When Kim and I re-formed Horizons in 2013, we hoped to be able to file our new company’s paperwork as a “New Mexico Benefit Corporation”, putting our commitment to wider issues of social justice and environmental sustainability into our official legal structure. That year, New Mexico’s House and Senate each passed the necessary legislation by wide and bi-partisan margins, but then-Governor Susana Martinez used her “pocket veto” power to sink the legislation without any explanation. Our incorporation documents described the business we’re in, of course — but they had to say that our sole motivation was profit for our corporation and its shareholders.
New Mexico’s Legislature kept trying, though, and brought back new versions of the Benefit Corporation legislation every year from 2014 through 2019 (click on New Mexico for the details). Finally in 2020, the Legislature found the right combination of legal language to pass a new bill, new Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham signed the bill into law, and our old friend Secretary of State Maggie Tolouse Oliver put the formal mechanisms in place later that summer to enable companies to re-register.
Unfortunately for us, that coincided with the early response to the COVID pandemic and a remarkably volatile period in the markets — so Kim and I decided to put off the necessary paperwork “just until things settle down a little”. But when markets recovered, other personal developments intervened, and we decided to delay further while we re-formed the company once more.
But earlier this year, I was at long last able to put together the time and paper work to follow through on our long-time goal — and as of March 4th, Horizons is registered as a Benefit Corporation. Officially, our beneficial purpose is listed this way: “We build investment strategies designed to promote environmental sustainability and social justice, so that our clients can express their values in their portfolios”. With this registration comes an obligation to provide an annual report of our beneficial impact: how are we actually having the kind of impact we say we do. To that end, we are producing our first-ever “Impact Report”, and we’ll be getting that into everyone’s hands as soon as our graphic design team is done.
Now that we’ve completed this step, we’re exploring “B Corp Certification” through B Lab Global. This certification would represent completion of a rigorous process of evaluation for our business. We’ve looked at it before and begun the data submission process, but when we recognized that becoming a Benefit Corporation was a necessary pre-requisite to certification, we decided to wait.
So! We’re re-registered as a New Mexico Benefit Corporation, producing our inaugural Impact Report, and preparing for B Corp Certification. We’re excited about these developments, and hope you are too!
