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SUBJECTS › LEGAL › The Appearance of Fairness Doctrine

The Appearance of Fairness Doctrine

Updated 4/07

The appearance of fairness doctrine is a rule of law that requires government decision-makers to conduct quasi-judicial hearings and make quasi-judicial decisions in a way that is both fair in appearance and in fact. A matter is quasi-judicial when the legal rights, duties, or privileges of specific parties are decided in a contested case proceeding by non-judicial decision-makers, such as city or county councils, planning commissions, boards of adjustment, and hearing examiners. The doctrine has been applied primarily to quasi-judicial land use decisions, and its purpose is to bolster public confidence in the fairness of such decisions by

    the elimination of actual bias, prejudice, improper influence or favoritism, but also in the curbing of conditions which, by their very existence, tend to create suspicion, generate misinterpretation, and cast a pall of partiality, impropriety, conflict of interest or prejudgment over the proceedings to which they relate.

Chrobuck v. Snohomish County, 78 Wn.2d 858, 868 (1971).

The doctrine as applied to quasi-judicial land use decisions, developed by Washington Supreme Court in the late 1960's, was codified by the state legislature in 1982. See Chapter 42.36 RCW. Land use decisions to which it has been applied include site-specific rezones, preliminary plat approvals, conditional use permits, variances, and shoreline substantial development permits. The doctrine does not apply to legislative or policy-making decisions, such as the adoption or amendment of comprehensive plans or zoning decisions of area-wide significance. RCW 42.36.010

In practice, the doctrine should work to disqualify from the quasi-judicial decision-making process those decision-makers who have prejudged the issues, who have a bias in favor of one side in the proceeding, who have a conflict of interest, or who cannot otherwise be impartial. Also, it prohibits "ex parte" communications between a decision-maker and a proponent or opponent of the matter being decided. RCW 42.36.060. Nevertheless, it does not apply to statements made while campaigning for elective office and it is not implicated by the receipt of campaign contributions. RCW 42.36.040, .050.

If a decision-maker's participation in a quasi-judicial decision violates the appearance of fairness doctrine and that participation was challenged in a timely manner, a court can invalidate the decision. A new hearing and decision will then need to be made without the disqualified decision-maker.

Reference Sources

Documents

  • The Appearance of Fairness Doctrine in Washington State, MRSC Report No. 32 (January 1995). This publication can be viewed in either HTML or Adobe Acrobat. This MRSC publication provides a detailed overview of the doctrine, questions and answers on the doctrine, summaries of all reported appellate case law on the doctrine from Washington courts (through 1999), and sample city council procedures for quasi-judicial hearings.