Opinion
Civil Action No. 00-2582(GK)
September 6, 2002
MEMORANDUM OPINION
Plaintiffs bring this action for attorneys fees and costs pursuant to the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act ("IDEA"), 20 U.S.C. § 1400 et seq. This matter comes before the Court on Plaintiffs' Motion for Summary Judgment, Amended Motion for Summary Judgment, and Second Amended Motion for Summary Judgment. Upon consideration of the Motions, Oppositions, Replies, and the entire record herein, for the reasons discussed below, Plaintiffs' Motions are granted in part and denied in part.
I. BACKGROUND
The cases underlying the instant action for attorneys' fees and costs involved proceedings brought by Plaintiffs, who are minor children or the parents, guardians or court-appointed advocates of minor children, against Defendant District of Columbia Public Schools ("DCPS") for failure to provide special education services pursuant to the IDEA. In a series of administrative due process hearings and settlement agreements, Plaintiffs resolved their IDEA claims against DCPS.
Plainfiffs filed the instant action for an award of attorneys' fees and costs, in the amount of $643,461.58, for representation during the due process hearings and settlement agreements with DCPS. Plaintiffs also request that Defendant pay $82,208.12, the full amount of experts' fees, including expert advocates' fees, less amounts already reimbursed.
II. STANDARD OF REVIEW
Under Fed.R.Civ.P. 56, a motion for summary judgment shall be granted if the pleadings, depositions, answers to interrogatories, admissions, and affidavits show that there is no genuine issue of material fact, and that the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. See Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 248 (1986). In considering a motion for summary judgment, the "evidence of the non-movant is to be believed, and all justifiable inferences are to be drawn in his favor." Id. at 255.
III. ANALYSIS
A. Plaintiffs Who Settled Their Claims Are Not Prevailing Parties Under the IDEA
The IDEA gives courts authority to "award reasonable attorneys' fees as part of the costs to the parent of a child with a disability who is a prevailing party." 20 U.S.C. § 1415(i)(3)(B). Defendant contends that the Supreme Court's decision in Buckhannon Board and Care Home Inc. v. West Virginia Dep't of Health and Human Resources, 532 U.S. 598 (2001), precludes Plaintiffs who settled their cases from recovering attorneys' fees and costs, because they are not prevailing parties within the meaning of the IDEA.
In Buckhannon, the Supreme Court clarified the meaning of the term "prevailing party" in statutory attorneys' fees provisions. The Court rejected the "catalyst theory", which had always been followed by our Court of Appeals — whereby a party is considered prevailing if he or she can establish that the pending litigation was a catalyst that brought about the desired action — as a basis for awarding attorneys' fees. The Court held that, to acquire prevailing party status, the party seeking attorneys' fees and costs must obtain a "judicially sanctioned change in the legal relationship of the parties."Id. at 605.
It appears that the D.C. Circuit has not had occasion to consider the effects of Buckhannon on IDEA cases. In Oil, Chem. and Atomic Workers Int'l Union, AFL-CIO v. Dep't of Energy, 288 F.3d 452 (D.C. Cir. 2002), however, the Court of Appeals recently applied Buckhannon to a request for attorneys' fees by a plaintiff in a Freedom of Information Act action. The D.C. Circuit concluded that the plaintiff was not a prevailing party under Buckhannon because the parties had entered into a settlement agreement, and the district court did not award the plaintiff any judicial relief. It concluded that, subsequent to the Supreme Court's ruling, in order to be eligible for an award of attorneys' fees, a plaintiff "must have "been awarded some relief by [a] court," either in a judgment on the merits or in a court-ordered consent decree." Id. at 456-57 (quoting Buckhannon, 532 U.S. at 603).
The Supreme Court in Buckhannon and the D.C. Circuit in Oil, Chem. and Atomic Workers, made clear that attorneys' fee-shifting provisions in different statutes are interpreted consistently. See Buckhannon, 532 U.S. at 603 n. 4 ("[w]e have interpreted these fee-shifting provisions consistently, and so approach the nearly identical provisions at issue here") (citation omitted); Oil, Chem. and Atomic Workers, 288 F.3d at 455 ("[w]e therefore adhere to the proposition, well-established in this court and in the Supreme Court, that eligibility for an award of attorney's fees in a FOIA case should be treated the same as eligibility determinations made under other fee-shifting statutes unless there is some good reason for doing otherwise"); see also Bennett v. Yoshina, 259 F.3d 1097, 1100 (9th Cir. 2001) ("[t]here can be no doubt that the Court's analysis in Buckhannon applies to statutes other than the two at issue in that case")
Although the Court of Appeals addressed the applicability ofBuckhannon to a range of fee shifting statutes, it must be noted that the Court of Appeals was considering Buckhannon in the FOIA context. This Court would emphasize, as did Judge Walton in his opinion in Akinseye v. District of Columbia, 193 F. Supp.2d 134 (D.D.C. 2002), that the IDEA differs greatly from FOIA, not only in terms of addressing totally different social problems, but also in terms of the practical workings of both statutes.
Judge Walton eloquently described how the special education processreally works in the District of Columbia. Settlement at the administrative level, for which Buckhannon precludes fees, is an absolutely essential component of the operation of the special education system. Speedy resolution of those cases is in the interest of all who are involved with that system. The goal is to provide disabled children, as early as possible in their difficult lives, with the full educational services to which they are entitled. If cases are litigated in court, rather than settled at the administrative level, access to those services is delayed for many months and, in some instances, years. As Judge Walton observed, based on his long service in Superior Court, "by the time some of these children ultimately receive these services, valuable and unretrievable time has been lost as cases grinded through the administrative process at an intolerably slow pace. . . . The end result for many of these children is that they never develop to their full educational achievement level." Id. at 140.
For these reasons, and many more which could be thoroughly articulated by knowledgeable amicus, such as the Children's Law Center, this Court hopes that it will be possible to rigorously examine at the appellate level whether it is appropriate to extend, for "good reason," Oil, Chem. Atomic Workers from its FOIA context to the totally different world of disabled children. See Oil, Chem. Atomic Workers, 288 F.3d at 455.
Here, many of Plaintiffs' cases were resolved through settlement agreements with DCPS. Plaintiffs do not contend that they received any judicial relief in those matters, let alone that they obtained a judgment on the merits or a consent decree. Accordingly, in light of Buckhannon and Oil, Chem. and Atomic Workers, the Court feels compelled to rule that those Plaintiffs who settled their cases are not prevailing parties, and are therefore not entitled to an award of attorneys' fees or costs pursuant to the IDEA.
B. The IDEA Permits Recovery of Costs and Fees Other Than Attorneys' Fees
Defendant does not maintain that Plaintiffs are precluded from receiving attorneys' fees in those cases where a hearing officer found that DCPS violated the IDEA. Moreover, Defendant concedes that the "Court is not limited by the [D.C.] Appropriations Act in awarding fees in this matter." Def. Opp'n to Pls. Mot. for Summ. J. at 9. Accordingly, Plaintiffs are entitled to an award of attorneys' fees in those cases that were resolved by a hearing officer, irrespective of the District's inability to pay awards in excess of the fee limitations set forth in the D.C. Appropriations Act of 2002. Pub.L. No. 107-96, 115 Stat. 923 (2001). See Calloway v. District of Columbia, 216 F.3d 1, 12 (D.C. Cir. 2000) (D.C. Appropriations Act does not restrict a court's authority to award fees pursuant to the IDEA).
In addition to requesting attorneys' fees, Plaintiffs also seek to recover their costs and expenses, including the fees of educational advocates. Defendant maintains that Plaintiffs are not entitled to these costs because the IDEA does "not direct the payment of advocates' fees and expenses." Def. Opp'n to Pls. Not. for Summ. J. at 9. To the extent that Plaintiffs seek costs in cases that were not resolved in settlement agreements, the Court concludes that the IDEA permits recovery of such costs.
Courts in this Circuit have repeatedly and consistently awarded costs and expenses to prevailing parties in IDEA cases. See, e.g., Lenny Haynes, et al. v. District of Columbia, No. 99-542, slip op. at 3 (Jan. 2, 2000); Bailey v. District of Columbia, 839 F. Supp. 888, 891-92 (D.D.C. 1993); Kattan v. District of Columbia, 691 F. Supp. 1539, 1543 (D.D.C. 1988). Significantly, Defendant does not cite any case, in any circuit, in which a court has determined that, as a matter of law, the IDEA does not permit recovery of costs and expenses.
Accordingly, it is clear that the IDEA permits Plaintiffs to recover their costs, including advocates' fees, in those cases that were not resolved by settlement agreements.
The reimbursement limitations set forth in the D.C. Appropriations Act apply only to attorneys' fees, not to costs. See Haynes, No. 99-542, slip op. at 3 (Jan. 2, 2000). Accordingly, the District is required to pay all costs to which it has not specifically objected.
IV. CONCLUSION
For the foregoing reasons, Plaintiffs' Motions for Summary Judgment are granted in part and denied in part. The Court assumes that, as a practical matter, this ruling disposes of all issues in this case. Unless the Court hears to the contrary from the parties, no later than September 25, 2002, this case will be dismissed.
An Order will issue with this Opinion.