State Insurance Commissioner Ralph Hudgens said Monday he will push legislation to keep insurance commissioners from doing what John Oxendine did last month as he left office: granting themselves insurance licenses without taking mandatory tests.
Hudgens, who succeeded Oxendine as insurance commissioner, wrote the new legislation after The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported Sunday that Oxendine issued himself several insurance agent and adjuster licenses the day before his term ended. Oxendine used an agency regulation that enabled him to waive the mandatory tests other Georgians must pass to get the licenses.
Hudgens' legislation, which is expected to be introduced in the state House, would prevent insurance commissioners from bypassing testing requirements and simply granting themselves licenses.
"This is an instance where there is no regulatory remedy for bad judgment, but I want to make sure it does not happen again," Hudgens said. "I plan to have legislation introduced specifically prohibiting a repeat of this unfortunate incident."
Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle, the Senate's president, said he thinks Hudgens' legislation has "a great chance of passing" the General Assembly. Cagle said he "appreciates Commissioner Hudgens' proactive leadership on this issue."
Senate Insurance Chairman Greg Goggans, R-Douglas, said the legislation makes sense.
"I think everybody should have to play by the rules and meet the same requirements," Goggans said.
Goggans, an orthodontist, said allowing the insurance commissioner to give himself insurance licenses would be like letting the people who run the Georgia Dental Association license themselves as dentists without undergoing the training.
Oxendine told the AJC last week that he gave himself the licenses without taking the mandatory tests because he thought his presence in testing centers would distract other test-takers. He also said his 16 years of writing insurance laws as commissioner made him more than qualified for the licenses.
“If 16 years [as commissioner] doesn’t give you a little bit of insurance experience, I don’t know what does,” said Oxendine. “I think that’s [worth] a little bit more than taking a test and taking a class."
Before he took office in January, Hudgens said he made it clear to Oxendine that he was fine with giving him the licenses if he passed the tests. But Oxendine granted himself the licenses the day before Hudgens took over.
"He said, ‘Anybody is an insurance agent when I tell them they are an insurance agent, and I am going to tell myself I am an agent,' " Hudgens said. "That's kind of basically the approach that was taken."
ajc results
On Sunday, the AJC broke the story documenting Oxendine's unusual actions. On Monday, the new insurance commissioner said he wants to make such actions illegal.
