degree and everything kind of lined up.”
She worked for five years in private practice in Minnesota and seven years at the North Dakota Office of the Attorney General as an assistant attorney general in the Natural Resources Division representing state agencies.“ I happened to get a job at the attorney general’ s office and ended up doing administrative law,” say Hogan.
In 2018, she accepted a position at the OAH as a full-time ALJ.“ When I came from the attorney general’ s office, I had no idea all the topics our office addressed, such as special education and school districts,” Hogan notes.“ Unless you practice in that area of law, you may not have either.”
Hogan was appointed director of the OAH in January. She says administrative law and the OAH provide a great opportunity for young lawyers to expand their skill set.“ What we do at the OAH is an opportunity to get litigation experience that you maybe won’ t see in district court,” Hogan notes.“ Most of our hearings do not settle and attorneys get a chance to experience the process.”
The OAH has recently started handling Title IX hearings for the University of North Dakota, notes Hogan.“ It is a new experience for our agency, and the school gets someone completely outside of the university to handle the hearings,” she says.
Continued Importance
Hogan notes one of the greatest challenges for the agency is budgeting.“ We are not general funded by the state; we charge for our services,” says Hogan.“ We are at the mercy of the requests we get and when cases go down, we have to raise our rates.”
She says it continues to be important to promote the agency and its role in settling administrative disputes, as well as what the OAH can offer agencies across the state.“ If you haven’ t challenged an agency decision, you might not know we are available,” says Hogan.“ We add that extra level of independence and due process to people, and we take some pressure off the district courts.”
For more information on the OAH, visit www. oah. nd. gov.
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