Shari M. Hintermeister v. Employment Appeal Board ( 2023 )

IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF IOWA
No. 22-0187
Filed January 25, 2023
SHARI M. HINTERMEISTER,
Petitioner-Appellant,
vs.
EMPLOYMENT APPEAL BOARD,
Respondent-Appellee.
________________________________________________________________
Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Linn County, Paul D. Miller, Judge.
Shari Hintermeister seeks judicial review of the agency decision denying
her claim for benefits under pandemic unemployment assistance coverage.
AFFIRMED.
Dan Feltes of Iowa Legal Aid, Iowa City, and Alexander Vincent Kornya of
Iowa Legal Aid, Des Moines, for appellant.
Rick Autry of the Employment Appeal Board, Des Moines, for appellee.
Heard by Bower, C.J., and Badding and Buller, JJ.
2
BULLER, Judge.
Shari Hintermeister filed a claim for pandemic unemployment assistance
coverage (PUA). She received benefits for the two-week period she was required
to self-quarantine after a positive test result for COVID-19, but she was denied
benefits outside that period. The denial was upheld by an administrative law judge
and the Employment Appeal Board, and the district court on judicial review, all of
which found that Hintermeister was not eligible for PUA under any of the applicable
provisions. Reviewing this agency action within the confines of Iowa Code chapter
17A (2021), we affirm.
I. Background Facts and Course of Proceedings
On December 13, 2019, Hintermeister concluded a temporary work
assignment through a Cedar Rapids staffing company. The assignment ended
because Hintermeister had been covering for an employee who was on vacation
and the employee returned. Three months later, in March 2020, the United States
government declared a public-health emergency due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Hintermeister decided she should self-quarantine because of her age: seventy-
two.
On November 22, 2020, Hintermeister tested positive for COVID-19 and
self-quarantined for two weeks. Hintermeister filed a claim with Iowa Workforce
Development (the agency) for PUA benefits, and she received payment for the
two-week period of self-quarantine. But the agency denied the remainder of her
claim, which sought PUA benefits for essentially all of 2020. Hintermeister
appealed, claiming in part that her “health care adviser” told her that she should
not work as a receptionist due to her “underlying health issues.” Hintermeister’s
3
sworn testimony before the administrative law judge identified this “adviser” as a
“good friend” and “HR person,” rather than a medical professional. Questioning
from the administrative law judge revealed that Hintermeister did not have any
health conditions that elevated her COVID-19 risk, other than age.
Based on the hearing testimony and exhibits, the administrative law judge
made a finding that Hintermeister “has not been advised by a health care provider
to self-quarantine” and affirmed denial of the PUA claim, except for the two weeks
of self-quarantine following the November 2020 test result. Hintermeister
appealed to the Employment Appeal Board, which affirmed the administrative law
judge and upheld the denial of benefits.
Hintermeister subsequently sought judicial review by the district court. The
district court affirmed the agency action, finding substantial evidence supported
the conclusion that Hintermeister was not unemployed due to the pandemic and
had not proven a health care provider advised her not to work during the pandemic.
This appeal follows.
II. Error Preservation
Error preservation is disputed between the parties, in part due to the
comingling of issues in the appellant’s briefs on appeal and below. “In cases
involving judicial review of final action of an administrative agency, an issue must
generally be presented to the agency to satisfy error preservation requirements.”
Renewable Fuels, Inc. v. Iowa Ins. Comm’r, 752 N.W.2d 441, 446 (Iowa Ct. App.
2008). To the extent Hintermeister asserts that the agency required “extrinsic
evidence” of a health care provider’s advice to self-quarantine, we find that issue
unpreserved, as it was not argued or litigated at any point prior to appeal.
4
Moreover, we find no such ruling by the agency or the district court. To the extent
Hintermeister asserts the agency ruled PUA benefits are only available to those
whose “job loss was due to the pandemic,” we also find that error unpreserved. In
fact, Hintermeister received payments for the two weeks she spent in self-
quarantine following her positive test result—a period that indisputably did not
involve job loss due to the pandemic—and the Board concedes those benefits
were appropriate.
We bypass any concern about error preservation that relates to the self-
certification of eligibility because we conclude that, even accepted at face value,
the self-certification would not affect the analysis of any issue presented. “Courts
exist to decide cases, not academic questions of law.” Homan v. Branstad, 864
N.W.2d 321, 328 (Iowa 2015).
III. Standard of Review
A PUA claimant, like any other state unemployment claimant, has the
burden of proof in making a claim. See Continued Assistance for Unemployed
Workers Act of 2020 (CAA), Pub. L. No. 116-260, § 201(c), 134 Stat. 1182, 1951
(codified at 15 U.S.C. § 9021(c)(5)(A)–(B)); Iowa Code § 96.6(2); see also Iowa R.
App. P. 6.904(3)(e) (“Ordinarily, the burden of proof on an issue is upon the party
who would suffer loss if the issue were not established.”). In reviewing agency
action, “The agency’s findings are conclusive when the facts are in dispute or when
reasonable minds may differ on the inferences to be drawn from the evidence.”
Harlan v. Iowa Dep’t of Job Serv., 350 N.W.2d 192, 193 (Iowa 1984).
Our review on appeal, like the district court’s below, is at law—not de novo.
Johnston v. Iowa Dep’t of Transp., 958 N.W.2d 180, 184 (Iowa 2021). We review
5
whether the agency action is supported by “substantial evidence in the record
before the court when that record is viewed as a whole.” Iowa Code
§ 17A.19(10)(f). Substantial evidence is “the quantity and quality of evidence that
would be deemed sufficient by a neutral, detached, and reasonable person, to
establish the fact at issue when the consequences resulting from the establishment
of that fact are understood to be serious and of great importance.” Id.
§ 17A.19(10)(f)(1).
IV. Discussion
The legal framework for this case flows from a series of federal statutes
passed during the height of the pandemic: the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and
Economic Security Act (CARES ACT), Pub. L. No. 116-136, 134 Stat. 281 (2020);
CAA § 200; and the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (ARPA), Pub. L. No: 117-
2, § 9011; 135 Stat. 4, 118. These statutes, generally speaking, provide benefits
for persons who were unemployed, partially unemployed, or unable to work due to
COVID-19. See 15 U.S.C. § 9021. There are numerous classes of persons
eligible for benefits under the statutory framework. See id. The inquiries relevant
to this appeal are whether the claimant
is unemployed, partially unemployed, or unable or unavailable to
work because:
(aa) the individual has been diagnosed with COVID-19 or is
experiencing symptoms of COVID-19 and seeking a medical
diagnosis;
...
(ff) the individual is unable to reach the place of employment
because the individual has been advised by a health care provider
to self-quarantine due to concerns related to COVID-19;
(gg) the individual was scheduled to commence employment
and does not have a job or is unable to reach the job as a direct result
of the COVID-19 public health emergency;
....
6
Id. § 9021(a)(3)(A)(ii)(I).
The Employment Appeal Board does not contest that Hintermeister properly
received benefits under section 9021(a)(3)(A)(ii)(I)(aa) for the two weeks she self-
quarantined following diagnosis. The fight is over the remainder of her claim,
which she seems to claim turns on section 9021(a)(3)(A)(ii)(I)(ff) or (gg).
By its plain language, section 9021(a)(3)(A)(ii)(I)(ff) requires that the
claimant have been “advised by a health care provider to self-quarantine.”
(Emphasis added.) Hintermeister’s own testimony indicates it was her friend, an
“HR person,” who told her to self-quarantine—not a “health care provider” as
required by the statute. While there is some ambiguous and vague suggestion in
the record that an unidentified “doctor” may have made some statement to
Hintermeister (possibly in June 2019, long before the pandemic), the agency
resolved any arguable conflict in the evidence and implicitly determined the more
credible evidence was Hintermeister’s admission she was told to quarantine by her
friend (the “HR person”) and we are bound by such a determination. See New
Homestead v. Iowa Dep’t of Job Serv., 322 N.W.2d 269, 271 (Iowa 1982). Our
conclusion is supported by federal Department of Labor guidance, which specifies:
“Without having been advised by a health care provider to self-quarantine, an
individual who does not go to work due to general concerns about exposure to
COVID-19, and who does not meet any of the other COVID-related criteria for
PUA, is not eligible for PUA.” Emp. & Training Admin., U.S. Dep’t of Labor,
Unemployment Insurance Program Letter No. 16–20, Change 1, Attachment I, at
I-10 (Apr. 27, 2020), https://www.dol.gov/sites/dolgov/files/ETA/advisories/UIPL/
7
2020/UIPL_16-20_Change_1_Attachment_1.pdf. This guidance applies to
administrator agencies, such as Iowa Workforce Development, the agency action
at issue here. See 15 U.S.C. § 9032. Substantial evidence supports the agency
determination on this ground, and we affirm that Hintermeister was not eligible for
PUA under section 9021(a)(3)(A)(ii)(I)(ff).
Looking at the plain language of section 9021(a)(3)(A)(ii)(I)(gg),
Hintermeister had to be “scheduled to commence employment” to make a claim
under that subsection. There is no record evidence she was scheduled to work
again after her vacation-fill-in job in December of 2019, and her lack of work
between December and March suggests there was no intent to job-seek.
Substantial evidence also supports this ground, and we affirm the denial of benefits
under section 9021(a)(3)(A)(ii)(I)(gg).
Last, assuming without deciding that an issue related to allocation of
burdens was adequately preserved, we reject Hintermeister’s claim that she is
owed relief on that basis. We would only be authorized to reverse if the allocation
of burdens was erroneous as a matter of law, as evidenced by an “explicit
assignment of the burden of proof to the wrong party.” Langley v. Emp. Appeal
Bd., 490 N.W.2d 300, 403 (Iowa Ct. App. 1992) (citation omitted). Hintermeister
identified no such explicit assignment and, even if she had, we believe the burden
of proof was correctly assigned to her.
Finding no legal error, we affirm the district court’s denial of Hintermeister’s
petition for judicial review of the underlying agency action denying her claim for
PUA benefits beyond the two weeks following her positive COVID-19 test result.
AFFIRMED.