Henry v. White

• Decision Date: 02 May 1973
• Docket Number: Civ. No. 15322.
• Citation: 359 F. Supp. 969
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Connecticut
• Parties: Effie HENRY et al. v. Henry C. WHITE, Individually and as Commissioner of the Connecticut State Department of Welfare.

359 F. Supp. 969

Effie HENRY et al. v. Henry C. WHITE, Individually and as Commissioner of the Connecticut State Department of Welfare.

Civ. No. 15322.

United States District Court, D. Connecticut.

May 2, 1973.

Charles J. Tuohy, Norwalk Legal Services, South Norwalk, Conn., for plaintiffs.

Francis J. MacGregor, Asst. Atty. Gen., East Hartford, Conn., for defendant.

MEMORANDUM OF DECISION ON DEFENDANT'S MOTION TO DISMISS

NEWMAN, District Judge.

This is an action to enjoin the closing of the Connecticut Department of Welfare's subdistrict office in Norwalk, Connecticut, and the removal of this office to Bridgeport, Connecticut, some twelve miles away. Plaintiffs, welfare recipients previously served through the Norwalk office, allege that the closing of this office denies them equal protection under the Fourteenth Amendment and deprives them of their statutory rights under the Social Security Act, 42 U.S.C. § 301 et seq. Defendant has moved to dismiss the action for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted.

The Norwalk subdistrict office was closed during October, 1972. Clients previously served by this office are now required to obtain such services as are provided by the State Welfare Department at the Bridgeport office, either in person — a three-dollar bus ride from Norwalk — or by phone — normally a twenty-cent toll call.¹ Although one full-time caseworker is currently stationed by the Department in Norwalk, working in an office made available by a private charitable organization, the parties agree that plaintiffs and the class they seek to represent must rely all but exclusively on the Bridgeport office for social services, information, and adjustments, both major and minor, with regard to the payment of benefits. Plaintiffs assert this results in a severe restriction on the availability of services. Their affidavits state that it often takes twenty or more calls to make telephone contact with the Bridgeport office; that aid in obtaining housing in the Norwalk area is apparently completely unavailable; and that at least two recipients were unable to attend fair hearings held in Bridgeport despite their requests to have the hearings transferred to Norwalk, because of the distance involved.²

The complaint alleges that with one exception, no Connecticut city of equal or greater size, and having an equal or greater number of poor residents, is without a welfare office and that of the fourteen cities with such offices, seven have smaller total and poverty populations. Plaintiffs urge that the state interest asserted by defendant is insufficient to justify this apparently irrational discrimination. Plaintiffs argue from these allegations that the closing of the Norwalk office unconstitutionally discriminates against Norwalk area welfare recipients because they have arbitrarily been selected to have their access to statutorily mandated services significantly impaired.

In addition to their constitutional claim, plaintiffs also contend that the closing violates 42 U.S.C. §§ 302(a)(1), 602(a)(1), 1202(a)(1), and 1382(a)(1) which require that state plans for the provision of various categories of federally assisted aid "shall be in effect in all political subdivisions of the state"; plaintiffs claim that these statutory provisions mandate a uniform level of benefits — both money and services — throughout the state. Finally, plaintiffs rely on Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (HEW) regulations implementing the Social Security Act, in particular 45 C.F.R. § 250.120(a) and 45 C. F.R. § 205.130(b) for the proposition that local offices must be provided where needed "on a basis consistent with the equitable treatment of individuals in similar circumstances throughout the state." 45 C.F.R. § 205.130(b).

Whether the complaint withstands defendant's motion to dismiss turns on the substantiality of plaintiffs' constitutional claim, for if this claim does not state a cause of action for which 28 U.S.C. § 1343(3) provides jurisdiction, pendent jurisdiction may not be exercised on the statutory claims. See e. g., Almenares v. Wyman, 453 F.2d 1075, 1082 (2d Cir.), cert. denied, 405 U.S. 944, 92 S.Ct. 962, 30 L.Ed.2d 815 (1972); Hagans v. Wyman, 471 F.2d 347 (2d Cir., 1973).

At first glance, a state administrator's decision to effect economies by closing one of many local offices would seem immune from any judicial scrutiny, much less a district court's consideration of whether such action violates the Constitution. But whenever governmental action results in different treatment of people similarly situated, there is always the possibility that a claim under the equal protection clause can be established. The only question to be decided on this motion is whether plaintiffs' claim is so devoid of merit that the suit can be dismissed, or whether the defendant must make some showing, either at trial or possibly on a motion for summary judgment, that in fact no violation of the equal protection clause has occurred. This determination depends on the approach to be taken in assessing equal protection claims, a matter which Circuit Judge Timbers has only recently charitably characterized as "uncertain." Boraas v. Village of Belle Terre, 476 F. 2d 806, 826 (2d Cir., 1973).

The uncertainty extends to two aspects of the equal protection issue: the standard to be applied when the merits of the claim are assessed and the nature of the material to be relied upon in determining whether the applicable standard has been met. Within the Second Circuit recent cases have suggested that the appropriate standard is somewhat higher than the traditional rational relationship test. Boraas v. Village of Belle Terre, 476 F.2d 806 (2d Cir., 1973); City of New York v. Richardson, 473 F. 2d 923 (2d Cir., 1973); Aguayo v. Richardson, 473 F.2d 1090 (2d Cir., 1973); Green v. Waterford Board of Education, 473 F.2d 629 (2d Cir., 1973); but see Hagans v. Wyman, supra. While some Supreme Court decisions offer hints in this direction in some contexts, Gomez v. Perez, 409 U.S. 535, 93 S.Ct. 872, 35 L. Ed.2d 56 (1973); Weber v. Aetna Casualty & Surety Co., 406 U.S. 164, 172-176, 92 S.Ct. 1400, 31 L.Ed.2d 768 (1972); Reed v. Reed, 404 U.S. 71, 76, 92 S.Ct. 251, 30 L.Ed.2d 225 (1971), more recent cases suggest that the rational relationship test is alive and well, San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez, 411 U.S. 1, 93 S.Ct. 1278, 36 L.Ed.2d 16 (1973); McGinnis v. Royster, 410 U.S. 263, 93 S.Ct. 1055, 36 L.Ed.2d 282 (1973).

Uncertainty as to the standard may be the result of uncertainty as to the technique to be used in determining whether the standard has been met. The choice on this latter problem is between hypothesizing both a state interest that could rationally be considered legitimate and a theory on which the challenged classification could rationally be considered to advance the state interest, or requiring some indication that the possible state interest and the means of advancing it were in fact what the state had in mind. The highwater mark of the hypothesizing approach was McGowan v. Maryland, 366 U.S. 420, 426, 81 S.Ct. 1101, 1105, 6 L.Ed.2d 393 (1961), where the Court stated that "a statutory discrimination will not be set aside if any state of facts reasonably may be conceived to justify it." More recently, the Court seems to have moved away from looking for conceivably rational state interests towards a search for what it has twice called an "articulated" legitimate state interest. San Antonio School District v. Rodriguez, supra, 411 U.S. 1, 93 S.Ct. 1278; McGinnis v. Royster, supra, at 1062 of 410 U.S., 93 S.Ct. 1055. Apparently, such an interest is to be sought not from the imagination of counsel, but from the relevant materials illuminating the actual purpose of the challenged action. See Richardson v. Belcher, 404 U.S. 78, 92 S.Ct. 254, 30 L. Ed.2d 231 (1971).

Where, as here, the challenged action is administrative, rather than legislative, it seems especially appropriate to require some indication that an actual, as distinguished from a hypothetical, legitimate state interest is in fact being advanced. Although such an indication might in some circumstances be found in materials properly considered on a motion to dismiss, the insufficiency of the plaintiffs' equal protection...