Controversial Group Reaps 96.8% of Funds from Program It Wrote into Prop 103, Adding to Tens of Millions It Has Pocketed Since Program's Inception

SACRAMENTO - D ata released today from the California Department of Insurance (CDI) shows that "Consumer Watchdog," a controversial Santa Monica advocacy organization, received $1,427,280.80 in fees from the state's inventor compensation program in 2025.

The figure represents 96.78 percent of the funds awarded by the department and is more than double the $643,530.15 Consumer Watchdog received in 2024. Only one other organization, the Consumer Federation of California Education Foundation received any other funds ($47,500).

The new data confirms that Consumer Watchdog continues to exploit the intervenor program it wrote into Prop 103. The group charges upwards of $650 per hour to intervene in insurance rate filings.

In the past decade, the group, which has zero members, received more than $11.2 million in fees from the program since 2013. These fees are ultimately paid for by ratepayers.

In September, CDI Commissioner Ricardo Lara proposed modernizing the program to diversify the recipients of intervenor program funds. He said his proposed reforms "represent another critical step toward building a market that protects consumers, holds insurance companies accountable, and bases rates on facts rather than delays."

A broad coalition of two dozen California industry and consumer leaders wrote a letter in support of Commissioner Lara's intervenor reforms. In the letter the coalition stressed, "for too long-self interested groups have exploited this process to enrich themselves at the expense of homeowners, farmers, and businesses. Commissioner Lara's reforms are essential to restoring accountability, ensuring timely rate reviews, and stabilizing California's insurance market so that real consumers can access the coverage they need."

The only major opposition to the reforms has come from the two entities that have been recipients of the fees during the past decade.

While Consumer Watchdog claims to represent the interests of consumers, the Department of Insurance has acknowledged that the group "has no members and is accountable to no one but itself," questioned the value of its interventions given CDI's robust rate-review process, and concluded that "Watchdog is turning a blind eye to consumers' needs while defending its own insurance piggy bank."

In 2012, legislators pressed then-Insurance Commissioner Dave Jones to diversify the program so other groups could participate in the process. Yet year after year, Consumer Watchdog dominates the program to its own benefit.

Meanwhile, the delays caused by the intervenor program have compounded California's worsening insurance crisis. In fact, recent analysis from actuarial firm Perr & Knight found that California's average rate review delay is over 100 days for homeowners insurance and over 200 days for auto insurance.

The Intervenor Fee program, written into Prop 103 by Consumer Watchdog's founder Harvey Rosenfield, is unique to California. The program has come under widespread criticism , with critics arguing that the program introduces costly, unnecessary delays that deter insurers from doing business in the state, while providing little benefit to consumers.

"It should be no surprise that Consumer Watchdog has a monopoly on this cash cow in the regulatory process - it literally wrote the law to benefit itself," said Nicole Mahrt-Ganley, the assistant vice president for public affairs for the American Property Casualty Insurance Association (APCIA). "This self-serving provision rewards delay over real solutions-and Californian consumers are paying the price, literally."

She noted that as the California insurance market continues to deteriorate, Consumer Watchdog continues to profit from the broken intervenor program at the direct expense of consumers and a collapsing insurance market. Its self-serving stranglehold on the system is an active threat to consumer access to insurance coverage.