Copyright 2006 THE DALLAS MORNING NEWS
By ANGELA SHAH and STEVE BROWN
The Dallas Morning News
Fireman’s Fund Insurance Co. has chosen Dallas as home to a national service center
The 143-year-old insurer, based in Novato, Calif., already has 180 employees downtown in a regional office and expects to add 70 more people to that staff, said Janet Ruiz, a Fireman’s Fund spokeswoman.
But the firm eventually could add far more new jobs, she said.
Real-estate sources said the figure could be as high as 400.
Such an expansion could mark one of the biggest employment boosts to the downtown area since Blockbuster Inc. moved its headquarters to the central business district in 1997.
At Fireman’s Fund, the national customer service center will have teams in direct sales and sales support, as well as a centralized call center.
The operation will provide field support for the company’s employees working in remote locations and support for independent agents who sell the insurer’s products and services, Ms. Ruiz said.
Real estate brokers say that Fireman’s Fund will need as much as 125,000 square feet of office space in locations downtown and in central Dallas.
But the office could grow even larger if the company decides to shift more workers here, rather than to a similar facility in St. Louis. Getting the extra workers will depend on what economic incentives the insurance company can secure, brokers say.
The Dallas City Council is expected to review an incentive package in August. Details were not available Friday, but typically, the city can provide help with infrastructure, tax abatements and development fee rebates.
No one from the state’s office of economic development was available to comment on any application made by Fireman’s Fund for a state package, said a governor’s spokeswoman.
The state of Missouri and St. Louis are also expected to offer incentives to lure additional jobs.
With many large blocks of office space available, Fireman’s Fund won’t have any trouble increasing its operation in downtown Dallas or in other close-in office markets.
Rick Hughes of real estate broker Cushman & Wakefield of Texas is representing the insurance company in its search for office space in Dallas.
Mr. Hughes was out of the office on Friday.
The company now occupies more than 80,000 square feet in the Harwood Center building at Bryan and Harwood streets under a lease that will expire in 2008.
The 70 new employees will work in the company’s existing space. No decisions have been made about where an expansion might take place, Ms. Ruiz said.
The first to insure the “horseless carriage” and airplanes, Fireman’s Fund was founded in 1863 and gets its name because it used to pay widows and orphans of firefighters 10 percent of its profit.