Summary
April 15, 2024
Honorable Senator Josh Becker
1021 O Street, Suite 7250
Sacramento, CA 95814
Re: Support letter for Senate Bill 1060: Property insurance underwriting: risk models
Dear Senator Josh Becker,
On behalf of the Marin County Board of Supervisors, I write to express our support for SB 1060, which would require property insurers to take vegetation management, home protection, and other work meant to reduce wildfires into account when determining the risk of covering a property.
The state has spent billions in recent years to reduce California’s risk of wildfire, and correspondingly the resulting risk to properties in and adjacent to the wildland urban interface (WUI). In Marin County, we have also invested significant local resources to vegetation management and home hardening – all with a communitywide lens since we know a regional approach is the only effective way to build wildfire resiliency.
Marin County residents passed a 10-year parcel tax in 2020 which raises $20 million annually for proactive, proven wildfire prevention and preparedness efforts throughout the County. The measure created the Marin Wildfire Prevention Authority (MWPA), which has made significant progress in reducing wildfire risk in Marin in just its first three years, including:
- Distributing $840,000 in homeowner grants for defensible space and home hardening
- Completed fuel reduction on 1,700 acres, including 46 miles of roads. Approved an additional 6,300 acres of fuel reduction for the coming year.
Widespread hazardous fuel reduction and structure hardening can substantially reduce an insurers’ average annual losses. Importantly, the risk models that insurers use should take into account the benefits of hazardous fuel reduction, home hardening, and defensible space for homes, businesses, and communities – and accurately reduce the reduced risk of wildfire to those properties.
As a result, we agree with the principals of SB 1060 that meaningful investments in mitigations, like what we have committed to in Marin, should reduce the cost of insurance and/or increase availability to those properties and regions. For these reasons, we support SB 1060 and appreciate your attention to this critically important issue in our state.
Sincerely,
Dennis Rodoni, President
Marin County Board of Supervisors
Cc: Marin County Board of Supervisors
Senator Mike McGuire
Assemblymember Damon Connolly
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