Shepherd Insurance has continued its expansion in southwest Florida, this time with the acquisition of Responsive Insurance, an agency with offices in Estero and Naples, the company said this week.
Matt Nance, owner of Responsive, and his team will stay with the agency.
The merger comes less than two weeks after Indiana-headquartered Shepherd Insurance, ranked
as one of the largest groups of independent agencies, announced it had acquired Arnold Insurance in Port Charlotte, Florida.
Shepherd, founded in 1977, now has eight Florida agency offices, new Bradenton office space, and
45 offices in six states, writing commercial and personal insurance, and offering employee benefits. Quinn Shepherd is CEO.
As the 2026 hurricane season blows in and a state-funded wind-mitigation program remains as popular as ever, a Florida entrepreneur named John Smith wants a word.
The My Safe Florida Home program, providing matching grants for window and door protections, is ripping off taxpayers and is installing hurricane shutters that can’
t be easily removed in case of a fire inside the home, Smith said in recent interviews and court filings.
“People are dying because of the shutters. That’s what is so incredible,” Smith said.
Smith, of Winter Park, is founder and president of StormStoppers, which employs a lightweight, lower-cost, reinforced plastic material that is mounted to window and
door frames with Dual-Lok fasteners—similar to a heavy-duty type of Velcro: Easy to install. Easy to remove from the inside if a fire breaks out.
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“Just open the window and push,” Smith said.
He notes that his “plywood alternative” is every bit as effective as the bolt-on, corrugated st
el shutters that the My Safe Florida Home program helps pay for. The company says the StormStop
per product has withstood the flying-debris “missile test” and 143-mph winds generated at Florida International University’s famous Wall of Wind testing laboratory.
“All ‘opening protection’ systems sold and installed in Florida must meet (Section) 24.2.2.3.3 of th
e Life Safety Code, which requires occupants to be able to remove the opening protection from inside
of windows in living areas and sleeping rooms ‘without any tools, keys or special effort,'” reads the amended lawsuit complaint, filed in March in Leon County Circuit Court.
Bolt-on shutters may meet state building code requirements. But that code is in conflict with the fire and Life Safety Code, also part of state statutes, Smith argues. In addi
tion to monetary damages, his suit asks that a judge require the My Safe program to comply with the s
afety code. If the program doesn’t comply, it’s possible that it could be forced to halt at least part of its grant allocations.
That could prove to be a big deal. The My Safe Florida Home program has provided more than $385 million in grants for some 40,000 homeowners (who receive di
scounts on their homeowner premiums) since it was relaunched in 2022. The program and installation contractors have indicated that metal shutters are safe because, in m
ost cases, homes that install window and door protections must leave at least one door uncovered—to allow emergency egress during a fire.
