Anders v. Cal. State Univ.
| Decision Date | 29 October 2021 |
| Docket Number | 1:21-cv-00179-AWI-BAM |
| Parties | TAYLOR ANDERS, HENNESSEY EVANS, ABBIGAYLE ROBERTS, MEGAN WALAITIS, TARA WEIR, and COURTNEY WALBURGER, individually and on behalf of all those similarly situated, Plaintiffs, v. CALIFORNIA STATE UNIVERSITY, FRESNO and BOARD OF TRUSTEES OF CALIFORNIA STATE UNIVERSITY, Defendants. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Eastern District of California |
ORDER GRANTING MOTION TO DISMISS COUNT II OF THE SECOND AMENDED COMPLAINT
Defendant Board of Trustees of California State University (the “Board”)[1] moves to dismiss Count II of Plaintiffs' Second Amended Complaint (“SAC”) Doc. No. 59, for lack of standing and failure to state a claim, pursuant to Rule 12(b)(1) and Rule 12(b)(6) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.[2] Doc. No. 60. The motion has been fully briefed and deemed suitable for decision without oral argument pursuant to Local Rule 230(g). For the reasons that follow, the motion will be granted.
The background for this case is addressed in detail in other orders. See Doc. Nos. 35, 57 & 58. In brief Fresno State announced in October 2020 that it would stop sponsoring women's lacrosse, men's wrestling and men's tennis in the 2021-22 academic year. Plaintiffs who were members of Fresno State's women's lacrosse team at the time, filed this putative class action on February 12, 2021, alleging an effective accommodation claim, an equal treatment claim and a financial aid claim under Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, 20 U.S.C. § 1681 et seq. (“Title IX”). See Doc. No. 1. They also brought a motion for a preliminary injunction barring Fresno State from eliminating women's lacrosse and requiring Fresno State to treat women's lacrosse as well as other varsity teams while this action was pending. See Doc. No. 2. The Court did not bar Fresno State from eliminating women's lacrosse but did order Fresno State to give women's lacrosse equal treatment through the conclusion of the 2020-21 season. See Doc. No. 35.
Plaintiffs filed a First Amended Complaint (“FAC”) on May 3, 2021, Doc. No. 36, whereupon the Board brought a motion to dismiss. Doc. No. 42. The Court denied the motion to dismiss as to the effective accommodation and equal treatment claims but granted it, with leave to amend, as to the financial aid claim. Doc. No. 57.
Plaintiffs filed a Second Amended Complaint (“SAC”) on August 12, 2021. Doc. No. 59. On August 26, 2021, the Board filed the instant motion, seeking dismissal of Plaintiffs' financial aid claim (“Count II”) for failure to state a claim on which relief can be granted, under Rule 12(b)(6), and for lack of standing, under Rule 12(b)(1). Doc. No. 60.
Under Rule 12(b)(6), a cause of action may be dismissed where a plaintiff fails “to state a claim upon which relief can be granted.” Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6). Dismissal under Rule 12(b)(6) may be based on the lack of a cognizable legal theory or on the absence of sufficient facts alleged under a cognizable legal theory. Conservation Force v. Salazar, 646 F.3d 1240, 1242 (9th Cir. 2011); Johnson v. Riverside Healthcare Sys., LP, 534 F.3d 1116, 1121-22 (9th Cir. 2008). To survive a Rule 12(b)(6) motion for failure to allege sufficient facts, a complaint must include a “short and plain statement of the claim showing that the pleader is entitled to relief.” Fed.R.Civ.P. 8(a)(2). Compliance with this rule ensures that the defendant has “fair notice of what the ... claim is and the grounds upon which it rests.” Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 555 (2007) (quoting Conley v. Gibson, 355 U.S. 41, 47 (1957)) (internal quotation marks omitted). Under this standard, a complaint must contain sufficient factual matter to “state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.” Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009) (citations omitted). A claim has facial plausibility when the plaintiff pleads factual content that allows the court to draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the alleged misconduct. Id. at 663.
In reviewing a complaint under Rule 12(b)(6), all allegations of material fact are taken as true and construed in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party. Mollett v. Netflix, Inc., 795 F.3d 1062, 1065 (9th Cir. 2015); Marceau v. Blackfeet Hous. Auth., 540 F.3d 916, 919 (9th Cir. 2008). But the Court is “not ‘required to accept as true allegations that contradict exhibits attached to the Complaint or matters properly subject to judicial notice, or allegations that are merely conclusory, unwarranted deductions of fact, or unreasonable inferences.' ” Seven Arts Filmed Entm't, Ltd. v. Content Media Corp. PLC, 733 F.3d 1251, 1254 (9th Cir. 2013) (citation omitted). Complaints that offer no more than “labels and conclusions” or “a formulaic recitation of the elements of a cause of action will not do.” Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678; Johnson v. Fed. Home Loan Mortg. Corp., 793 F.3d 1005, 1008 (9th Cir. 2015). Rather, “for a complaint to survive a motion to dismiss, the non-conclusory ‘factual content,' and reasonable inferences from that content, must be plausibly suggestive of a claim entitling the plaintiff to relief.” Moss v. U.S. Secret Serv., 572 F.3d 962, 969 (9th Cir. 2009) (quoting Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678).
Although leave to amend should be given freely, a district court may dismiss without leave where amendment would be futile. Cervantes v. Countrywide Home Loans, Inc., 656 F.3d 1034, 1041 (9th Cir. 2011) (citing Cook, Perkiss & Liehe, Inc. v. N. Cal. Collection Serv. Inc., 911 F.2d 242, 247 (9th Cir.1990) (per curiam)). When a district court has already granted a plaintiff leave to amend, its discretion as to further amendment is “particularly broad.” Chodos v. W. Publ'g Co., 292 F.3d 992, 1003 (9th Cir. 2002) (quoting Griggs v. Pace Am. Group, Inc., 170 F.3d 877, 879 (9th Cir.1999)) (internal quotation marks omitted).
“[T]hose who seek to invoke the jurisdiction of the federal courts must satisfy the threshold requirement imposed by Article III of the Constitution by alleging an actual case or controversy.” Maya v. Centex Corp., 658 F.3d 1060, 1067 (9th Cir. 2011) (quoting City of Los Angeles v. Lyons, 461 U.S. 95, 101 (1983)). “[T]o satisfy Article III's standing requirements, a plaintiff must show (1) it has suffered an ‘injury in fact' that is (a) concrete and particularized and (b) actual or imminent, not conjectural or hypothetical; (2) the injury is fairly traceable to the challenged action of the defendant; and (3) it is likely, as opposed to merely speculative, that the injury will be redressed by a favorable decision.” Id. (quoting Friends of the Earth, Inc. v. Laidlaw Envtl. Servs., Inc., 528 U.S. 167, 180-81 (2000)). “[L]ack of Article III standing requires dismissal for lack of subject matter jurisdiction under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1).” Id. (citing Simmonds v. Credit Suisse Sec. (USA) LLC, 638 F.3d 1072, 1087 n.6 (9th Cir.2011)).
Title IX states in pertinent part as follows: “No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance ….” 20 U.S.C. § 1681(a).
At the direction of Congress, the Department of Health, Education and Welfare (the predecessor of today's Department of Education (“DOE”)) issued regulations for Title IX that took effect in 1975.[4] See 34 C.F.R. §106.1. As applied to intercollegiate athletics, Title IX regulations provide for a “triumvirate of compliance-related claims”: (1) “financial aid”-or “scholarship”-claims, see 34 C.F.R. § 106.37(c); (2) “effective-accommodation” claims, see 34 C.F.R. § 106.41(c)(1); and (3) “equal-treatment” claims, see 34 C.F.R. § 106.41(c)(2)-(10). See Biediger v. Quinnipiac Univ., 928 F.Supp.2d 414, 436 (D. Conn. 2013). Each of these is “a separate and distinct type of claim, to be analyzed separately.” Beasley v. Alabama State Univ., 966 F.Supp. 1117, 1122 (M.D. Ala. 1997) (citations omitted).
As to financial aid in general, 34 C.F.R. § 106.37(a) provides that recipients of federal funding such as Fresno State shall not:
As to financial aid relating to athletics, 34 C.F.R § 106.37(c)(1) provides as follows:
To the extent that a recipient [of federal funding] awards athletic scholarships or grants-in-aid, it must provide reasonable opportunities for such awards for members of each sex in proportion to the number of students of each sex participating in interscholastic or intercollegiate athletics.
Guidance regarding compliance with 34 C.F.R. § 106.37(c)(1) (which parallels 45 C.F.R. § 86.37(c)) is set forth in A Policy Interpretation; Title IX and Intercollegiate Athletics, OCR, Dep't of Edu., 44 Fed. Reg. 71, 413 (Dec. 11, 1979) (“1979 Policy Interpretation”), which states, in pertinent part, as follows:
The [DOE] will examine compliance … primarily by means of a...
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