Court Opinion

ID: 9622824
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 06:24:08.247478+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:05:20.796806
License: Public Domain

MELTON, Justice,
concurring specially.
Although I agree that the Georgia Pines Community Service Board waived its service of process defense under the facts of this case, I cannot agree with the majority’s broad conclusions regarding the interaction of the Georgia Tort Claims Act (GTCA) and the Civil Practice Act.
1. As an initial matter, the resolution of this case rests solely on the finding that Georgia Pines waived its defective service defense. The majority concedes this fact, finding specifically that it need not consider whether service was properly delivered to Georgia Pines due to its waiver. Accordingly, the entirety of the majority’s first division which discusses the imposition of the service requirements of the Civil Practice Act onto the GTCA is dicta only. As such, it is nonbinding and lacks precedential authority.
2. Because the majority has chosen to make these findings in dicta, however, I feel that a full response, although it will also be dicta, is required. Pursuant to the Georgia Constitution, the State may waive its sovereign immunity only in the manner set forth in a tort claims act or in another act of the Legislature which expressly provides for and sets forth the extent of such a waiver. 1983 Ga. Const., Art. I, Sec. II, Par. IX (a), (e). Under the GTCA, OCGA § 50-21-20 et seq., the Legislature provided the mechanism by which the State waived its sovereign immunity, allowing civil actions against the State only if the requirements of the GTCA had been first met. Nothing in the GTCA or any other act of the Legislature which expressly waives sovereign immunity allows an action against the State to be maintained after service upon anyone at a state entity “whose duties include keeping records or accounts” rather than the appropriate chief executive officer. Therefore, in this case, where only the personnel manager of Georgia Pines was served, not the chief executive officer, the plaintiff failed to properly perfect service under the GTCA.
*345(a) The GTCA expressly mandates that its provisions must be strictly construed and limited to their terms. OCGA § 50-21-21 (a) states unequivocally: “[I]t is declared to be the public policy of this state that the state shall only be liable in tort actions within the limitations of this article and in accordance with the fair and uniform principles established in this article.” (Emphasis supplied.) OCGA § 50-21-21 (c) then provides: “All the provisions of this article should be construed with a view to carry out this expression of the intent of the General Assembly.” When analyzing cases such as this, one must remain cognizant of the Legislature’s clear intent to strictly limit the waiver of sovereign immunity in accordance with the express terms set forth within the statutory article containing the GTCA. To preserve this intent, one should not resort to the use of statutory authority outside of the GTCA unless it is absolutely necessary to maintain the efficacy of the GTCA.
With regard to the requisite service of process required to bring suit under the GTCA, “it is apparent that the [Legislature intended to require the plaintiff to serve process . . . on .. . two people.” Camp v. Coweta County, 280 Ga. 199, 200 (1) (625 SE2d 759) (2006). OCGA § 50-21-35 provides:
In all civil actions brought by the state under this article, to perfect service of process the plaintiff must both: (1) cause process to be served upon the chief executive officer of the state government entity involved at his or her usual office address; and (2) cause process to be served upon the director of the Risk Management Division of the Department of Administrative Services at his or her usual address.
Before a plaintiff may bring an action under the GTCA, strict compliance with the explicit terms of this provision is required, and this provision explicitly requires service upon two people, the director of the Risk Management Division and the chief executive officer of the state entity sought to be sued. This provision is unambiguous, and can be followed according to its own terms, without resort to general statutes outside of the GTCA. As such, service upon individuals other than the two explicitly named in OCGA § 50-21-35 cannot satisfy the service requirement. For this reason, under OCGA § 50-21-35, service upon the deputy administrator of the Risk Management Division rather than the director has been deemed insufficient service. Christensen v. State, 219 Ga. App. 10 (1) (464 SE2d 14) (1995), disapproved on other grounds by Brantley v. Dept. of Human Resources, 271 Ga. 679 (523 SE2d 571) (1999).
In this case, although the director of the Risk Management Division was properly served, the chief executive officer of Georgia *346Pines was not. The personnel manager of Georgia Pines was the only person at Georgia Pines who received service, and there is simply no question that she was not one of the two people whom OCGA § 50-21-35 requires to be served. Given the explicit requirements of the GTCA, there is simply no need to look outside its provisions for its proper enforcement, and it is improper to do so. The chief executive officer of Georgia Pines was not personally served as required. Georgia Pines, however, waived its defense based on this defective service.
Our holding in Camp v. Coweta County, supra, does not provide any basis for a different outcome in this case. In Camp, we found that “[b]ecause there are no specific proscriptions against amendments to cure a defect in the certification requirement under OCGA § 50-21-35, an amendment should generally be allowed prior to the entry of a pretrial order. . . .” Id. at 203 (3). Because the GTCA was silent regarding whether a complaint could be amended in this situation, it was absolutely necessary to look to the general provisions of the Civil Practice Act, namely OCGA§ 9-11-15, to determine whether such an amendment would be allowable. Unlike the situation in Camp where we had no choice but to look outside the GTCAbecause its provisions failed to speak to the issue at hand, in this case, the terms of the GTCA are explicit, unambiguous, and clearly sufficient enough to determine the propriety of service. Quite simply, the GTCAmandates that the director of the Risk Management Division and the chief executive officer of the state entity being sued must be served. We should not alter, manipulate, or extend this simple mandate through application of the more liberal service provisions of the Civil Practice Act. As it states, itself, the GTCA was intended to stand alone. In this case, importing provisions of the Civil Practice Act into the GTCA in order to interpret an unambiguous service requirement violates this legislative intention.
(b) Even if it were applicable to the case at hand, the statutory provision for service upon “public bodies” under the Civil Practice Act would not alter the result in this case. OCGA § 9-11-4 (e) provides, in relevant part:
Service shall be made by delivering a copy of the summons attached to a copy of the complaint as follows: ... (5) If against a county, municipality, city, or town, to the chairman of the board of commissioners, president of the council of trustees, mayor or city manager of the city or to an agent authorized by appointment to receive service of process. If against any other public body or organization subject to an action, to the chief executive officer or clerk thereof.
*347Decided June 29, 2007
Reconsideration denied July 27, 2007.
Seacrest, Karesh, Tate & Bicknese, Gary L. Seacrest, Annarita M. Busbee, for appellant.
Conley Griggs, Cale Conley, Richard A. Griggs, C. Frederick Overby, for appellees.
This provision, properly construed in context, does not allow service upon any generic clerk of a public body. To the contrary, just as it allows service on “the” chief executive officer of a public body, it allows service on “the” clerk of a public body. Public bodies such as cities, counties, and municipalities often have both a mayor or chief operating officer and an official clerk who acts on the public body’s behalf. In both cases, a single individual holds the office in question, and service upon either one ensures notice to that public body. See, e.g., Foskey v. Vidalia City School, 258 Ga. App. 298 (574 SE2d 367) (2002) (service on the Vidalia City School District had to be perfected on the chief executive officer or the clerk of the District).
Contrary to the Court of Appeals’ analysis, I do not believe that the Legislature intended that service on a public body could be perfected by giving process to any employee who fits the generic definition of clerk, i.e., any person whose duties include keeping records or filing. This interpretation simply does not fit within the clear context of the statute as written. For example, service on counties, cities, and the like must be made on specific individuals holding official offices: the chairman of the board, the president of the trustees, the mayor, etc. As with these other public bodies, the Legislature intended for service to be made on specific individuals with official offices and duties, not random employees who have certain basic administrative duties. Service on such random employees would deter the goal of the statute to ensure that the head of the public body receives actual notice of a pending action.
Therefore, for all of the reasons set forth above, I cannot concur in the majority’s conclusion that, in enforcing the GTCA, “courts will have to look elsewhere for answers to procedural questions.” Such a wholesale imposition of external statutes and provisions onto the framework of the GTCA simply does not comport with the legislative intent that the GTCA be allowed to stand on its own terms wherever possible.
I am authorized to state that Justice Hines joins in this special concurrence.
*348ThurbertE. Baker, Attorney General, KathleenM. Pacious, Deputy Attorney General, Loretta L. Pinkston, Senior Assistant Attorney General, Jennifer L. Dalton, Assistant Attorney General, amici curiae.