The race to succeed Republican U.S. Rep. C. W. Bill Young may have gained national attention, but in Florida’s 13th Congressional District, most voters are concerned with their own backyard.
Skyrocketing flood insurance premiums are affecting Pinellas County politics, writes Susan Davis for USA Today, more so than either personal attacks between candidates or the debate over the Affordable Care Act.
Republican David Jolly and Democrat Alex Sink face a battle for what has become a true swing district, divided fairly equally among Democrats, Republicans and independents. Cook Political Report rates Florida CD-13 as a “tossup.”
However, the contest has become a proving ground in gauging voter feelings on how much the federal government influences people’s lives. At the top of the list are the effects of the 2012 Biggert-Waters act that made sweeping changes to the National Flood Insurance Program, which allowed rising premiums that could drive a number of homeowners out of their homes.
Flood insurance premiums, based on risk level, could rise by as much as thousands of dollars a year, and CD 13 is one of the areas most affected by the change.
Congress enacted Biggert-Waters to close an NFIP shortfall, which was on a Government Accountability Office watch list as a financially unsustainable program that did not have a way to recover costs after claims incurred after Hurricane Katrina.
Jumps in flood insurance rates disproportionately affect new homeowners, something that could cripple a fragile Pinellas real estate market.
Democrats in Congress want to postpone new regulations and reinstate federal subsidies. Republicans call subsidies “bailouts” and want to scrap NFIP in favor of a “free market” of private insurers.
“For more than four decades, this experiment in government-provided flood insurance has proven to be ineffective, inefficient and indisputably costly to hardworking American taxpayers,” said House Financial Services Chair Jeb Hensarling in early January.
Sink and Jolly both support a delay in premium increases, Davis reports, but the GOP position makes the party faithful in this “centrist” district worried.
Pinellas County Property Appraiser Pam Dubov — a Jolly supporter — advised Pinellas County Republicans at a recent meeting that they need to be “honest about our party because in truth, it’s our party that’s keeping reform of this (flood insurance program) from being fixed.”
Dubov, like many in the Pinellas County GOP, is frustrated by the national leadership’s failure to address rate hikes.
“I never imagined the government of the country we were serving would do this to people,” Dubrov told USA Today.
In the $1.012 trillion spending bill approved by Congress this month, there is a provision to stave off premium hikes, but it is only valid until Sept. 30.
Disaster relief has been a touchy subject with Republicans, who insist on offsetting spending with matching budget cuts. The $50 billion Superstorm Sandy aid package for victims in New York and New Jersey only passed with Democratic support, getting a mere 49 votes from House Republicans.
Jolly’s proposal is to have a disaster insurance plan that aggregates overall risk throughout the U.S., covering different regions for disasters that have a higher probability of occurring locally. Plains states would be covered for tornados; California would be covered for earthquakes, and so on.
“If (Republicans) had as much trouble as they had a few years ago just dealing with a hurricane issue,” Sink responded in a recent interview, “I can’t imagine what it would be like to start talking about earthquakes and fires and tornadoes and every other kind of catastrophe you could think of.”
Sink is calling for a combination of tax breaks for home improvements to offset premium costs, stricter controls on the Federal Emergency Management Program and an immediate postponement of flood insurance changes. Like other Democrats, Sink feels the federal government has a vital role in disaster coverage.
Davis notes one constant theme in Sink’s campaign — Jolly’s experience as a Washington lobbyist.
“People understand what lobbyists do,” the former Florida CFO said. “They hire themselves out to special interests and make a lot of money trying to convince elected officials to do things that will enrich that special interest. He just became part of the Washington revolving door.”
“When I left my years of public service, I didn’t care to do that.”
Jolly is attempting to lump Sink together with the national Democrats, as well as the unpopular rollout of Obamacare.
But both Sink and Jolly are aware that the “national conversation,” as Davis puts it, does not resonate well with Pinellas County voters.
“People are trying to nationalize this into an Affordable Care Act (race),” Sink said. “Right now, people in this district are talking to me much more about flood insurance.”
“As I go around, as I have extensively, people care about what’s important in their lives today, here and now.”
