By MONA MOORE
Staff Writer
CHOCOWINITY — Mike Causey, candidate for insurance commissioner, spoke to the Beaufort County Republican Club Thursday night.
Causey is running against Richard Morgan in the July 17 Republican runoff. The winner of the race will face Democrat incumbent Wayne Goodwin in November.
Causey said North Carolina’s insurance system was different from the other 49 states.
“Sometimes, I refer to it as the insurance cartel,” he said. “But I’m old enough to remember what we used to have. It was a disaster.”
He called the current situation a cartel because a handful of insurance companies have a monopoly on North Carolina. Blue Cross Blue Shield issues the majority of the insurance policies in the state with United Health Group and the North Carolina Farm Bureau a distant second and third.
“There’s no competition. Blue Cross has 85 to 86 percent of the market share,” Causey said. “We have four or five companies that won’t even write insurance in North Carolina and that’s a problem.”
Causey said the state has to get more companies in the mix in order to stimulate competition. He also suggested simplifying the insurance system to encourage businesses to write policies in the state.
Another issue Causey wanted to address was companies refusing to insure coastal households. He would consider making an all-or-nothing ultimatum, insure homes everywhere in the state or nowhere.
Before jumping to ultimatums, Causey said he would like to get insurance companies to the table and talk to them about insuring households at different rates, allowing for the “appropriate risk.”
“There are all sorts of things that need to be fixed and if you elect me, I’ll be sure to fix them,” Causey said.
The Beaufort County Republican Club meets monthly on the fourth Thursday at 6 p.m.  at Woogie’s Family Restaurant on Highway 17. Contact Greg Dority at 946-9259, Helen Eckman at 946-3044 or Al Klemm at 974-2121 for more information.