Today's Law As Amended


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AB-970 Insurance: Climate and Sustainability Insurance and Risk Reduction Program.(2023-2024)



As Amends the Law Today


SECTION 1.

 Article 2.5 (commencing with Section 12945) is added to Chapter 2 of Division 3 of the Insurance Code, to read:

Article  2.5. Climate and Sustainability Insurance and Risk Reduction Program
12945.
 The Legislature finds and declares all of the following:
(a) In 2018, the Governor and the Legislature enacted Senate Bill 30 (Chapter 614, Statutes of 2018), directing the Insurance Commissioner to convene the Climate Insurance Working Group. The Climate Insurance Working Group was convened in 2019, including representatives from leading California environmental groups, international climate policy groups, universities, and the insurance and reinsurance sector, and met publicly to address the priorities of the enacted legislation.
(b) In 2021, the Climate Insurance Working Group published the Climate Insurance Report, available on the department’s website, creating recommendations to help protect California communities, preserve nature, and build resiliency to climate impacts. The Climate Insurance Report focused on reducing the impacts to communities from flooding, extreme heat, and wildfires, and the compounding effects of ongoing drought.
(c) The Climate Insurance Report stated that as the impacts of climate change intensify, insurance protection gaps will likely widen, and that a growing protection gap would exacerbate the disproportionate impacts facing vulnerable communities from climate-intensified events.
(d) An overarching recommendation in the Climate Insurance Report is to prioritize closing protection gaps by focusing on the protection of areas with low insurance uptake and high risk, thereby increasing both local community and statewide resilience.
(e) Additionally, the Climate Insurance Report found that even though climate-intensified risks are increasing, as recently reported in California’s Fourth Climate Change Assessment, few households in California have insurance for flooding, and insurance related to extreme heat events is rare.
(f) The Climate Insurance Report recommended that development of new risk management and insurance approaches was needed now in order for such concepts to be available to meet the future demands of surging costs related to climate impacts.
(g) The Climate Insurance Report recommended that community risk reduction, including investments in natural infrastructure like wetlands, urban greening, and ecological forest strategies, should be prioritized because such investments can reduce damages to health and structures, protecting communities from the physical and financial risks of climate change impacts.
12945.5.
 (a) The Department of Insurance shall, upon appropriation, establish and administer the Climate and Sustainability Insurance and Risk Reduction Program for the purpose of achieving the following goals:
(1) Develop proof of concepts that expand insurance options, especially in vulnerable and disadvantaged communities where climate risks are currently uninsured or underinsured.
(2) Develop innovative insurance mechanisms that reduce and transfer climate risks, including, but not limited to, flooding, sea level rise, extreme heat, drought, and wildfire, and the compounding impacts of these risks.
(3) Prioritize projects that promote resilience in areas of relatively high risk and low insurance uptake with a focus on closing protection gaps.
(4) Demonstrate how local jurisdictions and Indian tribes can address growing climate risks with insurance solutions tailored to the risks and protection gaps of their particular communities.
(5) Support projects that integrate nature-based solutions with risk assessment and risk communication, that create more lasting risk reduction, and that emphasize regional and community-scale approaches to reducing risk.
(b) The program shall provide technical support for the pilot projects described in Section 12946.
12946.
 (a) The state hereby establishes eight climate insurance pilot projects to reduce physical risks from flooding and extreme heat and the protection gap in communities with high risks and low insurance uptake. The pilot projects shall, upon appropriation, be implemented under the following criteria:
(1) The locations of the pilot projects shall be in the following jurisdictions:
(A) Humboldt Bay.
(B) The City of Imperial Beach.
(C) The County of Imperial.
(D) The northern Sierra Nevada Mountains.
(E) The Reservation of the Pala Band of Mission Indians.
(F) The Sacramento-San Joaquin region within the County of Sacramento.
(G) The San Fernando Valley.
(H) The San Mateo County Flood and Sea Level Rise Resiliency District.
(2) Each jurisdiction shall develop and establish a specific pilot project, in consultation with the department, that shall do all of the following:
(A) Leverage existing extreme heat, flooding, sea level rise, storm surge, and erosion information, as appropriate, to the focus of the project.
(B) Leverage existing early warning risk tools.
(C) Identify and employ nature-based solutions, when scientifically supported, to manage extreme heat or flooding risks.
(D) Invest in local risk reduction and risk communication.
(E) Conduct outreach to disadvantaged and vulnerable community members and community-based organizations.
(F) Prioritize predisaster mitigation activities and actions.
(G) Conduct a cost-benefit analysis of financial tools, including insurance approaches, to evaluate the most effective use of insurance to address existing uninsured costs from climate-intensified flooding or extreme heat.
(H) Consider opportunities for cost-sharing and risk pooling between or among communities and the state.
(I) Consider which costs and losses will be insured, and how those costs and losses are defined.
(J) Upon review of the cost-benefit analysis, establish a financial resilience program that may include a contract for insurance to reduce financial risk to the jurisdiction and residents from uninsured costs caused by future climate-intensified events.
(K) Consider the formation of a climate resilience district, as authorized pursuant to Division 6 (commencing with Section 62300) of Title 6 of the Government Code.
(L) Consult with the department on the elements of the financial resilience program for technical assistance.
(M) Monitor and submit periodic reports to the department that include, at a minimum, all of the following:
(i) The costs and benefits of the plan to residents.
(ii) The potential for future cost-sharing or risk pooling among communities.
(iii) The risk reduction actions taken and metrics of success.
(iv) The risk communication actions taken and metrics of success. “Risk communication” means an action or initiative of a pilot project that communicates risk information widely to support understanding by the groups of people who are exposed to the risk. This can take the form of direct public outreach, the development of publicly accessible risk maps to demonstrate which areas are at higher or lower risk, early warning systems that allow communities to prepare, and communications that provide households information on how to reduce their risks.
(b) On or before January 1, 2035, the department shall issue a report to the appropriate Legislative committees on the results of the pilot projects and the opportunities for the lessons learned to strengthen the state’s approach to climate resilience.
12947.
 This article shall remain in effect only until January 1, 2035, and as of that date is repealed.
SEC. 2.
 If the Commission on State Mandates determines that this act contains costs mandated by the state, reimbursement to local agencies and school districts for those costs shall be made pursuant to Part 7 (commencing with Section 17500) of Division 4 of Title 2 of the Government Code.