Is it the End of Days for Appointed Florida Commissioners?
February 16th, 2006 by Megan Mahan
While Florida’s current insurance commissioner, Kevin McCarty, was appointed by (and answers to) the elected Cabinet, several lawmakers are proposing something to the contrary.
The Insurance Journal reported today that bipartisan efforts by some Florida lawmakers are supporting a constitutional change to return the job to an elected Cabinet post.
Proponents of the measure say that ballooning property insurance premiums following major hurricanes now have the public feeling that the insurance process is skewed against them.
According to the Insurance Journal, the position of insurance commissioner became an appointed post in 1998 when Florida voters dialed down the Cabinet from six members to three, plus the governor. At that time, lawmakers decided that appointing insurance commissioners would eliminate some of the politics from the position and furthermore decided that elected candidates would be barred from taking campaign contributions from the insurance industry.
But as Florida homeowners saw premium hike after premium hike, they began to feel slighted and powerless, argue the measure’s proponents.
Now, I hate to point out the obvious, but Florida sees a lot of hurricanes. And while I understand that the public needs to feel some sort of responsibility [read: control] over the insurance regulations in their state, if I were a Florida home or business owner, I’d expect to be paying a fair amount to insure my property. And, I’d probably expect that with eight hurricanes in two years, insurers would need to increase their rates to cover their risk or they’d go out of business. And then Florida home insurance would be akin to New Jersey auto insurance, it’d be a mess and Florida residents would be even more upset.
But my theoretical diatribe begs the question: should the job of Florida insurance commissioner be an elected post? Because to be honest with you, I’m a copywriter who writes about insurance (hey, don’t believe what you hear–it’s glamorous.) and would like to hear how other industry experts feel.
So check out the Insurance Journal’s article and let me know what you think!
