Campanella v. Montana Department of Transportation , 335 Mont. 212 ( 2007 )

No. 05-615
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF MONTANA
2007 MT 2MARK CAMPANELLA,
Plaintiff and Appellant,
v.
MONTANA DEPARTMENT
OF TRANSPORTATION,
Defendant and Respondent.
APPEAL FROM: The District Court of the Twelfth Judicial District,
In and For the County of Hill, Cause DV-04-217,
Honorable David G. Rice, Presiding Judge
COUNSEL OF RECORD:
For Appellant:
Jeremy S. Yellin, Attorney at Law, Havre, Montana
For Respondent:
Susan J. Rebeck, Department of Transportation, Helena, Montana
Submitted on Briefs: September 27, 2006
Decided: January 3, 2007
Filed:
__________________________________________
Clerk
Justice Jim Rice delivered the Opinion of the Court.
¶1 Mark Campanella (Campanella) appeals from the order entered by the Twelfth
Judicial District Court, Hill County, dismissing his wrongful discharge complaint on the
ground it was barred by the applicable statute of limitations. We affirm.
¶2 We address the following issue on appeal:
¶3 Did the District Court err in dismissing Campanella’s complaint by determining
that Campanella was not entitled to a statutory 120-day extension of the otherwise
applicable one-year statute of limitations?
FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND
¶4 On November 12, 2004, Campanella filed a complaint in District Court alleging
that the Montana Department of Transportation (MDT), his former employer, wrongfully
terminated his employment on July 16, 2003. Prior to filing his suit, Campanella had
filed a grievance regarding his discharge with the Board of Personnel Appeals (BOPA)
pursuant to § 2-18-1001, MCA. MDT moved to dismiss the complaint on three separate
grounds: that Campanella’s discharge was exempted from the Wrongful Discharge From
Employment Act (WDEA), because, pursuant to § 39-2-912, MCA, the discharge was
subject to a state statute providing a grievance procedure and remedy for contesting the
dispute; that the cause of action was barred by the one-year statute of limitations provided
by § 39-2-911(1), MCA; and that Campanella had failed to exhaust administrative
remedies available to him, as required by § 39-2-911(2), MCA.
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¶5 Following briefing and oral argument on the motion to dismiss, the District Court
entered an order determining that it would be necessary to look outside the complaint to
decide whether Campanella’s action was exempted, pursuant to § 39-2-912, MCA, from
the WDEA because of the existence of a separate statutory remedy, and that it could not
do so at this stage of the proceeding. Alternatively, however, the court determined that
Campanella’s complaint was barred by the applicable statute of limitations because he
was not entitled to the 120-day tolling provided by § 39-2-911(2), MCA, and his
complaint was not filed within one year. Having concluded the complaint must be
dismissed for that reason, the District Court did not rule on MDT’s argument regarding
failure to exhaust administrative remedies. Campanella appeals.
STANDARD OF REVIEW
¶6 A complaint may be dismissed under M. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(6), only if, assuming the
truth of all of the allegations of fact in the complaint, the complaint nevertheless fails to
set forth a claim upon which relief can be granted. The determination that a complaint
does not state a claim upon which relief can be granted is a conclusion of law, which we
review to determine whether the district court’s interpretation is correct. Boreen v.
Christensen, 267 Mont. 405, 408, 884 P.2d 761, 762 (1994).
DISCUSSION
¶7 Did the District Court err in dismissing Campanella’s complaint by determining
that Campanella was not entitled to a statutory 120-day extension of the otherwise
applicable one-year statute of limitations?
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¶8 The District Court, in analyzing whether Campanella’s discharge was exempted
altogether from the WDEA pursuant to § 39-2-912, MCA, 1 looked to this Court’s
decision in Tonack v. Montana Bank of Billings, 258 Mont. 247, 854 P.2d 326 (1993). In
Tonack, the defendant bank argued that § 39-2-912, MCA, prohibited Tonack from
recovering under both the Wrongful Discharge Act and the federal Age Discrimination in
Employment Act. In evaluating that contention, this Court stated:
Whether a discharge will ultimately be “subject to any other state or
federal statute that provides a procedure or remedy for contesting the
dispute” is not immediately known when a claim is filed. This must be
determined before it is known whether the Wrongful Discharge Act may be
applied. It is established only when a finder of fact has made that
determination or when judgment on the claim has otherwise been entered.
Therefore, we conclude that claims may be filed concurrently under the
Wrongful Discharge Act and other state or federal statutes described in
§ 39-2-912, MCA, but if an affirmative determination of the claim is
obtained under such other statutes, the Wrongful Discharge Act may no
longer be applied.
Tonack, 258 Mont. at 255, 854 P.2d at 331. Applying this case, the District Court
rejected MDT’s argument that § 2-18-1001, MCA, provided a grievance procedure for
MDT employees that exempted application of the WDEA, reasoning that this issue could
not yet be determined. Relying on Tonack, the District Court concluded that determining
whether this grievance procedure qualified as “any other state or federal statute” for
Campanella to contest his discharge for purposes of the exemption set forth in § 39-2-
912(1), MCA, first required an affirmative determination that this grievance mechanism
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Section 39-2-912(1), MCA, states, in part: “Exemptions. This part [the WDEA]
does not apply to a discharge . . . that is subject to any other state or federal statute that
provides a procedure or remedy for contesting the dispute.”
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provided a procedure or remedy for contesting Campanella’s discharge, and since the
court could not look beyond the complaint, such a finding could not yet be made. We
agree with the District Court’s reasoning in this regard, and take no position on this issue,
despite our further discussion of the BOPA grievance procedure hereinafter.
¶9 The District Court then took up MDT’s next defense—that Campanella had filed
his action beyond the one-year limitation period in § 39-2-911, MCA. It was undisputed
that his WDEA action was not filed within one year after his July 16, 2003, discharge.
Therefore, unless Campanella was entitled to the maximum 120-day extension provided
in the statute for a claimant who had first contested his discharge by pursuing the “written
internal procedures” of the employer, his action would be time barred.2 For this defense,
it was Campanella’s turn to rely on the BOPA grievance procedure provided to MDT
employees under § 2-18-1001, MCA. He argued to the District Court, and does so here,
that this procedure constituted his employer’s “written internal procedures” for purposes
of § 39-2-911(2), MCA, and, therefore, his pursuit of this relief gave him the 120-day
extension of the one-year statute of limitations. The District Court, in denying
Campanella the 120-day extension, noted that the BOPA grievance procedure was a
statutory creation, and concluded that because “the grievance procedure for Department
of Transportation employees [was] specified by statute,” it could not qualify as a “written
internal procedure” of the employer for purposes of § 39-2-911(2), MCA. It thus
dismissed Campanella’s complaint as time barred.
2
Campanella’s complaint was filed one year and 119 days following his discharge.
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¶10 Section 39-2-911(1), MCA, requires that an action under the WDEA “must be
filed within 1 year after the date of discharge.” Section 39-2-911(2), MCA, adds the
tolling provision, providing that the one-year limitation period can be tolled for up to 120
days:
If an employer maintains written internal procedures, other than those
specified in 39-2-912, under which an employee may appeal a discharge
within the organizational structure of the employer, the employee shall first
exhaust those procedures prior to filing an action under this part. . . . The
limitation period in subsection (1) is tolled until the procedures are
exhausted. In no case may the provisions of the employer’s internal
procedures extend the limitation period in subsection (1) more than 120
days. [Emphasis added.]
Therefore, in order to conclude that Campanella’s pursuit of a BOPA grievance under
§ 2-18-1001, MCA, entitles him to a 120-day extension, it must first be determined that
the BOPA procedure is a “written internal procedure” for purposes of § 39-2-911(2),
MCA. Campanella contends that it is an internal procedure for MDT employees, who are
designated by statute to follow it. MDT counters that the procedure is not internal to the
organizational structure of MDT, but rather a statutory procedure outside the Department.
¶11 The interpretational difficulty here is created by the Legislature’s enactment of
two statutes addressing administrative remedies in the employment context, but without
coordination thereof. This particular problem arises only in a case involving a MDT
employee, who may want to seek relief under the WDEA, but who is also subject to § 2-
18-1001, MCA, which the Legislature has uniquely applied to MDT employees. That
provision provides, in pertinent part, as follows:
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Transportation department personnel grievances -- hearing. (1)
An employee of the department of transportation aggrieved by a serious
matter of his employment based upon work conditions, supervision, or the
result of an administrative action and who has exhausted all other
administrative remedies is entitled to a hearing before the board of
personnel appeals, under the provisions of a grievance procedure to be
prescribed by the board, for resolution of the grievance. [Emphasis
added.]
¶12 Section 2-18-1001, MCA, provides MDT employees with the BOPA grievance
procedure for addressing a “serious matter of his employment.” There would seem little
disagreement that a discharge is a serious matter of employment, and thus applicable to
Campanella’s claim. The issue, however, is whether this procedure is the employer’s
“written internal procedure” for purposes of § 39-2-911(2), MCA, of the WDEA.
¶13 We disagree with the assertion that merely because this is a statutorily enacted
procedure, it cannot be considered the employer’s internal procedure. The MDT is a part
of state government, and the Legislature has statutorily created a procedure for MDT
employees to follow. Even though enacted by statute, such a procedure could be
“internal” to those employees if so designed and intended to be by the statute. Thus, we
must look further into the workings of this particular dispute resolution procedure to
resolve the issue.
¶14 A reading of § 2-18-1001, MCA, reveals the language, italicized in the above
quotation, which we deem to be significant. The statute expressly provides that an MDT
employee must first “exhaust[] all other administrative remedies [before being] entitled to
a hearing before [BOPA] . . . .” Thus, the statute acknowledges that there may be yet
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other administrative remedies which an MDT employee must pursue before the employee
may turn to the BOPA grievance procedure.
¶15 In interpreting a statute, we consider “the statute’s text, language, structure, and
object.” S.L.H. v. State Compensation Mut. Ins. Fund, 2000 MT 362, ¶ 16, 303 Mont.
364, ¶ 16, 15 P.3d 948, ¶ 16. Although the Legislature did not coordinate the grievance
provisions of § 2-18-1001, MCA, with the provisions of the WDEA in §§ 39-2-911 or
39-2-912, MCA, the two statutes bear a similarity in their construction. The WDEA
requires a discharged employee to exhaust the employer’s internal written procedures
prior to initiating litigation. Section 39-2-912(2), MCA. Likewise, § 2-18-1001, MCA,
requires the discharged MDT employee to exhaust other administrative remedies prior to
commencing a BOPA grievance proceeding.
¶16 This correlation leads us to conclude that the BOPA grievance procedure cannot
be considered a “written internal procedure” for purposes of § 39-2-911(2), MCA.
Clearly, § 2-18-2001, MCA, contemplates other administrative remedies for the MDT
employee which must be exhausted prior to the initiation of a BOPA proceeding. It is
apparent that the Legislature intended these other remedies to be the mandatory “internal
procedures” for those employees.
¶17 Consequently, we conclude that the District Court correctly held that Campanella
missed the filing deadline for his WDEA action, because the one-year statute of
limitations found in § 39-2-911(1), MCA, expired before Campanella filed his complaint,
and the 120-day extension provided for in § 39-2-911(2), MCA, was not applicable, as
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the BOPA procedure provided for in § 2-18-1001, MCA, was not the employer’s written
internal procedure.
¶18 Affirmed.
/S/ JIM RICE
We concur:
/S/ W. WILLIAM LEAPHART
/S/ JAMES C. NELSON
/S/ PATRICIA COTTER
/S/ JOHN WARNER
/S/ BRIAN MORRIS
Chief Justice Karla M. Gray, specially concurring.
¶19 I concur in the result the Court reaches here. However, I would limit the discussion to
the issue raised and argued by the parties.
¶20 The overarching issue is whether Campanella is entitled to toll the one-year statute of
limitations set forth in § 39-2-911(1), MCA, of the WDEA pursuant to the tolling provision
contained in § 39-2-911(2), MCA. The tolling provision is available when a discharged
employee must exhaust an employer’s “written internal procedures” for appealing the discharge.
I agree with the Court that Campanella is not entitled to the tolling provision.
¶21 The subissue, however, is whether § 2-18-1001, MCA—a statutory personnel grievance
procedure enacted by the Legislature for MDT employees—is a “written internal procedure” for
purposes of the tolling provision in § 39-2-911(2), MCA. Campanella insists that it is. The
Court concludes it is not, and I agree. However, I would reach that result by concluding—
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simply and cleanly—that the statutory process involving the BOPA, a separate entity not within
the MDT, is not, by its terms, a written procedure internal to MDT, the employer.
¶22 Thus, I join in the result the Court reaches, which is to affirm the District Court, but not
in the entirety of its discussion.
/S/ KARLA M. GRAY
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