Thank you! This seems to work. Below is my test code.

use strict;
use warnings;
use Data::Dumper;

my $control = Control->new();
my $app = Control::Main->new( %{$control} );

package Control;
use Data::Dumper;

sub new {
    my $class = shift;
    my $self = bless {}, ref($class) || $class;

    #my $dbh = Area::DB::connect(\$_connected) if !$_connected;
    #tie %{$self->{data}}, "Tie::ODBCSession", $dbh, $session_id;
    $self->{data} = {};

    return $self;
}

sub DESTROY {
    my $self = shift;

    print "Destroying parent:\n";
    print Dumper ($self) . "\n";
}

package Control::Main;
@Control::Main::ISA = qw(Control);
use Data::Dumper;

sub new {
    my $class = shift;
    my %args = @_;
    my $self = {};

    bless $self, $class;

    # initialize with named parameters passed
    %{$self} = map { $_ => $args{$_} } keys(%args);
    
    # store action in the object
    $self->{data}->{action} = "test";
    
    return $self;
}

sub DESTROY {
    my $self = shift;

    $self->{data} = undef;
    print "Destroying child:\n";
    print Dumper ($self) . "\n";

}
[download]