Motor Coach Industries, Inc. v. Dole, s. 83-1652
| Citation | 725 F.2d 958 |
| Decision Date | 26 January 1984 |
| Docket Number | Nos. 83-1652,s. 83-1652 |
| Parties | 31 Cont.Cas.Fed. (CCH) 72,052 MOTOR COACH INDUSTRIES, INC., Hausman Bus Sales & Parts Co., Appellees, v. Elizabeth DOLE, Secretary of Department of Transportation, J. Lynn Helms, Administrator of Federal Aviation, First & Merchants National Bank, Defendants, and Eagle International Inc., American Coach Sales, Inc., Appellants. MOTOR COACH INDUSTRIES, INC.; Hausman Bus Sales & Parts Co.; Appellees, v. Elizabeth DOLE, Secretary of Department of Transportation; J. Lynn Helms, Administrator of Federal Aviation; Appellants, and First Merchants National Bank; Eagle International Inc.; American Coach Sales, Inc.; Defendants. MOTOR COACH INDUSTRIES, INC.; Hausman Bus Sales & Parts Co.; Appellees, v. FIRST & MERCHANTS NATIONAL BANK, Appellant, and Elizabeth Dole, Secretary of Department of Transportation; J. Lynn Helms, Administrator of Federal Aviation; Eagle International, Inc.; American Coach Sales, Inc.; Defendants. (L), 83-1831 and 83-1832. |
| Court | United States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (4th Circuit) |
Loren Kieve, Washington, D.C. (Gary C. Tepper, Steptoe & Johnson Chartered, Washington, D.C., J. Robert Brame, III, Roger W. Frydrychowski, McGuire, Woods & Battle, Richmond, Va., Elsie L. Munsell, U.S. Atty., Paula P. Newett, Asst. U.S. Atty., Alexandria, Va., on brief), for appellants.
George F. West, Jr., Alexandria, Va. (Murphy, McGettigan & West, P.C., Alexandria, Va., on brief), for appellees.
Before RUSSELL, SPROUSE and CHAPMAN, Circuit Judges.
This appeal arises out of an attempt by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to channel funds to the Air Carriers Trust Fund (Trust) in order to purchase ground transport buses for Dulles International Airport. 1 Eagle International (Eagle) and Motor Coach Industries (MCI), the two principal bus manufacturers in the United States, competed for the contract to supply the vehicles, with Eagle ultimately receiving the award. MCI then brought this action against the FAA, the Trust, and Eagle to void the award, contending that the Trust, like the FAA itself, was subject to federal procurement guidelines which had not been followed. The district court agreed that public funds were involved in the contract to purchase the buses, enjoined the sale, and ordered that the trust corpus be paid into the United States Treasury. Eagle and the government appealed, but the government has since withdrawn its appeal. We affirm both the district court's ruling that the trust fund was public and its order that the trust corpus must be paid into the Treasury.
The FAA operates Dulles International and Washington National Airports through an agency known as the Metropolitan Washington Airports. It collects significant revenue from its operations by levying various landing and lounge fees against air carriers that service the airports. 2 In fiscal year 1980, these fees produced between $10,000,000 and $11,000,000 at Dulles International alone. The air carrier fees are remitted to the United States Treasury and are not used directly to supplement the airports' operating budgets. See 31 U.S.C. Sec. 3302(b). The present controversy stems from an FAA-inspired plan to divert a portion of these fees to bolster bus service at Dulles.
The plan's genesis is found in the FAA's longtime concern about the underutilization of Dulles. Compared with its sister airport Washington National, Dulles has experienced a marked downturn over the years in the number of travelers using its facilities. Passengers apparently prefer the ready accessibility of Washington National, and the air carriers have responded by moving operations to that facility. The resulting congestion has created a potentially hazardous situation, prompting the FAA to explore ways of transferring part of Washington National's traffic flow to Dulles. This effort culminated in 1980 with a determination by the FAA that Dulles's utilization could best be improved by expanding bus transportation to and from the airport.
Rather than approach Congress for the necessary appropriations, FAA contacted the firm handling ground transportation at the airport about purchasing additional buses. The firm agreed that improvements needed to be made, but informed the FAA that it could not afford to acquire more buses. The FAA then contacted the airlines serving Dulles to solicit their assistance in securing the buses. An interwoven set of agreements designed to provide the necessary funds for ground transportation improvements emerged from these contacts.
The most important aspect of the agreements involved fees that the FAA normally charged airlines using Dulles. Under then-existing contracts with air carriers, the FAA levied landing and mobile fees for services it provided at the airport. Fees were based on air carrier weights and produced over $10 million annually in revenue. The FAA agreed to waive these fees after eliciting a promise from the airlines that they would establish and fund the Trust. The principal and income of the Trust were to be expended solely for the purchase of buses to provide ground transportation for Dulles. The waiver agreements were executed in January, 1980, and soon afterward the Trust was established.
The main feature of the Trust, and the one which concerns us on this appeal, is the funding mechanism. Participating airlines, now relieved of their landing fee responsibilities, were obligated to make monthly payments to the First and Merchant's National Bank, the trust administrator, based on an FAA-approved formula. In contrast to the pre-waiver agreement weight formula, the airlines' new obligations were calculated by multiplying each airline's monthly passenger load by seventy-seven cents per passenger. The FAA monitored airline ridership during the relevant periods to ensure the accuracy of the contributions and performed most of the administrative duties associated with collecting the per passenger fees. Projections placed the airlines' annual contributions under the formula at $3-4 million, which was $6 million less than they would have paid under the waived landing fee schedules. The expected savings from this arrangement virtually assured the airlines' participation in the trust plan.
Officially the airlines were the trust settlors, but the FAA maintained firm control over vital aspects of the Trust. The Trust's resources were dedicated to the objective of primary importance to the agency--securing suitable buses for Dulles. The trustees all airline officials, bore the responsibility of selecting the vehicles that best satisfied the airport's needs, but no expenditures from the Trust could be made without FAA authorization. Moreover, the terms of the Trust plainly stated that the beneficiary was the FAA and that accumulated funds not used for bus purchases would be paid into the United States Treasury when the agreement terminated on December 31, 1983.
All air carriers servicing Dulles agreed to the waiver and trust agreements except Air Florida. It continued to pay the FAA landing and mobile lounge fees under the old air carrier weight formula and made no per passenger contributions to the Trust. 3
By the end of 1982, the trust corpus had swelled to nearly $3 million, enabling the FAA and the trustees to go forward with procurement plans. An FAA official informally notified Eagle and MCI about the airport's needs and requested that each manufacturer prepare proposals for various types of buses. These proposals were submitted for consideration to four FAA employees and one trust official, who selected Eagle to supply the buses. The procurement decision was made without soliciting bids through public advertisements or seeking detailed proposals based on written specifications.
MCI was notified of the decision and promptly brought suit in federal district court against Eagle and the FAA, alleging that the trust corpus was public money that had been expended in violation of federal procurement guidelines. All parties stipulated that federal procurement procedures had not been followed in the bus selection process, leaving the court to decide a single issue--whether the Trust was created with public funds. The district court heard the evidence in February, 1982 and, in a memorandum decision two months later, ruled that the trust corpus was public money and must be paid into the United States Treasury. Enforcement of the decision was stayed to enable Eagle and the government to appeal.
Eagle's principal contentions on appeal are that (1) MCI lacked standing to attack the purchase contract; (2) even if MCI had standing, the trial court erred in holding that the Trust was funded with public money; (3) the FAA had no duty to comply with federal procurement requirements; and (4) the trial court abused its discretion when it enjoined enforcement of the purchase contract.
We first address the issue of standing. 4
"In essence the question of standing is whether the litigant is entitled to have the court decide the merits of the dispute...." Warth v. Seldin, 422 U.S. 490, 498, 95 S.Ct. 2197, 2205, 45 L.Ed.2d 343 (1975). The question is important on a constitutional level because it is tied to the courts' power to entertain the case; it is also important on a practical level because courts rely on the litigants' stake in the outcome to help sharpen and illuminate the presentation of the issues they must ultimately decide. Simon v. Eastern Kentucky Welfare Rights Organization, 426 U.S. 26, 96 S.Ct. 1917, 48 L.Ed.2d 450 (1976).
Standing, unlike the mootness and ripeness requirements of article III, "focuses on the party seeking to get his complaint before a federal court and not on the issues he wishes to have adjudicated." Flast v. Cohen, 392 U.S. 83, 99, 88 S.Ct. 1942, 1952, 20 L.Ed.2d 947 (1968). See, e.g., Valley Forge Christian College v. Americans United for Separation of Church and State, Inc., 454 U.S. 464, ...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Murray Energy Corp. v. McCarthy, Civil Action No. 5:14-CV-39
...of prior EPA actions. As such employers, the plaintiffs clearly fall within that zone. See Motor Coach Industries, Inc. v. Dole, 725 F.2d 958, 963 (4th Cir. 1984). The plaintiffs also assert procedural and informational injury as a basis for their standing. The procedural standing argument ......
-
Byers v. Intuit, Inc.
...fees allegedly charged by the Corporate Defendants are not subject to the IOAA. The first case Plaintiffs cite is Motor Coach Indus., Inc. v. Dole, 725 F.2d 958 (4th Cir.1984). The issue in Motor Coach was whether federal procurement guidelines had to be followed where the Federal Aviation ......
-
Clark Const. Co., Inc. v. Pena
...the integrity of the procurement process." Chemung County v. Dole, 781 F.2d 963, 969 (2d Cir.1986) (citing Motor Coach Indus., Inc. v. Dole, 725 F.2d 958 (4th Cir.1984)). Accordingly, Clark Construction lacks an adequate remedy at law against the The court finds it noteworthy to elaborate o......
-
Leaf Tobacco Exporters Ass'n, Inc. v. Block, 83-2145
...1048, 95 S.Ct. 2666, 45 L.Ed.2d 700 (1975); In re Swearingen Aviation Corporation, 605 F.2d 125 (4th Cir.1979); Motor Coach Industries, Inc. v. Dole, 725 F.2d 958 (4th Cir.1984); Hicks v. Southern Maryland Health Systems Agency, 737 F.2d 399 (4th Cir.1984). Cf. Control Data Corp. v. Baldrid......