Latest California Headlines

All the headlines from our California Topic Page, ordered by recency.

Hub International Acquires Two Agencies

May 9 2011 // Hub International Limited has acquired the assets of Lawson-Hawks Insurance Agency Inc. (LHI), a Mountain View, Calif.-based insurance brokerage firm, and Mark Tauber Insurance Brokerage Inc., a Brooklyn, New York-based...

Insuring the Children Grant Provides Funding for Southern California Day Camp

May 9 2011 // Insuring the Children (ITC), a program of the Insurance Industry Charitable Foundation (IICF), has awarded a special grant to the Children’s Bureau, meeting funding needs for Oak View Summer Day Camp, held at the Oak...

Calif. Blocks Bill to Boost Insurance Commissioner’s Penalty Powers

May 9 2011 // The California Senate Insurance Committee has blocked a restitution bill that would have given explicit authority to the state Insurance Commissioner to order restitution as part of an administrative enforcement action...

Calif. Bill Targets State Workers’ Comp Insurer’s Commission Policy

May 6 2011 // California Assembly Member Anthony Portantino, 44th District, has proposed a bill aimed to level the playing field for brokers who help to secure workers’ compensation insurance from the State Compensation Insurance...

Insurer Association Urges Calif. Legislators to Ban ‘Crash Taxes’

May 4 2011 // California’s Senate Public Safety Committee held a hearing yesterday, evaluating the need to ban local governments from charging accident response fees or “crash taxes” for emergency responses to vehicle...

$11M in Calif. Insurer Investments Go to Underserved Communities

May 4 2011 // Insurance Commissioner Dave Jones and Speaker John A. Pérez announced that $11 million in new insurance company investments will benefit underserved communities across California. In February, the commissioner sent a...

Calif. Agents: Tread Carefully When Providing Workplace Safety Advice

May 4 2011 // Woe to the employer who is not attentive and actively engaged in health and safety.” That’s the warning the California Division of Occupational Safety and Health (Cal/OSHA) is giving employers in the Golden...

Calif. Attempts to Rein in Workers’ Comp Compound Drug Costs

May 3 2011 // California legislators are considering a bill aimed at reigning in the use of compound drugs in workers’ compensation claims. According to Assembly Bill 378, existing law provides that it is unlawful for a physician...

California Legislators Consider Underinsured Motorist Bill

May 2 2011 // A California Assembly committee is considering a bill that would eliminate the authority of the insurer to deduct the amount paid to the insured by or for any person or organization that may be held legally liable for the...

Turner Joins California Women’s Insurance Association

May 2 2011 // J.D. Turner, a partner at the law firm of Lorber, Greenfield & Polito LLP, in Poway, Calif., has joined the Insurance Women of North San Diego County, an affiliation of the National Association of Insurance Women,...

Pending State Legislation to Implement NRRA Is Fly in the Ointment

May 2 2011 // Pending state legislative proposals, such as California’s AB 315, that would implement the Nonadmitted and Reinsurance Reform Act of 2010 (NRRA) are akin to the fly in the ointment. The NRRA becomes effective on July...

How to Find Cyber Insurance for the Uninsurable

May 2 2011 // The University of California (UC) has redefined the rules of cyber liability insurance, using an approach that the university’s Chief Risk Officer Grace Crickette calls “reverse underwriting.”...

Business Moves

May 2 2011 // Zenith AgriBusiness Solutions In what appears to be its first foray into offering liability coverages, Zenith Insurance Co., a workers’ compensation insurance specialist, is offering agribusiness insurance in...

Calif. Commissioner Seeks Stricter Penalty Powers

May 2 2011 // California Sen. Noreen Evans, D-District 2, has introduced legislation to grant explicit authority to the state Insurance Commissioner to order restitution as part of an administrative enforcement action against an...

Agents: Tread Carefully When Providing Workplace Safety Advice

May 2 2011 // Woe to the employer who is not attentive and actively engaged in health and safety.” That’s the warning the California Division of Occupational Safety and Health (Cal/OSHA) is giving employers in the Golden...

Japan Quake Reveals Cracks in Insurance System

May 2 2011 // Michael Korn, managing principal at Integro Insurance Brokers, is a popular person these days, which is perhaps not too surprising considering he is an insurance broker in earthquake-prone San Francisco. “We’re...

Bragging About an Agent’s Book of Business May Create a Greater Legal Duty of Care

May 2 2011 // It has often been said that every attorney has a little larceny in his heart. In similar fashion, it could be said that every insurance agent has a little puffery in his heart regarding his book of business, background and...

EPIC Honored as ‘Best Place to Work’

Apr 29 2011 // California-based EPIC (Edgewood Partners Insurance Center), a retail property, casualty and employee benefits insurance brokerage, has been recognized as a “Best Place to Work in the Bay Area” for the fourth...

Fentanyl Often Prescribed in Calif. Workers’ Comp

Apr 29 2011 // A CWCI Research Spotlight Report on the use of fentanyl – the most potent Schedule II opioid – in California workers’ comp finds that More than 1 out of every 5 injured workers in California who are...

Calif. Bill Proposes Consolidating Insurance Disclosure Notices

Apr 28 2011 // California legislators are considering whether to allow certain insurance policies and disclosures to be consolidated into one document, printed in smaller type. Currently, the law requires an insurer, upon receiving...