Iowa Supreme Court Ruling - a Sad Day for Iowa Landowners

We are members of the Independant Insurance Agents of Iowa (The BigI.) A few days ago I received an email alert about a recent Iowa Supreme Court ruling regarding Iowa's Statute on Recreational Immunity. I did read all 72 pages of the ruling on Sallee vs Stewart and much of it was gobbledegoop to me since they cited various statutes and other cases. Quite frankly, it mad me ANGRY!!! I was hoping I had interpretted the ruling incorrectly since I have been the granter and reciever of access.
I grew up on a farm, I remember people knocking on our kitchen door during pheasant season asking if they could hunt the ditches, or a fence row. My dad always planted several acres of sweet corn that was free to anyone that wanted to come out and pick it. Folks would run their snomobiles across our fields. We had our friends over; we rode the horses, played in the hay mow, or drove the dune buggy, go cart, trail bike, snowmobiles, shot dad's guns at cans, clay pidgeons, birds, squirrels, we were kids on a farm.
In recent years, my husband has taken me to several farm ponds to fish and we have hunted mushrooms and deer on various properties. These wonderful people, out of the goodness of their hearts have allowed us access to their property and asked for NOTHING in return.
We have in turn invited people to our property to hunt and fish and our tenant has allowed hunters (when the bird population is large enough.)

Today I received another email from The BigI. There was a link to the 75 page ruling - I am NOT going there, but more importantly, there was a link to a bulletin from the Iowa State University Center for Agricultural Law and Taxation. Follow this link ISU CALT  to read the 9 page document.

The following statement summerizes the opion of the authors.

"Landowners should take steps to protect themselves by preventing entry by any persons upon their property, within their structures, or upon their farms. The promised liability protection for opening agricultural land to others for recreational purposes no longer exists. The risks of continuing the practice are great with limited opportunities to guard against liability."

 

For me, a sad, sad, sad, sad day to be an Iowan and a landowner.

Food for thought

Did you know, on average for every dollar spent on food - cereal, hamburger, fresh fruit or what ever,  the farmer receives five cents? Out of this five cents they have to pay for their land (either purchasing or renting), equipment, seed/animals, fuel, ferilizers/herbacides, labor, insurance and their own living expenses.


Did you know America's farmers support 24 million jobs? Or that U.S. farmers supply 41.56% of the world's corn? How about that one acre of soybeans can create 82,368 crayons?
America's farmers produce many products for not only the U.S., but also the world. Take a look at the impact America's farmers have. (Americas Farmers - Some Food For Thought)
Video from Americas Farmers

Beautiful Snow

I looked out my front door this morning to see big snowflakes falling. It had been snowing several hours by this time & well, I happen to love snow covered trees and bushes so I grabbed my phone & walked out onto the front porch, barefoot mind you and took a few quick snaps.

Talk About Us

I am always thrilled when a prospective clients calls and says "Joe Jones" told me to give you a call to talk about my insurance.

• This means Joe is happy with the service we have provided him.
• Joe is confident that we will work hard to make his friend happy.
• His friend trusts Joe's opinion.
• We have made a difference to Joe.

Customer referals are the highest compliment you can give anyone in the insurance profession.

Go ahead, make our day, talk about us.

First snow approaching - Blizzard conditions

Everyone is all a twitter as our first snow since March 5, 2012 is appraoching. As usual, the amount of predicted snowfall varies depending on which weather forecast you happen to follow. Greg Dutra on KWQC said to 2-4 inches for our area this morning @ 7AM. Dayton said he heard 4-6 inches.... One thing all weather forecasts have said, it is going to be WINDY! 50-60mph, which means even if we only get 2 inches it is going to blow, blow, blow and look like we are getting dumped on. Even if we get zero snow, travelling is going to be difficult. Our Yaris probably won't even stay on the road........... maybe I do want to drive the Mazda pick-up to my hair appointment.
So everyone in the storm track - be extra careful tomorrow.

Allied/Nationwide Security Attack/Breach

A portion of the Allied/Nationwide Insurace computer network was victim to a crimminal security attack/breach on October 3rd, 2012. Immediately upon discovery, steps were taken to contain the attack. An invesitgation was initiated to determine if any information was stolen.

On October 16, it was determined that some personal information had likely been stolen. No financial information was compromised. Along with numerous law enforcement investigations, Allied/Nationwide is continuing to conduct their own invesitagation to fully understand the attack. They continue to cooperate with law enforcement authorities.

The process of verifying who may have been affected and what personal information may have been stolen continued and on November 2, 2012 confirmation of the identities and addresses of individuals whose information was "likely" compromised was recieved. Allied/Nationwide has mailed letters to notify those people that they believe were impacted by this crimminal attack. Along with notification, Allied/Nationwide is offering impacted persons one year of free credit monitoring and identity theft coverage though a partnership with Equifax. The letter includes instructions for individuals to sign up for this benefit. Information is also included for some additional things a person may wish to do to protect themselves.

OMG!!! was the very first thing I thought when I received the first notice last week of this incident, how the HE double hocky sticks did this happen and why am I (as an agent) just now getting notice were my next two thoughts.

We had numerous conversations in the office about how we, as an agency were going to communicate with our clients. Do we call every client or just the ones that may have been compromised? How do we get a list of those possibly affected? Is the list complete? What if we miss someone? There was never any thought that we would not get in touch with our clients, it was figuring out the logistics of completing the task. When we were abe to start searching the system, we of course typed in staff first - low and behold someone in each of our family was on the list. So yes, we were all affected personally by this, too. Coincidentally, it pops up when our office is heading into a 4 day weekend and there is no time to complete the list, let alone gather all the phone numbers and make calls before 5PM Wednesday.

First thing Monday morning we get our list of possibly affected people compiled and Dayton starts the job of calling. By the way, my husband got his letter over the weekend.... Dayton had not received a letter. So we know who MAY have been affected but not who WAS affected at this point, and we know that atleast some letters have been mailed, quick revision to our talking points/script.
I have to say, we have WONDERFUL clients, for the most part they have taken this unfortunate news with an ounce of salt and been gracious. Several vigilant clients had thrown away their letter thinking it was a scam, we were able to provide them with the information in their letter to get enrolled in the free credit monitoring/identity theft coverage. We have had a few clients come into the office and Dayton has helped them get enrolled.

We have continued to receive updates from Allied/Nationwide. As of this morning, we know that only Personal Lines Auto clients/prospects were impacted. There also has to have been either a new quote or a requote performed by an agent since September, 2011. If you have NOT received a letter, your information was not compromised, even if you were on the original list. At  this time, there is no known use/sale of the compromised information.

Reflections

Thanksgiving is just around the corner and with the day fast approaching, it begs me to reflect on the things I am thankful for.

1.  I know how blessed I am to have been raised by loving parents. They worked hard to provide for our family and as an adult I realized that while I did not get everything I wanted, I did not want for anything I needed. As a kid it is hard to distinguish the difference of "want" and "need."

2.  As farm kids we did all the things farm kids did back in the '60's and 70's: walked beans, baled hay, kicked corn, castrated pigs, shelled corn, mowed the yard, etc. But we also had fun: we "fished for hogs" - sat on top of the wooden hog feeder with an ear of corn tied with baling twine hanging down about a foot off the ground and waited for a pigs to take a bite! We built forts and tunnels in the hay mow, we played in the crick in the summer and ice skated on it in the winter.

3.  Growing up in a small community, we knew which houses to visit for trick or treat; homemade popcorn balls, cookies & full size candy bars! Our school bus driver, Aubrey King, gave us a Christmas present every year. If we were running late, he would pull up our drive and honk the horn to hurry us up. My friends were, for the most part, the kids of my parents friends from forever! If one of our sports team went to state, the town pretty well shut down to watch them play.

4.  I am blessed with my family, husband, children, step children, their significant others, a grandson and our extended families, aunts, uncles, cousins, etc.

5. The mistakes, errors in judgement and total screw ups are part of what is me, and while I regret them, they are blessings, I think my guardian angel was shook up pretty good a couple of times.

6. I wake up each day, to live in a country where I can say what I want, work at a job of my choosing, move about as I please, worship or not, etc. not because I did anything special or extraordinary but because people that I don't know, took it upon themselves to leave their home and come to the United States. Beyond that, relatives, friends and total strangers have fought and continue to fight for MY freedom to do these things.