Opinion ID: 2630864
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Declaratory judgment action as an independent lawsuit

Text: ¶ 47 Smith next claims that his September 26 complaint should stand on its own as a self-sufficient lawsuit raising constitutional challenges to the Citizens Clean Elections Act that are independent of his challenges to the Commission's rulings against him. These claims, he asserts, are not subject to the fourteen-day time limit imposed by A.R.S. § 16-957(B). ¶ 48 To the contrary, a party may not use a complaint for declaratory relief as a substitute for a timely complaint for judicial review of an administrative order. Smith was required to raise all of his challenges to the Commission's actions and his related constitutional claims in a timely complaint for judicial review under the JRADA. See Hurst v. Bisbee Unified Sch. Dist. No. Two, 125 Ariz. 72, 75, 607 P.2d 391, 394 (App.1979) (stating that constitutional challenges to an administrative act must be raised through appeal of the final agency decision); see also Thielking v. Kirschner, 176 Ariz. 154, 156, 859 P.2d 777, 779 (App.1993) (noting that [a] party ... cannot substitute a declaratory relief action for a timely appeal of an administrative decision). ¶ 49 The reasons for requiring challenges to administrative actions to be raised in appeals from agency decisions rather than in separate declaratory judgment actions parallel those for requiring notices of appeals to be timely filed following an agency's final decision: cases should proceed in only one forum at a time, and administrative decisions should become final on an identifiable date. If independent collateral challenges to the constitutionality of the underlying statutes were allowed, agency decisions would not be final until the time for filing declaratory judgment actions has run. Id. The appropriate method for raising such claims is a timely complaint for judicial relief filed pursuant to the JRADA. ¶ 50 Smith's untimely complaint therefore does not survive as an independent lawsuit on the merits of this claim or any other of his substantive claims.