Court Opinion

ID: 9696584
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 18:51:57.795413+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:20:23.713591
License: Public Domain

VANDE WALLE, Justice,
concurring specially.
I believe the majority opinion reaches an equitable result. Whether or not that result is a correct interpretation of legislative intent may, however, be open to question. I confess it is not entirely clear to me what the legislative intent is with respect to the agencies that are governed by Chapter 28-32, N.D.C.C., the Administrative Agencies Practice Act, and in particular the legislative intent with regard to the relationship of the Central Personnel Division to the State Personnel Board and the relationship of either of them to the Administrative Agencies Practice Act. The majority opinion concludes that the State Personnel Board is an administrative agency subject to the provisions of Chapter 28-32, including the right of appeal, but the Central Personnel Division is not. Section 28-32-01(l)(a) excludes from the term “administrative agency” the Office of Management and Budget “except with respect to rules relating to the central personnel system as authorized under section 54-44.3-07 ...” Section 54-44.3-07, N.D.C.C., is a section applicable to the State Personnel Board and provides, in part, at subsection 1 thereof, that the Board has the authority to promulgate rules and the promulgation of rules “shall be accomplished in accordance with provisions of chapter 28-32.” If the Central Personnel Division is a part of the Office of Management and Budget and the State Personnel Board is a separate entity from either, then it would be unnecessary for the Legislature to exempt the Office of Management and Budget (and presumably the Central Personnel Division) from the operation of Chapter 28-32 but specify that the rules of the State Personnel Board are to be adopted in accordance with Chapter 28-32; for if the Board is separate and apart from the Office of Management and Budget and the Central Personnel Division, it is not excluded from the provisions of Chapter 28-32 and the rules adopted by it must be promulgated in accordance with Chapter 28-32. See Section 28-32-03, N.D. C.C. To further complicate matters, Section 54-44.3-12(1) gives the director of the Central Personnel Division the authority to establish rules and regulations subject to the approval of the State Personnel Board. The director of the Central Personnel Division is appointed by the director of the Office of Management and Budget. It thus appears that the legislation is at best ambiguous and I conclude that the result reached in the majority opinion, construing legislative intent as to whether or not the State Personnel Board is an administrative agency governed by the provisions of Chapter 28-32, N.D.C.C., is as reasonable as a contrary result and I therefore concur with the result reached by the majority opinion in that regard.
I also agree that the effect of the amendments of Section 28-32-01(1) defining an “administrative agency” is to make decisions of administrative agencies subject to judicial review because of Section 28-32-15. The previous decisions of this court, beginning with Dakota National Insurance Company v. Commissioner of Insurance, 70 N.D. 97, 54 N.W.2d 745 (1952), are thereby superseded.
I am concerned by the reliance in the majority opinion on the North Dakota Personnel Policies Manual. Whether or not the *253Division or the Board are administrative agencies, it is clear from Section 28-32-01(1) that the rules and regulations relating to the central personnel system are to be promulgated pursuant to - Chapter 28-32. Section 28-32-03, N.D.C.C., requires that certain procedures be followed in promulgating the rules. In addition to an approving opinion by the Attorney General, Section 28-32-03 requires that, with certain exceptions, the rules be published in the North Dakota Administrative Code and further provides that “rules not published in the administrative code shall be invalid.” Although Chapter 4-02-04 of the North Dakota Administrative Code is concerned with appeals to the State Personnel Board, those provisions apply to appeals of classification or salary range except with respect to Merit System agency employees who have a much broader right of appeal, including appeals from dismissals. Mr. Hammond was not an employee of a Merit System agency. See Section 54-52-06, N.D. C.C. The rules upon which the majority opinion relies would therefore appear to be invalid under Section 28-32-03, N.D.C.C., because, from what I can ascertain, they were not published in the Administrative Code.
If, however, the State Personnel Board is an administrative agency and if the Board has the authority to review dismissals of all employees, whether or not they are employed by a Merit System agency, the decision of the Board is subject to judicial review independent of any rules. If I were to look only at Section 54-44.3-07, N.D.C.C., entitled “Duties of Board,” I would conclude that the Board only has the authority to review personnel action relating to pay ranges or job classification but not employee dismissals. However, as the majority opinion notes, Section 54-44.3-07 was enacted in 1975. Section 54-44.3-12, N.D. C.C., was enacted in 1979 as Section 2 of Chapter 566, 1979 N.D.Sess.Laws. That section, read in isolation, appears to apply to all employee complaints, including a dismissal, and to require the implementation of agency grievance procedures and a statewide appeal mechanism. But Section 1 of Chapter 566, 1979 N.D.Sess.Laws, codified as Section 54-44.3-12.1, applies to revisions of compensation plans and classifications. Therefore, it is possible that Section 54-44.-3-12, when read in conjunction with Chapter 566,1979 N.D.Sess.Laws, applies only to grievance procedures with regard to pay ranges or job classifications rather than to dismissals. It is again apparent to me that the provisions are ambiguous. The history of the 1979 legislation as recited in the majority opinion is helpful in construing that legislative intent and I agree with the conclusion reached by the majority. Whether or not that is truly indicative of the legislative intent is, I concede, debatable.1
Although there can be little doubt that the statutes with which we are concerned are ambiguous, one point is clear: The State Personnel Board did hold a hearing on Hammond’s grievance as to his dismissal and did render a decision. At least at that point the Board apparently believed it had the authority to do so. The Board now argues that it had the authority to do so as a result of the consent of the State Laboratories Commission that it do so and that the hearing was therefore without legal effect. Ordinarily, of course, jurisdiction cannot be conferred upon a court by consent. Presumably the same rule applies to administrative agencies. Whether or not the Board was legally authorized to hold a hearing and render a decision is unclear. However, the fact the Board did hold the hearing compounds the ambiguity created by the *254statutes. Because of the ambiguity and because, as I noted at the beginning of this special concurrence, the result reached by the majority is an equitable result, I agree with the conclusions reached therein. If the result reached in our attempt to clarify the statutes does not meet with the approval of future legislative assemblies, presumably they will take action to amend the statutes to correspond to what they perceive to be proper.
SAND, J., concurs.

. Several bills to clarify the status of the State Personnel Board were introduced in the 1983 legislative session. See H.B. 1555, H.B. 1251, H.B. 1093, S.B. 2041, and S.B. 2046, Forty-eighth Legislative Assembly. At least two of the bills were the product of interim studies. See pp. 13, 44-46, Report of the Legislative Council, 48th Legislative Assembly. Although the bills are not necessarily indicative of the intent of past legislative assemblies that enacted the statutes we are now called upon to construe [see, e.g., St. Vincent’s Nursing Home v. Department of Labor, 169 N.W.2d 456 (N.D. 1969) ], they would at least be significant in the future in which similar issues may again arise.