Standing Rock DAPL: Protesters Disperse; Santa Monica divests from Wells Fargo
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JahFocus CS
Get It How You Get It
She better hope they dont try to box her
With supporters carrying signs saying “Make big business pay” and Native American activists performing an “honor song” in gratitude, the Seattle City Council on Tuesday voted to make this the first city in the nation to ends its relationship with a bank in protest of the Dakota Access pipeline.
The nine-member council unanimously approved an ordinance to end its nearly two-decade relationship with its primary financial services provider, Wells Fargo, which is an investor in the pipeline and the company building it, Energy Transfer Partners of Texas. The bank handles about $3 billion a year for the city.
Yet questions over how effective such a move might be rose even before the hearing began, when the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, following instructions from President Trump, informed Congress earlier Tuesday that it planned to issue the final easement for the pipeline as soon as Wednesday.
The $3.8 billion, 1,170-mile pipeline would travel from North Dakota to Illinois, with the most controversial segment running beneath a dammed section of the Missouri River just north of the reservation of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. The tribe, which says the pipeline threatens its water supply and sacred sites, said Tuesday it would continue to fight the project’s completion.
Hundreds of protesters remain in snowy camps near the planned river crossing in North Dakota — a fact noted by many people in the far more comfortable City Council chambers.
Beatrice Menase Kwe Jackson, center, and Daniel Emory, both of the Ojibwe Tribe, lead a procession to the Cannonball River in December as part of protests against the Dakota Access oil pipeline in Cannon Ball, N.D. (David Goldman / Associated Press)
“It really moves me to think of the people who are hundreds of miles away from us today, waiting in the cold for our vote,” Lisa Herbold, a council member, said shortly before the vote.
Seattle, which is thriving on science and technology a thousand miles west of the pipeline’s route, would not seem to suffer obvious impacts if the pipeline were completed. But the city is deeply liberal, environmentally minded and riding a wave of activism that has put it at the forefront of social and economic causes — most recently as the location where state lawyers persuaded a federal judge, appointed by George W. Bush, to order a stay of President Trump’s travel ban.
The area also has a large Native American community that has actively opposed the pipeline, and one member of the council, Debora Juarez, is an enrolled member of the Blackfeet Nation tribe in Montana. Another council member, Kshama Sawant, is a socialist.
Seattle City Councilwoman Kshama Sawant, left, as fellow Councilwoman Debora Juarez, right, is embraced by Rachel Heaton, a Muckleshoot tribal member, before Wednesday's council meeting. (Elaine Thompson / AP)
Sawant, whose supporters filled the chambers on Tuesday, had pressed her colleagues for weeks to cut ties with Wells Fargo.
“The example that we have set today can be a beacon of hope to activists all around the country seeking to change the economic calculus of corporations who think that investing in the Dakota Access pipeline will be good for their bottom line,” Sawant said after the vote. “We’re making it bad for their bottom line.”
Her supporters, the predominant group at the standing-room-only hearing, began a chant as they filed out just after the vote: “When we fight, we win!”
Wells Fargo is one of 17 investors in the pipeline. The company says it has loaned about $120 million of the $2.5 billion that Energy Transfer Partners has borrowed to build it. Critics say the figure is far higher and note that Wells Fargo provides several other services for Energy Transfer Partners.
The ordinance passed by the council cites information from the Securities and Exchange Commission showing that the bank has supplied $347 million in credit to the companies building the pipeline and administers a $3.7-billion line of credit held by Energy Transfer Partners, among other investments.
The bank issued a statement after the vote, saying: “While we are disappointed that the city has decided to end our 18-year relationship, we stand ready to support Seattle with its financial services needs in the future.
“We will continue investing in this diverse and dynamic community that Wells Fargo has been devoted to since 1859. We will continue to support affordable housing and strengthen Seattle neighborhoods. We will continue to give back through volunteerism and corporate philanthropy. And we will continue to invest in entrepreneurship and help create jobs as the No. 2 small business lender in Washington.”
The City Council's move raises many questions, not least where Seattle will be able to put its money and feel good about it. In addition to citing the Dakota Access pipeline, the ordinance includes language strengthening policies on “socially responsible banking” that are intended to address Wells Fargo’s fraudulent banking practices that have been well-publicized over the last year.
Whether any of the major national banks will meet those new standards is unclear, as is whether small local banks or credit unions have the capacity. Councilman Mike O’Brien expressed support for Washington to establish a state-owned bank, a proposal also being pushed by a state lawmaker in Olympia. Others have talked about a city-owned bank.
The city will not end its relationship with the bank immediately. The ordinance says instead that it will not renew its contract with the bank when it expires at the end of 2018.
“Our responsibility is to change our checkbook provider, if you will, our banking services provider,” Glen Lee, the city’s finance director, said in an interview before the vote. “We will execute that. Hard or not, that’s what we’ll do. That’s our job.”
Seattle becomes the first city to sever ties with Wells Fargo in protest of Dakota Access pipeline
The nine-member council unanimously approved an ordinance to end its nearly two-decade relationship with its primary financial services provider, Wells Fargo, which is an investor in the pipeline and the company building it, Energy Transfer Partners of Texas. The bank handles about $3 billion a year for the city.
Yet questions over how effective such a move might be rose even before the hearing began, when the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, following instructions from President Trump, informed Congress earlier Tuesday that it planned to issue the final easement for the pipeline as soon as Wednesday.
The $3.8 billion, 1,170-mile pipeline would travel from North Dakota to Illinois, with the most controversial segment running beneath a dammed section of the Missouri River just north of the reservation of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. The tribe, which says the pipeline threatens its water supply and sacred sites, said Tuesday it would continue to fight the project’s completion.
Hundreds of protesters remain in snowy camps near the planned river crossing in North Dakota — a fact noted by many people in the far more comfortable City Council chambers.
Beatrice Menase Kwe Jackson, center, and Daniel Emory, both of the Ojibwe Tribe, lead a procession to the Cannonball River in December as part of protests against the Dakota Access oil pipeline in Cannon Ball, N.D. (David Goldman / Associated Press)
“It really moves me to think of the people who are hundreds of miles away from us today, waiting in the cold for our vote,” Lisa Herbold, a council member, said shortly before the vote.
Seattle, which is thriving on science and technology a thousand miles west of the pipeline’s route, would not seem to suffer obvious impacts if the pipeline were completed. But the city is deeply liberal, environmentally minded and riding a wave of activism that has put it at the forefront of social and economic causes — most recently as the location where state lawyers persuaded a federal judge, appointed by George W. Bush, to order a stay of President Trump’s travel ban.
The area also has a large Native American community that has actively opposed the pipeline, and one member of the council, Debora Juarez, is an enrolled member of the Blackfeet Nation tribe in Montana. Another council member, Kshama Sawant, is a socialist.
Seattle City Councilwoman Kshama Sawant, left, as fellow Councilwoman Debora Juarez, right, is embraced by Rachel Heaton, a Muckleshoot tribal member, before Wednesday's council meeting. (Elaine Thompson / AP)
Sawant, whose supporters filled the chambers on Tuesday, had pressed her colleagues for weeks to cut ties with Wells Fargo.
“The example that we have set today can be a beacon of hope to activists all around the country seeking to change the economic calculus of corporations who think that investing in the Dakota Access pipeline will be good for their bottom line,” Sawant said after the vote. “We’re making it bad for their bottom line.”
Her supporters, the predominant group at the standing-room-only hearing, began a chant as they filed out just after the vote: “When we fight, we win!”
Wells Fargo is one of 17 investors in the pipeline. The company says it has loaned about $120 million of the $2.5 billion that Energy Transfer Partners has borrowed to build it. Critics say the figure is far higher and note that Wells Fargo provides several other services for Energy Transfer Partners.
The ordinance passed by the council cites information from the Securities and Exchange Commission showing that the bank has supplied $347 million in credit to the companies building the pipeline and administers a $3.7-billion line of credit held by Energy Transfer Partners, among other investments.
The bank issued a statement after the vote, saying: “While we are disappointed that the city has decided to end our 18-year relationship, we stand ready to support Seattle with its financial services needs in the future.
“We will continue investing in this diverse and dynamic community that Wells Fargo has been devoted to since 1859. We will continue to support affordable housing and strengthen Seattle neighborhoods. We will continue to give back through volunteerism and corporate philanthropy. And we will continue to invest in entrepreneurship and help create jobs as the No. 2 small business lender in Washington.”
The City Council's move raises many questions, not least where Seattle will be able to put its money and feel good about it. In addition to citing the Dakota Access pipeline, the ordinance includes language strengthening policies on “socially responsible banking” that are intended to address Wells Fargo’s fraudulent banking practices that have been well-publicized over the last year.
Whether any of the major national banks will meet those new standards is unclear, as is whether small local banks or credit unions have the capacity. Councilman Mike O’Brien expressed support for Washington to establish a state-owned bank, a proposal also being pushed by a state lawmaker in Olympia. Others have talked about a city-owned bank.
The city will not end its relationship with the bank immediately. The ordinance says instead that it will not renew its contract with the bank when it expires at the end of 2018.
“Our responsibility is to change our checkbook provider, if you will, our banking services provider,” Glen Lee, the city’s finance director, said in an interview before the vote. “We will execute that. Hard or not, that’s what we’ll do. That’s our job.”
Seattle becomes the first city to sever ties with Wells Fargo in protest of Dakota Access pipeline
Well done. Protest capitalist by hitting them in the wallet.
newworldafro
DeeperThanRapBiggerThanHH
State owned bank is not a bad move.
Same thing I said.Holy shyt...
I didn't even consider that banks could "primary" financial services providers for cities. If that's the case, I would like a list of the PFSP's for the top 50 US cities and then the list of PFSPs for the largest populated black cities.
Sawant 
The beginning of the end. 
The bank should have been shuttered by the feds for opening 1 million fake accounts. A truly demonic company operating in a demonic industry 
The bank should have been shuttered by the feds for opening 1 million fake accounts. A truly demonic company operating in a demonic industry 
2 Cities To Pull More Than $3 Billion From Wells Fargo Over Dakota Access Pipeline
Seattle's City Council has voted to not renew its contract with Wells Fargo, in a move that cites the bank's role as a lender to the Dakota Access Pipeline project as well as its creation of millions of bogus accounts. As a result, the city won't renew its contract with the bank that expires next year.
The unanimous vote will pull more than $3 billion in city funds from the banking giant, the council says. Seattle says the bidding process for its next banking partner will "incentivize 'Social Responsibility.'"
Not long after Seattle's vote, the City Council in Davis, Calif., took a similar action over the pipeline. It voted unanimously to find a new bank to handle its roughly $124 million in accounts by the end of 2017.
On the same day the two cities moved to cut ties with Wells Fargo, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers granted an easement allowing the Dakota Access Pipeline to cross under the Missouri River north of the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation. As NPR's Rebecca Hersher reported, that clears the way for construction of the final 1.5 miles of the more than 1,700-mile pipeline.
member station KUOW reports. "Protesters, many of them Native people from Washington state, share the concerns of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, which says the pipeline would threaten tribal water supplies, land and cultural sites."
Wells Fargo has been in the headlines since last fall over a scandal involving bank employees creating fake accounts in customers' names to bolster performance results and boost bonuses. While other banks are also involved in the pipeline deal, Wells Fargo's recent history seems to have helped make it a target once again.
Seattle's plan to stop its dealings with Wells Fargo comes months after the city canceled a $100 million bond deal between its electric utility and the bank. That took place last fall, when the treasurers of California, Illinois and other entities said they would freeze their dealings with the bank — in some cases, for a one-year period.
Wells Fargo's commercial banking manager for Washington state, Mary Knell, tells KUOW that she's disappointed in Seattle's new move, noting that the bank is bound by its contract with the pipeline project.
Knell tells KUOW that the bank has "enhanced our due diligence on projects such as this to include more research into whether indigenous communities are affected and that they have been properly consulted."
Socialist City Council member Kshama Sawant, who spearheaded Seattle's move away from Wells Fargo, says a rally against the bank is scheduled for this weekend.
And after noting that Wells Fargo is "one of the six primary financiers of the for-profit private prison industry," Sawant ended a statement about the bill's initial passage earlier this month with a note of caution, saying, "All of the big banks are terrible, and, as long as we have capitalism, our contracts will be with institutions that put corporate greed over human need."
Days before Seattle held an initial vote on divesting from the bank, Wells Fargo announced plans to donate $500,000 to five of the city's nonprofit groups that work to revitalize Seattle neighborhoods.
When Seattle Council member Debora Juarez spoke of voting against Wells Fargo, she repeatedly cited a need for integrity — even as she acknowledged the small direct impact Seattle's move will likely have.
"For a company whose deposits totaled more than $1 trillion last year, it's a drop in a very big bucket," Juarez said in a statement. "But for Seattle, a City whose budget is approx. $4B., voting to withdraw our funds ... money that covers the biweekly payroll of $30 million for about 12,000 employees – is an opportunity to send a message."
In Davis, the city's report on the possibility of cutting ties with Wells Fargo noted that Philadelphia and Minneapolis are also considering the same move.
As for Seattle's future options, KUOW reports:
"It's not clear which financial institutions the city will work with in the future. More than a dozen other banks are connected to the pipeline, including CitiBank, ING, Chase and Bank of America.
"City Council members including Sawant, Mike O'Brien and Lisa Herbold are interested in contracting with a credit union or state-run public bank. Both of those options, however, would require a change to state law."
In addition to complaints about the pipeline and its business practices, Wells Fargo was hit with a lawsuit at the end of January that accused the bank of "illegally denying student loans to young immigrants who are protected from deportation and allowed to work and study in the U.S. under a program created by former President Barack Obama," as member station KPCC reported.
Seattle's City Council has voted to not renew its contract with Wells Fargo, in a move that cites the bank's role as a lender to the Dakota Access Pipeline project as well as its creation of millions of bogus accounts. As a result, the city won't renew its contract with the bank that expires next year.
The unanimous vote will pull more than $3 billion in city funds from the banking giant, the council says. Seattle says the bidding process for its next banking partner will "incentivize 'Social Responsibility.'"
Not long after Seattle's vote, the City Council in Davis, Calif., took a similar action over the pipeline. It voted unanimously to find a new bank to handle its roughly $124 million in accounts by the end of 2017.
On the same day the two cities moved to cut ties with Wells Fargo, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers granted an easement allowing the Dakota Access Pipeline to cross under the Missouri River north of the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation. As NPR's Rebecca Hersher reported, that clears the way for construction of the final 1.5 miles of the more than 1,700-mile pipeline.
member station KUOW reports. "Protesters, many of them Native people from Washington state, share the concerns of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, which says the pipeline would threaten tribal water supplies, land and cultural sites."
Wells Fargo has been in the headlines since last fall over a scandal involving bank employees creating fake accounts in customers' names to bolster performance results and boost bonuses. While other banks are also involved in the pipeline deal, Wells Fargo's recent history seems to have helped make it a target once again.
Seattle's plan to stop its dealings with Wells Fargo comes months after the city canceled a $100 million bond deal between its electric utility and the bank. That took place last fall, when the treasurers of California, Illinois and other entities said they would freeze their dealings with the bank — in some cases, for a one-year period.
Wells Fargo's commercial banking manager for Washington state, Mary Knell, tells KUOW that she's disappointed in Seattle's new move, noting that the bank is bound by its contract with the pipeline project.
Knell tells KUOW that the bank has "enhanced our due diligence on projects such as this to include more research into whether indigenous communities are affected and that they have been properly consulted."
Socialist City Council member Kshama Sawant, who spearheaded Seattle's move away from Wells Fargo, says a rally against the bank is scheduled for this weekend.
And after noting that Wells Fargo is "one of the six primary financiers of the for-profit private prison industry," Sawant ended a statement about the bill's initial passage earlier this month with a note of caution, saying, "All of the big banks are terrible, and, as long as we have capitalism, our contracts will be with institutions that put corporate greed over human need."
Days before Seattle held an initial vote on divesting from the bank, Wells Fargo announced plans to donate $500,000 to five of the city's nonprofit groups that work to revitalize Seattle neighborhoods.
When Seattle Council member Debora Juarez spoke of voting against Wells Fargo, she repeatedly cited a need for integrity — even as she acknowledged the small direct impact Seattle's move will likely have.
"For a company whose deposits totaled more than $1 trillion last year, it's a drop in a very big bucket," Juarez said in a statement. "But for Seattle, a City whose budget is approx. $4B., voting to withdraw our funds ... money that covers the biweekly payroll of $30 million for about 12,000 employees – is an opportunity to send a message."
In Davis, the city's report on the possibility of cutting ties with Wells Fargo noted that Philadelphia and Minneapolis are also considering the same move.
As for Seattle's future options, KUOW reports:
"It's not clear which financial institutions the city will work with in the future. More than a dozen other banks are connected to the pipeline, including CitiBank, ING, Chase and Bank of America.
"City Council members including Sawant, Mike O'Brien and Lisa Herbold are interested in contracting with a credit union or state-run public bank. Both of those options, however, would require a change to state law."
In addition to complaints about the pipeline and its business practices, Wells Fargo was hit with a lawsuit at the end of January that accused the bank of "illegally denying student loans to young immigrants who are protected from deportation and allowed to work and study in the U.S. under a program created by former President Barack Obama," as member station KPCC reported.