18 Jun HOW SUSTAINABLE INVESTING PROTECTS MIAMI’S FUTURE

The health of our surrounding environment depends on every Miamian doing their part.

The 2014 Our Miami Report made that clear, showing how our investment in transportation solutions, public spaces and natural resources, among many other areas, affects our quality of life and the well-being of the urban landscape around us.

Our goal here at The Miami Foundation is to build a greater Miami that is vibrant and thrives long into the future.  To do that, we examine how our actions affect the sustainability of our city and broader society. We constantly seek new ways to proactively step up and contribute to Miami’s phenomenal growth.

While The Miami Foundation’s community investment and civic leadership work are at the center of our impact agenda, when it comes to sustainability, the way we use all of our philanthropic assets matters.

Our endowment and the resources entrusted to us by our generous Fundholders collectively fuel our ability to meet a multitude of challenges and holistically build a better place to call home.  They are also carefully invested to ensure their long-term availability and growth.  We believe this creates an opportunity to do even more good with the resources under our stewardship.

For the first time in our history, we’re giving our Fundholders the opportunity to invest in an Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) driven investment pool.  It allows like-minded philanthropists to come together and support firms whose work is bringing about positive societal and environmental outcomes in areas such as climate change mitigation, waste reduction, clean energy usage and who also employ responsible labor and governance practices. Mutual funds, money managers and institutional investors have created structured screening processes and scorecards on many of these issues to identify firms that have a positive impact on communities.

Because I am personally passionate about local as well as global sustainability, I have chosen to invest my family Fund in the ESG investment pool and urge others to consider investing in this socially conscious way.

Environmentally focused investing is gaining momentum with foundations and financial institutions across the globe; as more organizations choose this method to invest their assets, we hope companies will be motivated to incorporate sustainable practices into their operations. In this way, individual decisions contribute to global change.

There will be additional updates soon about how the Foundation will take a more direct role in championing a sustainable Greater Miami.  We believe that to address issues critical to our community’s future, its residents’ participation is essential. Our work will require more public input, collaboration and action than ever before. We invite our Fundholders and every Miamian to have a role in the effort.

At its core, sustainability means working in a way today that ushers in a healthy tomorrow. I’m confident that if we pool our resources and passion to facilitate good growth in Greater Miami, we will continue on this arc toward a prosperous city that cares for the global community.

Javier Alberto Soto is the former president and CEO of The Miami Foundation.  For more information on moving your philanthropic Fund into the pool, email Janell Kaplan.