Reed v. Dist. of Columbia

• Decision Date: 09 December 2016
• Docket Number: C/w 16-7009,No. 15-7119,15-7119
• Citation: 843 F.3d 517
• Parties: Ashima Reed, et al., Appellants v. District of Columbia, Appellee
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — District of Columbia Circuit

843 F.3d 517

Ashima Reed, et al., Appellants

v.District of Columbia, Appellee

No. 15-7119

C/w 16-7009

United States Court of Appeals, District of Columbia Circuit.

Argued September 13, 2016

Decided December 9, 2016

Douglas Tyrka, Washington, DC, argued the cause and filed the briefs for appellants.

Richard S. Love, Senior Assistant Attorney General, Office of the Attorney General for the District of Columbia, argued the cause for appellee. With him on the brief were Karl A. Racine, Attorney General, Todd S. Kim, Solicitor General, and Loren L. AliKhan, Deputy Solicitor General.

Before: Tatel, Circuit Judge, and Edwards and Sentelle, Senior Circuit Judges.

Concurring opinion filed by Circuit Judge Tatel.

Edwards, Senior Circuit Judge:

The purpose of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act ("IDEA") is "to ensure that all children with disabilities have available to them a free appropriate public education." 20 U.S.C. § 1400(d)(1)(A). The statute contains a fee-shifting provision that permits parents and legal guardians to recover reasonable attorneys' fees and costs if they prevail in certain, statutorily prescribed proceedings. See 20 U.S.C. § 1415(i)(3)(B). In calculating a fee award, courts take into account both the "number of hours reasonably expended in litigation" and the "reasonable hourly rate" for the services provided, which is determined in part by reference to the prevailing market rate for attorneys' services. Eley v. District of Columbia , 793 F.3d 97, 100 (D.C. Cir. 2015) (quoting Save Our Cumberland Mountains, Inc. v. Hodel (SOCM) , 857 F.2d 1516, 1517 (D.C. Cir. 1988) (en banc)).

Appellants, parents and legal guardians of children with disabilities who prevailed in IDEA proceedings, filed suit in the District Court seeking reasonable attorneys' fees and costs related to these proceedings. Appellants also sought an award of "fees-on-fees" for work done in connection with their pursuit of fees for the IDEA proceedings. The District Court granted both requests, but did not award Appellants the full amounts requested.

Appellants contend that the District Court erred in excluding certain hours spent at "settlement conferences" from their fee award. Appellants also assert that the District Court abused its discretion in refusing to find that the "prevailing market rate" for attorneys' fees in IDEA cases is aligned with the Laffey Matrix, a fee matrix originally compiled to reflect the prevailing market rate for "complex federal litigation." See Laffey v. Nw. Airlines, Inc. (Laffey I) , 572 F.Supp. 354, 372 (D.D.C. 1983), aff'd in part, rev'd in part on other grounds , Laffey v. Nw. Airlines, Inc. (Laffey II) , 746 F.2d 4 (D.C. Cir. 1984), overruled in part on other grounds , SOCM , 857 F.2d 1516.

We agree with Appellants that the District Court should not have excluded certain hours billed as "settlement conferences" from its initial fee award calculation. However, we hold that the District Court did not abuse its discretion in finding that Appellants had failed to demonstrate that their IDEA matters fall within the category of "complex federal litigation" to which the Laffey Matrix applies. Therefore, the District Court was not obliged to follow the Laffey Matrix in calculating attorneys' fees due Appellants. Appellants also forfeited two claims raised for the first time on appeal: (1) that the affidavits they submitted in this case independently demonstrate a prevailing IDEA market rate that aligns with the Laffey Matrix; and (2) that the rates awarded by the District Court are insufficient to attract competent counsel and, thus, are too low. These claims were not clearly raised with the District Court, so we decline to address them on appeal. Finally, Appellants did not submit any evidence demonstrating that they should receive a different market rate for fees-on-fees and, therefore, the District Court did not abuse its discretion in applying the same rate when calculating both the initial fee award and subsequent fees-on-fees award.

I. BACKGROUND

A. The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act

As noted above, the purpose of IDEA is "to ensure that all children with disabilities have available to them a free appropriate public education that emphasizes special education and related services designed to meet their unique needs." 20 U.S.C. § 1400(d)(1)(A). IDEA provides a variety of mechanisms for students to receive the assistance they require. This assistance includes an "impartial due process hearing...conducted by the State educational agency or by the local educational agency" after a party has filed a complaint, 20 U.S.C. § 1415(f)(1)(A), pertaining to "any matter relating to the identification, evaluation, or educational placement of [a] child, or the provision of a free appropriate public education to such child," § 1415(b)(6)(A). Parents or legal guardians who prevail in such proceedings are permitted to bring suit in district court to request the award of "reasonable attorneys' fees" and related costs. 20 U.S.C. § 1415(i)(3)(B)(i).

Though fee applicants "bear[ ] the burden of establishing entitlement to an award," IDEA provides relatively little guidance to either the courts or litigants regarding how, precisely, these "reasonable attorneys' fees" are to be calculated. Eley , 793 F.3d at 100 (quoting Covington v. District of Columbia , 57 F.3d 1101, 1107 (D.C. Cir. 1995) ). The statute notes only that fee awards "shall be based on rates prevailing in the community in which the action or proceeding arose for the kind and quality of services furnished," 20 U.S.C. § 1415(i)(3)(C), and permits courts to reduce awards of attorneys' fees if they "unreasonably exceed[ ] the hourly rate prevailing in the community for similar services by attorneys of reasonably comparable skill, reputation, and experience." 20 U.S.C. § 1415(i)(3)(F)(ii). Nonetheless, in interpreting the dictates of IDEA's fee-shifting provision, this court has typically relied on a two-part framework that takes into account: (1) the "number of hours reasonably expended in litigation"; and (2) the "reasonable hourly rate" for the services provided. See Eley , 793 F.3d at 100 (quoting SOCM , 857 F.2d at 1517 ). Both parts of this test are at issue in this case.

To establish an entitlement to a particular fee award, fee applicants must document the hours spent litigating in IDEA proceedings in which they prevailed. See id. (quoting Covington , 57 F.3d at 1107 ). IDEA, however, imposes a number of limitations on the hours for which prevailing parties can seek recompense. See 20 U.S.C. § 1415(i)(3)(D)(i)–(iii). Of particular salience in this case, fee applicants are traditionally barred from recovering fees associated with hours spent in "resolution sessions." 20 U.S.C. § 1415(f)(1)(B) ; § 1415(i)(3)(D)(ii)–(iii) ; see D.D. ex rel. Davis v. District of Columbia , 470 F.Supp.2d 1, 2 (D.D.C. 2007).

In addition to providing an accounting of the hours spent on a particular IDEA claim, fee applicants must establish the reasonable hourly rate at which these hours should be reimbursed in order to prevail on a request for a fee award. Eley , 793 F.3d at 100. "Whether an hourly rate is reasonable turns on three sub-elements: (1) ‘the attorney['s] billing practices,’ (2) ‘the attorney['s] skill, experience, and reputation’ and (3) ‘the prevailing market rates in the relevant community.’ " Id. (quoting Covington , 57 F.3d at 1107 ). We have noted that determining the third of these sub-elements, the prevailing market rate, is "inherently difficult." Id. (quoting Blum v. Stenson , 465 U.S. 886, 895 n.11, 104 S.Ct. 1541, 79 L.Ed.2d 891 (1984) ). Fee applicants in IDEA cases have relied on two separate, but inter-related, approaches to providing evidence of prevailing market rate. We explain below.

First , litigants have claimed that IDEA litigation should be accorded the same rates laid out in the aforecited "Laffey Matrix." Two variants of the Laffey Matrix, intended to update the original matrix to reflect current market rates, are potentially implicated by such requests: (1) the USAO Laffey Matrix, which is maintained by the United States Attorney's Office for the District of Columbia and adjusts the rates set forth in the original Laffey Matrix to "account for inflation by using the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers of the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics"; and (2) the Legal Services Index (LSI) Laffey Matrix, which "uses the Legal Services Index of the Bureau of Labor Statistics to adjust for inflation." See Eley , 793 F.3d at 101. Because the Laffey Matrix and subsequent revisions to this matrix apply only to "complex federal litigation," fee applicants have focused their efforts on attempting to demonstrate that IDEA cases fall within the bounds of this type of litigation. See id. at 105 ; Laffey , 572 F.Supp. at 371–72.

Second , fee applicants have tried to establish the prevailing market rate by providing evidence of the fees charged, and received, by IDEA litigators. While practitioners appear to frequently state that their rates are identical to some version of the Laffey Matrix, this means of establishing the "prevailing market rate" is not conceptually linked to the Laffey Matrix. See Price v. District of Columbia , 792 F.3d 112, 117 (D.C. Cir. 2015) (Brown, J., concurring) (noting that absent a finding that representation in "IDEA administrative due process hearings" commands the same rates as complex federal litigation, "Laffey Matrix rates are irrelevant to the prevailing-rate determination").

B. The Proceeding Below

Appellants in this case are the parents and legal guardians of six students who prevailed in separate due process hearings. On November 10, 2014, they filed suit in the District Court requesting the award of "reasonable fees and costs" associated with their IDEA claims. The District Court referred the case to a Magistrate Judge for full case management. Appellants then submitted a Motion for Summary...