Opinion ID: 2831474
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Equal Protection and Due Course of Law

Text: In addition to asserting ultra vires claims as a basis for subject-matter jurisdiction, the Petitioners further contend that sovereign immunity does not bar relief on their claims under the Texas Constitution. See, e.g., Tex. Dep’t of Transp. v. Sefzik, 355 S.W.3d 618, 621 (Tex. 2011) (suits to require state officials to comply with constitutional provisions are not prohibited by sovereign immunity); see also TEX . CONST . ART . I §§ 3 (equal-protection clause), 19 (due-course-oflaw clause). While it is true that sovereign immunity does not bar a suit to vindicate constitutional 7 Although the Legislature has waived a local governmental entity’s sovereign immunity to suit for contracts for goods or services, the waiver does not apply here because the meet-and-confer agreement is not a contract for goods or services. See Zachry Constr. Corp. v. Port of Houston Auth. of Harris Cnty, 449 S.W .3d 98, 106 (Tex. 2014). 18 rights, Heinrich, 284 S.W.3d at 372, immunity from suit is not waived if the constitutional claims are facially invalid, see Andrade v. NAACP of Austin, 345 S.W.3d 1, 11 (Tex. 2011).
The Petitioners allege the pension board treated them differently than former city employees who now work for separate legal entities due to municipal outsourcing. For example, the Petitioners argue the City employees working at the Houston Zoo became employees of Houston Zoo, Inc., and that the pension fund determined a separation of service occurred as a result. According to the Petitioners, the zoo employees were declassified as “employees” and pension-system “members” and some were thereafter permitted to collect their pension benefits while remaining employed in essentially the same jobs. The Petitioners contend they are similarly situated to the zoo employees but are being treated differently. They further assert—as they must to state a valid equal-protection claim—that the pension board’s disparate determination that CCSI employees remain members of the pension system is not rationally related to any legitimate governmental objective. The Texas Constitution provides that all people “have equal rights, and no man, or set of men, is entitled to exclusive separate public emoluments, or privileges.” TEX . CONST . ART . 1 § 3. The Petitioners contend the pension board’s determination that they remain members of HMEPS violated their right to equal protection of the law. To state a viable equal-protection claim under the Texas Constitution, the Petitioners must show they have been “treated differently from others similarly situated.” Tex. Dep’t of Transp. v. City of Sunset Valley, 146 S.W.3d 637, 647 (Tex. 2004). Because neither a suspect classification nor a fundamental right is involved, the Petitioners must further demonstrate that the challenged decision is not rationally related to a legitimate governmental 19 purpose. First Am. Title Ins. Co. v. Combs, 258 S.W.3d 627, 639 (Tex. 2008). In conducting a rational-basis review, we consider whether the challenged action has a rational basis and whether use of the challenged classification would reasonably promote that purpose. Id. These determinations are “not subject to courtroom fact-finding and may be based on rational speculation unsupported by evidence or empirical data.” FCC v. Beach Commc’ns, Inc., 508 U.S. 307, 315 (1993).8 Even assuming the pension board has in fact treated similarly situated employees differently, we hold the Petitioners failed to plead a viable equal-protection claim because the board’s actions are rationally related to at least two legitimate government objectives which are promoted by the challenged classification. First, the pension board has a legitimate interest in preserving sources of pension funding that are adequate to meet the demands on the fund, which it may rationally accomplish by ensuring the City meets its contribution obligations to the pension system. See 405 S.W.3d at 225 (citing U.S. R.R. Ret. Bd. v. Fritz, 449 U.S. 166, 174 (1980), which recognizes preservation of pension funds as a legitimate basis for distinguishing among pensioners). Continued depletion of the workforce through nominal privatization of municipal services would undoubtedly restrict or significantly impair the pension system’s funding sources. The preservation of funding sources is a legitimate and rational basis for concluding that, under the circumstances presented here, convention department workers performing municipal functions as CCSI employees remain 8 Federal equal-protection cases are instructive with regard to equal-protection challenges under the Texas Constitution. See First Am. Title Ins. Co. v. Combs, 258 S.W .3d 627, 638 (Tex. 2008). 20 members of the pension system.9 Given the long-term ramifications of concerted efforts to reduce the City’s contributions to the pension fund, any previous failure of the pension board to perceive or acknowledge a threat to pension-funding sources does not change the analysis of this issue. Cf. McDonald v. Bd. of Election Comm’rs of Chicago, 394 U.S. 802, 808 (1969) (“[A] legislature traditionally has been allowed to take reform ‘one step at a time, addressing itself to the phase of the problem which seems most acute to the legislative mind[]’; and a legislature need not run the risk of losing an entire remedial scheme simply because it failed, through inadvertence or otherwise, to cover every evil that might conceivably have been attacked.” (internal citation omitted)). The pension board also has a legitimate interest in policies that lessen the risk of overpaying pensioners or allowing them to “double dip.” See, e.g, Connolly v. McCall, 254 F.3d 36, 43 (2d Cir.