Court Opinion

ID: 9731464
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 15:46:34.388902+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:26:18.340886
License: Public Domain

McCORMICK, Justice
(concurring specially).
I believe Leaseamerica Corp. v. Iowa Department of Revenue, 333 N.W.2d 847 (Iowa 1983), was wrongly decided and should be overruled rather than merely distinguished. Judicial review is available only to a person or party who has in fact exhausted all adequate administrative remedies. See Iowa Code § 17A.19(1). The fact that intra-agency appeals are permissive under section 17A.15(3) does not excuse failure to take an intra-agency appeal to meet this independent exhaustion requirement of section 17A.19(1). Moreover, an agency cannot by rule modify the statutory exhaustion requirement. I recognize that we gave effect in Leaseamerica to a rule that purported to declare the exhaustion requirement satisfied at the hearing officer level, but I do not believe we should have done so.
In sum, an administrative remedy is available when an intra-agency appeal may be taken. Section 17A.19(1) requires all adequate administrative remedies to be exhausted. I would hold that an intra-agency appeal from a hearing officer to the director is thus at least impliedly required in revenue department cases as a condition precedent to petitioning for judicial review.