Court Opinion

ID: 9531252
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 04:09:11.648818+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:28:23.040104
License: Public Domain

Stafford, C.J.
(dissenting) — The narrow issue before us is whether an alleged indigent is entitled to a waiver of a filing fee and of a bond for costs on the appeal of a superior court’s order affirming an order of the Higher Education Personnel Board reached as a result of an administrative hearing and review provided by statute.
*404In Iverson v. Marine Bancorporation, 83 Wn.2d 163, 517 P.2d 197 (1973), we waived the filing fee and the required bond for costs on appeal for an indigent appellant. Basically, the majority suggests that we should follow the same course here. However, Iverson is not apposite. It involved an initial appellate review of a superior court judgment awarding damages in a civil action for wrongful eviction. On the other hand, in the case at hand, appellant seeks review of an administrative ruling previously affirmed by the Higher Education Personnel Board and by the Superior Court after a hearing and review in each instance.
There is no adequate reason to extend the rationale of Iverson to the vast realm of administrative decisions. I would hold that appellant is not entitled to a waiver of the filing fee and the bond for costs on appeal to this court.
In Ortwein v. Schwab, 410 U.S. 656, 35 L. Ed. 2d 572, 93 S. Ct. 1172 (1973),5 the petitioners sought waiver of a filing fee required for review of an administrative order reducing their welfare payments. Petitioners alleged they were indigent and unable to pay the fee required to obtain review by the Oregon Court of Appeals. In a per curiam opinion, the United States Supreme Court held that Oregon’s appellate court filing fee did not violate the due process or equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
In Oregon,6 as in this state, judicial review of the agency’s decision is authorized.7 In Oregon that judicial review is first made by the Court of Appeals. Here, judicial review is first made by the Superior Court,8 with appeal available to the Supreme Court as in other civil cases.9 In both states parties seeking the appellate court review provided are required to pay a filing fee and provision is made for the giving of a bond.10 Thus, the similarity between the two *405administrative systems is immediately apparent. In Washington, however, an appellant is even entitled to an additional judicial review of an adverse administrative ruling without the necessity of posting a bond (i.e., at the superior court level).
Turning again to Ortwein, the Supreme Court stated that in United States v. Kras, 409 U.S. 434, 445, 34 L. Ed. 2d 626, 93 S. Ct. 631 (1973), they had observed “one’s interest in a bankruptcy discharge ‘does not rise to the same constitutional level’ as one’s inability to dissolve his marriage except through the courts.”11 Ortwein also held that the increased welfare payments, sought by appellants, had far less constitutional significance than the interest of the appellant who sought a divorce in Boddie v. Connecticut, 401 U.S. 371, 28 L. Ed. 2d 113, 91 S. Ct. 780 (1971). The Ortwein court, at pages 659-60, went on to make the following comments which are directly applicable to the administrative process here under review.
Each of the present appellants has received an agency hearing at which it was determined that the minimum level of payments authorized by law was being provided. As in Kras, we see “no fundamental interest that is gained or lost depending on the availability” of the relief sought by appellants. 409 U. S., at 445.
. . . In Kras, the Court also stressed the existence of alternatives, not conditioned on the payment of the fees, to the judicial remedy. . . . The Court has held that procedural due process requires that a welfare recipient be given a pretermination evidentiary hearing. . . . These appellants have had hearings. The hearings provide a procedure, not conditioned on payment of any fee, through which appellants have been able to seek redress. . . .
. . . As in Kras, this litigation, which deals with welfare payments, “is in the area of economics and social welfare.” ... No suspect classification, such as race, nationality, or alienage, is present. . . . The applica*406ble standard is that of rational justification ...
The purpose of the filing fee, as with the bankruptcy fees in Kras, is apparent. The Oregon court system incurs operating costs, and the fee produces some small revenue to assist in offsetting those expenses. . . . Appellants do not contend that the fee is disproportionate or that it is not an effective means to accomplish the State’s goal. The requirement of rationality is met.
(Footnotes omitted. Italics ours.)
In the instant case appellant, as with petitioners in Ortwein, had redress from the agency’s termination of his services (i.e., the University of Washington) by means of an evidentiary hearing and review by the Higher Education Personnel Board. That hearing and review, as with petitioners in Ortwein, was not conditioned upon payment of any fee. Thus, there is “no fundamental interest that is. gained or lost depending on the availability” of the relief sought by appellant. United States v. Kras, supra. Nor is any suspect classification such as race, nationality or alien-age present. Consequently, the applicable standard is that of rational justification.
As spelled out in Ortwein, the fact of charging a fee at the judicial appellate level is not in and of itself evidence of a denial of due process or equal protection. The case went on to point out that there existed a rational relationship between the small fee charged and the revenue necessary to assist in offsetting the costs of judicial operation. The same may be said of the bond for costs.
In the instant case it is not seriously argued that either the filing fee or the required bond for costs on appeal is disproportionate; Likewise it is not suggested that it is not an effective means to accomplish the State’s goal.
I would deny appellant’s motion for waiver of the filing fee and the posting of a bond for costs on appeal.
Brachtenbach, J., concurs with Stafford, C.J.

Accord, Hill v. Michigan, 488 F.2d 609 (6th Cir. 1973).

Ore. Rev. Stat. § 183.480 (1971).

RCW 28B.16.150-.160.

RCW 28B.16.150.

RCW 28B.16.160.

Ore. Rev. Stat. § 183.480 (1971); ROA I-22.

Ortwein v. Schwab, 410 U.S. 656, 659, 35 L. Ed. 2d 572, 93 S. Ct. 1172 (1973), was referring to Boddie v. Connecticut, 401 U.S. 371, 28 L. Ed. 2d 113, 91 S. Ct. 780 (1971).