health care aides, roofers, landscapers, and the families that we see, respect and value every day. We train each other in Community Power, because there is strength, beauty and poetry in Community. We are many -- and growing more each day -- and the cruel and uncaring people in power right now are far fewer in comparison, and far less powerful than they believe. Thank you all for the work that you each do. It is a privilege to be among you in the effort to rebuild a better world. I'll close with some words from long-time activist Cleve Jones who spoke at San Franciso's No Kings rally on October 18, which perfectly capture how I view community: The pronouns I use the most are the ones probably understood the least by those in the White House today. They are WE, US and OURS. We are in this together. And it is up to us to be the leaders we need to save our country and our democracy. [...] What will you do to imagine and launch and sustain the massive campaign of nonviolent civil disobedience and non-cooperation that history informs us is now required? Look to your hearts and find the abiding strength that dwells there. Look to the sky and all the magnificent beauty that surrounds us still. Look to those who stand proudly at your shoulders. Look to your ancestors and claim your future. We are the people. Now is the time. This is the moment. Jay Stansell is a retired immigration attorney who has led Know Your Rights trainings with the Jewish Coalition for Immigrant Justice. < Back to Table of Contents

The Retire Advocate < Back to Table of Contents July 2026 PSARA's Juneteenth 2026 PSARA thanks Mr. Delbert Richardson, our special guest; our host, Rev. Robert Jeffrey, Sr., and his church, New Hope Missionary Baptist Church; Larry Gossett, who introduced Mr. Richardson; Anne Watanabe, Chair of PSARA's Race and Gender Equity (RaGE) Committee; Faith Action Network; the Abe Keller Peace Foundation; our PSARA members; and the community for a successful Juneteenth 2026 event. As people who attended the Juneteenth event were departing they commented that the presentation by Delbert Richardson and his exhibit were "fabulous", and "out-standing". Bob Barnes, who provided the audio system, commented that he was really glad that he had the opportunity to be present at this program. We are very grateful to Mr. Richardson for his well conceived and impactful exhibit and presentation. Special guest Delbert Richardson, RaGE Committee Chair Anne Watanabe, and PSARA Executive Committee member and former ML King County Council member Larry Gossett. < Back to Table of Contents

The Retire Advocate < Back to Table of Contents March 2025 Behind the Scenes of the WA Coal Act Mary Lou Dickerson and Barbara Carey The Washington Coal Act, SB 5439, is now in the Senate Ways and Means Committee and is unlikely to progress towards passage this year. The Act re- quires our state’s public pension board, the WSIB, to divest from coal and stop making new investments in coal as well. We should not be surprised or disappointed. Significant bills very often take a few years to pass, and this bill has already gathered unexpectedly broad and enthusiastic support during this difficult session. It generated thousands of supportive emailsto senators and developed a coalition of 10 active organizations backing it. We have made huge progress. Bills have a two-year life span. We will take that time to continue to build support and understanding of the need to divest fromthis deadly, dirty, energy source that contributes to climate change throughout the world, including right here in Washington. We will use the interim to raise important issues and question some of the WSIB's claims to legislators. We are enormously thankful to Senator Noel Frame (D-36), who sponsored the Washington Coal Act with six co-sponsors during thecurrent legislative session. The Board provided input to Senator Frame after the bill was introduced, claiming that the WSIB had only $119 million invested incoal and had reduced its exposure to coal from 0.33 percent in 2012 to 0.07percent in 2024. The chair of the Ways and Means Committee’s legislative assistant sent an email to some of the bill proponents saying Sen. Robinson would not be scheduling ahearing for the bill because the WSIB is reducing its coal investments and will probably continue to do so. Unfortunately, the method used by the WSIB to classify coal holdings only takes into account companies whose primary sourceof revenue is thermal coal, according to the MSCI Global Industry Standards Classification (GCIS). This method eliminates giantconglomerates whose huge coal operations may, nevertheless, be dwarfed by their other trading businesses. In contrast, the Global Coal Exit List (GCEL), used in the proposed WA Coal Act, is internationally recognized and used byinvestors, banks, insurance companies, pension funds, and asset management companies around the world to get a clear viewof major coal operations worldwide. Investors representing almost $20 trillion in assets use the GCEL to evaluate theirinvestments. The GCEL turns up $2.6 billion in WSIB coal investments. That’s 24 times more than the WSIB counts in its coal holdings! The GCIS used by the WSIB makes it almost impossible to track substantial coal investments, while the GCEL provides a clear,annually updated status of major coal operations. The WSIB representative also posed the argument to Senator Frame, in an email opposing the WA Coal Act, that some WSIB coal investments “fall in the category of ‘brown-to-green’ investments, whereby companies are actively transitioning fromgreenhouse gas-in- tensive energy production or consumption to renewable energy sources.” WSIB’s example of such an investment, NTPC Ltd, is the largest power company in India – mainly coal-fired plants! That’s a bitshocking. NTPC’s generating capacity of 71 gigawatts is equivalent to 92 Centralia coal plants. While it claims to be adding 60 gigawatts of renewable energy by 2032, it is currently its coal production by the equivalent of 11 Centralia coal plants – not including its many subsidiaries. That certainly doesn't sound like a brown to green investment. The Washington Legislature passed the Clean Energy Transition Act in 2019, which bans the use of coal for energy inWashington after 2025. How is it that a state agency completely stonewalls against the intentions of the Legislature byrefusing to even acknowledge that there are ways it could better align with climate policies and simultaneously up theirgame in complying with their fiduciary duty to act in the best interests of their beneficiaries? This is not politics, this is prudence. Pensions are tasked with acting in the long-term best interest of beneficiaries, not makingshort-term gambles. Coal is dying out in the US and is being replaced by much less expensive renewables. Coal is not a good long-term investment. The long-term outlook for US coal is a steady downward trend. According to the Institute for Energy and Economic FinancialAnalysis (IEEFA), it’s possible that all the remaining US coal capacity could be shuttered by 2040. Britain, where the first coal plant was built in 1882, has already closed its last coal plant. Coal produces more green-housegases than any other energy form – not to mention toxic emissions that researchers estimate have caused 460,000 prematuredeaths in the US between 1999 and 2020. Fiduciary duty is a hallmark of the WA Coal Act. The WSIB is good at making investments with healthy returns. California andOregon have both passed coal divestment bills. CalPERS’ returns increased nearly $600 million in 2022 according to Wilshire, CalPERS’ consultant. Moving $2.6 billion from coal over 3-5 years into other investments is not a large ask for WSIB’s $200 billion portfolio. Many thanks to all the PSARA members who wrote to their senators about this significant issue. We ask you to continue toadvocate with us as we move forward toward passage. Mary Lou Dickerson is a former Washington State Representative, PSARA member, and Third Act Washington Policy Lead. Barbara Carey is a Divest Washington co-leader, PSARA member, and Washington State PERS3 Retiree. < Back to Table of Contents

The Retire Advocate < Back to Table of Contents April 2025 Protecting our Assets and Protecting Our Asses -Part 2 Jeff Johnson If all mankind were to disappear, the world would regenerate back to the rich state of equilibrium that existed 10 thousand years ago. If insects were to vanish, the environment would collapse into chaos.” E.O. Wilson Naturalist Edward Wilson recognizes a fundamental truth. Humankind’s pen- chant for hubris, our seemingly eternal quest to one up the natural world, has created the conditions for our own demise. As we continue to spew carbon into the atmosphere, we create climate chaos and species decline. To put a point on it, this is not good. And of course, while all of us will be impacted, not all of us will be impacted equally. Those countries, communities, and individuals that did the least to cause climate disaster will be disproportionately impacted by the climate chaos as well as by the inability to recover from its effects. I remember listening to a college lecture in 1971 from an analyst from either the Pentagon or the Department of State. She laid out a scenario of future climatic shifts that would reduce the amount of arable land and potable water, causing massive human migration, species decline, and geo-political unrest. It is no longer hyperbole to recognize that we have crossed over the climate chaos threshold. While the ignorance of climate deniers and their disastrous policies make those pushing for carbon neutrality by 2050 seem reasonable, our hubris prevents us from recognizing the urgency of the moment, even as insects and birds vanish exponentially. We can’t wait for 2050 to act. We need to dramatically reduce carbon pollution and rapidly increase renew- able clean energy now. Our planet is seriously out of balance, egregiously out of equilibrium. I was struck by something I read from the Dalai Lama, that while humans “have the capacity to destroy the earth, so, too, do we have the capacity to protect it.” I believe that we can help the earth rebalance itself. But to do so we must act thoughtfully, equitably, and with a great sense of urgency and purpose. Financial Rebalancing There is an analogous concept of rebalancing in the financial world. Diversified financial portfolios are made up of a variety of assets in different risk classes, i.e., equities, bonds, real estate, hedge funds, government securities, etc. The overall goal for the long-term health of your portfolio is to establish a range of asset allocations that provide the best return for the least risk. You develop a target asset allocation range for different asset classifications and then track how your portfolio values match up to your asset allocations. If you can keep your portfolio in this preferred range over time, your portfolio will be in balance, providing the best returns for the least risk. Of course, as economic activity goes up and down and investment decisions change, asset values rise and fall on a daily, weekly, and quarterly basis. As a consequence, the values of your asset classes change from the targeted allocation you chose. Some will have grown higher than the target range and others fallen below the preferred range. So now what do you do? Well, it’s not rocket science. To rebalance your port- folio, to bring it back into equilibrium, you make strategic decisions to sell off certain assets from one classification and buy assets from another classification. [Note: It doesn’t work quite the same way for private-equity type investments. Often it is more prudent to hold the private-equity type investments until their normal wind-down, but importantly to not invest more]. Financial rebalancing of portfolios is a usual and customary practice. It hap- pens all the time. Washington State Investment and Pension Funds The Washington State Investment Board (WSIB) manages nearly $200 billion of state funds and public employee pension dollars. The WSIB has been a good care-taker of these funds for decades and has earned a positive national reputation as one of the best- managed state funds. The WSIB has approximately $5.5 billion invested in fossil fuel assets. This represents about 2.5 percent of its total portfolio. Given that fossil fuel assets have been significantly underperforming the broad stock market for quite some time; that the concept of financial prudence defined narrowly or more broadly, as laid out in article two of this series, war- rants selling off fossil fuel assets; that financial rebalancing is standard practice in the financial industry; and given the continued decline in the value of fossil fuel assets, there is no good reason not to rebalance our state’s Investment portfolio by selling off fossil fuel assets over the next several years and replacing them with assets that provide a better return for a lower risk. So Now Where Are We? In the first three articles of this series, “Protecting Our Assets, Protecting Our Asses,” we laid out the moral, economic, fiscal, employment, and social needs bases for rebalancing our state funds out of fossil fuels. We made the argument that it is important for our state and our public employee unions to lead the way in countering the financial industry’s $7 trillion investment in fossil fuels since the signing of the Paris Climate Accords. Rebalancing of fossil fuel assets will send a strong message to institutional investors to do likewise. We have also shown that by any measure of financial prudence our state funds and pension funds are not being well served by fossil fuel investments. Finally, we have shown that financial rebalancing is done as a matter of course in the financial industry. And that rebalancing our Washington State funds out of fossil fuels is not only a smart and financially prudent thing to do, it is a step towards rebalancing our earth – protecting both our assets and our asses. Jeff Johnson is a former President of the Washington State Labor Council and the Co-President of PSARA. < Back to Table of Contents

Bill Gates Knows Best: Philanthropy Is Power Bill Gates has been getting a lot of press recently about his “green initiatives” PSARA member Michael Righi discusses why these initiatives are far from good environmental solutions. Read

The Retire Advocate < Back to Table of Contents May 2026 How To Transition Off Plastics John Birnel As we have been dealing with the ongoing problem of plastics in our solid waste landfill, we are also becoming more attentive to the chemical toxicity of plastics in their production, use, and disposal, especially in its breakdown into microplastic and nanoplastics that we all imbibe through the air, food, and touch. We read about whales washing ashore with so much plastic, which they have mistaken for food, clogging their gut. Of course, transitioning off these toxic materials will require legislative remedies. One bill recently passed, E2S-SB 5284, Improving Washington's Solid Waste Management Outcomes, is being implemented and may help. Another bill, Break Free from Plastics, is being pushed in Congress as well. New Jersey and New York have instituted plastic bag bans and some related measures. But people want to know, in the meantime, how we can avoid, as much as possible, the plastics that are all around us and moving inside of us. Avoiding single use water sold in plastic containers is one. Avoiding unnecessary packaging of food and deliveries, is another. Others include not heating up food in the microwave in plastic containers, and buying natural fabric clothing, rugs, and linens (many available at second hand stores). I am currently enjoying reading a paper-back Sustain: 50 Easy Tips for a Greener, Cleaner Plastic Free Home, by Christina Strutt of Cabbages and Roses. Used copies are available at a modest sum from ABE books. Want to dig deeper into the nightmare of omnipresent toxicity of plastic production, use, and disposal, and what we, as a society, can do about it? BeyondPlastics.org and Zero Waste Washington are good starting points, along with the recent book, The Problem With Plastic, by Judith Enck. John Birnel is a long-time member of PSARA and an ongoing member of the PSARA Climate and Environmental Justice Committee. < Back to Table of Contents

The Retire Advocate < Back to Table of Contents June 2025 North Olympic Peninsula 2025: Rural Resistance! Lisa Dekker Like the rest of Washington State, Clallam County and the Peninsula are reeling from the harms happening now – and those yet to come – from this corrupt regime and their flagrant refusal to follow the law. But we are not taking this lying down. Our residents and our leaders are determined to resist. Olympic National Park, just outside Port Angeles, gets thousands of visitors each year and is an economic engine for the region. It was already unable to meet basic maintenance needs, and reduced staffing will make it worse. In addition, although $80 million was al- ready allocated by Congress to replace the Hurricane Ridge Day Lodge that burned down in 2023, delivery of those dollars is now uncertain. For many years Port Angeles has been a gateway for Canadian visitors via the Coho/BlackBall Ferry that connects us to Victoria, B.C., just 12 miles away. But now, the absurd tariffs and territorial threats coming from #47 have resulted in an understandable backlash of Canadians deciding not to spend their tourist dollars here. This will have grave economic consequences for our restaurants, hotels, and small businesses this summer unless the tariffs are undone. Likely the most unconscionable harms to individuals here would be the drastic cuts to Medicaid in the current Republican budget. With 20 percent of our adults and more than 37 percent of our children dependent on Medicaid in Clallam County alone, the devastation would be felt by thousands here on the Peninsula. So how are we fighting back? There have been sizeable rallies in Port Ange- les, Sequim, and Port Townsend (Jefferson County) that have many new faces and an enthusiastic response from the community. Indivisible Sequim, first begun in 2016, has had a surge of new members and has backed several rallies. One of the largest gatherings in Port Angeles, and the one with the most young people, was a raucous and upbeat march supporting the Olympic National Park and Park staffers who had been abruptly laid off. Clallam Democrats have become re-energized. With the leadership of their Chair, PSARA member Ellen Menshew, they have hosted timely forums and promoted many rallies. With a new online newsletter, Clallam Democrats Rising, plus a blog, a presence on Substack and Blue Sky, and an events calendar, the Dems are keeping members informed and involved. Our three County Commissioners even did their bit with a letter to Senators Murray and Cantwell and Congresswoman Emily Randall, reminding them of the impacts being felt here and asking that they “do all that they can to support our community.” We don’t know what’s next, but here in the northwest corner, we saw that despair became righteous anger, then hope, and now resistance. We are determined to fight back. Lisa Dekker is PSARA's Co-VP for Outreach and a leader of PSARA's Clallam County organizing committee. < Back to Table of Contents