RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — A state appeals court ruled Tuesday it can’t reverse homeowners’ insurance premiums that soared by up to nearly 30 percent along the coast because state law doesn’t allow a challenge to the former insurance commissioner’s last-minute deal.

A three-judge Court of Appeals panel ruled in a lawsuit by coastal communities trying to overturn a December 2008 deal between former Insurance Commissioner Jim Long and the North Carolina Rate Bureau, which represents insurers.

Their settlement on homeowners’ rates, which came weeks before Long ended his 24-year run as the state’s top insurance regulator, also allowed homeowners in 32 western counties to cut their premiums.

The municipalities argued Long made the deal before    coastal residents could react to the increases insurers wanted.

Then Long allowed homeowners’ premiums to jump by unreasonably high levels, said attorneys representing Dare, Washington, Currituck, and Hyde counties and five coastal towns.

Attorneys for the state agency and the Rate Bureau told the judges at a hearing three months ago that state law makes the insurance commissioner responsible for representing consumers, and rate settlements can’t be appealed to the court by anyone else.

Insurance Commissioner Wayne Goodwin, who took over the month after Long’s settlement, said the case isn’t over and he couldn’t comment on Tuesday’s ruling.

A second, related appeal of the Rate Bureau case was argued last week before a different three-judge appeals court panel, Goodwin said.

“Our case is still before the Court of Appeals on the issues that are important to us,” Dare County Manager Bobby Outten said.

“This was one of two avenues that was dismissed and the other avenue is before the court for their decision.”

The judges ruled that since Long never held a hearing at which the rate increases were challenged, and never judged the requested premium increases to be excessive, inadequate, or unreasonable, the court couldn’t overturn the deal.

• Emery P. Dalesio