The Rural Voice, 1981-07, Page 6Ins uring
your barn
"You can't expect insurance to
build you a new barn. But we'll
start again, unless a barn is
too dear to build."
by Herb Shoveller
On a Saturday evening, late in April.
maybe to take advantage of one of the few
free evenings they knew would be
available in the months ahead, Brad and
Sharon Carnochan headed off to the local
drive-in. They didn't get to see the show.
As the movie was about to begin, the call
came, and later Brad would estimate he
made the 16 -mile trip home in eight
minutes. All the high speed journey
afforded the couple, however was a front
row view of the destruction by fire of their
barn and 500 pigs. "We heard it was
gone in 15 minutes, maybe half an hour,"
said the young farmer a few days after
the incident. A barren, smoke-stained
cement foundation was all that remained
of the barn built by Brad's grandfather
during the thirties.
In the case of the Carnochans, and
many other farmers who were victims of a
similar fate, a fii only begins a long,
arduous process. It is not ways a matter
of simply gritting your teeth, tightening
your belt and starting again. First, you
have to determine whether you can start
over.
Three days after the fire, Sharon was
convinced there would be another barn on
the Carnochan farm. "We're planning on
rebuilding," she said. "1 can't imagine
my husband without his pigs."
The husband announced this plans
with more caution. First. he said he
doubted he could afford to construct as
Targe a building as the one destroyed.
Sure, the barn was insured. but as he
added, the protection never meets the full
value. "You can't expect insurance to
build you a new barn," was his remark-
ably calm comment in the aftermath.
"But we'll start again, unless a barn is
too dear to build."
Too often, fire doesn't just destroy
barns and other buildings, it can also ruin
a family's chosen life on the land.
Insurance doesn't necessarily offer any
guarantees. It doesn't have to be that
way, though, according to Larry Dillon, a
hog farmer from near Clinton. Dillon is de
facto leader of a one-man crusade against
what he sees as a disproportionately high
number of farm fire losses. In fact, he
feels insurance companies are not doing
their share to encourage fire safety.
The argument can get complicated,
but it can also be simply put. Dillon
contends, given the current insurance
structure, that premiums punish farmers
accordinp to the degree of fire risk in
their barns, yet premiums fail to reward
those who conscientiously include a
variety of safety feature in their barns. To
Dillon, this is not only unfair to the
concerned farmer, but the premium
system also does not encourage safety by
providing financial incentives in insur-
ance rates.
Dillon received a rather bleak intro-
duction to this issue three years ago when
a neighbour was killed by liquid manure
fumes. The episode illustrated to him
dangers inherent in unsafe barns, with
fire one of the concerns. At the time,
Dillon had an old wooden bank barn. "It
was the first built on a stone foundation in
Hullett Township. At least, that's what
my father-in-law told me," explained
Dillon. "It was 100 years old, at least. It
had extremely unsafe wiring, and there
was a problem with physical safety. I
almost had a wall fall on me." A fate
similar to his neighbour's was a real
possibility-
He
ossibilityHe decided the barn was beyond repair
so, with the help of an engineer from
OMAF in Clinton. Dillon designed a new
building. The result of the planning
included a steel exterior, and on the
inside four feet of asbestos with more
steel above. The dividing walls are made
from concrete blocks. All wiring is
incased in metal conduit, and he doesn't
use straw. Instead, he is "committed" to
liquid manure. which is stored in under-
ground tanks outside. Air locks prevent
the vapor from getting back into the barn.
With the building completed, it was
time to search for an insurance policy.
After spending much more than he
needed to. Dillon figured his commitment
to safety in his barn would be recognized
in a substantially reduced premium. He
didn't expect to recoup his outlay
immediately, but he hoped he would save
through premium breaks in the long run.
"An insurance agent came out and
said, 'you couldn't burn this place down if
you tried.' And then they want to give me
fire insurance at the same price as
before," marvelled Dillon. In his mind,
he'd replaced a definite hazard with a
barn loaded with fire and other safety
features. Speaking with him, it is clear he
expected agents in droves looking for an
opportunity to insure the low-risk build-
ing. Instead, insurance -wise he was no
better off than befoere.
He began a long search for what he
could consider an acceptable policy, and
with each rebuttal, his resentment grew,
and so did his anger. In one instance.
when he'd explained the details of his
fire -safe design to a mutual insurance
company, the secretary -treasurer, he
said, virtually called him a liar. He kept
looking and finally, though still not
completely satisfied. settled on a policy
PG. 4 THE RURAL VOICE/JULY 1981