Court Opinion

ID: 9692320
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 15:51:29.728503+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:19:11.397664
License: Public Domain

DON BURGESS, Justice,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent. The majority decides this case based upon the “primary vs. exclusive” jurisdiction doctrine, vis a vis, administrative and judicial review. Even under the majority’s flawed analysis, they reach the wrong conclusion. If the legislature meant for the expertise of the administrative hearing in the Justice Court to be paramount, then the 60 day deadline is mandatory as to the exhaustion of administrative remedies. Consequently, the failure to meet the deadline, when viewed as a failure to exhaust administrative remedies, deprives the County Court at Law of jurisdiction to hear the appeal as a trial de novo.
However, I believe the case should be analyzed as argued by Sullivan. It is well-settled that a statute such as the one sought to be construed in the present case is mandatory, not directory. In State v. Fox, 133 S.W.2d 987, 990 (Tex.Civ.App.-Austin 1939, writ ref'd) (emphasis added), the court noted:
The general rule relating to the construction of statutory law prescribing the time for the performance of the duties of public officials is well stated in 46 C.J. 1037, § 306, as Mows: “As a rule a statute prescribing the time within which public officers are required to perform an official act is merely directory, unless it denies the exercise of the •power after such time or the nature of the act or the statutory remedy shows that the time was intended as a limitation.”
Mr. Sutherland, at page 1117, § 612, of his book on Statutory Construction, also states the rule to be as follows: “Provisions regulating the duties of public officers and specifying the tune for their performance are in that regard generally directory. Though a statute directs a thing to be done at a particular time, it does not necessarily follow that it may not be done afterwards. In other words, as the cases universally hold, a statute specifying a time within which a public officer is to perform an official act regarding the rights and duties of others is directory, unless the nature of the act to be performed, or the phraseology of the statute, is such that the designation of time must be considered as a limitation of the power of the officer.”
The Supreme Court of Texas acknowledged the continued soundness of Fox in the far more recent case of Schepps v. Presbyterian Hosp. of Dallas, 652 S.W.2d 934 (Tex.1983). In Schepps, 652 S.W.2d at 936, the court quotes Chisholm v. Bewley Mills, 155 Tex. 400, 287 S.W.2d 943, 945 (1956), for the general guidelines to determine whether a statutory provision is mandatory or directory:
There is no absolute test by which it may be determined whether a statutory *154provision is mandatory or directory.... If the statute directs, authorizes or commands an act to be done within a certain time, the absence of words restraining the doing thereof afterwards or stating the consequences of failure to act within the time specified, may be considered as a circumstance tending to support a directory construction.
See also Texas Dept. of Public Safety v. Guerra, 970 S.W.2d 645, 648 (Tex.App.Austin 1998, pet. denied) (quoting Chisholm, 287 S.W.2d at 945). More recently, in Helena Chemical Co. v. Wilkins, 47 S.W.3d 486, 495 (Tex.2001), the court noted, “[t]o determine whether a timing provision is mandatory, we first look to whether the statute contains a noncompliance penalty. If a provision requires that an act be performed within a certain time without any words restraining the act’s performance after that time, the timing provision is usually directory.”
Unlike the cases cited by DPS, Guerra, 970 S.W.2d at 645, Balkum v. Texas Dep’t of Public Safety, 33 S.W.3d 263 (Tex.App.-El Paso 2000, no pet.), Texas Dep’t of Public Safety v. Dear, 999 S.W.2d 148 (Tex.App.-Austin 1999, no pet.), and Texas Dep’t of Public Safety v. Salas, 977 S.W.2d 845 (Tex.App.-Austin 1998, no pet.), the statute here provides the hearing shall be held “in no event more than 60 days after the date that the applicant or license holder requested the hearing.” Tex. Gov’t Code Ann. § 411.180(b) (Vernon Supp. 2003) (emphasis added). These are words which restrain “the doing thereof after-wards.” Chisholm, 287 S.W.2d at 945. Accordingly, they are not directory, but mandatory.
The statute goes further and proscribes application of the Administrative Proee-dures Act to a hearing under section 411.180. See Tex. Gov’t Code Ann. § 411.180(a) (Vernon Supp.2003). The legislature had several models from which to select a statutory scheme but chose to craft a unique procedure for revocation of handgun licenses.1 It is not for this court to disregard the legislature’s choice that the statute be mandatory.
The court in Helena Chem. Co. noted “[e]ven if a statutory requirement is mandatory, this does not mean that compliance is necessarily jurisdictional. When a statute is silent about the consequences of noncompliance, we look to the statute’s purpose to determine the proper consequences.” See Helena Chemical Co., 47 S.W.3d at 494 (citations omitted). The statute in this case expressly proscribes performance of the act after the sixty-day time period. The statute therefore provides the penalty for noncomplianee — the hearing cannot be held. Accordingly, I would hold the statute is not directory, but mandatory, and failure to comply is jurisdictional. See Helena Chem. Co., 47 S.W.3d at 495. Consequently, I would sustain issues one and two.
Having found the statute is mandatory and its requirements are jurisdictional, I would conclude the County Court at Law should have dismissed DPS’ appeal. Accordingly, I would reverse the judgment of the County Court at Law of Orange County, Texas and render in favor of Sullivan.

. The issue of "Right to Carry” was hotly debated in political and legislative circles. It is certainly consistent that the legislature would prescribe specific, mandatory requirements when the government (DPS) was attempting to take away this "Right.”