Hurley v. Toia

• Decision Date: 03 May 1977
• Docket Number: No. 77 Civ. 1877 (JMC).,77 Civ. 1877 (JMC).
• Citation: 432 F. Supp. 1170
• Parties: Kathleen HURLEY, on behalf of herself and all other persons similarly situated, Plaintiff, v. Philip TOIA, Individually and in his capacity as Commissioner of the New York State Department of Social Services, and William J. Eagen, Jr., Individually and in his capacity as Dutchess County Commissioner of Social Services, Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Southern District of New York

432 F. Supp. 1170

Kathleen HURLEY, on behalf of herself and all other persons similarly situated, Plaintiff, v. Philip TOIA, Individually and in his capacity as Commissioner of the New York State Department of Social Services, and William J. Eagen, Jr., Individually and in his capacity as Dutchess County Commissioner of Social Services, Defendants.

No. 77 Civ. 1877 (JMC).

United States District Court, S. D. New York.

May 3, 1977.

Mid-Hudson Legal Services, Inc., Poughkeepsie, N.Y. (Jane E. Bloom, Michael E, Kolb, Barry Kaufman, and Bryan D. Hetherington, Poughkeepsie, N.Y., of counsel), for plaintiffs.

Louis J. Lefkowitz, Atty. Gen., New York City (Mark C. Rutzick, New York City, of counsel), for defendant Toia.

OPINION AND ORDER

CANNELLA, District Judge.

Named plaintiffs,¹ recipients of public assistance benefits under New York State's Home Relief program,² suing on behalf of themselves and all others similarly situated, seek a preliminary injunction staying the enforcement of a recent amendment to 18 N.Y.C.R.R. § 358.8(c)(1) insofar as it authorizes the termination, reduction or discontinuance of Home Relief benefits prior to affording the opportunity for a fair hearing to contest such termination, reduction or discontinuance. The Court finds that this action may be maintained as a class action, and hereby grants the motion for a preliminary injunction.

FACTS

Except for a thirty-day period during November 1976, plaintiff Kathleen Hurley had been a recipient of Home Relief continuously from March 1975 until April 13, 1977, when her assistance was terminated by action of the Dutchess County Department of Social Services ("Dutchess County DSS").³ Her termination was due to the following set of circumstances: Having been deemed employable by the Dutchess County DSS, Hurley was required to report for work relief assignments pursuant to N.Y. Social Services Law § 164 and 18 N.Y.C.R.R. § 385.3(b)(1)(v). In early March 1977 she contacted the local Social Services office to report that her mother was ill and could not care for herself or for plaintiff's two brothers, aged eleven and twelve. Plaintiff further stated she was going to tend her mother and brothers and therefore would be unable to report to her work relief assignment.⁴ Hurley failed to report for the entire month of March, and was notified, by letter dated March 28, 1977, that her assistance would be discontinued for this reason. See N.Y.Soc.Serv.Law § 164(4) (McKinney 1976).

After receiving this notice, Hurley made a timely request for a fair hearing to contest the discontinuance of benefits, but was denied continuation of assistance pending the hearing.⁵ In response to inquiries made by counsel, officials of both the Dutchess County and New York State DSS stated that "aid continuing" status had been denied by virtue of an amendment to 18 N.Y. C.R.R. § 358, effective April 11, 1977, that excepted from the usual requirement of a pre-termination fair hearing review of

a determination by a Social Services official, that a recipient voluntarily terminated his employment or reduced his earning capacity for the purpose of qualifying for a larger amount of Home Relief or that such person without good cause, refused to register with or report semimonthly to the New York State Employment Service, refused to accept employment or refused to participate in Work Relief on a public work project or that such person otherwise refused to comply with employability requirements of § 131 of the Social Services Law or Part 385 of this Title.

18 N.Y.C.R.R. § 358.8(c)(1).

The named plaintiffs, purporting to represent

all recipients of Home Relief in the State of New York who are deemed employable and are not caretakers of minor or needy children, who timely request fair hearings to contest the proposed discontinuance, suspension, or reduction of their benefits for alleged violations of employability requirements and whose benefits are terminated, suspended or reduced prior to the rendering of fair hearing decisions pursuant to 18 N.Y.C.R.R. § 358.8(c)(1),

maintain that the regulation is violative of their due process rights in that it allows discontinuance of public assistance benefits prior to a hearing on the correctness of such action. See Goldberg v. Kelly, 397 U.S. 254, 90 S.Ct. 1011, 25 L.Ed.2d 287 (1970).

Jurisdiction over this action is founded upon 28 U.S.C. § 1343(3) and 42 U.S.C. § 1983. Almenares v. Wyman, 453 F.2d 1075, 1081-83 (2d Cir. 1971), cert. denied, 405 U.S. 944, 92 S.Ct. 962, 30 L.Ed.2d 815 (1972).

CLASS ACTION CERTIFICATION

The Court finds this lawsuit properly maintainable as a class action, as the requisites of Rules 23(a) and 23(b)(2) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure have been satisfied.

Class Definition

At the outset, defendants maintain that the proposed class is too broadly drawn.⁶ Because the class includes individuals affected by five separate exceptions to the general requirement that aid continue pending the fair hearing determination, they argue that different issues will be raised with respect to some class members than are raised by others. These allegedly distinct categories arise when a Home Relief recipient has

1) voluntarily terminated his employment or reduced his earning capacity for the purpose of qualifying for a larger amount of Home Relief;

2) without good cause refused to register with or report semi-monthly to the New York State Employment Service;

3) without good cause refused to accept employment;

4) without good cause refused to participate in work relief on a public work project; or

5) otherwise refused to comply with the employability requirements of § 131 of the New York Social Services Law or Part 385 of the regulations governing administration of the Home Relief program.

The claim being asserted on behalf of the proposed class is that § 358.8(c)(1) allows termination of public assistance benefits without affording the recipient a prior evidentiary hearing. Whether the recipient is entitled to such a hearing depends, in part, upon the type of factual issues involved in the decision to discontinue benefits. Where there is little likelihood that the initial determination by the agency will be erroneous, due process does not require the opportunity for a pre-termination hearing. See Mathews v. Eldridge, 424 U.S. 319, 335, 96 S.Ct. 893, 47 L.Ed.2d 18 (1976); see notes 10-11 and accompanying text, supra. Thus, only plaintiffs whose administrative claims raise similar types of factual issues should be members of the same class.

Although recipients in categories two, three and four may have had their benefits discontinued for diverse reasons, the issues that would be the subject of an administrative fair hearing contesting such agency actions are virtually identical — whether the recipient has, in fact, failed to make himself available for employment (be it by failure to register with or report to the New York State Employment Service, by refusing to accept employment, or, as is the case with the named plaintiffs herein, by refusing to participate in work relief) and, if so, whether the recipient had good cause for doing so. There is no reason to believe that the excuses given for failure to report for work relief will be any different from, for example, reasons offered for refusal to report to the employment service. Indeed, defendants have not presented a single characteristic of any one of these categories that would distinguish it from the other two in any meaningful way. There is no indication in the record that individuals in any of these three categories will experience treatment different from that experienced by those in the other categories. Compare Burchette v. Dumpson, 387 F.Supp. 812, 820 (E.D.N.Y.1974) (likelihood of variations in treatment of public assistance recipients, raising possibility that the challenged regulation may be unconstitutional as applied to certain class members but constitutional as applied to others, requires denial of class certification motion). Nor has there been a showing that different types of factual issues will be raised by class members in disparate categories. The law is clear that not every member of a proposed class need be in a situation identical to that of the others, so long as the requirements of Rule 23 are otherwise met. See Rich v. Martin Marietta Corp., 522 F.2d 333, 340 (10th Cir. 1975); Almenares v. Wyman, 453 F.2d 1075, 1080 n. 7 (2d Cir. 1971), cert. denied, 405 U.S. 944, 92 S.Ct. 962, 30 L.Ed.2d 815 (1972); Eisen v. Carlisle & Jacquelin, 391 F.2d 555, 562 (2d Cir. 1968); Wallace v. McDonald, 369 F.Supp. 180, 188 (E.D.N.Y.1973); Leisner v. New York Tel. Co., 358 F.Supp. 359, 372 (S.D.N.Y.1973) (Motley, J.).

It cannot be stated, however, that the claims raised by a recipient found to have voluntarily terminated his employment or reduced his earning capacity for the purpose of qualifying for a larger benefit will be similar to those raised in the "without good cause" categories. This is especially so in light of the presumption found in New York Social Services Law § 131(11), upheld in Lavine v. Milne, 424 U.S. 577, 96 S.Ct. 1010, 47 L.Ed.2d 249 (1976).⁷

Category five, a catchall provision apparently designed to encompass a variety of violations, likewise may be triggered by diverse factual situations raising numerous issues requiring due process analysis differing significantly from that undertaken in categories two, three and four.

Thus, for the purpose of the instant motion for a preliminary injunction, the Court defines the plaintiff class as follows:

all recipients of Home Relief in the state of New York who are deemed employable and are not caretakers of minor or needy children, who timely request a fair hearing to contest the proposed discontinuance, suspension, or reduction of their benefits for refusal to register with or report semi-monthly to the New York State Employment Service, refusal to accept employment or refusal

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