Home Depot Investors Back Racial Audit, Deforestation Proposals

Home Depot Investors Back Racial Audit, Deforestation Proposals


(Bloomberg) -- Home Depot Inc. shareholders voted in favor of proposals calling for an independent racial audit and a report on the company’s links to deforestation in its wood sourcing, adding to the wave of companies facing investor pressure on environmental, social and governance issues.


The racial-equity resolution calls for directors to authorize an independent audit into the effectiveness of the retailer’s practices related to stakeholders who are Black, Indigenous or people of color, and to minority communities. The resolution flagged an incident in which an employee at one of Home Depot’s Minneapolis stores was suspended when he refused to remove a Black Lives Matter logo from his uniform.

The vote represents a win for socially conscious investors as ESG proxy proposals become more common. This year, there have been 36 racial-equity proxy proposals up for a vote among Russell 3000 companies, according to Rob Du Boff, a senior ESG analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence. Including the one at Home Depot, six have passed. By contrast, there were 14 such resolutions last year and none passed, he said, though a couple of companies complied voluntarily anyway.

The five other companies this year whose proposals passed are Apple Inc., Altria Group Inc., Johnson & Johnson, Maximus Inc. and Waste Management Inc.

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