A bit of relief is on the way for beleaguered South Florida homeowners: The discounts insurers now offer for strengthening homes against hurricanes, such as adding shutters or roof straps, could double by December.

The bottom line for consumers: bigger savings on windstorm insurance premiums.

In mid-August, state insurance regulators began revamping the mitigation discounts insurers are required to offer.

The goal is to provide a more specific, standardized discount for each type of hurricane protection added, moving away from the broad ranges insurers have used since 2002.

If mitigation is seen ``as the wave of the future, we need to give homeowners greater economic incentive'' to undertake these measures, Insurance Commissioner Kevin McCarty said on Thursday.

Lawmakers, insurers and regulators wrestling with the state's deepening insurance crisis now see mitigation as one of the best ways to save lives and reduce costs for the insurance industry and homeowners.

Field studies as well as analyses of the losses from the hurricanes of the past two years have shown that newer homes and those retrofitted to meet the current stricter building codes stand up better to massive storms.

The Office of Insurance Regulation already has the cooperation of State Farm Florida, one of the state's largest insurers, McCarty said.

Allstate Floridian, another major insurer, supports the idea of discount standardization as long as it doesn't ``cause overall homeowner rates to become inadequate for the risk being taken on,'' the company said in an e-mail to The Miami Herald.

Regulators also are working on creating a rating system to classify a home's strength to withstand a major hurricane. McCarty said Gov. Jeb Bush is a proponent of such a system.

LOWER PREMIUMS

These hurricane ratings eventually could be used together with revamped mitigation discounts to lower windstorm premiums.

Current discounts often leave homeowners wondering if they are applied fairly and uniformly.

Benjamin Scotchman is miffed that Citizens Property Insurance, the state-run insurer of last resort, will grant him only a $19 discount on his homeowners insurance premium even though he recently installed impact-resistant windows on his Plantation town house.

He wasn't expecting to recover immediately the nearly $17,000 the new windows cost, but he was hoping for a bigger discount to lower his annual bill of $3,200.

``These windows protect the property. In the event of a hurricane, I won't suffer any damage,'' says Scotchman, who is retired.

``I know this is an ongoing source of frustration,'' said Frank Kowalski, president and chief executive of Koski & Co. in Palmetto Bay. He's a member of Gov. Jeb Bush's newly created Property and Casualty Reform Committee, which is investigating possible short- and long-term solutions to the state's insurance crisis, including mitigation measures.

Right now, there's little recourse for consumers who are unhappy with discounts offered by insurers. They can, however, file a complaint with the Department of Financial Services' Division of Consumer Affairs.

The consternation for homeowners over these discounts stems partly from the broad ranges insurers are allowed to work with right now. For instance, Citizens, the state-run insurance pool and the largest insurer of homes in Florida, offers discounts ranging from 0 percent to 33 percent for shutters. Gulfstream Property & Casualty offers discounts of up to 46 percent for shutters, while State Farm offers up to 17 percent.

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