Choice Story
Tribal Warfare

A Native American tribe raises the hopes of compensation managers desperate for lower insurance premiums, but winds up incurring the wrath of California regulators.

By Bruce Shutan

Fast-food restaurant owner Safar Ghaffari, a foot soldier in the small-business community's war on steep workers' comp rate hikes, sought in late 2002 to secure affordable coverage for roughly 120 employees at four restaurants he owns in Humboldt Count north of San Francisco near the Oregon border.

Wilmot, a senior vice president in the Toronto office of Toa Reinsurance, says he and his family eventually came to take the road for granted. "I just never thought about it until the rains came," he says. The rains he's talking aren't damp northern drizzles. They're heavy, torrential downpours of epic proportions. "It doesn't just rain up there anymore," he adds. "These days we have biblical rain." As a result, the rains of the past few years have washed out the road every year for the past seven years.