Hurricanes and global warming Part 2: Insurance company shareholders love Al Gore
By John Temple Ligon
Temple@TheColumbiaStar.com

Taking a tip from his fellow authority Leonardo DiCaprio on trends in global climate change, former Vice President and recent spokesman in an Oscar- award- winning film, Al Gore has all but guaranteed America's Atlantic coast more intense hurricanes and greater frequency of hurricanes in the near future. The insurance industry couldn't be happier.

After all, with the integrity of Bill Clinton's running mate, Gore can stir up the masses, and the masses need coastal home insurance. The insurance companies, of course, absolutely love this stuff.

Insurance rates doubled? Scared to death? Did we drop you? Willing to pay, really pay? Well then, pay here. Oh, and while you're paying for your home insurance, it's now customary to force you to buy all kinds of collateral coverage to entice us to cover your house. So how 'bout your automobile coverage and your life insurance and ...what else?

Homeowners on the South Carolina coast in the past year have seen insurance premiums increase more than 100%. The state legislature says the coast is in a crisis. At least 20,000 coastal S.C. policies have been dropped by the insurers.

Senate President Pro Tempore Glenn McConnell has taken a shot at insurers, insisting on fair treatment, reasonable hikes in premiums, and even some loyalty and compassion on behalf of the insurers.

McConnell put up a bill Thursday, March 8, that would forbid underwriters from cancelling a policy that has been held for at least three years. The bill would stop carriers from requiring all the add- ons, such as forcing the purchase of automobile insurance before renewing the homeowner's policy.

McConnell, in early February, also pulled together a bipartisan coalition of lawmakers to call for a new state- owned agency or authority to insure homeowners in all coastal area counties, even those not closest to the water.

Following leads in Florida and other Gulf Coast states besides Hawaii, the bill creates a tax- exempt state authority capable of selling bonds and insuring properties. And, according to McConnell's bill, the state's insurance department would move the state commissioner's post from governor- appointed to an elected position answerable to the people.

Alternative movements in insurance reform are coming from the governor-appointed commissioner, former state legislator Scott Richardson, who is calling for market- based reforms.

Richardson suggests a $500 tax credit for homeowners who pay more than 5% of the value of their incomes for insurance premiums. He adds another relief in the suggestion for an elimination of state sales tax in the purchase of building supplies to strengthen homes, to make them hurricane ready. And to keep insurance business flowing to private insurance companies instead of state agencies, Richardson says the private insurer can take a tax credit for writing policies in areas covered by the state- backed wind pool, an expanded area to expand and spread the risk.

Farther north, New York City's Mayor Bloomberg last fall responded heavily to Gore's message and formed the Office of Long- Term Planning and Sustainability.

And across the Atlantic, bleak conclusions came out last month from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, released in Paris.

In last week's Columbia Star , however, was a report on Dr. Christopher Landsea of the National Hurricane Center in Miami. He said last month at USC that maybe a 5% increase in hurricanes' intensity by the end of the 21st century was a reasonable expection. And he said as a matter of scientific disclosure, the number and frequency of hurricanes in the Atlantic should be anywhere from 10% to 30% less than the last century.

In other words, as it must be said again, the insurance company shareholders love Al Gore.