EX PARTE BROOKWOOD HEALTH SERVICES, INC.

• Decision Date: 13 October 2000
• Citation: 781 So.2d 954
• Parties: Ex parte BROOKWOOD HEALTH SERVICES, INC., d/b/a Brookwood Medical Center. (Re Brookwood Health Services, Inc. v. The Alabama State Health Planning and Development Agency et al.)
• Court: Alabama Supreme Court

781 So.2d 954

Ex parte BROOKWOOD HEALTH SERVICES, INC., d/b/a Brookwood Medical Center.

(Re Brookwood Health Services, Inc. v. The Alabama State Health Planning and Development Agency et al.)

1981866.

Supreme Court of Alabama.

October 13, 2000.

John T. Mooresmith, John C. Morrow, Cary Tynes Wahlheim, and Cameron Turner Earnhardt of Burr & Forman, L.L.P., Birmingham, for petitioner.

Mark D. Wilkerson and R. Winston Lee of Brantley & Wilkerson, P.C., Montgomery, for respondent Alabama State Health Planning and Development Agency.

R. Marcus Givhan of Johnston, Barton, Proctor & Powell, L.L.P., Birmingham; Charles M. Crook of Balch & Bingham, L.L.P., Montgomery; and Frank C. Ellis, Jr., of Wallace, Ellis, Fowler & Head, Columbiana, for respondent Shelby County Health Care Authority d/b/a Shelby Medical Center and Nursing Home.

BROWN, Justice.

Brookwood Health Services, Inc. ("Brookwood"), appealed to the Montgomery Circuit Court from a decision of the Alabama State Health Planning and Development Agency ("SHPDA"). The Montgomery Circuit Court transferred the appeal to the Shelby Circuit Court, under the doctrine of forum non conveniens. Brookwood petitions for a writ of mandamus directing the Montgomery Circuit Court to set aside its transfer order, arguing that the court abused its discretion in entering that order. We grant the petition and issue the writ.

In May 1996, Brookwood applied for a certificate of need ("CON") to construct and operate a cancer-treatment center in Shelby County. The Shelby County Health Care Authority ("the Authority"), acting with the assistance of Baptist Health Systems ("Baptist"), timely intervened in Brookwood's CON application and requested a contested-case hearing.

Two months after Brookwood filed its application, the Authority submitted its separate CON application to construct and operate a cancer-treatment center in Shelby County. Brookwood timely intervened in the Authority's CON application and requested a contested-case hearing.

Because it had two separate CON applications, SHPDA assigned the review of both applications and their respective interventions to the same administrative law judge ("ALJ"). Before the hearings, the ALJ denied the Authority's request for consolidation and comparative review; however, she allowed the contested-case hearings to be conducted back-to-back for the convenience of the witnesses and the parties. The contested-case hearing on Brookwood's application was held first. Following the conclusion of that hearing, the Authority designated all of the testimony and evidence received in the Brookwood hearing as evidence in support of its application for a CON. Subsequently, the ALJ issued her findings of fact and conclusions of law, and she recommended that both Brookwood and the Authority be granted a CON for the construction and operation of a cancer-treatment center in Shelby County.

The Certificate of Need Review Board ("CONRB") conducted public hearings on both Brookwood's proposal and the Authority's proposal and voted consecutively to approve both projects. Thereafter, Brookwood and Baptist separately filed requests for a fair-hearing review of the CONs granted. Although the hearings were conducted by the same Fair Hearing Officer ("FHO") on the same day, the FHO did not merge or consolidate the cases. The FHO upheld both the CON granted to Brookwood and the CON granted to the Authority.

On December 11, 1998, Baptist filed in the Shelby Circuit Court a petition for judicial review of the CON granted to Brookwood. On December 23, 1998, Brookwood filed in the Montgomery Circuit Court a petition for judicial review of the CON granted to the Authority. The Authority, on January 22, 1999, moved to transfer Brookwood's appeal from the Montgomery Circuit Court to the Shelby Circuit Court.

In its order transferring Brookwood's appeal to the Shelby Circuit Court, the Montgomery Circuit Court stated:

"Both parties agree that venue is proper in Montgomery County, but Shelby County Health Care Authority asks the Court to exercise its discretion under the forum non conveniens doctrine to transfer this case to Shelby County so that the same court can decide both appeals arising from essentially a single record involving interdependent facts and issues, and that the county where the proposed service is to be located is the most logical forum for the case."

Brookwood filed a motion to "reconsider" the transfer. The Montgomery Circuit Court denied the motion. Brookwood petitioned the Court of Civil Appeals for a writ of mandamus directing the circuit court to set aside the transfer order. The Court of Civil Appeals denied the petition on July 20, 1999, without an opinion. Ex parte Brookwood Health Servs., Inc., (No. 2981098) 781 So.2d 1034 (Ala.Civ.App.1999) (table). Brookwood now petitions this Court for the writ. See Rule 21, Ala. R.App.P.

Mandamus is a drastic and extraordinary writ, to be issued only where there is (1) a clear legal right in the petitioner to the order sought, (2) an imperative duty upon the respondent to perform, accompanied by a refusal to do so, (3) the lack of another adequate remedy, and (4) properly invoked jurisdiction of the court. Ex parte Integon Corp., 672 So.2d 497, 499 (Ala.1995). "A petition for the writ of mandamus is a proper method for presenting a venue challenge based on the doctrine of forum non conveniens." Id. (citations...