Opinion ID: 532511
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Adequacy of CARB's Findings

Text: 23 Reeve argues that CARB's regulations are defective because they allow CARB to suspend a carrier without requiring that findings be made or published. We agree. CARB gave no reason why the presentation of the president of Reeve was unsatisfactory, nor did it explain why suspension was justified even though the FAA continued to allow Reeve to operate. CARB did not state what standards were violated, how the suspension determination was made, or what factors were relevant in that determination. The Lacey Affidavit, J.A. at 139, which detailed at least three standards that CARB may have used, is a prohibited post-hoc rationalization; the standards appear nowhere in the administrative record and do not represent an articulated basis for the agency's decision. See Motor Vehicle Mfrs. Ass'n v. State Farm Mut. Automobile Insurance Co., 463 U.S. 29, 50, 103 S.Ct. 2856, 2870, 77 L.Ed.2d 443 (1983); Western Union Corp. v. FCC, 856 F.2d 315, 318 (D.C.Cir.1988); City of Brookings Mun. Tel. Co. v. FCC, 822 F.2d 1153, 1165 (D.C.Cir.1987); National Coalition Against the Misuse of Pesticides v. EPA, 809 F.2d 875, 882-83 (D.C.Cir.1987). DOD's response with regard to the original decision is conclusory at best. DOD argues that the basis for its denial of Reeve's appeal was the continued existence of the problems indicated in the NASIP report; too many uncorrected problems remained. DOD points out that Reeve has never seriously questioned the violations noted in the report. DOD also claims that the comments of the DOD Air Carrier Service and Analysis Office, which were appended to the denial of the administrative appeal, provide some specific rationales for Reeve's suspension. Reeve replies that the comments attached to the denial of the appeal are post-hoc rationalizations that in any event are not authoritative statements that have decisional authority. 24 Reeve is surely correct when it argues that all items in the NASIP report are not of equal value or detriment. The report contained a wide array of FAA concerns--operational, clerical, and historical--none of which merited FAA action at the time of CARB's action, and CARB failed to identify which of the myriad details led it to its conclusion. CARB should have articulable, specific reasons for its suspension of Reeve, reasons that it can memorialize in a written finding. The letters from CARB to Reeve both after the original decision and on administrative appeal not only fail to be tolerably terse; they are so intolerably mute as to be inscrutable. See Greater Boston Television Corp. v. FCC, 444 F.2d 841, 852 (D.C.Cir.), cert. denied, 403 U.S. 923, 91 S.Ct. 2233, 29 L.Ed.2d 701 (1971). Like the Lacey Affidavit, the staff commentary appended to the denial of the administrative appeal is a post-hoc rationalization that cannot suffice for articulable findings.