JOSEPH MATURO, JR. v. STATE EMPLOYEES RETIREMENT COMMISSION
(SC 19831)
Supreme Court of Connecticut
July 11, 2017
Rogers, C. J., and Palmer, Eveleigh, McDonald, Espinosa and Robinson, Js.*
Argued March 30
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Syllabus
Pursuant to statute (
The plaintiff appealed from the judgment of the trial court upholding the declaratory ruling of the defendant retirement commission and dismissing his administrative appeal. The plaintiff retired from his position as a firefighter with the town of East Haven in 1991 and was awarded a disability pension through his membership in the municipal employees retirement system, which is governed by the Municipal Employees’ Retirement Act (
- The trial court properly dismissed the plaintiff‘s appeal from the decision of the commission, the plain language of
§ 7-438 (b) having barred the plaintiff from continuing to collect a disability pension while serving as the mayor of East Haven: the plaintiff‘s claim that the act could be interpreted to exclude elective officers as employees, and that, as mayor, he was not an employee of the town as that term is used in§ 7-438 (b) , was unavailing, as that interpretation would deprive elective officers who are members of the retirement system from many of the rights and benefits that other members enjoy, and, in the absence of any apparent rationale for such a scheme or a clear statement of legislative intent, this court declined to adopt the interpretation urged by the plaintiff, which would achieve a bizarre outcome. - The plaintiff could not prevail on his claim that
§ 7-438 (b) , when read as a whole and in light of the underlying policy rationales, evidenced a legislative intent to preclude a member of the retirement system from receiving a retirement pension only while reemployed in a participating position, and that, because he returned to work in a nonparticipating position, he was entitled to continue collecting his disability pension; notwithstanding the provision in§ 7-438 (b) that a member “shall be eligible to participate, and shall be entitled to credit,” in the retirement system, a member of the retirement system, such as the plaintiff, who is reemployed in a nonparticipating position is not eligible to participate in the retirement system while so employed, and§ 7-438 (b) reasonably may be understood to embody a legislative judgment that a participating municipality should not have to contribute additional funds to a member‘s retirement pension while at the same time paying the member‘s salary. - There was no merit to the plaintiff‘s claim that the commission and the trial court improperly interpreted
§ 7-438 (b) in isolation and did not consider its relationship to§ 7-432 (g) , which precludes the medical examining board from reconsidering eligibility for a disability pension unless additional facts concerning the member‘s condition are disclosed: subsection (g) was not added to§ 7-432 until 2013, approximately two years after the retirement services division suspended the plaintiff‘s pension, and§ 7-432 previously did not reference the medical examining board but, instead, delegated broad authority to the commission to determine a member‘s ongoing eligibility for a disability pension. - This court was not persuaded by the plaintiff‘s claim that the commission was bound by, or should have adhered to, its prior interpretation of
§ 7-438 (b) that permitted elective officials to retain their pensions while reemployed by participating municipalities in light of the fact that the legislature effectively acquiesced in that prior interpretation when it failed to amend the act, and the fact that the attorney general issued a nonbinding opinion letter counseling the commission not to deviate from its prior interpretation in the absence of further legislative direction: the evidence for legislative acquiescence in the commission‘s prior interpretation of the act was inconclusive and did not compel this court to depart from the plain meaning of the statutory text, and the legislature‘s failure to address the commission‘s revised interpretation when the legislature amended§ 7-438 in 2011 tended to demonstrate acquiescence in the revised interpretation; moreover, the plaintiff‘s claim that the attorney general‘s opinion that the legislature had acquiesced in the commission‘s prior interpretation and that the revised interpretation might upset retirees’ settled expectations was unconvincing, as an administrative agency, such as the commission, that discovers that it has been applying an erroneous interpretation of a statute is obliged, after giving fair notice to affected persons, to conform its policy to the correct interpretation, particularly in light of the provision (§ 7-439h ) in the act that requires the commission to correct any erroneous overpayment of benefits.
Procedural History
Appeal from the decision of the defendant determining that the plaintiff was ineligible to receive certain pension benefits, brought to the Superior Court in the judicial district of New Britain and tried to the court, Schuman, J.; judgment dismissing the appeal, from which the plaintiff appealed. Affirmed.
Lawrence C. Sgrignari, for the appellant (plaintiff).
Michael J. Rose, with whom was Cindy M. Cieslak, for the appellee (defendant).
Opinion
I
FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY
The following facts and procedural history, as found by the commission and supplemented by the undisputed evidence of record, are relevant to our disposition of the plaintiff‘s appeal. The plaintiff served as a firefighter for the town of East Haven from 1973 to 1991, during which time he participated as a member of the retirement system. In September, 1991, the town separated the plaintiff from service on the basis of a “service-connected” disability. In a January, 1992 letter, the commission approved his application for early retirement, but informed him that his retirement payments would be suspended if he again accepted employment with the town. In 1993, after the medical examining board confirmed the plaintiff‘s disability, the commission approved his “service-connected disability retirement,” retroactive to October, 1991. A March, 1993 letter from the commission again advised the plaintiff as to the retirement system‘s reemployment rules, stating that “[his] eligibility for a disability retirement [pension] is contingent on [his] being permanently and totally disabled from performing any gainful employment in the service of [his] former employer [and that he] may not accept reemployment with that municipality.”
In 1997, the plaintiff was elected to the office of mayor of the town of East Haven. At all times relevant to this case, although the town participated in the retirement system, it did not designate the office of mayor as a participating position. The plaintiff served as mayor from 1997 until 2007, when he lost a reelection bid. During that time, in spite of the warnings contained in the January, 1992 and March, 1993 letters, it was the policy of the agencies that a member could continue to collect a pension while reemployed by a participating municipality, so long as the member was reemployed in a nonparticipating position. Accordingly, during his initial ten years as mayor, the plaintiff received a salary from the town and also continued to collect his disability retirement pension.
In June, 2010, in response to information that the plaintiff was again considering running for elective office, Helen M. Kemp, the assistant director and counsel of the retirement services division, wrote to advise him that the commission‘s prior interpretation of the act was erroneous and that in the future he would not be eligible to collect a disability retirement benefit while employed in any paid position for the town. In a follow-up letter, Mark E. Ojakian, the deputy state comptroller and acting director of the retirement services division, explained that, in 2009, the retirement
Shortly thereafter, the plaintiff received a letter from Kimberly McAdam, a retirement system supervisor, informing him that he was no longer considered to be disabled under the act because “[t]he fact that [he is] performing the duties of [mayor] indicates that [he is] neither permanently nor totally disabled from engaging in gainful employment in the service of the municipality.” The letter notified the plaintiff that his pension would be “stopped” as of November 19, 2011. In that same time period, the commission sent letters to all disability retirees informing them that they could not collect a disability retirement pension while working for the same municipality from which they had retired, even in a nonparticipating position.
The retirement services division subsequently declined the plaintiff‘s request to reconsider its decision. The plaintiff then appealed to the commission, which, following what the trial court characterized as “a long and somewhat complicated administrative review process,” ultimately issued a declaratory ruling denying reinstatement of the plaintiff‘s retirement pension.
The plaintiff then appealed to the Superior Court. While proceedings in that court were pending, the General Assembly considered—for the second time in three years—legislation that would have expressly allowed the plaintiff and similarly situated members of the retirement system to continue to collect retirement pensions while reemployed by a participating municipality in a nonparticipating position. See
The plaintiff made four primary claims before the trial court. First, he argued that the decision of the commission upholding the suspension of his disability pension while he is employed as the mayor of East Haven was inconsistent with various provisions of the act. Specifically, he argued that (1)
In its memorandum of decision, the trial court found the first argument to be without merit because, although the retirement services division initially had informed the plaintiff that his disability pension was being terminated because his reemployment with East Haven was prima facie proof that he no longer was disabled, the commission itself did not rely on the premise that the plaintiff no longer was disabled. Rather, the commission determined that
Second, the plaintiff claimed that it was improper for the agencies, after years of construing the act to allow the plaintiff and others similarly situated to retain their retirement pension when returning to work in a nonparticipating position, to adopt a new, contrary interpretation of the law. He specifically argued that (1) he had reasonably relied to his detriment on the agencies’ pre-2009 interpretation of the act and on a September 30, 2011 letter in which the retirement services division director, Brenda Halpin, advised him to take no action with respect to his current employment status until the retirement services division completed an administrative review of the issue, and (2) the commission should have abided by the advice of Attorney General George C. Jepsen, who counseled in a November 2, 2012 opinion letter (Jepsen opinion) that the commission not deviate from its pre-2009 interpretation of the act in the absence of further legislative direction.
In rejecting the plaintiff‘s detrimental reliance claim, the trial court noted that the law disfavors claims of estoppel against government entities, which “may be invoked: (1) only with great caution; (2) only when the action in question has been induced by an agent having authority in such matters; and (3) only when special circumstances make it highly inequitable or oppressive not to estop the agency.” (Internal quotation marks omitted.) Chotkowski v. State, 240 Conn. 246, 268-69, 690 A.2d 368 (1997). In the present case, the court determined that that standard was not satisfied because the retirement services division had notified the plaintiff that its prior interpretation of the act was erroneous and that, henceforth, he would not be permitted to receive a disability benefit while employed in any paid position with the town. In addition to concluding that the plaintiff‘s ongoing reliance on the retirement services division‘s past interpretation of the act was unreasonable, the court concluded that the plaintiff had failed to demonstrate that his reliance thereon had caused him any detriment. Rather, the court found that the plaintiff‘s erroneous receipt of a retirement pension during his previous ten year tenure as mayor had been a “windfall.” The court further noted that the Jepsen opinion constituted nonbinding authority and that the opinion was unpersuasive insofar as it did not purport to analyze the statutes at issue or identify any defects in the commission‘s revised interpretation of the act. As a general matter, the court rejected as untenable the principle that a government agency must continue to adhere to an erroneous interpretation of a statute even when, having discovered its error, it provides fair notice to affected persons that it will change its policy in light of the revised interpretation.
Third, the plaintiff claimed that the commission treated him differently from other, similarly situated persons and thereby denied him equal protection of the law, as guaranteed by the federal and state constitutions. At trial, the plaintiff was unable to identify any other members who had been permitted to retain their retirement pensions
The trial court found that the plaintiff also had abandoned this claim by inadequate briefing, insofar as he had failed to allege that any selective treatment was based on impermissible considerations or membership in a protected class. In the alternative, the court rejected the equal protection claim on the merits, finding that the commission had informed all disability pension recipients that they could not collect their pensions while working for the same municipality for which they had previously worked, even in a nonparticipating position. The court further concluded that the aforementioned factual allegations did not constitute selective treatment vis-a-vis other, similarly situated persons.
Fourth, the plaintiff claimed that the commission‘s decision to provide him with an informal rather than a formal hearing violated both the governing statutes and his right to procedural due process. The trial court, in rejecting this claim, determined that the relevant procedural statutes did not require the commission to hold a formal hearing and that the requirements of due process had been satisfied.
Consistent with these determinations, the trial court affirmed the commission‘s decision and dismissed the plaintiff‘s appeal. The plaintiff appealed from the judgment of the trial court to the Appellate Court, raising claims substantially similar to those he raised before the trial court, and we transferred the appeal to this court pursuant to
II
ANALYSIS
The plaintiff‘s primary argument on appeal is that the trial court misinterpreted the reemployment provisions of the act and that
We begin our analysis of the plaintiff‘s claim by setting forth the well established standards that govern judicial review of an agency decision under the Uniform Administrative Procedure Act (UAPA),
B
In order to evaluate the plaintiff‘s claims, we first must describe in some detail the statutory framework that establishes and governs the retirement system. That framework is codified at
Finally,
“(b) If a member is retired under this part and again accepts employment from the same municipality from which he was retired or any other participating municipality, he shall be eligible to participate, and shall be entitled to credit, in the municipal employees’ retirement system for the period of such municipal employment. Such member shall receive no retirement allowance while so employed except if (1) such employment is for less than twenty hours per week, or (2) his services are rendered for not more than ninety working days in any one calendar year, provided that any member reemployed for a period of more than ninety working days in one calendar year shall reimburse the Municipal Employees’ Retirement Fund for retirement income payments received during
C
It was the conclusion of both the agencies and the trial court that the plaintiff‘s case represents a straightforward application of
On appeal, the plaintiff identifies what he considers to be four flaws in the commission‘s statutory analysis. First, the plaintiff contends that his position as the mayor of East Haven does not constitute “employment” and that he is not an “employee” of that town for purposes of the act and, therefore, that
1
The plaintiff‘s first contention is that
When a term is not defined in a statute, we begin with the assumption that the legislature intended the word to carry its ordinary meaning, as evidenced in dictionaries in print at the time the statute was enacted. State v. Wright, 320 Conn. 781, 802, 135 A.3d 1 (2016); State v. Menditto, 315 Conn. 861, 866, 110 A.3d 410 (2015). Although the earliest version of the predecessor statute to
Instead, the plaintiff argues that the words “employee,” “employed,” and “employment” are statutory terms of art that have a particular meaning in the context of the act. He notes, for example, that
The plaintiff‘s efforts to distinguish between municipal employees and elective officers, while valiant, are unavailing. We begin by observing that
This interpretation is consistent with the fact that many provisions of the act refer only to “employees” or related cognate terms; specific mention of elective officers is made only in particular instances when distinct treatment is warranted. Compare, e.g.,
It bears emphasizing in this regard that many provisions of the act that afford rights or benefits to members of the retirement system use only the terms
Particularly fatal to the plaintiff‘s theory are those sections of the act that appear to equate elective officers with municipal employees or imply that the former as well as the latter can be “employed” for purposes of the retirement system.
Finally, we note that the original version of the reemployment statute barred retired members from collecting a pension while reemployed in any state or municipal position, but expressly exempted elective officers from that prohibition. See
2
The plaintiff‘s second statutory argument is that
The key to the plaintiff‘s argument is the provision in
The conundrum we face, then, is that, under the circumstances of the present case, it seems that we must disregard either the eligibility clause, which allows members such as the plaintiff to participate in the retirement system, or the second sentence of
First, the commission offers a more plausible account of how all the different provisions of
The commission, by contrast, offers a plausible account of how all the various provisions of the statute can be given effect. Specifically, the commission submits that the eligibility clause reasonably may be understood to mean that a retired member is entitled to earn additional retirement credits so long as he or she is reemployed in a position for which such credits are available.14
Alternatively, it may well be that the legislature meant exactly what it said, and that retired members such as the plaintiff are eligible to earn additional credits in the retirement system even while reemployed in nonparticipating positions. Although a municipality may opt not to designate its elective officers as participating positions; see
Second, we are not persuaded that the plaintiff is correct in his assessment of the policy rationales that underlie
The plaintiff argues that, prior to 1987,
3
The plaintiff‘s third statutory argument takes as its starting point the well established rule that we must “construe a statute as a whole and ... harmonize its disparate sections within the bounds of reason.” State v. Gonzalez, 210 Conn. 446, 451, 556 A.2d 137 (1989). He faults the agencies and the trial court for having considered
The plaintiff primarily relies on
4
The plaintiff‘s fourth statutory argument is that the commission is bound by, or should adhere to, its prior interpretation of
With respect to the plaintiff‘s legislative acquiescence argument, we frequently have explained that “the legislative acquiescence doctrine requires actual acquiescence on the part of the legislature. [Thus, in] most of our prior cases, we have employed the doctrine not simply because of legislative inaction, but because the legislature affirmatively amended the statute subsequent to a judicial or administrative interpretation, but chose not to amend the specific provision of the statute at issue. . . . In other words, [l]egislative concurrence is particularly strong [when] the
In the present case, the legislature made no changes to
Lastly, we consider the plaintiff‘s argument that the Jepsen opinion, while not binding on this court; see Wiseman v. Armstrong, 269 Conn. 802, 825, 850 A.2d 114 (2004); nevertheless represents highly persuasive authority to which the trial court should have deferred. As that court recognized, however, the Jepsen opinion neither purported to interpret the statutory language at issue nor concluded that the agencies’ pre-2009 interpretation of
For all of these reasons, the plaintiff‘s statutory arguments are unpersuasive.19 In addition, we have reviewed the
The judgment is affirmed.
In this opinion the other justices concurred.
* This case originally was scheduled to be argued before a panel of this court consisting of Chief Justice Rogers and Justices Palmer, Eveleigh, McDonald, Espinosa and Robinson. Although Justice Robinson was not present when the case was argued before the court, he has read the briefs and appendices, and listened to a recording of the oral argument prior to participating in this decision.
For similar reasons, we are not persuaded by the plaintiff‘s apparent argument that he is no longer a member of the retirement system and, therefore, not bound by
With respect to the plaintiff‘s equal protection claim, we note that the allegedly political motivations of certain legislators in delaying the amendment of
Lastly, in his principal appellate brief, the plaintiff refers to his due process claims only in passing and fails to list those claims in his statement of issues. Accordingly, we decline to address those claims as inadequately briefed. See Estate of Rock v. University of Connecticut, 323 Conn. 26, 33, 144 A.3d 420 (2016).