INDIANA DEPT. OF ENVIRO. MANAGEMENT v. West
| Decision Date | 09 August 2004 |
| Docket Number | No. 49A02-0309-CV-752.,49A02-0309-CV-752. |
| Citation | 812 N.E.2d 1099 |
| Parties | INDIANA DEPARTMENT OF ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT, Appellant-Petitioner, v. Lynn C. WEST, Michael J. Dalton, and Phillip E. Wuensch, Appellees-Respondents. |
| Court | Indiana Appellate Court |
Steve Carter, Attorney General of Indiana, Frances Barrow, Deputy Attorney General, Indianapolis, IN, for Appellant.
Melinda O'Dell, Mooresville, IN, for Appellees.
The Indiana Department of Environmental Management ("IDEM") appeals the trial court's denial of its petition for judicial review of the Indiana State Employees' Appeals Commission's ("SEAC") final order finding that IDEM had discriminated against Lynn West, Michael Dalton, and Phillip Wuensch (collectively, "Employees") on the basis of their age. IDEM raises six issues, which we restate as:
We affirm.
The relevant facts follow. In 1998, IDEM announced that the Office of Solid and Hazardous Waste Management and the Office of Environmental Response would be merged together to create the Office of Land Quality. In the process of restructuring, IDEM reclassified many positions, including Employees' positions. Employees' new positions did not result in pay changes but did result in decreased managerial responsibility.
Before the restructuring, West's job was classified as Environmental Manager Supervisor 4, and the official job description defined the general purpose of the position as follows:
Incumbent is Chief of the Regulatory Development Section and is responsible for the direct supervision of five professional staff with overall responsibility for solid and hazardous waste rulemaking activities, coordination of rulemaking with policy development and Subtitle C & D authorization.
Id. at 105. Dalton was her direct supervisor. After the merger, she was offered only a position as a Senior Environmental Manager 1, which she accepted. This position was a "nonmanager position" that required her to do "staff work" instead of "management work." Id. at 315-316. She also moved from a larger section chief cubicle to a smaller staff cubicle. West had wanted a section chief position, but was never given the opportunity to compete for such a position. After West accepted the position of Senior Environmental Manager 1, and "[she knew] that others viewed it as a demotion." Id. at 336.
Before the restructuring, Dalton's job was classified as Environmental Branch Chief E-7, and the official job description defined the general purpose of the position as follows:
The branch chief is the first-line manager and serves as a liaison between senior management and first-line supervisors (section chiefs) and staff, serving as an advocate of both senior management perspectives and staff concerns. The [Branch Chief] position is critical in maintaining institutional memory within the agency and in addressing technical and programatic [sic] issues to require a broader perspective than could be expected from first-line supervisors and staff. The [Branch Chief] focuses on leadership & management rather than supervision, the former emphasizing doing the right tasks and equipping the program to execute those tasks, and the latter, focusing on "doing things right."
Record at 62. After the merger, IDEM did not offer Dalton the opportunity to apply for the newly created Branch Chief E-6 position, which would have been equivalent to his Branch Chief E-7 position. Rather, IDEM offered Dalton a choice between two lower level positions, and eventually, Dalton accepted a position as Senior Environmental Manager Supervisor 3. As a Senior Environmental Manager Supervisor 3, Dalton's responsibilities decreased. He no longer supervised section chiefs and instead supervised staff members, and he moved from a private office to a section chief cubicle. Dalton referred to his new position as a demotion and said that based upon his skills and experience, he felt that he was qualified for the newly created Branch Chief E-6 position. As of the date of the hearing, the newly created Branch Chief E-6 position had not been filled.
Before the restructuring, Wuensch's job was classified as Environmental Manager Supervisor 4, which involved "supervising a group of people, including performance appraisals, signing attendance, [and] leave requests." Id. at 395. The official job description defined the general purpose of Wuensch's position as follows:
Incumbent is Chief of the Administrative Support Section of the Operations Branch and is responsible for the direct supervision of eight professional staff with overall responsibility for managing the various budgetary and miscellaneous support function of the Office of Solid & Hazardous Waste Management. Report directly to Branch Chief.
Id. at 109. As a result of the merger, he was offered and accepted a position as Senior Environmental Manager 1, where his job description "changed drastically." Id. at 398. Wuensch was "no longer responsible for supervision, evaluating people, signing off any documents." Id. at 398. He was equal to people whom he had previously supervised, and he went from a large section chief cubicle to a smaller staff cubicle. Wuensch wanted the position of Section Chief of the Finance Section, which is the job with essentially the same duties and responsibilities that he had prior to the merger. Wuensch believed that his physical move affected his perceived status in his department.
Before the merger, Robert Moran, an IDEM employee over the age of forty, spoke with Assistant Commissioner, Mary Beth Tuohy, who had encouraged senior supervisors to take technical positions and to facilitate a reorganization. Privately, Tuohy told Moran that he should consider taking a "SEM 1" position, which would have been a demotion, because it would set a good example for all the other supervisors. Id. at 350. She hinted that if Moran did not voluntarily take the position she could use the "performance appraisal system" to accomplish the demotion. Id. at 351. She said she wanted "new blood with fresh ideas." Id. West had also heard that Tuohy had said that the "office could use some new blood and some—or some younger blood or some new blood and some new ideas." Id. at 325. Before the merger, IDEM promoted several employees, all of whom were under the age of forty. After the merger, they remained in their promoted positions.
Employees filed merit complaints with the State Personnel Department, alleging that IDEM had created unacceptable working conditions when it reclassified their jobs. Employees, who are all over forty years of age, also complained that as a result of the merger, staff members over forty had been demoted while staff members under forty had been promoted. Rachel Scudder, IDEM's director of human resources, sent a memorandum to Wuensch, identifying the number and percentage of managers by age before and after the merger. The memorandum indicated that before the merger, there were thirty-nine managers of whom thirty-four were over the age of forty and five were under the age of forty. Thus, before the merger, 87% of the managers were over the age of forty and 13% were under the age of forty. After the merger, there were twenty-six managers of whom twenty-one were over the age of forty and five were under the age of forty. Thus, after the merger, 81% of the managers were over forty and 19% were under the age of forty.
Scudder denied Employees' complaints. All of the denials provided, in relevant part, that:
The state classification system defines your move ... as a lateral transfer, not a demotion. Your classification resulted in decreased management responsibility without a corresponding decrease in salary. Management has the authority to make such decisions based on agency need.
Appellees' Appendix at 7. The denials also indicated that Employees' allegations of age discrimination had been forwarded to IDEM's Affirmative Action Coordinator for investigation. Although Scudder denied Employees' complaints, she later testified that there was a "cause for concern" because all of the managerial demotions happened to employees over the age of forty. Id. at 517. She was not able to rule out the possibility that IDEM's facially neutral criterion had resulted in a disparate impact on employees over forty. Id. at 519-520. However, she determined that Employees' allegations had no merit because management of the Office of Land and Quality had assured her that they had used objective and reasonable criterion to place Employees. As of the date of the evidentiary hearing, there were no official job descriptions for Employees' current jobs.
Approximately three weeks after Scudder denied Employees' complaints, Employees received a letter from Bruce Baxter, the director of the Grievance Administration, indicating that he had investigated Employees' allegations of age discrimination and had found no substantiation for their claims. Baxter also indicated that Employees' reclassifications were considered lateral reclassifications, adding that Employees had lost no salary as a result of their job changes.
On January 4, 2000, Employees filed their notice of appeal to SEAC. SEAC conducted a fact finding hearing,...
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