Opinion ID: 2224640
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Evidence of Misconduct.

Text: The employer, Hormel, contends these claimants are precluded from recovery of unemployment compensation because they were guilty of misconduct. See Iowa Code § 96.5(2). Misconduct, in this context, is defined as a deliberate act or omission by a worker which constitutes a material breach of the duties and obligations arising out of such worker's contract of employment. Misconduct as the term is used in the disqualification provision as being limited to conduct evincing such willful or wanton disregard of an employer's interest as is found in deliberate violation or disregard of standards of behavior which the employer has the right to expect of employees, or in carelessness or negligence of such degree of recurrence as to manifest equal culpability, wrongful intent or evil design, or to show an intentional and substantial disregard of the employer's interests or of the employee's duties and obligations to the employer. On the other hand mere inefficiency, unsatisfactory conduct, failure in good performance as the result of inability or incapacity, inadvertencies or ordinary negligence in isolated instances, or good faith errors in judgment or discretion are not to be deemed misconduct within the meaning of the statute. 370 Iowa Admin.Code 4.32(1)(a) (now found at 345 Iowa Admin.Code 4.32(1)(a)) (emphasis added). Section 6.2 of the collective bargaining agreement provides that the employees may not be disciplined for participation in an authorized strike. These claimants argue that the use of the word authorized must be interpreted to mean that, if they had a good-faith belief that the strike was authorized, they could not be deemed guilty of misconduct based on the errors in judgment language in the quoted rule. They argue that employees who honored the picket line did so in the honest and well-grounded belief that they could do so under the collective bargaining agreement. The appeal board considered the misconduct issue at length, and ruled that the claimants were guilty of misconduct on three separate grounds: (1) excessive absenteeism; (2) unauthorized strike participation; and (3) failing to use the dispute resolution procedures provided by their collective bargaining agreement. In finding misconduct on the second ground, unauthorized strike participation, the board specifically considered and rejected the good-faith belief argument now urged. The question now is whether substantial evidence supports that finding. In Heatherly v. Iowa Department of Job Service, 397 N.W.2d 670, 670 (1987), we discussed the scope of review in these cases: In several recent judicial review decisions we have emphasized that the district court and our appellate courts are not permitted to and should not review de novo the record made before the agency. Hussein v. Tama Meat Packing Corporation, 394 N.W.2d 340, 341 (Iowa 1986); Hurtado v. Iowa Department of Job Service, 393 N.W.2d 309, 311 (Iowa 1986); Harlan v. Iowa Department of Job Service, 350 N.W.2d 192, 193 (Iowa 1984); Higgins v. Iowa Department of Job Service, 350 N.W.2d 187, 190 (Iowa 1984). The final agency decision in a contested case (Iowa Code § 17A.2) should be affirmed by the district court and our appellate courts when there is no error of law and the decision is supported by substantial evidence in the record as a whole. See Iowa Code § 17A.19(8)(f) (1985). Substantial evidence is that which a reasonable mind would accept as adequate to reach a given conclusion, even if a review[ing] court would have drawn a contrary inference from the evidence. Messina v. Iowa Dep't of Job Serv., 341 N.W.2d 52, 59 (1983); Iowa Health Sys. Agency, Inc. v. Wade, 327 N.W.2d 732, 733-34 (Iowa 1982). Evidence is substantial when a reasonable mind could accept it as adequate to reach the same findings. Norland v. Iowa Dep't of Job Serv., 412 N.W.2d 904, 913 (Iowa 1987). The fact that an agency could have drawn two inconsistent conclusions from the evidence presented does not mean that the conclusion it chose is unsupported by substantial evidence. Anthon-Oto Community School Dist. v. PERB, 404 N.W.2d 140, 142 (Iowa 1987). We hold that the board's finding of misconduct by the claimants, based on their refusal to work in the face of overwhelming evidence that the strike was unauthorized was supported by substantial evidence. In view of our holding on this ground, we do not address the additional two bases of misconduct found by the board, i.e., excessive absenteeism and failure to resolve the dispute according to the collective bargaining agreement.