NU Online News Service, Sept. 10, 1:34 p.m. EDT
Massachusetts Insurance Commissioner Nonnie Burnes said yesterday she is resigning next week to become a senior university fellow at Northeastern University.
Ms. Burnes, who will leave her post Sept. 17, will develop and teach an interdisciplinary course on regulatory reform at the university in Boston, where she received her law degree and serves as a trustee.
Joseph Murphy, currently first deputy commissioner, will serve as acting commissioner, a spokesman for the insurance division said.
Gov. Deval Patrick, who appointed Ms. Burnes in 2007, reacted with a statement that, "Nonnie Burnes is a great friend and was a great Insurance Commissioner. She brought fresh insight and real courage to one of the central successes of this administration — the introduction of balanced, consumer-oriented competition to our auto insurance market."
Under changes put through by Ms. Burnes, regulations that impeded out of state insurers from entering the Massachusetts marketplace were removed and firms such as Geico, Progressive and Allstate began competing for business.
"Thanks to her steady leadership, good drivers everywhere in the Commonwealth have lower rates and more choices, and many new companies have entered the state. I commend Commissioner Burnes on a job well done and wish her success in her new endeavor," Gov. Patrick said.
Ms. Burnes received her law degree from Northeastern in 1978 and was an undergraduate at Wellesley. Prior to becoming commissioner she was a Massachusetts State Superior Court judge from 1996 to 2007. Before her appointment to the Superior Court by Governor William Weld, she was a partner at the firm of Hill & Barlow.
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