Prop. 100 Backers Change Their Name

The committee responsible for Proposition 100, an insurance initiative financed primarily by trial lawyers, has informed the state’s Fair Political Practices Commission that it is changing its name, and the watchdog agency has “informally” accepted the change.

The name the committee has used up to now in advertising worth hundreds of thousands of dollars is the “Consumer Insurance Reform Coalition.” Insurance industry backers of a competing initiative objected to the FPPC on June 16 on grounds that this misled the electorate.

The new name is “Good Driver Initiative, Sponsored By a Consumer, Legal, Financial & Health Coalition/Yes on Proposition 100.”

This, committee attorney Lance H. Olson told the commission, has been adopted voluntarily because “we want to make very certain that the California public is fully informed about our sponsorship.”

At least 72% of the $2.5 million collected for the initiative campaign through July 1 came from trial lawyers, another 15% from bankers and about 5% from medical practitioners. Very little was identifiable as coming from consumers or their organizations.

Both the insurers and the coordinator of another insurance initiative, one supported by consumer advocate Ralph Nader, were quick Wednesday to object to the new name as still being misleading.

A spokeswoman for the FPPC said that the commission staff had given “oral informal advice” that the new name “appeared to be OK.” But she said the FPPC “can’t be certain” it will approve the change when it renders its formal view in writing.

In a letter to the FPPC, insurance industry attorney John H. Hodgson II charged that the new name is “a planned obfuscation which confuses the public.” The word “legal,” Hodgson said, “falsely indicates that groups such as the State Bar or the Sacramento County Bar Assn. could be the sponsors of the initiative” rather than the trial lawyers.

Harvey Rosenfield, a coordinator of the Nader-supported “Voter Revolt” initiative, said of the new name: “My concern is the voters are still not going to know who’s behind it. It’s outright deception. This is bankrolled by lawyers, and that’s what it should say.”

Rosenfield charged that the FPPC is “abdicating its responsibility” by even informally accepting the change.

Meanwhile Wednesday, a Sacramento member of the Trial Lawyers Assn., Allan Owen, filed suit in the state Court of Appeal asking that the insurers’ no-fault initiative be ordered off the fall ballot. By allowing banks to sell insurance business and limiting lawyers’ fees, the suit contends, the initiative violates a rule against including more than a single subject in an initiative.

However, Joe Remcho, counsel for the Trial Lawyers Assn., said Owen was acting on his own, and the trial lawyers will file a brief in the case opposing his suit.

Remcho said the Trial Lawyers Assn. believes that the courts should let both the initiative it supports and the insurers’ no-fault measure come to a vote.