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California Town Must Improve Risk Management or Lose Insurance Coverage

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Insured City

One southern California town has officially been warned that their insurance will be cut off if city officials do not adopt risk management policies.

Irwindale’s insurer, the California Joint Powers Insurance Authority, issued a performance improvement plan on August 28 and said city liability and workers compensation insurance will be terminated if it does not adopt the measures. Allegations of corruption have cast a pall over the police department and local government, and the city has been forced into almost $2 million in settlement payouts over the past five years, according to the Pasadena Star News.

“They’re on notice that they need to improve their risk management practices within the city’s operations, specifically in the police department, to maintain their insurance coverage with our agency,” JPIA’s risk management program manager Bob May told the paper.

Irwindale has been mired in controversy over the past few years.

Of 24 police officers, three are on paid administrative leave and the department is conducting 14 internal affairs investigations. A local woman recently filed a $20 million lawsuit against the city, alleging that an officer sexually assaulted her during a traffic stop. Police Lt. Mario Camacho has been accused of retaliation by an officer under his command and of sexual harassment by a female cadet. Four city officials are charged with of misappropriation of public funds, embezzlement and conflict of interest resulting from a series of lavish trips to New York City that utilized over $200,000 of public funds.

Under the guidelines from JPIA, the city must hire a permanent human resources manager and council members must complete training on council relations and cooperation. If they do not complete the improvement plan, they risk losing coverage and will have to go to the open market or self-insure.

In September 2011, the JPIA issued a similar warning to the city of La Puente, Calif. As part of the “healthy members program” criteria, which outlines what members should do to stay within risk management guidelines, Insurance Journal reported that the town’s performance improvement plan required that La Puente “hire a permanent city manager, give notice of any harassment and retaliation complaints, and send council members to etiquette classes to learn how to get along.” The city recently completed the program and remains insured.

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So far, the only town to be officially cut off by the California Joint Powers Insurance Authority is Maywood. The city was dropped in 2010 and the lack of insurance forced the local government to lay off almost all of its employees and disband the police department.

Risk Managers Gain Foothold as ERM Program Drivers

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Fewer boards of directors are seen as their company’s top ERM program drivers, dropping to 26% in 2013 from 34% in 2011, according to the 2013 RIMS Enterprise Risk Management Survey, released today. This year risk managers came in as the second driver at 17%. By comparison, the second highest category in the 2011 report, which did not include risk management as an option, was “other” at 19%. Commenting on the 2011 report, Carol Fox, RIMS director of strategic & enterprise risk practice confirmed that many respondents wrote in their comments, that “other” was a risk management department initiative. “While I can’t do a direct comparison to this year’s 17%, I’d say it may be a shift as risk professionals take more of a leadership role in instituting ERM programs,” she said.

In 2011, in fact, part of the survey’s response was that “risk managers needed to take more of a leadership role with ERM. And since board leadership showed a drop [in 2013], risk managers may have taken up the slack,” she said.

Fox observed that concerns about rating agency requirements resulting from the financial crisis of 2008—that were some of the drivers for ERM in 2011—were also lower. “In 2013 ‘regulatory drivers’ for implementing ERM was 14%, dropping from 18% in 2011—so it is a shift,” she said.

What this means, she explained, is that more organizations understand the value of ERM. “It’s no longer about compliance with regulations or pressure from the rating agencies. They’re seeing the value in ERM itself.”

The board is still the largest driver, however. “That hasn’t changed, ERM is still very much top of mind for the board. As you look at the types of risk that can affect the objectives of the organization, they are mostly strategic. They are still the primary driver, but they were a higher driver in years past,” she said, adding, “This doesn’t say the board is less interested. The primary driver is the leadership role the risk professional is bringing.”

The 2013 RIMS ERM Survey was produced with Advisen LTD as a follow up to previous surveys in 2009 and 2011. The survey is free for both RIMS members and non-members and can be downloaded in RIMS newly revamped Risk Knowledge library at www.rims.org/RiskKnowledge.

 

RMORSA Part 3: Risk Appetite and Tolerance Statement

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The third step in the Risk Management and Own Risk and Solvency Assessment Model Act (RMORSA) is the implementation of a risk appetite and tolerance statement. This step is meant to sets boundaries on how much risk your organization is prepared to accept in the pursuit of its strategic objectives.

An organization-wide risk appetite statement provides direction for your organization and is a mandatory part of your assessment. As defined by COSO (one of the risk management standards measured in the RIMS Risk Maturity Model umbrella framework), the risk appetite statement allows organizations to “introduce operational policies that assure the board and themselves that they are pursuing objectives within reasonable risk limits.” A risk appetite statement should be reflective of your organization’s strategic objectives and serve as a starting point for risk policies and procedures.

Once your organization has documented your risk appetite (and received the Board’s approval), the question becomes how do you measure whether your organization is adhering to it? The answer is to implement risk tolerances.

While risk appetite is a higher level statement that broadly considers the levels of risk that management deems acceptable, risk tolerances set acceptable levels of variation around risk. For example, a company that says it does not accept risks that could result in a significant loss of its revenue base is expressing appetite.  When the same company says that it does wish to accept risks that would cause revenue from its top 10 customers to decline by more than 1%, it is expressing a tolerance.

Why Set Tolerance Levels?

Operating within risk tolerances provides management with greater assurance that the company remains within its risk appetite, which in turn provides a higher degree of comfort that the organization will achieve its objectives.

The second step of RMORSA, Risk Identification and Prioritization, outlines a risk assessment process for your organization that provides quantitative language for risk based decision making. This standardized scale allows you to discuss the resulting assessment indexes to determine a uniform tolerance throughout the organization. It may not be possible to set accurate tolerances until risk intelligence has been collected over a period of time, but eventually you’ll be able to prioritize resources to the risks with the highest variation.

The process of articulating a risk appetite statement and setting tolerances brings your ERM program into alignment. Every day, process owners make operational decisions about risk far from the organization’s risk appetite statement, which is set at a senior executive level. By setting tolerances, process owners are provided benchmarks they can use to measure their performance.

Align with Strategic Goals

When risk tolerances are aligned with both overall risk appetite and strategic goals, they will improve risk mitigation effectiveness and contribute to achieving your strategic goals. It is important to remember that risk appetite and tolerance levels are not static. They should be reviewed and reconsidered periodically by senior executives to keep your organization moving in the right direction.

To learn more about risk appetite and risk tolerance statements, look for the complimentary LogicManager webinar, “ORSA Compliance: 5 Steps You Need to Take” in 2014.

http://info.logicmanager.com/918-orsa-compliance-erm-framework


FEMA Releases Premium Guidelines for “High-Risk” Flood Zones

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Insurers have historically used FEMA’s Specific Rating Guidelines to calculate premiums for properties at high risk of flooding, particularly those built with the lowest floor elevation below the Base Flood Elevation (BFE). Prior to the National Flood Insurance Program’s extension in 2012 owners of these properties received subsidized rates well below the true flood risk. Many of these properties will now be rated using the Specific Rating Guidelines which FEMA released to the public last Wednesday.

The use of these new guidelines will undoubtedly result in significantly higher premium rates for many property owners in high risk zones. In its report FEMA stated that people whose properties are four feet below base flood elevation will see premiums totaling $95,000 over a 10-year period. These rates have many property owners and elected officials speaking out strongly against the reforms. Members of the Louisiana congressional delegation, including Senator Mary Landrieu (D), Rep. Bill Cassidy (R), and Rep. Cedric Richmond (D), have urged Congress to pass legislation that will delay or lower the rate increases. “I remain very concerned about the impacts these rate increases will have on homeowners and small businesses throughout our nation,” said Sen. Landrieu. Michael Hecht, president and CEO of Greater New Orleans, Inc., went every further stating that “flood insurance will be unaffordable for home and business owners across coastal and riverine America.”

In its guidelines FEMA did provide suggestions for property owners affected by the rate increases which include elevating the property above base flood level; however, this is often easier said than done. Flood insurance policies in the northeast offered an extra $30,000 to allow owners to elevate properties that had been damaged during Hurricane Sandy, but many property owners found that this amount would not cover all of the costs associated with elevating an entire property several feet above its original base. Other FEMA suggestions include adding flood vents to the property’s foundation, taking on higher deductibles, and working with local officials about community wide mitigation strategies.

The NFIP has become a major point of contention in light of the program’s fiscal crisis which was only exacerbated by Hurricane Sandy in 2012. House Financial Services Committee Chairman Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas) went as far as to vow that his committee would take up legislation to privatize the flood insurance market. The program is sure to draw more and more attention as rate increases go into effect October 1, 2013.