| Coalition of University Employees (CUE) | 2855 Telegraph Ave., Suite #302, Berkeley, CA 94705 Contact CUE (510) 845-2221 (phone), (510) 845-7444 (FAX) |
Dear Editor:
I am writing on behalf of my union, the Coalition of University Employees (CUE), which represents the 18,000 hard-working clericals at the University of California. CUE is one of three successful plaintiffs in the recent lawsuit against the Regents of the University, and their refusal to disclose the performance rating of its venture capital investments.
I am writing to dispute the University's claim that the lawsuit's success will have damaging effects on our retirement funds. In declarations to the court, it was pointed out that many VC funds, including those the University invests in currently or has invested with in the past, regularly disclose their IRR's (internal rates of return).
Further, neither CALPERS nor CALSTIRS has experienced any negative impact from their recent decisions to disclose the IRRs. The suggestion by the University that we have harmed the pension fund is ridiculous. In fact, we think that it is more likely that disclosure is a protection against repeated bad investments. CUE is proud of our participation in this struggle with the University. We believe that our lawsuit should never have been necessary in the first place, and that we are doing what the Regents should have been doing all along -- demanding public accountability for the investment of employee and tax payers' monies.
Sincerely,
Claudia Horning, President, Coalition of University Employees (CUE)