Smith v. Maine Employment Sec. Com'n

• Decision Date: 14 February 1983
• Citation: Smith v. Maine Employment Sec. Com'n, 456 A.2d 2 (Me. 1983)
• Parties: Arnold P. SMITH v. MAINE EMPLOYMENT SECURITY COMMISSION and City of Augusta.
• Court: Maine Supreme Court

Page 2

456 A.2d 2

Arnold P. SMITH v. MAINE EMPLOYMENT SECURITY COMMISSION and City of Augusta.

Supreme Judicial Court of Maine.

Argued Jan. 12, 1983.

Decided Feb. 14, 1983.

Richard M. Goldman (orally), Downeast Law Offices, Augusta, for plaintiff.

James E. Tierney, Department of Manpower Affairs, Atty. Gen., Susan P. Herman, Asst. Atty. Gen. (orally), Linda B. Gifford (orally), Charles E. Moreshead, Augusta, for defendants.

Before McKUSICK, C.J., and GODFREY, ROBERTS, CARTER, VIOLETTE and WATHEN, JJ.

VIOLETTE, Justice.

Defendants, Maine Employment Security Commission and the City of Augusta, appeal from a judgment of the Superior Court, Kennebec County, which reversed a decision of the Employment Security Commission denying plaintiff, Arnold P. Smith, unemployment compensation benefits on the ground that he voluntarily left his employment without good cause, 26 M.R.S.A. § 1193(1)(A). ¹ In reversing the Commission's decision, the Superior Court ruled: (1) the Commission applied an incorrect legal standard; and (2) the Commission's findings were unsupported by substantial evidence. On appeal, the defendants claim that both rulings by the Superior Court were erroneous. Plaintiff cross-appeals on the ground that the Superior Court erred by denying his motion for a remand to the Commission for the taking of additional evidence. We sustain defendants' appeal and deny plaintiff's cross-appeal.

I.

Except for a brief period of time during either 1970 or 1971 plaintiff was employed as a firefighter by the City of Augusta from March of 1964 until his resignation in March of 1980. During the last two years of his employment, the fire department's manpower was reduced from a level of 41 firefighters and 12 line officers in 1978 to 24 firefighters and 7 line officers in 1980. In addition, the number of firefighters who responded to a fire was reduced from 9 in 1978 to 7 in 1980. Plaintiff's claim that he left work for good cause centers on his belief that this reduction in manpower increased the risk of physical injury, thus causing him to fear for his safety.

Several months after leaving work, plaintiff applied for unemployment compensation benefits, claiming he left work for the following reasons: (1) the reduction in firefighters caused him to fear for his safety; (2) the number of working hours; and (3) his unwillingness to work as an emergency medical technician. His claim was denied by a Deputy of the Department on the ground that the plaintiff left work voluntarily without good cause attributable to his employment. After an unsuccessful appeal to the Appeal Tribunal, plaintiff appealed to the Commission. Following a hearing, the Commission also denied plaintiff benefits on the ground that he left his employment without good cause attributable to such employment. As relevant to this appeal, ² the Commission based its decision on the following reasons:

The claimant also asserted that he feared for his personal safety as a result of the reduction in the fire department's manpower. First, the Commission notes that firefighting is a very dangerous occupation. The claimant was undoubtedly aware of the inherent dangers in firefighting when he accepted the employment and certainly within the first few years of his employment. On the one hand, the Commission would not approve benefits to a firefighter where he decides to quit his job because he no longer is willing to accept the occupational hazards. On the other hand, the Commission would not deny benefits where it is shown that an employer has substantially and unnecessarily increased the inherent risks to its employees.

In this case the record does not show that there was a substantial increase in the danger to the claimant's health or safety. Prior to 1978, nine firefighters usually responded to a box alarm. By 1980 that number was reduced to seven. Fifty years ago, when equipment, technology, and training were much less sophisticated, twenty firefighters may have responded to a fire with less efficiency and greater danger than seven do today. The record does not demonstrate that a reduction from nine firefighters to seven significantly increased the risk of injury to the claimant.

The facts that the claimant was often alone on a pumper and was first at the scene do not necessarily imply danger when he did not undertake to engage the fire before others arrived. The claimant contends that he sometimes entered a burning building alone, although he offered no specific details of any such incident. However, the employer contends that this was a violation of department policy. Such a policy would be expected. Yet the claimant did not allege that he was ever ordered to enter a building alone or that he ever questioned whether he should do so. It is not clear whether the claimant ever did enter a burning building but, if he did, it was apparently not with the approval of his employer and the claimant could easily have avoided such danger without jeopardizing his employment.

* * *

It is important to note that the claimant's asserted beliefs must be measured against a standard of reasonableness under all of the circumstances. The issue is not what the claimant subjectively believed but "... whether reasonable persons acting reasonably under similar circumstances would have held that belief and acted upon the basis of it." Therrien v. MESC, 370 A.2d 1385, 1391 (Me.1977).

The Commission finds that the claimant's belief was not reasonable considering all of the circumstances including the nature of his employment....

Plaintiff appealed the Commission's decision to the Superior Court. On September 10, 1981, he moved pursuant to 5 M.R.S.A. § 11006(1)(B) to have the case remanded for the Commission to take additional evidence. This motion was denied on October 2, 1981. Subsequently, the Superior Court reversed the Commission's decision because: (1) the Commission applied an incorrect legal standard; and (2) the Commission's findings were unsupported by substantial evidence. Both defendants then appealed to this Court; plaintiff cross-appealed on the ground that the Superior Court erred by denying his motion to remand for the taking of additional evidence.

II.

This case involves plaintiff's claim that the reduction in manpower increased the risks to his safety such that he had good cause to voluntarily leave his job. In Therrien v. Maine Employment Security Commission, 370 A.2d 1385, 1390 (Me.1977), we recognized that the Commission would be warranted in treating the resigning employee as leaving with good cause where he faces a change in his employment "to which he rationally believes he cannot or should not accomodate himself for reasons of physical or mental health...." See also Paige v. Maine Employment Security Commission, 391 A.2d 321, 325 (Me.1978). When a claimant alleges that a change in working conditions caused him to resign, then according to Therrien the Commission must make the following determinations:

(1) what the claimant believed regarding the change in working conditions;

(2) whether the plaintiff left his employment because of that belief;

(3) whether the belief was reasonable; and

(4) if the belief was reasonable, then whether the belief constituted good cause under all the circumstances.

Therrien, 370 A.2d at 1391.

In denying plaintiff benefits on the ground that he voluntarily left his employment without good cause attributable to the employment, the Commission ended its decision by expressly applying the Therrien standard and concluding that plaintiff's belief was unreasonable considering all of the circumstances. However, at the Superior Court level, plaintiff argued, and the Superior Court ruled, that the Commission did not apply Therrien, but instead applied the following incorrect legal standard:

[T]he Commission notes that firefighting is a very dangerous occupation. The claimant was undoubtedly aware of the inherent dangers in firefighting when he accepted the employment and certainly within the first few years of his employment. On the one hand, the Commission would not approve benefits to a firefighter where he decides to quit his job because he no longer is willing to accept the occupational hazards. On the other hand, the Commission would not deny benefits where it is shown that an employer has substantially and unnecessarily increased the inherent risks to its employees. (emphasis added).

The Superior Court reasoned that, although the Commission stated it was applying Therrien at the end of its decision, "the bulk of its analysis was devoted to a discussion of whether the Plaintiff had proven a 'substantial increase' in the risks of his employment."

On appeal, plaintiff correctly points out that the above statement does not properly set forth the standard by which the Commission must determine whether he left work voluntarily with good cause. However, we agree with defendants that, read as a whole, the Commission applied the proper standard. In context, the Commission was merely noting a clear case in which it would certainly not deny plaintiff benefits. In its decision, the Commission did not apply the statement in controversy as its benchmark to determine whether plaintiff qualified for benefits. Rather, the Commission expressly applied Therrien and concluded that plaintiff's belief was unreasonable under all the circumstances.

Plaintiff also argues that, even if the Commission did apply the Therrien standard, the Commission erroneously required the plaintiff to show that the employer substantially increased the inherent risks of his employment to prove the reasonableness of his belief. In Therrien, 370 A.2d at 1391, we further detailed the inquiry as to the reasonableness of a belief as follows: "[W]hether reasonable persons acting reasonably under similar circumstances would have held that belief and acted upon the basis of it." Plaintiff, therefore, correctly argues that the increase in risk did not necessarily...