Joelson v. City of Casper, Wyo., 83-173

• Decision Date: 03 February 1984
• Docket Number: No. 83-173,83-173
• Citation: 676 P.2d 570
• Parties: Jeanne JOELSON, Appellant (Defendant), v. CITY OF CASPER, WYOMING, a municipal corporation, Appellee (Plaintiff).
• Court: Wyoming Supreme Court

Page 570

676 P.2d 570

Jeanne JOELSON, Appellant (Defendant), v. CITY OF CASPER, WYOMING, a municipal corporation, Appellee (Plaintiff).

No. 83-173.

Supreme Court of Wyoming.

Feb. 3, 1984.

Earl R. Johnson, Jr., Casper, for appellant.

James R. Bell, Deputy City Atty., Casper, for appellee.

Before ROONEY, C.J., and THOMAS, ROSE, BROWN and CARDINE, JJ.

ROSE, Justice.

This is an action by the City of Casper, plaintiff-appellee, against Jeanne Joelson, defendant-appellant, to enjoin and restrain Ms. Joelson from keeping, maintaining and using a carport and a garage on her property, in violation of the city's ordinances.

There is no good purpose to be served in going into an exhaustive recitation of the facts since we will hold that neither the district court nor this court possesses jurisdiction to respond to the merits (or lack of merits) of the case. It stands undenied that Ms. Joelson erected a carport and a garage in violation of the ordinances of the City of Casper. She was ordered by the building inspectors to remove the violating structures and she did not do so. Instead, she appealed to the city's board of adjustment where, as to both structures, the board issued its orders affirming the building inspector's order to remove the offending part or parts of the structures. Ms. Joelson did not appeal from these board of adjustment orders and she did not correct the violations, thus necessitating the city to seek injunctive relief with respect to the ordinance violations.

The court enjoined Ms. Joelson from continuing the complained-of violations for the reason, among others, that

"Defendant [appellant] failed to appeal the decisions of the Board of Adjustment in a timely and proper manner in accordance with the Wyoming Rules of Appellate Procedure * * *."

The appellant identifies the following issues for our consideration:

"I. Should the Court have granted Summary Judgment in contradiction of a finding that Appellant had not exercised her administrative remedies or in the alternating [sic] should the Court have remanded the matter for full exercise of administrative remedies?

"II. Did the Appellee deny its approval of appellant's remedy in an arbitrary, capricious and inequitable manner?

"III. Does the potential loss to appellant outweigh the gains of the social order?"

The appellee describes the issue for our decision as follows:

"Whether or not the Court below erred in granting Appellee's Motion for Summary Judgment in favor of Appellee and enjoining Appellant from maintaining her carport and a portion of her garage in violation of Appellee's ordinances and further ordering their removal upon finding that there existed no genuine issue as to any material fact."

Decision

We will hold that the district court acted properly in granting injunctive relief to the city on the ground that Ms. Joelson had not appealed her adverse administrative decisions as she was bound to do. The effect of this inaction is that neither the district court nor this court possesses jurisdiction to consider the merits of the contentions of Ms. Joelson aimed at avoiding the application of the city ordinances.

Jurisdiction

The statutes of Wyoming provide that, once the remedies have been exhausted in an administrative proceeding, a person aggrieved or adversely affected by a final decision of an agency is entitled to judicial review. ¹ This court has adopted Rule 12, W.R.A.P. to govern judicial review of administrative action. ² We have held that the timely filing of a petition for review ³ of the final order or decision of an agency is mandatory and jurisdictional. Stagner v. Wyoming State Tax Commission, Wyo., 642 P.2d 1296 (1982); Department of Revenue and Taxation v. Irvine, Wyo., 589 P.2d 1295 (1979); Snell v. Ruppert, Wyo., 541 P.2d 1042 (1975); and Regan v. City of Casper, Wyo., 494 P.2d 933 (1972). See also, Curtis v. Center Realty Company, Wyo., 502 P.2d 365 (1972) and Town of Afton, Lincoln County v. Public Service Commission, Wyo., 471 P.2d 331 (1970).

We have held:

" * * * This court can have no greater jurisdiction of the subject matter than the trial court and where the trial court had no jurisdiction in an administrative appeal from an agency, this court must dismiss the appeal." Snell v. Ruppert, supra, 541 P.2d at 1048, citing Ginn v. Parrish, Wyo., 362 P.2d 824 (1961).

When the courts are called upon to enforce an administrative order that has become final, only those questions concerning the order's violation may be adjudicated and not questions which go to the validity of that order. Federal Trade Commission v. Morton Salt Company, 334 U.S. 37, 54, 68 S.Ct. 822, 832, 92 L.Ed. 1196, 1 A.L.R.2d 260 (1948). We have acknowledged and approved the rule which holds that if judicial review is granted by statute and no appeal is taken, the decision of an administrative board is final and conclusive. Salt Creek Freightways v. Wyoming Fair Employment Practices Commission, Wyo., 598 P.2d 435 (1979), citing Campbell v. Superior Court, In and For County of Mariposa, 18 Ariz.App. 287, 501 P.2d 463 (1972).

The Ruling of the Board of Adjustment Invokes the Doctrine of Collateral Estoppel

This case comes to the courts upon a complaint of the City of Casper for an injunction. Of course, the above appellate requirements are not applicable unless the matter at hand is addressed by the same parties to identical claims as those which were before the administrative agency. Salt Creek Freightways v. Wyoming Fair Employment Practices Commission, supra. If the claims and parties are the same, however, and there has been no appeal as provided by statute, the agency's decision acts to collaterally estop the litigant from raising the same issues in the subsequent action, Salt Creek Freightways, supra.

We discussed res judicata and collateral estoppel in this context in Salt Creek Freightways, supra, and found that they were both applicable to administrative proceedings. In Salt Creek Freightways we said that at one time res judicata did not apply to administrative decisions ⁴ but this rule has changed--until now it is held almost universally that res judicata does apply to the administrative decision. ⁵ The authorities which hold res judicata to apply to the final administrative order are broad enough to include the doctrine of collateral estoppel. In Lawlor v. National Screen Service Corporation, 349 U.S. 322, 326, 75 S.Ct. 865, 867, 99 L.Ed. 1122 (1955), n. 6, attention is called to the fact that Restatement of the Law of Judgments, §§ 47, 48 and 68 (1942) utilizes the term res judicata broadly enough "to cover merger, bar, collateral estoppel, and direct estoppel." ⁶

In United States v. Utah Construction and Mining Company, 384 U.S. 394, 421-422, 86 S.Ct. 1545, 1559-1560, 16 L.Ed.2d 642 (1966), the Court accepted the Restatement concept when it said:

" * * * [W]e note that the result we reach is harmonious with general principles of collateral estoppel. Occasionally courts have used language to the effect that res judicata principles do not apply to administrative proceedings, but such language is certainly too broad. When an administrative agent is acting in a judicial capacity and resolves disputed issues of fact properly before it which the parties have had an adequate opportunity to litigate, the courts have not hesitated to apply res judicata to enforce repose. [Citing cases.]"

In Salt Creek Freightways v. Wyoming Fair Employment Practices Commission, supra, we concluded the comparison between the doctrines of res judicata and collateral estoppel with this observation:

"The doctrine of collateral estoppel has much in common with res judicata, except that it does not involve the same cause of action but does involve identical issues necessary for disposal of the controversy. Roush v. Roush, Wyo., 589 P.2d 841, 843 (1979) (per curiam); Lawlor v. National Screen Service Corp., supra." 598 P.2d at 438.

At the administrative level, the moving party before the administrative agencies was Ms....