Opinion ID: 419921
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Exhaustion: Rockland County

Text: 23 The Commission, joined by utility intervenors PASNY and Con Ed, argue that Rockland's petition should be dismissed because the county has failed to exhaust available administrative remedies. We agree. This action reaches us on Rockland's petition for review of an administrative order in which the Commission declined to shut down or take alternative enforcement action at Indian Point. Our jurisdiction extends to all final orders of the Commission. 28 U.S.C. Sec. 2342(4) (1976 & Supp. V 1981); 42 U.S.C. Sec. 2239(b) (1976). Section 189 of the Atomic Energy Act states that any person whose interest may be affected  by an order of the Commission is entitled to a hearing on request and shall be admitted as a party to such proceeding. See 42 U.S.C. Sec. 2239 (1976 & Supp. I 1977) (emphasis added), amended by 42 U.S.C. Sec. 2239 (West Supp.1983). Any party aggrieved by a final order of the Commission may file a petition for review in the court of appeals. 28 U.S.C. Sec. 2234 (1976). 24 Rockland clearly qualified as an entity whose interest may be affected by the Commission's review of emergency preparedness at Indian Point. As such, the county could have participated in the December 1982 Commission proceedings and would have been entitled to party status for purposes of appeal. Alternatively, Rockland could have filed a section 2.206 petition 11 challenging the December 1982 order and could have appealed in this forum if the Commission refused to grant its petition. 10 C.F.R. Sec. 2.206 (1982); see Rockford League of Women Voters v. United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission, 679 F.2d 1218, 1219 (7th Cir.1982); Porter County Chapter of the Izaak Walton League of America, Inc. v. United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission, 606 F.2d 1363, 1365 (D.C.Cir.1979). If the county chose either of these options, the jurisdictional requirements of 42 U.S.C. Sec. 2239 would have been satisfied. 25 The party status rule is premised on the exhaustion doctrine, a judicially created concept which serves a vital function in the context of administrative decisionmaking: 26 The basic purpose of the exhaustion doctrine is to allow an administrative agency to perform functions within its special competence--to make a factual record, to apply its expertise, and to correct its own errors so as to moot judicial controversies. 27 Parisi v. Davidson, 405 U.S. 34, 37, 92 S.Ct. 815, 817, 31 L.Ed.2d 17 (1972); see McKart v. United States, 395 U.S. 185, 194-95, 89 S.Ct. 1657, 1663, 23 L.Ed.2d 194 (1968); see generally Gage v. United States Atomic Energy Commission, 479 F.2d 1214, 1217-21 (D.C.Cir.1973). Since Rockland has failed to offer any convincing reason or justification for its failure to exhaust available administrative remedies, its petition is dismissed. See Gage v. United States Atomic Energy Commission, 479 F.2d at 1216 (We hold that petitioners have come to the wrong forum with an inappropriate claim in search of an unavailable remedy.); see also Susquehanna Valley Alliance v. Three Mile Island Nuclear Reactor, 619 F.2d 231, 238-39 (3d Cir.1980), cert. denied, 449 U.S. 1096, 101 S.Ct. 893, 66 L.Ed.2d 824 (1981).