Feeling Helpless in Rain-Ravaged New Hampshire

New Hampshire independent insurance agent Tom Minkler got his first call Sunday morning Oct. 9 at 5 a.m. After that, the phones continued ringing. Minkler wasn’t bothered by the calls. What bothered him was having to tell so many of his customers that they had no flood insurance.

“It’s very hard. We have an awful lot of customers who chose not to buy flood insurance and we feel so badly,” said Minkler, vice president of Clark-Mortenson Agency, which has one of its offices in flood-stricken Keene.

“It’s a helpless feeling,” he lamented when contacted by Insurance Journal.

Little has changed

Unfortunately, little has changed since then. The rains, the phone calls and the denials of the need for coverage continued throughout the month.

That week in early October, heavy rains caused unprecedented flooding that destroyed roads, bridges, homes and farms in the southwestern part of the state. As many as seven people were killed.

Gov. John Lynch declared a state of emergency and called in 500 National Guard members for assistance. “This is the worst damage they’ve seen from flooding in 25 years in New Hampshire,” the governor said.

Additional heavy rains a week later worsened the damage. Then when contacted by Insurance Journal even later, on Oct. 26, Minkler was in his office as outside wild winds and rain compliments of Hurricane Wilma were threatening local riverbanks yet again. Another flood watch was in effect.

Declined to buy

During the first October storm, Minkler said most of the callers without flood coverage remembered they declined to buy it. But they called anyway, hoping there might be a loophole. Minkler doesn’t blame them. “It’s so tragic. In my 29 years in the industry I have never seen this type of destruction on such a broad scale,” he said. His own building escaped harm.

In the entire state, the National Flood Insurance Program reports there are only about 5,000 policies in force. The average premium in the area is between $400 and $500.

In late October, his agency was still receiving flood damage claims daily from those people who were just getting around to dealing with their physical losses, after taking time to cope with the human tragedy. For those with coverage, his agency employees have stepped in to help however they can.

For those many homeowners and business owners without coverage, his staff tries to provide a sympathetic shoulder, tips on restoring property and information on external resources.

But it has not been easy to see the hurt and be unable to help the way an independent agency prides itself on doing. One customer came in with “just the clothes on his back,” his home, car and possessions having been washed away by the record high waters. Another customer became extremely angry when reminded he had no insurance, but later embraced an agency employee to acknowledge in the midst of all his pain and loss that he should have listened to their advice and renewed his flood policy.

The homes of six of the agency’s own employees were damaged.

Minkler hoped that the tragic experience of early October might prompt more clients to buy coverage but that hasn’t been the case. Since that first flood, his agency has received numerous calls inquiring about flood insurance but only two clients have purchased the coverage.

Minkler is disappointed. “Even with the horrific results that flooding can produce fresh in everyone’s mind, virtually no one wants to purchase the coverage,” he commented.

How could this happen? “I believe that this is partly the result of a basic misunderstanding by many individuals. Many believe that if they suffer a flood loss, the federal and or state governments will take care of them, at no cost to the homeowner or business owner. This is just not the reality of the situation,” the veteran agent added.

Minkler, who sits on the national board of the Independent Insurance Agents and Brokers, has been thinking about his agent friends in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida with whom he has communicated recently. While the southwestern New Hampshire floods are much smaller in scale than what his southeastern friends have experienced, for Minkler they brought home the “power of water” and the tragedy of seeing people lose everything.

“This is when we in this business should shine and step in to help people,” Minkler said, sadly noting there is little his agency can do for those who decline to buy flood protection.