Latest Florida Headlines
All the headlines from our Florida Topic Page, ordered by recency.
Florida Lawmakers Advance Brain Injury, Wrongly Imprisoned Claims Bills
Jan 12 2012 // A man who spent 27 years in prison for a murder he didn’t commit and the brain-damaged and paralyzed victim of a crash with a speeding sheriff’s deputy who was late for work would receive millions in...
Outpatient Costs Higher in States Without Fee Schedules: Workers’ Comp Study
Jan 11 2012 // States without fee schedules have higher hospital outpatient costs for common surgeries compared to states with fee schedules, according to a workers’ compensation study. The study found that significant variations...
Florida Lawmakers File Bills to Address Auto Insurance PIP Fraud
Jan 11 2012 // State Sen. Joe Negron this week filed legislation designed to crack down on the fraud that leads to more expensive personal injury protection insurance required of all Florida drivers. Negron’s bill (SB 1860) targets...
Florida Gov. Scott Talks Insurance Fraud in State of State Speech
Jan 11 2012 // In the annual State of the State address opening Florida legislative session, Gov. Rick Scott highlighted automobile insurance while remaining mum on the future of the state’s property insurance underwriter, Citizens...
Florida’s Citizens Property CEO Wallace to Exit
Jan 10 2012 // Citizens Property Insurance Corp. President Scott Wallace has announced that he will step down as president and CEO of the corporation effective April 6. Wallace, who has served more than six years as the CEO of the...
Texas Insurer Acquires Florida’s Physicians Insurance
Jan 9 2012 // The Texas Medical Liability Trust has acquired the Florida-based Physicians Insurance Co. The Deerfield Beach, Florida-based Physicians Insurance has been operating in the state since 2003. According to a 2011 Office of...
Florida Waits on Condo Rates
Jan 9 2012 // Florida condominium buildings will see no rate increase for now. Citizens Property Insurance Corp. has been looking to shed some of its current 1.5 million policyholders. One proposal called for capping the available...
Florida May Tap Surplus Lines to Depopulate Citizens
Jan 9 2012 // Florida lawmakers are considering allowing surplus lines carriers to help Citizens Property Insurance Corp. lose some of its 1.5 million policyholders. State Sen. Garrett Richter (R-Naples) and Rep. Jim Boyd (R-Bradenton)...
People
Jan 9 2012 // State insurance regulators have named 28 consumer representatives to advise them on insurance issues during 2012. The National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) said the 18 funded and 10 unfunded consumer...
Florida’s Older Drivers Need a Road Plan
Jan 9 2012 // Florida is home to one of the highest percentages of residents ages 65 and older in the United States, but very few of them have thought ahead to a time when they will no longer be able to drive a vehicle safely or...
Florida Investigating Massive PIP Fraud in Dade County
Jan 8 2012 // State investigators are considering criminal charges after finding regulatory violations in almost 90 percent of the pain clinics that treat automobile accident victims in Miami-Dade County. A report by the Agency for...
Florida Workers’ Compensation Market Remains Healthy: State Report
Jan 6 2012 // The state’s annual report on workers’ compensation insurance says Florida’s market is “competitive,” and availability of coverage is not a significant problem. The Office of Insurance...
Florida Citrus Growers Batlling Sub-Freezing Temperatures
Jan 5 2012 // Florida citrus growers reported damage to some orange groves for the second consecutive day on Thursday, after overnight temperatures dropped dangerously low in parts of the state’s citrus belt. “For the second...
Traffic Deaths Continue to Decline in Florida
Jan 4 2012 // State officials say the number of traffic deaths in Florida has continued to drop. The Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles reported that through Monday there were 2,312 traffic deaths in Florida, compared with...
Florida Commercial Health Plan Enrollment Continues Overall Slide
Dec 22 2011 // Enrollment in commercial health insurance in Florida was down 4.3 percent in 2010, the fifth straight year it has dropped. The annual report of the Florida Health Care Insurance Advisory Board shows that total enrollment...
For Florida Gov. Scott, Insurance Fixes Are Legislative Priority
Dec 21 2011 // Gov. Rick Scott wants lawmakers to fix a pair of auto and property insurance issues that are costing Floridians hundreds of millions of dollars but have eluded resolution for more than a decade. The issue facing the...
Digital Insurance Acquires South Florida’s Kellogg Smith
Dec 20 2011 // Digital Insurance has acquired Kellogg Smith as part of a plan to increase its presence in Florida. The addition of the Miami-based Kellogg markets the eleventh addition to the company this year. Established in 1993,...
Florida’s Citizens Pulls Back on Condominium Rate Hikes for Now
Dec 20 2011 // Florida condominium buildings that rent out 25 percent of their units will see no rate increase for now despite playing a key role in the state’s largest property insurer’s plan to reduce its policy...
Supreme Court Schedules Obama Healthcare Arguments
Dec 19 2011 // Oral arguments on President Barack Obama’s sweeping U.S. healthcare overhaul will last 5-1/2 hours spread over three days from March 26-28, the Supreme Court said on Monday. The Supreme Court last month agreed to...
Florida’s Citizens Insurance Board Approves Proposals for Depopulating
Dec 19 2011 // The board overseeing the Citizens Property Insurance Corp. is moving ahead with a half dozen recommendations for the Legislature it believes will help depopulate the state-backed insurer. The plan approved last week in...
