Madera v. Secretary of Executive Office of Communities and Development

• Decision Date: 22 July 1994
• Citation: 418 Mass. 452,636 N.E.2d 1326
• Parties: Jesus MADERA v. SECRETARY OF the EXECUTIVE OFFICE OF COMMUNITIES AND DEVELOPMENT & another. 1
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

Page 1326

636 N.E.2d 1326

418 Mass. 452

Jesus MADERA v. SECRETARY OF the EXECUTIVE OFFICE OF COMMUNITIES AND DEVELOPMENT & another. ¹

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Hampden.

Argued April 6, 1994.

Decided July 22, 1994.

Pierce O. Cray, Asst. Atty. Gen., for Secretary of the Executive Office of Communities and Development.

J. Paterson Rae, Springfield, for plaintiff.

James M. McCreight, Boston, for Mass. Coalition for the Homeless, amicus curiae, submitted a brief.

Before LIACOS, C.J., and ABRAMS, NOLAN, LYNCH and GREANEY, JJ.

GREANEY, Justice.

The defendant, the Secretary of the Executive Office of Communities and Development (EOCD), has appealed from a partial judgment entered in the Housing Court for Hampden County which granted summary judgment pursuant to Mass.R.Civ.P. 56(a), 365 Mass. 824 (1974), to the plaintiff, Jesus Madera, who had been denied public housing by the Springfield Housing Authority (authority). ² The judgment ordered the EOCD to treat the plaintiff's administrative appeal from the authority's denial of his application for public housing as requiring a formal adjudicatory proceeding under G.L. c. 30A, §§ 1(1), 10, and 11 (1992 ed.), of the State Administrative Procedure Act. We transferred the appeal to this court on our own motion principally to decide the issue of the plaintiff's right to an adjudicatory hearing. We conclude that § 1(1) of G.L. c. 30A entitled the plaintiff to an adjudicatory hearing before the EOCD. We also conclude, however, that other relief ordered by the judge sweeps too broadly, and we order vacated that part of the judgment which addresses the question of communications between the EOCD and local housing authorities.

No argument is made that the case is inappropriate for disposition by summary judgment. The undisputed factual background is as follows. In August, 1988, the plaintiff, who suffers from schizophrenia, filed an application for public housing with the authority. The plaintiff was put on a waiting list and, since he had other housing, was not granted preference.

In November, 1990, the Springfield police arrested and charged the plaintiff with arson after a small fire developed in the apartment building where he had been living. Following a jury trial, the plaintiff was acquitted on January 17, 1991. The plaintiff had been in custody pending trial. When he was released, he discovered that his apartment had been rented to another person.

Now homeless, the plaintiff renewed his request for public housing. In response, the authority, by a letter dated April 16, 1991, denied the plaintiff's renewed application, indicating that (1) the plaintiff had a tendency to destroy property which "would substantially interfere with the health, safety, security and peaceful enjoyment of other tenants and would adversely affect the physical environment of the resident community"; and (2) the plaintiff was "capable of setting fires" during periods in which he was not quiet and well behaved. Thereafter, pursuant to 760 Code Mass.Regs. § 5.12(1) (1989), as in effect prior to July 30, 1993, ³ the plaintiff requested an informal conference with the authority to contest this decision.

On June 5, 1991, the authority held a tape-recorded hearing at which the plaintiff claimed that he had not set fire to his apartment building and submitted documentation of his acquittal on the arson charge. The plaintiff also submitted a letter from a psychiatrist who had been treating him for schizophrenia, and a letter from a supervisor of a day treatment program which attested to the plaintiff's regular attendance and participation.

After this hearing, the authority declined to approve the plaintiff's renewed application. In its decision, the authority made reference to a recent criminal charge against the plaintiff for breach of the peace (while armed with brass knuckles) for which the plaintiff had received a suspended sentence. The plaintiff appealed the authority's decision to the EOCD pursuant to 760 Code Mass.Regs. § 5.12(2) and (3) (1989). ⁴

After the authority failed to submit sufficient documentation, the EOCD chief counsel's legal secretary made contact with the authority's tenant selection supervisor and requested additional information associated with the plaintiff's application. Thereafter, the authority forwarded to the EOCD the plaintiff's application for housing. It also submitted (1) an arson squad investigation report concerning the arson case brought against the plaintiff; (2) two witness statements implicating the plaintiff in the apartment-house fire; and (3) an applicant history sheet containing notes of conversations about the plaintiff with various unnamed individuals. The authority also provided to the EOCD a tape recording of the informal conference of June 5, 1991, at which the plaintiff had been present. The authority did not provide the plaintiff with copies of its submissions. On September 18, 1991, counsel for the plaintiff, by letter, advised the EOCD that he had not received copies of any of the materials submitted by the authority other than a copy of a letter dated July 25, 1991. EOCD then provided the plaintiff with a copy of the plaintiff's application for housing.

By decision dated December 6, 1991, the EOCD, after accepting the plaintiff's argument that he had not been provided with the opportunity to rebut the breach of the peace charge which had been referred to in the authority's decision, remanded the matter to the authority for another hearing. After further hearing, the authority again denied the plaintiff's application.

The plaintiff's action in the Housing Court against both the authority and EOCD, asserted, insofar as the EOCD is concerned, that the agency had (1) improperly failed to provide him with an adjudicatory hearing under G.L. c. 30A, and (2) engaged in improper ex parte communications with the authority during the course of agency review in violation of 760 Code Mass.Regs. § 5.12(3) (1989). ⁵ See note 4, supra.

Cross motions for summary judgment were filed on these issues under Mass.R.Civ.P. 56(a) and (b). A judge of the Housing Court granted the plaintiff's motion and denied the motion of the EOCD. The judge concluded that the plaintiff was entitled to an adjudicatory hearing under G.L. c. 30A on his appeal of the authority's decision, and that the authority had engaged in improper ex parte contacts with the EOCD. Declarations were made "that [the EOCD] is obligated to provide hearings in the form required by G.L. c. 30A, §§ 10 & 11, on appeals from decisions of local housing authorities denying eligibility for housing," and prescribing how an authority and the EOCD can communicate when a review of a housing application is pending. ⁶ Orders enforcing these declarations were embodied in the partial judgment before us for review.

1. The applicability of G.L. c. 30A. At the time of the plaintiff's application, the EOCD considered a denial of eligibility for public housing under 760 Code Mass.Regs. § 5.12(3) (1989), on the basis of "written argument and documentation," and "review[ed] the decision of [an authority] for its compliance with applicable statutes and regulations." ⁷ The plaintiff maintained that the EOCD was required, by reason of his possession of a constitutional right, to provide him with an adjudicatory hearing. The judge agreed, concluding that applicants for State-funded public housing have a constitutionally protected interest in their eligibility for that housing, and that the provisions of G.L. c. 30A, therefore, required the EOCD to provide the plaintiff with an adjudicatory hearing, conducted under G.L. c. 30A, §§ 10 and 11, at which he could contest the authority's basis for the rejection. We agree that this result is required under the relevant provisions of G.L. c. 30A.

An " '[a]djudicatory proceeding' is defined in G.L. c. 30A, § 1, as 'a proceeding before an agency in which the legal rights, duties or privileges of specifically named persons are required by constitutional right or by any provision of the General Laws to be determined after opportunity for an agency hearing.' If the proceeding is 'adjudicatory,' then it must comply with §§ 10 and 11 [of c. 30A]." Forsyth School for Dental Hygienists v. Board of Registration in Dentistry, 404 Mass. 211, 214, 534 N.E.2d 773 (1989). See General Chem. Corp. v. Department of Envtl. Quality Eng'g, 19 Mass.App.Ct. 287, 289-290, 474 N.E.2d 183 (1985).

The plaintiff is, of course, a "specifically named person." The EOCD is an "agency," as defined in G.L. c. 30A, § 1(2). Under the EOCD's prior and present regulations, the agency has the task of determining the legal rights of a person, like the plaintiff, whose application for public housing has been rejected by a local housing authority. Under the regulations in effect prior to June 30, 1993, the EOCD was responsible for reviewing an adverse decision by an authority "for its compliance with applicable statutes and regulations," and notifying the authority and the applicant of its decision in the matter within thirty days. 760 Code Mass.Regs. § 5.12(3) (1989). Although the prior regulations may not have stated expressly that the EOCD had the power to affirm or reverse the action of an authority, see note 4, supra, the right to EOCD review plainly implies the power to accept or to reject the decision of an authority. ⁸ In a practical sense, then, an applicant's eligibility for public housing is finally determined by the EOCD. See Cambridge Elec. Light Co. v. Department of Pub. Utils., 363 Mass. 474, 500, 295 N.E.2d 876 (1973).

The remaining question, therefore, is whether the plaintiff had a property interest in his eligibility for public housing "which would invoke the protection of the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, and of art. 10 of the Declaration of Rights of the Massachusetts Constitution." School Comm. of Hatfield v. Board...