Declarations

“I really feel for the business owners in the heart of downtown who have fought so hard to come back after Floyd in 1999.”

Virginia Gov. Timothy M. Kaine in declaring a statewide emergency after as much as 12 inches of rain fell on central and southeastern Virginia, swelling the Blackwater River and flooding the city of Franklin. As many as 120 businesses and 35 homes suffered damage in the worst flooding since Hurricane Floyd in September 1999.

Charitable kick-off
“New York could be our most important division. New York is the world capital of insurance.”

Bill Ross, CEO of the Insurance Industry Charitable Foundation, upon the launch of a New York division. The California organization believes collective industry giving can be more effective and garner more recognition than individual company efforts. The New York division has set a goal of $3 million in community grants to nonprofits within its first two years. American International Group gave $400,000 to launch the East Coast division. Other founding members include Endurance Global Insurance Group; Excess Line Association of New York; LeBoeuf, Lamb, Greene & MacRae LLP, Munich Reinsurance of America Inc., ABD Insurance Services Inc., Benfield Group, Chubb Group and Enterprise Rent-A-Car.

Hurricane forecast
“We have experienced average hurricane activity through September. August was inactive, but September had above-average activity. We expect October to have below-average activity largely due to developing El Nino conditions in the central and eastern Pacific. November activity in El Nino years is very rare.”

Colorado State University hurricane expert William Gray upon downgrading his forecast for the 2006 Atlantic storm season again. He now predicts no intense hurricanes.

Terrorism coverage take-up
“The general trend observed in the market has been that as insurer retentions have increased under TRIA and policyholder surpluses have risen, prices for terrorism risk have fallen and take-up rates have increased.”

The report by the President’s Working Group on Financial Markets Terrorism Insurance in concluding that the Terrorism Risk Insurance Act “appears to negatively affect the emergence of private reinsurance capacity because it dilutes demand for private sector reinsurance.”

Main Street settlement

“Main Street insurance agents did not commit the alleged abuses that led to these proposed settlements. But this settlement agreement attempts to impose a remedy for wrongdoing on Main Street agents, who did nothing wrong. That’s just not right.”

National Association of Professional Insurance Agents Executive Vice President Len Brevik, who asked a court to delay approval of a class settlement with Zurich Insurance involving compensation disclosure.