NU Exclusive: Sheffield Plans To Run For Ga. Commissioner

Ms. Sheffield–who, like Mr. Oxendine, is a Republican–noted that she worked with the Georgia Department of Insurance for six years. At first, she was still working on obtaining her law degree and served in the administrative procedures division, handling legislative work for the insurance department and the fire marshal–a position appointed by the insurance commissioner.

After obtaining her law degree–which she added to a master's degree in public administration and a master's in business administration–she requested a move to the regulatory services division, responsible for general licensure and compliance issues.

To her knowledge, she said, this was the first time an attorney had served in the regulatory division, because traditionally attorneys serve in enforcement.

While the enforcement division "clearly plays a valuable role in the department," functioning "after someone's done something they shouldn't have done," she said she wanted the experience of helping insurers before they were in trouble.

"My experience with companies is that you're always going to have a small segment of the industry that is doing something they shouldn't do," she said, while adding that "97 percent are trying to do the right thing."

Ms. Sheffield said regulators need to do what they can to "make sure we assist the industry in being compliant. If we're available to them in advance–before they've done something wrong–that can make a big difference."

She added that "we can't think of the industry as an enemy of the state. The industry provides a very valuable service to the citizens of the state of Georgia and it also generates a lot of revenue for the state."

As an attorney, Ms. Sheffield noted that she has had experience with the captive insurance industry, which she is interested in promoting in Georgia.

"Georgia's been a domicile since the 1980s, but it's never been an active domicile," she said, noting that a number of self-insurance funds decided to convert after the captive law was passed. She pointed out that Georgia is one of the only states to allow a captive to directly write workers' compensation if the insureds are located in the state.

While most of the captives in Georgia are for workers' comp coverage, there now are four or five medical liability captives and a few that provide liability coverage for the taxi cab industry, she noted.

However, to attract a wider range of captives, she said she would like to see Georgia adopt regulations similar to those in Vermont and South Carolina.

"As you know, many of the states have a captive law and some of them have embraced that industry," she said. "Clearly the captive industry can be a revenue generator. We've seen what has happened here in Vermont."

In Vermont the captive insurance industry is supported by the governor and legislature and is hailed for the number of "clean" jobs and income it has brought to the state–about 1,400 to date, she noted.

She said Georgia already has a strong industry base and a network of captive service providers in place–actuaries, attorneys and third-party administrators, reinsurers and intermediaries.

The captive industry, she noted, is not a competitor to the traditional insurance marketplace. Major corporations, such as Coca-Cola and Home Depot, have captives, and since "they're going to put them somewhere, why not at least have a law on the books that allows these corporations–that are either headquartered in Georgia or have major operations in Georgia–the option to have a captive close to where they're domiciled?"

As commissioner, she said, her goal would be to see the necessary changes made in legislation, and to have someone in the department with a background in captives to help run the program.