Court Opinion

ID: 9571759
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 20:34:53.999137+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:30:55.246389
License: Public Domain

FLEMING, Judge
(concurring in part, dissenting in part).
I concur with the majority holding that relator has no claim to reinstatement in her previous position and that having been fully paid all wages and benefits for the contract year, she has no claims for damages as a result of her suspension, reassignment, termination and refusal to renew her probationary position.
I respectfully dissent in respect to the majority decision that the suspension, reassignment and subsequent termination of relator’s contract were sufficiently stigmatizing as to implicate a constitutionally protected liberty interest requiring a hearing under MinmStat. § 125.12 (1990).
Having concluded that the termination of her contract was already effective, with no remaining claim for damages resulting from the termination, I can find no authority permitting or requiring review by writ of certiorari.
A clear reading of Minn.Stat. § 125.12 seems to me to indicate that the legislature did not intend to provide for a hearing before the school board as a condition of suspending or reassigning a teacher during her probationary period. In any event, I do not believe that this court has the jurisdiction to address the suspension or the reassignment because the writ of certiorari was untimely sought and issued.
Minn.Stat. § 606.01 (1990), specifically governing writs of certiorari, provides:
No writ of certiorari shall be issued, to correct any proceeding, unless such writ shall be issued within 60 days after the party applying for such writ shall have received due notice of the proceedings sought to be reviewed thereby.
(Emphasis added.) This 60-day time period for issuance of the writ cannot be extended by consent of the parties or by court action. See Minn.R.Civ.App.P. 126.02; Kenzie v. Dalco, Corp., 309 Minn. 495, 497, 245 N.W.2d 207, 208 (1976).
In this case, relator received notice of suspension on January 4, 1991. She received notice of her reassignment as principal on special assignment on March 15, 1991. The writ of certiorari issued on July 18, 1991 was clearly more than 60 days after the actions relator seeks to have reviewed by this court took place. Accordingly, I would have granted the motion of the respondent to have limited review to only the issue of the termination and nonre-newal of relator’s probationary contract, which occurred on May 20, 1991.
The majority attempt to avoid the operation of Minn.Stat. § 606.01 by concluding the school board’s subsequent termination and nonrenewal of relator’s contract on May 20, 1991 somehow acted as a ratification of the suspension action of January 4, 1991 and the reassignment of March 5, 1991, and thus the 60-day clock on the prior actions did not begin to run until the May 20 action.
*400I submit that there is no support in the record for this conclusion. To the contrary, the record supports the district’s contention that relator’s position as a principal had never been terminated until the board’s action of May 20, 1991.
Nowhere in the record is there any prior action “immediately” terminating relator’s position. Only in the event of an “immediate” termination was the relator entitled to a hearing during the probationary period under Minn.Stat. § 125.12.
I can find nothing in the return on writ of certiorari, which makes up the record herein, that indicated any action by the board to ratify any prior actions of the school administration in respect to the suspension or reassignment of relator.
If the majority is correct, and I do not agree that they are, that the reassignment in March did in fact constitute an immediate termination which would have afforded relator a hearing under Minn.Stat. § 125.12, then certainly it was incumbent upon her to have sought a writ of certiorari within the statutory 60 days of that action.
Assuming the writ was timely issued to permit review of the suspension and reassignment, I would nevertheless be required to find this probationary employee not entitled to a hearing under Minn.Stat. § 125.12 because she was not “immediately terminated” during the period of probation.
When suspended on January 2, 1991, she was advised “the administration suspension is not disciplinary or punitive in any way. As noted above you will continue to receive full pay and benefits during the Administration suspension.” Clearly this action cannot be inferred to be an immediate termination.
When reassigned on March 5, relator was again advised that the reassignment was not disciplinary and that full salary and benefits would continue. This action, to me, is certainly inconsistent with an “immediate termination.”
In my opinion, relator was, in any event, afforded full due process and was given more than ample opportunity to be heard. See Cleveland Bd. of Educ. v. Loudermill, 470 U.S. 532, 546, 105 S.Ct. 1487, 1495, 84 L.Ed.2d 494 (1985) (stating that assessing the sufficiency of due process, the important inquiry is whether the plaintiff had an opportunity to present her side of the story before the governmental action was taken). She was invited and urged to participate in the investigation by appearing with her counsel and she chose not to do so. She also refused to respond to written interrogatories even though that method of getting her input had been suggested by her counsel.
In my view, the investigation undertaken by the school district was appropriate and within its discretion in managing the school’s business. I do not see how relator can claim rights she would not otherwise have enjoyed by refusing to participate in the investigation.
I do not believe the record before us establishes that relator has been stigmatized. I do not agree that one can draw a logical inference from the district’s letter to the parents on January 3, 1991 that the district was accusing relator of failing to control the meeting or of endangering the students or the staff at the school. As to relator, the letter said only that she was being suspended with pay pending an outcome of an investigation.
Once the district determined to undertake an investigation related to the December 1990 incident, its decision to suspend relator would appear to be beyond challenge. Suspension with pay is a commonly used procedure.
Having determined to do so, the action could hardly have been done in secret. Having in mind the unrest at the Meadow Lake School and the parent participation in the December incident, it would appear to me that the board had no alternative but to communicate with the parents to advise them what has happening.
I do not understand what our requiring the board to hold a hearing will accomplish. We have already said they need not reinstate her. Minn.Stat. § 125.12 does not appear to address the school board authority to hold hearings except as it relates to employment status.
*401As concerns relator’s good name, the district, at the time of suspension and reassignment, emphasized the actions were not disciplinary or punitive. I am not sure that a hearing can do more than that.
I would order that the writ of certiorari be discharged.