Massachusetts Highway Department v. Perini Corp.

Summary

The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court held that an arbitration panel had authority to decide whether a contractor’s claim had satisfied procedural prerequisites and become pending before the panel’s members were not renewed. Because the parties had agreed to arbitrate the underlying claim and the timing issue was procedural rather than a substantive limit on arbitrability, the issue was for the arbitrators to decide. The court affirmed dismissal of the project’s complaints, while holding that the appeals from denials of stays were moot because the arbitration had concluded.

Holdings

1. The appeals challenging the denials of motions to stay arbitration were moot because the arbitration proceedings had already concluded.
2. When the parties have agreed to arbitrate the substantive dispute and have not expressly provided otherwise, the arbitrator presumptively decides procedural questions concerning whether the claim satisfied prerequisites for submission to arbitration.
3. The board did not exceed its authority by proceeding with the underpinning-impact dispute because the agreement's procedural ambiguity did not establish that the claim was outside the board's authority.

Questions Presented

1. Whether the appeals from the Superior Court's denials of motions to stay arbitration became moot after the arbitration proceeding concluded.
2. Whether the arbitration board, rather than the court, had authority to decide whether PKC's underpinning-impact claim had satisfied the procedural prerequisites to become a dispute pending before that board before its members' terms expired.
3. Whether the board exceeded its authority by proceeding with the underpinning-impact arbitration.

Disposition

affirmed