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New York City Comptroller William C. Thompson, Jr., on behalf of the New York City Employees’ Retirement System, today announced that Par Pharmaceuticals Companies, Inc. has agreed to implement its shareholder proposal providing shareholders an advisory vote on executive pay.

“We are pleased that Par Pharmaceuticals has listened to its shareholders and has committed to providing shareholders a vehicle to express their opinions regarding the senior executives’ pay,” Thompson said. “This added voice will provide Par Pharmaceuticals with shareholders’ views on whether they feel that senior executive compensation is in their best interests.”

The proposal, filed in November 2007 by the New York City Employees’ Retirement System (NYCERS), called on Par Pharmaceuticals’ Board of Directors to adopt a policy that stockholders be given an opportunity at each annual shareholders’ meeting to vote on an advisory resolution to ratify the compensation of named executive officers.

“Investors are increasingly concerned about mushrooming executive compensation which sometimes appears to be insufficiently aligned with the creation of shareholder value,” the shareholder resolution reads. “We believe that existing corporate governance arrangements…do not provide stockholders with enough mechanisms for providing input to boards on senior executive compensation.”

NYCERS filed a similar resolution last year, which received 56.8% of the shares voted at Par Pharmaceuticals’ annual meeting. Subsequently, the company agreed to allow shareholders an annual advisory vote on senior executive compensation beginning with the 2009 annual meeting.

NYCERS filed a similar resolution with Blockbuster in 2007, which also received a majority vote from shareholders.

NYCERS holds 62,877 shares in Par Pharmaceuticals, with a market value of $1,363,802.

In addition to Thompson, trustees for NYCERS are: New York City Finance Commissioner Martha E. Stark (Chair); New York City Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum; Borough Presidents Scott Stringer (Manhattan), Helen Marshall (Queens), Marty Markowitz (Brooklyn), Adolfo Carrion (Bronx), and James Molinaro (Staten Island); Lillian Roberts, Executive Director, District Council 37, AFSCME; Roger Toussaint, President Transport Workers Union Local 100; and Gregory Floyd, President, International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Local 237.

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