IN THE COMMONWEALTH COURT OF PENNSYLVANIA

Charles Hobart, :

Petitioner :

:

v. : No. 462 M.D. 2017

: Argued: September 14, 2018

Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, :

Governor’s Office of Administration, :

Pennsylvania State Police and the :

Pennsylvania Department of :

Transportation, :

Respondents :

BEFORE: HONORABLE P. KEVIN BROBSON, Judge

HONORABLE ANNE E. COVEY, Judge

HONORABLE DAN PELLEGRINI, Senior Judge (P.)

OPINION NOT REPORTED

MEMORANDUM OPINION

BY JUDGE BROBSON FILED: October 31, 2018

Before the Court in our original jurisdiction are the preliminary 

objections of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Governor’s Office of 

Administration (OA), Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT), and 

Pennsylvania State Police (PSP) (collectively, Respondents) to an amended petition 

for review (Petition) filed by Charles Hobart (Hobart). In the Petition, Hobart 

challenges actions taken by Respondents to ban him permanently from accessing 

information systems housed or operated by Respondents without providing due 

process. We now overrule Respondents’ preliminary objections. 
2

In ruling on preliminary objections, we accept as true all well-pleaded 

material allegations in the petition for review and any reasonable inferences that we 

may draw from the averments. Meier v. Maleski, 648 A.2d 595, 600 (Pa. 

Cmwlth. 1994). The Court, however, is not bound by legal conclusions, 

unwarranted inferences from facts, argumentative allegations, or expressions of 

opinion encompassed in the petition for review. Id. We may sustain preliminary 

objections only when the law makes clear that the petitioner cannot succeed on the 

claim, and we must resolve any doubt in favor of the petitioner. Id. “We review 

preliminary objections in the nature of a demurrer under the above guidelines and 

may sustain a demurrer only when a petitioner has failed to state a claim for which 

relief may be granted.” Armstrong Cty. Mem’l Hosp. v. Dep’t of Pub. Welfare, 

67 A.3d 160, 170 (Pa. Cmwlth. 2013).

With the above standard in mind, we accept as true the following 

allegations from the Petition. Hobart worked as a police officer with the Northern 

Berks Regional Police Department (Department). (Pet. at ¶ 13.) During his time as 

a police officer, Hobart had access to multiple electronic record dissemination 

systems. (Pet. at ¶ 14.) Among these electronic record dissemination systems 

were (1) the Pennsylvania Justice Network (JNET), which is housed by OA; (2) the 

Commonwealth Law Enforcement Assistance Network (CLEAN), which is operated 

by PSP; and (3) an information system maintained and operated by PennDOT. (Pet. 

at ¶¶ 8-10.) Respondents operate their respective systems collaboratively with one 

another. (Pet. at ¶ 11.) 

In September 2016, the Department suspended and subsequently 

terminated Hobart’s employment due to misconduct, which included Hobart 

improperly accessing JNET, CLEAN, and PennDOT’s information system. (Pet. 
3

at ¶ 15.) Through his labor organization, Hobart filed a grievance pursuant to the 

parties’ collective bargaining agreement. (Pet. at ¶ 17.) During the pendency of the 

grievance, Hobart’s employer took steps to revoke Hobart’s access to Respondents’

information systems without providing Hobart prior notice. (Pet. at ¶ 18.) 

Subsequently, Hobart’s grievance was denied and the matter proceeded to binding 

arbitration. (Pet. at ¶ 17.) 

In or about February 2017, OA revoked Hobart’s JNET privileges. 

(Pet. at ¶ 19.) Hobart received no notice regarding these actions. (Id.) As of the 

date of filing of the Petition, Hobart had yet to receive any notice from OA regarding 

the termination of his JNET privileges. (Id.) 

On or about May 30, 2017, the arbitrator issued an arbitration award,

determining that just cause did not exist for Hobart’s termination. (Pet. at ¶ 23.) 

Accordingly, the arbitrator converted Hobart’s termination to a suspension with time 

served and directed the Department to reinstate Hobart’s employment. (Id.)

Subsequently, Hobart contacted the Department’s Chief of Police, inquiring as to 

when he should return to work. (Pet. at ¶ 24.) The Chief of Police informed Hobart 

that his suspension remained active, and he was not to report to work. (Id.) 

Thereafter, Hobart learned that PSP and PennDOT apparently revoked 

and declined to reinstate his access to their respective information systems. (Pet. 

at ¶ 25.) Neither PSP nor PennDOT served Hobart with notice of their actions. (Id.) 

Hobart attempted to appeal PSP’s decision, but PSP did not answer or otherwise 

acknowledge the appeal. (Pet. at ¶ 26.) 

The Department subsequently filed a petition to vacate the arbitration 

award in the Court of Common Pleas of Berks County (trial court), asserting that 

Hobart could not work as a police officer without access to Respondents’
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information systems. (Pet. at ¶ 32.) The trial court granted the motion and vacated 

the arbitration award. (Pet. at ¶ 33.) Hobart appealed the trial court’s grant of the 

motion to vacate the award to this Court. Hobart’s appeal is docketed as Northern 

Berks Regional Police Commission v. Berks County Fraternal Order of Police, 

Lodge #71, 254 C.D. 2018.

Subsequently, Hobart filed the instant Petition, seeking reinstatement 

of his access to JNET, CLEAN, and PennDOT’s information system. Hobart alleges 

that Respondents refuse to grant Hobart access to their information systems but have 

not provided notice of such decisions. (Pet. at ¶¶ 25, 27-28.) Hobart asserts that 

Respondents are denying him access to tools that the Department contends he needs 

in order to fully perform his duties, thereby depriving him of his property interest in 

continued employment without first affording him any form of due process. 

(Pet. at ¶¶ 45-46.) 

In response, Respondents filed separate motions to quash and, 

alternatively, preliminary objections. For the purposes of the motions to quash, 

Respondents construed the Petition as an attempted appeal of Respondents’ 

decisions to deny Hobart access to their systems. Respondents sought to quash the 

Petition on procedural and jurisdictional grounds. By order dated March 6, 2018, 

this Court denied Respondents’ motions to quash, opining that the Petition is 

arguably in the nature of a mandamus action and is properly docketed in the Court’s 

original jurisdiction. 

Respondents’ preliminary objections challenge the sufficiency of the 

Petition. Analyzing the Petition as an action in mandamus, Respondents assert that 

Hobart failed to plead either a clear legal right to access to their respective systems

or a corresponding duty in Respondents to provide such access. Further, 
5

Respondents object to this Court’s jurisdiction over the matter, asserting that Hobart 

is seeking enforcement of the arbitration award and that an employer’s failure to 

comply with such an award would constitute an unfair labor practice, over which the 

Pennsylvania Labor Relations Board has exclusive jurisdiction. Additionally, 

PennDOT objects to the specificity of the Petition. PennDOT argues that Hobart’s 

allegations that PennDOT failed to provide him due process are vague, as Hobart 

failed to state with specificity when the denial occurred or why he is entitled to due 

process. 

Although Respondents analyze the Petition as an action in mandamus, 

the Court’s further review reveals that Hobart has pleaded a declaratory judgment 

action in the Court’s original jurisdiction, asserting a denial of due process. Actions 

for declaratory judgment are governed by the Declaratory Judgments Act, 42 Pa. 

C.S. §§ 7531-7541. The purpose of the Declaratory Judgments Act is to “settle and 

to afford relief from uncertainty and insecurity with respect to rights, status, and 

other legal relations, and [the Declaratory Judgments Act] is to be liberally construed 

and administered.” 42 Pa. C.S. § 7541(a). An action brought under the Declaratory 

Judgments Act “‘must allege an interest by the party seeking relief which is direct, 

substantial and present . . . and must demonstrate the existence of an actual 

controversy related to the invasion or threatened invasion of one’s legal rights.’” 

Bowen v. Mount Joy Twp., 644 A.2d 818, 821 (Pa. Cmwlth.) (quoting 

Pa. Institutional Health Servs., Inc. v. Dep’t of Corr., 631 A.2d 767, 771 

(Pa. Cmwlth. 1993), aff’d per curiam, 640 A.2d 413 (Pa. 1994)), appeal denied, 

652 A.2d 1326 (Pa. 1994). Granting or denying an action for a declaratory judgment 

is committed to the sound discretion of a court of original jurisdiction. Gulnac by 

Gulnac v. S. Butler Cty. Sch. Dist., 587 A.2d 699, 701 (Pa. 1991).
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Here, Hobart alleges an interest in his employment. Specifically, 

Hobart avers that he has a property interest in his continued employment under what 

is referred to as the Police Tenure Act,1and that access to JNET, CLEAN, and 

PennDOT’s information system is incidental to his employment as a police officer. 

Section 2 of the Police Tenure Act provides that a police officer may be suspended, 

removed, or reduced in rank for:

(1) physical or mental disability affecting his ability to 

continue in service, in which case the person shall receive 

an honorable discharge from service; (2) neglect or 

violation of any official duty; (3) violating of any law 

which provides that such violation constitutes a 

misdemeanor or felony; (4) inefficiency, neglect, 

intemperance, disobedience of orders, or conduct 

unbecoming an officer; (5) intoxication while on duty.

53 P.S. § 812. Hobart asserts that Respondents are denying him access to their 

respective information systems, systems to which the Department contends Hobart 

must have access in order to perform his duties. (Pet. at ¶ 45.) As the Department 

refuses to allow Hobart to work without access to these systems, Hobart alleges that 

Respondents are effectively depriving him of his property interest in his employment 

without due process of law. (Id.) 

With the foregoing in mind, we now turn to Respondents’ preliminary 

objections. Respondents’ first preliminary objection is that Hobart failed to plead 

both a clear right to access Respondents’ information systems and a mandatory duty 

in Respondents to provide such access. In so arguing, Respondents assert that 

Hobart has no right to access their information systems. In support of this position, 

Respondents direct this Court’s attention to Haywood v. Pennsylvania State Police, 

660 A.2d 1324 (Pa. 1995). 

 

1 Act of June 15, 1951, P.L. 586, as amended, 53 P.S. §§ 811-816. 
7

In Haywood, PSP revoked a police officer’s (Haywood) CLEAN access 

after an investigation revealed that Haywood provided information from CLEAN to 

a private citizen, in violation of the requirement that CLEAN only be used for

legitimate law enforcement purposes. Subsequently, Haywood’s employer 

suspended him and conditioned his reinstatement dependent on the reestablishment 

of his CLEAN access. Haywood filed a petition for review in the nature of 

mandamus in this Court, seeking an order directing PSP to reestablish his CLEAN 

access until PSP held a hearing and issued an adjudication on the matter. Haywood

then filed a motion for judgment on the pleadings, and this Court denied the motion 

and dismissed the petition for review. 

On appeal to the Supreme Court, Haywood argued that he had a 

statutory right to CLEAN access and that PSP’s revocation constituted an agency 

adjudication for which a hearing was required. Haywood asserted that his statutory 

right to CLEAN access stemmed from Section 710(f) of the Administrative Code 

of 1929, Act of April 9, 1929, P.L. 177, as amended, 71 P.S. § 250(f), which 

provides:

The [PSP] shall have the power and its duty shall be:

. . . 

(f) To collect and classify, and keep at all times 

available, complete information useful for the 

detection of crime, and the identification and 

apprehension of criminals. Such information shall 

be available for all police officers within the 

Commonwealth, under such regulations as the 

Commissioner of [PSP] may prescribe.

(Emphasis added.) The Supreme Court rejected Haywood’s argument, opining:

[Haywood] contends that this provision gives every police 

officer a right to obtain information collected by [PSP].

However, even assuming arguendo that officers have a 
8

right to obtain information from [PSP] in accordance with 

applicable regulations, this does not mean that every 

officer has a right to use CLEAN. Access to CLEAN is 

provided by contract. In this case, a contract was entered 

between [PSP] and [Haywood’s employer]. It created no 

right for any individual officer to access the system; rather, 

it provided a right of access for the municipality. Since 

[Haywood’s] access to CLEAN was not a matter of 

individual right, no hearing was required before 

prohibiting him from using the system. Mandamus against 

[PSP] was properly denied.

Haywood, 660 A.2d at 1325-26. 

While we agree with Respondents that police officers do not have a 

statutory right to access their respective information systems, we view Haywood as 

distinguishable from the instant matter. The police officer in Haywood argued that 

he had a statutory right to CLEAN access. Here, Hobart makes no such claim. 

Instead, Hobart claims to have a property interest in his employment, which, as 

Hobart alleges, is effectively extinguished by Respondents’ decisions to revoke his 

access to JNET, CLEAN, and PennDOT’s information system. This argument was 

not raised in Haywood, nor does the Supreme Court’s opinion provide any guidance 

to that end. 

Further, Hobart is conceivably arguing that access to JNET, CLEAN, 

and PennDOT’s information system is not a right; rather, these accesses are 

privileges. Privileges that—similar to a driver’s license—can only be revoked when 

preceded by procedural due process. See Dep’t of Transp., Bureau of Driver 

Licensing v. Clayton, 684 A.2d 1060, 1064 (Pa. 1996) (“[I]t is beyond peradventure 

that procedural due process must be met before one’s operating privilege can be 

revoked.”). With respect to privileges such as driver’s licenses, the United States 

Supreme Court opined:
9

Once licenses are issued, . . . their continued possession 

may become essential in the pursuit of livelihood.

Suspension of issued licenses thus involves state action 

that adjudicates important interests of the licensees. In 

such cases the licenses are not to be taken away without 

that procedural due process required by the Fourteenth 

Amendment. This is but an application of the general 

proposition that relevant constitutional restraints limit 

state power to terminate an entitlement whether the 

entitlement is denominated a “right” or a “privilege.”

Bell v. Burson, 402 U.S. 535, 539 (1971) (citations omitted). 

Here, it is clear from the Petition that access to JNET, CLEAN, and 

PennDOT’s information system are critical to Hobart’s functions as a police officer. 

Hobart pleaded that the Department will not reinstate his employment without access 

to these systems. (Pet. at ¶ 31.) Thus, Hobart’s access to JNET, CLEAN, and 

PennDOT’s information system—much like the driver’s license in Bell—is 

conceivably essential to the pursuit of his livelihood. If such is the case, and 

Hobart’s access to these systems is a privilege protected by due process, then the law 

does not make clear that Hobart cannot succeed on his claim, which is required in 

order to sustain preliminary objections. See Meier, 648 A.2d at 600. At this stage 

of the proceedings, it is not clear that the law does not afford Hobart relief. 

Accordingly, we overrule Respondents’ first preliminary objection.

Next, Respondents argue that this Court is without original jurisdiction 

over the matter. To this point, Respondents aver that Hobart is seeking judicial 

review of a governmental determination, and that, pursuant to 42 Pa. 

C.S. § 763, such review is properly addressed to this Court’s appellate jurisdiction. 

This argument, again, mischaracterizes the nature of the Petition. Hobart is not 

attempting to appeal any purported determinations by Respondents. Rather, Hobart 

is seeking relief from an alleged deprivation of his interest in employment without 
10

first receiving due process. A declaratory judgment action filed in this Court’s 

original jurisdiction is the proper manner for Hobart to seek such relief. See 42 Pa. 

C.S. § 761(a). Thus, Respondents’ preliminary objection to jurisdiction is overruled. 

Finally, PennDOT alone objects to the sufficiency of the Petition, 

arguing that Hobart failed to state with specificity when the denial of due process 

occurred or why he is entitled to due process. The practice and procedure governing 

civil actions apply to actions for declaratory judgment. Pa. R.C.P. No. 1601. A 

complaint must state the “material facts on which a cause of action or defense is 

based . . . in a concise and summary form.” Pa. R.C.P. No. 1019(a). This rule is 

satisfied if the allegations in a pleading contain averments of all facts the plaintiff 

must eventually prove in order to recover, and the averments are sufficiently specific 

to enable the adverse party to prepare a defense. Unified Sportsmen of Pa. v. Pa.

Game Comm’n (PGC), 950 A.2d 1120, 1134 (Pa. Cmwlth. 2008). A complaint must 

provide the defendant with notice of what the plaintiff’s claim is and the grounds 

upon which it rests, and formulate the issues by summarizing those facts essential to 

support the claim. Id.

Here, we determine that Hobart has met the requirements of Pa. R.C.P. 

No. 1019. With respect to when the denial occurred, Hobart pleaded that, to the best 

of his knowledge, PennDOT made a determination to deny Hobart access to its 

information system without communicating the decision to Hobart. (Pet. at ¶ 27.) 

Further, Hobart pleaded that he attempted to appeal PSP’s denial to PSP, but has 

never received any answer—or acknowledgment whatsoever—from PSP. (Pet. 

at ¶ 26.) Such pleading satisfies the standard of Pa. R.C.P. No 1019(a), such to 

enable PennDOT to prepare a defense.
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With respect to Hobart specifically pleading why he is entitled to due 

process, Hobart pleaded that he has a property interest in his employment, pursuant 

to the Police Tenure Act. Due process must precede any deprivation of this interest. 

As Hobart alleges that the Department refuses to allow Hobart to work without 

access to these systems, Hobart alleges that Respondents are effectively depriving 

him of his interest in his employment without first affording him due process. This, 

too, meets the necessary standard of specificity for Pa. R.C.P. No. 1019(a). Thus, 

PennDOT’s objection to specificity is overruled. 

Accordingly, we overrule Respondents’ preliminary objections and 

direct Respondents to file an answer to the Petition within thirty days of this order.

P. KEVIN BROBSON, Judge
IN THE COMMONWEALTH COURT OF PENNSYLVANIA

Charles Hobart, :

Petitioner :

:

v. : No. 462 M.D. 2017

:

Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, :

Governor’s Office of Administration, :

Pennsylvania State Police and the :

Pennsylvania Department of :

Transportation, :

Respondents :

O R D E R

AND NOW, this 31st day of October, 2018, the preliminary objections 

of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Governor’s Office of Administration,

Pennsylvania Department of Transportation, and Pennsylvania State Police

(collectively, Respondents) to the Amended Petition for Review (Petition) filed by 

Charles Hobart are OVERRULED. Respondents are directed to file a response to 

the Petition within thirty days of this order.

P. KEVIN BROBSON, Judge