Raleigh Report Special Edition 

NOTE: IIANC has been working hard to provide assistance to our members in the impacted parts of the state, and information on those resource can be found on our website.

The impact of all the damage done by Helene prompted the NC General Assembly to come into a special session on Wednesday, October 9th, to address immediate issues associated with the state’s recovery efforts. 

The legislative relief package was inserted into an existing bill and handled as a conference report, meaning no amendments would be considered and legislators would simply vote YES or NO. 

The bill passed both the state House and Senate without opposition, and Governor Roy Cooper signed it into law on Thursday. 

Contained in HB 419, entitled Disaster Recovery Act of 2024:

• Appropriates $273M from state reserves to create the Hurricane Helene Fund, with $250M of that going for required state match of federal funds provided through the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), as well as for a revolving loan program for state and local government agencies to cover expenses while they await the arrival of federal funds.  
• Grants $5M to the State Board of Elections for costs associated with finding new voting locations in the impacted counties, and puts in place several temporary election laws to accommodate the voting process for the 2024 election for citizens in the west. NC Elections Board met Monday to address the issue of election-related accommodations needed in place where existing precinct vote sites are now unusable. 
• Dedicates $2M to organizations that work with local government to assist with management of recovery funds, with a priority given to counties with fewer than 250,000 residents. 
• Offers local governments in impacted areas flexibility to use existing state wastewater and drinking water funds to cover needed repairs, permits open burning of storm-related debris without an air quality permit, waives certain DMV fees and sets aside some environmental requirements related to repair of roads, and extends provisional licenses of adult and family care homes. 
• Provides $16M for nutrition employees within public schools who lost compensation due to closures, and offers local school systems flexibility in calendaring to make up for lost instructional time. 
• Extends to March 2025 the governor’s statewide emergency declaration that facilitates the use of state personnel and materials in the recovery efforts.

The legislature plans to return on October 24th to take up any additional disaster-related issues, and IIANC is in discussions with the NC Department of Insurance to assess all matters that impact independent insurance agents which may necessitate legislative action.

Given the significant flooding in western North Carolina caused by Hurricane Helene, IIANC received a number of media inquiries about what people without flood coverage could do.

IIANC member Lisa Sharrard (pictured above), a nationally recognized flood insurance expert, made herself available to chat with reporters a number of times, and is working with IIANC lobbyist Joe Stewart on what proposals can be made to the state legislature to address flood coverage issues going forward.

IIANC Board Steps Up 

Also announced this week was that the IIANC Board of Directors had approved up to $100,000 from the organizations reserves to match all donations to the Trusted Choice Disaster Relief Fund made by the close of business on Friday, October 18th, 2024.

This program provides financial assistance to insurance industry personnel impacted by catastrophic occurrences not covered by their own insurance or other grants and funding sources.  

And finally … 

The IIANC Governmental Affairs program will host a post-election recap at 12 noon on Wednesday, November 6th, and IIANC lobbyist Joe Stewart

will provide insights and analysis on the results, and what they mean relative to the legislative and regulatory priorities of independent insurance agents at both the state and federal level. 

You can register for this free webinar (CE credits available) by clicking HERE. 

And, you can check out information on the candidates for NC Insurance Commissioner on the IIANC 2024 Elections webpage. 

This week, the NC Alliance for Safe Transportation (Joe Stewart is chair of the NCAST Board) launched a new free monthly newsletter, Safe Travels NC. 

NCAST has a distribution list of 28,000 NC households who have an interest in traffic safety issues, as well as local and state elected officials and others in governmental positions that deal with transportation matters. 

If you have friends, family, customers or colleagues who would like to receive Safe Travels NC, please forward them the link, www.safetravelsnc.org, so they can subscribe.