One-year statute of limitation controls in unlawful discrimination suit against school
Matter of Amorosi v South Colonie Ind. Cent. School Dist., 9 N.Y.3d 367, Court of Appeals,
Jennifer Amorosi was hired by the South Colonie Central School District in July 1999 as a temporary part-time guidance counselor. In January 2001, she became a full-time counselor and began a three-year probationary period.
In January 2002, Amorosi applied for, and was given, a maternity leave, returning to work in September 2002. In June 2003, she and the district agreed to extend her probationary period until June 2004. Her July 2003 review, however, stated that her prospects for tenure depended upon addressing certain performance-related recommendations.
Three months later, in October 2003, Amorosi applied for a second maternity leave. After returning from her second leave in December 2003, Amorosi said that that “she received the ‘poorest’ review rating to date and was asked to resign.”
Amorosi’s sued, alleging unlawful “workplace discrimination.” She contended that she was discriminated against in violation of Executive Law §296 “because she took maternity leave.” However, her going forward with her lawsuit depended on whether she had filed a timely action. As Amorosi had not filed her lawsuit against the school district until September 7, 2005, she asked a State Supreme Court judge to approve her serving “a late notice of claim” on the school district.
Although Supreme Court granted Amorosi’s application for leave to serve a late notice of claim, holding that CPLR 214 (2) provides a three-year statute of limitations for an Executive Law §296 claim brought against a school district, the Appellate Division reversed that ruling.
The Appellate Division said that the statute of limitations applicable to a damages claim for unlawful workplace discrimination brought under Executive Law §296 [the State’s Human Rights Law] against a school district was one year, as set out in “the clear and unambiguous language of Education Law §3813(2-b).”
In so doing, the Appellate Division, Third Department, “rejected the reasoning of the Second Department cases relied upon by Supreme Court and concluded that the clear language of Education Law §3813 (2-b) provides for a one-year statute of limitations.”
In addition, the Appellate Division ruled that Supreme Court did not have the authority to grant Amorosi’s application for leave to serve a late notice of claim as a matter of discretion as Amorosi filed her lawsuit “more than one year after her cause of action arose.”
The Court of Appeals affirmed the Appellate Division, Third Department’s ruling, noting that it was “hard-pressed to find any ambiguity in the language of Section 3813 (2-b),” rejecting Amorosi’s arguments that (1) the one-year statute of limitations was created solely as relates to claims by contractors and (2) “a one-year statute of limitations is contrary to the intent underlying the legislative creation of civil remedies to redress Human Rights Law violations.”
The Court of Appeals noted that the State’s Human Rights Law was enacted in 1968, and Education Law §3813(2-b) was enacted in 1981. It said that “[h]ad the Legislature wanted a longer statute of limitations for illegal workplace discrimination claims against school districts, it could have excepted those claims from the language of Education Law §3813(2-b), just as it did for tort claims in Education Law §3813(2). It did not do so.”
The court said that the latest that Amorosi’s claim against the district could have accrued was January 2004, when she resigned. Accordingly, her September 2005 application for leave to file a late notice of claim, filed more than a year and eight months after her resignation, was untimely.
The opinion then notes that “[a]lthough the result is in apparent contradiction with the policy of eliminating employment discrimination in the public sector, Education Law Section 3813(2-b) left Supreme Court without discretion to grant [Amorosi’s] application to serve a late notice of claim.
