Opinion ID: 166622
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Breach of Implied Contract

Text: 45 Mr. Jones also appeals the district court's decision granting summary judgment for the defendants on his claim for breach of implied contract. Colorado law presumes that an employee hired for an indefinite period is an `at will employee,' whose employment may be terminated by either party without cause and without notice. Continental Air Lines, Inc. v. Keenan, 731 P.2d 708, 711 (Colo.1987). Nonetheless, [w]hen a school board limits its power to discharge personnel by promulgating and issuing a handbook, an employee may rely on the provisions in the handbook to state a claim for relief for breach of implied contract. Smith v. Bd. of Educ. of Sch. Dist. Fremont RE-1, 83 P.3d 1157, 1163 (Colo.Ct.App.2003). In Smith, the Colorado Court of Appeals held that an employee handbook that provided detailed examples of Just and Proper Cause for disciplining an employee could reasonably be read to require that termination be only for just cause. Id. at 1164. On the other hand, in George v. Ute Water Conservancy Dist., 950 P.2d 1195, 1198-1200 (Colo.Ct.App.1997), the same court emphasized that summary judgment is appropriate if the employer has clearly and conspicuously disclaimed intent to enter into a contract limiting the right to discharge employees, and found handbook language promoting fair and equitable standards for all employees insufficient to alter employees' at-will status. Although Colorado courts do not consider a disclaimer clear and conspicuous if it is inconspicuously placed in an appendix to the handbook, see Ferrera v. Nielsen, 799 P.2d 458, 461 (Colo.Ct.App.1990) (construing Cronk v. Intermountain Rural Elec. Ass'n, 765 P.2d 619 (Colo.Ct.App.1988)), they have found disclaimers clear and conspicuous when they appear on the first page of the handbook, see id., or in close proximity to the provision setting forth ... required procedure on termination, George, 950 P.2d at 1199. 46 The gist of Mr. Jones's claim is that Policy GDQD-R, which entitles employees to two pre-termination hearings strictly confined to whether there is any competent evidence to support the dismissal recommendation, R. Vol. I, p. 157, operated as an implied contract that prohibited the District from dismissing him without just cause. He contends that by reneging on its promise to work around his lack of a driver's license, faulting him for absences despite the fact that he still had sick days available, and enforcing the break policy against him but not against other employees, the District acted without just cause and thus breached the contract. 47 We conclude that under Colorado law, Policy GDQD-R did not create an implied contract whereby the District would not terminate Mr. Jones except for just cause. Mr. Jones's original employment agreement contains a clear and conspicuous disclaimer making him an at-will employee, and Policy GDQD-R itself states, in its opening paragraph and on the same page as the language describing the pre-termination hearings, that [t]he procedures do not change the at-will status of classified employees. R. Vol. I, p. 156. Unlike the language in Smith, Policy GDQD-R does not require just cause for termination, but instead creates an essentially procedural guarantee of pre-termination hearings. Although Mr. Jones boldly states that requiring competent evidence in support of dismissal is the same as requiring just cause, the policy in fact imposes no limits on the reasons, just or unjust, for which the District may dismiss an employee. 48 Further, even if the policy created an implied contract, Mr. Jones cannot survive summary judgment because no reasonable jury could find that the District breached the terms of that contract. The District fully complied with the procedures laid out in Policy GDQD-R, and both the director of Human Resources and an impartial hearing officer affirmed the District's decision. The record unquestionably contains at least some competent evidence to support each of the reasons cited by the District: the depositions of Mr. Jones's supervisors and co-workers confirm his excessive absences, the written reprimand documents his violations of the break policy, his own testimony concedes his lack of a driver's license, and documents from the fall of 2001 support a decline in the department's workload. Any of those reasons appears sufficient, under the terms of Policy GDQD-R, to support the dismissal. 49 Mr. Jones vigorously contests each of the District's reasons, but it is not the role of this Court to decide whether the District acted for sound reasons, or even whether it acted for its stated reasons. We limit our review to whether the District breached an implied contract that, at most, obligated the District to dismiss him only when any competent evidence supported the decision. No reasonable finder of fact could conclude that there is no competent evidence, on any ground, to support Mr. Jones's dismissal. We therefore affirm the district court's grant of summary judgment for the defendants on the breach of implied contract claim.