Opinion ID: 1187649
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: 1a 2. The school board's failure to enter the Cloud memoranda in plaintiff's personnel file prior to reassigning plaintiff to a teaching position violated plaintiff's rights under section 44031 to review and comment upon derogatory materials which might serve as a basis for affecting plaintiff's employment status. We remand the case to the trial court for a determination as to whether any such violation prejudiced plaintiff.

Text: The record reveals that in recommending plaintiff's reassignment to a teaching position, Associate Superintendent Cloud prepared some 20 confidential memoranda for the school board's use. According to the declaration of Dr. Cloud's secretary, On or about December 23, 1975 Dr. Cloud dictated, from his personal notes and calendar, a summary of various meetings, contacts, occurrences, and events [which took place between March 7 and December 3, 1975,] involving Mr. Hal R. Miller, Jr. [¶] Immediately thereafter, I transcribed said summary on separate sheets of paper, with each sheet bearing the date on which the meeting, contact, occurrence or event took place; said sheets were numbered as Attachments 11 through 30. I then compiled said Attachments 11 through 30 into `EXHIBIT A' together with Attachments 1 through 10. Attachments 1 through 10 comprised the documents already contained in plaintiff's personnel file; Dr. Cloud submitted these documents and his freshly transcribed memoranda to Superintendent Jeffries in support of the recommendation that plaintiff be reassigned. As the school board admits, the Cloud memoranda  attachments 11 through 30 of exhibit A  have never been entered in plaintiff's personnel file. Substantial evidence supports the trial court's finding that the documents constituting attachments 11 through 30 contain information directly or implicitly derogatory of plaintiff. A memorandum dated November 6, 1975, for example, criticizes plaintiff's procedure for recommending substitute teachers; another expressed Dr. Cloud's amazement at plaintiff's feeling that socio-economic status had very little, if anything, to do with scores attained on standardized tests. The remaining memoranda reflect similar reservations about plaintiff's performance or repeat criticisms of plaintiff allegedly voiced by third parties. Plaintiff contends that prior to February 27, 1976, when the board notified him of his reassignment, he was unaware of the contents, existence, or substance of these memoranda; because the board failed to allow him to comment upon these memoranda before deciding to reassign him, the board violated his rights under section 44031. Plaintiff asserts that if he had been afforded the opportunity to comment upon this material at the time it was compiled, Dr. Cloud would not have been able to provide any reasons supporting [plaintiff's] reassignment, because the derogatory information contained in [the memoranda] could have been easily contradicted and/or explained. [9] Section 44031 provides: Materials in personnel files of employees which may serve as a basis for affecting the status of their employment are to be made available for the inspection of the person involved.... [¶] Every employee shall have the right to inspect such materials upon request, provided that the request is made at a time when such person is not actually required to render services to the employing district. [¶] Information of a derogatory nature ... shall not be entered or filed unless and until the employee is given notice and an opportunity to review and comment thereon. An employee shall have the right to enter, and have attached to any such derogatory statement, his own comments thereon. Such review shall take place during normal business hours, and the employee shall be released from duty for this purpose without salary reduction. [10] The school board unpersuasively asserts that section 44031 does not apply to the present case on the ground that none of the Cloud memoranda were ever entered or filed in plaintiff's personnel file. A school district, however, may not avoid the requirements of the statute by maintaining a personnel file for certain documents relating to an employee, segregating elsewhere under a different label materials which may serve as a basis for affecting the status of the employee's employment. Nor, as the present trial court pointed out, may the school district insulate itself by simply neglecting to file material which the statute contemplates will be brought to the employee's notice. (2) The Legislature enacted section 44031 in order to minimize the risk of employment decisions that were arbitrary or prejudicial, and to this end established a procedure whereby employees could correct or rebut incomplete or inaccurate information in the hands of their employers which might affect their employment status. The significance which the Legislature attached to adherence to the procedure is reflected in the provision allowing employees to review their files during normal business hours without reduction in salary. A school employee's personnel file serves as a permanent record of his employment; derogatory information placed in that record may be used against the employee long after the informant becomes unavailable. Thus the statute provides the employee with the concurrent right to place on the record material in rebuttal. Unless the school district notifies the employee of such derogatory material within a reasonable time of ascertaining the material, so that the employee may gather pertinent information in his defense, the district may not fairly rely on the material in reaching any decision affecting the employee's employment status. [11] (1b) Defendants have violated plaintiff's rights under section 44031 in precisely the described fashion. After becoming aware of some deficiencies in plaintiff's performance, Associate Superintendent Cloud began a program of frequent consultation with plaintiff directed toward a recommendation concerning plaintiff's continued employment for the 1976-1977 school year. Dr. Cloud kept notes incidental to his program of supervision and eventually transcribed these notes for presentation as formal support for his final recommendation of reassignment. As the trial court found, The District had ample time to place each of the Attachments 11 through 30 in [plaintiff's] personnel file sufficiently in advance of his notice of reassignment to afford [plaintiff] a reasonable opportunity to review and comment thereon prior to his notice of reassignment. Nevertheless, the board received Dr. Cloud's confidential memoranda without first allowing plaintiff the opportunity to correct any inaccurate derogatory information contained therein. [12] Having concluded that the school board violated plaintiff's rights under section 44031, we must determine whether that violation warrants plaintiff's reinstatement to his post as principal. We have decided, because the present record is unclear, to remand the case to the trial court for a determination as to whether the board's action was prejudicial. Declarations by individual members of the school board suggest that the board may have relied on the Cloud memoranda in reaching the decision to reassign plaintiff. As one member declared, the materials in Exhibit `A,' and the Superintendent's recommendation convinced me that the action of replacing [plaintiff] as principal was and is in the best interest of the Bidwell service area. At the same time, however, the members declare that the Cloud memoranda were not necessary to their decision, and that other adequate factors influenced the decision to demote plaintiff. Thus the same member of the board explained, On April 27, 1976, Mr. Miller and Mr. Harry Marsh, his attorney, appeared before the Board. The offer of proof by Mr. Marsh in behalf of Mr. Miller did not carry sufficient evidence to indicate that a modification to any decision should be forthcoming. Mr. Marsh expressed concern about items 11 through 30.... My decision would have been the same had those particular attachments not been presented. (Italics added.) Referring to this and other similar declarations the trial court below found, with all due respect to the members of the School Board  these are self-serving statements after the fact, and do not meet the question as to whether [items 11 through 30 in exhibit A] were, in fact, considered before the decision to [reassign]. As we have explained heretofore in other contexts, however, the correct inquiry focuses not merely on whether the school board considered the Cloud memoranda in deciding to reassign plaintiff, but on whether but for the memoranda the board would not have reassigned him. (See Bekiaris v. Board of Education (1972) 6 Cal.3d 575, 592-594 [100 Cal. Rptr. 16, 493 P.2d 480]; Bonham v. McConnell (1955) 45 Cal.2d 304 [288 P.2d 502]; see also Mt. Healthy City Board of Ed. v. Doyle (1977) 429 U.S. 274, 283-287 [50 L.Ed.2d 471, 481-484, 97 S.Ct. 568]; Byrd v. Savage (1963) 219 Cal. App.2d 396 [32 Cal. Rptr. 881].) (3) (See fn. 13.) Inasmuch as we cannot determine on the present record whether the board would have reached the same decision as to plaintiff's demotion even in the absence of the Cloud memoranda, we reverse the present judgment and remand the case for further proceedings. [13] On remand, the trial court should determine whether absent the Cloud memoranda, the board would have reassigned plaintiff. If the court determines that the board would have reassigned plaintiff in any case, it should deny plaintiff's petition for reinstatement. If the court determines that the Cloud memoranda played a crucial role in the board's decision to reassign plaintiff, it should issue a writ of mandate requiring the board to reinstate plaintiff as principal, without prejudice to any future reassignment based on proper considerations. Finally, if the court cannot determine whether or not the Cloud memoranda played a crucial role in the board's decision of reassignment, the court should order the board to reconsider its decision of reassignment without reference to the Cloud memoranda. [14]