Opinion
NOT FOR PUBLICATION
Argued and Submitted December 5, 2006 San Francisco, California
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of California D.C. No. CV-03-00332-JSW, Jeffrey S. White, District Judge, Presiding
Before: HAWKINS, TASHIMA, and THOMAS, Circuit Judges.
This disposition is not appropriate for publication and may not be cited to or by the courts of this circuit except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3.
Patricia Cline (§Cline§) appeals following a jury verdict in favor of Contra Costa County, Health Services Department (the §County§), on her claims brought under the California Fair Employment and Housing Act (§FEHA§). We affirm.
The district court did not err by denying Cline§s renewed motion for judgment as a matter of law on her FEHA reasonable accommodation claim. The reasonableness of an accommodation is ordinarily a jury question. Prilliman v. United Air Lines, Inc., 62 Cal.Rptr.2d 142, 152 (Ct. App. 1997). A §jury§s verdict must be upheld if it is supported by substantial evidence, which is evidence adequate to support the jury§s conclusion, even if it is also possible to draw a contrary conclusion.§ Pavao v. Pagay, 307 F.3d 915, 918 (9th Cir. 2002). Viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the County, a rational jury could have determined that the extended leave of absence with benefits, coupled with the actions taken by the County to attempt to reassign Cline and her eventual, actual reassignment, constituted a reasonable accommodation, especially in light of the numerous restrictions Cline herself placed on the reassignment, which may have contributed to the delay in placement.
The district court did not abuse its discretion by admitting evidence regarding the requirement of a word processing certificate. Although pre-trial it appeared that such a certificate was only relevant to promotional positions, at trial, the County introduced evidence that this was also a requirement of various lateral positions. The evidence was therefore relevant and properly admitted.
Nor did the court abuse its discretion by awarding costs to the County. An award of costs in federal district court is governed by Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 54(d), even in cases in which state law supplies the law of decision. Champion Produce, Inc. v. Ruby Robinson Co., 342 F.3d 1016, 1022 (9th Cir. 2003). Rule 54(d) creates a presumption in favor of awarding costs to a prevailing party as a matter of course, and this rule applies unless there is a federal statute with an express provision governing costs. Fed.R.Civ.P. 54(d)(1); Brown v. Lucky Stores, Inc., 246 F.3d 1182, 1190 (9th Cir. 2001). Cline§s arguments based on the FEHA statute are thus unavailing. Cline does not make any alternative argument to support a discretionary denial of costs. See, e.g., Save Our Valley v. Sound Transit, 335 F.3d 932, 945 (2003) (identifying factors that could justify a discretionary denial of costs). Consequently, the district court did not abuse its discretion in denying Cline§s motion to tax costs. AFFIRMED.