Relation Insurance Services has acquired the assets of PT Business Solutions in South Pasadena, California.
PT Business Solutions is a provider of employee benefit, HR, payroll, workers’
compensation and group retirement plans. The agency has been serving clients since 2003.
Relation Insurance Services is an insurance brokerage that offers risk mana
gement and benefits consulting services across the U.S. with a reported 1,350 employees across more than 100 locations. It is a
privately held corporation backed by Aquiline Capital Partners, a private equity firm based in New York and London.
A federal appeals court has ruled that the government is liable for damage to homes that flooded upstream of the Addicks and Barker
dams after Hurricane Harvey unleashed more than 50 inches of rainfall on the Houston region in 2017.
A three-judge panel in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit ruled
unanimously earlier this week that the government “was aware or should have been aware” that the dams were not enough to protect nearby communities.
In their lawsuit, a group of homeowners said the dams were built with the goal of protecting Houston’s downtown area do
wnstream, “even at the cost of flooding private lands.” Land upstream from the Addicks and Barker dams are dry most of the time,
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and many homeowners didn’t know their neighborhoods were built inside federally owned flood control reservoirs which filled to unprecedented levels after Harvey.
It’s estimated that around 14,000 homes were inside the reservoir at the time Harvey made landfall in Rockport as a Category 4 storm
then stalled out over the Houston region and dumped record levels of rain. More than one-third of the homes in the reservoirs flooded.
Houston Public Media first reported the new ruling. Daniel Charest, a partne
r with the law firm of Burns Charest that is representing the plaintiffs, told HPM the decision could help the claims others have made against the government.
“This ruling reinforces that every property owner whose land is subject to the government’s flowage easement deserves compensat
ion for that permanent burden on their property rights,” Charest said in a news release.
The government could either appeal the decision to the full Federal Circuit, or file an appeal directly to the U.S. Supreme Court.
“There are a few more legal hoops to jump through but relief is now closer than ever,” Gov. Greg Abbott wrote on X.