CPPC Submits Testimony to California Department of Insurance on Consumer Intervenor Process
SAN DIEGO (July 1, 2024) – The University of San Diego (USD) School of Law Consumer Protection Policy Center (CPPC) at the Centers for Public Interest Law (CPIL) submitted public comment to the California Department of Insurance (CDI) on the consumer intervenor process.
The consumer intervenor process, established under Proposition 103’s passage in 1988, plays a crucial role in protecting consumers from arbitrary insurance rates and practices, and ensuring fair insurance availability and affordability for Californians. However, CDI now wishes to create new barriers for intervenors to participate in its ratemaking proceedings and — if successful — recover costs and expenses. The Department has given notice to insurers regarding the eligibility of Consumer Watchdog and Consumer Federation of California Education Foundation as intervenors, and allegedly no other group was reached for eligibility verification.
CPPC believes these changes would discourage active participation on behalf of consumer protection.
To read CPPC’s testimony, click here.
About Consumer Protection Policy Center
Founded in 1980, the University of San Diego School of Law’s Consumer Protection Policy Center (CPPC) at the Centers for Public Interest Law (CPIL) serves as an academic center of research and advocacy in regulatory and public interest law. CPPC focuses its efforts on the study of an extremely powerful, yet often overlooked, level of government: state regulatory agencies. Under the supervision of experienced public interest attorneys and advocates, CPPC law student interns study California agencies that regulate business, professions, and trades.
CPPC publishes the California Regulatory Law Reporter, a unique legal journal that covers the activities and decisions of over 13 major California regulatory agencies.
In addition to its academic program, CPPC has an advocacy component. Center faculty, professional staff, and interns represent the interests of the unorganized and underrepresented in California’s legislature, courts, and regulatory agencies. CPPC attempts to make the regulatory functions of California government more efficient and visible by serving as a public monitor of state regulatory activity. The Center has been particularly active in reforming the state’s professional discipline systems for attorneys and physicians, and in advocating public interest reforms to the state’s open meetings and public records statutes.
About the University of San Diego School of Law
Each year, USD educates approximately 800 Juris Doctor and graduate law students from throughout the United States and around the world. The law school is best known for its offerings in the areas of business and corporate law, constitutional law, intellectual property, international and comparative law, public interest law and taxation.
USD School of Law is one of the 84 law schools elected to the Order of the Coif, a national honor society for law school graduates. The law school’s faculty is a strong group of outstanding scholars and teachers with national and international reputations and currently ranks 30th nationally among U.S. law faculties in scholarly impact and 41st nationally in past-year faculty downloads on the Social Sciences Research Network (SSRN). The school is accredited by the American Bar Association and is a member of the Association of American Law Schools. Founded in 1954, the law school is part of the University of San Diego, a private, independent, Roman Catholic university chartered in 1949.