Title: Clark County REMC v. Reis
Citation: N/A
Docket Number: 21S-CT-00343
State: Indiana
Issuer: Indiana Supreme Court
Date: December 29, 2021

I N  T H E  
Indiana Supreme Court 
Supreme Court Case No. 21S-CT-343 
Clark County REMC, 
Appellant, 
–v– 
Glenn Reis, et al., 
Appellees. 
Argued: October 7, 2021 | Decided: December 29, 2021 
Appeal from the Clark Circuit Court 
No. 10C01-1808-CT-143 
The Honorable Maria D. Granger 
On Petition to Transfer from the Indiana Court of Appeals 
No. 20A-CT-622 
Opinion by Justice Slaughter 
Chief Justice Rush and Justices David, Massa, and Goff concur. 
 
 
 
FILED
C L E R K
Indiana Supreme Court
Court of Appeals
and Tax Court
Dec 29 2021, 2:06 pm
Indiana Supreme Court | Case No. 21S-CT-343 | December 29, 2021 
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Slaughter, Justice. 
For decades, the board of a county REMC, a rural electric membership 
cooperative, adopted a series of policies providing health-insurance 
benefits to former directors who met certain conditions. We must decide, 
as an issue of first impression in Indiana, whether the board policy at 
issue here created a binding contract with the REMC’s former directors. 
We hold there was not a contract because the policy was not an offer. 
I 
The four plaintiffs are former directors of Clark County REMC, a 
public-utility company established under the Indiana Rural Electric 
Membership Corporation Act. See Ind. Code §§ 8-1-13-1 et seq. Clark 
REMC is administered by a board of directors, on which the plaintiffs 
served during these years: Glenn Reis, 1984 to 2005; Dale Bottorff, 1992 to 
1993 and 1996 to 2014; Steve Stumler, 1994 to 2018; and Jimmie Sanders, 
1997 to 2018. 
From 1972 until 2018, Clark REMC had a series of board policies that 
allowed former directors who met eligibility requirements to receive 
health-insurance benefits. Under the 1972 policy, former directors with 
either twenty years of service or twelve years of service if forced to retire 
at age sixty-five could participate in Clark REMC’s group health-
insurance plan. Under this policy, Clark REMC paid the eligible directors’ 
health-insurance premiums.  
The board changed its policy over the years. The changes made in 2014 
and 2018 are the basis of the dispute here. The 2014 version did the 
following: 
• eliminated eligibility for the group health-insurance plan for 
former directors;  
• required retired directors to obtain their own health insurance, 
which Clark REMC then reimbursed subject to certain caps;  
• said that “[t]his policy will be reviewed periodically”; and  
• said that the updated policy “shall take the place of, revoke and 
render null and void” the previous version.  
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The 2018 version then terminated the health-insurance reimbursement 
policy for former directors.  
After the 2018 revision took effect, the plaintiffs sued Clark REMC 
alleging, as relevant here, breach of contract. Clark REMC moved for 
summary judgment on the breach-of-contract claim, and the plaintiffs 
cross-moved for partial summary judgment on liability. The trial court 
granted summary judgment on this claim for the plaintiffs and against 
Clark REMC. The plaintiffs’ other claims, including a promissory-estoppel 
claim, were later resolved by a court-approved settlement agreement. 
Clark REMC appealed, and the court of appeals affirmed the trial 
court’s judgment. Clark Cnty. REMC v. Reis, 167 N.E.3d 333, 335 (Ind. Ct. 
App. 2021). Clark REMC then sought transfer, which we granted, Clark 
Cnty. REMC v. Reis, 171 N.E.3d 616 (Ind. 2021), thus vacating the appellate 
opinion. 
II 
Summary judgment is appropriate when there are no genuine issues of 
material fact, and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. 
Griffin v. Menard, Inc., 175 N.E.3d 811, 813 (Ind. 2021). The parties here do 
not dispute the underlying facts. What they dispute is the legal effect of 
the uncontested factual record: whether any of Clark REMC’s evolving 
board policies formed a binding contract with any of the four former 
directors. Questions of contract formation are legal issues we review de 
novo. See Orr v. Westminster Village North, Inc., 689 N.E.2d 712, 721 (Ind. 
1997) (deciding, as a matter of law, that an employee handbook was not a 
contract in part because it did not represent an offer). 
Under settled Indiana law, a contract requires “offer, acceptance, and 
consideration”. Indiana Dep’t of State Revenue v. Belterra Resort Indiana, LLC, 
935 N.E.2d 174, 179 (Ind. 2010), opinion modified on reh’g, 942 N.E.2d 796 
(Ind. 2011). This is true whether a contract is unilateral or bilateral. See 
Orr, 689 N.E.2d at 720–21 (discussing offer, acceptance, and consideration 
in the context of a unilateral contract). The plaintiffs contend the board’s 
2018 policy, which eliminated the health-care reimbursement plan for 
former directors, breached Clark REMC’s contract with them. The policies 
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went through many formulations from 1972 to 2018, but we look to the 
2014 version as the purported moment of contract formation. That is when 
the board established the health-care reimbursement plan, which 
remained unaltered until the board rescinded it in 2018. The 2014 policy 
provided in relevant part: 
5. Health and Hospitalization Insurance. 
c. If permitted by prevailing law, all eligible active and 
past directors who were elected to the Board before 
January 1, 2000 shall, at such time when he or she stops 
serving on the Board of Directors, have the option to 
participate in the Cooperative’s family health and 
hospitalization plan or such substitute health plan 
acquired through an exchange as dictated by the 
Affordable Care Act or other prevailing law at the 
Cooperative’s expense. A Director is not eligible for past 
director coverage under this subsection unless: (A) the 
Director has served on the Board no less than twelve (12) 
full years and has reached the full age of 65 years when 
s/he leaves the Board, or (B) the Director has served on the 
Board no less than twenty (20) full years and has not 
reached the full age of 65 years when s/he leaves the 
Board. HOWEVER the amount of health insurance 
premiums payable by the Cooperative for past director 
coverage shall not exceed the rates established [below].  
 
(Emphasis in original). 
We hold there was no contract as to any plaintiff because the board’s 
2014 policy did not manifest Clark REMC’s intention or invitation to 
contract. With no intention to contract, there was no offer; with no offer, 
there was no binding agreement. Thus, we reverse the trial court’s 
contrary judgment. 
“An offer is defined as the manifestation of willingness to enter into a 
bargain, so made as to justify another person in understanding that his 
assent to that bargain is invited and will conclude it.” Zimmerman v. 
McColley, 826 N.E.2d 71, 77 (Ind. Ct. App. 2005) (cleaned up) (quoting 
Restatement (Second) of Contracts § 24 (1981)); accord Conwell v. Gray 
Indiana Supreme Court | Case No. 21S-CT-343 | December 29, 2021 
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Loon Outdoor Mktg. Grp., Inc., 906 N.E.2d 805, 813 (Ind. 2009) (requiring 
reasonable certainty of contract terms “including by whom and to 
whom”). Here, as an initial matter, the 2014 policy did not show Clark 
REMC’s intent was to contract with another person. Rather, the policy was 
simply the board’s internal communication with itself. It was not styled as 
a “contract” or “agreement” with—or as an offer to—an individual 
director but as a “Policy of the Board of Directors”. It did not memorialize 
terms and conditions but set out “the practice of the Cooperative”. Also, 
the policy was signed only by the board secretary—and not by the 
individual plaintiffs or by the board on Clark REMC’s behalf. And the 
policy fell explicitly under the category of “Governance Process”. Indeed, 
the secretary’s signature served only as an “affirmation of official Board 
action adopting this policy”. No designated evidence shows it was 
directed to any plaintiff in any capacity outside his role as a director 
acting collectively on Clark REMC’s behalf. The 2014 policy merely 
formalized the board’s internal operations and did not manifest an 
intention or invitation by Clark REMC to contract with another. Thus, it 
was not an offer that any director could accept to form a binding, 
enforceable contract.  
Moreover, the 2014 policy did not convey a promise to any plaintiff 
with reasonable certainty. The mere “expressed intention to do a given 
thing” is not a promise and does not create a binding obligation. Joyce v. 
Hamilton, 111 Ind. 163, 165, 12 N.E. 294, 295 (1887); accord 1 Williston on 
Contracts § 4:9 (4th ed.) (“[A]n ordinance or resolution of a municipality 
does not amount to an offer since it merely evidences the municipal 
corporation’s intent to do something in the future, but does not thereby 
make a promise that it shall be done. Nor does a vote by the directors of a 
private corporation itself amount to an offer for the same reason”.). An 
offer must also convey with “reasonable certainty . . . the terms and 
conditions of the promises made”. Conwell, 906 N.E.2d at 813. 
Here, the 2014 policy contained no promise at all, only an expression of 
the board’s contemporaneous intention to provide health-insurance 
benefits to its former directors—an intention that could, and did, change 
over time. Nothing in this policy suggested the board was promising to 
continue this benefit in perpetuity or for a former director’s lifetime. The 
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plaintiffs implicitly conceded this point in their summary-judgment 
motion by acknowledging: “In other words, the REMC agreed to provide 
health insurance benefits that survived any changes to the contrary.” The 
plaintiffs cannot contend that Clark REMC agreed to continue providing 
lifetime health benefits without change when they posit that Clark REMC 
agreed to provide benefits only until it made “changes to the contrary.”  
Nor did the 2014 policy convey with reasonable certainty the board’s 
promise to provide former directors with health-insurance benefits for life 
in exchange for their future board service. As explained above, the policy 
read like an internal governance document and not a binding contract 
between Clark REMC and individual directors. And the policy itself said 
it “will be reviewed periodically.” Moreover, even without this statement, 
corporations have inherent power to change their bylaws at will. I.C. § 8-
1-13-7(a); Supreme Lodge, K. of P. of the World v. Knight, 117 Ind. 489, 496–97, 
20 N.E. 479, 483 (1889). Policies are not bylaws; they are even less formal 
than bylaws. Bylaws, though subordinate to a corporation’s articles of 
incorporation, are typically considered an organization’s “most 
authoritative governing document”. Bylaw, Black’s Law Dictionary (11th 
ed. 2019). If corporations can change their bylaws at will, it follows they 
can change their policies at will, too. The plaintiffs concede there is no 
difference under the statute in Clark REMC’s ability to amend its bylaws 
versus its policies. Indeed, the statute empowers an REMC to “make its 
own rules and regulations as to its procedure.” I.C. § 8-1-13-7(e). Thus, the 
default rule in Indiana is that corporations can change their policies at 
will. A corporate policy that does not reject this rule cannot convey such  
reasonable certainty about its terms that it represents an offer.  
On appeal, the parties’ arguments focus on whether there was 
consideration and whether the former directors had a vested right to 
lifetime health benefits. Because we hold there was no offer, we need not 
address whether there was consideration. And because there was no 
contract, Clark REMC had no ongoing obligation to provide health-care 
benefits, vested or not, to its former directors. Clark REMC is entitled to 
summary judgment. 
 
Indiana Supreme Court | Case No. 21S-CT-343 | December 29, 2021 
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*          *          * 
The 2014 board policy, which established reimbursement benefits for 
former directors, was not an offer because it did not convey with 
reasonable certainty promises manifesting an intention or invitation to 
contract with another. With no offer, there was no contract, and the 
plaintiffs’ breach-of-contract claims must fail. We reverse the trial court’s 
grant of summary judgment to the plaintiffs and remand with instructions 
to enter judgment for Clark REMC. 
Rush, C.J., and David, Massa, and Goff, JJ., concur. 
A TT O R N E YS F O R  AP P EL LA N T  
Kent M. Frandsen 
Katherine M. Moore 
Parr Richey Frandsen Patterson Kruse LLP 
Lebanon, Indiana 
David A. Lewis 
Jeffersonville, Indiana 
A TT O R N E Y F O R  A PP E LLE E S 
Mark R. Waterfill 
Plainfield, Indiana