Opinion ID: 1867076
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Heading: Our Cases.

Text: We have discussed discretionary-function immunity in several recent cases, which track the development of our law from our adoption in Stanley v. State, 197 N.W.2d 599, 602-04 (Iowa 1972), of immunity based on the planning/operational analysis of Dalehite v. United States, 346 U.S. 15, 73 S.Ct. 956, 97 L.Ed. 1427 (1953), through more recent cases advocating a test based on Berkovitz v. United States, 486 U.S. 531, 108 S.Ct. 1954, 100 L.Ed.2d 531 (1988). See Goodman v. City of Le Claire, 587 N.W.2d 232, 238-39 (Iowa 1998) (rejecting our prior planning/operational test in favor of the Berkovitz test). The Supreme Court in Berkovitz explained its two-step analysis in assessing discretionary-function immunity under the Federal Tort Claims Act: First, [i]n examining the nature of the challenged conduct, a court must first consider whether the action is a matter of choice for the acting employee. This inquiry is mandated by the language of the exception; conduct cannot be discretionary unless it involves an element of judgment or choice. Berkovitz, 486 U.S. at 536, 108 S.Ct. at 1958-59, 100 L.Ed.2d at 540-41 (citation omitted). Second, a court must determine whether that judgment is of the kind that the discretionary function exception was designed to shield. The basis for the discretionary function exception was Congress' desire to prevent judicial `second-guessing' of legislative and administrative decisions grounded in social, economic, and political policy through the medium of an action in tort. The exception, properly construed, therefore protects only governmental actions and decisions based on considerations of public policy. Id. at 536-37, 108 S.Ct. at 1959, 100 L.Ed.2d at 541 (quoting United States v. Varig Airlines, 467 U.S. 797, 814, 104 S.Ct. 2755, 2764-65, 81 L.Ed.2d 660, 674-75 (1984)). We applied the Berkovitz test in Shelton v. State, 644 N.W.2d 27 (Iowa 2002), a case heavily relied on by the district court, the court of appeals, and the City of Dubuque, because, as a case arising out of a hiking injury in a state park, it is closely analogous on its facts. (We held in Shelton that the state's maintenance of a hiking trail was a discretionary function under the analogous state tort claims act, Iowa Code § 669.14. Shelton, 644 N.W.2d at 31). This plaintiff, however, contends Shelton is distinguishable because the state tort claims act provides a broader discretionary-function immunity than the one involved in this case under the Municipal Tort Claims Act. We reject both the city's reliance on Shelton and the basis for the plaintiff's distinguishing Shelton. The city relies on Shelton because of the similarity in the facts underlying the incident; both cases involved falls from public trails. However, under Goodman and the cases following it, the circumstances underlying the public entity's decision, and not the facts surrounding the injury itself, is the key to immunity. We also reject the plaintiff's argument that Shelton must be distinguished on the basis of different language in the Municipal Tort Claims Act as compared to the state tort claims act considered in Shelton. We reject this argument; for our purposes the statutes are effectively identical.