Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca11-14-15435/USCOURTS-ca11-14-15435-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Daisy Abdur-Rahman
Respondent
DeKalb County
Petitioner
Ryan Petty
Respondent
U.S. Department of Labor
Respondent

Document Text:

[PUBLISH]

IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT

________________________

No. 14-15435

________________________

Agency No. 12-064

DEKALB COUNTY, 

 Petitioner,

versus

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF LABOR, 

RYAN PETTY,

DAISY ABDUR-RAHMAN,

 Respondents.

________________________

Petition for Review of a Decision

of the Department of Labor

________________________

(February 8, 2016)

Before TJOFLAT and MARTIN, Circuit Judges, and ROSENTHAL,∗ District 

Judge.

 ∗ Honorable Lee H. Rosenthal, United States District Judge for the Southern District of 

Texas, sitting by designation.

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ROSENTHAL, District Judge:

This petition for review asks us to clarify the standard the Department of 

Labor’s Administrative Review Board applies to an appeal from an Administrative 

Law Judge’s findings and conclusions in a proceeding under the Federal Water

Pollution Control Act, 33 U.S.C. § 1367. The petitioner asks us to vacate the 

Board’s ruling reversing the ALJ because the Board applied de novo rather than 

substantial-evidence scrutiny to the ALJ’s factual findings. The parties agree that 

the Board applied the incorrect standard. We conclude, however, that reviewing 

for substantial evidence would not have changed the result because the Board 

reversed the ALJ on matters of law, not fact. We therefore deny the petition for 

review.1

I. BACKGROUND

Daisy Abdur-Rahman and Ryan Petty filed complaints after they were 

terminated from their jobs with the DeKalb County, Georgia Department of Public 

Works. The ALJ held a 13-day hearing on their claims that they were fired in 

retaliation for whistleblower activity protected under the Federal Water Pollution 

Control Act (“FWPCA”).

 1 The parties have petitioned and cross-petitioned for review of related orders on 

attorney’s fees and costs. See No. 15-12407; No. 15-15376. Those petitions were consolidated 

and have been stayed pending resolution of this case. 

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Abdur-Rahman and Petty worked as compliance inspectors on a program to 

reduce sewer overflows caused by restaurants improperly disposing of fats, oils, 

and grease. The County requires restaurants—there are around 5,000 in the 

County—to have grease traps to collect this type of solid waste. If the traps are 

missing or fail, fats, oils, and grease accumulate in sewer lines and can cause the 

lines to burst or overflow, releasing raw, untreated sewage that can seep into

surrounding waters. The County’s compliance inspectors monitor the traps, 

process and respond to complaints, and investigate discharges. The Department 

also assigned Abdur-Rahman and Petty to a committee updating the County’s

ordinances and procedures regulating this type of solid-waste disposal. 

For the first six months after the County hired them in mid-2004, AbdurRahman and Petty were probationary employees who could be fired at will. Their 

immediate supervisor was Chester Gudewicz, the County’s Compliance Section 

Supervisor. Gudewicz, in turn, reported to John Walker. 

The probationary period was marked by conflict between Gudewicz and 

Abdur-Rahman and Petty. All three, and Walker, testified about the conflicts 

before the ALJ. Problems began when Abdur-Rahman and Petty asked Gudewicz 

for historical records of sewer spills in the County. They wanted the records for 

their committee and compliance work so they could identify “hot spots” where 

sewers had frequently overflowed and use that information to facilitate future 

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enforcement. When Gudewicz failed to produce the records, Abdur-Rahman and 

Petty persisted, asking for them on a weekly basis. By late 2004, Gudewicz was 

actively discouraging the search, telling Abdur-Rahman and Petty that they were 

“ruffling too many feathers” and “rocking the boat.” Gudewicz became 

increasingly frustrated and impatient with their questions, and with them. He 

viewed their questions as “insubordination” and would walk away to avoid them. 

Walker also resisted the efforts to find the records, telling Abdur-Rahman and 

Petty that they did not need the data and were being “too thorough or scientific.” 

This opposition led Abdur-Rahman and Petty to suspect that the County had 

something to hide. They told coworkers and supervisors that “the County could 

get in trouble” with the State for failing to properly document and report spills. 

They also came to believe that Gudewicz was unqualified for his position and 

concerned with preserving the status quo and his job, rather than the program. 

They raised their concerns about the County’s lack of compliance and enforcement 

with increasing frequency. Tensions spiked in January 2005, when, according to

Gudewicz’s testimony, he overheard Abdur-Rahman call him “incompetent” and 

“a liar.” 

Abdur-Rahman’s and Petty’s suspicions turned out to be unfounded. The 

records they sought were available in a nearby office, and the County was 

investigated by Georgia’s Environmental Protection Division, which concluded

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that the County had reported spills as required by state law. In the meantime, 

however, Gudewicz concluded that Abdur-Rahman’s and Petty’s behavior was 

disruptive and harmful to workplace morale. In January 2005, Gudewicz sent

Walker two memoranda, one recommending firing Petty, and the other reporting

Abdur-Rahman for “argumentative” behavior. The County fired both in early 

March 2005. 

One month later, Abdur-Rahman and Petty each filed a complaint with the 

Occupational Safety and Health Administration (“OSHA”), asserting that the 

County had fired them in retaliation for voicing their concerns and complaints. 

OSHA found no violation of the FWPCA’s antiretaliation provision. A number of 

witnesses testified at the evidentiary hearing held before the ALJ between 

September 2006 and March 2007. The testimony frequently conflicted. The ALJ 

had to, and did, make credibility judgments in resolving the factual inconsistencies. 

The ALJ found and concluded that Abdur-Rahman and Petty had engaged in 

activity that the FWPCA protects, but that this activity was not the motivating 

factor behind the decision to terminate their employment. The ALJ found and 

concluded that the County showed that it would have terminated Abdur-Rahman 

and Petty “even had they not engaged in protected activity because managing them 

was above their supervisor’s [Gudewicz’s] means and they did not fit the peculiar 

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culture [of their workplace].” The ALJ dismissed Abdur-Rahman’s and Petty’s

complaints. 

On appeal, the Administrative Review Board reviewed the ALJ’s findings 

and conclusions de novo and reversed. The Board agreed with the ALJ’s finding

that Abdur-Rahman and Petty had engaged in protected activity by pressing for the 

records and by voicing concerns about the County’s regulatory compliance and 

enforcement when they met resistance. But the Board found that this activity was 

a motivating factor—not the motivating factor, as the ALJ had incorrectly stated—

in the County’s decision to fire them. The Board also agreed with the ALJ’s 

factual findings that the County had both legitimate and retaliatory reasons for its 

termination decision and that the reasons arose from the same protected activity. 

The Board rejected the ALJ’s legal analysis, however, “arriv[ing] at [the] different 

legal conclusion” that the County’s legal and illegal motives could not be separated 

and the County had not shown that it would have fired Abdur-Rahman and Petty 

absent their protected activity. The Board remanded to the ALJ to decide the 

remedy for the retaliatory terminations.2 The Board affirmed the ALJ’s post-

 2 On remand, the ALJ asked the parties whether it needed to reopen the record to decide 

the remedies issue. In a June 2011 letter to the ALJ, the County asked the ALJ not to reopen the

record. The County argues in this appeal that although on remand it had urged the ALJ to keep 

the record closed, the ALJ’s limited reopening of the record denied the County an opportunity to 

present evidence showing a failure to mitigate damages. The County did not raise this lostopportunity issue until its June 2012 appeal to the Board, not to the ALJ. The County cannot 

complain on appeal about an alleged error it invited. Yellow Pages Photos, Inc. v. Ziplocal, LP, 

795 F.3d 1255, 1283 (11th Cir. 2015). 

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remand decisions, including the reinstatement and back-pay awards, and the 

County petitioned this court for review. We have jurisdiction under 33 U.S.C. § 

1367(b) and 33 U.S.C. § 1369, and we deny the petition. 

II. THE STANDARD OF REVIEW

An appellate court “must review the [Administrative Review Board’s]

decision pursuant to the standard of review outlined in the Administrative 

Procedure Act.” Stone & Webster Constr., Inc. v. U.S. Dep’t of Labor (“Stone & 

Webster II”), 684 F.3d 1127, 1132 (11th Cir. 2012). Legal conclusions are 

reviewed de novo, keeping in mind that agencies often receive deference in 

construing the statutes they administer. Chevron, U.S.A., Inc. v. Natural Res. Def. 

Council, 467 U.S. 837, 104 S. Ct. 2778 (1984). The Board’s factual findings are 

reversed only if “unsupported by substantial evidence” on the record as a whole. 5 

U.S.C. § 706(2)(E) (APA standard for formal adjudications); Stone & Webster II, 

684 F.3d at 1132. 

“The substantial evidence standard limits the reviewing court from deciding 

the facts anew, making credibility determinations, or re-weighing the evidence.” 

Stone & Webster II, 684 F.3d at 1133 (quotation marks omitted). When “we 

review administrative findings of fact under the substantial-evidence test, [we] will 

reverse such findings only when the record compels a reversal; the mere fact that 

the record may support a contrary conclusion is not enough . . . .” Indrawati v. 

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U.S. Att’y Gen., 779 F.3d 1284, 1304 (11th Cir. 2015) (quotation marks omitted). 

Substantial evidence is “more than a mere scintilla. It means such relevant 

evidence as a reasonable mind might accept as adequate to support a conclusion.” 

Richardson v. Perales, 402 U.S. 389, 401, 91 S. Ct. 1420, 1427 (1971) (quotation 

marks omitted).

Since 2007, these same standards have applied to the Board’s review of the 

ALJ’s findings and conclusions in an FWPCA claim. “[I]n 2007, the Secretary of 

Labor revised the [Board’s] standard of review of an ALJ’s factual findings . . .

from de novo review to substantial evidence review.” Stone & Webster, 684 F.3d 

at 1132; see also 29 C.F.R. § 24.110(b) (“The [Board] will review the factual 

findings of the ALJ under the substantial evidence standard.”). The parties agree 

that the Board incorrectly reviewed the ALJ’s factual findings de novo. The issue 

is the effect of that error.

III. DISCUSSION

The elements of an FWPCA retaliation claim are that (1) the employee 

engaged in protected activity, (2) the employee suffered an adverse action, and (3) 

the protected activity was a motivating factor in the adverse action. Kaufman v. 

Perez, 745 F.3d 521, 527 (D.C. Cir. 2014). The parties agree that Abdur-Rahman 

and Petty suffered an adverse action. The County challenges the Board’s 

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determinations that they engaged in activity the FWPCA protects and that their 

protected activity was a motivating factor in the decision to fire them.

A. Protected Activity

The FWPCA makes it unlawful to “fire, or in any other way discriminate 

against . . . any employee . . . by reason of the fact that such employee . . . has 

filed, instituted, or caused to be filed or instituted any proceeding under this 

chapter . . . .” 33 U.S.C. § 1367(a). The Secretary has interpreted “proceeding” to 

shield from retaliation employees who make “informal” or “internal” complaints to 

supervisors and coworkers, even if those complaints ultimately lack merit. Stone 

& Webster Eng’g Corp. v. Herman (“Stone & Webster I”), 115 F.3d 1568, 1575 

(11th Cir. 1997), superseded in part by regulation on other grounds, 29 C.F.R. § 

24.110(b); Bechtel Constr. Co. v. Sec’y of Labor, 50 F.3d 926, 931–33 (11th Cir. 

1995). The County does not challenge the Secretary’s interpretation. 

Substantial evidence in the record shows that, as the ALJ found and the 

Board agreed, Abdur-Rahman and Petty engaged in protected activity. They 

repeatedly sought the County’s historical records of sewer spills, believing that the 

records would be helpful to the County’s enforcement and compliance work. The

requests were rebuffed, and they were discouraged from pursuing the records. The 

ALJ found, and the Board affirmed, that Abdur-Rahman and Petty “came to 

suspect the County might be hiding the information.” They told coworkers and 

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supervisors that “the County could get in trouble” with the State as a result, and 

Abdur-Rahman confronted Gudewicz about why hot spots continued to exist. 

Although the suspicions turned out to be unfounded, the record shows a good-faith 

basis for voicing them. The FWPCA protects activity undertaken with a 

reasonable, good-faith basis, even if it is incorrect. Stone & Webster I, 115 F.3d at 

1575; Passaic Valley Sewerage Comm’rs v. U.S. Dep’t of Labor, 992 F.2d 474, 

478–79 (3d Cir. 1993). The record shows ample support for the ALJ’s and the 

Board’s finding and conclusion that Abdur-Rahman and Petty engaged in protected 

activity.

3

 

B. Motivating Factor

The Secretary interprets the FWPCA to incorporate the burden-shifting 

framework used in mixed-motive employment-discrimination cases. See 76 Fed. 

Reg. 2808-01, 2811 (Jan. 18, 2011) (citing Price Waterhouse v. Hopkins, 490 U.S. 

228, 109 S. Ct. 1775 (1989); Mt. Healthy City Sch. Dist. Bd. of Educ. v. Doyle, 429 

U.S. 274, 97 S. Ct. 568 (1977)). The employee has the burden to show “by a 

preponderance of the evidence that the protected activity caused or was a 

motivating factor in the adverse action alleged in the complaint.” 29 C.F.R. § 

24.109(b)(2). A motivating factor is “a substantial factor.” Mt. Healthy, 429 U.S. 

 3 We need not—and do not—address whether Abdur-Rahman and Petty also engaged in 

protected activity at other times during their brief employment.

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at 287, 97 S. Ct. at 576. “In saying that [the protected activity] played a motivating 

part in an employment decision, we mean that, if we asked the employer at the 

moment of the decision what its reasons were and if we received a truthful 

response, one of those reasons would be that the . . . employee [engaged in 

protected activity].” Price Waterhouse, 490 U.S. at 250, 109 S. Ct. at 1790 

(plurality opinion).

“If the [employee] has demonstrated by a preponderance of the evidence that 

the protected activity caused or was a motivating factor in the adverse action 

alleged in the complaint,” the burden shifts to the employer. 29 C.F.R. § 

24.109(b)(2). “[R]elief may not be ordered if the [employer] demonstrates by a 

preponderance of the evidence that it would have taken the same adverse action in 

the absence of the protected activity.” Id.; see also Mt. Healthy, 429 U.S. at 287, 

97 S. Ct. at 576. The employer must “separate its legitimate rationale from its 

prohibited rationale . . . [to] prove its decision would have been the same absent 

[the employee’s protected activity].” Passaic, 992 F.2d at 482. “It is not enough 

that the evidence prove[s] that the [employer] could have in retrospect made its 

employment decision on legitimate grounds.” Id. “The risk that the illegal and 

legal motives behind employee termination merge and become inseparable is 

placed on the employer.” Id. (citing NLRB v. Transp. Mgmt. Corp., 462 U.S. 393, 

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103 S. Ct. 2469 (1983)).4 The County has not challenged the Secretary’s 

interpretation.

Applying this interpretation, the Board identified errors in the ALJ’s legal 

analysis. The ALJ asked whether Abdur-Rahman and Petty had shown that their 

protected activity was the motivating factor—rather than a motivating factor—in 

the decision to fire them. The Board concluded that Abdur-Rahman and Petty had

shown that their protected activity met the proper causation test. Although the 

Board described its review of the ALJ’s factual findings as de novo, substantial 

evidence—evidence that the ALJ also relied on—supports this conclusion. The 

Board correctly applied de novo review in rejecting the ALJ’s legal conclusion that 

the record had to show that the protected activity was the motivating factor in the 

County’s decision.

The ALJ also erred in failing to put the burden on the County to show that it 

would have made the same decision absent the protected activity. The Board 

accepted the ALJ’s factual findings, including that Gudewicz’s poor management 

 4 This analysis differs from McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S. 792, 93 S. Ct. 

1817 (1973), and its progeny, under which the burden of persuasion “at all times” remains with 

the employee, Tex. Dep’t of Cmty. Affairs v. Burdine, 450 U.S. 248, 253, 101 S. Ct. 1089, 1093

(1981). See generally Watson v. Se. Pa. Transp. Auth., 207 F.3d 207, 215–16 (3d Cir. 2000) 

(Alito, J.) (“[T]he Price Waterhouse shift in the burden of persuasion does not apply to ‘pretext’ 

cases, in which plaintiffs prove intentional discrimination indirectly through the burden-shifting 

paradigm set forth in McDonnell Douglas . . . .” (citing Price Waterhouse, 490 U.S. at 277–78, 

109 S. Ct. at 1805 (O’Connor, J., concurring))); cf. Pulliam v. Tallapoosa Cty. Jail, 185 F.3d 

1182, 1186–88 (11th Cir. 1999) (distinguishing a pretextual-discrimination claim from a mixedmotive discrimination claim).

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and supervisory skills were a factor in his decision to recommend firing AbdurRahman and Petty. These findings were supported by substantial record evidence. 

The Board rejected the ALJ’s legal analysis because the County had not met its 

burden to separate the retaliatory from the nonretaliatory motives for deciding to 

fire the employees. The Board reversed the ALJ’s legal conclusion because, given 

the intertwined nature of the legitimate and retaliatory reasons, the County had not 

met its burden to show that it would have reached the same decision absent the 

protected activity. 

The parties agree that the Board incorrectly reviewed the ALJ’s factual 

findings de novo. Ordinarily, “a court of appeals should remand a case to an 

agency for decision of a matter that statutes place primarily in agency hands.” INS 

v. Ventura, 537 U.S. 12, 16, 123 S. Ct. 353, 355 (2002) (per curiam). In Stone & 

Webster II, 684 F.3d at 1133, we remanded because the Board “acknowledged that 

it was bound by the substantial evidence standard” but, in effect, reviewed the 

ALJ’s factual findings de novo, “show[ing] little deference to the ALJ’s findings 

with which it disagreed, and . . . disregard[ing] the ALJ’s conclusions supported by 

substantial evidence in the record.” Here, in contrast to Stone & Webster II, “the 

. . . issue is legal, not factual.” Calle v. U.S. Att’y Gen., 504 F.3d 1324, 1330 (11th 

Cir. 2007). Remand to the agency is unnecessary because “the agency would reach 

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the same result upon a reconsideration cleansed of errors.” Lin v. U.S. Dep’t of 

Justice, 453 F.3d 99, 107 (2d Cir. 2006). 

The Board properly reviewed the ALJ’s legal conclusions de novo and held 

that the ALJ incorrectly applied the motivating-factor and the Mt. Healthy/Price 

Waterhouse burden-shifting framework. The Board’s decision would have been

the same had it reviewed the ALJ’s factual findings for substantial evidence rather 

than de novo. We therefore need not remand.

IV. CONCLUSION

We deny the County’s petition for review.

PETITION DENIED.

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