The Louisiana Legislature's 2025 regular session begins four weeks from today, and lawmakers will once again be looking at possible ways to reduce insurance rates, especially auto insurance rates.
"There's no reason why we should have the highest insurance in the country," Sen. Kirk Talbot (R-River Ridge) said to WWL's Tommy Tucker on Monday. "There's nothing that causes us to be an outlier that we can't control."
Talbot described the state's auto insurance crisis as a "huge important issue" that must be addressed immediately. He says lawmakers are discussing ideas and what needs to be done to drive down car insurance prices.
"If we don't fix this auto insurance thing, it's going to hold our state back," Talbot said. "We're never going to reach the goals that every governor that runs wants: create jobs (and) create a strong middle class. We can't do that unless we fix this auto insurance problem."
Talbot compared the auto insurance price problem to another issue corrected by lawmakers in the 1980s.
"We had a horrible worker's comp environment where worker's comp was unaffordable, and we fixed it, and we need to do the same thing with auto insurance," Talbot said.
Talbot noted that lawmakers will bring a bill to permanently fund the state's fortified roof program, but he admitted that driving down home insurance costs will be tricky.
"I get it on property insurance," Talbot said, referring to high premiums Louisiana residents pay. "We have a coastal state. The majority of our population is below I-10. We are, unfortunately, the number-one destination for named storms that hit land."
