Friday, October 2, 2009

Moonlighting for $1M - BostonHerald.com

Moonlighting for $1M - BostonHerald.com

Elaine S. Ullian, chief executive officer of financially strapped Boston Medical Center, almost doubles her $1.3 million annual salary by sitting on the boards of three local companies that also do business with her hospital.

“What is she doing?” said John Gatti, a former government official turned waste and fraud watchdog. “Doesn’t she have enough to do, trying to run BMC with all the problems they have down there?”

Ullian’s lucrative corporate directorships - she also serves on each board’s executive compensation committee - raise questions about her professional commitments during a time of turbulence at the inner-city hospital, which just announced plans to eliminate 40 more jobs and close an intensive-care unit, Gatti said. ...

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“Even if she isn’t making the purchasing decisions herself, it’s the appearance of impropriety that is wrong,” Gatti said.

Ullian, 61, has served as president and CEO of the 550-bed medical center since it was created in 1996.

In 2008, she was paid nearly $4.8 million from Boston Medical Center, including her $1.34 million salary and a one-time $3.5 million retirement bonus. She is slated to leave the hospital in January.

Last year, Ullian also received $337,480 in cash and stock to sit on Vertex Pharmaceuticals’ board of directors; $275,319 in cash and stock to serve on the board of Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc., a maker of medical instruments and laboratory supplies; and $304,698 to work on medical device maker Hologic Inc.’s board. ...

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