Mobile Bay Blog

Rates for policyholders of Alabama's insurer of last resort will go up 5.5 percent on average, beginning July 1, the Alabama Insurance Underwriting Association said in a letter dated Tuesday.

Rates are going up in Mobile, Gulf Shores, Orange Beach, Fort Morgan and Dauphin Island, while they will decline in south Mobile County, the Eastern Shore, and areas of south Baldwin County including Magnolia Springs, Perdido Beach, Josephine, Elberta and Lillian. They'll stay flat elsewhere in Mobile and Baldwin.

The group, commonly known as the Beach Pool, charged $2,173 on average for a residential policy at the end of April. A 5.5 percent increase would bump that by $120 to $2,293.

Individual customers will see rates change at their annual renewal. Changes will vary based on location and type of construction.

Manager Bob Groves said that models showed that the pool's risks had increased as it grew to more than 11,700 policies in Mobile and Baldwin counties, and it needed to charge higher rates.

"We believe the rate change we are implementing is very modest," he said.

The pool initially applied to the Alabama Insurance Department for a 7.4 percent increase, but cut its request during regulatory talks.

The Beach Pool passes on much of its risk to firms that do business elsewhere in the state but shun the coast. It writes bare-bones policies.

Hardest hit will be customers in Gulf Shores, Orange Beach, Fort Morgan and Dauphin Island, who will see rates increase by 9.9 percent.

State regulators capped the increase for any single policyholder at 15 percent. The pool plans to impose the maximum on 1,575 customers, more than 13 percent of its policyholders.

The pool has traditionally used three rating zones, but a fourth zone consisting solely of the Mobile city limits was added along with the rate changes. Groves said that was meant to match the pool's territories more closely with those used by the Insurance Services Office, a group that draws zones for carriers.

Rates in Mobile will go up 5 percent on average. But for more than 400 policyholders in the area south of Interstate 10, rates should fall substantially, Groves said.

Pool board member Jay Ison, a Mobile insurance agent, said the group has taken on many older homes in Mobile. "That zone needed a rate increase because of a higher concentration of risk," he said.

Mobile had almost 20 percent, or 2,198, of the pool policies at the end of April, the most of any city but Gulf Shores. Mobile traditionally made up a much smaller share of the policy total.

Charges will go down 3.3 percent in the rest of south Mobile County's mainland and in parts of Baldwin including the Eastern Shore, Magnolia Springs, Perdido Beach, Josephine, Elberta and Lillian.

Gulf Shores resident and former State Farm employee Davey Jones, who pays the pool more than $3,000 a year for wind coverage alone, said he doesn't understand the need for an increase, considering the pool hasn't faced any major hurricanes since 2005. He said he'd like a more public explanation of how the pool spends its $26 million in premium income.

The Beach Pool will spend most of this year's premiums, almost $15 million, on reinsurance. Reinsurance prices rose this year, and the pool is buying less coverage than in 2008, leaving member firms more at risk.

After the member companies pay for the first $100 million in losses, reinsurance would cover the next $235 million. Al Carlson, a spokesman for All Churches Together, or ACT-II, which lobbies for more affordable insurance, said the increases are a "wake-up call" to policyholders who hoped rates would drop or stay level.

Gulf Shores Mayor Robert Craft, the lone member of the 11-person pool board who doesn't work in the insurance business, took a leave of absence from the panel starting in January as he recovered from brain surgery, and wasn't part of rate increase talks. It's doubtful, though, that his lone vote or protest would have made a difference.

"As mayor, it certainly is not good news for our city," Craft said. "Unfortunately, I don't know how you fight it."

Raising Cain!

A Brief Story of Joe Cain

The civil war had halted all revelry. Joseph Stillwell Cain was a store clerk in Mobile, Alabama in 1865, who had noticed how much the war had mentally worn down the populace. He, like most of his fellow Mobilians, were still under Union occupation, but the mental war between the ex-confederate soldiers and union authorities  still raged and was taking a toll. During the occupation several edicts had come down from Union leaders in an effort to totally break the the will of the the Mobilians. To make matters worse, finding themselves "men without a country" following the end of the Civil War, members of any branch of the Confederate forces were forced to sign "Amnesty oaths", to restore their citizenship rights.

  After all, these were the people and soldiers that kept Union forces at bay, even after the battle and fall of Mobile Bay to the Union Navy in 1864. During the "bread riot of 1863, and the Union blockade which substantially reduced the trade in Mobile for the duration of the war, its people endured.  Disruption of foreign trade persisted after the war, as Union occupying forces, which took the city of Mobile in April 1865, closed the port to foreign trade until late in August 1865.

 Joe Cain knew however, that to openly voice any opposition to the occupation of Mobile by the Union troops would be viewed technically, as treason. The mental drain, however, had to be stopped, and the spirit and pride of the Mobilians has to be restored.

It was against this back drop that Cain, in 1866, decided the best way to accomplish this renaissance of the spirit, was to revitalize the Kraft parade, the celebration of Mardi Gras in Mobile, which had been halted during the conflict. One night, he led a group of revelers in a parade through the city, using a "borrowed" coal wagon and dressed in improvised costumes depicting a Chickasaw Indian chief from the local Wragg Swamp, he called himself Chief Slacabamorinico. The significance of choosing this character was a backhanded insult to the Union forces as the Chickasaw, had never surrendered during the civil war. He mocked the union military that controlled Mobile at the time.

 This celebration gave the Mobilians a much needed boost, when the Union leadership learning of the, "one horse stunt" were furious at the man, but couldn't touch him because he had voiced no opposition.  

  In 1867, Cain reappeared, this time with a group of confederate soldiers, who were also musicians, calling themselves the Lost Cause Minstrels (and they paraded until 1879).

The parade continued to give Mobile back it's spirit and pride and allowed the city to hold its collective head up, and continue to progress and to some degree, move on. 

Joe Cain is currently buried at Church Street Cemetery in Mobile, Alabama. 

The Joe Cain Procession was started in 1967 by a local folk singer, historian, writer named Julian Rayford. He wanted to bring recognition to the man who revived Mardi Gras activities in Mobile. Julian Rayford dressed as Chief Slacabamorinico in his coal wagon. Cain's Merry Widows follow, a mysterious group of women in black, throwing black roses and Mardi Gras beads. The number of participating groups has grown over the years, now at 32 (a limit set by the Mobile Police Dept.). Julian Rayford also petitioned for Joe Caine and his wife's body to be moved from Bayou La Batre to the Church Street Graveyard in downtown Mobile, which has been closed to new burials since 1898. Julian Rayford died in 1980, and his body was buried right next to Joe Cain's. After the Joe Cain Procession, Cain's Merry Widows partake in a Mardi Gras funeral at the grave site of Joe Cain. Weeping, dancing and tossing beads in memory of Joe Cain. 

Posted by ksayre January 26, 2009 10:28AM

MOBILE, Ala. -- State health officials reopened oyster beds of Mobile Bay to commercial harvesting today at 6 a.m.

Waters including Cedar Point, Portersville Bay, Grand Bay, Heron Bay, Dauphin Island Bay and Bon Secour Bay had been closed since Jan. 13, according to the Alabama Department of Public Health.

The closure had been a result of possible bacteriological contamination of the oyster beds following rainfalls, officials said.