Court Opinion

ID: 9766258
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 04:38:15.387582+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:30:20.767309
License: Public Domain

Bogdanski, J.
(dissenting). I do not agree that the trial court properly sustained the demurrer to the prayer for a writ of mandamus.
The issuance of a writ of mandamus rests in the sound discretion of the trial court exercised in accordance with recognized principles of law. State ex rel. Donahue v. Holbrook, 136 Conn. 691, 693, 73 A.2d 924. The writ may properly issue when a plaintiff has a clear legal right to compel the performance of a purely ministerial act and when the plaintiff is without other adequate remedies. See, e.g., Cleary v. Zoning Board, 153 Conn. 513, 518, 218 A.2d 523; Andrews v. New Haven, 153 Conn. 156, 159, 215 A.2d 102. In the present case, the complaint alleged that the defendant board of education failed to follow the procedural requirements of General Statutes § 10-151 in attempting to remove the *43plaintiff from her position. If that allegation is in fact true, then the plaintiff was denied a clear legal right to have her contract renewed.
As agencies of the state, the only powers possessed by boards of education are those granted to them by the General Statutes. Herzig v. Board of Education, 152 Conn. 144, 150, 204 A.2d 827; Fowler v. Enfield, 138 Conn. 521, 530, 86 A.2d 662. The method by which a board of education may properly decline to renew the contract of a nontenured teacher is set out in § 10-151 (a) of the General Statutes. Three procedural requirements are there established: (1) the board must give the teacher written notification, prior to March 1 of any year, that the contract will not be renewed; (2) within five days after receipt of the teacher’s request, the board must furnish the teacher with the reasons for a failure to renew; and (3) the board must grant a hearing which must be held within fifteen days of the teacher’s timely request therefor. Joanou v. Board of Education, 165 Conn. 671, 673-74, 345 A.2d 46.
Statutes such as § 10-151 (a), which create a special procedure for the protection of personal rights, must be strictly followed. See Tempe Union High School District v. Hopkins, 76 Ariz. 228, 262 P.2d 387; Fresno City High School District v. DeCaristo, 33 Cal. App. 2d 666, 92 P.2d 668. The instant statute explicitly states that a nontenured teacher’s contract of employment “shall be renewed for a second, third or fourth year,” unless the procedural requirements are complied with. (Emphasis supplied.) General Statutes § 10-151 (a). “‘[T]he legislature has said in effect that the board “cannot” discharge a probationary teacher except in the mode *44and manner specified.’ ” Comstock v. Board of Trustees, 35 Cal. App. 2d 466, 471, 95 P.2d 969. See Tempe Union High School District v. Hopkins, supra; Blalock v. Ridgway, 92 Cal. App. 132, 136, 267 P. 713. By the terms of § 10-151 (a), if a board of education fails to provide notice or a proper hearing to a teacher whose contract it intends not to renew, the teacher has a clear legal right to have the contract renewed.
The action which the plaintiff is attempting to require the board to take involves no exercise of discretion. Although the decision of whether to renew a contract of a nontenured teacher is a matter of discretion for the board, the procedure to be followed in the implementation of the exercise of that discretion has been mandated by the legislature. The board has no discretion whether or not to follow that mandate. If the statutory procedure is not followed, the teacher’s contract must be renewed.
The majority have concluded that the plaintiff did not lack adequate alternative remedies. In order to preclude relief by mandamus, an alternative remedy must be adapted to secure the desired result effectively and completely. State ex rel. Eastern Color Printing Co. v. Jenks, 150 Conn. 444, 451, 190 A.2d 591; State ex rel. Foote v. Bartholomew, 103 Conn. 607, 618, 132 A. 30. If the allegations of the complaint were shown to be true, and the plaintiff was thus entitled to have her contract renewed pursuant to § 10-151 (a), then the only effective and complete method of enforcing that statutory entitlement would be to require the board of education to renew the contract. An action for damages sounding in contract could not accomplish that result. The procedural safeguards alleged to *45have been violated are creatures of statute: they do not spring from the plaintiff’s contract. Mandamus may lie in such a case. See Thompson v. Troup, 74 Conn. 121, 49 A. 907; Gilman v. Bassett, 33 Conn. 298. By the great weight of authority, it is firmly established that where by positive provision of law, a teacher “can be removed only in some prescribed manner, and where, consequently, the removal is not authorized, mandamus will issue, even though another has been selected to fill the position.” 52 Am. Jur. 2d, Mandamus, § 242. See, e.g., School District No. 6 of Pima County v. Barber, 85 Ariz. 95, 332 P.2d 496; Horner v. Board of Trustees of Excelsior Union High School District, 61 Cal. 2d 79, 389 P.2d 713; School City of Elwood v. State ex rel. Griffin, 203 Ind. 626, 180 N.E. 471; State ex rel. Kennington v. Red River Parish School Board, 193 So. 225 (La. App.); Cheatham v. Smith, 229 Miss. 803, 92 So. 2d 203; State ex rel. Foster v. Madison Township Board of Education, 151 Ohio St. 413, 86 N.E.2d 598; Bragg v. School District of Swarthmore, 337 Pa. 363, 11 A.2d 152; Cochran v. Trussler, 141 W. Va. 130, 89 S.E.2d 306; State ex rel. Karnes v. Board of Regents of Normal Schools, 222 Wis. 542, 269 N.W. 284.
For the above reasons, if after a hearing the trial court concluded that the board did not comply with § 10-151 (a), it would not have been precluded from exercising its discretion in favor of the issuance of a writ of mandamus. I would, therefore, set aside the judgment and remand the case with direction to overrule the demurrer as to the prayer for a writ of mandamus.