Notice of Appeal of State Agency Ruling Must Identify Specific Legal or Factual Errors
2008-0584 and 2008-0630. Medcorp, Inc. v. Ohio Dept. of Job & Family Servs., Slip Opinion No. 2009-Ohio-2058.
Franklin App. No. 07AP-312, 2008-Ohio-464. Certified question answered in the affirmative, judgment of the court of appeals reversed, and cause dismissed for lack of jurisdiction.
Moyer, C.J., and O'Connor, Lanzinger, and Cupp, JJ., concur.
Pfeifer, Lundberg Stratton, and O'Donnell, JJ., dissent.
Opinion: http://www.supremecourt.ohio.gov/rod/docs/pdf/0/2009/2009-Ohio-2058.pdf 
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(May 7, 2009) The Supreme Court of Ohio held today that R.C. 119.12 requires a party appealing an administrative order or ruling by a state agency to identify in its notice of appeal one or more specific legal or factual errors in the order being appealed, rather than merely restating the statutory standard of review for such orders.
The Court’s 4-3 majority decision, authored by Chief Justice Thomas J. Moyer, reversed a ruling by the 10th District Court of Appeals.
The case involved a 2006 adjudication order issued by the Ohio Department of Job & Family Services (ODJFS) in which the department ordered Medcorp Inc. to repay $534,719 it had previously billed the department for providing ambulance services to Ohio Medicaid patients. The order was based on an audit of claims Medcorp had submitted in 1996 and 1997.
Pursuant to R.C. 119.12, Medcorp filed a notice of appeal with the Franklin County Court of Common Pleas seeking judicial reversal of the department’s administrative order. In its notice of appeal, Medcorp stated that the ODJFS order in question “is not in accordance with law and is not supported by reliable, probative and substantial evidence.” ODJFS moved for dismissal of the appeal, arguing that Medcorp’s appeal notice had merely restated the generic standard of review for reversal of any administrative order, and that language did not “state the grounds” upon which Medcorp’s appeal of the specific order in this case was based as required by R.C. 119.12. Accordingly, they argued, the notice of appeal was defective and did not properly invoke the jurisdiction of the trial court. Rather than ruling on the motion to dismiss, the trial court issued a decision on the merits of the appeal and reversed the department’s order.
The department appealed to the 10th District Court of Appeals and raised the question of the trial court’s jurisdiction, along with a question on the merits. The court of appeals concluded that the language of Medcorp’s notice of appeal set forth sufficient grounds to invoke the jurisdiction of the trial court, and it affirmed the trial court’s decision on the merits. ODJFS sought and was granted Supreme Court review of the 10th District’s ruling.
Writing for the majority in today’s decision, Chief Justice Moyer noted that R.C. 119.12 requires that notices of appeals must set forth “the order appealed from and the grounds of the party’s appeal,” and said the Court’s duty is to “apply the statute as written when the meaning is clear and unambiguous.”
Citing similar definitions of the word “grounds” from standard and legal dictionaries, the Chief Justice wrote: “(T)o comply with R.C. 119.12, an appealing party must state in its notice of appeal the specific legal and/or factual reasons why it is appealing. The statute does not suggest that parties must present these reasons in exacting detail. Rather, parties must simply designate the explicit objection they are raising to the administrative agency’s order, much in the same way that appellants in a court of appeals must assert specific legal arguments in the form of assignments of error and issues for review ... and appellants in this court must advance propositions of law.”
“In this case, Medcorp claimed that the department’s audit determination was based on a flawed statistical-sampling methodology for which there is no provision in the department’s internal procedural manuals. Thus, in its notice of appeal, Medcorp could have stated, ‘The department erred when it employed a flawed statistical-sampling methodology to support its audit finding against Medcorp’ or ‘The department used a statistical-sampling methodology not provided for in its internal procedural manuals.’ If Medcorp believed that the department acted in contravention of a specific statute, it could have simply said, ‘The department’s audit was not conducted in compliance with’ that statute. Any of these statements could fairly be called grounds for appeal, and all would have notified the court and the department of the precise argument being advanced.”
“When a party files an appeal from an order of an administrative agency, it is already making an affirmative statement that it believes that the underlying order ‘is not supported by reliable, probative, and substantial evidence, and/or is not in accordance with law’ because it must meet that standard to succeed on appeal under the plain language of R.C. 119.12. If we were to adopt Medcorp’s position, those same, general words could be used in virtually every appeal from an administrative agency filed pursuant to the statute. By specifically requiring an appealing party to state the ‘grounds of [its] appeal’ in the notice of appeal, the General Assembly clearly intended that the appealing party should provide some information supporting its conclusion that the order is not in accordance with law and is not supported by reliable, probative, and substantial evidence. If every appealing party could simply restate the standard of review applicable to all appeals without further specification, this requirement would, in effect, be excised from the statute.”
In view of these and other reasons set forth in the majority opinion, Chief Justice Moyer concluded: “(W)e hold that to satisfy the ‘grounds of the party’s appeal’ requirement in R.C. 119.12, parties appealing under that statute must identify specific legal or factual errors in their notices of appeal; they may not simply restate the standard of review. While an extensive explanation of the alleged errors is not required at that point in the proceedings, the stated grounds must be specific enough that the trial court and opposing party can identify the objections and proceed accordingly, much in the same way that assignments of error and issues for review are presented in the courts of appeals and propositions of law are asserted in this court.”
Because the notice of appeal filed by Medcorp in this case simply restated the statutory standard of review rather than designating specific legal or factual errors in the ODJFS order it wished to appeal, the Chief Justice concluded that the notice “does not strictly comply with the plain meaning of R.C. 119.12, and thus the trial court lacked jurisdiction to consider Medcorp’s appeal.”
The majority opinion was joined by Justice Maureen O’Connor, Judith Ann Lanzinger and Robert R. Cupp. Justices Evelyn Lundberg Stratton and Terrence O’Donnell entered dissenting opinions, both of which were joined by Justice Paul E. Pfeifer.
Justice Stratton stated that she would affirm the court of appeals’ holding that Medcorp’s notice of appeal was sufficient to invoke the jurisdiction of the common pleas court. She wrote: “The plain language of R.C. 119.12 does not require an appealing party to state the ‘grounds of the party’s appeal’ with any specificity. ... I believe that the majority has added a degree of specificity that the General Assembly did not include in the statute. Had the General Assembly intended to require specific grounds in the notice of appeal, it could have included language in R.C. 119.12 requiring the appealing party to indicate how the order was not supported by reliable, probative, and substantial evidence. ... R.C. 119.12 is a general statute that covers appeals from many different agencies. Thus, ‘[t]he language of the statute must be of a general nature to accommodate the many agencies within its purview.’ ... The grounds requirement may be met by simply stating in the operative words of R.C. 119.12 that the order appealed from ‘is not supported by reliable, probative, and substantial evidence, and/or is not in accordance with law.’”
Justice O’Donnell suggested that the majority’s holding went beyond interpretation of R.C. 119.12 and added a new requirement not imposed by the legislature by requiring appellants to identify specific errors in administrative orders in their initial notices of appeal.
“R.C. 119.12 does not set forth the specificity requirement imposed by the majority,” wrote Justice O’Donnell. “Rather, it calls for the notice of appeal to identify only the order appealed from and the ‘grounds’ of the party’s appeal. It says nothing about legal or factual errors. Thus, in my view, an appeal may be taken on procedural or constitutional grounds by using the words ‘not in accordance with law,’ as Medcorp did here. Tinkering with statutes as the majority has chosen to do here only complicates the practice of law for practitioners, who rely on the words used by the legislature to determine what they must do to properly file a notice of appeal. R.C. 119.12 does not require an appellant to identify a specific legal or factual error nor does it call for a party to ‘designate precise errors.’ ... The majority’s decision to insert these requirements into this statute prevents me from joining it. I would urge the General Assembly to clarify its intent with regard to this important area of law.”
Contacts
Benjamin C. Mizer, 614.466.8980, for the Ohio Department of Job & Family Services.
Geoffrey E. Webster, 614.461.1156, for Medcorp Inc.