Maryland commissioner steps down
MARYLAND is the latest US state to see its insurance commissioner step down, capping a year in which five regulators have left their posts.
Ralph Tyler who became insurance commissioner in 2007, having worked as state governor Martin O’Malley’s chief counsel, will step down from his role on January 8 to take over as chief counsel at the US Food and Drug Administration.
This year has seen a number of insurance commissioners give up their posts to return to private legal practice, academia or pursue other political ambitions.
In early September Massachusetts’ Nonnie Burnes quit, taking on a role at the Northeastern University, Boston. She followed quickly in the footsteps of Washington DC‘s Thomas Hampton, who spent just over three years in the role until stepping down at the end of the summer to be replaced by Gennet Purcell (Insuranceday.com, Sep 1), and the joint July departures of Eric Dinallo, who left the New York hotseat back in July also to join the university scene, and New Jersey’s Steven Goldman, who returned to the legal sector.
Meanwhile in October, California’s deputy commissioner Bill Gausewitz, left the department to return to private practice at law firm Michelman & Robinson.
Previous years have seen some commissioner resignations, but not on the scale of 2009.
In 2008 Alabama’s Walter Bell and Oregon’s Scott Kipper resigned. Kipper had only been in the post for a year having replaced Joel Ario, who had left to become insurance commissioner for Pennsylvania as the permanent replacement for Diane Koken who resigned in February 2007. Also in 2007, Michigan’s Linda Watters stepped down.
News of the latest commissioner departure comes just weeks after the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) elected its officers for 2010, who will be presided over by Jane Cline, West Virginia’s representative.
President-elect will be Iowa insurance commissioner Susan Voss, with Florida’s Kevin McCarty named vice president and Oklahoma’s Kim Holland secretary-treasurer. All four newly elected officers assumed their duties following this month’s NAIC’s winter national meeting in San Francisco.
President Cline was appointed West Virginia insurance commissioner in 2001, and has previously served as commissioner of the West Virginia division of motor vehicles and as deputy commissioner of the West Virginia division of highways.
