National Meeting NewsEvolving Marketplace, Continued State Leadership: NAIC President White 2026 Spring National Meeting KeynoteMar. 23, 2026

SAN DIEGO, Calif. (March 23, 2026) Evolving Marketplace, Continued State Leadership: NAIC President White 2026 Spring National Meeting Keynote NAIC President and Virginia Insurance Commissioner Scott A. White welcomed attendees to the NAIC’s 2026 Spring National Meeting on March 23 in a keynote address that focused on several of the organization’s strategic priorities for the year ahead. Along with sharing an update on risk-mitigation grant programs that several state insurance departments are spearheading amid increasingly severe natural disasters, Commissioner White highlighted a visit state insurance commissioners made over the weekend to the Dixon Trail neighborhood in Escondido, Calif. Dixon Trail is the first development built to meet the Insurance Institute for Business & Home Safety's (IBHS) Wildfire Prepared Home™ neighborhood-level wildfire resilience standard. “What they saw as they walked along those streets wasn’t just individual wildfire-prepared homes," said Commissioner White. "They saw an entire wildfire-prepared neighborhood built on a blueprint that blended risk mitigation and modern building standards. And, hopefully, these homes are a potential glimpse into a more resilient future.” Commissioner White also discussed the NAIC’s Homeowners Market Data Call, calling it “a key part of our efforts to address affordability and availability challenges.” Regarding state insurance regulators’ work to regulate insurers’ use of artificial intelligence, Commissioner White noted, “Our approach at the NAIC has been to strike the right balance. We don’t want to stand in the way of innovation that generally serves consumers. But we do want to make sure that it is used transparently, fairly, and in ways that hold up to scrutiny.” He also discussed issues including state regulation in light of “the changing investment risk profile of life insurers,” describing a “straightforward” overall goal of ensuring “that the capital insurers hold reflects the risk they're actually taking.” For more information about the NAIC’s 2026 Spring National Meeting, follow us on social media and visit the NAIC’s Meetings and Events page . You can find Commissioner White’s remarks, as prepared for delivery, below: **** Thank you, Commissioner Lara, for welcoming us and for the kind words. You’re a tough act to follow. So, let me begin by saying what an honor it is to serve as your president this year. We’re just a few months into 2026, and we’re already off to a productive start to the year. But today I want to focus on the work in front of us. I’m really excited to talk to you about the priorities of the NAIC this year and where we’re focusing our attention. And there’s so much we could talk about—we have a lot going on. But I’m going to focus on our top three priorities, and within those priorities, the one or two areas I think will have the most impact when we look back a few years from now. I’m also going to piggyback off Commissioner Lara, I’ll start with our work that addresses natural catastrophe risk and resiliency. We’re continuing to see climate-driven natural disasters have devastating impacts across the United States—not just headline-making catastrophes but also the unnamed storms and extreme weather that are just as impactful on our communities. None more so than the L.A. wildfires last year, as we just heard from Commissioner Lara.  And as we gather here in California, I think back to the many commissioners who made the trip to Altadena last year to see firsthand the impact of the wildfires and the discussions that took place to learn how we can better protect our communities from future disasters. That learning continues. Just Saturday, we had more than 20 commissioners visit the Dixon Trail community in Escondido, California, about 30 miles north of here. What they saw as they walked along those streets wasn’t just individual wildfire-prepared homes. They saw an entire wildfire-prepared neighborhood built on a blueprint that blended risk mitigation and modern building standards. And, hopefully, these homes are a potential glimpse into a more resilient future. Let’s take a look at their visit. [Video] What you just saw is something I see daily in my work with the NAIC—commissioners and regulators from across the country coming together to learn and take those leading-edge practices back to their states. And there’s no better example than these department-led risk-mitigation grant programs we’ve been talking so much about these last few years. And what started in Alabama has spread to other parts of the country. Louisiana has in just a few short years provided grant funds for about 4,500 of the total 11,000 [IBHS] FORTIFIED™ roofs in that state and counting. States like New Mexico and California are developing programs to address wildfire risk. In Oklahoma, Minnesota, and Arkansas, grant programs have launched or are being developed to address the severe convective storm peril which has been driving natural cat