Court Opinion

ID: 9787197
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 00:12:26.331719+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:36:53.328653
License: Public Domain

Rose, J.,
concurring:
Any party aggrieved by an administrative decision may appeal the decision to the district court for judicial review.1 This is a time-honored right rooted in fairness and procedural due process. The Legislature was well aware of the statutory real property taxation scheme set forth in NRS Chapter 361 when it enacted NRS 233B. 130(1) and the Administrative Procedure Act. Had it wanted to expressly eliminate a county’s right to appeal from an administrative decision, it certainly could have done so. The Legislature was not “silent” on permitting a county to appeal from an adverse decision of the Board of Equalization as the dissent claims because the Legislature has passed the overarching Administrative Procedure Act that specifically provides for the right of all parties to appeal from an adverse administrative decision.
This court has previously emphasized the general proposition that an agency should be permitted to appeal an adverse administrative decision. In State, Department of Motor Vehicles v. McGuire, a hearing officer ruled after a license revocation hearing that the allegedly drunk driver was entitled to a seven-day temporary driving permit.2 The Department of Motor Vehicles appealed the decision to the district court, where the driver asserted that the Department did not have the right to appeal under NRS 233B.130 since the law allowed only a “person” and not an agency to seek judicial review. This court concluded that the amendment to NRS 233B.130 the succeeding year changed “person” to “party” *538and showed an intent to retroactively modify the statute. This court then went on to state: “Finally, ‘[t]he right of appeal . . . should not be taken away unless clearly intended by the statute. Any doubt about the construction of statutes regulating the right of appeal should be resolved in favor of allowing an appeal.’ ”3 No statute states that the counties are denied an appeal from a decision of the State Board of Equalization.
The dissent claims that permitting the county to appeal is an absurd result, even though each party is given the right to appeal under a specific section of Nevada law. Rather than absurd, I find that permitting both parties to appeal an administrative decision a fundamentally fair process. These two statutes can be harmonized by simply following our prior decisions and resolving this dispute “in favor of allowing an appeal.”4

 NRS 233B. 130(1).

 108 Nev. 182, 827 P.2d 821 (1992).

 Id. at 184, 827 P.2d at 822 (quoting Thompson v. District Court, 100 Nev. 352, 355, 683 P.2d 17, 19 (1984)).

 Id.