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10th District appellate panel vacates prevailing-wage ruling
KEITH ARNOLD
Special to the Legal News
Published: August 27, 2024
A Franklin County appellate panel vacated a 2023 ruling by a lower court in a prevailing-wage case, having determined that the common pleas court never should have accepted the administrative appeal.
The Tenth District Court of Appeals panel relied upon a plain-text reading of the statute that governs a prevailing-wage dispute, R.C. 4115.16(A), which confirms the appropriate forum for an appeal is the court of common pleas in the county in which the violation by a specific contractor or subcontractor is alleged to have occurred.
“Thus, if an interested party wants to challenge the (Commerce) department’s factual or legal determination that the alleged violation either did not occur or was not intentional, only a common pleas court in the county where the violation is alleged to have occurred has jurisdiction … to hear that appeal,” Tenth District Judge Carly Edelstein wrote for the 2-1 panel.
According to a summary of the case, Central State University, located in Wilberforce, awarded a contract for construction of a dormitory on the southwest Ohio campus to University Housing Solutions with Adena Corporation serving as the general contractor and KE Gutridge LLC serving as the subcontractor to complete the heating, ventilation and air conditioning work.
South Solon-based Oldaker’s Mechanical Insulation LLC provided asbestos workers for KE Gutridge, paying them $25 per hour for insulation work on this project, the summary provided.
The International Union of Heat and Frost Insulators, Local 50, filed a complaint on Aug. 15, 2022, with the state Department of Commerce alleging Oldaker’s violated the prevailing-wage law on the CSU dormitory construction project.
The labor union made the argument on behalf of an insulation firm that had bid on the project.
The union’s complaint asserted prevailing-wage violations by Oldaker’s that involved reporting, recordkeeping, notification, wage requirements and fringe benefits.
The department concluded after investigating the complaint that back wages were not due to the workers because they had been paid the prevailing wage.
On March 13, 2023, the union appealed the department’s decision to the Franklin County Court of Common Pleas pursuant to R.C. 4115.16(A), summary provided.
The common pleas on Nov. 7, 2023, denied the union’s motion for an oral hearing and dismissed the administrative appeal, having found no evidence that the department’s review of Local 50’s prevailing-wage complaint was unlawful, irrational, arbitrary and/or capricious.
The union appealed the lower court judgment, asserting that the common pleas court erred by failing to find an abuse of discretion where an administrative agency’s determination was not supported by any evidence and by deferring to an administrative agency’s interpretation that R.C. 176.05 applies to dormitory construction projects.
“While the CSU dormitory construction project is in Greene County, Oldaker’s corporate office is located in Madison County,” Edelstein wrote. “In supplemental briefing ordered by this court, the parties agree that Local 50’s prevailing wage complaint alleged violations by Oldaker’s in Greene County. Most significantly, it is undisputed that none of the alleged violations by Oldaker’s occurred in Franklin County.”
She concluded that the union appealed to “a forum without any jurisdictional authority to hear the controversy,” despite neither party having raised the issue at the common pleas level or in the present case.
“Because we find that, pursuant to R.C. 4115.16(A), the Franklin County Court of Common Pleas lacked jurisdiction over the subject matter of the case below, the judgment entered on Nov. 7, 2023, is void,” Edelstein wrote.
Tenth District Judge Michael Mentel concurred with the opinion, while Tenth District Judge Terri Jamison dissented on the basis that the administrative appeal resulted from a decision by a department official in Franklin County.
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