In the Matter of Sheila Graves v. Doar

• Decision Date: 30 August 2011
• Parties: In the Matter of Sheila GRAVES, et al., respondents-appellants,v.Robert DOAR, etc., et al., appellants-respondents.
• Court: New York Supreme Court — Appellate Division

87 A.D.3d 740

928 N.Y.S.2d 774

2011 N.Y. Slip Op. 06379

In the Matter of Sheila GRAVES, et al., respondents-appellants,

v.Robert DOAR, etc., et al., appellants-respondents.

Supreme Court, Appellate Division, Second Department, New York.

Aug. 30, 2011.

Eric T. Schneiderman, Attorney General, New York, N.Y. (Benjamin N. Gutman and Peter Karanjia of counsel), for appellant-respondent Robert Doar, as Commissioner of the Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance of the New York State Department of Family Assistance.John Castellano, Islip Terrace, N.Y. and Law Office of Peter Vollmer, P.C., Sea Cliff, N.Y., for respondents-appellants (one brief filed).REINALDO E. RIVERA, J.P., RANDALL T. ENG, SHERI S. ROMAN, and ROBERT J. MILLER, JJ.

In a hybrid proceeding pursuant to CPLR article 78 to review several determinations of Robert Doar, Commissioner of the Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance of the New York State Department of Family Assistance, each dated February 23, 2006, which, after a fair hearing, affirmed several determinations of John E. Imhof, Commissioner of the Nassau County Department of Social Services, each dated December 19, 2004, inter alia, reducing the food stamp benefits of the petitioners/plaintiffs, and action, inter alia, for declaratory and injunctive relief, Robert Doar appeals, (1) as limited by his brief, from so much of an order of the Supreme Court, Nassau County (Woodard, J.), entered April 2, 2009, as granted that branch of the petitioners/plaintiffs' motion which was for summary judgment on the first cause of action declaring that the Group Home Standardized Benefits Program of the Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution and article I (§ 11) of the New York Constitution, awarding the petitioners/plaintiffs all retroactive benefits denied them under the Group Home Standardized Benefits Program, and authorizing eight identified individuals and others similarly situated to seek leave to intervene in the instant proceeding and action, and, (2) as limited by his brief, from so much of an order and interlocutory judgment (one paper) of the same court entered February 4, 2010, as, upon the order entered April 2, 2009, declared that the respondents/defendants' implementation of the Group Home Standardized Benefits Program violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution and article I (§ 11) of the New York Constitution, awarded the petitioners/plaintiffs retroactive benefits, and certified the proposed intervenors as members of a class consisting of “recipients of food stamps in the State of New York whose food stamp benefits were determined and reduced under the G[roup] H[ome] S[tandardized] B[enefits] P[rogram] and whose monthly income included payments of S[upplemental] S [ecurity] I[ncome] benefits,” John E. Imhof separately appeals from the same order and interlocutory judgment, and the petitioners/plaintiffs cross-appeal from so much of the same order and interlocutory judgment as failed to restore all additional food stamp benefits over and above the prereduction levels to which they and members of the defined class would have been entitled, from January 1, 2005, had the Group Home Standardized Benefits Program not been implemented, denied that branch of their motion which was for summary judgment on the third cause of action declaring that the implementation of that program violates article XVII (§ 1) of the New York Constitution, in effect, awarded summary judgment to the respondents/defendants declaring that the Group Home Standardized Benefits Program does not violate that provision of the New York Constitution, and, in effect, declared that the Group Home Standardized Benefits Program does not violate that provision of the New York Constitution.

ORDERED that the appeal by John E. Imhof from the order and interlocutory judgment is dismissed as abandoned, without costs or disbursements; and it is further,

ORDERED that the appeal from the order entered April 2, 2009, is dismissed, without costs or disbursements, as that order was superseded by the order and interlocutory judgment; and it is further,

ORDERED that the order and interlocutory judgment is modified, on the law and the facts, by deleting the provision thereof certifying the proposed intervenors as members of a class consisting of “recipients of food stamps in the State of New York whose food stamp benefits were determined and reduced under the GHSBP and whose monthly income included payments of SSI benefits”; as so modified, the order and interlocutory judgment is affirmed insofar as appealed from by Robert Doar and insofar as cross-appealed from, without costs or disbursements.

The State of New York implemented a five-year pilot program, known as the New York State Group Home Standardized Benefits Program (hereinafter the GHSBP), authorizing a fixed allocation of food stamps to group-home residents, based on a matrix that charted geographic region (either the New York City metropolitan area, consisting of the City of New York, and Nassau, Suffolk, Westchester, and Rockland Counties, or the remainder of the state) and income source (either public assistance [hereinafter PA] benefits, Supplemental Security Income [hereinafter SSI] benefits/other Social Security Administration benefits, or other income source). The petitioners/plaintiffs (hereinafter the petitioners) are residents of group homes, and are entitled to, and/or are recipients of, SSI benefits. They alleged, inter alia, that, under the GHSBP, recipients of SSI benefits residing in group homes were awarded less than one half the monthly food stamp allotment given to similarly-situated PA recipients, in violation of their equal protection rights. They moved, among other things, for summary judgment on that ground. The Supreme Court awarded summary judgment to the petitioners on their first cause of action, and declared that the implementation of the GHSBP violated the Equal Protection Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution and article I (§ 11) of the New York Constitution. The Supreme Court also directed the restoration of monthly food stamp benefits which the petitioners would have received had the GHSBP not been implemented but, in effect, awarded summary judgment to the respondents/defendants in connection with the third cause of action declaring that the GHSBP did not violate article XVII (§ 1) of the New York Constitution, which recites that the “aid, care and support of the needy ... shall be provided by the state.”

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