CenterSquare’s commitment to evaluating ESG principals is based upon the belief that they make good business sense and can represent a strong source of return for investors. Governance is the most material of the three primary categories, followed by Environmental factors, with Social factors being the least germane as a result of the nature of the real estate industry. Our process begins with a ranking framework that assesses a company’s ESG score along ten equally-weighted factors (each scored 0 to 10) measuring environmental stewardship, social responsibility, and corporate governance to provide an expanded analysis. The sum of these ten scores generates the REIT’s overall ESG score. Environmental factors account for 40% of CenterSquare’s overall ESG score. These factors capture the robustness of the company’s environmental sustainability policies addressing energy efficiency, conservation, and carbon footprint reduction as well as the execution and disclosure of those policies. As the company develops additional assets, we identify brown-field development and mass transit-oriented development as environmentally friendly. We also analyze the company’s real estate portfolio for heightened sustainability standards, such as attaining LEED2 and GRESB3 certification. Companies receive superior scores for being leaders and advocates within the environmental sustainability space. Social factors account for 20% of the overall ESG score. These factors capture the company’s quality of employee engagement and extent of community involvement. We consider policies regarding ethics, conduct, anti-corruption, and anti-bribery for employees and contractors as well as the company’s commitment to community involvement, civic service, and philanthropic efforts. Governance factors account for the remaining 40% of the overall ESG score. Shareholder alignment and board independence measure the shareholders’ influence over the company and the board’s ability to carry out its fiduciary responsibility as the steward of shareholder capital. We also measure the extent to which strategic efforts have been clearly identified and implemented to enhance governance of shareholder capital and the quality of governance disclosures.