Court Opinion

ID: 9558521
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 17:11:20.621707+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:09:21.370838
License: Public Domain

*768RABINO WITZ, Justice,
with whom ERWIN, Justice, joins, dissenting.
I must dissent from the court’s affirmance of the superior court’s dismissal of Viola Jerrel’s appeal from the Kenai Peninsula Borough School District’s upholding of her nonretention as a tenured teacher. Regarding tenured teachers, AS 14.20.205 provides:
If a school board reaches a decision unfavorable to a teacher, the teacher is entitled to a de novo trial in the superior court.
Concerning appeals to the superior court from an unfavorable decision of the school board, Appellate Rule 45(a)(2) stipulates:
The time within which an appeal may be taken to the superior court from an administrative agency shall be 30 days from the date that the order appealed from is mailed or delivered to the appellant.
Under the particular factual circumstance of the case at bar, I am persuaded that it was error for the superior court to have failed to relax the 30-day time limitation for such appeals under the authority granted Alaska’s trial courts by Civil Rule 941 and Appellate Rule 45(j).2 Civil Rule 94 provides:
These rules are designed to facilitate business and to advance justice. They may be relaxed or dispensed with by the court in any case where it shall be manifest to the court that a strict adherence to them will work injustice.
Simply put, it is manifest that disallowance of Ms. Jerrel’s appeal will result in an injustice to her.
Here we have a case where appellant had been teaching for a period of 15 years, had attained tenure, and as recently as the school year prior to her nonretention had received an excellent evaluation as a teacher from her then principal. Despite the fact that she was notified on April 18, 1975, that she would not be retained, she was also informed that the Kenai Peninsula Borough School Board would render its final decision with specific findings of fact and conclusions of law in the near future.3 Ms. Jerrel did not receive the Board’s Findings of Fact, Conclusions of Law and Decision until June 6, 1975. Thus, I conclude that the time for appeal did not commence to run until June 6, 1975. I think it of some significance that none of these aforementioned documents advised Ms. Jerrel that she had only 30 days in which to appeal the Board’s decision to the superior court.4
It is also of significance that the record shows that prior to June, Ms. Jerrel became *769dissatisfied with the attorney who had represented her at the school board hearing and upon his refusal to consider co-counsel, Ms. Jerrel sought the services of Edgar Paul Boyko. From this time until approximately August 1, 1975, when the National Education Association confirmed that it would finance her appeal and she was then able to retain Mr. Boyko, the record shows that Ms. Jerrel was diligent in her attempts to contact and retain Mr. Boyko, as well as in making financial arrangements for her appeal. Within two weeks of his retention, Mr. Boyko, on August 15, 1975, filed an action in the superior court in Ms. Jerrel’s behalf. This appeal to the superior court was untimely by a total of approximately 40 days.
Given the importance of Ms. Jerrel’s interests which are at stake in this matter and the fact that the legislature saw fit to give tenured teachers the right to a de novo trial in the superior court in the event the school board reaches a decision unfavorable to the teacher, I believe that the factual context of this record mandated that the superior court relax the time limit for appeal in recognition of the importance of appellate review of nonretention decisions. In Cook v. Aurora Motors, Inc., 503 P.2d 1046,1049-50 (Alaska 1972), this court stated:
In examining the circumstances of this case, the lower court should balance the right to appellate review, the willfulness and extent of the rules violation, and the possible injustice that might result from dismissal. Depending on its findings, the court could then either relax the rules and allow the appeal, dismiss the appeal for noncompliance with the rules, or allow the appeal but assess costs or attorney’s fees as a penalty for the rules infraction in order to discourage similar future conduct, pursuant to Civil Rule 95. (footnotes omitted)
In the instant case, application of the Cook balancing analysis indicates that the superior court erred in failing to relax the 30-day time limitation found in Appellate Rule 45(a)(2). On the one hand, we have to weigh a specific legislative grant of appeal by trial de novo in the superior court from a school board decision unfavorable to a tenured teacher and the profound impact the school board’s nonretention decision will have on Ms. Jerrel’s teaching career. Balanced against these considerations, one finds in the record a rather insignificant delay in appealing the matter to the superi- or court and an absence of any indication that Ms. Jerrel wilfully violated the 30-day time limitation of Appellate Rule 45(a)(2).5
For the foregoing reasons, I would reverse the superior court and permit Ms. Jerrel to obtain judicial review of the school board’s decision not to retain her.

. Compare Appellate Rule 46 which reads:
These rules are designed to facilitate business and advance justice. They may be relaxed or dispensed with by this court where strict adherence to them will work surprise or injustice.
In McCarrey v. Commissioner of Natural Resources, 526 P.2d 1353, 1355 (Alaska 1974), we held that the failure to file an appeal from an administrative determination within strict time limitations does not create a jurisdictional defect. There we noted, “[c]ourts in Alaska have authority to relax the strict requirements of the rules in order to avoid surprise or a serious miscarriage of justice, or otherwise in aid of their appellate jurisdiction.” (footnotes omitted)

. Appellate Rule 45(j) provides, regarding appeals to the superior court from administrative agencies:
After notice of appeal to the superior court has been given, the superior court shall have power to make such orders as are necessary and proper to aid its appellate jurisdiction.
See McCarrey v. Commissioner of Natural Resources, 526 P.2d 1353, 1355 n. 12 for a discussion of the appropriateness of the superior court’s use of Appellate Rule 45(j) to extend the time for the filing of an appeal from an administrative agency decision.

. AS 14.20.180(c) provides, in part, that the final decision of the school board must be “written and contain specific findings of fact and conclusions of law.”

. In her reply brief the following assertions are made:
During this period of time Mrs. Jerrel was not made aware she must file a notice of appeal with the court within a certain time period, and swears she would have had she known. Her prior counsel evidently failed to inform her of the existence of a time requirement, simply informing her instead that she must wait for the final decision of the school board.

. In Wagle v. Murray, 546 F.2d 1329 (9th Cir.1976), a teacher nonretention case brought pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983, the Ninth Circuit recognized the importance of judicial review in holding that the teacher did not need to exhaust his administrative remedies. Similarly, the provision of AS 14.20.205 allowing appeal by trial de novo illustrates the relative unimportance of the prior administrative holding when compared with the importance of the rights involved. See Wagle, 546 F.2d at 1333.