Opinion ID: 1672315
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Meaning of Civil Service Board

Text: Reduced to its essence, the present case requires this Court to decide whether proceedings before the City's OJI Panel fall within the scope of section 27-9-114(a)(1). Specifically, we must determine whether the OJI Panel qualifies as a civil service board. At the outset of performing this task, we note that section 27-9-114 does not define what is meant by the phrase civil service board. We further note that the legislative history surrounding the statute sheds no light on the subject. The City argues that its OJI Panel is not a civil service board under section 27-9-114 and, therefore, its proceedings are not subject to the contested case procedures of the UAPA. Accordingly, the City contends that judicial review of the OJI Panel's decisions is pursuant to the common law writ of certiorari. The City reasons that the legislature's decision to amend section 27-9-114 by removing the broad language city or county official or board and substituting the specific language civil service boards of a county or municipality, reflects an intent to exclude entities like the OJI Panel from the statute's reach. Thus, proceedings before the OJI Panel are not subject to the UAPA. We disagree. Prior to the 1988 amendment to section 27-9-114, the courts regularly applied the statute to a wide variety of municipal entities, including civil service boards, see Gaston v. Civil Serv. Merit Bd. of Shelby County, 1986 WL 9964 (Tenn.Ct.App. Sept.15, 1986), city councils, see Huddleston, 635 S.W.2d at 694, pension boards, see Love v. Ret. Sys. of the City of Memphis, 1987 WL 17246 (Tenn.Ct.App. Sept.21, 1987), boards of education, see Cunningham v. Bd. of Educ. for Grundy County, 1986 WL 10692 (Tenn.Ct.App. Oct.1, 1986), and boards of health, see Goodwin v. Metro. Bd. of Health, 656 S.W.2d 383 (Tenn.Ct.App.1983). [6] After the 1988 amendment, the courts continued to apply section 27-9-114 to the decisions of municipal entities that, while not called civil service boards, effectively sat as civil service boards by making decisions that affected a worker's employment status. See, e.g., Yates v. City of Chattanooga, No. E2000-02604-COA-R3-CV, 2001 WL 533351 (Tenn.Ct.App. May 21, 2001) (applying the amended statute to a city council); Bullard v. City of Chattanooga Firemen's & Policemen Ins. & Pension Fund, No. 03A01-9705-CH-00193, 1998 WL 90834 (Tenn.Ct.App. Mar.3, 1998) (applying the amended statute to the denial of pension benefits by a pension fund board); Stephenson v. Town of White Pine, No. 03A01-9705-CH-00185, 1997 WL 718974 (Tenn.Ct.App. Nov. 13, 1997) (applying section 27-9-114 to a mayor and board of alderman); Holder v. City of Chattanooga, 878 S.W.2d 950 (Tenn.Ct.App.1993) (rejecting an argument that a city council did not qualify as a civil service board under section 27-9-114 when it was effectively sitting as a civil service board rather than as a legislative body); Jones v. Personnel Merit Bd. of the City of Dyersburg, 1988 WL 104697 (Tenn.Ct.App. Oct.10, 1988) (applying section 27-9-114 to a personnel merit board's termination of a fireman following a work-related injury). [7] Thus, in short, cases decided before the 1988 amendment to section 27-9-114 held that the statute was the remedy for reviewing administrative decisions affecting the employment status of city and county employees. This was true whether or not the administrative agency was technically labeled a civil service board. Cases decided after the 1988 amendment have continued to hold that the technical designation of a municipal body as a civil service board is not necessary for section 27-9-114 to apply. It is apparent, therefore, that the weight of case law does not support the City's interpretation of the statute. The City also argues that we should look to the definition of a civil service board found in Tennessee Code Annotated section 6-54-114(b) (2005) to determine the scope of section 27-9-114. The problem with the City's reliance upon section 6-54-114(b) is that the statute does not provide a definition of a civil service board, but merely sets forth the qualifications and procedures for the appointment of civil service board members in the state's most populous counties. [8] Section 6-54-114 does not speak to the authority, obligations, or purposes of a civil service board. In other words, section 6-54-114 does little to help resolve this case. There is another statute, however, Tennessee Code Annotated section 8-8-409 (2002), which is helpful. Section 8-8-409 states that a civil service board shall . . . [h]ear and determine appeals and complaints respecting the administration of this part ... and [d]etermine all fringe benefits to employees coming under the provisions of this part. Although section 8-8-409 applies only to sheriff department employees, it provides insight into what the legislature considered the appropriate functions of a civil service board to be, i.e., hear administrative appeals and determine benefits to which an employee may be entitled. The definition of a civil service board gleaned from section 8-8-409 is consistent with the application of section 27-9-114 by the courts before and after the 1988 amendment to section 27-9-114. Additionally, it is significant that the current version of section 27-9-114 exempts certain entities from the scope of the statute. Specifically, section 27-9-114(a)(2) states that [t]he provisions of this subsection pertaining to hearings by civil service boards shall not apply to municipal utilities boards or civil service boards of counties organized under a home rule charter form of government. This language indicates that the legislature intended for all administrative bodies functioning in an adjudicative capacity not specifically exempted to be included within the statute's reach. See Myint v. Allstate Ins. Co., 970 S.W.2d 920, 925 (Tenn.1998) (statutes containing coverage exemptions may be read to include entities not specifically exempted). This is not to say that section 27-9-114 applies to every proceeding before every municipal entity having decision-making power. Rather, section 27-9-114 applies when the entity in question is sitting in an adjudicative capacity functioning as a civil service board by making decisions that affect a worker's employment status. Accordingly, we decline to limit the definition of a civil service board as used in section 27-9-114 only to those municipal entities that are technically designated as such. To do so would elevate form over substance. See Johnson v. Johnson, 37 S.W.3d 892, 896 (Tenn. 2001). Finally, we note that in addition to harmonizing the language of 27-9-114 with other references in the code to civil service boards, as well as giving meaning to the statute's coverage exemptions, our interpretation of section 27-9-114 should bring some measure of uniformity to the process by which municipalities resolve claims for work-related injuries. The employees and the amicus argue that uniformity is needed so that similarly situated claimants are not subject to widely divergent results. They also argue that the protections afforded by the administrative process adopted by the City are inadequate because affected employees are not given a meaningful opportunity to present their claims. They further argue that the City's process deprives them of the presumption of causation found in Tennessee Code Annotated section 7-51-201. The City responds that the common law writ of certiorari prevents it from handling claims in the arbitrary manner feared by the employees. In our view, it unnecessary for this Court to pass upon the adequacy of the City's policies and procedures for handling work-related injury claims at this time. However, we do agree that some measure of uniformity, achieved by applying the UAPA, is a desirable goal. The legislature promulgated the UAPA for this very purpose  to clarify and bring uniformity to the procedures of administrative agencies and judicial review of their decisions. See Tenn.Code Ann. § 4-5-103(a) (2005). Applying the foregoing to this case, we conclude that the City's OJI Panel was acting as the functional equivalent of a civil service board by holding hearings, analyzing evidence, and determining appeals from administrative decisions to grant or deny benefits to injured employees. The OJI Panel was acting in the role contemplated by section 8-8-409, i.e., a civil service board shall . . . [h]ear and determine appeals and complaints respecting the administration of this part ... and [d]etermine all fringe benefits to employees. . . . Thus, we agree with the trial court's finding that the City's OJI Panel fits within the civil service board language of section 27-9-114.