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Renz v. Larimer County School District Poudre R-16/27/1996
In this workers' compensation case, petitioner, Gladys Renz (claimant), widow of the deceased worker, Ruben Henry Renz, seeks review of a final order of the Industrial Claim Appeals Panel (Panel) which upheld an order of an Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) in favor of respondents, Larimer County School District Poudre R-1 and Colorado Compensation Insurance Authority. The ALJ granted respondents' petition to reopen a prior award on the grounds of a mistake of law in a previous adjudication and, in the reopened proceeding, allowed respondents henceforth to offset claimant's federal social security widow's benefits against her workers' compensation death benefits. We reject claimant's contentions of error, and therefore, we affirm.
The record reveals the following pertinent facts. After the decedent died in 1977, claimant became entitled to workers' compensation death benefits under the former § 8-50-103, C.R.S. (1986 Repl. Vol. 3B) (now recodified with certain changes not relevant here as § 8-42-114, C.R.S. (1995 Cum. Supp.)). Later, when claimant also became entitled to widow's benefits under the federal social security scheme, a dispute arose between claimant and respondents as to whether § 8-50-103 authorized respondents to offset her federal survivors' benefits against her workers' compensation death benefits.
This dispute was previously litigated by these parties in earlier administrative and judicial workers' compensation proceedings, culminating in the decision issued by this court in Larimer County School District Poudre R-1 v. Industrial Commission, 727 P.2d 401 (Colo. App. 1986), cert. denied as improvidently granted, 752 P.2d 80 (Colo. 1988). In Larimer County, a division of this court affirmed an order of the Industrial Commission disallowing such an offset, ruling that federal social security widow's benefits do not constitute the type of "periodic death benefits" under the provisions of § 8-50-103 which are authorized to be offset against workers' compensation death benefits.
Nearly six years after the decision in Larimer County became final, the supreme court issued its decision concerning a similar issue in L.E.L. Construction v. Goode, 867 P.2d 875 (Colo. 1994). There, the supreme court held that the provisions of § 8-50-103 do indeed authorize the offsetting of federal social security mother's benefits against workers' compensation death benefits. Moreover, the court further ruled that these statutory provisions authorize all federal social security survivors' benefits, including widow's benefits, to be offset against workers' compensation death benefits, and the court expressly "disapproved" the ruling in Larimer County to the extent that it is inconsistent with Goode. L.E.L. Construction v. Goode, supra (fn. 5).
Respondents thereafter eventually filed a petition to reopen as to the offset issue based on the Goode decision, asserting that the previous disallowance of the offset was based on a mistake of law and once again asserting that they are entitled to take the offset.
Following a hearing, the ALJ granted the petition to reopen under § 8-43-303, C.R.S. (1995 Cum. Supp.), ruling that the Goode decision established a "mistake of law" in the previous disallowance of the offset which justified the reopening of the offset issue. Despite finding as credible claimant's testimony that allowing the offset would work a "financial hardship" upon her, the ALJ then allowed respondents to offset claimant's future social security widow's benefits against her workers' compensation death benefits beginning from the date of the hearing on the reop
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