Watered Down Measure To Relieve Citizen's Property Died In Session
TALLAHASSEE (CBSMiami/NSF) - A bill to make it easier for less regulated surplus lines insurers to take policies out of Citizens Property Insurance Corp. died during the session's final week.
As more and more amendments were added to water down the measure to the point, backers said, that prospective companies would show no interest.
Following intense debate on the floor pitting Sen. Mike Fasano, R-New Port Richey, against Senate leaders including Sen. Garrett Richter, R-Naples, the measure (HB 245) withered on the vine after an amendment requiring policyholders to opt in to the surplus lines take out companies – rather than being automatically switched - was added to the bill.
A similar fight happened in the House.
Gov. Rick Scott and other policy makers generally want Citizens to shed risk because if the company can't pay claims, it could be financially, and politically, problematic. Once Citizens' cash and reinsurance is exhausted, private insurance customers would first pay assessments, raising their rates, and if that weren't enough to cover Citizens' losses or insurance customers balked, state taxpayers might have to pick up part of the tab.
Scott has called on the state-backed property insurance company, which now has about 1.5 million policies, to greatly reduce that number. Realistically, Citizen's officials would like to see its number of policyholders reduced to about 800,000 policies.
The News Service of Florida contributed to this report.
