At a time when the president of the United States has been recorded bragging about grabbing women’s genitalia because he “can do anything” as a celebrity, it would seem that local and state efforts to encourage even a symbolic bulwark against further discrimination is all the more urgent.
It’s surprising, then, for The Durango Herald’s editorial board (Herald, March 15) to opine that “state legislatures do not have a role to play” when it comes to the Colorado General Assembly and House Joint Resolution 1017, which modestly encourages a purely voluntary “equitable and diverse” gender representation on boards for publicly held corporations.
This is exactly the role state legislatures must play. When the executive branch retreats on protecting gender, religious and most forms of civil rights, it is incumbent on local and state governments to pick up the slack. And as the resolution offers, numerous studies show that companies with greater diversity among their senior management do better financially.
Consider the Herald: Is there a connection between its male-dominated senior management (where the Herald’s parent company, Ballantine Communications’ chief executive officer, vice president of finance and operations, senior vice president of business development and vice president of news and directories are all men), its declining readership and the recent decision to print the newspaper only four days a week?
Just a thought.
Tom Sluis
Durango
