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House Passes Financial Stability Act, Includes Office of National Insurance The U.S. Senate passed the “Restoring American Financial Stability Act of 2010” May 20. S. 3217, authored by Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., chairman of the U.S. Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs, aims to promote financial stability by improving accountability and transparency in the financial system, to end “too big to fail,” to protect the American taxpayer by ending bailouts, and to protect consumers from abusive financial services practices. S. 3217, which has been amended since originally passing the Senate Banking Committee, establishes an Office of National Insurance within the U.S. Department of the Treasury. The office will be headed by a director who is to be ap-
pointed by the secretary of the treasury. The office’s main functions will be: • to monitor all aspects of the insurance industry, including identifying issues or gaps in the regulation of insurers that could contribute to a systemic crisis in the insurance industry or the U.S. financial system; • to recommend to the Financial Stability Oversight Council that it designate an insurer, including the affiliates of such insurer, as an entity subject to regulation as a nonbank financial company supervised by the Board of Governors pursuant to Title I of the Restoring American Financial Stability Act of 2010; • to assist the secretary in administering the Terrorism Insurance Program esSee House Passes Act, Page 12
ABPA Conference Airs Aftermarket Parts Certification Issues Again by John Yoswick Special to Autobody News
The fallout in recent months from concerns raised about non-OEM bumper and structural parts raised by industry trainer Toby Chess was clearly on the minds of the parts manufacturers and distributors gathered in Indianapolis, Ind., this spring for the Automotive Body Parts Association’s 30th annual meeting. At the Collision Industry Conference (CIC) this past November and January, Chess demonstrated key differences between some non-OEM structural parts and the OEM parts they are being sold to re-
place. The demonstrations have led at least four insurers to pull back from asking shops to use certain non-OEM parts, and has led to new testing and certification efforts related to such parts. Chess’ Eileen Sottille of QPC latest presentation on such parts at CIC in April was halted at the last minute after he said he was threatened with a lawsuit by LKQ Corporation, parent company of Keystone Automotive. See ABPA Conference, Page 18
VOL. 1 ISSUE 4 JUNE 2010
Gunder’s Case Not Over—Court Mediation Ordered On May 18, the Federal Court of Appeals in Atlanta, GA, ordered State Farm Insurance to undergo mediation with Gunder’s in an effort to bring a satisfactory resolution to Gunder’s claim against State Farm for Tortious Interference and Slander. (Tortious interference of business occurs when false claims and accusations are made against a business or an individual’s reputation in order to drive business away.) The Appelant court order was in response to Gunder’s Auto Center’s request for appeal of a Florida courts recent summary judgment. “If you read recent articles by some industry writers, they’ve made it sound as if we lost our case against State Farm and the matter was over and done with” says Ray Gunder, founder of the 42-year old family owned and operated Gunder’s Auto Center in Lakeland, Florida.
“It would appear that some writer’s intent is to vindicate Sate Farm’s actions and to discourage other repairers from stepping up and defending their good names and their businesses. Our case is far from over! We got knocked back a bit, but not knocked down or out. “The slander case (which was summarily discharged by the lower court) alRay Gunder lowed us a great deal of discovery and through many hours of depositions and review of acquired documentation we uncovered extensive evidence to support our claims. Says Gunder, “No, this is far from over; we just need our day in court to allow See Gunder’s Case, Page 12
Gulf Coast Oil Spill Causes Far More Than Just Ecological Headaches
On April 20th, an explosion on the DeepThe oil reached the Louisiana water Horizon while drilling in an oil well shoreline May 14, posing a serious off the Gulf Coast of Louisiana left 17 threat to fishermen’s livelihoods, marine workers injured and 11 missing and pre- habitats, beaches, wildlife and human sumed dead. Since that day, oil has been health. spilling from a BP offshore drilling well in the Gulf of Mexico. The leak is currently discharging 200,000 gallons of crude oil a day, according to the official estimate, and efforts to manage the spill with controlled burning, dispersal and plugging the leak were unsuccessful. It is estimated that more than 6 million gallons of crude oil have spewed into the Gulf so far. A worker shovels oil off Fourchon Beach in Port Fourchon, This oil spill is on track to beLouisiana, on May 24 come the worst oil spill in history, surpassing the damage done by The slick has forced the shutdown of the Exxon Valdez tanker that spilled the gulf’s rich fishing grounds and could 11 million gallons of oil into the eco- also spread to the busy shipping lanes at logically sensitive Prince William the mouth of the Mississippi River, tying Sound in 1989. Unlike the Exxon up the cargo vessels that move millions of Valdez tragedy, in which a tanker held tons of fruit, rubber, grain, steel and other a finite capacity of oil, BP’s rig is commodities and raw materials in and out tapped into an underwater oil well of the nation’s interior. and could pump more oil into the There’s no denying the impact this ocean indefinitely until the leak is spill will have on the seafood and fishing See Oil Spill, Page 12 plugged.
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