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No. 131632
| Joseph Lash, |
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Robert D. Kent-Bryant |
Plaintiff-Appellee, |
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(Appeal from Ct of Appeals) |
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(Grand Traverse - Power, T.) |
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| City of Traverse City, |
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Mary Massaron Ross |
| Defendant-Appellant. |
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| __________________________________________ |
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Plaintiff-Appellee's Brief on Appeal>>
Defendant-Appellant's Brief on Appeal>>
Defendant-Appellant's Reply Brief>>
Michigan Municipal League's Amicus Curiae Brief>>
Background
Joseph Lash answered an ad seeking police patrol officers for Traverse City. The ad described the city’s residency requirement, which requires certain city employees to live within 20 road miles of the city limits. The city offered Lash a job, conditioned on his passing a physical examination, a psychological examination, and a physical endurance test. The city then discovered that the property where Lash intended to reside, if he was hired, was more than 20 road miles from the city limits. The city then withdrew its conditional offer of employment. Lash sued, seeking money damages for the city’s purported “unlawful failure to hire” him as a police officer. He cited MCL 15.602, which provides that a local unit of government may not require its employees to live “within a specified geographic area or within a specified distance or travel time from his or her place of employment as a condition of employment or promotion by the public employer.” But the statute does allow an employer to require that “a person reside within a specified distance from the nearest boundary of the public employer” so long as that distance is 20 miles or greater. Lash alleged that the city’s residency requirement violated MCL 15.602 by requiring employees to live within 20 road miles, as opposed to linear miles, of the nearest city limit. Lash claimed that his property was within 20 miles of the city, if measured by radius rather than road miles. But the trial court granted the city’s motion for summary disposition and dismissed Lash’s case, finding that the city’s requirement was consistent with MCL 15.602 and enforceable. Lash appealed, and the Court of Appeals reversed the trial court in a publisheddecision. Two appeals court judges held that MCL 15.602(2) only contemplates straight line measurements, not “road miles.” As a result, these judges held, the city’s residency requirement was more restrictive than permitted by MCL 15.602 and was unenforceable. A majority of the panel also agreed that Lash could sue the city for money damages. The case was remanded for further proceedings. The city appeals.
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