Case Title: VERNUS WUNSCHEL, JACQUELYN WUNSCHEL and WUNSCHEL OIL COMPANY, Appellants, vs. IOWA DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC SAFETY, Appellee.

Citation: 

Docket Number: 99-1497

State: iowa

Court: Iowa Supreme Court

Date: 2001-10-22T00:00:00Z

Document:
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF IOWA

		No. 145 / 99-1497

Filed October 22, 2001

VERNUS WUNSCHEL, JACQUELYN
WUNSCHEL and WUNSCHEL OIL
COMPANY,

	Appellants,

vs.

IOWA DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC SAFETY,

	Appellee.
________________________________________________________________________
	Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Ida County, John P. Duffy, Judge.

	Petitioners appeal from the district court’s ruling dismissing their judicial review action challenging the respondent’s decision.  AFFIRMED.

	Robert Kohorst of Kohorst, Early, Gross & Louis, Harlan, for appellants.

	Thomas J. Miller, Attorney General, and Jeffrey D. Farrell, Assistant Attorney General, for appellee.

	Considered by Carter, P.J., and Cady, J., and McGiverin, S.J.*

*Senior judge assigned by order pursuant to Iowa Code section 602.9206 (2001).
PER CURIAM.
	The petitioners, Vernus Wunschel, Jacquelyn Wunschel and Wunschel Oil Company, (the Wunschels), appeal from the district court’s ruling dismissing their judicial review action challenging the decision by the respondent, the Iowa Department of Public Safety.  The Wunschels claim the district court erred in determining that they untimely filed their petition for judicial review and that the court was thus deprived of jurisdiction to consider their action.  We affirm.
	On December 23, 1998, the commissioner of the department issued a decision imposing penalties on the Wunschels for the operation of their business.  On January 21, 1999, the Wunschels sent a petition for judicial review to the clerk of district court for Ida County by express mail.  The Wunschels claim that such a mailing would normally have been completed by the next day.  On Saturday, January 23, 1999, the postal service attempted to deliver the notice, but the clerk’s office was closed.  The petition was then filed on Monday, January 25, 1999, beyond the thirty-day period for filing a petition for judicial review under Iowa Code section 17A.19(3) (1999).
	The department moved to dismiss the petition on the basis that it was not timely filed under the statute.  The district court granted the motion to dismiss.  The court determined that timely filing of the petition for judicial review was jurisdictional under section 17A.19 and the Wunschels’ failure to make such a filing deprived the court of jurisdiction to consider the action.  The court denied the Wunschels’ Iowa Rule of Civil Procedure 179(b) motion, and they appealed.  
	The Wunschels claim that they should be considered in substantial compliance with the filing requirement of section 17A.19(3) because they attempted to send the petition for judicial review by express mail within the time for filing under section 17A.19.  The Wunschels further claim that the filing requirement should not be considered jurisdictional.  However, we have explicitly stated that this filing requirement is jurisdictional and untimely filing of the petition requires dismissal of the action.  See Sharp v. Iowa Dep’t of Job Serv., 492 N.W.2d 668, 669–70 (Iowa 1992).  Mailing of the notice to the clerk’s office does not constitute filing in the clerk’s office for purposes of section 17A.19(3).  In this case, the petition was filed beyond the thirty-day period provided by section 17A.19(3) for its filing.  Consequently, the district court lacked jurisdiction to consider the petition and properly dismissed it.  Sharp, 492 N.W.2d at 669–70.  Accordingly, the district court’s ruling is affirmed.  
	AFFIRMED.

	This opinion shall not be published.