Who Pays for Crash Rescue?

Posted on November 19, 2006 by shabina921

By SHABINA S. KHATRI
FREE PRESS STAFF WRITER

November 19, 2006

A battle between insurance companies and municipalities over who should pay for the firefighters, heavy equipment and cleanup crews used in some car accidents is heating up in Michigan.

And it could mean higher insurance rates – and unexpected bills – for motorists.

At the center of the debate is one issue: Should drivers who get into car accidents outside of their hometowns have to pay extra for the public safety services they receive?

Until about five years ago, when local tax dollars alone were enough to pay for police and fire services, the answer was no. But falling revenues and budget crunches have prompted many municipalities to reconsider.

Insurance companies are balking at the extra costs and warn that if the trend continues, they’ll start charging higher premiums. Meanwhile, some of the cities charging extra fees now question whether the paperwork and effort required to collect them is worth it when return rates are dismal.

Still, the practice has many advocates. Among them is Woodhaven Fire Chief Janet Sikes, whose city charges for safety services provided to nonresidents in car crashes.

“We have I-75 that runs through our city. Most of those accidents do not pertain to our city, and these outsiders are costing our city dollars,” said Sikes, who estimated that the fees have generated about $180,000 in the past four years.

“I’m not going to say that it’s been abundantly lucrative for the city, but it’s helped,” she said earlier this month.

At least two dozen communities in Michigan charge extra for police and fire services used by nonresidents, and an increasing number of cash-strapped communities are starting to embrace the practice.

How St. Clair Shores breaks down the cost

St. Clair Shores is among a number of cities that charge nonresidents additional fees for emergency response. If insurance doesn’t cover the fees, the bill is passed on to the nonresident.

Here’s a look at fees for nonresidents who get into accidents on I-94 in St. Clair Shores:

• Level 1: Minor vehicle accident with no injuries; no fee
• Level 2: Accident with fire engine to back up the ambulance, victim requiring treatment and cleanup of scene; $466
• Level 3: Multiple engines and extrication measures like Jaws of Life; $810

Utica and St. Clair Shores are the most recent metro communities to join the club, passing ordinances that would bill nonresidents’ insurance companies an average of $400 to $800 when they need to send out firefighters or use equipment such as the Jaws of Life.

The practice is one that insurance providers across the country are watching closely. In April, the National Association of Mutual Insurance Cos. (NAMIC) blasted the growth of municipal accident response fees, calling it an “ominous trend” that would “most likely result in rate increases passed along to consumers” if companies have to cover the additional fees.

“I think a lot of municipalities are under the impression that these fees are covered under the policy, and generally they’re not,” said Lori Conarton, communications director for the Insurance Institute of Michigan, a Lansing-based trade association that represents the state’s property and casualty insurance companies.

Those companies already cover ambulance transport fees, but additional accident-related costs could prompt some providers to ramp up premiums, she added.

But Regina Moore, president of Ohio-based Cost Recovery Corp., the company that says it started the practice of charging nonresidents accident user fees in 1999, said the fees are not likely to cause insurance rate boosts.

Moore estimated that about half of all insurance agencies nationwide pay the claims, but not all communities are seeing a high return.

In Ohio, the site of the fiercest debates, NAMIC says at least 28 municipalities collect accident fees from nonresidents. But several are reconsidering because of the mountain of paperwork involved.

Earlier this month, for example, the Toledo City Council held a special meeting to discuss the effectiveness of the policy, which has generated numerous complaints since it was enacted in January 2005. Council President Rob Ludeman, who voted against the practice, said the city has collected on only 10% of its claims.

Because that still amounts to $253,000, the ordinance likely will not be thrown out, but he added it could at least be amended to become more user-friendly. Nonresidents who work in Toledo, for example, may not be charged user fees for public safety because they already pay income taxes to the city.

In St. Clair Shores, the policy was discussed three times before a version was approved in September. Now, nonresidents will be billed only if they get into accidents on I-94, which runs between 8 Mile and 14 Mile roads in the city.

But Councilwoman Erin Stahl said the practice still leaves a bad taste in her mouth.

“I think it’s another money grab,” said Stahl, who voted against the ordinance.

The city has yet to collect on the first dozen claims it filed, said Fire Chief Matt Kovalcik, but he remains optimistic. He said that 98 of the 113 vehicles involved in the 67 accidents in the city in January and February belonged to nonresidents “who don’t pay any taxes.”

“Ultimately we’re looking for someone to pay,” he said.

John Czerkis, 68, of St. Clair Shores has spoken out against the fees. He agrees that his community needs more revenue, but said he is worried about the long-term implications.
“I may not be the brightest bulb in the package,” he said. “But my concern is insurance premiums are going to go up because of that policy, even for good drivers. Somebody’s going to have to pay.”

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All the Small Things

Posted on November 1, 2006 by shabina921

By Shabina S. Khatri

November 2006

During announcements delivered after ish’aa salat at the masjid recently, I was amazed to hear four separate requests for monetary donations, one after another – first for IAGD, then for aid overseas, and finally two more for relief efforts closer to home.

It wasn’t the existence of such sheer need that surprised me, but rather, my reaction to these pleas. Feeling overwhelmed, I briefly thought to myself, what’s the point? It’s too much to handle, so why bother at all?

Then, alhumdullilah, my senses returned.

Even though I can’t fix everything, I reminded myself, I could always contribute something.

And something is always better than nothing.

It’s a simple enough notion, but one that’s easy to miss when you have been conditioned, like so many of us, with an all-or-nothing mentality.

The detrimental thought process works something like this:

Say you wish to establish a regular exercise routine. The first few weeks go smoothly and then inevitably, you miss a workout – on a Monday.

Uh oh.

Now, it’s suddenly 10 times harder to get to the gym the rest of the week. Why? Because you’ve fallen behind, and under the all-or-nothing approach, one setback is inexcusable. So you become discouraged and forego workouts all week, which only makes you feel worse, so you skip the next week as well, perpetuating the cycle of your supposed failures until even the thought of returning to your original schedule exhausts you into complete inactivity.

Whew.

As Muslims, we’re supposed to be the most enthusiastic practitioners of the middle way. But too often, we get just as caught up in extremes as everybody else.

Fortunately, life doesn’t have to be this dramatic.

It is critical that we work to find long-term solutions to recurring problems like poverty, crime and corruption. But such grandiose efforts can always be supplemented with smaller gestures.

Few of you, for example, would assert that not having the time or ability to memorize the entire Qur’an excuses you from learning the Fatiha. Similarly, then, while you may not have the energy to clean up all the trash littering your college campus, that’s not an excuse to disregard the empty pop can sitting at your foot. And on a grander scale, you may not be able to solve homelessness in Detroit, but that’s not an excuse to turn away the one man who asks you to spare a dollar for dinner.

In the best-selling book “The Tipping Point,” author Malcolm Gladwell contends that when small numbers of people start behaving differently, that behavior can ripple outward until a critical mass or “tipping point” is reached, changing the world.

As an example, he credits the cleanup of New York’s subways in the 1980s to the city’s subsequent drop in violent crime.

“Weird as it sounds,” Gladwell concludes, “it is possible to be a better person on a clean street or in a clean subway than in one littered with trash and graffiti.”

On an intuitive level, it makes sense that little things can add up to spark very significant changes. Consider the implications of something as small as smiling and holding the door open for a stranger. The gesture could inspire the beneficiary to do the same thing for the person behind him, and so forth, paying forward your good deed infinitum.

But even if the heavens don’t open up and mountains remain unmoved by the actions of one individual, it helps to remember that results aren’t everything.

Intentions matter, too.

Our beloved Prophet (SAW) once said, “If an individual has an opportunity to plant a tree, even if he knows the Day of Judgement is imminent, let him plant the tree.”

So even if the world is coming to an end and no one is around to benefit from our actions, we are advised to complete good deeds. Why? Because if nothing else, they benefit us.

There are many reasons, then, to not give in or give up when our efforts seem in vain – and the primary one is that they’re not in vain.

Because whether through our time, our money, our hands, our tongues, our smiles or our du’as, we can always contribute something.

And something is always better than nothing.

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