Opinion ID: 1938216
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Preservation of the issue before the Commission.

Text: In his Tenant Petition which initiated the proceedings before the Commission, Goodman alleged that [n]o written notice that a claim of exemption was on file was given me as a tenant or prospective tenant as required by section 3407.5 of the D.C. Rental Housing Regulations. [18] So far as we can determine from the record, this is the sole allusion to receipt or non-receipt by Goodman of the written notice of exemption from rent stabilization. [19] The point was not addressed in the written decisions of the Hearing Examiner, the former Commission, or the present Commission. No determination has been made by any fact-finder as to whether Goodman received notice and, if so, when this occurred. [20] To be sure, Graybill has not affirmatively asserted in any of his submissions that such notice was provided. We suspect that, if it had been, Graybill might well have been sufficiently enterprising to find and avail himself of some opportunity to tell us so. Nevertheless, an appellate court may not assume the responsibility of the agency to make findings of fact, nor may it decide a case, in the absence of agency findings, on the basis of inferences or hunches drawn from what a lawyer said or did not say. The Supreme Court has instructed us that a reviewing court usurps the agency's function when it sets aside the administrative determination upon a ground not theretofore presented and deprives the Commission of an opportunity to consider the matter, make its ruling, and state the reasons for its action. Unemployment Compensation Commission of Alaska v. Aragon, 329 U.S. 143, 155, 67 S.Ct. 245, 251, 91 L.Ed. 136 (1946). In the absence of exceptional circumstances, a reviewing court will refuse to consider contentions not presented before the administrative agency at the appropriate time. Getty Oil Co. v. Andrus, 607 F.2d 253, 255-56 (9th Cir.1979); see also 4 K.C. DAVIS, ADMINISTRATIVE LAW TREATISE § 26.7, at 441-44 (1983). This court has likewise held, citing Aragon, supra, that contentions not urged at the administrative level may not form the basis for overturning the decision on review. John D. Neumann Properties, Inc. v. District of Columbia Bd. of Appeals & Review, 268 A.2d 605, 606 (D.C. 1970). Like our federal colleagues, however, we have recognized that the courts may show a measure of flexibility in this regard when the interests of justice so require. See, e.g., J. Parreco & Son v. District of Columbia Rental Housing Commission, 567 A.2d 43, 45 n. 4 (D.C. 1989). [21] The question is whether the circumstances of this case are sufficiently exceptional to warrant our consideration of an issue which Goodman has failed meaningfully to preserve. We note in that regard that the sequence of events here was certainly unusual. At almost every stage of the proceedings prior to the present Commission's decision in Graybill's favor, Goodman had won the war of the exemption, having successfully urged that Graybill owned five units rather than four. When Goodman eventually lost on this point, this occurred only because the present Commission declined to follow the apparent law of the case when reviewing the examiner's decision on remand. [22] Understandably, during the period when he was the apparent winner with respect to coverage, Goodman's attention was not on notice. Under the law as enunciated by the hearing examiner and by the former Commission, receipt or nonreceipt of notice was irrelevant because it had been determined that Graybill owned five units and was thus not entitled to the exemption at all. Having persuaded the former Commission on the question of coverage, Goodman was not required to cross-appeal with respect to the issue of notice. He did, however, have the right to address that issue before the Commission and to claim lack of statutory notice as an alternate basis for sustaining the hearing examiner's favorable decision. As Justice Brandeis stated for the Court in United States v. American Railway Express Co., 265 U.S. 425, 435, 44 S.Ct. 560, 564, 68 L.Ed. 1087 (1924), the appellee may, without taking a cross-appeal, urge in support of a decree any matter appearing in the record, although his argument may involve an attack upon the reasoning of the lower court or an insistence upon matter overlooked or ignored by it. Accord, Edwards v. Woods, 385 A.2d 780, 783 (D.C.1978) ([i]n pursuing her defense on this appeal, [appellee] is free to urge a rationale different from that utilized by the trial court). As we have noted, however, Goodman did not address the notice issue in his submissions to the Commission or to the hearing examiner. That being so, he is in no position to complain about the failure of the Commission to decide the question. Moreover, even if we were to conclude  and we do not  that Goodman was lulled by his string of victories on the issue of coverage into a justifiable belief that he need not press to the Commission his claim of lack of notice, any such lulling would surely have ended when the present Commission sustained Graybill's claim. Goodman had the right at that point to file a motion for reconsideration, see 14 D.C.M.R. § 3823.1 (1989), and to bring to the Commission's attention his contention that it had not addressed the notice issue, which he had raised in his initial petition. Goodman filed no such motion, however, and such omissions have been held to be fatal to those seeking judicial review of agency action in comparable situations. See, e.g., Garment Workers v. Quality Mfg. Co., 420 U.S. 276, 281 n. 3, 95 S.Ct. 972, 975 n. 3, 43 L.Ed.2d 189 (1975); Glaziers' Local No. 558 v. N.L.R.B., 132 U.S.App.D.C. 394, 399-400, 408 F.2d 197, 202-03 (1969). [23] The Supreme Court's decision in Garment Workers is particularly apposite. There, the respondent employer complained that the agency had violated procedural due process by basing its order on a ground not charged or litigated before it. The Court, in an opinion by Justice Brennan, held that the employer's failure to file a motion for reconsideration, as authorized by the agency's Rules, precluded it from asserting its objection to a reviewing court. The Court did not view the alleged ambush of the employer, occasioned by a ruling on grounds not presented to the agency, as constituting extraordinary circumstances warranting a departure from the general rule barring presentation to the court of contentions not made before the agency. Garment Workers, supra, 420 U.S. at 281 n. 3, 95 S.Ct. at 975 n. 3. In Garment Workers, the employer could not have made its argument to the agency before that body had issued its decision, because the basis for the argument  that the agency ruled on grounds which the employer had not had the opportunity to address  had not yet come into existence. It was thus the failure to move for reconsideration, standing alone, that precluded the employer from obtaining judicial review of its due process contention. Unlike the employer in Garment Workers, Goodman did have a previous opportunity to address the notice issue before the Commission. He failed either to do so or to petition for reconsideration. The logic of Garment Workers therefore applies, a fortiori, to the present case. We recognize that Goodman is not an attorney, and that the niceties of agency procedure may not be easy to master for persons not trained in the law [24] (or even for those who are). As a result of Goodman's failure to present to the Commission his contentions as to the alleged lack of notice, however, we are simply left without a record adequate to enable us to address the question responsibly. Never having been asked to rule on the point, the Commission did not do so. We do not discern here the kind of manifest injustice which would warrant either reversal of the agency's decision or a remand for further proceedings, where the request for such relief is predicated on a theory which the Commission has never had any occasion to address.