JENNIFER ASKVIG, Appellant, vs. SNAP-ON LOGISTICS CO. a/k/a SNAP-ON TOOLS CORP., Appellee.
No. 20–0997
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF IOWA
December 17, 2021
Submitted November 17, 2021
Mansfield, J.
Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Polk County, Jeffrey D. Farrell, Judge.
A workers’ compensation claimant appeals a district court order dismissing her petition for judicial review of the agency decision as untimely.
AFFIRMED.
Mansfield, J., delivered the opinion of the court, in which all justices joined.
Mark S. Soldat of Mark S. Soldat, PLC, West Des Moines, for appellant.
Joni L. Ploeger of Dentons Davis Brown, P.C., Des Moines, for appellee.
I. Introduction.
This case requires us to interpret a provision of our COVID-related supervisory orders. During the early months of the COVID pandemic, a workers’ compensation attorney failed to file a petition for judicial review within thirty days of the date when the claimant‘s application for rehearing had been deemed denied. See
The district court granted the employer‘s motion to dismiss the petition. The court reasoned that the April 2 supervisory order did not apply to the thirty-day deadline for petitioning for judicial review set forth in
On appeal, we agree with the district court. The
commencing an action in district court.” Apr. 2 Order at 9. It is fundamentally different. It is an appellate deadline. There are and were practical reasons during the COVID pandemic to treat appellate deadlines differently from original deadlines. An attorney tasked with filing an appeal does so on a record that is already complete. In many cases, as here, the attorney has a preexisting attorney–client relationship with the client. Thus, avoiding person-to-person contact—the fundamental concern that drove this court‘s early supervisory orders—is less of an issue for appeals. For these reasons, and others we discuss herein, we conclude the district court correctly dismissed the claimant‘s petition for judicial review.
II. Facts and Procedural History.
Jennifer Askvig worked for Snap-On Logistics Company d/b/a Snap-On Tools. In the middle of 2017, she realized she had sustained a work injury. This resulted in her undergoing right carpal tunnel surgery. With the assistance of her present counsel, Askvig pursued workers’ compensation benefits.
In an appeal decision dated February 5, 2020, the workers’ compensation commissioner
On February 25, Askvig, through counsel, filed an application for rehearing. The commissioner did not act on the application. Therefore, on March 16, it was deemed denied. See
Thereafter, according to
On May 5, Snap-On‘s counsel wrote Askvig‘s counsel by email as follows:
By my calculations, the deadline to file an application for judicial review has expired for this matter. Can you please confirm you have not filed an application for judicial review? If so, I will move forward with asking my client to issue check(s) to pay out the award. My calculation of the award amounts are as follows. Please let me know if you agree.
Thirteen days later, on May 18, Askvig‘s counsel responded by email, claiming that this court‘s supervisory orders dated April 2 and May 8 had the effect of tolling the deadline for seeking judicial review. That same day, Askvig‘s counsel filed a petition for judicial review in the Polk County District Court.
Snap-On moved to dismiss the petition, asserting that it was untimely under
The district court held a hearing on Snap-On‘s motion to dismiss on July 7. Two days later, the court issued an order granting the motion. Askvig appealed, and we retained the appeal.
III. Standard of Review.
“We review the granting of a motion to dismiss for errors at law.” Jacobs v. Iowa Dep‘t of Transp., 887 N.W.2d 590, 593 (Iowa 2016) (quoting Cooksey v. Cargill Meat Sols. Corp., 831 N.W.2d 94, 96 (Iowa 2013)).
IV. Legal Analysis.
If a party files an application under section 17A.16, subsection 2, for rehearing with the agency, the petition for judicial review must be filed within thirty days after that application has been denied or deemed denied. If a party does not file an application under section 17A.16, subsection 2, for rehearing, the petition must be filed within thirty days after the issuance of the agency‘s final decision in that contested case.
Our supervisory order of April 2, 2020, provided,
STATUTE OF LIMITATIONS
33. Tolled. Any statute of limitations, statute of repose, or similar deadline for commencing an action in district court is hereby tolled from March 17 to June 1 (76 days). Tolling means that amount of time [is added] to the statute of limitations or similar deadline. So, for example, if the statute would run on April 8, 2020, it now runs on June 23, 2020 (76 days later).
Apr. 2 Order at 9.
A follow-up order of May 8 reiterated,
FURTHER PROVISIONS RE STATUTE OF LIMITATIONS TOLLING
3. Statute of Limitations Tolling. As previously ordered on April 2, 2020, any statute of limitations, statute of repose, or similar deadline for commencing an action in district court is tolled from March 17 to June 1 (76 days). Tolling means that amount of time is added to the statute of limitations or similar deadline.
May 8 Order at 2.
Clearly, the deadline in
To begin with, the thirty-day deadline in
of a state agency.“); Anderson v. W. Hodgeman & Sons, Inc., 524 N.W.2d 418, 420 (Iowa 1994) (“Historically, we have distinguished cases involving a district court‘s appellate jurisdiction from those invoking its original jurisdiction. Where a party attempts to invoke the district court‘s appellate jurisdiction, compliance with statutory conditions is required for the court to acquire jurisdiction.“); Black v. Univ. of Iowa, 362 N.W.2d 459, 462 (Iowa 1985) (“Fundamentally, in judicial review proceedings the district court exercises only appellate jurisdiction . . . .“). The party petitioning for judicial review is not “commencing an action in district court“; they are continuing the action.2
When a party is invoking appellate jurisdiction, as here, their claims have already had a full hearing. This helps explain why there is often less tolerance for equitable modification of appellate deadlines. Also, as the district court noted,
[T]here are practical distinctions between judicial review proceedings and original jurisdiction cases. The coronavirus crisis created real obstacles to filing and serving original actions. Attorneys had more difficulty meeting with clients and potential witnesses before filing an action. Service is complicated because
process services may need to come into personal contact with defendants. These concerns do not apply to judicial review cases. The attorneys and clients have already been through a contested case hearing and intra-agency appeal. The facts and arguments have already been developed. The decision to take the next step to judicial review does not require the same level of personal contact. Service can be made by regular mail, so personal contact can be completely avoided.
We generally agree with these cogent observations. Filing a judicial review petition (like pursuing other types of appeals) would not normally present the same COVID-related difficulties that come with bringing an original action.
Appellate deadlines, such as the thirty days at issue here, are short by design. This is due to the need for finality. Extending a thirty-day deadline by seventy-six days would have had far greater relative impact than the same seventy-six-day extension for a statute of limitations or statute of repose, which are typically calculated in years. See
Moreover, the thirty-day deadline in
Unlike a statute of limitations or statute of repose, the thirty-day deadline for filing a judicial review petition cannot be waived by the opposing party and is not subject to equitable tolling doctrines like estoppel. Compare Cooper v. Kirkwood Cmty. Coll., 782 N.W.2d 160, 164 n.1 (Iowa Ct. App. 2010) (noting that “a lack of subject matter jurisdiction cannot be waived“), with Est. of Anderson ex rel. Herren v. Iowa Dermatology Clinic, PLC, 819 N.W.2d 408, 414 (Iowa 2012) (explaining that “fraudulent concealment allows a plaintiff to pursue a claim that would be otherwise time barred under the statute of repose“).
In Sharp v. Iowa Department of Job Service, we rejected a claim that a provision in the Iowa Rules of Civil Procedure extending the filing deadline when timely service was made by mail could apply to a petition for judicial review. 492 N.W.2d at 669–70. Quoting an earlier case, we said, “The courts of our state cannot expand their judicial review jurisdiction by allowing appeal of agency action in contested cases beyond the time limit specified for that purpose by the legislature.” Id. at 669 (quoting Sioux City Brick & Tile Co. v. Emp. Appeal Bd., 449 N.W.2d 634, 638 (Iowa 1989)).
Additionally, the legislature has entrusted the field of workers’ compensation primarily to the executive branch. Workers’ compensation is an administrative process. See generally
deny finality to the actions of another branch of government. On the other hand, extending the deadline for petitioning for judicial review of administrative actions would affect the finality of many actions of a separate branch of government. In this respect as well, the
Notably, Askvig‘s attorney does not claim that he delayed filing the petition for judicial review in reliance on the court‘s April 2 or May 8 supervisory orders. Rather, he points to the following COVID-related issues while conceding, at the same time, that the deadline was “overlooked” by his office:
Because of the hearing workload prior to and after the office was closed to the public, the failure of the commissioner to respond to the 2/25/20 rehearing application, and the general stresses and confusion of self-sheltering in both the office and at home, both the undersigned‘s legal assistant and he overlooked the fact that the “deemed denied” event had occurred on 3/16/20 and that the judicial review needed to be filed on or before 4/15/20.
Askvig‘s attorney is a busy practitioner who appears frequently in the appellate courts. We do not doubt the veracity of these statements. Still, these statements about the burdens imposed by COVID are general in nature and could have justified the extension of any deadline. That is not what we did in the April 2 and May 8 supervisory orders.
Askvig raises several additional arguments. She maintains that “similar deadline” must mean something, and that to have a meaning, it must include appellate deadlines. We respectfully disagree. While only this case is before us, and we make no prediction as to how any other case would be decided, other deadlines do exist that are more akin to statutes of limitations or repose. See, e.g.,
Askvig also argues that this court had authority, given the COVID emergency, to extend the thirty-day deadline in
Askvig separately argues that she substantially complied with
IV. Conclusion.
For the foregoing reasons, we affirm the district court‘s order of dismissal.
AFFIRMED.