Industry Representatives Say Calif. Is Prepared

How would California respond to a disaster, be it a major earthquake, fire or something the equivalent of Sept. 11?

Addressing the state’s level of preparedness in the event of a major tragedy, representatives of the insurance industry testified Dec. 5 before the California Assembly Insurance Committee on the industry’s response to Sept. 11 and how prepared California is to respond to future incidents.

Among those testifying was Diane Colborn, vice president of legislative and regulatory affairs for the Personal Insurance Federation of California.

“The nature and enormity of the loss [on Sept. 11] is unprecedented,” Colborn said.

While the attacks took place 3,000 miles from California, Colborn commented that the Golden State is prepared to react if a major event takes place on the West Coast.

“In terms of preparation, we did talk about the fact that the industry here in California set up a catastrophe communications and media relations plan through the California Insurance Communications Working Group [CICWG],” Colborn said. “The plan has been in place for some time. It was focused on natural disasters like earthquakes, floods and fires. They went into it and amended it to reflect the terrorism risk.”

The CICWG is comprised of insurance company representatives, trade associations, and agents and brokers who do business in the state.

According to Colborn, primarily the plan is based on communication. The core element of the Plan is CICWG’s Communications Catastrophe Task Force.

In the event of a catastrophe, the unit will quickly assess the situation and put the plan into place. According to Colborn, the Insurance Information Network of California (IINC) will head the Task Force as well as a three-person executive committee to coordinate the Task Force’s activities.

Where an event takes place would determine whether the IINC office in Southern or Northern California serves as the Communications Center to direct activities. If both of the offices are impacted, the New York-based Insurance Information Institute would serve to coordinate communications activities for California.

“When a catastrophe occurs, insurers will coordinate with all local, state and federal agencies throughout California,” Colborn said. “Each individual company has their own plan for how they’ll get claims adjusters to the sites and how they’ll deal with that. We wanted to make sure on an industry-wide level we had a communications plan in place to communicate with the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the California Office of Emergency Services, the California Department of Insurance and others.”

Topics California Catastrophe