Delta CEO to give up pay, bonuses up to $9.1M By Dan Reed, USA TODAY Delta Air Lines Chairman and CEO Leo Mullin, under intense fire from congressional leaders and his own workers, said late Thursday that he's giving up as much as $9.1 million in pay and bonuses because of the airline industry's crisis. Mullin's announcement came as Congress worked to pass a supplemental budget bill to cover war expenses that includes $3 billion in aid for the airlines. Airline executive pay has become part of the debate about aid to the struggling industry after disclosures that CEOs got multimillion-dollar pay packages as their companies reported deep losses in 2002. Mullin's compensation package was worth $32 million last year, an amount US Airways CEO David Siegel criticized as excessive at an airline industry conference Thursday. Both the House and Senate airline packages have provisions calling for executives to take a pay freeze for their companies to qualify for aid. Delta's announcement might indicate that airlines are resigned to pay caps surviving any aid measure that passes Congress. In a three-page memo to employees explaining his decision, Mullin said the intent of the raises, bonuses and options awarded to Delta's top management was to maintain a team of managers "capable of responding effectively to the extraordinary challenges" faced by the company after the Sept. 11 attacks. "However, the reality of the airline industry is that the context changes rapidly," he said. "Concerns we are now facing were not part of the environment when those earlier decisions were made, or their importance has been magnified." Mullin will take a 25% pay cut this year, down to $596,250. He also will not accept any performance-based incentive pay this year and won't accept any bonuses or options under an executive retention plan in 2004 and 2005. Mullin also will turn down stock-based compensation worth $5.5 million that is called for in the five-year contract he signed in November. Leaders of both parties say airline aid should remain part of the supplemental war spending bill. "This is really up to Congress," said House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill. "You need to keep this industry at least competitive and alive." The debate about whether to aid the airlines has sparked a rare public disagreement between President Bush and top Republican leaders on Capitol Hill. The Bush administration initially wanted to include no aid for airlines in the war spending bill. After it became clear this week that airline aid had wide congressional backing, the White House Office of Management and Budget issued a statement expressing a willingness to work out a compromise. But the OMB statement argued that Congress risks keeping bad businesses afloat with taxpayer money. Contributing: Kathy Kiely, Barbara De Lollis, Marilyn Adams *************************************************** The owner of Roger's Trinbago Site/TnTisland.com Roj (Roger James) escape email mailto:ejames@xxxxxxxxx Trinbago site: www.tntisland.com Carib Brass Ctn site www.tntisland.com/caribbeanbrassconnection/ Steel Expressions www.mts.net/~ejames/se/ Site of the Week:http://www.ttsailing.org/ TnT Webdirectory: http://search.co.tt *********************************************************