By Matthew Ricchiazzi

In 2010, the New York State Pension Fund had over $21 billion invested in international equities (aka, literally sending jobs to Brazil, Russia, India, and China rather than investing here at home). They had another $12.7 billion invested in privately held equities.

How much of that was invested in Upstate and Western New York? Next to nothing.

A major contributor to Buffalo’s decline has been the lack of venture capital and private equity investment in the region. Why would the Comptroller prefer to invest in China rather than Buffalo? Apparently the New York State Pension Fund, one of the largest institutional investors in the world, isn’t willing to take a risk on Western New York either.

At the very least, shouldn’t we be willing to invest in ourselves? If we’re not willing to mobilize capital to invest in our own economic recovery, who would?

I’m proposing a bold new approach: Mandate that the New York State Pension Fund allocates $30 billion of its $134 billion fund to establish “The Upstate Venture Fund,” making investments in early stage start ups in high growth industries that are headquartered in Upstate New York.

This would not increase taxes, nor would it add to the debt. We’d just be reallocating capital from the existing investment portfolio—in a way that will create hundreds of thousands of jobs and $30 billion of investment in Western and Upstate New York. If the Comptroller, Governor, or Legislature refuses, then they’ll have to explain why they’re sending jobs overseas.

That venture capital fund should be headquartered in Buffalo, governed by an independent Board whose members reside in Upstate and Western New York.