The Broadcast Pioneers of Philadelphia

Born in 1930, Herb Denenberg has been an investigative and consumer reporter and columnist for over 25 years. Before that he served as Pennsylvania Insurance Commissioner, Pennsylvania Public Utility Commissioner, and Professor at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

He was the consumer and investigative reporter for WCAU-TV, Channel 10 for 25 years, and more recently served in that capacity at the Harron Cable Update and the Adelphia Cable update, both nightly newscasts, and for the Tri-State Media All-News Cable Network. He was also a columnist for a group of papers in Pennsylvania and New Jersey and appears as an expert witness cases against insurance companies involving bad faith denial of claims and other matters.

He was also an adjunct professor of information science and technology at Cabrini College. He has also served as an assistant professor of insurance at the University of Iowa and a professor of law at Temple University.

He has won hundreds of awards for his media work, including 40 Emmys, the Consumer Service Award of the Consumer Federation of American, the Award of Achievement from the American Board of Trial Advocates, an award for the best in consumer journalism from the National Press Club and a Lambert Award for contributions to the health care delivery system.

During Denenberg's tenure as Pennsylvania Insurance Commissioner, Ralph Nader wrote, "He's clearly the most consumer-oriented insurance commissioner in American history." As a result of the health care reforms he implemented as Commissioner, he was elected to the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences. His motto as Insurance Commissioner, was "Populus Iamdudam Defutatus Est" which translated from the Latin is "The Consumer Has Been Screwed Long Enough."

Denenberg was a graduate of Johns Hopkins University (B.S.), Creighton University School of Law (J.D.), Harvard University School of Law (LL.M.), and the University of Pennsylvania (Ph.D.). He also received two honorary degrees, a Doctor of Humane Letters from Spring Garden College and a Doctor of Laws from Allentown College. He was a CPCU (Chartered Property and Casualty Underwriter) and a CLU (Chartered Life Underwriter).

For three years he served in the Judge Advocate General's Corps of the U.S. Army as a first lieutenant and and was a captain in the reserves.

He was the author of seven books and hundreds of articles on insurance, law, and consumer affairs. He has testified many times before Congressional committees, state legislative committees, and the City Council of Philadelphia.

He has served on the board of Consumers Union, the publisher of Consumer Reports, and is now on the board of the Sapio Institute (on interactive learning) and the Center for Proper Medication Use. He served as President of the American Risk and Insurance Association. He recently authored a Shopper's Guide to Herbal Medicine, published by the Center, and a more complete version of that guide which is to appear on their Web Site at www.cpmu.org.

Denenberg has served as consultant to the US Department of Labor, the US Small Business Administration, the National Commission on Product Safety, the FTC, the US Department of Justice, the US Department of Transportation, the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, the Philadelphia School Board, the State of Alaska and Nevada, the United States Commission on Civil Rights, and other government agencies. He was special counsel and research director of the President's National Advisory Panel on Insurance in Riot-Affected Areas; associate director of the Wisconsin Legislature's Law Revision Committee, special counsel to the Mayor of Washington D.C., and general counsel of the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission. He was a co-author of the first no-fault law passed in a United States jurisdiction (the Social Protection Plan of Puerto Rico). He also instituted a long list of fundamental reforms as Pennsylvania Insurance Commissioner.

Herb Denenberg passed away on March 18, 2010. On Friday, Novmber 19, 2010, Herb Denenberg was posthumously inducted into the Broadcast Pioneers Hall of Fame.

The e-mail address of the Broadcast Pioneers of Philadelphia is pioneers@broadcastpioneers.com