The majority uses AOPA as a contrast: it shows that when the legislature wants an agency to have reconsideration authority, it knows how to say so explicitly. That silence in the BZA statutes is therefore meaningful.

V. Precedents and Authorities Cited

A. Administrative Agencies as Creatures of Statute

The majority rests on a long-standing Indiana principle: administrative agencies have no powers beyond those granted by statute and those strictly necessary to carry out those statutory grants.

Key authorities include:

• Blue v. Beach, 56 N.E. 89 (Ind. 1900): Early articulation that administrative bodies are “statutory creatures” whose authority is limited by their enabling legislation.
• Smith v. Thompson Construction Co., 69 N.E.2d 16 (Ind. 1946):
  • The Workers’ Compensation Board “derives its authority from the statutes” and “can do the things authorized by the Legislature and beyond that it cannot legally go.”
  • “Its authority is not expanded by the ‘common law.’”
  • The Court rejected the idea that a statute authorizing correction of clerical or factual errors implied a broader power to grant new hearings on substantive issues already decided.
• Cress v. State, 152 N.E. 822 (Ind. 1926):
  • Crucially states: “power to undo an act once done will not be implied from the mere grant of power … to do the act.”
  • This is the direct doctrinal foundation for rejecting an implied reconsideration power absent express statutory authorization.
• Indiana State Board of Public Welfare v. Tioga Pines Living Center, Inc., 622 N.E.2d 935 (Ind. 1993):
  • Administrative authority is “limited to that which is granted it by statute,” and action within such limits has the force of law.
• Sowers v. Covered Bridge Tree Service, 621 N.E.2d 1111 (Ind. 1993):
  • Reiterates that the Workers’ Compensation Board’s authority is defined by statute and “is not expanded by the ‘common law.’”
• Indiana Air Pollution Control Board v. City of Richmond, 457 N.E.2d 204 (Ind. 1983):
  • An administrative agency “has only such power as its creating statute has bestowed upon it.”
• Chicago & E.I.R. Co. v. Public Service Commission, 49 N.E.2d 341 (Ind. 1943):
  • The Public Service Commission’s power exists only where the statute can be read to grant it; absent statutory authority, none exists.
• Indiana Law Encyclopedia, Administrative Law and Procedure § 9 (2025):
  • Summarizes the doctrine: “Administrative boards, agencies and officers have no common-law or inherent powers but only such authority as is conferred upon them by valid statutory enactment.”
  • “A statutorily created administrative body has limited powers and jurisdiction, possessing only those powers that are expressly granted … and other necessary incidental powers.”

From this line of authority, the majority derives a straightforward rule: unless the legislature clearly grants an agency the power to reconsider its final decisions, courts will not imply such a power.

B. Earlier BZA-Specific Cases Limiting Reconsideration

Before the “error-of-law” cases emerged, the Court of Appeals had already applied this statutory-creature doctrine specifically to BZAs:

• Schlehuser v. City of Seymour, 674 N.E.2d 1009 (Ind. Ct. App. 1996):
  • Held a BZA “generally has no inherent power to review and vacate, rescind or alter its decision after it has been made.”
  • Emphasized that BZA powers are strictly limited to those in the authorizing statute.
  • Recognized a narrow, implied power: where a variance is issued subject to conditions, and those conditions are not met, the BZA may revoke the variance as a means to enforce its conditions.
• Burcham v. Metropolitan BZA, 883 N.E.2d 204 (Ind. Ct. App. 2008):
  • Reaffirmed Schlehuser’s principle that BZAs lack inherent authority to revoke final decisions.
  • Recognized a limited ability to correct clerical errors appearing in orders.
• Brownsburg Conservation Club, Inc. v. Hendricks County BZA, 697 N.E.2d 975 (Ind. Ct. App. 1998):
  • Explicitly stated that “a zoning board has no inherent authority to revoke a variance once issued.”
  • Echoed the distinction between:
    • revocation as enforcement of conditions attached to a permit; and
    • revocation as reconsideration of the original decision itself.
• American Law of Zoning § 40:51 (5th ed. 2025):
  • States that, absent express statutory authority, many courts hold that zoning boards lack general authority to rehear and reconsider matters once decided.
  • Indiana’s statutory-creature doctrine aligns with this national trend.

C. The “Error-of-Law” Exception Line—Now Disapproved

The majority’s most consequential step is to disapprove the Court of Appeals decisions that had recognized an error-of-law exception, under which agencies could correct their own legal mistakes even without explicit statutory permission.

1. Origin: Adkins v. City of Tell City (1993)

In Adkins v. City of Tell City, 625 N.E.2d 1298 (Ind. Ct. App. 1993):

• Tell City’s Board of Public Works and Safety voted to dismiss a police officer (Adkins) for misconduct but failed to follow the correct statutory procedure.
• Within ten days, the Board rescinded its dismissal order, recognized its procedural misstep, then proceeded to follow the correct procedure and dismissed Adkins again.
• Adkins argued the Board lacked power to rescind the first dismissal and that he preferred judicial review of that flawed decision.

The Court of Appeals gave two distinct rationales:

1. Harmless error / no prejudice: If Adkins had obtained judicial review of the first dismissal order, a court could only have reversed and remanded for a procedurally proper hearing—the very relief the Board had already effectively given him. Thus, he “had nothing about which to complain.” This reasoning is unproblematic and is not the point of contention.
2. Error-of-law authority: The court also stated that when an agency “recognizes its own error of law, it may correct that error.” It relied on two authorities:
   • Robbins v. National Veneer & Lumber Co., 88 N.E.2d 773 (Ind. App. 1949); and
   • Geiger v. Mississippi State Bd. of Cosmetology, 151 So.2d 189 (Miss. 1963).

The majority explains why these were misplaced:

• Robbins concerned the Industrial Board’s statutory authority. Past cases (like Homan v. Belleville Lumber & Supply Co.) had recognized a sort of “continuing jurisdiction” for the Board grounded in specific statutory language. In other words, the power to revoke there was expressly statutory, not inherent.
• Geiger applied Mississippi law, under which administrative agencies have broad extra-statutory authority to reconsider decisions on numerous equitable grounds. That approach directly contradicts Indiana’s statutory-creature doctrine and cannot support reading such a power into Indiana law.

The majority therefore views Adkins as having improperly imported an expansive Mississippi approach, and misread Robbins as establishing a general Indiana common-law rule instead of a statute-specific one.

2. Extension: ANR Pipeline and Essroc

Two later decisions extended Adkins’ error-of-law principle:

• State ex rel. ANR Pipeline Co. v. Indiana Dep’t of State Revenue, 672 N.E.2d 91 (Ind. Tax Ct. 1996):
  • Acknowledged the general rule that agencies cannot rescind final determinations absent statutory authority.
  • Nevertheless adopted the rule that an agency “may correct” an error of law, citing only Adkins.
• Essroc Cement Corp. v. Clark County BZA, 122 N.E.3d 881 (Ind. Ct. App. 2019):
  • Applied the same exception specifically to BZAs.
  • Declared that, while agencies generally cannot change their minds after a final determination, they can when correcting their own legal error.
  • Cited only ANR Pipeline, which in turn cited only Adkins, thereby deepening the precedential disconnect from the Indiana Supreme Court’s statutory-creature doctrine.

The Supreme Court in Bedford Recycling finds that Adkins, ANR Pipeline, and Essroc never reconciled their “error-of-law” rule with the foundational Indiana principle that:

• agencies have no non-statutory common-law authority; and
• legislative silence on reconsideration means no such power exists.

For that reason, the Court explicitly disapproves the error-of-law exception in all three cases and reaffirms that Indiana agencies have no inherent power to reconsider final orders, even to correct legal errors.

VI. The Court’s Legal Reasoning

A. No Inherent or Common-Law Authority to Reconsider Final Agency Orders

The heart of the majority’s reasoning is syllogistic:

1. Premise 1 (Statutory-creature rule): Administrative agencies, including BZAs, exist only by statute and therefore have only those powers:
   • expressly granted by statute, and
   • necessarily implied to carry out those grants.
   They have no common-law authority beyond that.
2. Premise 2 (Cress rule on undoing acts): The power to “undo an act once done” will not be implied from a mere grant of authority to “do the act” in the first place. In short, a grant of power to issue orders does not by itself include the power to rescind or reconsider those orders later.
3. Premise 3 (Legislative design): When the legislature intends for agencies to have reconsideration authority, it says so expressly, as it did in AOPA. Silence on reconsideration within the BZA statutes therefore suggests that the legislature intentionally withheld that power.

From these premises, the Court concludes that BZAs have no implied authority to revisit final decisions, and any reconsideration power must be explicitly statutory.

This is consistent with the Court’s interpretive approach in other contexts, as reflected in cases like ESPN, Inc. v. University of Notre Dame Police Dep’t, 62 N.E.3d 1192 (Ind. 2016), where the Court emphasized paying attention both to what statutes say and what they do not say.

B. Rejection of the Error-of-Law Exception

The Court then addresses the primary counter-argument: that there should be a narrow exception allowing agencies to correct their own legal mistakes. The BZA relied on Essroc and its predecessors for this proposition.

The Court rejects that exception for several reasons:

• Doctrinal inconsistency: The error-of-law exception is fundamentally incompatible with Indiana’s statutory-creature doctrine. If agencies have no common-law powers, they cannot possess an extra-statutory authority to correct errors of law—however appealing that may be as a matter of policy.
• Misreading of prior authorities: As noted, Adkins misapplied:
  • Robbins, which was actually based on specific statutory text; and
  • Geiger, which arose under a very different Mississippi doctrinal framework.
  Subsequent decisions (ANR Pipeline, Essroc) simply replicated that error without engaging with controlling Indiana Supreme Court precedent.
• Legislative supremacy: Allowing an error-of-law exception would amount to judicially creating additional agency powers not granted by the General Assembly. The Court declines to do so, reaffirming that defining agency powers is the legislature’s job.

Accordingly, the Court formally announces that there is no common-law or inherent authority for an administrative body in Indiana to reconsider its final decisions, even when those decisions rest on legal error.

C. Application to the Monroe County BZA

With these principles in place, the Court examines the BZA’s statutory authority and its actions in this case.

1. No express reconsideration power in the BZA statutes:
   • A review of the 900, 1000, and 1600 series in Indiana Code § 36‑7‑4 reveals no provision that authorizes a BZA to revoke or reconsider a final decision based on legal error.
   • The BZA conceded throughout litigation that no such statute exists, arguing instead that reconsideration authority arose from the common law.
2. Misplaced reliance on judicial review “stay” statute:
   • The BZA belatedly argued that Indiana Code § 36‑7‑4‑1609(b)—which allows a court to stay a BZA decision under judicial review, including a “revocation or suspension of a previously approved variance, exception, or use”—somehow implied legislative recognition of BZA revocation authority.
   • The Court rejects this reading. The provision merely presupposes that BZAs may revoke or suspend approvals when they are enforcing conditions that were expressly attached to those approvals (authority recognized in Schlehuser and Brownsburg), not that they have a general power to reconsider otherwise final decisions for legal error.
3. AOPA as contrast, not source of power:
   • AOPA demonstrates what an explicit reconsideration grant looks like, and the Court notes that the legislature could add an analogous provision for BZAs if it wishes.
   • Until it does, however, courts must assume that BZAs lack such authority.

On these grounds, the Court holds that the BZA’s August 2022 revocation of Bedford’s permit was ultra vires and void. The proper remedy is to:

• affirm the trial court’s order vacating the revocation; and
• reinstating the September 2021 conditional use permit.

Importantly, the Court does not decide whether the September 2021 grant itself complied with the Monroe County zoning ordinance. That question remains pending in the separate judicial review action brought by Republic Services.

VII. The Dissent: Preserving a Limited Error-of-Law Power

Justice Goff’s partial dissent agrees with the result but diverges sharply on the doctrinal question of agency power to correct legal errors.

A. Adoption of the Error-of-Law Exception

Justice Goff would formally adopt the error-of-law exception recognized in Essroc and related cases, concluding that:

• Agencies “generally” require statutory authorization to revoke final decisions, but narrow exceptions can exist.
• One such exception should be that “when an administrative agency recognizes its own error of law, it may correct that error.”

His rationale includes:

• Judicial analogy: Trial courts possess inherent authority to revisit their own orders in some circumstances, particularly where necessary to prevent manifest injustice. He cites State v. Huffman, 643 N.E.2d 899 (Ind. 1994) for the principle that courts may revisit erroneous decisions in “extraordinary circumstances.” He sees agencies as having a parallel, though narrow, corrective role.
• Judicial economy: Allowing agencies to correct their own legal errors promotes efficiency by eliminating the need for judicial review in situations where all parties agree that the original decision was wrong as a matter of law.
• Gap-filling where no one else can appeal: In grant decisions like Bedford’s:
  • The applicant (Bedford) had no incentive to challenge a decision in its favor, even if legally erroneous.
  • The BZA itself lacks express statutory authority to initiate judicial review of its own decision.
  • Sometimes, there may be no third party with standing to seek review.
  In such scenarios, an error-of-law exception may be the only way to correct an obvious legal mistake and “promote confidence” in administrative outcomes.
• Support from other jurisdictions: He notes decisions from:
  • the Fifth Circuit (Macktal v. Chao, 286 F.3d 822 (5th Cir. 2002)) recognizing a general inherent authority for federal agencies to reconsider decisions absent statutory limitations;
  • the Federal Circuit (Tokyo Kikai Seisakusho, Ltd. v. United States, 529 F.3d 1352 (Fed. Cir. 2008)), allowing reconsideration of a proceeding tainted by fraud; and
  • Wisconsin (Schoen v. Bd. of Fire and Police Comm’rs of Milwaukee, 873 N.W.2d 232 (Wis. Ct. App. 2015)), recognizing that the “power to decide carried with it the power to reconsider.”

B. Time Limitation: “Reasonable Time” Tied to Judicial Review Period

Justice Goff emphasizes that any inherent power to correct legal error must be time-limited to protect finality and reliance interests:

• Citing Dale Bland Trucking, Inc. v. Calcar Quarries, Inc., 417 N.E.2d 1157 (Ind. Ct. App. 1981), he proposes that a “reasonable time” for reconsideration is the same period during which judicial review is available.
• For BZA decisions, Indiana Code § 36‑7‑4‑1605 provides that petitions for judicial review must be filed “not later than thirty (30) days” after the zoning decision.
• After that 30-day window closes, parties should be entitled to rely on the decision’s finality.

On this view, agencies would have a brief, clearly defined window—parallel to the judicial review period—within which they could correct their own legal mistakes. After that, only the courts should be able to disturb final decisions.

C. Application to Bedford Recycling

Applying his proposed framework, Justice Goff concludes:

• The BZA’s revocation of Bedford’s permit eleven months after the original grant was far outside the “reasonable time” defined by the 30-day judicial review period.
• Bedford had reasonably relied on the permit, reportedly investing substantial time (and likely expense) in preparing the project during those eleven months.
• Therefore, even under an error-of-law exception, this revocation should be invalid as untimely.

Thus, while he disputes the majority’s categorical denial of inherent corrective power, Justice Goff concurs in the judgment reinstating Bedford’s permit.

VIII. Impact and Implications

A. Broader Administrative Law in Indiana

The decision has consequences well beyond land-use and zoning:

• Clear rule: No inherent reconsideration power. The Opinion establishes a bright-line principle: Indiana administrative agencies have no inherent or common-law power to revisit final orders. All reconsideration authority must come from statute.
• Reallocation of error-correction to courts. If an agency issues a final order that it later believes is legally erroneous:
  • Correction must occur, if at all, via judicial review initiated by an aggrieved party within the statutory period; or
  • by new agency action based on changed circumstances, where that constitutes a new application rather than reconsideration (a question the Court deliberately leaves open).
• Legislative choices highlighted. The Opinion gently invites the General Assembly to consider whether it wishes to:
  • add a reconsideration mechanism (akin to AOPA § 4‑21.5‑3‑31) for BZAs specifically, or for local land-use bodies more generally;
  • leave BZAs with no revisory authority, relying entirely on judicial review and enforcement powers for conditions.
• Consistency across agencies. Although the case concerns BZAs, the reasoning relies on general doctrines about all administrative bodies. Unless another agency’s enabling statute specifically grants reconsideration authority, this decision strongly suggests that no Indiana agency may reconsider final orders under a non-statutory “error-of-law” theory.

B. Land Use and Zoning Practice

For zoning practitioners, this case reshapes risk allocation and litigation strategy:

• Increased finality for permit holders.
  Once the BZA issues a final approval (and the judicial review period passes without challenge), the decision is legally secure against self-initiated revocation based on later-discovered legal error. Property owners can:
  • plan development with greater confidence after the 30-day review period expires; and
  • cite Bedford Recycling if a BZA later attempts to “rethink” a permit solely because its legal interpretation has changed.
• Greater pressure on opponents to act quickly.
  Neighbors, competitors, and civic groups cannot rely on the BZA to police its own errors after the fact. If they believe an approval is unlawful, they must:
  • file for judicial review within the statutory deadline; and
  • consider seeking a stay of the permit during review under § 36‑7‑4‑1609(b).
• Limits on BZA course-corrections.
  Local governments sometimes want the flexibility to correct mistakes without litigation. After Bedford Recycling:
  • BZAs may still enforce conditions attached to approvals (and revoke permits if conditions are violated);
  • they may still correct clerical errors (which the Court does not disturb);
  • but they may not re-open final approvals simply because new members or counsel now read the ordinance differently.
• Strategic drafting of conditions.
  Because revocation authority clearly exists where conditions are violated, municipalities may respond by:
  • attaching more explicit and detailed conditions to approvals; and
  • framing certain legal understandings or technical parameters as “conditions” to preserve some corrective leverage if they prove inaccurate.

C. For Litigants and Counsel

The Opinion also carries practical lessons for attorneys counseling both governments and private parties:

• Emphasize the importance of the record at the first hearing.
  Because BZAs cannot later “fix” a fatally flawed approval, both applicants and opponents should:
  • ensure that all key factual and legal arguments are made at the initial hearing;
  • insist on clear and accurate written findings under § 36‑7‑4‑915; and
  • carefully document any staff recommendations and legal analyses at that stage.
• Use judicial review proactively.
  Parties should not assume that an obviously unlawful approval will be undone administratively. Any party with standing who wishes to challenge a BZA decision must:
  • file for judicial review within 30 days; and
  • consider whether to ask the court for a stay of the approval during litigation.
• Monitor statutory developments.
  Given the Court’s explicit statement that the legislature “is free” to add reconsideration power for BZAs, counsel should monitor:
  • whether any such amendments are proposed or enacted; and
  • how they might interact with existing local ordinances.

IX. Complex Concepts Simplified

Several legal concepts in the Opinion warrant brief clarification for non-specialists.

A. “Creature of Statute”

When the Court calls an agency a “creature of statute,” it means:

• The agency exists only because a statute created it.
• Every power the agency has—what it can decide, what remedies it can impose, what procedures it can follow—must be found in some statute.
• The agency does not inherit broad, unwritten powers from the common law, as courts once did in England.

For a BZA, this means: if the Indiana Code and local ordinances do not say the BZA can reconsider a decision, it cannot.

B. “Common Law” vs. “Statutory Law”

• Statutory law consists of written laws passed by the legislature (e.g., Indiana Code). These define agency structures and powers.
• Common law consists of legal principles developed by courts over time, often in areas like contracts, torts, and property.
• In Indiana, courts have consistently held that administrative agencies do not possess additional common-law powers beyond what statutes give them.

C. “Conditional Use Permit”

In zoning:

• Zoning ordinances divide land into “districts” or “zones” with lists of:
  • permitted uses (allowed by right); and
  • conditional or special uses (allowed only if certain conditions are met).
• A conditional use permit (sometimes called a special exception) allows a use that is not automatically permitted, but is considered potentially compatible if specific criteria (often relating to traffic, noise, environmental impact, etc.) are satisfied.
• The BZA is typically the body that decides whether a conditional use meets the criteria in the ordinance.

D. “Error of Law”

An “error of law” occurs when:

• the relevant facts are correctly known; but
• the decision-maker misapplies or misinterprets the law to those facts.

In this case, everyone knew Bedford’s facility would be a scrap metal recycling operation not handling mixed “solid waste.” The question was whether those facts legally fit the ordinance definition of a “Central Garbage/Rubbish Collection Facility.” The County later decided it had misread that definition—that is, it made an error of law.

E. “Ultra Vires”

“Ultra vires” is Latin for “beyond the powers.” An action is ultra vires when an entity (like a BZA) does something it has no legal authority to do. Ultra vires actions are typically void and unenforceable.

F. Judicial Review of BZA Decisions

Judicial review is the process by which a court examines an administrative decision to determine whether it is:

• lawful (consistent with statutes and ordinances),
• supported by substantial evidence, and
• made through proper procedures.

For BZA decisions in Indiana:

• A petition for review must be filed within 30 days.
• A court may stay the effect of the BZA’s decision during review in certain circumstances, including when enforcement of a revocation is at issue.

X. Conclusion: Key Takeaways and Significance

Monroe County BZA v. Bedford Recycling, Inc. is a landmark clarification of Indiana administrative law and land-use procedure. Its central contributions can be distilled as follows:

1. No inherent power to reconsider final orders. Indiana administrative agencies, including BZAs, do not have common-law or inherent authority to rescind or modify final decisions based on legal error. Any such power must be clearly granted by statute.
2. Error-of-law exception disapproved. The Court of Appeals doctrine allowing agencies to correct their own legal mistakes—articulated in Adkins, ANR Pipeline, and Essroc—is rejected as inconsistent with the statutory-creature principle and based on misapplied authority.
3. BZA revocation in this case was ultra vires. Because the Monroe County BZA lacked statutory authority to reconsider or revoke Bedford’s conditional use permit simply due to a later change in legal interpretation, its August 2022 revocation was invalid, and the permit is reinstated.
4. Finality and reliance reinforced. Property owners and other parties can place more weight on the finality of agency decisions once the judicial review period has lapsed. Agencies cannot unilaterally reopen decisions simply because membership, legal counsel, or interpretive philosophy has changed.
5. Judicial review as primary error-correction mechanism. The Opinion underscores that correcting agency legal errors is primarily the responsibility of courts, via timely petitions for judicial review—not of agencies via “self-correction” without statutory authorization.
6. Legislature retains policy choice. The General Assembly remains free to design reconsideration mechanisms, as it has done via AOPA for other agencies. The Court’s role is to enforce the current statutory framework, not to expand agency powers by judicial fiat.

In sum, this decision signals a strong commitment to legislative supremacy over administrative powers, to the stability of final agency actions, and to a clear procedural pathway—judicial review—for correcting legal errors in administrative decision-making. For Indiana practitioners, planners, and property owners, Bedford Recycling reshapes the contours of risk and responsibility in zoning and beyond.