Opinion ID: 2077983
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: Constitutional Protections and Sovereign Immunity

Text: The statute providing for compensation to be paid to the commission members for their attendance at meetings in 1991 and 1992  coupled with the members' alleged attendance at meetings during this period  also vested them with a protected property interest under the Rhode Island Constitution and entitled them to receive the compensation provided for by statute. [2] Here, the statuteoperated to confer on commission members a legitimate claim of entitlement to receipt of the compensation in question. Thus, once the members attended the meetings in question, the statute endowed plaintiffs with a property interest in the statutory benefit that could not be taken from them for the public's use without due process of law and just compensation. See Barber v. Exeter  West Greenwich School Committee, 418 A.2d 13, 19-20 (R.I.1980); Lynch v. Gontarz, 120 R.I. 149, 156-57, 386 A.2d 184, 188 (1978); see also Board of Regents of State Colleges v. Roth, 408 U.S. 564, 92 S.Ct. 2701, 33 L.Ed.2d 548 (1972); Perry v. Sindermann, 408 U.S. 593, 601, 92 S.Ct. 2694, 2699, 33 L.Ed.2d 570, 580 (1972) ([a] person's interest in a benefit is a `property' interest    if there are such rules or mutually explicit understandings that support his [or her] claim of entitlement to the benefit   ). In sum, we hold that the state laid aside whatever sovereign immunity it otherwise possessed with respect to its obligation to pay these government officials for attending commission meetings when it bound the commission to comply with its statutory responsibility of paying a specific compensation to its members after they had earned the right to receive the compensation provided for by the statute. See V.S. DiCarlo Construction Co. v. State, 485 S.W.2d 52, 54 (Mo.1972). For these reasons, we hold that the state waived its sovereign immunity for compensation claims arising out of commission members attending commission meetings during the February, 1991, through July, 1992, period.