In the Louisiana Supreme Court’s May 21, 2008, Landry opinion (see summary of and link to opinion here), which was the Court’s other big hurricane opinion that everyone had been waiting on, the Court successfully avoided the issue of whether Louisiana’s Valued Policy Law allows for full face-value recovery under a homeowner’s policy when the home is totally destroyed by concurrent causes, one a covered peril (wind) and the other an excluded peril (flood). The Court evaded the larger issue by finding that, under the policy terms of the Citizens’ policy at issue, the insurer had properly opted out of the VPL valuation method; this resulted in a very narrow holding. The Court did, however, include a four-page footnote explaining why it wasn’t addressing the issue of whether the VPL applied generally to homeowners’ “all-risk” policies rather than just to policies insuring against fire, in which the Court included dicta that suggested that the VPL fell somewhere in between all-risk and fire-only and ultimately entreatied the Legislature to address the issue.

The New Orleans Times-Picayune’s coverage of the opinion provides good reaction by attorneys on both sides of the issue.