With New Law, Insurance Companies Need to Address Rates

Letter to Editor

Unlike the rest of the country, people are continuing to flock to the Sunshine State, mainly because they will have a chance to live out the American Dream with as little government interference as possible.  That is bringing with it some serious growing pains and putting pressure on schools, roads, and housing.

The housing issue is already complicated by rising property taxes and insurance.  We will never get our affordable housing needs met if we don’t deal with these two issues head on.

The legislature has debated reforming the state’s bad faith laws in the past.  The bad faith provision allows homeowners to sue their insurers if they are not being treated fairly, and one of the triggers is a time limit by which a company has to deal with a claim.

The problem is that lawyers were dragging out the claim process to give them opportunity to sue for bad faith after the time limit expires.  I don’t think people were realizing that every time we get another frivolous lawsuit, all of our rates were going up. I say were because the governor and legislature did something about it several weeks ago.  Now, the insurance companies need to do something to bring rates down.  Giving all of us a break from frivolous lawsuits was a great first step.

Linda Witt