Hurricane Dorian’s uneventful passage through Volusia-Flagler leaves Security First officials relieved

After having had to evacuate its beachside corporate offices on A1A for both hurricanes Matthew and Irma, Security First Insurance officials were determined to complete their new "fortress"-like headquarters at Ormond Crossings before the next hurricane.

A move-in date was set for Sept. 16.

Unfortunately, Hurricane Dorian beat them to the punch, sweeping through the Volusia-Flagler area this past Wednesday.

The good news is that Dorian's impact locally was nowhere close to the damage caused by the hurricanes that hit the area in 2016 and 2017.

"From our perspective, it (hurricane damage claims filed by homeowners insured by Security First) will be much less than Irma and Matthew," said a relieved Melissa Burt DeVriese, the insurance company's chief administrative officer and general counsel, in a phone interview on Wednesday morning.

"For us, Irma resulted in over 40,000 claims, while Matthew resulted in over 13,000 claims," said DeVriese, whose Ormond Beach-based company specializes in providing homeowners insurance to Florida residents.

"From this storm (Dorian), we expect less than 5,000 claims statewide," she said.

"The counties expected to have the greatest impact from Dorian are Brevard, Volusia and Duval in terms of the number of claims we receive," she said.

"St. Johns (County) will be impacted the same, but there's not as many homes there," she said.

Founded in 2005 immediately following the multiple hurricanes that hit Florida the previous year and the decision by some large national insurers to pull out of this market, Security First today is one of the largest private insurers for homeowners in the Sunshine State.

In Volusia County, nearly one out of every five homes (18 percent) are insured by Security First, which has a 15 percent market share in Flagler.

Hurricane Dorian brushed by the area approximately 85 miles off the coast as a Category 2 storm, according to DeVriese.

While that resulted in some strong wind gusts of up to 44 miles per hour, that was nothing like the Category 5 force winds that devastated the north Bahamas.

Still, DeVriese encouraged local homeowners whose residences were damaged by the storm to notify their insurance company as soon as possible.

"You don't get penalized by Acts of God," she said.

Homeowners should keep in mind that hurricane deductibles are annual.

"If there's another storm before the end of the year, they wouldn't have to pay the deductible again if they met it the first time or it could be accumulated with what they already paid (for Dorian)," DeVriese said.

Security First set up temporary operations in both Georgia and Ohio to ensure no interruption to its service during Hurricane Dorian.

With its new headquarters designed to withstand sustained Category 5 hurricane winds, DeVriese hopes her company will no longer need to evacuate for future hurricanes.

As far as moving in to the company's new corporate offices, while a new move-in date has not yet been set, DeVriese expressed optimism that it will be sometime later this month.

"We only lost about two days," she said.

Clayton Park is business editor of The News-Journal. He can be reached at clayton.park@news-jrnl.com.

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