G & J Investments Corp. v. Florida Dept. of Health & Rehabilitative Services

• Decision Date: 22 March 1983
• Docket Number: No. 82-1565,82-1565
• Citation: 429 So.2d 391
• Court: Florida District Court of Appeals
• Parties: G & J INVESTMENTS CORPORATION, Appellant, v. FLORIDA DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND REHABILITATIVE SERVICES, Appellee.

Page 391

429 So.2d 391

G & J INVESTMENTS CORPORATION, Appellant, v. FLORIDA DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND REHABILITATIVE SERVICES, Appellee.

No. 82-1565.

District Court of Appeal of Florida,

Third District.

March 22, 1983.

Rehearing Denied April 25, 1983.

R. Stuart Huff and Gregg J. Ormond, Coral Gables, for appellant.

Robert P. Daniti, Tallahassee, for appellee.

Before NESBITT, DANIEL S. PEARSON and FERGUSON, JJ.

DANIEL S. PEARSON, Judge.

The appellant, G & J Investments Corporation, a landlord, recovered a judgment for overdue rent owed by its tenant, a nursing home operator. The judgment having gone unsatisfied, G & J sought a writ of garnishment against the Florida Department of Health and Rehabilitative Services (HRS), claiming that HRS was holding Medicaid funds due to G & J's judgment debtor. The trial court quashed the writ on the ground that HRS, a state agency, was immune from garnishment proceedings. G & J appeals. We affirm.

Absent a clear and unequivocal legislative enactment making the state, its agencies and subdivisions liable in garnishment proceedings, they are immune from such proceedings. See Wesley Construction Company v. Biscayne Construction, Inc., 341 So.2d 786 (Fla. 3d DCA 1977) (order directing county to distrain funds owing to a party for the benefit of such party's creditor is equivalent to garnishment proceeding against a state's subdivision and impermissible); State (Dept. of Transp.) (Parks and Recreation Division of General Services Bureau) v. Gordon Bros. Concrete, Inc., 339 So.2d 1156 (Fla. 2d DCA 1976) (doctrine of sovereign immunity protects state from garnishment proceedings; statute providing right of garnishment contains no waiver by state); Board of County Com'rs. v. Gulf Pipeline Co., 168 So.2d 757 (Fla. 1st DCA 1964) (county immune from action asserting equitable lien against money owing by it to another, "in essence an indirect or equitable garnishment," in absence of statutory authority). We are bound to employ a rule of strict construction against waiver of immunity, Berek v. Metropolitan Dade County, 422 So.2d 838 (Fla.1982); Arnold v. Schumpert, 217 So.2d 116 (Fla.1968); Spangler v. Florida State Turnpike Authority, 106 So.2d 421 (Fla.1958), and cannot, as appellant suggests we do, imply from legislation authorizing HRS to be sued in actions ex contractu, see § 402.34, Fla.Stat. (1981), an authorization that it may be sued in garnishment proceedings. Moreover, were we free to make such an implication, we would not do so. We perceive a distinction between the state being sued as a party defendant and being sued as a garnishee. ¹ The number of garnishment suits which the state might be called upon to defend, being limited only by the number of creditors of the person to whom the state is said to owe money, would vastly exceed the number of contract actions. While this would not result in any greater encroachment on the public treasury, that is but one of the public policy considerations upon which the doctrine of sovereign immunity rests. The second policy consideration underlying the doctrine is to protect against the disruption of the orderly administration of government. Spangler, 106 So.2d at 424. Surely, the Legislature could legitimately conclude that the proliferation of litigation which...