10 Things to Know About Public Entities

1. There are 3,141 counties and county equivalents in the 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia. (USGS CoreFacts, U.S. Geological Survey)
2. Counties build and maintain 45 percent of the public roads and 230,690 of the nation’s bridges, and are involved in one-third of the transit and airport systems in the United States. (National Association of Counties)
3. More than 14,000 public school districts in the United States spend an excess of $500 billion on public elementary and secondary education annually through a combination of federal, state and local funds. (U.S. Census Bureau)
4. In 2013, nine states enacted legislation related to weapons in schools, including Tennessee, which allows any K-12 employee to carry a firearm on school grounds as long as they are licensed and have undergone selected training. Oklahoma passed a similar law related only to private schools. (Education Commission of the States)
5. Three areas about which public entities currently are curious about are cyber coverage, physical abuse and molestation coverage – particularly on the West Coast – and prevailing trends in insurance market and the effect those trends have on individual entities. (Daniel Howell, Alliant Insurance Services, California)
6. The liability side of the public entity insurance market could be characterized as a “musical chairs of underwriters” with new entrants in the market and new appetites. The property side overall is relatively soft depending on loss history of the individual public entity and its exposure to catastrophe perils. (Daniel Howell, Alliant Insurance Services, California)
7. Since the 1980s, a large number of public entities have joined insurance pools and group purchasing programs, and utilized self-insured retentions. Agents and brokers would do well to help those entities choose the correct amount of retention and find the appropriate markets. (Daniel Howell, Alliant Insurance Services, California)
8. It is estimated that more than 80 percent of cities, towns, schools, counties and special districts in the United States use risk pools to manage some or all of their risk management and risk financing needs. (Association of Governmental Risk Pools)
9. According to 2009 data, there were 87,849 entities in the public entity market nationwide, including counties, municipalities and townships, special districts, school districts. (“Public Entity Pooling – Built to Last,” Karen Nixon, Public Agency Risk Sharing Authority of California, 2011)
10. Some 39 percent of public entity risk pools are staffed by their own employees; 35 percent of pools are managed by a broker or third- party administrator; 26 percent are administered by associations. (“Public Entity Pooling – Built to Last,” Karen Nixon, Public Agency Risk Sharing Authority of California, 2011)