Court Opinion

ID: 9737186
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 19:18:26.273943+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:23:57.101764
License: Public Domain

*23CRUMLISH, Jr., President Judge,
concurring.
I concur with the majority’s result but must disagree with its analysis of the pertinent provisions of the statute at issue.
The majority rightly recognizes, as did the trial court, that the City’s civil service regulations never applied to appellant Tucker as the civilian head of the Police Department. However, no reference or mention of the City’s civil service regulations is contained in the Retirement Service Ordinance. Pension eligibility and classification is thus not governed by the civil service. Hence, the necessary focus of our analysis should be the Ordinance itself.
As the majority notes, City pensions under the Ordinance are divided into the Municipal Division and the Police and Fire Division. In turn, Section 201.1(d) of the Ordinance defines police employee as “[a]ny full time uniformed or investigatory employee of the Police Department, the District Attorney’s office or Fairmount Park Commission of the City____” Although it is clear that appellant Tucker is not a uniformed Department employee, the term “employee” is defined at Section 201.1(a) as “[a]ny elected or appointed officer or employee who is paid out of the Treasury of the City____” Thus, it would at first blush appear that there is merit to the argument that Tucker is a Plan D-eligible employee as that term is defined in the Ordinance — that is, any appointed investigatory officer paid out of the City treasury.
However, if the term includes Tucker, then it must also include the Executive Director of the Fairmount Park Commission and the Recreation Commissioner (an ex officio member of the Park Commission) whose duties include, inter alia, investigatory functions.
So while the language of the ordinance may seem sufficiently broad to include Tucker, it follows that it must also include these other employees, whose duties fall under the general “investigatory” rubric — -a result that is not only inequitable but also absurd.
*24Upon examining the Ordinance in full context, it should be clear that the Plan-D pension was created for the benefit of uniformed policeman, police detectives and special units of the Department. Common sense dictates that the adjective “investigatory” is inserted in the definition to insure that police and district attorney’s office personnel — for example, plainclothes officers, detectives, undercover units— who may not be uniformed but who nonetheless perform the same functions as their uniformed colleagues, are included in and benefit from the same pension plan.
The reason the City Charter, 351 Pa.Code § 6.6-600, and the Ordinance expressly provide for a separate pension fund for these men and women (as well as for firefighters) should be manifest. Not only are these employees members of privately organized associations which provide them with certain pension and retirement benefits, see Notes to 351 Pa.Code § 6.6-600, they also expose themselves daily to great risk. (Notwithstanding that a Commissioner may attempt to appear to assume an investigatory role by tucking a nightstick into his tuxedo before an orchestrated media display make an appearance at a disaster or melee, police officers are committed by the nature of their jobs to undergo grave risks daily while investigating possible criminal activity.) Having ascertained the intent of the Ordinance by considering the circumstances under which it was enacted and the object to be attained, 1 Pa. C.S. § 1921(c)(2) and (4), we can then look to other factors which support our interpretation.
The City’s civil service regulations govern police officers and investigatory personnel; they do not apply to the Police Commissioner or other department heads, 351 Pa.Code § 7.7-301(b). The Commissioner is an at-will appointee of the Mayor and has no property or statutory right to his job or its emoluments. Tucker, originally serving (however briefly) in the Managing Director’s office, was placed at the inception of his tenure in Plan J by the Pension Board’s Executive Director.
*25While no one of these facts is dispositive in and of itself, the distinctions lend credence to the conclusion that the Ordinance’s Plan-D pension provisions were never intended to apply to a civilian Police Commissioner who had not served in the department in any capacity other than administrative or executive.
Tucker’s removal from Plan J to Plan D, in contravention of Article II, Section 106.3 of the Ordinance, is an apparent attempt to justify additional compensation through a circuitous route taken at taxpayers’ expense. In an era of severe municipal fiscal retrenchment, this type of maneuver to “end run” the system for personal gain is particularly unconscionable.
I differ also with the majority’s analysis on the question of Rizzo’s invocation of the court’s equity jurisdiction. Again, the Ordinance itself provides a basis for standing without resort to the principles articulated in the Biester and Sprague precedents.
Section 112.1 of the Ordinance allows “[a]ny member or beneficiary ... the right to appeal any decision or determination of the Fund of the Association to the Board.” Thus, we need lock no further than the Ordinance to find Rizzo's standing. As a party with the right to appeal, he is entitled to notice of the Board’s determination. 2 Pa.C.S. § 553. Consequently, if Rizzo has shown that he was not given notice of a decision which he rightfully may seek to remedy by appeal, then his statutory remedy is inadequate.
Having said that, I hasten to add that courts should not allow equity to act unless the inadequacy of other remedies is first established. We must also preserve the “clean hands” maxim and not waste judicial resources in the name of equity on what, it cannot be gainsaid, appears in this case to be a personal mission. It is indeed a cynical view of government and of our judicial system — which Rizzo on the basis of his longstanding tenure in public office ought to condemn instead of espouse — that looks to the courts as the preferred venue to pursue political ambition or other self-gratifying causes. This conduct mocks the intention of the *26Ordinance and perforce reduces the public respect for those whose lives are dedicated to the safety and welfare of the citizens of Philadelphia. Courts are not soundstages on which to create controversy for publicity purposes, a fact which herein I sense.
As is obvious in this discussion, it is with no small measure of distress that I must participate in a decision which would favor either side in this unprofessional dispute, when neither has demonstrated the good faith which the public trust, by virtue of their offices, had at least at one time required of them.