Opinion
No. 73-178
Decided November 21, 1973.
Board of education — Review of proceedings — Decision not to reemploy teacher — Not appealable, when — R.C. 2506.01 — Quasi-judicial proceedings contemplated — R. C. 3319.01 et seq. — Statutory construction.
1. The review of proceedings of administrative officers and agencies, under R.C. 2506.01, contemplates quasi-judicial proceedings only. ( M.J. Kelley Co. v. Cleveland, 32 Ohio St.2d 150, approved and followed.)
2. The action of a board of education in deciding not to reemploy a school teacher whose limited employment contract is due to expire is not a quasi-judicial proceeding subject to judicial review under R.C. 2506.01.
APPEAL from the Court of Appeals for Hamilton County.
The appellant, Susan DeLong, was employed as a teacher by appellee, Board of Education of the Southwest School District, under a three-year limited contract which expired on August 31, 1972. On April 24, 1972, the board of education met "for the purpose of reviewing and employing teachers whose contracts expire at the end of the 1971-72 school year." Appellant's status was considered at that meeting, and the board voted unanimously not to reemploy her. It is undisputed that at this time appellant was eligible for "continuing service status" (R.C. 3319.11), and that the Superintendent of Southwest School District had recommended that she be reemployed under a continuing contract.
R.C. 3319.08, as applicable, defines a limited contract as one for a term not to exceed five years, and describes a continuing contract as one that remains in effect until the teacher resigns, retires, or is properly removed.
Appellant filed a notice of appeal, under R.C. Chapter 2506, seeking a review of the board's decision not to rehire her. The appeal was dismissed by the Court of Common Pleas, and the judgment of dismissal was affirmed by the Court of Appeals. The cause is now before this court upon the allowance of a motion to certify the record.
Messrs. Smith, Latimer Swing and Mr. George H. Kearns, for appellant.
Aronoff, Rosen Lerner Co., L.P.A., Mr. Donald M. Lerner, and Mr. William J. Ennis, for appellees.
We are called upon to determine whether R.C. Chapter 2506 provides an avenue whereby appellant may seek a review of appellee's decision not to reemploy her. R.C. 2506.01 delineates the administrative actions from which an appeal may be taken, as follows:
"Every final order, adjudication, or decision of any officer, tribunal, authority, board, bureau, commission, department or other division of any political subdivision of the state may be reviewed * * *.
"* * *
"A `final order, adjudication, or decision' does not include * * * any order which does not constitute a determination of the rights, duties, privileges, benefits, or legal relationships of a specified person * * *."
In M.J. Kelley Co. v. Cleveland (1972), 32 Ohio St.2d 150, this court held that Section 4(B), Article IV of the Ohio Constitution, requires an administrative proceeding to be quasi-judicial in nature before any order issuing therefrom can be appealed pursuant to R.C. 2506.01. Our initial focus, then, is on the nature of the proceedings which culminated in the decision not to rehire appellant.
The action of appellee was taken pursuant to R.C. 3319.11, which, in pertinent part, provides:
"Upon the recommendation of the superintendent [of schools] that a teacher eligible for continuing service status be re-employed, a continuing contract shall be entered into between the board [of education] and such teacher unless the board by a three-fourths vote of its full membership rejects the recommendation of the superintendent. * * *" There is no requirement in R.C. 3319.11, or anywhere in R.C. Chapter 3319, that a board of education must provide a teacher, whose limited contract is due to expire, with notice of, or opportunity to be heard at, the meeting where his re-employment is being considered. Absent such legislative mandate, we conclude that the determination not to rehire appellant was not the product of a quasi-judicial proceeding, as defined in Kelley Co., supra, and therefore appellee's decision cannot be appealed under R. C. 2506.01.
We note that no constitutional due-process claim was here raised by appellant. However, both parties did discuss Orr v. Trinter (C.A. 6, 1971), 444 F.2d 128, wherein such a claim was fully considered and rejected in a well-reasoned opinion by Chief Judge Phillips.
Appellant attempts to distinguish Kelley Co. She contends that that case involved no administrative determination of a pre-existing right, whereas, here, appellee's action constituted an unlawful abridgement of her vested statutory right to re-employment. Appellant characterizes the language of R.C. 3319.11 as giving her a right to a continuing contract, subject to a veto by the board of education, and places much reliance on her superintendent's having recommended her for continuing service status.
We do not agree with appellant's contention. R.C. 3319.07 makes it clear that the ultimate responsibility for employing teachers rests with the board of education, and R.C. 3319.11 carefully preserves the board's right to have the final say in all reemployment situations. Although, under R.C. 3319.11, a teacher's contract is deemed renewed by a board's failure to act timely, this very failure is, itself, statutorily considered to be an expression of the board's will.
We have carefully examined the arguments of both appellant and amicus curiae, and do not agree that R.C. Chapter 3319 gave appellant any statutory right to reemployment upon the expiration of her three-year limited contract.
For the foregoing reasons, the judgment of the Court of Appeals is affirmed.
Judgment affirmed.
O'NEILL, C.J., HERBERT, CORRIGAN, CELEBREZZE, W. BROWN and P. BROWN, JJ., concur.