Court Opinion

ID: 9723471
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 10:16:49.911106+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:18:38.851438
License: Public Domain

NEAL, Judge.
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Respondent-appellants, the Indiana Department of Highways and John P. Isen-barger (the Department), appeal the order of the Hendricks Circuit Court returning this case to the Department for further hearing.
We reverse.
STATEMENT OF THE FACTS
Petitioner-appellee, Michael J. Pigg (Pigg), was an employee for the Department. Pigg’s job classification was that of Highway Maintenance Supervisor when he was demoted on May 5, 1985, to the job classification of Highway Maintenance Worker III. He served in that position until his dismissal on December 13, 1985.
Pigg filed administrative complaints after both his demotion and dismissal. Pursuant to each complaint, Pigg was granted a hearing according to the grievance procedure established by the Department’s employee handbook. Pigg was denied relief after each hearing. Subsequent to each denial of relief, Pigg filed a verified petition for judicial review in the Marion Superior Court. The two cases were later ven-ued to the Hendricks Circuit Court where the demotion case was consolidated with the dismissal case.
In his petitions for judicial review, Pigg claimed the Department’s hearings, upon his demotion and subsequent dismissal, circumvented the procedures set forth in its employee handbook. The Department moved for summary judgment, challenging Pigg’s right to seek judicial review. After a hearing on the Department’s motion, the trial court issued the following order:
Arguments and positions set out by the attorneys in this case, the court finds that where an administrative agency provides a specified appeal procedure granting procedural due process rights to an at-will employee in excess of the rights *185set out by Indiana Statute then the administrative agency must follow the procedural rights so granted. Considering this, the Court orders this cause returned to the respondent administrative agency for further hearing not inconsistent with this opinion.
Record at 166. The Department subsequently perfected this appeal.
ISSUE
While the Department presents three issues for review, the following issue is dis-positive:
Whether the trial court has jurisdiction to review the Department’s compliance with procedural due process safeguards set forth in its employee handbook.
DISCUSSION AND DECISION
The Department contends the trial court erred in granting judicial review of the administrative hearings held upon Pigg’s demotion and subsequent dismissal. The Department asserts that the trial court lacked jurisdiction to review the hearings in that Pigg was at at-will employee. Therefore, the Department argues the trial court’s order remanding the case to the Department for further hearing was reversible error. We agree.
We note that Pigg was an at-will employee and thus subject to demotion or dismissal at the Department director’s discretion. Indiana Department of Highways v. Dixon (1987), Ind.App., 512 N.E.2d 1113; IND.CODE 8-9.5-4-4(g)(l). Furthermore, the Department’s regulations set forth under the Indiana Administrative Code providing for an employee complaint procedure subject to judicial review are not applicable because Pigg’s job status is not among the listed positions covered by those regulations. 120 IAC 1-3-1 to -7.
Pigg claims that rules and regulations providing for a grievance procedure, set forth in the Department’s employee handbook, provided him procedural due process safeguards in excess of those statutorily mandated. Consequently, Pigg argues he has a right to insure those procedural safeguards through judicial review, pursuant to IND.CODE 4-22-1-14 of the Administrative Adjudication Act. Pigg cites Wells v. Auberry (1985), Ind.App., 476 N.E.2d 869 and Indiana Alcoholic Beverage Commission v. Gault (1980), Ind.App., 405 N.E.2d 585 in support of his contention.
Citing Gault the court in Wells stated in part:
Although the law in Indiana is quite clear that if one’s employment is at the will of a government agency, that person has no property interest in employment at a particular rank; Indiana also recognizes that the governmental agency’s statutory authority or its rules and regulations may afford those certain procedural safeguards, namely a hearing and determination of cause, prior to demotion, and thus create vested rights. (Citation omitted.)
476 N.E.2d at 873. Further, the Administrative Adjudication Act affords judicial review of “hearings on discharge or dismissal of an officer where the law authorizes such hearing.” IND.CODE 4-22-1-2. However, in Gault the court stated that the government agency’s authority as provided by statute is subject to any rules and regulations which the government agency “may have promulgated.” 405 N.E.2d at 589. Moreover, a rule making action which does not conform to the requirements set forth in IND.CODE 4-22-2-13 to -44 does not have the effect of law. IND.CODE 4-22-2-44. In the present case, however, there is no indication in the record that the Department’s employee handbook grievance procedure set forth duly promulgated rules and regulations.
Dixon, supra, controls this case. Dixon was a highway department maintenance worker IV, and was entitled to the grievance procedure set forth in the Department’s employee handbook. He unsuccessfully pursued that procedure, and thereafter sought judicial review. Nevertheless, this court held that Dixon’s at-will status, plus his job position’s exclusion from the listed positions under 120 IAC 1-3-1 to -7, precluded him from seeking judicial review of his dismissal. Consequently, in the *186present case Pigg was not entitled to seek judicial review of his dismissal. The trial court erred by not granting the Department’s motion for summary judgment.
For the above reasons, this cause is reversed and remanded with orders to the trial court to enter summary judgment in favor of the Department.
JUDGMENT REVERSED.
RATLIFF, C.J., concurs:
SULLIVAN, J., dissents with opinion.