Insurance chief’s remark ridiculed

The Sun Herald, 5/15/8

Coast readers of the Sun Herald want to know who Insurance Commissioner Mike Chaney thinks he’s fooling when he says that state wind pool premiums will approach pre-Katrina levels in June.

“They are closer to pre-Katrina levels except that they are 75 percent more expensive,” one reader commented at sunherald.com. “C’mon. Do the math… What a joke!”

A news release that Chaney sent via e-mail quoted a rate of $679 for $100,000 of coverage on a masonry dwelling in August 2005, compared to $1,189 for the same coverage once wind pool rates drop in June. The average decrease will be 11 percent, after a statewide increase in 2006 of 90 percent for residential customers.