Texas Lawmakers Named to Coastal Insurance Study Committee

A joint committee of state lawmakers over the next year will be looking in to alternatives for providing property insurance along the Texas coast.

Texas House Speaker Joe Straus, R-San Antonio, has announced Texas House appointments to the Joint Interim Committee to Study Seacoast Territory Insurance.

The committee will examine alternative ways to provide insurance to the state’s seacoast territory, which is currently served by the quasi-governmental Texas Windstorm Insurance Association (TWIA).

Additional duties for the committee include studying the residual markets of windstorm and hail insurance in other states, and studying windstorm-related building codes and mitigation strategies.

The committee was created through House Bill 3, 1st Called Session, 82nd Legislature and will report its recommendations by Dec. 1, 2012.

Speaker Straus has appointed Chairman John Smithee (Amarillo) as co-chair of the committee. The committee members include Rep. Craig Eiland (Galveston), Chairman Todd Hunter (Corpus Christi), and Rep. Kenneth Sheets (Dallas).

Source: Texas House of Representatives