Boyertown Area School District v. Pennsylvania Department of Education

In Boyertown Area School District v. Pennsylvania Department of Education, 797 A.2d 421 (Pa. Cmwlth. 2002), the Court held that the Secretary's decision to withhold subsidies from a school district under authority of Section 17-1725-A(a)(5) was an adjudication because it was a final order that affected the school district's property rights. Accordingly, the Court held that the Department must provide a school district with notice and an opportunity to be heard before withholding subsidies from that district. In accordance with Boyertown's holding, the Department has established the practice of scheduling an administrative proceeding whenever it receives a request from a charter school to withhold subsidies from a school district. The adjudication produced at the conclusion of that hearing can then be reviewed by this Court in its appellate jurisdiction. In Boyertown, the Department argued that withholding a school district's subsidy was not an adjudication because it was not final until a hearing was conducted in accordance with Section 17-1725-A(a)(6). The Court held, however, that withholding subsidies affected property rights and was, therefore, an adjudication. By adding the word "estimated," the legislature has signaled that the withholding of subsidies is not an adjudication, as found in Boyertown, because the actual amount withheld is not final until the school district has had the hearing provided in Section 17-1726-A(a)(6).