Posts Tagged: Ricardo Lara
News
On Wednesday, May 14, Capitol Weekly hosted “California’s Insurance Crisis,” its first in-person gathering of the year and second conference of 2025. Held at the University of California Student and Policy Center, the event featured three panels and a keynote address from the California Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara. Discussions ranged from the overall state of the insurance industry to the impact of the Los Angeles wildfires and the path forward.
News
In August, the Nonprofit Insurance Alliance, which insured 90 percent of the 220 private foster agencies in California, announced that it would not renew coverage of the organizations. Now, these agencies are seeking $47 million from the state budget.
Opinion
OPINION – California’s homeowners insurance crisis is making it more difficult to build and buy affordable homes — and in some cases impossible. By restricting the supply of housing, particularly condominiums and multi-family housing, lack of insurance availability is driving up consumer housing costs and limiting the lowest priced homeownership option for consumers.
Opinion
OPINION – An updated rate-setting process is necessary to restore a functioning insurance market in California, and we need that NOW for more reliable rates, greater policy availability, and safer communities.
Experts Expound
The California insurance market is in flux. We asked our Experts to rate, on a scale of one to 10, Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara’s handling of this situation so far.
Opinion
OPINION: Perhaps the greatest financial risk faced by Californians today has nothing to do with rising interest rates or a looming recession. Rather, it is the loss of access to products they rely upon to protect their most valuable assets: auto, homeowners and commercial insurance.
News
Sarah Mapel bought her dream home in Santa Cruz County’s Boulder Creek neighborhood in 2018. Later, she purchased fire insurance through the Fair Access to Insurance Requirements (FAIR) plan, a state-mandated program for consumers unable to acquire such insurance due to high-risk factors. “It was quite expensive,” she said.
Opinion
OPINION: We will always fight to protect the interests of these workers. That’s why we are urging Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara to reject proposed new regulations that could eliminate group insurance discounts that we provide our members.
Opinion
OPINION: The California Department of Insurance, having identified a disparity, has established a worthy goal of expanding auto insurance discounts to more low-income consumers and communities of color. But as it pursues that goal, the department must keep in mind a foundational principle in healing problems: Do no harm.
News
With no compromise in sight, at appears the debate over business interruption insurance coverage will be solved by litigation, not legislation. At issue are thousands of businesses around California with insurance policies to protect them against a sudden catastrophic event that forces them to close down for an extended period of time.
California Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara. Photo by Ellie Appleby, Capitol Weekly. 
