Opinion
DOCKET NO. A-2868-12T1
09-23-2014
BETTINITA C. HARRIS, Appellant, v. BOARD OF REVIEW, DEPARTMENT OF LABOR AND GANNETT SATELLITE INFORMATION, Respondents,
Bettinita C. Harris, appellant pro se. John J. Hoffman, Acting Attorney General, attorney for respondent State of New Jersey (Lewis A. Scheindlin, Assistant Attorney General, of counsel; Sally Ann Fields, Senior Deputy Attorney General, on the brief). Respondent Gannett Satellite Information has not filed a brief.
NOT FOR PUBLICATION WITHOUT THE APPROVAL OF THE APPELLATE DIVISION Before Judges Messano and Ostrer. On appeal from the Board of Review, Department of Labor, 363,807. Bettinita C. Harris, appellant pro se. John J. Hoffman, Acting Attorney General, attorney for respondent State of New Jersey (Lewis A. Scheindlin, Assistant Attorney General, of counsel; Sally Ann Fields, Senior Deputy Attorney General, on the brief). Respondent Gannett Satellite Information has not filed a brief. PER CURIAM
Bettinita C. Harris appeals from the final decision of the Board of Review ("the Board") affirming the decision of the Appeal Tribunal ("the Tribunal") that held Harris was liable for the refund of $6731 in unemployment benefits received for the weeks ending October 3, 2010 through January 29, 2011. We affirm.
The record reveals that Harris resides in Pennsylvania and was employed in New Jersey for more than two years before being laid off in July 2009. She had been previously furloughed by her employer and filed an application for unemployment benefits in New Jersey in February 2009. Harris collected partial unemployment benefits in New Jersey from August until December 2009, although she found new part-time employment in Pennsylvania in August 2009. She was laid off from that position and, in February 2010, filed another claim for unemployment benefits in New Jersey. Later in February 2010, she secured part-time employment in another position in Pennsylvania.
Harris collected regular unemployment benefits in New Jersey from February through September 2010. Thereafter, Harris received Emergency Unemployment Compensation (EUC) benefits from September 5, 2010 through January 29, 2011. However, on October 3, 2010, Harris filed a separate unemployment compensation claim in Pennsylvania and received benefits there until January 2011.
On September 1, 2011, the Department of Labor and Workforce Development ("the Department") notified Harris that she was required to refund the overpayment of benefits in the amount of $10,517. She appealed, and, following a remand by the Board, the Tribunal concluded that Harris was eligible to receive unemployment compensation benefits in Pennsylvania while she received EUC benefits in New Jersey. Hence, the Tribunal determined a refund was required, but it modified the amount. The Board affirmed the Tribunal's findings and conclusions in its final decision mailed on January 9, 2013, and Harris filed a timely appeal to this court.
The gravamen of Harris's appeal is that she has been provided conflicting and incomplete information regarding her eligibility or ineligibility for EUC benefits and her liability for repayment. She does not dispute any of the relevant facts, but rather asks that we "compel[]" the Department "to provide [her] with a complete and detailed accounting of why she became ineligible in October 2010 for unemployment compensation from New Jersey."
Our "capacity to review administrative agency decisions is limited." Brady v. Bd. of Review, 152 N.J. 197, 210 (1997). "'[I]n reviewing the factual findings made in an unemployment compensation proceeding, the test is not whether [we] would come to the same conclusion if the original determination was [ours] to make, but rather whether the factfinder could reasonably so conclude upon the proofs.'" Ibid. (quoting Charatan v. Bd. of Review, 200 N.J. Super. 74, 79 (App. Div. 1985)). "If the Board's factual findings are supported by sufficient credible evidence, [we] are obliged to accept them." Ibid. (internal quotation marks omitted). Only if the Board's action was arbitrary, capricious, or unreasonable should it be disturbed. Bustard v. Bd. of Review, 401 N.J. Super. 383, 387 (App. Div. 2008).
Although we are not bound by the agency's interpretation of a statute or its decision on a strictly legal issue, "[o]rdinarily, [we] give[] substantial deference to the agency's interpretation of the statute it is charged with enforcing." Lourdes Med. Ctr. of Burlington Cnty. v. Bd. of Review, 197 N.J. 339, 361 (2009) (internal quotation marks omitted). Additionally, we have long recognized that "N.J.S.A. 43:21-16(d) requires the full repayment of unemployment benefits received by an individual who, for any reason, regardless of good faith, was not actually entitled to those benefits." Bannan v. Bd. of Review, 299 N.J. Super. 671, 674 (App. Div. 1997) (emphasis added). This is true even when the overpayment resulted from agency error. Id. at 673.
The Emergency Unemployment Compensation Act of 2008, Pub. L. No. 110-252, § 4001, 122 Stat. 2533 (codified at 26 U.S.C. § 3304) sets up a complex federal-state regime to provide EUC benefits to those individuals who exhausted all rights to regular unemployment benefits. Pursuant to that Act, to be eligible for EUC benefits, one must "have no rights to regular compensation or extended compensation . . . under . . . any other State . . . or Federal law." § 4001(b)(2). It is undisputed that Harris actually received unemployment benefits in Pennsylvania from October 3, 2010 through January 29, 2011, while she received EUC benefits from New Jersey from September 5, 2010 through January 29, 2011. Because she was eligible (and did receive) payments for regular compensation from another state, she was no longer entitled to the EUC benefits she received from New Jersey, and, as such, they were subject to repayment.
Affirmed. I hereby certify that the foregoing is a true copy of the original on file in my office.
CLERK OF THE APPELLATE DIVISION