|
The kids are all right
A leader in the human services field, Irwin Siegel Agency expands
its menu of youth programs
By Elisabeth Boone, CPCU
It’s common to think of childhood as a time of carefree innocence, of playing and
dreaming and exploring, of growing up in a stable, loving home.
For too many kids, the reality is starkly different from this appealing vision.
Poverty, violence, drugs, crime-ridden neighborhoods, and failing schools are
like a series of doors slamming shut in the faces of kids who all too often
fall through the cracks of an overburdened social service system.
Even in pleasant suburbs of comfortable houses and two-parent families, kids who
started out on the right track can suddenly find themselves on a long walk down
a bad road. What began as a harmless prank turns into a serious crime…an experiment with drugs or alcohol puts an honor student in juvenile court…divorce tears apart a once-loving family…a parent’s lost job leads to foreclosure and then homelessness.
A host of social service organizations make it their mission to provide help and
support to troubled and at-risk youth. Other agencies offer adoption and foster
care services to place kids in safe, nurturing home environments. The rewards
of turning just one kid’s life around are incalculable–and so are the risks inherent in doing so.
Those risks are magnified by the impact of the troubled economy and decisions by
the federal, state, and local governments to balance their budgets by making
cuts in funding for social services. With the recession causing a drop in
charitable contributions, many private entities also are struggling to meet
current and emerging needs for their services. Laboring under the dual burden
of underfunding and staff cutbacks, social service agencies are forced to do
more with less, and that can lead to taking shortcuts that may have unintended
but disastrous consequences.
Since it was established in 1960, Irwin Siegel Agency, Inc. (ISA), a managing
general agency located in Rock Hill, New York, has focused on creating and
delivering insurance and risk management solutions to the social services
field. (See “Driving the Paratransit Market” in the May 2009 issue of Rough Notes.)
For a number of years, ISA has offered programs nationwide for Big Brothers Big
Sisters organizations, Boys and Girls Clubs, and Head Start programs. Recently
ISA announced a significant expansion of its youth services programs with the
introduction of two new package policies: one for adoption and foster care
agencies and another for entities that serve at-risk youth.
“We’ve been offering youth programs like those mentioned earlier for over 12 years,” says Sheila Shaw, senior vice president of ISA. “Recently we introduced products for adoption and foster care and alternatives to
incarceration programs. We thought we needed to become involved in these more
difficult segments of the youth services market, because ISA has always
specialized in hard-to-place business in the social services area.”
For risks in these classes, severity is more likely to be an issue than
frequency, says Terry Grafmuller, youth program underwriting specialist. “Claims are usually sizable, and they’re likely going to be related to abuse or molestation of either a client or a
staff member. There’s also a potentially severe liability exposure when clients are out in the
community and may injure or be injured by a third party. Claims like this can
be in the range of $200,000 and up,” Grafmuller says.
Frequency tends to be the issue in programs like Big Brothers Big Sisters, Boys
and Girls Clubs, and Head Start, Grafmuller remarks. “We see claims from kids getting injured on the playground and in similar
situations, but these claims tend to be smaller. We offer a youth accident
policy to pick up this kind of exposure.”
In youth programs, Grafmuller points out, the location of a facility or the
venue for an outing can affect severity. “In rural and suburban areas, it may take longer for a doctor or an ambulance to
reach an injured child. In an urban environment with mass transit, law
enforcement and other agencies will have a harder time finding a runaway than
might be the case in a suburb,” she explains.
To address these and the many other exposures faced by youth services programs,
ISA offers package programs that provide comprehensive coverage tailored to the
needs of these classes. ISA is the program administrator for Chartis.
Available in all 50 states, the package program for foster care and adoption
agencies includes property, auto, inland marine, crime, general liability,
professional liability, and abuse coverage. General and professional liability
and abuse coverage are written on nonadmitted paper, and abuse coverage limits
are available up to $1 million.
General liability coverage is written on an occurrence basis; professional
liability and abuse coverage are claims-made. Follow-form umbrella coverage is
available with limits to $25 million. Liability coverage can be arranged for
foster parents; this is particularly important for foster parents who are
providing a home for a child with behavioral challenges.
Optional coverages are available for youth accident, volunteer accident, workers
compensation (except in monopolistic fund states), and directors and officers
liability including employment practices liability.
ISA also offers a package policy for at-risk youth, alternatives to
incarceration, and youth intervention programs that follow a behavior-based
model and have staff-secure locations. The package covers general liability and professional liability, and sexual
abuse coverage provides separate dedicated limits and coverage for employees,
clients, and third parties. Also covered are commercial auto, property, and
crime, as well as psychiatrists. For accounts that have a coastal exposure,
wind coverage can be written through a nonadmitted market.
Available coverage options are youth accident, workers compensation, HIPAA
protection, cyber and network liability, directors and officers liability, and
employment practices liability.
Over a half-century of serving this challenging market, Irwin Siegel Agency has
gone beyond developing insurance products to create a broad menu of services
that help insureds understand and control their exposures.
“We provide a high-quality insurance product, and we support it with risk
management services from within ISA and in conjunction with our carriers and
other partners,” Shaw explains. A risk management representative with experience in the social
services field is assigned to each insured to help identify and control
exposures and promote quality outcomes for the insured’s clients.
“For our youth-focused programs, one of our biggest resources is a company called
Praesidium, which focuses solely on abuse risk management,” says Brad Storey, director of risk management. “They have a toll-free abuse prevention help line that is staffed by social
workers, psychologists, and family therapists. This is a confidential way for
an insured to speak with a qualified third party about what exactly constitutes
abuse, appropriate and inappropriate touching, and similar concerns.
“Praesidium also provides a policies and procedures review to help the insured
identify any gaps and address them from an abuse risk management standpoint,” Storey continues. “Praesidium will also visit an insured agency and conduct an on-site evaluation
of the facility and provide training for the management staff.”
ISA also partners with an online training provider called Essential Learning,
Storey says. Insureds can access a variety of online libraries at a discounted
cost. Topics include community action; children, youth, and families; and
behavioral health and addiction treatment.
Each training module is accredited by the appropriate body, Storey explains. “Licensed professionals like social workers and nurses can earn continuing
education credits through this training, so they don’t have to take time off from work to attend off-site training. This enhances the
productivity of the insured agency and gives a boost to its billable hours,” Storey remarks.
“Most organizations have a budget for training and staff development, and we’ve been able to help agencies save money by using the online resources provided
by us and our partners.”
Except in the most isolated and rural areas of the country, most communities
have at least one social service agency that is dedicated to working with
youth. Irwin Siegel is willing to work with a retail agent or broker who may
have only an occasional need for its services, says Dawn Martin, director of
underwriting.
“We welcome any agent, whether they have one account or 100 accounts,” Martin says. “We pride ourselves on having the resources available to help any retailer with
the risks they’re writing; we want to be their go-to market and information source. We don’t have any production requirements, and we’re happy to entertain any submission that meets our eligibility requirements.”
Developing business in the youth services niche is a natural for retailers, ISA
believes. Agents may serve on the board of a youth agency or sit on a
committee, and many volunteer to help with fundraising and special events.
Another approach is to ask existing clients if they are involved with a local
youth services organization.
All of these activities can open the door for an agent to discuss reviewing the
organization’s insurance and risk management program.
“Many of the agents and brokers we work with do sit on the boards of youth
services organizations, and we learn a lot from them,” comments Sara Ruggiero, ISA’s director of marketing. “We use the input they share with us to develop coverages for directors and
officers liability at a variety of levels based on their specific exposures.”
What do the experts at ISA believe are the most important things retail agents
and brokers should know about the youth services class?
“The key to this class is awareness of the abuse and molestation exposures and
the need to obtain appropriate coverage,” Grafmuller responds. “Whether a youth program is on a campus, in a group home setting, or out in the
community, organizations and their staff are vulnerable to claims of abuse and
molestation. Depending on the behavioral issues in a given organization, the
community may be vulnerable as well.
“Our coverage is broad; it covers clients themselves and client-to-client
exposures, client-employee issues, and client issues with a third party in the
community. In addition to sexual abuse and molestation, our policy also covers
physical abuse,” Grafmuller adds.
In our still troubled economy, job losses and foreclosures are adding to the
challenges faced by parents, kids, and the agencies that try to help them while
dealing with cutbacks in funding and resources.
With its 50-year tradition of providing insurance and risk management solutions
to the social services market, Irwin Siegel Agency is committed to helping
retail agents and their youth services clients make sure that “the kids are all right.”
Rough Notes would like to thank Gerard McCaffery, CEO of MercyFirst in Syosset, New York,
for contributing his insights and experience to this article. MercyFirst is a leading nonprofit human services agency that was established in
1894 by the Sisters of Mercy.
Irwin Siegel Agency, Inc.
|
