Anyone in Charge ?

Mr. John D. Wren
Business Week

Mr. Stanley Brezenoff

The Brooklyn Paper/Tom Callan

The law requires a board of a not-for-profit corporation to be in overall charge. No matter how many executives and other employees there may be, it is the Board, and nobody else, that is charged with the fiduciary duty to preserve and nurture the organization. In the case of LICH, that would be the Board of Regents, whose chairman is Mr. John D. Wren.

Mr. Brezenoff, who has made all the policy statements more or less on his own, has certainly given the impression that it is he, and nobody else, who is in charge. But, at least in form, he is but a paid servant of LICH, with but one seat on the Board. Where in all this is the legally-responsible Board ? Where is Mr. Wren ? What does Mr. Wren have to say about the important policy decisions that lie ahead for LICH ?

Madison Ave. vs. Hicks St. -- ct'd

The planter in front of LICH's Graffiti House (385 Hicks) has once again become the target of theft. Another beautiful plant has been stolen within the last twelve hours or so.

Is other crime encouraged by the vandalism known as graffiti ? Mayor Guiliani thought so. These graffiti are ugly and should be removed for that reason alone. But they also contribute to the blight and crime of a neighborhood. There is no excuse for LICH to just ignore the situation.

Would Mr. Wren tolerate this at his other location ? I don't think so.

Hicks Street is not Madison Avenue

The graffiti at 325 Hicks Street, a LICH building, are still where they were months ago. Is that a pretty sight ?

As it happens, LICH shares leadership with the Omnicom Group, "A Global Leader in Advertising ...," as it describes itself. Mr. John D. Wren is the CEO of Omnicom and the chairman of the board of LICH. Omnicom is headquartered at 437 Madison Avenue in Manhattan. So I went over there this morning to see how that building is kept, in comparison with 325 Hicks. I took seven pictures on Madison Avenue, another seven new ones here on Hicks, all today, October 25, 2007.

Can you tell which picture was taken where ?

It takes 190 LICH nurses ....

At LICH, it takes 190 nurses to earn as much as the Chairman of the LICH Board of Regents. Even LICH executive salaries -- and those of hospitals generally (see previous posting, below) -- pale when compared to top executive salaries in private industry.

LICH's President was no doubt appointed by the LICH Board of Regents, a board that contains many accomplished men and women from many walks of life. The Chairman of this Board of Regents is Mr. John D. Wren, who is also the CEO of the Omnicom Group. Omnicom is required to file detailed reports with the SEC, including detailed information about its top salaries. For 2006, Mr. Wren's compensation package at this corporation totaled $13,241,034, roughly nineteen times the salary of LICH's President/CEO, almost forty times the salary of a LICH surgeon, and one hundred ninety times the pay of a LICH Registered Nurse.