Opinion ID: 2608708
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: proper service

Text: RCW 51.52.110 provides the superior court with appellate jurisdiction over Board decisions: [A] worker, beneficiary, employer or other person aggrieved by the decision and order of the board may appeal to the superior court. ... Such appeal shall be perfected by filing with the clerk of the court a notice of appeal and by serving a copy thereof by mail, or personally, on the director and on the board. Except as provided in RCW 51.52.110, all jurisdiction of the courts of the state over [workers' injuries is] abolished by the industrial insurance act. RCW 51.04.010. In the past, we have required strict compliance with the elements of RCW 51.52.110 to provide the superior court with appellate jurisdiction. Lidke v. Brandt, 21 Wn.2d 137, 150 P.2d 399 (1944) (personal service on Spokane office assistant supervisor was jurisdictionally faulty); Rybarczyk v. Department of Labor & Indus., 24 Wn. App. 591, 602 P.2d 724 (1979) (service by mail on Board Chairman, not Director of Department, was jurisdictionally faulty). We have refused to allow the superior court to exercise its special limited jurisdiction unless the steps prescribed by the statute have been followed. Mac Veigh v. Division of Unemployment Compensation, 19 Wn.2d 383, 385, 142 P.2d 900 (1943) (failure to file notice of appeal with superior court clerk proved jurisdictionally fatal); Smith v. Department of Labor & Indus., 23 Wn. App. 516, 596 P.2d 296 (1979) (personal service mail on Attorney General's office, not Director of Department, was jurisdictionally faulty). Wilson, relying on the cases cited above, claims that the prescribed steps have not been followed because, according to his interpretation of the affidavits attached to his motion for reconsideration, service by mail was not made on the director. Each of the cases relied on by Wilson involved methods of service which were not likely to provide actual notice to the Director of the Department and in which there was no evidence that the Director had actually received notice of the intent to appeal. Lidke was a case of personal service on an individual in the Department's Spokane office, with no evidence that the notice had been forwarded to the Director. Rybarczyk concerned a notice mailed to the wrong individual in the Department  routing by name or title would have placed the notice in the Board's office. Mac-Veigh concerned only the failure to file a notice of appeal with the superior court; there is no indication that notice was not properly served. Smith involved an appeal in which notice was not filed on anyone in the Department, but instead on the independent Attorney General's office. [2, 3] We do not know in this case how the notice of appeal directed To: ... Director, Department of Labor & Industries was actually served by mail; we do not know if the Director received notice. But we can state that, even if an appellant must strictly comply with the statute, service by mail ... on the director must be considered accomplished if there is evidence that the Director actually received notice of appeal. The requirement of service by mail ... on the director does not mean that the envelope containing the notice of appeal must be addressed to the Director. Service on the director could have been achieved in this case by mailing notice to the Department if, through routing within the Department, the Director actually received notice of appeal. Even if we did not consider the cases of Lidke, Rybarczyk, Mac Veigh, and Smith distinguishable because of the clear evidence regarding actual notice to the Director, we would warn against slavish adherence to the precedent they represent. The requirement of notice contained in RCW 51.52.110 is a practical one meant to insure that interested parties receive actual notice of appeals of Board decisions. As noted by the Court of Appeals in In re Saltis, supra at 219, the test for legal sufficiency ... is ... whether the notice was reasonably calculated to reach the intended parties. Mullane v. Central Hanover Bank & Trust Co., 339 U.S. 306, 94 L.Ed. 865, 70 S.Ct. 652 (1949); Thayer v. Edmonds, 8 Wn. App. 36, 42, 503 P.2d 1110 (1972). In cases considering the court's general jurisdiction, we have stated that substantial compliance with procedural rules is sufficient, because delay and even the loss of lawsuits [should not be] occasioned by unnecessarily complex and vagrant procedural technicalities: [T]he basic purpose of the new rules of civil procedure is to eliminate or at least to minimize technical miscarriages of justice inherent in archaic procedural concepts once characterized by Vanderbilt as the sporting theory of justice. Curtis Lumber Co. v. Sortor, 83 Wn.2d 764, 767, 522 P.2d 822 (1974). See also First Fed. Sav. & Loan Ass'n v. Ekanger, 93 Wn.2d 777, 613 P.2d 129 (1980); Malott v. Randall, 83 Wn.2d 259, 517 P.2d 605 (1974); Thayer v. Edmonds, supra . It is true that in these cases service did not perfect subject matter jurisdiction, as it does under RCW 51.52.110. But, as in the case with general procedural rules, the means of establishing superior court jurisdiction under RCW 51.52.110 are aimed primarily at insuring adequate procedural safeguards of timeliness, notice, and appropriate forum. To this extent, the legislature was not unwilling to allow judicial review of a subject otherwise removed from court jurisdiction if appeal is promptly requested and affected parties are made aware of the challenge. Our acceptance of the sufficiency of substantial compliance with procedural rules has as much application to this special jurisdictional notice requirement as it has to the more general provisions of the rules of civil procedure. Direction of the notice of appeal to the Department in a manner reasonably calculated to give the Director actual notice of the pending appeal is sufficient to perfect subject matter jurisdiction under RCW 51.52.110. Thus, we hold that proper service in this case occurred if: (1) the Director received actual notice of appeal to the Superior Court or (2) the notice of appeal was served in a manner reasonably calculated to give notice to the Director. As set forth in the next section, this case must be remanded to the trial court for a factual finding that will determine whether either of these standards was met.