Summer Hours!

As you may have seen in our most recent newsletter (and if you didn't, why aren't you on our email list?!), Summer hours are now in effect at The Library. Through Labor Day, The Library will be closed on Fridays except by previous appointment.

We will periodically check email and voicemail, so if you have a rush request, do leave us a message and we will do our best to help (please note that extra fees may be incurred for the rush request).

We use this time to work on projects which we can't get done during the rest of the year and to catch up on various tasks. We believe that taking this time "off" in the summer better prepares us to meet the needs of our patrons throughout the rest of the year.

When it Rains it Pours

 

Source: Risk & Insurance Cover Story: Building Resiliency in the Face of Climate Change

 

As those of us in states with four seasons are experiencing the highs (and lows) of spring, it seems an apt time for all of the attention which is currently getting paid to climate change and insurance. We have been inundated, of late, here at The Library with information on the topic.

In today's mail we received copy of the most recent edition of Risk & Insurance with an arresting image on the front (see above). Risk & Insurance cites a number of studies/facts from leading expert organizations in their three page spread entitled: Business Resiliency in the Face of Climate Change, including from Munich Re and from The Business Continuity Institute.

On Friday, The Standard published an article with excerpts from a recent S&P study entitled: "Are Insurers Prepared for the Extreme Weather Climate Change May Bring?" It's been a popular study, also garnering articles, from Property Casualty 360, and two from The Insurance Journal.

Last week we received a donation of books from a member company. Included in the donation were copies of At War with the Weather: Managing Large-Scale Risks in a New Era of Catastrophes by Howard C. Kunreuther & Erwann O. Michel-Kerjan, 2009, The Financing of Catastrophe Risk edited by Kenneth A. Froot, 1999, and Catastrophe Modeling: A New Approach to Managing Risk edited by Patricia Grossi and Howard Kunreuther, 2005.

If you're interested in the topic, we here at The Library are poised to help, as best we can!

What's Black & White and Red All Over?!

It's not a zebra with a sunburn, it's articles about us! In case you missed it, in the past week two articles have been written about The Library.

Agency Checklists started the week off with an article about The Boston Insurance Training Center arm of our Library. You can click here to read more about our first class offered at Roxbury's Project Hope. The Boston Insurance Training Center was funded by grants from the Arbella Charitable Foundation and Eastern Insurance. This grant allows us to introduce career opportunities to underrepresented individuals and to provide the foundation of quality, professional insurance education. For more information on this program or to offer internship/job opportunities for those taking the classes, please contact Glenn Cryan.

We're ending the week with an article in The Standard. Robert Montgomery, CPCU announces in his editorial that The Library is publishing a History due out later this year. This week's issue of The Standard contains some excerpts from that upcoming book (that article begins on page 12).



Click Here to Visit The Standard's Website

Don't be a Scrooge!

"At the ominous word 'liberality', Scrooge frowned, and
shook his head, and handed the credentials back." -- A Christmas Carol

On Black Friday last year, I posted the many ways you could donate to The Library. The ways haven't changed, though the various wishlists have had additions of subtractions. I mentioned in another post that after several years of having it on the wishlist, we were the lucky recipients of a lap top. We also had several individuals step forward in the past year to adopt books (we showed off the re-furbished History of Insurance in Philadelphia at this week's Annual Meeting). In case you wanted to donate to a charity as you shopped on amazon, or you wanted to make sure to get a donation in to one of your favorite charities before the end of the year, we thought we'd publish the three main ways to donate in one easy to find place!

The Annual Fund is where general monetary donations throughout the year go. The money is spent on up-keep of the library as well as focusing on one or two projects for the year. Companies and individuals who donate to the annual fund get their name published in our newsletter (we're a non-profit so your donation may also be eligible for a tax deduction -- we're not tax experts though). This year, a portion of the money went toward cleaning the library and putting finishing touches on rooms that had been damaged in the flood. If you take any classes from the library, you'll notice the basement classrooms have been spruced up!

Another way of supporting the library and its collection is through the "Adopt A Book Program" which provides for preservation of our historical publications and documents. The money donated goes toward a specific item --you can read some background about the books and look at them online in their tattered state to pick which one you want to adopt. We make sure a personalized book plate is put in the front of books, when requested, so users know whose generosity ensured future use of the material. The book plate can be donated in honor of someone in case you want to buy it as a gift for someone else. Your recipient can come into the library any time they want and admire the book-binder's handiwork and their name emblazoned on the inside cover.

Finally, the library has an Amazon Wishlist. While you're completing your other shopping on amazon, you can click over and skim the list. If anything catches your fancy, you can simply add it to your cart with the rest of your purchase and Amazon should know to send it to us. You'll notice there are items on the list for general office upkeep. We're currently using the 2004 version of Quicken and would love to upgrade to a more recent version. As you would expect, the rest of the list is filled out with books. Many of these books have been requested by patrons or are for very specialized areas of insurance interest but aren't in our budget. If you find something that falls within your particular area of interest, we'd love it if you'd donate it to our library so we could share it with many more people.

We are very grateful for all the ways in which our membership supports us, without your generosity we would not be able to offer the services we do!

Annual Meeting

The library had its annual meeting today and welcomed a new trustee, Patrick Quinn of Quinn Group Insurance, to the board.

Patrick Quinn and Frederick N. Nowell, III

Three awards were presented at the meeting as well. Sara Hua of Ironshore earned The Frank W. Humphrey Award. Joe Sciacca, her instructor, presented the award after a heartfelt speech about all of Sara's hard work. Her acceptance speech almost brought the group to tears!

Sarah Hua and Joseph Sciacca

Marc Cleary presented The Barbara W. Thornton Award to his colleague and student, Samantha Frank of Liberty Mutual. She spoke highly of Marc in her acceptance speech mentioning his excellent track record in preparing her for the national examinations.

Marc Cleary & Samantha Frank

Finally, Marc Cleary received an award as a teacher of excellence, for the above average passing ratio of students in his classes. It is the highest level of award from The Institutes, and Marc seemed both surprised and very pleased to be the recipient! He commented that it's the students who do so well, he merely encourages them to take the tests. "You can't pass unless you try."

We are very proud of all three award winners and pleased that they could attend the meeting this morning!

Insurance Library Annual Meeting

This year's Insurance Library Association's Annual Meeting will be held on Tuesday, November 22, 2011. The meeting is open to all of our members (member companies may send a representative). If you'd like to attend the meeting or assign a proxy, you can email Jean Lucey, or fill out the form found here.

Onward & Upward

Sandra Glaser Parrillo, 2011 Insurance Professional of the Year Award Winner

Donald F. Vose, President of the Board of Trustees for The Insurance Library Association of Boston

I'm afraid this blog languished while we worked on the Education Fair in September and the Insurance Professional of the Year Event in October. November is suddenly upon us and we're shocked at how quickly our annual meeting is approaching.

I mentioned last year that after The Insurance Professional of the Year Award Ceremony it often feels like a new year around here (perhaps it's no coincidence that our event occurs in the same season as Rosh Hashanah). So I'm sure you'll pardon us as we reflect a little.

A lot has happened in the last year:

1. We've worked harder on maintaining our website and blog. We've started a LinkedIn profile for the library and we're exploring ways to make our library even more available electronically.

2. We've added more items to our adopt a book program, and to our wishlist (and we finally got the laptop we'd put on there several years ago!).

3. We held our first ever Education Fair (with a lot of support), and had our 10th Insurance Professional of the Year Award Ceremony (which included a lot of firsts as well).

4. We put on our first ever (though, not last) silent auction during the social hour at The Award Ceremony -- thanks to a lot of support for that, we raised about $6,300 for the library!

Some staff changes include:

1. Our Director, Jean Lucey, changing her schedule to working three days a week.

2. Our "other" Jean, Jean Osborne, increasing her hours to three days a week (we don't ever want to be short a Jean).

3. Meagan completing another two CPCU tests on her way toward earning the designation.

It really does feel like a whirlwind, but we are glad that you were here for the ride!

Redlining

Last week I promised a post somewhat related to Martin Luther King jr. and the Civil Rights Movement. There is so much information available on the topic I had in mind that it's been hard to provide a concise and insightful post on it. I suppose that's a great argument for why you should be a member of the library -- then you could borrow all of our resources and become an expert on the subject yourself!

When I tried to come up with an insurance topic related to the holiday, the first one that came to mind was Redlining. According to the IRMI Glossary of Insurance and Risk Management Terms it is:

An underwriting practice involving the rejection of a risk based solely on geographical location. This practice is prohibited under the laws of most states as it tends to be discriminatory to minorities.

The practice of redlining began in the 1930s though the term wasn't used until the 1960s (if wikipedia can be believed). It literally refers to the red lines that used to be drawn on maps used for property loans. Below you can see an example of a similar map of Philadelphia:

If you click on the map, you will be transferred to the UPenn website on redlining where you can click on different locations on the map and zoom in to see what it says (this is all courtesy of the Free Library of Philadelphia Map Collection). The insurance industry adopted a similar stance to that of banks and as a result it was difficult to get insurance in certain urban areas. In 1968 the President's National Advisory Panel on Insurance in Riot Affected Areas examined the ill effect that not providing affordable insurance just based on locality was having on communities. A 1979 publication entitled Insurance Redlining: Fact Not Fiction, describes the issue by saying:"The problem of insurance unavailability is not one that randomly affects isolated individuals but rather strikes at residents of older urban communities. Insurance unavailability threatens the viability of entire communities."

The result of the 1968 examination was the establishment of Fair Access to Insurance Requirements or FAIR plans. As Gregory D. Squires says in Insurance Redlining: Disinvestment, Reinvestment, and the Evolving Role of Financial Institutions, "I have often referred to the issue of insurance redlining as the ugly duckling of the fair housing movement." The Fair plans established in the early 70s required inspection of properties to determine their risk level and provided minimal standards of insurance for hard to place risks.

In the years that followed that initial study, many states also adopted anti-redlining legislation. "The State of Missouri enacted one of the earliest antiredlining laws" in 1977, according to Insurance Redlining: Fact not Fiction. The National Association of Insurance Commissioners added an antiredlining section to their recommended Unfair Trade Practices Act in 1978. Their reasoning, explained in the 1978 NAIC proceedings was that

It is the position of the NAIC that the insurance industry has been perceived
to be redlining, and the perception can only be altered by implementing such
practices as stating exact reasons for rejections, cancellations and
nonrenewals. The insurance industry should also abandon underwriting
"short-cuts" such as refusing to accept an application solely because the
applicant was refused coverage by another carrier.

While I would like to report that the threat of redlining has been completely eradicated, there have been well publicized cases regarding redlining filed by the NAACP as recently as the 90s. Still, I hope that Martin Luther King would be proud of the progress that has been made.

If you'd like more information on the history of redlining, we have the items cited in this post, as well as Regulatory Challenge Business Principles Versus Social Pressures (an analysis of property and casualty insurance regulation) by Conning and Company; Problem of Property Insurance In Urban America, a Hearing Before the Subcommittee on Housing and Urban Affairs; Full Insurance Availability: Department of Housing and Urban Development and Fairness and Balance in Residential Property Insurance: A National Survey of Homeowners Attitudes. We've also got journal articles discussing redlining.

Burning Interest in Punitive Damages

In Massachusetts yesterday a jury awarded 71 million dollars when they found a tobacco company liable for the death of Marie Evans. The full story can be found in the Boston Globe, among other places. It turns out that the tobacco company in question, "Lorillard had never lost a case brought by an individual before yesterday" While the tobacco company is appealing the case, there is speculation that more cases may follow as a result of this one.

Apparently "the verdict sets up a second phase of deliberations in which the jury could also award Evans’s estate and family punitive damages, which often are a multiple of the amounts awarded in the compensatory phase." Insurance coverage for punitive damages is actually an interesting topic. By interesting, I mean it is a topic that is worthy of many articles full of discussion as well as a few books. Clearly we don't have the space to explore all of the ramifications here in a little blog post, but a section from The Thomson West Publication: Punitive Damages Law and Practice by John J. Kircher and Christine M. Wiseman sheds some light on how convoluted a topic it is.

The question of insurance coverage for punitive damages continues to plague the courts, insurers, and insureds. The trend appears to favor finding coverage, but the decisions have not persuasively decided the issue. In fact, they have more recently enhanced the controversy by positing additional arguments both in support of and in opposition to coverage. (pp 7-38-7-39)

They go on to discuss the reasoning behind punitive damages and explore whether insurance coverage hinders those motives:

In most jurisdictions, punitive damages are intended to be awarded not to compensate the injured, but to punish the wrongdoer and to deter the wrongdoer and others from similar egregious conduct. Once it is determined that punitive damages are covered by the policy terms, courts then face the issue whether coverage would frustrate the public policy involved in the punishment and deterrence considerations of the punitive damages. (pp 7-42-7-43)

If you're interested in more information on punitive damages or products liability, please feel free to email the library with your specific question or stop by and check out our collection.

More Holiday Fire Talk

We were sort of a killjoy when it came to Thanksgiving. We're back to talk about Chanukah which starts this week (sundown on the 1st if I read my calendar right). You're probably thinking we'll harp on how dangerous frying food is, or how having 9 candles burning near wrapping paper is a definite no-no. You'd be wrong though. What we have to talk about today is only tangentially related to Chanukah.

Recently I was looking at the definition of fire in an insurance glossary (Rupp's Insurance and Risk Management Glossary, 2nd edition for those of you who don't follow the link). I thought it was very interesting that the glossary differentiated between friendly fire and hostile fire especially since I had really only heard the term friendly fire in regard to war.

In insurance terms, Chanukah candles would epitomize friendly fire. They are set intentionally for beneficial purposes and (it is hoped) remain within their intended confines. Insurance does not cover friendly fire unless it spreads to unintended materials (in other words, becomes hostile).

If you are yearning for more information on fire definitions, you'd probably like to know that most fires caused by modern Chanukah celebrations would be considered "class a fires," fires involving solid combustibles and best put out using water or class a fire extinguishers. Had the oil lamp at the original Chanukah spread beyond the proper confines, it would have been a "class b fire," a type of fire involving flammable liquids (oil) and requiring carbon dioxide or a class b fire extinguisher to put out.

My foray into the insurance glossary section of our collection led me to an 1886 book called Harris's Technical Fire Insurance Dictionary. As you may know, our library began in 1887 as a fire insurance library (we didn't add casualty insurance to our collection until 1920 and it wasn't until the 1970s that we broadened our collection to include life and health insurance). This means, that the book was part of our very early collection housed in this room:

(taken from the 1923 edition of The Insurance Index)

And carefully watched over by a librarian following these rules:

A larger version of this can be found by following this link.

Harris's Technical Fire Insurance Dictionary has many interesting entries. The preface states:

This book, comprising in a condensed form many notes and observations made by the Author during a long and very busy experience as Surveyor, Inspector and Branch Secretary, has been written mainly with the view of drawing attention of Fire Insurance Officials and Agents to important points connected with matters of survey, and general practice and to the many dangers arising not only during processes of manufacture, but also from the crowded character of risks; from spontaneous combustion; and from other sources too numerous to mention.

Yes, all of that is one sentence, and also the first paragraph of the preface! I love that it includes this phrase: "comprising in a condensed form. . ." leaving me to wonder what a fully expanded form would look like.

My favorite entry in the book though, is the following:

FIRES, Refreshments at: Bills for expenses of this kind require very careful scrutiny, and in no case should they be paid when refreshments have been given away indiscriminately, or without proper authority. In no case where publicans throw open their houses should any payment be authorised by the Agent. See also FIRES, Assistance At.

If you are as charmed by this book as I am or there's someone on your holiday list who you think might be taken with it, feel free to contact us about the possibility of adopting the book as part of our "adopt a book" program. While the book is not in terrible shape, it could use some loving care to bring it back to its former glory.