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Milner v. City of Leander3/23/2000
Appellant Carol Ann Milner sued appellees under statutory causes of action seeking review and reassessment of a workers' compensation claim and under a common law cause of action for breach of the duty of good faith and fair dealing in handling the claim. The trial court granted partial summary judgments on the tort claim in favor of each appellee. The trial court also rendered a partial summary judgment on a legal issue relating to one statutory cause of action but then dismissed the entire cause for lack of jurisdiction. Milner appeals all five rulings. We will reverse the order of dismissal, affirm the three summary judgments on the tort claim, affirm the partial summary judgment on the statutory cause of action, and remand the cause for further proceedings on the remaining issues in the statutory causes of action.
BACKGROUND
Carol Ann Milner was employed by appellee City of Leander in its police department as a dispatcher/secretary. On July 8, 1992, Milner suffered an on-the-job injury and sought compensation. On November 12, 1993, Milner's chiropractor certified that Milner had an impairment rating of thirteen percent. At the benefits review conference, Axia made an oral request that Milner be re-examined. The benefits review officer construed this request as a dispute of the impairment rating certified by Milner's chiropractor and assigned a designated doctor. Milner did not question the initial impairment rating challenge or the appointment of the designated doctor. On March 24, 1994, a second benefit review conference was held, at which the designated doctor reported that he had certified Milner's impairment rating to be only five percent.
Milner disagreed with the designated doctor's impairment rating, and a contested case hearing was held. The hearing officer determined that: (1) the first impairment rating had not become final; (2) the designated doctor had been properly appointed; (3) the designated doctor's report was not overcome by the great weight of other medical evidence; (4) Milner's correct rating was five percent impairment; and (5) Milner did not have a disability after August 7, 1992. Dissatisfied with the results of the hearing, Milner sought review by an appeals panel of the Texas Workers' Compensation Commission. The appeals panel affirmed the decision, and Milner brought suit in the district court in Williamson County.
In her petition, Milner asserted four causes of action. In her first cause of action, Milner claimed that appellees had breached their duty of good faith and fair dealing in handling her compensation claim. Milner also alleged that several errors occurred in the administrative proceedings; she sought a trial de novo on the issue of impairment in her second cause of action and a substantial-evidence review of procedural and legal issues in her third cause of action. In her final cause of action, Milner sought a declaratory judgment on issues relating to both her common law tort claim and her statutory workers' compensation claims.
In January 1997, the trial court granted summary judgments in favor of all three appellees on the good-faith-and-fair-dealing cause of action. Although the summary judgments disposed of the tort claim, neither side requested severance of that action. On November 2, 1998, the trial court also granted a partial summary judgment on one of Milner's administrative complaints, finding that appellee's oral request at the benefits review conference was sufficient under the Texas Administrative Code to dispute the impairment rating made by Milner's chiropractor. The same day, the trial court ordered that Milner's cause be dismissed for lack of jurisdiction because she had failed to comply with
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