ORDER DENYING MOTION TO STRIKE:
July 13, 2018
CBCA 6031
WOOLERY TIMBER MANAGEMENT INC.,
Appellant,
v.
DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE,
Respondent.
Charlotte Woolery, President of Woolery Timber Management Inc., Tuolumne, CA,
appearing for Appellant.
Elisabeth L. Esposito, Office of the General Counsel, Department of Agriculture, San
Francisco, CA, counsel for Respondent.
LESTER, Board Judge. 
ORDER
Because this appeal is proceeding under the small claims procedure set forth in Board
Rule 52 (48 CFR 6101.52 (2017)), the Board issued a schedule of proceedings on May 23,
2018, to allow for expedited consideration of this case, including the imposition of a deadline
for the submission of dispositive motions.  Respondent, the Department of Agriculture (the
Department), has filed a motion seeking to strike a motion for summary relief that appellant,
Woolery Timber Management Inc. (Woolery), has submitted to the Board or, in the
alternative, for leave to respond to Woolery’s summary relief motion.  The Department

CBCA 6031 2
asserts that, pursuant to the Board’s May 23 order, any dispositive motions had to be filed
by July 9, 2018.  Because Woolery’s motion was filed after 4:30 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time
(EDT) on July 9, 2018, the Department argues, the motion was untimely and should be
stricken.
Under Board Rule 1(b)(5)(iii), a filing submitted to the Board by electronic mail, like
Woolery’s motion for summary relief, “will be considered to be filed on” the working day
that it was submitted to the Board if it is “received by 4:30 p.m. Eastern Time.”  That rule
further provides that “[e]mail filings received after that time will be considered to be filed
on the next working day.”  Rule 1(b)(5)(iii); see Estes Brothers Construction, Inc. v.
Department of Transportation, CBCA 4963, 15-1 BCA ¶ 36,166, at 176,479 (“A filing which
is submitted by e-mail is received on the day of its transmission only if it is received by 4:30
p.m., Eastern Time, on that day.”).  Accordingly, Woolery’s motion, which the Board
received through its email address at 8:54 p.m. EDT on July 9, 2018, is considered to have
been filed on July 10, 2018.  Because the Board’s May 23 order required all dispositive
motions to be filed by July 9, 2018, the Department is correct that Woolery’s motion was
filed one day late.
Notwithstanding that the motion was technically late, we see no reason in the
circumstances here to strike it or decline to consider it.  Woolery is not being represented by
an attorney, and, although we may not necessarily give a corporate representative handling
a corporation’s appeal the same kind of procedural latitude and leniency as we would a pro
se appellant representing his or her own personal interests, see 1-A Construction & Fire, LLP
v. Department of Agriculture, CBCA 2693, 15-1 BCA ¶ 35,913, at 175,552 & 175,564 n.3,
we recognize that a corporate representative is less likely than an attorney to be fully versed
in the Board’s rules and procedures.  Woolery has no history of late or untimely filings,1 a
1 The Department incorrectly asserts, as support for its motion to strike, that
Woolery has a history of late submissions.  The agency cites to a requirement in the Board’s
May 23 order that all written discovery requests be provided to the opposing side no later
than May 30, 2018.  According to the Department, Woolery did not serve its discovery
requests until 11:10 p.m. EDT on May 30, 2018, and the Department argues that service was
late under Rule 1(b)(5)(iii) because it occurred after 4:30 p.m. EDT.  The Department is
wrong.  The 4:30 p.m. deadline in Rule 1(b)(5) only applies to actual filings with the Board. 
A filing is a document that is submitted to and “received by the Office of the Clerk of the
Board.”  Rule 1(b)(5)(i).  Although a written discovery request must be served on the
opposing party, Rule 14, meaning that there must be “[a]ctual delivery of the [written
discovery request] to the person [or party] to whom it is directed,” Black’s Law Dictionary
1327 (10th ed. 2014), nothing in our rules requires the written discovery request to be filed

CBCA 6031 3
written discussion of the facts and evidence applicable to this case is of assistance to the
Board in an expedited appeal like this one, and the Department does not identify any realistic
prejudice from Woolery’s four-and-a-half-hour delay in filing beyond the Board’s 4:30 p.m.
EDT cutoff.  We exercise our broad discretion to accept Woolery’s motion for summary
relief, which we deem filed effective July 10, 2018.
The Department’s motion to strike is DENIED.  Although the Department has, in the
alternative to its motion to strike, requested leave to file a response to Woolery’s motion for
summary relief, the Board indicated in its May 23 order that it would “review any
[dispositive] motions filed before setting a schedule for the opposing side to respond to such
motions (if responses are deemed necessary).”  To the extent that the Board desires a
response to the motion in this expedited case, or a response by Woolery to the Department’s
pending motion for summary relief, it will request it in due course.
Harold D. Lester, Jr. 
HAROLD D. LESTER, JR. 
Board Judge
with the Board to be effective.  In fact, the Board’s May 23 order specifically indicated that
“[s]uch requests do not need to be filed with the Board.”  Accordingly, the deadline in
Rule 1(b)(5)(iii) does not apply to Woolery’s written discovery requests, which were, under
the Department’s own description of them, timely served, having been not only sent by
Woolery, but actually received by the Department, prior to midnight on May 30, 2018.