Around the P&C insurance industry: August 12, 2020
News from Kennedys, NAMIC, Brightway Insurance, and more.
Kennedys has announced that it is forming an association with Dolden Wallace Folick, LLP. The two firms share a number of global, London market and U.S.-based clients and have worked together on several matters.
NAMIC announced that the federal disaster policy achieved another milestone as the application process for the first grants under the Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities (BRIC) grant program is getting underway. The result of a years-long NAMIC advocacy initiative, the BRIC program was established under the Disaster Recovery Reform Act of 2018 to provide significant and consistent funding to states, local communities, tribes, and territories for cost-effective, risk-reducing disaster mitigation activities to strengthen the nation’s resilience and reduce future disaster costs and losses. The funding notice is available on Grants.gov. Applications will be accepted Sept. 30, 2020, through Jan. 29, 2021.
Brightway opens two new agencies in Florida and Louisiana: Brightway, The O’Niell Agency in Lafayette, La., and Brightway, The Linda Dreiling Agency in Lake Worth, Fla.
Foundation of Associated Industries of Florida, Florida Department of Economic Opportunity, FloridaMakes and Workers’ Compensation Institute will co-host the Cybersecurity Forum 2020 on September 16-17. The second annual forum, which is being held as a virtual event this year, will include relevant educational offerings on best practices in cybersecurity for businesses across all industries and professionals at all levels.
RMS announced significant updates to its suite of HWind forecasting products, which are part of the RMS HWind Real-Time Analysis solution. HWind forecasting product updates expand the amount and quality of information that can be discerned about potential track, hazard, and loss impacts during an active event. The corresponding analytics and insights support a variety of pre-landfall event response applications.
NAIC Financial Regulation Standards and Accreditation Committee voted to accredit the departments of Maryland, Oregon and Washington. Accredited insurance departments undergo comprehensive, independent review every five years to ensure they meet financial solvency oversight standards. The NAIC Accreditation Program was established to develop and maintain standards to promote effective insurance company financial solvency regulation. The purpose of the accreditation program is for state insurance departments to meet baseline standards of solvency regulation, particularly with respect to the regulation of multi-state insurers. To become accredited, the state must submit to a full on-site accreditation review.