Business briefs

LOS ANGELES — California Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner Wednesday challenged the rates Allstate Corp. charges consumers for homeowner’s insurance and said he would order the company to refund premiums if a hearing substantiates those claims.

Poizner said that while other insurers have lowered rates for homeowner’s coverage by between 10 percent and 18 percent, Allstate has applied for a 12 percent rate hike. The company also recently announced it would not write new policies in California because of losses from wildfire and other claims.

In an order compelling Allstate to justify its rates, the state said a preliminary analysis of claims data suggests rates should be reduced by 43.88 percent.

"I am drawing a line in the sand,” Poizner said. "If I find that Allstate’s rates are excessive, refunds will occur.”

The company denied the allegation, saying the current rates were approved by the state insurance department in 2003 and "are competitively priced.”

Suit claims Hyundai helped exec flee U.S. after fatal SoCal crash

SANTA ANA — A wrongful-death lawsuit filed Wednesday claims U.S. Hyundai executives helped a colleague flee the country after a drunken-driving crash that killed a motorcyclist.

The Orange County Superior Court lawsuit seeks unspecified damages from Hyundai Motor America, Hyundai Motor Finance Co. and three executives for the 2005 death of Ryan Dallas Cook of Huntington Beach.

One of the executives, Youn Bum Lee, was charged last month with four felony charges: vehicular manslaughter by unlawful act with gross negligence while intoxicated; vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence; driving under the influence causing bodily injury and hit-and-run with permanent injury or death.

Lee is believed to have fled to his native South Korea after the accident and a warrant was issued last month for his arrest, although authorities are unsure of his specific whereabouts, said Susan Schroeder, a spokeswoman for the Orange County district attorney’s office.

Napa Valley wine making a name for itself in Europe

SAN FRANCISCO — California’s Napa Valley is making a name for itself in Europe with officials there declaring that wine bottles can’t say Napa on the label if the grapes come from someplace else.

The European Union’s decision to grant Napa Valley what is known as "geographic indicator” status, reached earlier this year and scheduled to be formally announced in San Francisco on Thursday, was hailed by vintners as a breakthrough.

"It’s been a wild ride,” said Doug Shafer, president of Shafer Vineyards, a Napa Valley producer of high-end wines. "The fact that we have this protection is wonderful.”

The EU agreement is the first time the Napa name has been protected outside California, where a state law bans producers from slapping a Napa label on non-Napa grapes.

"The momentum for wine recognition is gaining so rapidly,” said Terry Hall, spokesman for the Napa Valley Vintners, a trade group that has been fighting to protect the Napa name.

The EU action also applies to imports, meaning other countries can’t bring faux Napa products into Europe, said Hall, noting that a number of wines are being sold under the Napa name, including Clos du Napa in Britain.

The push for label authenticity goes beyond Napa.

In accords reached with the EU two years ago, the United States agreed to ask Congress to stop U.S. producers from using names such as sherry, port and Champagne that refer to European wine-growing regions. However, that agreement grandfathered in existing U.S. brands.

Producers from Champagne, Porto and Jerez are campaigning for expanded protection in the United States through the Washington-based Center for Wine Origins.

In March, producers from wine-growing regions in the United States as well as Italy, Australia and Hungary signed on to a "Joint Declaration to Protect Wine Place & Origin,” bringing the total number of regions involved in the effort to 13.

The campaigns are a big shift from 25 years ago, when Shafer can remember going to Europe and finding people who had only a hazy idea of where California was, let alone Napa. "California was just this big place kind of near Australia,” he said.

"What’s been great is to see top wines from Napa being sold worldwide,” he said. "All of a sudden you’re on a world stage and you get compared with the top wines in the world.”

———

On the Net:

http://www.napavintners.com

http://www.protectplace.com

http://www.shafervineyards.com