WALL STREET Ex-NYSE chairman demands board jobs over Grasso's pay

The former NYSE chairman compared the board to the one at Enron.
NEW YORK (AP) -- A former chairman of the New York Stock Exchange joined critics in calling for a clean sweep of the boardroom as the best way of quelling the growing storm over chairman Dick Grasso's lavish pay package.
The exchange's directors, who are considering ways to ease outrage over the $139.5 million Grasso received in accrued benefits and savings, were expected to call a meeting later this week.
James Needham, a retired accountant who was NYSE chairman from 1972 to 1976, said on Monday that everyone associated with the decision should step down, including Grasso. "It's time to clean house," said Needham, 77, who also served on the Securities and Exchange Commission. "I feel the board just didn't step up to the plate and run that operation properly."
Shared views
He said he has shared his views with Grasso and SEC chairman William Donaldson, who raised sharp questions about the pay package after it was announced last month. The SEC is reviewing the NYSE's response.
Needham likened the appearance of the board's handling of Grasso's pay to the problems at Enron Corp., where directors' conflicts of interest and a lack of awareness of company operations became evident when that company collapsed in scandal in 2001.
"It's nothing easy for me to say, because I think he's the best chairman the exchange has had, including me," Needham said. "But ... in that position, you have to look reasonably perfect."
Traders and seatholders were said to be circulating one or more petitions seeking big changes in top management at the NYSE. The matter was expected to be discussed at a meeting of active seatholders Thursday, and at a general meeting next month.
Several directors have privately expressed strong views as well, particularly newer members who are said to have been unaware of how much was promised to Grasso in contracts negotiated during the stock market's giddy rise in the late 1990s. Even after Grasso announced he would forgo an additional $48 million disclosed last week, opinions seemed mixed as to whether he should be ousted.
Few have criticized the job performance of Grasso, 57, who started his career at the exchange as a floor clerk in 1968. He was the only candidate for the top post when Donaldson left in 1995.