Court Opinion

ID: 9641110
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 17:23:21.149547+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:10:35.102211
License: Public Domain

Dissenting Opinion by
Judge Mencer:
I respectfully dissent. I conclude that the suspension here does not constitute an adjudication within the meaning of Section 2 of the Act of December 2, 1968, P.L. 1133, 53 P.S. §11302, because appellant has only a conditional or limited property right to continued employment.' The majority concludes that Section 4408 of The Third Class City Code, Act of June 23, 1931, P.L. 932, as amended, 53 P.S. §39408, provides appellant with a statutory property right to continued active employment status, except for the enumerated reasons set forth in Section 4408.
I do not believe that one may retain the benefits of an act while attacking one of its important conditions. Section 4408 of The Third Class City Code provides, in pertinent part:
*49“All employes subject to civil service shall be subject to suspension by the director of the department for misconduct, or violation of any law of this Commonwealth, any ordinance of the city, or regulation of the department, pending action by the. city council upon the charges made against any of such employes. On hearing before the city council, where they may be represented by counsel, they may be fined or suspended for a period not exceeding thirty days with or without pay, or they may be discharged by city council, if found guilty of the charges made against them. The director of each such department may, for misconduct or violation as aforesaid, suspend any employe of such department for a period of ten days, with or without pay, without preferring charges and without a hearing of council. ...” (Emphasis added.)
Property interests are not created by the Constitution. Rather, they are created and their dimensions are defined by existing rules or understandings that stem from an independent source such as state law. Board of Regents v. Roth, 408 U.S. 564 (1972). Here appellant did have, by Section 4408, a statutory expectancy that he not be suspended for a period of more than 10 days without a hearing before the city council. However, this very section, which is the sole basis of appellant’s property interest, also provides that any employe may be suspended for a period of 10 days without a hearing.
The Legislature was obviously intent on according a measure of statutory job security to employes of third class cities which they had not previously enjoyed but was likewise intent on excluding such job security relative to suspensions for a period of 10 days or less.
Where the grant of a substantive right is inextricably intertwined with a specific limitation, one claiming the right must also accept and be subject to *50the limitation. To conclude otherwise results in a holding that appellant was granted not merely that which the Legislature gave him in the first part of Section 4408 but also that which the Legislature had expressly withheld from him in the latter part of the same section. I cannot bring myself to join in such a holding.
The majority states that our decision in Kretzler v. Ohio Township, 14 Pa. Commonwealth Ct. 236, 322 A.2d 157 (1974), controls this case. I can readily distinguish Kretzler on two grounds: First, Kretzler dealt with a reduction of rank under a statutory provision1 applicable to regular full-time police officers2 in any police department of any township of the second class, or any borough or township of the first class, and, in my view, not comparable with the provisions of Section 4408 of The Third Class City Code; and second, the statutory provision applicable in Kretzler did not include a 10-day limitation relative to suspension as provided for in the statutory provision which applies in the present case. This limitation set forth in the very same section that grants appellant his property interest should be considered significant and controlling. The majority’s reluctance to consider it so is the heart reason for my dissent.
I would hold that there is no right of appeal from a 10-day suspension under the provisions of Section 4408, and the only remedy for a wrongful suspension remains an action in assumpsit for lost pay. See Loftus v. Carbondale, 405 Pa. 276, 175 A.2d 85 (1961).

 Act of June 15, 1951, P.L. 586, §2, as amended, 53 P.S. §812.

 Policemen appointed for a probationary period of one year or less were expressly excepted from the statutory protection, afforded regular full-time police officers. We had no occasion in Kretzler v. Ohio Township, supra, to consider the property interests, if any, afforded such probationary policemen.