I promised myself I wouldn't do it.
When I started this column, I decided that I was going to avoid the practice of promoting content within the issue. All too often, that's a cop-out way for an editor to fill their column space, and it reads like self-serving pablum.
Which of course was a fine tack to take until I read Chad Hemenway's cover story about West, Texas insurance agent/mayor Tommy Muska.
Muska is the man upon whose shoulders, to a great degree, the recovery of West, Texas rests. West, if you recall—and I hardly blame you if you don't, since this terrible tragedy has, incredibly, largely fallen off the nation's radar—was torn asunder when a massive explosion at the West Fertilizer Co. plant took homes, schools and lives from the people of this small town.
These are farming folk, some of the most salt-of-the-earth Americans you're likely to meet. Hardworking, faithful, practical people from whom we'd all learn something very valuable about this nation and the life we're privileged to enjoy here. Unlike some of us who live in cities or even the suburbs, the people in this town with a population of 2,800 know their friends and neighbors well.
And after the plant explosion dealt a blow to the community to the tune of some $100 million in property damage, they're naturally looking to the insurance industry to help take them take the pieces of their lives and put them back together again. And the industry is doing what it always does in its finest moments: Responding to the needs of the people who placed their trust in their insurers.
The plant itself was grossly underinsured for about $1 million (in liability cover) and no excess or umbrella coverage, partly because it slipped through regulatory cracks and also because few people were aware how much of a risk it actually was. To hear Muska tell it, no one knew how much ammonium nitrate (which caused the explosion) was kept at the facility. "We just grew up with it out there," he tells us, noting how the community to a large extent grew around the plant—and that does much to explain the relative proximity of many homes, schools and businesses to what became a blast site. "Nobody knew."
The EPA says it is investigating whether the facility's operators complied with regulations, but the agency says it doesn't regulate ammonium nitrate, which isn't considered an extreme hazard as a dry fertilizer. But in any case, long after any number of state and federal agencies come out with their findings of who did what wrong, the people of West will still be living in the aftermath. And the man to whom many are looking for answers—and strong leadership—as this community slowly recovers is a man who sells insurance for a living.
Muska has seen tragedy before this disaster, as the story reveals, and draws his strength from the memory of his teenage son, who was taken from him in a terrible car accident. One could imagine that boy would be especially proud of his insurance-salesman dad for devoting every ounce of his strength to seeing that things are set right in the community he leads.
And that is no small thing.
Shawn Moynihan is Executive Managing Editor of NUP&C. He can be reached at smoynihan@sbmedia.com.
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