Somerset County v. Department of Corrections

2016 ME 33, 133 A.3d 1006, 2016 Me. LEXIS 34, 2016 WL 640788
CourtSupreme Judicial Court of Maine
DecidedFebruary 18, 2016
DocketDocket Som-14-101
StatusPublished
Cited by16 cases

This text of 2016 ME 33 (Somerset County v. Department of Corrections) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Judicial Court of Maine primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Somerset County v. Department of Corrections, 2016 ME 33, 133 A.3d 1006, 2016 Me. LEXIS 34, 2016 WL 640788 (Me. 2016).

Opinions

HJELM, J.

[¶ 1] This case calls for us to construe legislation that bears on a financial dispute between Somerset County and the former State of Maine Board of Corrections. The County receives' income generated by boarding federal prisoners at the Somerset County Jail (SCJ), and that income is used to support the jail budget. When the County received more federal boarding revenue than anticipated during fiscal year (FY) 2013, it then — without consulting with or receiving approval from the Board — applied a portion of that surplus income to debt service for the cost to construct the SCJ facility. In response, the Board, which had statutory authority to establish and amend most aspects of the counties’ correctional services budgets, correspondingly reduced the amount of the County’s corrections funding from other sources. The County appealed that agency action to the Superior Court. (Somerset County, Alexander, /.), which concluded that controlling legislation did not authorize the Board to adjust payments to the County as a result of the County’s unauthorized use of surplus federal boarding income. On this appeal filed by the Board, we vacate the Superior Court’s judgment and remand for entry of judgment in favor of the Department of Corrections (DOC) as the party substituted for the Board.

I. SUBSTITUTION OF PARTIES ,

[¶ 2] We first address the justiciability of this action. During the pendency of this appeal, the State of Maine Board of Corrections was abolished. See P.L.2015, ch. 335 (emergency, effective July 12, 2015) (codified in scattered sections of 1 M.R.S., 4 M.R.S., 5 M.R.S., 14 M.R.S., 30-A M.R.S., and 34-A M.R.S.). At our direction, counsel for the County and for the Board filed memoranda addressing the question of whether, in light of that legislative development, the County’s claim remained justiciable. Based on those filings, we then gave the County an opportunity to file a motion that would bring into this action an existing entity to.substitute for the Board, which no longer exists. See M.R. Civ. P. 25(c); M.R.App. P. 10.

[¶ 3] The County filed a motion to substitute DOC for the Board, arguing that many of the responsibilities held by the Board, including some of the financial management of the county jail system, were transferred to DOC, and so. DOC became the proper entity in this financial dispute to stand in the Board’s shoes. The County supported its motion with an affidavit executed by Sagadahoc County Sheriff Joel A. Merry, who had been a member of the Board since 2014 and was serving as its Chair when it ceased to exist in July 2015. In his -affidavit, Sheriff Merry certified that as the Board wound up its financial responsibilities, it prepared a final report of its remaining funds as of June 30, 2015. Sheriff Merry stated that the report, which he appended to his affidavit, “reflects a FY2014 carry forward of $560,884 for the anticipated expenditure to Somerset County for FY2013, which [the Board] understood could be distributed, depending upon the result of the pending litigation.” The sum of $560,884 is the combined amount in dispute in this action [1009]*1009and a companion ease that raises the same issues. See infra n. 6.

[¶ 4] DOC filed a memorandum in opposition to the County’s motion, disputing the County’s assertion that the Board created the reserve referenced in Sheriff Merry’s affidavit and contending that the financial provisions in the legislation abolishing the Board did not allow any fiscal room to satisfy the County’s claims if the County were successful here.

[¶ 5] Although the record creates some measure of ambiguity,1 we cannot disregard Sheriff Merry’s sworn assertion that funds from the Board’s budget were earmarked to pay the County if we were to hold that the Board erred by withholding money otherwise due to the County. 'Further, pursuant to the legislation that abolished the Board, the money in the Board’s budget was to be carried forward to the County Jail Operations Fund General Fund account administered by DOC. P.L. 2015, ch. 3B5, §§ 22, 23, 29 (codified at 34-A M.R.S. §§ 1208-B, 1210-D (2Ó15)). Although the new legislation generally prescribes the way DOC is to use that money, see P.L.2015, ch. 335, § 23 (codified at 34-A M.R.S. § 1210-D), it does not affirmatively foreclose the creation of the reserve fund described in Sheriff Merry’s affidavit.

[¶ 6] The record therefore is sufficient for us to determine that the process by which the Board was eliminated preserved the justiciability of this action. According to Sheriff Merry’s affidavit, money that would be used to satisfy a judgment was set aside to DOC.’Because DOC thereby was given the role of the responsible party in the event the County were to prevail here; DOC may be properly substituted for the Board. Cf. Skolnick v. Kemer, 435 F.2d 694, 695 (7th Cir.1970) (holding that “a pending suit, even if-properly instituted against ah existing governmental agency, [must] abate when the agency dissolves without a'successor assuming its powers and functions.”). Accordingly,- we grant the- County’s motion and substitute DOC for the Board as the defendant and appellant in this action.

II. BACKGROUND

[¶ 7] The facts are not in material dispute. In 2008, the .Legislature created the Board of Corrections to oyersee Maine’s coordinated corrections system., P.L.2007, ch. 653, part A, § A-30 (emergency, effec-five Apr. 18, 2008); 34-A M.R.S. §§ 1801-1807 (2013).2 One of the Board’s functions was to “[r]eview, amend if necessary and adopt the correctional services' expenditures in each county budget under Title 30-A, section ' 710.” 34-A M.R.S. § 1803(1)(A). In 2012, the County submitted its proposed SCJ budget fob FY 2013 to the Board, which approved a total budget of $6,805,069. The approved expenses did not include debt service' for the County’s new jail facility.'

[¶ 8] The SCJ budget was funded primarily through three sources. First, the County itself was to pay $4,863,215 from taxes assessed and collected from local municipalities. See 30-A M.R.S. § 701(2-[1010]*1010A) (2012).3 Second, the County was to receive $1,131,768 from the State Investment Fund, which consists of money appropriated from State General Fund accounts, and Other Special Revenue Funds accounts. See 34-A M.R.S. §§ 1805(1), (3). Third, the budget was supported with estimated revenue of $450,960 that the County expected to receive from the United States Marshals Service to board federal prisoners at the SCJ.4 The record indicates that this was the total amount of federal boarding revenue that the County expected to receive in FY 2013, based on the amount of income actually received during the previous fiscal year.

[¶ 9] On July 31, 2012, the Board approved payment of $560,833 to the County, which constituted' the State Investment Fund disbursement for the first two quarters of FY 2013.

[110] When the second quarter of FY 2013 ended, the County had already received $660,259 in federal prisoner boarding revenue. Because this amount substantially exceeded the amount of federal revenue that the County expected to receive for the entire fiscal year, on January 2, 2013, the County Commissioners passed Resolution.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
2016 ME 33, 133 A.3d 1006, 2016 Me. LEXIS 34, 2016 WL 640788, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/somerset-county-v-department-of-corrections-me-2016.