CCI - BOOTS CAPITAL HIGHLIGHTS CROWN CASTLE'S SIGNIFICANT DESTRUCTION OF SHAREHOLDER VALUE AND FAILED OPERATIONAL STRATEGY DUE TO INEFFECTIVE LEADERSHIP | Benzinga

Urges Shareholders to Vote the GOLD Proxy Card "FOR" Boots Capital's Four Highly Qualified Director Nominees – Ted Miller, Charles Green, David Wheeler, and Tripp Rice – and "WITHHOLD" on ALL Crown Castle Nominees

Files Definitive Proxy Materials and Mails Letter to Crown Castle Shareholders

Launches www.RebootCrownCastle.com

HOUSTON, April 22, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Ted B. Miller, co-founder and former Executive Chairman & Chief Executive Officer of Crown Castle Inc., (NYSE:CCI) ("Crown Castle" or the "Company") and his investment vehicle Boots Capital Management, LLC ("Boots Capital") today filed definitive proxy materials with the Securities and Exchange Commission ("SEC") for the election of Ted B. Miller, Charles C. Green, David P. Wheeler, and Tripp H. Rice to Crown Castle's Board of Directors (the "Board") at the Company's 2024 Annual Meeting of Shareholders (the "2024 Annual Meeting") to be held on May 22, 2024.

In connection with the filing of definitive proxy materials, Boots Capital is mailing a letter to Crown Castle's shareholders and launched www.RebootCrownCastle.com. 

The full text of the letter being mailed is below.

April 22, 2024

To Crown Castle Shareholders:

You deserve better. For more than a decade, you and all Crown Castle shareholders have suffered at the hands of a Board that made the wrong decision every time it mattered most. The Board's poor judgment has cost shareholders tens of billions of dollars in value, left you with a debt-fueled dividend policy, and corroded employee morale and broader stakeholder trust.

As a fellow shareholder in Crown Castle Inc., Ted B. Miller, the Company's co-founder and former Executive Chairman & Chief Executive Officer and his investment vehicle, Boots Capital Management, LLC ("Boots Capital"), are deeply concerned about the future of the Company and believe that shareholders deserve better stewards of their capital. Crown Castle's Board has not provided meaningful insights regarding next steps and has shown resistance to engaging substantively with us. It's finally time to bring this lost decade to a close, and to take action to restore the value of your investment.

The facts speak plainly and loudly. Look at the chart below, which compares Crown Castle Total Shareholder Return (TSR) relative to the overall market and its two primary tower-company competitors – American Tower Corp. and SBA Communications Corp. Crown Castle has performed significantly worse than these direct peers and the overall market over each of the 10-, 7-, 5-, 3-, 2- and 1-year periods ending December 31, 2023.

Table 1: Total Shareholder Returns (TSR)¹

Unsurprisingly, Crown Castle's TSR has lagged its two tower peers for the tenures of all of its legacy directors. Once again, the table below tells the story. 

Table 2: Total Shareholder Returns (TSR) of Directors²

In Crown Castle's own preliminary proxy statement, dated April 4, 2024, the Board states "[we] acknowledge that our stockholder returns have been disappointing and not what we or our investors expect from the Company." This moment of candor was struck from the Company's definitive proxy statement filed on April 11, 2024.

A TRACK RECORD OF FAILED STEWARDSHIP, CORPORATE GOVERNANCE, AND EXECUTION

The decision to file our proxy solicitation was only made after considering the feedback and views of many large institutional shareholders. Apart from overwhelming frustration with Crown Castle's performance, shareholders have expressed uncertainty regarding the Company's continued stewardship, corporate governance, and execution. Consider the following areas:

1.   Lack of relevant skillsets

Until just a few months ago, not one independent director on the Board had tower company operating experience. Now, the closest they come to meeting this criterion is one independent director that served as CFO of a tower company. Only one independent director has even been a public-company CEO. And that was for a bank.

The current Board's lack of tower company experience has exacerbated the impact of its failed management and operational strategy. It was easy to mask such shortcomings during a period of low interest rates, as tower companies delivered yield when there was precious little available to investors. But with rates much higher, the stresses for REIT management teams are also higher. Crown Castle still must deliver the dividend checks on time, but it has less investor rope to allocate capital as poorly as it has. It needs operators and doers – at both the executive and Board level – to make Crown Castle a more efficient and valuable company.

Boots Capital's four nominees bring expertise where Crown Castle's board is weakest: The tower-industry itself. Our nominees founded this company and this industry, and have over 50 years of direct experience in ...

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