Reynolds v. City of San Carlos

• Decision Date: 28 October 1981
• Citation: 178 Cal.Rptr. 636,126 Cal.App.3d 208
• Court: California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals
• Parties: Kent D. REYNOLDS, Petitioner and Appellant, v. CITY OF SAN CARLOS, et al., Respondents. Civ. 46817.

Page 636

178 Cal.Rptr. 636

126 Cal.App.3d 208

Kent D. REYNOLDS, Petitioner and Appellant, v. CITY OF SAN CARLOS, et al., Respondents.

Civ. 46817.

Court of Appeal, First District, Division 3, California.

Oct. 28, 1981.

Hays & Elder, Lafayette, for petitioner and appellant.

Lagorio, Heneke & Madden, Los Altos, for respondents.

BARRY-DEAL, Associate Justice.

Kent D. Reynolds appeals from the judgment of the superior court denying his petition for a writ of mandate pursuant to Code of Civil Procedure section 1094.5. In his petition appellant sought to compel the Civil Service Commission of the City of San Carlos (Commission) to grant his application for service connected disability retirement under the Public Employees Retirement System (PERS), which by contract with the city pursuant to Government Code section 20450 provides retirement benefits to the city's employees.

Appellant, a 32-year-old firefighter, injured his knee on October 16, 1977, while fighting a fire. At the time, he was an employee of the city and a local safety member of PERS. A few months after his injury, appellant was assigned to a temporary, light-duty job while continuing treatment for the disability. Although his treating physician and a consultant recommended surgery on his knee, appellant refused the surgery and applied for permanent disability retirement.

Following an evidentiary hearing on June 8, 1978, the Commission found that appellant suffered an "on-the-job injury to his knee," and that as a result of his injury he is "unable to engage in the usual duties of a fire suppression employee." The Commission denied appellant's application for retirement, however, after also finding, inter alia, that: "11) Because the medical probabilities are great that Firefighter Reynolds will be restored to normal functioning if he submits to surgery, his disability is not permanent.

"...

"14) The recommended medical treatment is the kind of medical treatment to which a reasonable man would submit."

The superior court reviewed the minutes of the Commission's meeting and the evidence introduced and, exercising its independent judgment, affirmed the Commission's denial of appellant's application for retirement. The court found "that the petitioner's refusal of surgery was not reasonable under the circumstances; and that the commission had the jurisdiction, by analogy to the Workmen's Compensation cases ... to require the petitioner to undergo the recommended surgery."

We find no error and affirm the judgment.

I. Authority to Determine Permanent Disability

Appellant first asserts that the Commission was compelled to grant him retirement after finding that an industrial injury rendered him unable to pursue his usual occupation of fire suppression employee.

Although appellant does not challenge the jurisdiction of the Commission to determine that he is disabled, he does challenge their authority to determine that he was not permanently disabled and that he unreasonably refused medical treatment. (See Code Civ. Proc., § 1094.5, subd. (b).) ¹ He bolsters his challenge with three overlapping arguments: (A) the Commission, in determining that appellant unreasonably refused surgery, invaded the jurisdiction of the Workers' Compensation Appeals Board (WCAB), which "has exclusive jurisdiction to resolve controversies involving benefits" for work-related injuries under the California Constitution (art. 14, § 4) and Labor Code sections 5300 and 4056; (B) the WCAB has exclusive jurisdiction under Government Code section 21025.4 and Labor Code sections 4850 and 4851 to determine when a work-related disability becomes permanent; and (C) the Commission lacks jurisdiction under Government Code sections 21020 and 21025 to determine the reasonableness of appellant's refusal to undergo surgery.

Appellant requests this court either to order the Commission to certify to the Board of Administration of PERS that he is disabled by an industrial injury or to refer the issues of his permanent disability and his refusal to undergo surgery to the WCAB for a determination.

A.

Appellant's first argument is unpersuasive because he fails to perceive the basic distinction between workers' compensation laws and PERS.

In Pathe v. City of Bakersfield (1967) 255 Cal.App.2d 409, 63 Cal.Rptr. 220 the court considered the claim of the city and the city's pension board that the Industrial Accident Commission (now the WCAB) had exclusive jurisdiction under the Constitution and Labor Code section 5300 to determine whether an employee's injury was service-connected. The reasoning of the Pathe court in rejecting this argument is applicable to the case before us. The two systems were distinguished: "It is indisputable that the Industrial Accident Commission and the pension board exist for entirely different reasons and were established to attain wholly independent objectives. The Industrial Accident Commission exists primarily to adjudicate workmen's compensation claims under the general laws adopted by the Legislature pursuant to the Constitution. Its main objective, therefore, is to carry out the legislative scheme which is to provide adequate compensation for employees, public or private, who are injured in the course and scope of their employment while such employees are disabled and incapable of earning a living. On the other hand, the pension board is concerned only with the retirement of a limited class of public employees under a retirement system which was adopted primarily for the betterment of city government. Its objective is not only to recognize the public obligation to certain employees who after long and faithful service become incapacitated by age or physical disabilities, but it is also to make certain that these employees will be replaced by more capable employees for the betterment of the public service without undue hardship on the employees removed (citation)." (Id., at pp. 414-415, 63 Cal.Rptr. 220; see also Gov. Code, § 20001.) The court concluded that the retirement system "does not affect, abrogate or modify the Workmen's Compensation Laws in any manner. To the contrary, it grants additional compensation benefits to employees who are compelled to retire for service-connected disabilities and to this extent it is in harmony rather than in conflict with the Workmen's Compensation Laws of the Labor Code." (Id., at p. 416, 63 Cal.Rptr. 220.)

Although the workers' compensation law (Lab. Code, §§ 3200 et seq.) and the Public Employees' Retirement Act (Gov. Code, §§ 20000-21500) are not coordinated in all respects and are administered by independent boards, it is clear that they supplement each other. The jurisdiction of the WCAB "is exclusive only in relation to its own objectives and purposes and at the very most overlaps the subject matter jurisdiction of the pension board on a single issue of fact only, the issue as to whether an injury or disability is service-connected. Thus, it is also manifest that the pension board does not lose its inherent power to retire a city employee who 'is physically or mentally incapacitated for the performance of duty' simply because the employee" may also be eligible for workers' compensation benefits. (Pathe v. City of Bakersfield, supra 255 Cal.App.2d at p. 415, 63 Cal.Rptr. 220.)

Appellant argues that only the WCAB can make a finding under Labor Code section 4056, incorporating a substantive rule of tort law, which provides: "No compensation is payable in case of the death or disability of an employee when his death is caused, or when and so far as his disability is caused, continued, or aggravated, by an unreasonable refusal to submit to medical treatment, or to any surgical treatment, if the risk of the treatment is, in the opinion of the appeals board, based upon expert medical or surgical advice, inconsiderable in view of the seriousness of the injury."

It is true that there is no comparable provision in the Public Employees' Retirement Act, but, as we have seen, neither the Constitution nor the Labor Code restricts a retirement board, here the Commission, from exercising its authority to determine eligibility for retirement under PERS. The Commission can apply workers' compensation laws by analogy when making a finding of eligibility or noneligibility. (See Heaton v. Marin County Employees Retirement Bd. (1976) 63 Cal.App.3d 421, 428, 133 Cal.Rptr. 809, and discussion below.)

B.

Appellant next argues that Labor Code sections 4850 and 4851 and Government Code section 21025.4 vest in the WCAB the exclusive jurisdiction to determine when an industrial disability becomes permanent.

Appellant misreads the code sections. Labor Code section 4850, a workers' compensation provision, gives to a local safety member disabled in the course of his employment a benefit not afforded to injured workers generally. Section 4850 provides in pertinent part: "Whenever any ... city fireman ... who is a member of the Public Employees' Retirement System ... is disabled, whether temporarily or permanently, by injury or illness arising out of and in the course of his duties, he shall become entitled, regardless of his period of service with the city ..., to leave of absence while so disabled without loss of salary, in lieu of temporary disability payments, if any, which would be payable under this chapter, for the period of such disability but not exceeding one year, or until such earlier date as he is retired on permanent disability ...." Payments pursuant to section 4850 are not salary but workers' compensation benefits. (Boyd v. City of Santa Ana (1971) 6 Cal.3d 393, 397, 99 Cal.Rptr. 38, 491 P.2d 830.)

Labor Code section 4851 provides that the governing body of a local agency, "in addition to anyone else properly entitled," including PERS, may request the WCAB to determine whether the disability under section 4850 was industrially caused, and the WCAB shall make such a determination. Thus, the fact finding body for PERS has...