Opinion ID: 2630266
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Preliminary, Preparatory, Procedural, or Intermediate

Text: ¶ 11 The Commission's order is clearly a preliminary ruling. Indeed the Commission was still in the process of adjudicating the dispute after the order was issued. In Barker v. Utah Public Service Commission, we identified three prior Utah cases evaluating finality and found no final order in the following circumstances: (1) a remand for further proceedings, Sloan v. Board of Review, 781 P.2d 463, 464 (Utah Ct.App.1989); (2) an order converting informal proceedings into formal ones, Merit Elec. & Instrumentation v. Department of Commerce, 902 P.2d 151, 153 (Utah Ct.App.1995); and (3) a denial of a motion to dismiss, Barney v. Division of Occupational & Professional Licensing, 828 P.2d 542, 544 (Utah Ct.App. 1992). 970 P.2d 702, 706 (Utah 1998). ¶ 12 The Barney case is particularly instructive. In Barney, the Division of Occupational and Professional Licensing filed a petition alleging that the petitioner in that case was guilty of unprofessional conduct. 828 P.2d at 543. The petitioner filed with the Division a motion to dismiss for lack of subject matter jurisdiction based on double jeopardy grounds since the petitioner had previously been acquitted of the abuse charges that served as the basis of the unprofessional conduct complaint. Id. His motion was denied. Id. Despite the serious nature of his double jeopardy motion, the court of appeals determined that the denial of his motion to dismiss did not constitute final agency action and was therefore not subject to appellate review. Id. Like the order denying the motion to dismiss in Barney, the Commission's order denying Heber Light's motion to dismiss is only preliminary and is therefore not subject to appellate review. ¶ 13 Because Heber Light has not met its burden of showing that the Commission order constitutes a final appealable agency action, we now consider its request for extraordinary relief.