Bouvier v. Wilson

• Decision Date: 21 April 1981
• Docket Number: No. 72-80,72-80
• Parties: Pamela BOUVIER, et al. v. David WILSON, Commissioner of Social Welfare.
• Court: Vermont Supreme Court

Page 465

431 A.2d 465

139 Vt. 494

Pamela BOUVIER, et al. v. David WILSON, Commissioner of Social Welfare.

No. 72-80.

Supreme Court of Vermont.

April 21, 1981.

David Watts and Gretchen S. Bailey, Vermont Legal Aid, Inc., Burlington, for plaintiffs.

M. Jerome Diamond, Atty. Gen., Montpelier, and Michael O. McShane, Asst. Atty. Gen., Waterbury, for defendant.

Before BARNEY, C. J., LARROW, BILLINGS and HILL, JJ., and SHANGRAW, C. J. (Ret.), Specially Assigned.

BARNEY, Chief Justice.

The Department of Social Welfare issued a regulation, W.A.M. § 2613.2, restricting the duration of unlimited temporary housing payments under the General Assistance program to twenty-eight days in any six month period. The level of assistance would then drop to the level of the permanent housing allotment for the area. An action was brought on behalf of six plaintiffs challenging the regulation as unauthorized under the provisions of the Vermont statutes relating to welfare and general assistance (33 V.S.A. chs. 26 and 38), as well as violating the Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution. The plaintiffs sought to have the action stand as a class action under V.R.C.P. 23, but since the trial court did not so order it as provided in V.R.C.P. 23(c)(1), it remains a suit maintained by the plaintiffs on their own behalf.

The lower court made findings and adjudged the regulation invalid as inconsistent with the statutory purposes of 33 V.S.A. § 2501(1), which states the goal to be to "provide assistance and benefits to persons ... in proven need thereof and eligible for such assistance ...." The disposition did not dispute the right of the Department to exercise its authority to maximize the effect of the money appropriated for the General Assistance program, but it did find that the regulation in question, W.A.M. § 2613.2, went beyond the reasonable bounds of the Department's authority and struck it down. The court found it unnecessary to reach any constitutional issues.

There is no significant factual dispute in this case. The General Assistance program is wholly state funded, but has not been adequately financed by the Legislature over the past several years. The Department is concerned because a new program designed to meet emergency fuel needs has now been added to the underfunded General Assistance program.

33 V.S.A. § 2554 provides:

Should the funds available for assistance be insufficient to provide assistance to all those eligible, the amounts of assistance granted in any program or portion thereof shall be reduced equitably, in the discretion of the commissioner by regulation.

Under that authority the regulation in question, W.A.M. § 2613.2, was promulgated. The temporary shelter program has been an expensive one, of uneven application. This is because not all recipients can find permanent lodgings, particularly in Chittenden County, and because temporary shelter has been two to four times the cost level of the maximum allowed for permanent housing. Many recipients are living, and some have lived for some time, in hotels or motels. Until W.A.M. § 2613.2 there was no duration limit on the amount of temporary housing assistance a recipient could be given.

After a year's study, the Department determined that approximately 21% of the people receiving temporary housing assistance were unable to locate alternatives to temporary housing within 28 days or less. Under the regulation, they would go onto the permanent housing allowance which would be insufficient to keep them housed as they were, and would result, very probably, in eviction. Although not reflected in the findings, the evidence pointed out by the plaintiffs demonstrates the nature of the Department's concern. In the year of study, 542 people in Chittenden County received temporary housing assistance at a cost of $157,164.35. $68,142.76, or 43%, of this was paid out in benefits for people in temporary housing for twenty-eight days or more. This, the Department claims, indicates that a small number of recipients are consuming a disproportionate amount of that welfare money, justifying the regulation ultimately decided upon.

The basic inquiry is whether the regulation is in harmony with the statutory scheme, uniform in operation and equal in effect so as to be a valid exercise of regulatory authority. Hatin v. Philbrook, 134 Vt. 456, 459, 365 A.2d 511, 513 (1976). If it conforms to that test, the fact that the regulatory solution is not the one this Court would have selected or preferred is of no moment. Welfare benefits are awards created entirely by statutory authority, and therefore any regulatory exercises must likewise be consistent with the enacted law.

The plaintiffs argue that it is not their position that the imposition of a complete bar to temporary housing assistance after twenty-eight days when permanent housing assistance is available is invalid per se. The claim is that, given the present housing conditions in Vermont, the challenged regulation will result in large numbers of people being without shelter, and therefore the new provision does not meet the requirements of the Welfare Code. At the time this action was brought these plaintiffs, all from Chittenden County, had all received temporary shelter assistance for periods ranging from four to twenty months at the time of the hearing, and all had been unsuccessful in finding permanent housing.

The social welfare policy of the state is given in 33 V.S.A. § 2501:

It is the policy of the state of Vermont that:

(1) Its social welfare programs shall provide assistance and benefits to persons of the state in proven need thereof and eligible for such assistance and benefits under the provisions of this title; ....

Aid is defined in 33 V.S.A. § 2502(a)(1) as "financial assistance."

General assistance is defined by 33 V.S.A. § 3001(4) as: "financial aid to provide the necessities of life including food, clothing, shelter, fuel, electricity, medical care and other items as the commissioner may prescribe by regulation when a need is found to exist and the applicant is otherwise found eligible."

33 V.S.A. § 3004(a), dealing with eligibility, opens with the following statement: "Consistent with available appropriations, the department of social welfare shall furnish general assistance under this chapter, except as provided below, to any otherwise eligible individual unable to provide the necessities of life for himself and for those whom he is legally obligated to support."

Taking all of these statutory directions together, it is established that the Department has a duty to furnish monetary assistance to eligible persons in need, and if the appropriated funds are insufficient to provide full assistance, the amounts granted are to be reduced equitably. The law calls for this equitable reduction to be accomplished through the exercise of discretionary judgment by the Commissioner and the result incorporated into regulations. 33 V.S.A. § 2554.

Without intending to detract from or in any way distort the claims of the plaintiffs, it seems clear that all of the challenges to the proposed regulation center on the claimed failure of the proposal to represent a sufficiently "equitable" reduction to comply with the statutory purposes, or even to pass a broader "due process" or "equal protection" constitutional test. The trial court overturned the regulation entirely on the basis that the...