Hawkins, Hawkins & Burt LLP
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David A. Burt, Esq.
Mr. Burt’s first hands-on experience with crop insurance was at the age of fourteen when he attended a crop insurance adjusters training session and learned how to adjust tobacco losses. During the summers, he worked in his father’s business, which was contracting with crop insurance companies and reinsuring their crop insurance risks with various foreign and domestic reinsurance companies. He spent one entire summer working in North Carolina issuing crop insurance policies, collecting premiums, paying losses, and accompanying loss adjusters to various claims.
After he graduated from the University of Virginia Law School in 1975, Mr. Burt represented several insurance and reinsurance entities in various legal matters. He was subsequently hired by those entities and ultimately became their Executive Vice President, Treasurer and General Counsel. He became the operational head of all of their crop insurance operations, which included the following:
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American Hail Insurance Company, which wrote only multiple peril crop insurance and crop hail insurance throughout the United States. American Hail Insurance Company was one of the first Reinsured Companies for the Federal Crop Insurance program.
American Hail Insurance Company, which wrote only multiple peril crop insurance and crop hail insurance throughout the United States. American Hail Insurance Company was one of the first Reinsured Companies for the Federal Crop Insurance program.•American Hail Management, Inc., a managing general agency, which provided all of the underwriting, accounting, policy issuance, agency appointment and training, claim adjustment and payment, and adjuster training services to American Hail Insurance Company and other insurance companies which appointed American Hail Management to produce crop insurance business on their behalf. American Hail Management had offices throughout the United States.
American Hail Management, Inc., a managing general agency, which provided all of the underwriting, accounting, policy issuance, agency appointment and training, claim adjustment and payment, and adjuster training services to American Hail Insurance Company and other insurance companies which appointed American Hail Management to produce crop insurance business on their behalf. American Hail Management had offices throughout the United States.•Hail Adjustment Services, Inc., which provided crop insurance claim adjustment services for insurance companies, primarily in the southeastern United States.
Hail Adjustment Services, Inc., which provided crop insurance claim adjustment services for insurance companies, primarily in the southeastern United States.•Hail Information Services, Inc., which was a crop insurance statistical organization, establishing premium rates and policy forms for member insurance companies.
Hail Information Services, Inc., which was a crop insurance statistical organization, establishing premium rates and policy forms for member insurance companies.•Hail Reinsurance Management, Inc., which managed, on behalf of various insurance companies, a significant book of crop insurance business produced by independent managing general agencies throughout the United States.
Hail Reinsurance Management, Inc., which managed, on behalf of various insurance companies, a significant book of crop insurance business produced by independent managing general agencies throughout the United States.During his time in private industry, Mr. Burt came into contact with individuals from various crop insurance entities and the Risk Management Agency (RMA), which agency manages the Federal Crop Insurance program. These contacts continue to be important.
Mr. Burt returned to the private practice of law in 1992, and almost immediately began representing growers who had crop insurance claims.
He has represented growers in mediations, arbitrations, litigation in Federal Courts, National Appeal Division hearings, Equal Access to Justice hearings and before the Farm Service Agency. He has represented growers in seeking Final Agency Determinations (FADs) related to policy interpretations.
Mr. Burt is a member of the Florida Bar and the Virginia State Bar, and is licensed to practice before the United States District Courts for the Middle District of Florida and the Southern District of Florida, as well as the United States Courts of Appeal for the 5th and 11th Circuits, and the Supreme Court of the United States. He is a mediator in both State and Federal courts, and was certified by the Supreme Court of Florida as a mediator. He was instrumental in the establishment of the Florida Agriculture Mediation Service and served as its first mediator.
He has lectured on the subject of Agricultural Mediations at seminars sponsored by the Agriculture Law Committee of the General Practice Section of the Florida Bar.
He taught a class on Crop Insurance Basics at the University Of Florida Levin College Of Law.
He was a Panel Member in a presentation before the American Agricultural Law Association entitled Crop Insurance 101 – Litigation Basics & Suggestions for the New Practitioner.
