State ex rel. Elyria Foundry Co. v. Industrial Commission

[This opinion has been published in Ohio Official Reports at 

82 Ohio St.3d 88

.]




 THE STATE EX REL. ELYRIA FOUNDRY COMPANY, APPELLANT, v. INDUSTRIAL
                     COMMISSION OF OHIO ET AL., APPELLEES.
  [Cite as State ex rel. Elyria Foundry Co. v. Indus. Comm., 

1998-Ohio-366

.]
Workers’ compensation—Mandamus action challenging Industrial Commission’s
        award of temporary total disability compensation lacks ripeness, when.
       (No. 95-1501—Submitted March 24, 1998—Decided June 10, 1998.)
   APPEAL from the Court of Appeals for Franklin County, No. 94APD06-880.
                                  __________________
        {¶ 1} In 1991, appellee-claimant, L.B. Woolbright, filed an occupational
disease claim, alleging that he had contracted silicosis in the course of his
employment with appellant Elyria Foundry Company (“EFC”). A district hearing
officer of appellee Industrial Commission of Ohio allowed the claim for silicosis
and awarded temporary total disability compensation (“TTD”). The order was
administratively affirmed.
        {¶ 2} EFC objected to this order. EFC objected to the allowance of the
claim in its entirety because it believed that claimant had contracted his alleged
silicosis with an earlier employer. EFC alternatively contended that even if it was
the amenable employer, claimant’s alleged temporary total disability was partially
due to nonindustrial conditions.
        {¶ 3} EFC, pursuant to R.C. 4123.512, appealed the allowance of the claim
to the Lorain County Common Pleas Court. That case remains pending.
        {¶ 4} EFC also commenced a mandamus action in the Court of Appeals for
Franklin County, challenging the commission’s award of TTD. The court of
appeals denied the writ, after finding that EFC’s common pleas appeal provided it
with an adequate remedy at law.
        {¶ 5} This cause is now before this court upon an appeal as of right.
                              SUPREME COURT OF OHIO




                               __________________
       Licata & Crosby Co., L.P.A., Elizabeth A. Crosby and Ellyn Tamulewicz,
for appellant.
       Betty D. Montgomery, Attorney General, and Jeffrey B. Duber, Assistant
Attorney General, for appellee Industrial Commission.
       Shapiro, Kendis & Associates Co., L.P.A., James D. Kendis and Rachel B.
Jaffy, for appellee Woolbright.
                               __________________
       Per Curiam.
       {¶ 6} Appellees     successfully   argued    below    that   mandamus     was
inappropriate. We affirm the denial of the writ, but do so for a reason other than
that given by the court of appeals.
       {¶ 7} We find that the controversy presented by EFC’s mandamus action
lacks ripeness. Ripeness “is peculiarly a question of timing.”        Regional Rail
Reorganization Act Cases (1974), 

419 U.S. 102, 140

, 

95 S.Ct. 335, 357

, 

42 L.Ed.2d 320, 351

. The ripeness doctrine is motivated in part by the desire “to prevent the
courts, through avoidance of premature adjudication, from entangling themselves
in abstract disagreements over administrative policies * * *.” Abbott Laboratories
v. Gardner (1967), 

387 U.S. 136, 148

, 

87 S.Ct. 1507, 1515

, 

18 L.Ed.2d 681, 691

.
As one writer has observed:
       “The basic principle of ripeness may be derived from the conclusion that
‘judicial machinery should be conserved for problems which are real or present and
imminent, not squandered on problems which are abstract or hypothetical or
remote.’ * * * [T]he prerequisite of ripeness is a limitation on jurisdiction that is
nevertheless basically optimistic as regards the prospects of a day in court: the time
for judicial relief is simply not yet arrived, even though the alleged action of the
defendant foretells legal injury to the plaintiff.” Comment, Mootness and Ripeness:
The Postman Always Rings Twice (1965), 65 Colum.L.Rev. 867, 876.



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                                 January Term, 1998




        {¶ 8} EFC is asking us to address the abstract and the hypothetical. The
allowance of claimant’s entire workers’ compensation claim is in dispute, as are the
medical conditions allegedly related to it. Therefore, EFC is effectively asking us
to answer the question, if the claim is allowed, and if it is allowed only for silicosis,
is claimant entitled to temporary total disability compensation?            This is an
inappropriate question for review.
        {¶ 9} Accordingly, the judgment of the court of appeals is affirmed.
                                                                    Judgment affirmed.
        MOYER, C.J., DOUGLAS, RESNICK, F.E. SWEENEY, PFEIFER, COOK and
LUNDBERG STRATTON, JJ., concur.
                                __________________




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