Title: State ex rel. Vonderheide v. Multi-Color Corp.

State: ohio

Issuer: Ohio Supreme Court

Document:

[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it may be cited as State 
ex rel. Vonderheide v. Multi-Color Corp., Slip Opinion No. 2019-Ohio-1270.] 
 
 
 
NOTICE 
This slip opinion is subject to formal revision before it is published in an 
advance sheet of the Ohio Official Reports.  Readers are requested to 
promptly notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of Ohio, 65 
South Front Street, Columbus, Ohio 43215, of any typographical or other 
formal errors in the opinion, in order that corrections may be made before 
the opinion is published. 
 
 
SLIP OPINION NO. 2019-OHIO-1270 
THE STATE EX REL. VONDERHEIDE, APPELLEE, v. MULTI-COLOR 
CORPORATION ET AL.; INDUSTRIAL COMMISSION OF OHIO, APPELLANT. 
[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it 
may be cited as State ex rel. Vonderheide v. Multi-Color Corp., Slip Opinion 
No. 2019-Ohio-1270.] 
Workers’ compensation—Temporary total disability—Industrial Commission’s 
conclusion that claimant was not in active workforce when she underwent 
knee surgery was supported by evidence in record—Court of appeals’ 
judgment granting writ of mandamus and ordering commission to vacate 
decision reversed. 
(No. 2018-0832—Submitted February 19, 2019—Decided April 9, 2019.) 
APPEAL from the Court of Appeals for Franklin County, No. 16AP-493,  
2018-Ohio-1714. 
________________ 
 
 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
 
2
Per Curiam. 
{¶ 1} Appellant, Industrial Commission, denied the request of appellee, 
Sharon Vonderheide, for temporary-total-disability (“TTD”) compensation.  The 
Tenth District Court of Appeals granted Vonderheide’s petition for a writ of 
mandamus and ordered the commission to vacate its decision.  The commission 
asks this court to reverse that judgment.  Vonderheide requests oral argument.  We 
reverse the Tenth District’s judgment and deny the motion for oral argument. 
I. FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY 
{¶ 2} Vonderheide sustained injuries while working at Multi-Color 
Corporation in 1992.  Her workers’ compensation claim was approved for a variety 
of back, leg, and knee conditions.  In 2001, she had a right total knee replacement.  
In 2002, Vonderheide began receiving Social Security retirement benefits.  That 
same year, the commission determined that Vonderheide had reached maximum 
medical improvement.  In 2003, she entered a vocational rehabilitation program but 
withdrew from it after several months. 
{¶ 3} In testimony before the commission, Vonderheide stated that after 
2002, she worked primarily at her family farm in Brown County, approximately 90 
minutes from her residence in Cincinnati.  The farm raised cows and grew tobacco; 
working with her husband (who lived at the farm) and others, Vonderheide rode on 
the back of a tractor and planted tobacco seeds, stripped tobacco leaves from their 
stalks, separated the leaves into three different grades, drove a tractor to cut hay, 
and raked hay.  At the end of each year, her husband gave her a portion of the farm’s 
net profits as payment for these activities. 
{¶ 4} After Vonderheide’s husband died in 2009, however, she sold all the 
cattle and leased the farmland to others.  Though her son stated in an affidavit that 
Vonderheide had continued with activities including farming and stripping tobacco 
until July 2012, Vonderheide testified that after she sold the cows and leased out 
the farmland, her activity at the farm involved tasks such as mowing the grass and 
January Term, 2019 
 
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picking up trash in the yard.  The record contains transcripts of Vonderheide’s tax 
returns for tax years 2004 through 2007 and 2009 through 2012, showing that her 
income varied significantly from year to year. 
{¶ 5} In July 2012, Vonderheide had surgery on her right knee.  She had a 
follow-up surgery in November 2012.  In March 2014, Vonderheide requested TTD 
compensation commencing July 31, 2012.  The commission denied the request, 
finding that Vonderheide had not met her burden to establish that she was in the 
workforce and had wages to replace as of that date.  The commission noted that the 
evidence regarding Vonderheide’s farm work was conflicting, but it ultimately 
concluded that the farm was a passive investment at which Vonderheide sometimes 
performed chores and that this did not constitute evidence that Vonderheide was in 
the workforce as of the date on which she was requesting that her TTD 
compensation begin. 
{¶ 6} Vonderheide filed a mandamus petition asking the Tenth District to 
order the commission to vacate its decision and grant her request for TTD 
compensation.  A Tenth District magistrate recommended that the court deny the 
writ, and Vonderheide objected.  The court of appeals sustained the objection and 
granted the writ, holding that the commission’s decision was not based on “some 
evidence” and therefore constituted an abuse of discretion.  2018-Ohio-1714, 111 
N.E.3d 773, ¶ 34-35.  The commission appeals the Tenth District’s decision. 
II. ANALYSIS 
{¶ 7} When reviewing a claim for a writ of mandamus in a workers’ 
compensation case, a court’s role is to determine whether the commission has 
abused its discretion.  See State ex rel. Packaging Corp. of Am. v. Indus. Comm., 
139 Ohio St.3d 591, 2014-Ohio-2871, 13 N.E.3d 1163, ¶ 29.  The commission is 
the exclusive finder of fact and has sole responsibility to evaluate the weight and 
credibility of the evidence.  State ex rel. Perez v. Indus. Comm., 147 Ohio St.3d 
383, 2016-Ohio-5084, 66 N.E.3d 699, ¶ 20.  So long as the commission’s order is 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
 
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based on some evidence in the record, a court should not find an abuse of discretion.  
Id.; Packaging Corp. at ¶ 29. 
A. Some Evidence Supported the Commission’s Decision 
{¶ 8} “Temporary total disability compensation is intended to compensate 
an injured worker for the loss of earnings incurred while the industrial injury heals.”  
State ex rel. Pierron v. Indus. Comm., 120 Ohio St.3d 40, 2008-Ohio-5245, 896 
N.E.2d 140, ¶ 9.  “There can be no lost earnings, however, or even a potential for 
lost earnings, if the claimant is no longer part of the active work force.”  Id. 
{¶ 9} The Tenth District began its analysis by asserting that “the traditional 
understanding of what constitutes being a part of the active workforce for the 
purpose of awarding TTD benefits has not taken into account inherent differences 
in farm employment from other types of employment as applied to the facts 
contained in the record.”  2018-Ohio-1714, 111 N.E.3d 773, at ¶ 29.  To remedy 
this, the Tenth District turned to an article describing how the United States 
Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics counts farm workers in its 
Current Population Survey (“CPS”).  Id. at ¶ 30, citing Bowler and Morisi, 
Understanding the Employment Measures from the CPS and CES Survey, Monthly 
Lab.Rev. 
23, 
24, 
26 
(Feb. 
2006), 
available 
at 
https://www.bls.gov/ 
opub/mlr/2006/02/art2full.pdf (accessed Mar. 5, 2019).  The Tenth District 
concluded that the CPS survey would have counted Vonderheide as employed and 
that the commission abused its discretion by failing to recognize this.  Id. at ¶ 31. 
{¶ 10} The Tenth District erred when it created a new standard to determine 
whether farm workers are in the active workforce based on whether the CPS survey 
would count them as employed.  No authority supports the use of guidelines for a 
federal population survey to determine eligibility for Ohio workers’ compensation 
benefits.  More importantly, applying the CPS survey’s standard would count 
claimants as employed for purposes of TTD-compensation eligibility in violation 
of principles espoused in Ohio’s workers’ compensation caselaw. 
January Term, 2019 
 
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{¶ 11} The CPS survey has a “broad definition of employment.”  Bowler 
and Morisi at 24.  That definition includes workers performing as little as one hour 
of work during the week that serves as the survey’s reference period, without regard 
to the regularity of their work in any other week.  Id. at 24, 26.  It also includes 
unpaid “family workers” working in family-owned businesses.  Id. 
{¶ 12} Workers who sustain an industrial injury, leave their former position 
of employment, reenter the workforce, and become temporarily and totally disabled 
due to the original injury while working at their new job can qualify for TTD 
compensation under Ohio law.  State ex rel. McCoy v. Dedicated Transport, Inc., 
97 Ohio St.3d 25, 2002-Ohio-5305, 776 N.E.2d 51, syllabus.  This rule applies 
equally to those who reenter the workforce as family-business workers, including 
farmers.  But to be eligible for TTD compensation, those workers, like any others, 
must be actively engaged in gainful employment.  See Pierron, 120 Ohio St.3d 40, 
2008-Ohio-5245, 896 N.E.2d 140, at ¶ 9-11; McCoy at ¶ 40.  That is to say, their 
work—though it may be full- or part-time—must be regular, not sporadic.  See, 
e.g., State ex rel. Brown v. Indus. Comm., 10th Dist. Franklin No. 14AP-722, 2015-
Ohio-2923, ¶ 17-18, citing Pierron at ¶ 4, 10-11; State ex rel. Dishman v. Indus. 
Comm., 10th Dist. Franklin No. 07AP-613, 2008-Ohio-3291, ¶ 40.  And they must, 
on account of that work, receive earnings that will be lost due to their industrial 
injury.  See Pierron at ¶ 9; McCoy at ¶ 40. 
{¶ 13} Applying Pierron, the commission concluded that at the time she 
underwent knee surgery in July 2002, Vonderheide’s farm was a passive 
investment, she was not in the active workforce, and she therefore had no wages to 
replace.  The commission’s decision was supported by evidence in the record.  First, 
Vonderheide had chosen to begin receiving Social Security retirement benefits in 
2002, at age 62.  This court has considered the choice to seek retirement benefits as 
evidence that a claimant was no longer in the workforce.  State ex rel. Floyd v. 
Formica Corp., 140 Ohio St.3d 260, 2014-Ohio-3614, 17 N.E.3d 547, ¶ 24 (“Had 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
 
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Floyd intended to return to the workforce after leaving Formica, he had no reason 
to file for retirement benefits at that time”).  Second, while Vonderheide testified 
that she made a few attempts to find a job after 2002, her testimony did not include 
any such efforts leading up to 2012—leaving only her farm as a possible source of 
work.  Third, after her husband’s death in 2009, Vonderheide had sold the farm’s 
cattle and leased its land out to be farmed by others.  Fourth, the tax records that 
Vonderheide submitted do not specify whether her earnings came from farm work 
or rents.  And finally, the tax records show that Vonderheide’s earnings fluctuated 
greatly from year to year both before and after her husband’s death and that she 
earned more in some of the years that she physically did little work at the farm than 
she did in some of the years in which she performed more work at the farm. 
{¶ 14} As the commission acknowledged, the record also contained 
evidence that supported Vonderheide’s claim.  However, “[a]n order that is 
supported by ‘some evidence’ will be upheld.  It is immaterial whether other 
evidence, even if greater in quality and/or quantity, supports a decision contrary to 
the commission’s.”  State ex rel. Pass v. C.S.T. Extraction Co., 74 Ohio St.3d 373, 
376, 658 N.E.2d 1055 (1996).  The Tenth District erred by disregarding this 
directive. 
B. Vonderheide Has Not Shown a Need for Oral Argument 
{¶ 15} Finally, we deny Vonderheide’s motion for oral argument.  In a 
direct appeal such as this, the granting of oral argument is subject to this court’s 
discretion.  S.Ct.Prac.R. 17.02(A).  We typically do not grant oral argument unless 
the case involves (1) a matter of great public importance, (2) complex issues of law 
or fact, (3) a substantial constitutional issue, or (4) a conflict among courts of 
appeals.  See State ex rel. BF Goodrich Co., Specialty Chems. Div. v. Indus. Comm., 
148 Ohio St.3d 212, 2016-Ohio-7988, 69 N.E.3d 728, ¶ 23.  Vonderheide presents 
no argument in support of her request for oral argument; accordingly, she identifies 
January Term, 2019 
 
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nothing that makes this case more complex or important than the many other 
workers’ compensation appeals that this court has resolved without oral argument. 
III. CONCLUSION 
{¶ 16} For the reasons set forth above, we reverse the judgment of the court 
of appeals and deny the motion for oral argument. 
Judgment reversed. 
O’CONNOR, C.J., and KENNEDY, FRENCH, FISCHER, DEWINE, and STEWART, 
JJ., concur. 
DONNELLY, J., dissents. 
_________________ 
Clements, Taylor, Butkovich & Cohen, L.P.A., Co., and Edward Cohen, for 
appellee. 
Dave Yost, Attorney General, and John Smart, Assistant Attorney General, 
for appellant. 
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