Patronis Says New Insurance Commissioner Could Be Named Soon
Florida officials could name a new state insurance commissioner as soon as next month, the state’s chief financial officer said this week.
At a news conference Monday, CFO Jimmy Patronis said that a name could be submitted at the March meeting of the Florida Cabinet, made up of the top elected state officials.
“I’m excited about what’s going to happen over there,” Patronis said, according to a video of the news conference, available on the Florida Channel public site. “We’ve got to have the right person for the job.”
By law, the governor and CFO should agree on a name before submitting it to the Cabinet. The insurance commissioner and the Office of Insurance Regulation are housed within the CFO’s Department of Financial Services. The Cabinet surprised some in the insurance industry when it did not discuss the insurance commissioner position at its Jan. 17 meeting.
Florida has been without top leadership at the OIR for the past two months or so. Commissioner David Altmaier resigned in late December after more than six years in the position. Susanne Murphy, the longtime deputy director for property and casualty insurance, left in November to take a job with the Florida insurance law and lobbying firm of Meenan PA.
Patronis said it’s important for a new commissioner to be named so that he or she “can build out their team for life and health, property casualty.”
The CFO also bragged on his staff’s recent management of insurance villages set up in southwest Florida to help property owners deal with claims on damage left by Hurricane Ian in September. He said almost 1,100 policyholders came to the sites.
“We told the carriers, ‘If you’re going to participate in our insurance villages, we want you to write checks on site,” Patronis said at the news conference. “Almost $6 million was paid out at the point of the events.”
The villages will continue until most property owners with claims are taken care of, he said.