Introduction
The purpose of this page is to explain the basics of representing yourself at an administrative hearing. What happens in your hearing may be a little different from the description here. This will depend on the type of hearing, the unique circumstances of your case, and the agency that made the decision from which you are appealing. Those differences are explained in this webpage.
Although it is generally desirable to be represented by attorneys, most citizens who appear before the Office of Administrative Hearings (OAH) represent themselves. State agencies may be represented by an attorney; however, they may also be represented by agency representatives, who are not attorneys. Whether or not you or the agency has an attorney, Idaho law requires OAH Administrative Law Judges (sometimes shortened to “ALJs”) to provide “independent and unbiased decision-making” when hearing an administrative matter.
An administrative hearing is an informal way of resolving disputes between agencies and citizens without the strict procedural rules of a court. An OAH Administrative Law Judge conducts the hearing as the “hearing officer” and prepares an order. Generally, an ALJ will prepare one of two kinds of orders: recommended orders and preliminary orders.
The difference is this: a preliminary order is one which may become a final order without any further action by the agency. A recommended order is different: it does not become a final order by itself; instead, an agency itself must issue a final order (or take other actions allowed by statute). The appeal rights section at the end of the OAH order will tell you what kind of order it is and what options are available after that order.
The hearing officer who hears your case is either 1) a professional ALJ and employee of OAH, or 2) an attorney who has contracted with the OAH to provide hearing officer services when OAH requests their assistance. Either way, whether the hearing officer is an OAH ALJ or a contracting attorney, they are not employees of the agency which issued the administrative decision. The OAH is an independent, self-governing agency, which provides professional ALJs and contract hearing officers who are specially trained in administrative law and who must abide by a Code of Conduct established by OAH.
