South Carolina              
Administrative Law Court
Edgar A. Brown building 1205 Pendleton St., Suite 224 Columbia, SC 29201 Voice: (803) 734-0550

SC Administrative Law Court Decisions

CAPTION:
Michelle Hatfield vs. SCBCB

AGENCY:
South Carolina Budget and Control Board

PARTIES:
Petitioner:
Michelle Hatfield

Respondent:
South Carolina Budget and Control Board, South Carolina Retirement Systems
 
DOCKET NUMBER:
06-ALJ-30-0181-CC

APPEARANCES:
n/a
 

ORDERS:

ORDER OF DISMISSAL

The above-captioned case is before this Court upon the request of Petitioner Michelle Hatfield for a contested case hearing to challenge the decision of Respondent South Carolina Budget and Control Board, South Carolina Retirement Systems (SCRS), to deny her application for disability retirement benefits. By a Motion to Dismiss filed on April 21, 2006, SCRS moved to dismiss this matter because Petitioner failed to timely file her request for a contested case with this Court, and thus failed to properly invoke this Court’s jurisdiction. Petitioner has not filed a response to the motion filed by SCRS. For the reasons set forth below, I find that SCRS’ motion to dismiss must be granted.

BACKGROUND

On January 11, 2006, Respondent SCRS issued a Final Agency Determination to Petitioner Michelle Hatfield, in which SCRS denied her application for disability retirement benefits. On that same day, SCRS mailed the Final Agency Determination to Petitioner along with a cover letter explaining how to challenge the determination by filing a request for a contested case hearing with the Administrative Law Court. See Resp’t Mot. to Dismiss, Ex. #1. The cover letter explained that the request must be filed with the Administrative Law Court within thirty days of Petitioner’s receipt of the determination and provided Petitioner with the address to the Court and a blank form for a Request for a Contested Case Hearing, as well as information about the Court’s filing fee. See Resp’t Mot. to Dismiss, Ex. #1. In particular, in the section of the letter captioned “DEADLINE TO APPEAL,” the cover letter informed Petitioner that, “[i]n order to appeal the Final Agency Determination, you must file the Request for a Contested Case Hearing with the Administrative Law Court within thirty (30) calendar days after receipt of this Final Agency Determination,” and that, “[i]f you fail to respond within this time limitation, your right to appeal the Final Agency Determination will end.” Resp’t Mot. to Dismiss, Ex. #1, at 2 (emphasis in original).

Petitioner received the Final Agency Determination, with the cover letter and attached documents, by certified mail on January 13, 2006. See Resp’t Mot. to Dismiss, Ex. #2. Subsequently, Petitioner submitted a Request for a Contested Case Hearing and a Request to Waive Filing Fee to SCRS; these documents were received by SCRS on February 13, 2006. However, Petitioner did not file those documents or similar papers with this Court at that time. In fact, the Court did not receive Petitioner’s request for a contested case hearing and request for a waiver of the filing fee until SCRS forwarded those documents to the Court on March 15, 2006, after it had learned, through a conversation with the Clerk’s Office, that Petitioner had not filed any of her documents with the Court.

DISCUSSION

The South Carolina Administrative Law Court is authorized to preside over contested cases concerning disputes between a member of the South Carolina retirement system and SCRS. See S.C. Code Ann. §§ 1-23-600(B) (Supp. 2005), 9-21-60 (Supp. 2005). However, for this Court to hear such a contested case, its jurisdiction must be properly invoked through a timely request for a contested case. See Botany Bay Marina, Inc. v. Townsend, 296 S.C. 330, 372 S.E.2d 584 (1988) (holding that a party’s failure to file an appeal of a zoning decision within the statutory time period divested the board of adjustment of jurisdiction to hear the appeal), overruled on other grounds by Woodard v. Westvaco Corp., 319 S.C. 240, 460 S.E.2d 392 (1995); Burnett v. S.C. State Highway Dep’t, 252 S.C. 568, 167 S.E.2d 571 (1969) (holding that a landowner’s failure to timely appeal a condemnation decision by the Highway Department deprived the reviewing court of jurisdiction to hear the appeal); see also, e.g., Schaible Oil Co. v. N.J. Dep’t of Envtl. Prot., 586 A.2d 853, 855-56 (N.J. Super. Ct. App. Div. 1991) (“The statutory time limit for requesting an adjudicatory hearing is mandatory and jurisdictional[;] . . . . enlargement of statutory time for appeal to a state administrative agency lies solely within the power of the Legislature . . . and not with the agency or the courts.”); Lewis v. N.C. Dep’t of Human Res., 375 S.E.2d 712, 714 (N.C. Ct. App. 1989) (“The right to appeal to an administrative agency is granted by statute, and compliance with statutory provisions is necessary to sustain the appeal.”). In the instant matter, Petitioner failed to timely file her request for a contested case to challenge SCRS’ Final Agency Determination and, therefore, failed to properly invoke this Court’s jurisdiction.

Pursuant to ALC Rule 11(C), a request for a contested case hearing to challenge a final agency determination “must be filed and served within thirty (30) days after actual or constructive notice of the agency’s determination.” Similarly, Section 9-21-60 of the South Carolina Retirement Systems Claims Procedures Act provides that a request for contested case review of a final decision by SCRS must be filed “within thirty calendar days after the claimant receives [SCRS’] final decision.” S.C. Code Ann. § 9-21-60. In the case at hand, Petitioner did not file a request for a contested case hearing to challenge SCRS’ denial of her application for disability retirement benefits with this Court within thirty days after she received—and thus had actual notice of—the denial on January 13, 2006. In fact, Petitioner did not file a request for a contested case with this Court at any time. Therefore, while Petitioner did attempt to timely file a request for a contested case by sending a request to SCRS within the thirty-day period after she received SCRS’ final determination, she did not cross the mandatory jurisdictional threshold of timely filing such a request with this Court. Accordingly, this Court has no choice but to find that Petitioner failed to properly invoke this Court’s jurisdiction and to conclude that this matter must be dismissed. However, in dismissing this case, this Court wishes to emphasize that, while it is sympathetic to Petitioner’s circumstances and realizes that this dismissal may seem unduly harsh, it has an obligation to carefully examine jurisdictional questions like that presented here, see, e.g., State v. Johnston, 327 S.C. 435, 438, 489 S.E.2d 228, 230 (Ct. App. 1997), rev’d on other grounds, 333 S.C. 459, 510 S.E.2d 423 (1999) (holding that “it is the duty of the court to assure that it renders no decision in a matter when it has no authority to act”), and is constrained from extending the time for filing a request for a contested case or deeming an untimely request to be timely because of the filing party’s mistake, inadvertence, surprise, or excusable neglect, see, e.g., Burnett, 252 S.C. at 570-71, 167 S.E.2d at 572.

ORDER

For the reasons set forth above,

IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that SCRS’ motion to dismiss is GRANTED and the above-captioned case is DISMISSED with prejudice.

AND IT IS SO ORDERED.

______________________________

JOHN D. GEATHERS

Administrative Law Judge

1205 Pendleton Street, Suite 224

Columbia, South Carolina 29201-3731

May 18, 2006

Columbia, South Carolina


Brown Bldg.

 

 

 

 

 

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