Albritton v. Neighborhood Centers Ass'n for Child Development, 83-1052

Decision Date01 August 1984
Docket NumberNo. 83-1052,83-1052
Citation12 Ohio St.3d 210,12 OBR 295,466 N.E.2d 867
Parties, 12 O.B.R. 295 ALBRITTON et al., Appellants, v. NEIGHBORHOOD CENTERS ASSOCIATION FOR CHILD DEVELOPMENT, Appellee.
CourtOhio Supreme Court

Syllabus by the Court

The doctrine of charitable immunity is hereby abolished. A charitable organization is subject to liability in tort to the same extent as any other person or corporation.

This is an action brought by Alfreda Albritton, on behalf of herself and her minor child, against the Neighborhood Centers Association for Child Development ("NCA") and the Eleanor B. Rainey Memorial Institute, Inc. ("Rainey Institute"), both nonprofit corporations. The child was injured while participating in a Head Start day care program run by NCA and housed at the Rainey Institute.

NCA operated this program pursuant to an arrangement with the Council for Economic Opportunities In Greater Cleveland, Inc. The program was federally funded and NCA was required to conform to federal guidelines and comply with all applicable state and local laws, ordinances and codes. The child attended the program and participated at no cost.

In March 1981, NCA moved for summary judgment on the ground that it was immune from liability under the doctrine of charitable immunity. NCA's motion was granted on May 1, 1981. Albritton then moved for relief from judgment pending submission of further pleadings. This motion was granted. On April 15, 1982 the trial court again granted NCA summary judgment. Albritton entered into a covenant not to sue with the Rainey Institute and her claim against Rainey was dismissed. The court of appeals affirmed the grant of summary judgment for NCA.

This cause is now before the court pursuant to the allowance of a motion to certify the record.

Alan I. Goodman, Cleveland, for appellants.

Neil E. Roberts, Cleveland, for appellee.

WILLIAM B. BROWN, Justice.

The issue presented by this case is whether an organization enjoys immunity from liability for damages in tort merely because it is organized for charitable purposes. Because this court can no longer discover any valid, rational reasons for retaining charitable immunity this doctrine is hereby abolished.

A preliminary question is raised as to whether NCA is, in fact, a charity and able to raise the defense of charitable immunity at all. Albritton contends that NCA is a far different organization than the purely eleemosynary institution envisioned at the time charitable immunity was established. Instead, Albritton maintains NCA is a quasi-governmental organization and subject to liability under this court's ruling in Enghauser Mfg. Co. v. Eriksson Engineering Ltd. (1983), 6 Ohio St.3d 31, 451 N.E.2d 228. In support of this position, Albritton points to the source of NCA's funds and the agreement to abide by the rules and regulations of various governmental levels.

Civ.R. 56(E) provides, in pertinent part:

" * * * When a motion for summary judgment is made and supported as provided in this rule, an adverse party may not rest upon the mere allegations or denials of his pleadings, but his response, by affidavit or as otherwise provided in this rule, must set forth specific facts showing that there is a genuine issue for trial. If he does not so respond, summary judgment, if appropriate, shall be entered against him."

Thus, a party must establish, by specific facts, that there is a genuine issue for trial in order to avoid summary judgment. State, ex rel. Garfield Heights, v. Nadratowski (1976), 46 Ohio St.2d 441, 442-443, 349 N.E.2d 298 . Unsupported allegations in opposition to a motion for summary judgment are insufficient to require denial of the motion. Harless v. Willis Day Warehousing Co. (1978), 54 Ohio St.2d 64, 66, 375 N.E.2d 46 ; Mathis v. Cleveland Public Library (1984), 9 Ohio St.3d 199, 202, 459 N.E.2d 877.

In the present case, Albritton has never presented any specific facts, beyond the allegations in her pleadings, to challenge NCA's status. In contrast, NCA has supplied proof that it is a private nonprofit entity, created by incorporation and established as a tax-exempt charitable institution. Absent some factual response, by affidavit or as otherwise provided by Civ.R. 56, there was no issue to determine and the conclusion that NCA is a charity was proper. Albritton failed to make such a response. The only possible factual conclusion is, therefore, that NCA is a charity.

The legal conclusion is the same. Receipt of governmental funds alone is insufficient to transform an entity from charity to quasi-governmental agency. NCA had a contract to provide services. Public monies were paid NCA under that contract. Compliance with applicable laws and regulations by NCA was one condition of the contract. Under Albritton's rationale, any person or entity from church soup kitchen to defense supplier or highway contractor, under contract with any level of government by which public monies are paid and governmentally established standards met, would become a quasi-governmental agency. Obviously this contention reaches too far.

Instead, the relevant concern is whether an organization's day-to-day operations are governmentally supervised, not whether it receives public money and complies with governmental standards and regulations. United States v. Orleans (1976), 425 U.S. 807, 815, 96 S.Ct. 1971, 1976, 48 L.Ed.2d 390. Albritton has produced no evidence whatsoever of day-to-day governmental supervision of NCA's operations.

The critical question is whether the doctrine of charitable immunity retains any validity in Ohio today. The origin of the doctrine in the United States is well documented and needs no repetition here. See Avellone v. St. John's Hospital (1956), 165 Ohio St. 467, 469, 135 N.E.2d 410 , citing President & Directors of Georgetown College v. Hughes (C.A.D.C.1942), 130 F.2d 810. Suffice it to say that the rule was originally erroneously adopted in that it derived from dicta in two English cases which had already been overruled. Despite such a tenuous inception, the doctrine of charitable immunity spread until it became a concept firmly embedded in American jurisprudence, although not one universally accepted.

However, the "rule" of charitable immunity is, in reality, not a rule at all. In the first place, charitable immunity is an exception to the general principle of liability for tortious conduct. Individuals and entities are ordinarily held responsible for their own legally careless action and for negligent harms inflicted by their agents and employees. The form of legal organization may affect where liability is ultimately placed. But, in general, it does not nullify liability altogether and does not leave the burden of negligent injury to be borne exclusively by the victim.

Moreover, the "rule" of charitable immunity has itself been devoured by exceptions. The immunity was first adopted in Ohio in Taylor v. Protestant Hospital Assn. (1911), 85 Ohio St. 90, 96 N.E. 1089. Subsequent decisions gave additional vitality to that doctrine. Since then, the landscape of charitable immunity has been so pockmarked with exceptions as to be virtually unrecognizable. Immunity for hospitals has been abolished. Avellone v. St. John's Hospital, supra. There is no charitable immunity where the injured plaintiff is not a beneficiary of the defendant charity or where the plaintiff is harmed as a result of the charity's negligence in the selection or retention of an employee. Gibbon v. Y.W.C.A. (1960), 170 Ohio St. 280, 164 N.E.2d 563 , paragraph one of the syllabus. Likewise, a charity is liable where it operates a business enterprise for profit not directly related to the purpose for which the organization was established. Blankenship v. Alter (1960), 171 Ohio St. 65, 167 N.E.2d 922 . Finally, there is no immunity where the plaintiff pays for services rendered by the charity. Bell v. Salvation Army (1961), 172 Ohio St. 326, 175 N.E.2d 738 . In light of these exceptions it is apparent that the doctrine of charitable immunity is not an ironclad, sacrosanct rule but has been severely limited in its actual application. Indeed, the very existence of these manifold exceptions militates strongly against all of the policy arguments advanced in favor of retention of the doctrine.

Furthermore, charitable immunity does not, and has not, existed as a "rule" in the nation as a whole. In other jurisdictions charitable immunity survived only in a welter of conflict founded on a kaleidoscope of result and reasoning. See, generally, President & Directors of Georgetown College v. Hughes, supra, at 817-822. There is, consequently, no compelling precedential reason for retention of this doctrine.

This court has previously founded its acceptance of charitable immunity on the theory of public policy. Avellone v. St. John's Hospital, supra, 165 Ohio St. at 473, 135 N.E.2d 410; Gibbon v. Y.W.C.A., supra, 170 Ohio St. at 288, 164 N.E.2d 922. This theory reasons that charities are good and that their purpose, to provide services for intended beneficiaries, should not be defeated by indemnification of tort claimants. As NCA has characterized the rationale, it has been determined that the benefit to society as a whole from protecting charitable organizations outweighs the detriment to any one particular injured individual.

As was discussed in Avellone, resolution of such a question involves a balancing of two rights. On the one hand is the right of charitable organizations to any benefit and assistance which society can justly allow them. On the other hand is the right of an individual, injured by the negligence of another, to seek compensation. In Gibbon this court concluded that public policy considerations were not such as to alter the doctrine of charitable immunity beyond its state at that time. A careful review of the competing policies underlying the present question convinces this court that that conclusion is no longer justified.

In the first...

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