Opinion
12-15-2016
In re Dr. Marie MONACO, et al., Petitioners–Appellants, v. NEW YORK UNIVERSITY and New York University School of Medicine, Respondents–Respondents.
Gladstein, Reif & Meginniss, LLP, New York (Beth M. Margolis of counsel), for appellants. Bond, Schoeneck & King PLLC, New York (Louis P. DiLorenzo of counsel), for respondents.
Gladstein, Reif & Meginniss, LLP, New York (Beth M. Margolis of counsel), for appellants.
Bond, Schoeneck & King PLLC, New York (Louis P. DiLorenzo of counsel), for respondents.
SWEENY, J.P., RENWICK, MANZANET–DANIELS, KAPNICK, JJ.
Judgment, Supreme Court, New York County (Alexander W. Hunter, Jr., J.), entered July 17, 2015, which, to the extent appealed from, granted respondents' cross motion to dismiss petitioners' breach of contract and promissory estoppel claims, unanimously reversed, on the law, with costs, the cross motion denied, the plenary claims reinstated, and the matter remanded for further proceedings. A university's academic and administrative decisions require professional judgment and may only be reviewed by way of an article 78 proceeding to ensure that such decisions are not violative of the institution's own rules and neither arbitrary nor irrational (Maas v. Cornell Univ., 94 N.Y.2d 87, 92, 699 N.Y.S.2d 716, 721 N.E.2d 966 [1999] ; Gertler v. Goodgold, 107 A.D.2d 481, 485–486, 487 N.Y.S.2d 565 [1st Dept.1985], affd. 66 N.Y.2d 946, 498 N.Y.S.2d 779, 489 N.E.2d 748 [1985] ; Matter of Bennett v. Wells Coll., 219 A.D.2d 352, 356, 641 N.Y.S.2d 929 [4th Dept.1996] ). However, "[i]f the claim involves a matter of contractual right it may, of course, be vindicated in an action [at] law" (Gertler, 107 A.D.2d at 486, 487 N.Y.S.2d 565 ).
For the purpose of surviving respondents' cross motion to dismiss, petitioners, tenured faculty members of respondent New York University's School of Medicine, have sufficiently alleged that the policies contained in respondent's Faculty Handbook, which "form part of the essential employment understandings between a member of the Faculty and the University," have the force of contract (see O'Neill v. New York Univ., 97 A.D.3d 199, 208–210, 944 N.Y.S.2d 503 [1st Dept.2012] ). Further, for the purposes of surviving respondents' cross motion to dismiss, petitioners have sufficiently alleged that they had a mutual understanding with respondent that tenured faculty members' salaries may not be involuntarily reduced. Additionally, petitioners have sufficiently alleged that they reasonably relied on oral representations by respondents that their salaries would not be involuntarily reduced.