Art Jacobs from Gibson Insurance discussed the city’s recent renewal during Monday’s Common Council meeting.
Next year the city will see a 37% increase in insurance costs with the majority of it coming with the replacement values of city properties. Jacobs said the validation of properties went up quite a bit because building prices have almost doubled after COVID.
Jacobs gave a few examples. With the city’s current insurance, the Plymouth Municipal Airport was insured for $1.7 million, and with the renewal that has increased to $5.3 million. Appraisals were completed for the city’s Sewer Treatment Facility and the Wastewater Plant. The city’s water plant had been insured at $12.6 million but with the renewal, that increased to $19.5 million.
The value of all the city’s buildings alone increased from $48,977,000 to $183,573,000. An example given was city hall. If the building was destroyed in a fire and the insurance company had to pay to have it rebuilt, the city had it insured for $1,543,000 but to build it as it currently exists the cost was estimated to be $3,312,000.
Art Jacobs said insurance companies have experienced some big losses due to all the storms. They began to realize that many businesses, industries, and homeowners had their properties insured under their true values. The insurance companies are now setting the values and Gibson worked on behalf of the city to negotiate something that both sides were agreeable to.
The Common Council didn’t have to take any action on the renewal information presented, it was just informational for members.
