School Bd. of Leon County v. Mitchell

• Decision Date: 04 May 1977
• Docket Number: No. EE-64,EE-64
• Parties: The SCHOOL BOARD OF LEON COUNTY, Florida, Appellant, v. Ruth S. MITCHELL, Appellee.
• Court: Florida District Court of Appeals

Page 562

346 So.2d 562

The SCHOOL BOARD OF LEON COUNTY, Florida, Appellant, v. Ruth S. MITCHELL, Appellee.

No. EE-64.

District Court of Appeal of Florida, First District.

May 4, 1977.

Rehearing Denied June 22, 1977.

C. Graham Carothers and Michael Pearce Dodson of Ausley, McMullen, McGehee, Carothers & Proctor, Tallahassee, for appellant.

Joseph C. Jacobs and Brian S. Duffy of Ervin, Varn, Jacobs, Odom & Kitchen, Tallahassee, for appellee.

BOYER, Chief Judge.

By this interlocutory appeal, appellant challenges the trial court's denial of its motion to dismiss appellee's complaint and further claims that appellee has failed to exhaust her administrative remedies and that, in any event, her declaratory judgment suit was improperly instituted.

Appellee, employed by appellant on a continuing contract basis as supervisor of guidance and testing, appeared at an April 1, 1975 meeting of appellant and presented argument against the county-wide reorganization plan then being considered to reduce administrative costs. The proposed plan abolished her position and allocated the functions associated therewith to two new positions, coordinator of career guidance and counseling and coordinator of research and evaluation services. Appellant rejected appellee's argument and adopted the proposed reorganization plan by a vote of three to two.

Appellee, pursuant to Section 120.68, Florida Statutes (1975), commenced two actions: By the first, ¹ she sought review in this court of an administrative agency rule. That action has been stayed pending the outcome of the second action, which is the subject of this appeal. By the second action, appellee sought in Circuit Court a declaratory judgment as to her rights under Chapter 231, Florida Statutes (1975) and under her continuing contract with appellant, a temporary and permanent injunction to prevent appellant from implementing the reorganization plan, and money damages for breach of contract. The complaint alleged that appellee had exhausted her administrative remedies. Appellant moved to dismiss the declaratory judgment for lack of subject matter jurisdiction. The trial court denied the motion without comment.

Essentially, the motion to dismiss raises two issues: Whether appellee has exhausted her administrative remedies, and, assuming arguendo that administrative remedies have been exhausted, whether the Circuit Court may properly entertain a declaratory judgment action challenging final agency action.

In this opinion, we consider the unanswered question posed in a recent opinion of this court, State ex rel. Department of General Services v. Willis, ² viz: "the extent to which the 'undivested' statutory jurisdiction of Circuit Courts to render declaratory judgments under Chapter 86 is nevertheless to be judicially restricted when coercive relief, not a declaration of some doubtful right or status, is plaintiff's real objective, or when uninvoked administrative remedies are available." Put another way, the central issue in this case is whether, in recognition of the saving clause contained in Section 120.73, Florida Statutes (1975), ³ a plaintiff in this type of proceeding will be permitted to maintain a declaratory judgment action, or whether he (or she) will be limited to his (or her) remedies under the Administrative Procedures Act.

Our task sub judice has been materially facilitated by the Willis opinion which is particularly helpful in its analysis of the evolution of the APA. From that opinion, we learn that the APA in its original form limited declaratory relief to questions of the validity, meaning, or application of any rule (see Section 120.30, Florida Statutes (1973)), that the 1974 version of the APA repealed Section 120.30, and that no section of the 1975 version of the APA, in particular Section 120.73, Florida Statutes (1975), revived Section 120.30. Thus, because there is no existing section within the APA nor the declaratory judgment act detailing the instances in which a rule or order of a state agency may be challenged in a declaratory judgment action, we must resolve that issue by analyzing the nature of the declaratory judgment remedy and by examining the cases construing Chapter 86 in an administrative context (particularly those decided prior to the adoption of the now repealed Section 120.30) in light of the substantial changes which administrative procedure has undergone in Florida.

The primary characteristics of the declaratory judgment action may be gleaned from an examination of Chapter 86 and the cases interpreting that statute. By statute, the Circuit Court is empowered to render declaratory judgments on the existence or non-existence of any immunity, power, privilege, or right, or of any fact concerning said existence or non-existence. In a declaratory judgment action other forms of relief may be requested and, if appropriate, granted. Section 86.011, Florida Statutes (1975). Although not intended to be an exclusive enumeration (see Section 86.051, Florida Statutes (1975)), some of the more common situations in which a declaratory judgment action is proper involve persons who may be in doubt about their rights under a deed, will, contract or other written instrument or are in doubt whether certain rights are affected by statute, regulation made under statutory authority, or by a municipal ordinance, contract, deed, will, franchise, or other written instrument. Section 86.021, Florida Statutes (1975). Chapter 86 is both substantive and remedial, and is to be liberally construed. Section 86.101, Florida Statutes (1975). A declaratory judgment action will not be dismissed on the ground that there is another adequate remedy. Section 86.111, Florida Statutes (1975).

Consistent with the statutory scheme, the courts have variously described the purpose of the act as: To establish a means whereby one might obtain a judicial declaration of rights never before determined (deMarigny v. deMarigny, 43 So.2d 442 (Fla.1959)), to extend procedural remedies to comprehend relief in cases where technical or social advances have tended to obscure or place in doubt one's rights, immunities, status or privileges (Watson v. Centro Espanol De Tampa, 158 Fla. 796, 30 So.2d 288 (1947)), to relieve litigants of the common-law rule that no declaration of rights may be judicially adjudged unless a right has been violated and to render practical help in ending controversies which have not reached the stage where other legal relief is immediately available (Bell v. Associated Independents, Inc., 143 So.2d 904 (Fla. 2nd DCA 1962)), and to settle and afford relief from insecurity and uncertainty with respect to rights, status and other equitable or legal relations. (Hialeah Race Course, Inc. v. Gulf Stream Park Racing Ass'n., 210 So.2d 750 (Fla. 4th DCA 1968)).

Notwithstanding the above, the courts soon recognized that the scope of the declaratory judgment action was not infinite and that certain restrictions would be imposed upon its use. In fact, the Supreme Court, in a seminal opinion authored by the late Justice Terrell ⁴ which upheld the constitutionality of Florida's initial declaratory judgment act, recognized the types of situations to which the declaratory judgment act was generally found to be inapposite:

"(1) Where it would serve no useful purpose; (2) where special tribunals have been provided to handle specified controversies ; (3) where the facts sought to be litigated were hypothetical, presented a 'made case,' or were uncertain of occurrence; (4) the question raised must be real and not theoretical, and the person raising it must have a bona fide interest in it; and (5) there must be a defender with a bona fide right to defend." (Sheldon v. Powell, 128 So. at page 262 (emphasis supplied).

Not long after the Sheldon opinion was authored, actual, as opposed to abstract, limitations on declaratory judgment actions were developed and promulgated by the courts. For example, academic or moot questions will not be decided in a declaratory judgment suit (Ready v. Safeway Rock Co., 157 Fla. 27, 24 So.2d 808 (1946)), nor will a court ordinarily entertain an action for declaratory judgment when a proceeding is already pending between the same parties involving the same issues. (Taylor v. Cooper, 60 So.2d 534 (Fla.1952)). It has also been held that where the only material issue in a dispute is of a factual nature, an action for declaratory judgment will not lie. (Travelers Indemnity Co. v. Johnson, 201 So.2d 705 (Fla.1967)).

In the field of administrative law, the battle lines were quickly drawn between those seeking to challenge agency action in reliance upon the generally accepted principle that the declaratory judgment act was to be liberally construed, and those attempting to narrow the declaratory judgment remedy by reference to the doctrines of primary jurisdiction and exhaustion of administrative remedies. As noted by this Court in the Willis opinion a plethora of Florida cases have required judicial deference to administrative remedies. (See State ex rel. Department of General Services v. Willis, supra, at 589, 590) In their consideration of declaratory judgment actions vis a vis the doctrines of primary jurisdiction and exhaustion of administrative remedies, the courts developed a method for determining whether a declaratory judgment action was appropriate in an administrative law context which turned on the characterization of administrative action in any particular case as either quasi-judicial on the one hand or quasi-executive (or quasi-legislative or "purely administrative") on the other hand. In one of the first cases to employ that distinction, albeit in a case involving a different issue (the reviewability of an administrative order), the Florida Supreme Court noted the primary characteristic of a judicial or quasi-judicial agency decision: ". . . when notice and a hearing are required and the judgment of the board is contingent on the...