Opinion
Argued May 10, 2001.
June 4, 2001
In a proceeding pursuant to CPLR article 78 to review a determination of the respondent Board of Education of the City School District of the City of New York, dated February 5, 1999, which placed the petitioner on inactive status based on a medical determination that he was unfit to teach, the petitioner appeals from a judgment of the Supreme Court, Kings County (R. E. Rivera, J.), entered March 8, 2000, which dismissed the proceeding.
James R. Sandner, New York, N.Y. (J. Christopher Meagher of counsel), for appellant.
Michael D. Hess, Corporation Counsel, New York, N.Y. (Elizabeth I. Freedman, Dona B. Morris, and Kay M. Fredericks of counsel), for respondents.
Before: GLORIA GOLDSTEIN, J.P., LEO F. McGINITY, ROBERT W. SCHMIDT, NANCY E. SMITH, JJ.
ORDERED that the judgment is affirmed, with costs.
This proceeding was improperly brought before the petitioner exhausted his administrative remedies (see, Plummer v. Klepak, 48 N.Y.2d 486, cert denied 445 U.S. 952; Matter of Gamma v. Bloom, 274 A.D.2d 14). Article 21(H)(4) of the parties' collective bargaining agreement provides that the petitioner could have challenged the medical evaluation of the respondent Board of Education of the City School District of the City of New York, on the basis of which he was put on inactive status, by submitting to an independent assessment by an impartial medical arbitrator. The petitioner failed to do so, and therefore he may not bring this proceeding (see, Levine v. Board of Educ. of City of New York, 186 A.D.2d 743).
GOLDSTEIN, J.P., McGINITY, SCHMIDT and SMITH, JJ., concur.