Opinion ID: 437224
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: the state administrative proceedings

Text: 22 In Board of Education of the Hendrick Hudson Central School District v. Rowley, 458 U.S. 176, 102 S.Ct. 3034, 73 L.Ed.2d 690 (1982), the Supreme Court discussed the proper scope of judicial review in actions brought under 20 U.S.C. Sec. 1415(e)(2): First, has the State complied with the procedures set forth in the Act? And second, is the individualized educational program developed through the Act's procedures reasonably calculated to enable the child to receive educational benefits? Id. at 206-07, 102 S.Ct. at 3051 (footnotes omitted). In view of the state hearing officer's findings that the Town violated numerous state and federal laws in handling the child's special educational plans, the State and the Does--appellants here--challenge the failure of the district court to determine whether the Town complied with the procedures mandated by the federal Act and the corollary state Act. The Town responds by arguing that the hearing officer's findings were essentially ultra vires. The resolution of this question requires us to determine whether the state due process hearing, a central feature of the federal Act, was defective. 23 The appellants urge as error the district court's refusal to give any weight to the hearing officer's determination that the Town violated numerous state substantive and procedural regulations plus several federal provisions in its handling of the child's special education. The Town's response is that findings concerning past practices regarding compliance with state educational standards and procedures were irrelevant to the question appropriately before the hearing officer, viz., is the IEP proposed by the Town adequate and appropriate? Thus, in the Town's view, the district court properly ignored those findings. The Town raises two other objections to the findings. First, it argues that it was not given fair notice of the procedural or reimbursement issues in violation of the due process clause of the fourteenth amendment, U.S. Const. amend. XIV, Sec. 1, and the Massachusetts Administrative Procedure Act, Mass.Gen.Laws Ann. ch. 30A, Sec. 11(1) (West 1979), and, second, that the hearing officer's consideration of the prior years of the boy's education was unnecessary and erroneous. We first address the question of notice.
24 We note at the outset that the impartial due process hearings authorized by the Act are to be conducted in accordance with state law. 20 U.S.C. Sec. 1415(a). 3 This principle is limited only where the federal Act and regulations mandate different or more stringent procedural protection on a given point than does state law. See 20 U.S.C. Sec. 1415(b)(1) (The procedures required by this section shall include, but shall not be limited to ...). In regard to notice, the federal Act speaks only to written prior notice to the parents or guardian of the child regarding certain actions a state or local educational agency might take in relation to a disabled child, see Sec. 1415(b)(1)(C). We find no federal procedural provision preempting state law on the question of fair notice of issues to be decided at the due process hearing. We turn, then, to state law. 25 The Massachusetts Administrative Procedure Act in pertinent part provides: 26 (1) Reasonable notice of the hearing shall be accorded all parties and shall include statements of the time and place of the hearing. Parties shall have sufficient notice of the issues involved to afford them reasonable opportunity to prepare and present evidence and argument. If the issues cannot be fully stated in advance of the hearing, they shall be fully stated as soon as practicable. In all cases of delayed statement, or where subsequent amendment of the issues is necessary, sufficient time shall be allowed after full statement or amendment to afford all parties reasonable opportunity to prepare and present evidence and argument respecting the issues. 27 Mass.Gen.Laws Ann. ch. 30A, Sec. 11(1). The Town's claim of inadequate notice of the procedural issues is disingenuous. In a memorandum dated November 28, 1979, submitted by the Town to the state hearing officer, one section is entitled There is no proof of procedural irregularity and no harm or prejudice to the [Does]. Additionally, uncontroverted testimony and exhibits submitted at the administrative hearing indicate that Mr. Doe met with the Town's School Committee in executive session to alert it to what he viewed as substantive and procedural irregularities in the handling of his child's special education. Adequate notice was provided to the Town on the procedural issues. 28 We also find that the Town had adequate notice under Sec. 11(1) of the reimbursement issues. While the corroborating documents were not put into evidence until the last day of the hearing, testimony from Mr. Doe on the first day of the hearing (September 26, 1979) and from Mrs. Doe on the last day (November 1) was directed to whether the Town had provided them with the information regarding their right to an independent evaluation of their son, as required by 20 U.S.C. Sec. 1415(b)(1)(A); 34 C.F.R. Sec. 300.503; and Mass.Admin.Code tit. 603, Sec. 328, and what independent evaluations the parents actually had obtained. We believe that the natural implication of the Does' testimony that the Town denied them notice of their right to and payment for independent evaluations is that they would expect to be reimbursed for the expenditures the law required of the Town. This inference is reasonable in view of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court's decision in Amherst-Pelham Regional School Committee v. Department of Education, 376 Mass. 480, 381 N.E.2d 922 (1978), which validated the Department's power to order reimbursement to parents who obtained necessary services for their child because of the school committee's failure to provide them. 29 The hearing officer, moreover, provided an opportunity to both parties to submit rebuttal evidence as well as argument in written closing statements. At the request of both parties, the deadline was extended an additional three weeks. The Town did not utilize this evidentiary opportunity but claimed that procedural due process required that they be given an opportunity to cross-examine witnesses regarding the bills. The hearing officer found, however, and we agree, that all the submitted bills corresponded to testimony given at the hearing by witnesses examined and cross-examined by the Town. We find no authority for construing the provision reasonable opportunity to prepare and present argument respecting the issues, Mass.Gen.Laws ch. 30A, Sec. 11(1), to require that a second opportunity for cross-examination of witnesses must be provided. Nor do we construe 20 U.S.C. Sec. 1415 to mandate such an opportunity. Rather, we think that the hearing officer provided the procedural due process required by the statute and, in any event, no prejudice has been shown. We discern no basis for a constitutional claim of denial of due process on either issue. 30
31 The hearing officer took into consideration all years of John's education because she found that the Town had provided the parents with an incomplete notice of their appeal rights in June 1977, at the close of John's first year, and no written transmission of any information about parents' rights subsequent to that time. The hearing officer therefore concluded that the parents cannot be held responsible for any delay in requesting appeal and that the matter is legitimately before the Bureau 4 at this time. In Re BSEA # 2867 at 12 (Jan. 20, 1980). The Town challenges the consideration by the Bureau of prior years as well as the relevance of past alleged illegalities to a judgment regarding a prospective IEP. The cases on which it relies are inapposite, however. In both New Bedford Gas and Edison Light Co. v. Board of Assessors of Dartmouth, 368 Mass. 745, 335 N.E.2d 897, 899 (1975), and Canron, Inc. v. Board of Assessors of Everett, 366 Mass. 634, 322 N.E.2d 83, 85 (1975), the Supreme Judicial Court undertook to interpret Mass.Gen.Laws Ann. ch. 59, Sec. 59, regarding the timeliness of tax abatement petitions; no rulings were made interpreting the Massachusetts Administrative Procedure Act, Mass.Gen.Laws Ann. ch. 30A, Secs. 10, 11, which governed this case at the state hearings. 32 Moreover, the state Act, consistent with the requirements of the federal Act, expressly charges the school system with the responsibility of notifying parents of their procedural and appellate rights. Compare Mass.Gen.Laws Ann. ch. 71B, Sec. 3 with 20 U.S.C. Sec. 1415(b)(1)(D). See also Scokin v. Texas, 723 F.2d 432 (5th Cir.1984). In Rowley, the Court commented on the importance of the procedural safeguards in Sec. 1415: 33 When the elaborate and highly specific procedural safeguards embodied in Sec. 1415 are contrasted with the general and somewhat imprecise substantive admonitions contained in the Act, we think that the importance Congress attached to these procedural safeguards cannot be gainsaid. It seems to us no exaggeration to say that Congress placed every bit as much emphasis upon compliance with procedures giving parents and guardians a large measure of participation at every stage of the administrative process, see, e.g., Secs. 1415(a)-(d), as it did upon the measurement of the resulting IEP against a substantive standard. 34 Rowley 458 U.S. at 205-6, 102 S.Ct. at 3050-1. The Court further noted that adequate compliance with the procedures described would assure much of what Congress wished in the way of substantive content in an IEP. Id. Lack of notice to the parents, then, regarding their procedural rights drives a stake into the very heart of the Act. 35 Since the Town failed to give the parents proper notice, and since such notice might have led them to appeal earlier, it was reasonable for the State to hear those appeals despite their falling outside of the specified time frame, and to view the Town's lack of notice as a waiver of any time bar objection that might otherwise apply. Here, complete procedural information should have been provided to the parents in June 1977. Although the federal Act was not yet effective on that date, the state Act's provisions were in force. The hearing officer was, therefore, empowered to take into consideration the events the parents could have appealed on that date. 36 The practical effect of examining the entire course of events is limited. No hearing officer or court can turn back the clock and provide a disabled child an appropriate education for prior years; prospective relief, except for reimbursement under certain circumstances, Doe v. Brookline, 722 F.2d at 919-21, generally comprises the remedy under the Act. Anderson v. Thompson, 658 F.2d 1205, 1210-13 (7th Cir.1981). The value of considering a broader period of time, therefore, is basically evidentiary, to show procedural bad faith or a history of nonimplementation of IEPs. Further, while we do not reach the question, certain prospective relief, such as compensatory education, may arguably be ordered on the basis of prior defaults in the provision of a free appropriate public education. See Timms v. Metropolitan School District of Wabash County, 722 F.2d 1310, 1314-15 (7th Cir.1983); see also Milliken v. Bradley, 433 U.S. 267, 289-90, 97 S.Ct. 2749, 2761-62, 53 L.Ed.2d 745 (1977). We conclude that interpreting the reach of the hearing officer in this manner comports with the court's responsibility to do substantial justice. Doe v. Brookline, 722 F.2d at 917.
37 The cooperative federalism that has been identified as a central hallmark of the Act, Georgia Association of Retarded Citizens v. McDaniel, 716 F.2d 1565, 1569 (11th Cir.1983); Battle v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, 629 F.2d 269, 278 (3d Cir.1980), cert. denied, 452 U.S. 968, 101 S.Ct. 3123, 69 L.Ed.2d 981 (1981); see also King v. Smith, 392 U.S. 309, 316, 88 S.Ct. 2128, 2133, 20 L.Ed.2d 1118 (1968); Abrahamson v. Hershman, 701 F.2d 223, 231 (1st Cir.1983), is specifically reflected in 20 U.S.C. Sec. 1415(a). That section, as already noted, indicates that the procedures governing the impartial due process hearing[s], including the procedures due parties, are to be determined on the basis of state law unless more stringent federal provisions control. Here, in order to determine whether the state hearing officer was permitted to consider the Town's alleged violations of state special education regulations, we must decide whether the federal Act requires any differentiation in the choice of substantive law to be applied in state administrative hearings. 38 Under the federal Act, a state is free to accept or reject the participation of the federal government in its educational programs for the disabled. See Doe v. Brookline, 722 F.2d at 916 n. 4. For states that contract for inclusion, the Act expressly authorizes and requires a state and local administrative apparatus to effectuate both its substantive and procedural guarantees in the first instance. See, e.g., 20 U.S.C. Secs. 1412-1415; 34 C.F.R. Secs. 300.122, 300.128-.130, 300.220-.227, 300.300, 300.304. While compliance with the minimum standards set out by the federal Act is mandatory for the receipt of federal financial assistance, Smith v. Cumberland, 703 F.2d 4, 7 (1st Cir.1983), cert. granted, --- U.S. ----, 104 S.Ct. 334, 78 L.Ed.2d 304 (1983), the Act does not presume to impose nationally a uniform approach to the education of children with any given disability; it requires only that a free appropriate ... education, 20 U.S.C. Sec. 1412(1), in conformity with the state's educational standards, 20 U.S.C. Secs. 1401(18) 5 , 1412(6) 6 , be provided to each disabled child upon individualized evaluation and planning. See 20 U.S.C. Sec. 1401(18)-(19) and Rowley 458 U.S. at 200-04, 102 S.Ct. at 3047-50. Cooperative federalism in this context, then, allows some substantive differentiation among the states in the determination of which educational theories, practices, and approaches will be utilized for educating disabled children with a given impairment. Rowley at 207-08, 102 S.Ct. at 3051-52. 7 This approach also permits substantive variations in the level of remedial educational services states provide, once the federal minimum standard of a free appropriate public education is met. See 20 U.S.C. Sec. 1412(6). We find no indication in either the statutory language or the legislative history of the Act that Congress intended to create either a substantive or procedural ceiling regarding the rights of the disabled child. Thus, under our reading of the Act, states are free to elaborate procedural and substantive protections for the disabled child that are more stringent than those contained in the Act. Accord Eberle v. The Board of Public Education of the School District of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, 444 F.Supp. 41, 43 (W.D.Pa.1977). 39 We believe that under the cooperative federalism approach the proper construction of Sec. 1415 is that state substantive law supplements the federal Act in prescribing the determinations to be made at the due process hearing. It seems plain that the Congress drew the procedural and substantive contours of education for disabled children, but left the shading and tinting of the details largely to the states. States are responsible for filling in the numerous interstices within the federal Act through their own statutes and regulations. Congress provided for federal executive oversight through states' annual plans to assure basic compliance with the federal minimum standards but the states supply the machinery necessary to effectuate the guarantees provided by the federal Act on a daily basis. 8 40 Given the crucial role Congress has assigned to the states in effectuating a free appropriate public education for all disabled children, we hold that states have the right to enforce their own laws and regulations at the due process hearings authorized by Sec. 1415, 9 and not merely those skeletal federal provisions designed as minimum standards. 10 Any other construction would render the states powerless to effectuate the federal Act fully or to provide greater protection and services for disabled children than the Act requires. We find no support in the legislative history of a congressional intention to supplant the states' historic direction of education within their boundaries. 11 41 We now evaluate the Town's claim that the hearing officer deviated from the only question properly before her and allowed extraneous considerations to taint her decision that the Town's IEP was inadequate for John's needs. The hearing officer framed the issues at the outset of her opinion: 42 1. Whether the educational plan and placement proposed by Burlington ... a 502.4 prototype, 12 is adequate and appropriate to meet [John's] special needs. 43 2. Whether the Burlington Public Schools have violated the procedural requirements of Chapter 766 in significant and prejudicial ways. 44 3. Whether, in the alternative, the Carroll School, a 766 approved private day school is the least restrictive, adequate program and placement which meets [John's] special educational needs.4. Whether Burlington Public Schools is responsible for payment of certain evaluations. 45 The Town does not object to issue one, nor to the correlative inquiry contained in issue three; it concentrates its attack on issue two. 13 The hearing officer's inquiry, however, is mandated by the crucial role of state regulations in effectuating the guarantees of the federal Act. Further, the officer did not merely enumerate the state and federal regulations she found the Town to have violated, but discussed how many of those illegalities seriously compromised John's right to an appropriate education. 46 Since there is no claim of federal preemption here, the only question remaining is whether the hearing officer properly applied state substantive law. In Isgur v. School Committee of Newton, 9 Mass.App. 290, 400 N.E.2d 1292 at 1292 (1980), the court posed the pertinent question: [D]oes the failure to comply with the regulation[§ identified] go to the essence of rights granted by c. 766 [and the federal Act]? 14 We have no difficulty in finding that the hearing officer properly answered this question affirmatively. Accordingly, we hold that the hearing officer did not err in linking the Town's violations of John's essential rights to the conclusion that the Town lacked the capacity to implement the IEP as written.