Guam Waterworks Authority v. Civil Service Commission, and Joey A. Taitano

Summary

The Supreme Court of Guam held that Guam Waterworks Authority’s personnel rules required Joey A. Taitano to receive ten days to respond to proposed adverse action after receiving notice. Because GWA terminated Taitano four days after he received the notice, the court reversed the Superior Court’s decision and held the termination invalid. The court also concluded that objections to the timeliness of GWA’s petition for judicial review involved nonjurisdictional claim-processing rules and had been waived.

Holdings

1. The Superior Court properly exercised jurisdiction over GWA's petition. The thirty-day filing deadline, the administrative-order requirement that a document is not filed until the filing fee is paid, and the Superior Court's email-filing policy were court- or agency-created claim-processing rules rather than jurisdictional limits, and Taitano waived his objections to their application.
2. When a CSC matter is disposed of under the Rule of Four and no findings of fact can be issued, judicial review is limited to a de novo determination of whether the agency decision was in accordance with law; courts may not review factual issues.
3. The phrase "after receipt of the notice" means after the employee actually receives the notice, or after a legally applicable presumption of delivery, and does not mean after mailing or completion of service by mail.
4. Certified mail does not establish that an employee received notice upon mailing. When certified mail is sent with return receipt requested, the return receipt ordinarily supplies prima facie evidence of the delivery date. If no receipt is available, a rebuttable presumption of delivery may apply in appropriate circumstances, but it cannot be treated as conclusive or as instantaneous receipt upon mailing.
5. GWA violated its own personnel rules by terminating Taitano before he had received ten full calendar days to answer the notice of proposed adverse action. An adverse action taken before the ten-day period after receipt has elapsed is invalid.

Questions Presented

1. Whether the Superior Court had jurisdiction over GWA's petition for judicial review when the petition was stamped filed one day after the applicable thirty-day deadline.
2. Whether the thirty-day deadline for seeking judicial review of a CSC decision, the filing-fee requirement, and the Superior Court's email-filing policy were jurisdictional or nonjurisdictional claim-processing rules, and whether Taitano waived any objection.
3. Whether the GWA Rules gave Taitano ten days to answer after actual or presumed receipt of the notice of proposed adverse action, rather than from the date of mailing or completion of service.
4. Whether GWA violated its own rules by terminating Taitano before the ten-day response period after receipt had elapsed.
5. Whether the Superior Court could review factual issues when the CSC decision was disposed of under the Rule of Four and the CSC issued no findings of fact.

Disposition

reversed