Consumer Watchdog has made $12.5 million from the intervenor process over the last 12 years. (Credit: Oleksii/Adobe Stock)
California Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara announced new regulations on Friday that will significantly change the state’s intervenor process.
The changes will effectively get rid of a financial model relied on almost exclusively by Consumer Watchdog, an advocacy organization that often makes money by intervening in insurance rate-setting proceedings.
“Consumers are frustrated with hidden fees, especially when insurance costs are already exorbitant and unaffordable for many,” Lara said in a statement. “To stabilize our market, we need a rate review system that delivers timely, fair, accurate and thorough decisions, rather than one that gets bogged down in process or delays real solutions.”
Proposition 103 — which was passed by voters in 1988 and authored by Harvey Rosenfield, Consumer Watchdog’s founder — established a public administrative process for setting and raising insurance rates in California. It includes the ability for third-party intervenors to offer input during the process, and they may recoup their costs through insurers, who can then pass those expenses on to consumers.
In the last 12 years, Consumer Watchdog has charged 90% of these intervenor fees and has made more than $12.5 million from the process.
The proposed reforms would allow the insurance commissioner to decide whether an intervenor has made “a substantial contribution to the adoption of any order, regulation or decision” and has earned compensation. The reforms will be open for public comment for 45 days starting Oct. 3.
“We want diverse voices to be heard from every corner of our state,” Lara said in the press release, which included a link to an intervenor compensation chart for 2025. The chart contained only two intervenors: Consumer Federation of California Education Foundation, which was the intervenor for two files, and Consumer Watchdog, which intervened on 24 files.
“Our rural and Sierra Nevada communities, which have been disproportionately affected by wildfires, have historically been excluded from the intervenor process,” Lara said. “This regulation aims to create a stronger and more equitable system for all consumers across California, not just a select few who have mastered the current system.”
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