Godbout v. Attanasio

Citations

• 199 Conn. App. 88

Syllabus

The plaintiff sought to recover monetary relief pursuant to statute (§ 12- 170) for the alleged misconduct of the defendants, members of the town board of assessment appeals related to his motor vehicle tax assessment appeal. The defendants filed a motion to dismiss the plaintiff's action on the grounds that the trial court lacked subject matter jurisdiction because the plaintiff failed to exhaust his administrative remedies and had failed to allege that the defendants had engaged in some unlawful act or the omission of a necessary act, allegations that were required to support an action pursuant to § 12-170. The court granted the motion to dismiss on both grounds, from which the plaintiff appealed to this court. Held: 1. The trial court improperly held that it lacked subject matter jurisdiction over the plaintiff's action because the plaintiff failed to exhaust his administrative remedies before the Freedom of Information Commission (FOIC): there was nothing in the record before this court from which to conclude that the legislature intended that a plaintiff seeking to recover under § 12-170 must first exhaust any and all administrative remedies; § 12-170 does not contain an exhaustion requirement and nothing in the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) statutory scheme mandates that any and all issues involving the FOIA must always be raised to and resolved by the FOIC before an action is brought in the Superior Court; moreover, there is no statute that confers any authority on the FOIC to impose monetary penalties on board members and, thus, it would have been futile for the plaintiff to have filed an administrative appeal because the FOIC lacked the ability to provide the plaintiff with the relief requested. 2. This court declined to consider the plaintiff's claim that a motion to dismiss was not the proper procedural vehicle to challenge the legal sufficiency of his complaint, the plaintiff having waived any objection to the defendants' use of a motion to dismiss b