Citizens Property Insurance president resigning

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. -- Citizens Property Insurance Corporation President Scott Wallace is leaving the state-backed property insurer after serving more than five years as its leader.

Wallace, 59, turned in his resignation to Board Chairman Carlos Lacasa on Friday. Wallace will remain at Citizens into early April to assist with a transition to new leadership.

Lacasa credited Wallace for improvements in Citizens' service levels, risk transference initiatives, and professionalism towards its policyholders, agents, legislative leaders and stakeholders.

"Scott has led the company through a complex ramp up of the infrastructure needed for Citizens to provide the services and possess the claims payment ability that is so essential to our state's housing industry," Lacasa said Monday.

The company has grown rapidly in recent years despite legislative efforts to reduce its size and liabilities.

While Citizens was designed as a last-resort backup, the shrinking of the private market in recent years in hurricane-prone Florida has made it the largest home insurer in the state with roughly 1.5 million policies now in force.

Wallace, who previously served as a vice president at Citizens, was the second CEO of the insurer, which was created by the Legislature in 2002 to provide insurance to homeowners in high-risk areas and those unable to find coverage in the private market. He replaced Bob Ricker on an interim basis in November of 2006 and was named to the job permanently on Jan. 10, 2007 at a salary of $220,000.

The company's operations have come under increased scrutiny in recent months with Lacasa becoming the board chair and Gov. Rick Scott pushing for the company to be downsized if not sold outright to a private entity.

The not-for-profit public corporation has come in for criticism for paying many of its executives lucrative salaries, including Wallace whose salary jumped dramatically just two years after becoming the company's fulltime president. He was paid a base wage of $343,608 in 2009

Source: http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/01/09/2581387/citizens-property-insurance-president.html

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