Many Verizon shareholders apparently like the idea of being able to cast an advisory vote each year on pay packages for the corporation's top executives.
A proposal allowing them to do just that earned approval from more than 49 percent of shareholders who voted before and during Verizon Communications Corp.'s annual meeting Thursday in Pittsburgh.
The "say on pay" plan, in fact, was the only potential majority vote-getter among seven shareholders' initiatives taken up at the sometimes-raucous session filled with hundreds of union members.
"It is getting closer to the 50 percent mark," said Chairman and CEO Ivan Seidenberg, whose own compensation -- totaling $21.3 million for 2006 -- was brought up often, drawing jeers from the crowd at the Westin Convention Center Hotel. Final voting results will be known in about a week, Seidenberg said and, "If it passes, the board will take it up."
Executive pay, measured against Verizon's lackluster financial performance, was the dominant topic as AFL-CIO representatives and members, retirees and other shareholders spoke to executives of the New York-based telecommunications giant that has been investing $22 billion in a fiber-optic network to carry its TV, Internet and voice services.
The Association of BellTel Retirees Inc., claiming 100,000 members, asked Verizon shareholders to approve a requirement for non-binding votes on executive pay packages, a measure that is among dozens of "say on pay" initiatives considered this year at public companies.
BellTel President C. William Jones felt "pretty good" after the meeting, noting many in the audience who cast late votes likely are supporters. "Obviously, we got support from some of the big guys," Jones said, referring to proxy voting services and major investment funds that control many Verizon shares.
Yesterday's meeting followed a rally near the United Steelworkers Building Downtown. About 600 Communications Workers of America, International Brotherhoood of Electrical Workers and other union members picked up red shirts and signs urging Verizon to stop "union-busting" and negotiate with the two unions, both part of the AFL-CIO.
"Verizon and other corporations want consumers to pay more, workers to earn less and CEOs to receive obscene salaries and buyouts," said the Rev. Jack O'Malley, an AFL-CIO chaplain. The workers, many from other states, walked through Downtown to the hotel.
CWA workers have gone on strike three times in the past two decades. Contracts for both the CWA and IBEW -- representing about 97,000 Verizon workers nationwide -- expire Aug. 2, 2008, and talks typically start a few months before the deadline.
Union officials criticized what they called the company's moves in recent years to limit pensions, health benefits and organizing rights, particularly for Verizon Business technicians in the Boston and New York, plus its plan to sell off phone lines in Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont.
The AFL-CIO backed the BellTel group's say on pay plan, plus controls on "golden parachute" severance deals and compensation consultants that Verizon's board uses for determining top salaries. The latter proposals got about 47 percent of shareholders' votes.
"If you were to leave this month without cause, you would get $32.4 million," CWA member Ron Collins told Seidenberg, to moans from the audience. That's five times what the proposed severance limits would allow, he said, asking the CEO, "When is enough enough?"
Seidenberg said Verizon, which moves its annual meeting to a different city each year, considers Pittsburgh "one of the most important markets that we serve." The company expects to launch its FiOS TV service on new fiber-optic lines in the region late this year.
He told the audience at one point that unless Verizon can beat competing cable companies at their own game -- selling phone and Internet service along with TV -- "you won't have anybody here to complain to.
"As we go out over time, FiOS is going to make this company strong. It is going to create more jobs," he said, and the company's first-quarter earnings released Monday show the strategy is paying off, with a 6 percent increase in revenue.
Verizon's 15 board members were re-elected for a year, including Seidenberg and Thomas O'Brien, retired CEO of PNC Financial Services Group Inc. Verizon has about 4,000 local employees.
Union representatives and members left the meeting pleased with strong shareholder votes for some of their proposals, but frustrated over a perceived lack of concern for their issues.
"I just felt like he was trying to avoid the issues," Kenneth Williams, a CWA member from Charleston, W.Va., said of Seidenberg.
Larger text
Smaller text
Print this article
E-mail this article
