Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca9-17-17504/USCOURTS-ca9-17-17504-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 440
Nature of Suit: Other Civil Rights
Cause of Action: 

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FOR PUBLICATION

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

PEYMAN PAKDEL; SIMA CHEGINI,

Plaintiffs-Appellants,

v.

CITY AND COUNTY OF SAN 

FRANCISCO; SAN FRANCISCO BOARD 

OF SUPERVISORS; SAN FRANCISCO 

DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC WORKS,

Defendants-Appellees.

No. 17-17504

D.C. No.

3:17-cv-03638-

RS

OPINION

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Northern District of California

Richard Seeborg, District Judge, Presiding

Argued and Submitted September 13, 2019

San Francisco, California

Filed March 17, 2020

Before: Ronald M. Gould, Carlos T. Bea, and Michelle T. 

Friedland, Circuit Judges.

Opinion by Judge Friedland;

Dissent by Judge Bea

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2 PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO

SUMMARY*

Civil Rights

The panel affirmed the district court’s dismissal of an 

action brought pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against the City 

and County of San Francisco asserting an as-applied 

challenge to the Expedited Conversion Program, which 

allows property owners to convert their tenancy-in-common 

properties into condominium properties on the condition that 

the owners agree to offer any existing tenants lifetime leases 

in units within the converted property. 

Plaintiffs purchased an interest in a tenancy-in-common 

property in 2009 and soon thereafter rented their portion of 

the property to a tenant. When the Expedited Conversion 

Program began, plaintiffs and their co-owners applied to 

convert their property and plaintiffs agreed to offer their 

tenant a lifetime lease as a condition of converting and duly 

received final approval from the City to convert. During the 

process, plaintiffs had several opportunities to request an 

exemption from the lifetime lease requirement but did not do 

so. Indeed, toward the end of the process, they expressly 

waived their right to seek such an exemption. But after 

securing final approval, plaintiffs requested that the City not 

require them to execute and record the lifetime lease or, in 

the alternative, that the City compensate them. Consistent 

with plaintiffs’ previous lack of objection and their prior 

express agreements not to seek an exemption, the City 

refused plaintiffs’ requests. Plaintiffs sued the City, 

* This summary constitutes no part of the opinion of the court. It 

has been prepared by court staff for the convenience of the reader.

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PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO 3

contending under various theories that the lifetime lease 

requirement violated the Takings Clause of the Fifth 

Amendment. The district court dismissed plaintiffs’ takings 

claims because they had not sought compensation for the 

alleged taking in state court, which then was required by 

Williamson County Regional Planning Commission v. 

Hamilton Bank of Johnson City, 473 U.S. 172 (1985).

The panel first acknowledged that the state-litigation 

requirement has since been eliminated by Knick v. Township 

of Scott, 139 S. Ct. 2162 (2019), so it was no longer a proper 

basis for dismissal. Nevertheless, the panel held that 

because plaintiffs did not timely ask the City for an 

exemption from the lifetime lease requirement, they failed to 

satisfy Williamson County’s separate finality requirement, 

which survived Knick and thus continued to be a requirement 

for bringing regulatory takings claims such as plaintiffs’ in 

federal court. The panel stated that plaintiffs’ belated 

attempts to request an exemption were untimely and 

expressly waived. The panel therefore affirmed the 

dismissal of plaintiffs’ takings claim as unripe. 

The panel rejected plaintiffs’ argument that they were 

exempt from the Williamson County ripeness requirements 

because the Expedited Conversion Program effects a 

“private” taking, benefitting private individuals rather than 

the public. The panel held that plaintiffs’ characterization of 

their claim as a “private” takings claim was foreclosed by 

Rancho de Calistoga v. City of Calistoga, 800 F.3d 1083 (9th 

Cir. 2015). The panel also rejected plaintiffs’ request that 

the panel exercise its discretion to excuse plaintiffs from the 

finality requirement. The panel concluded that none of the 

cases plaintiffs used to argue that they should be excused 

from the finality requirement presented circumstances 

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4 PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO

analogous to those here, and the panel saw no reason to 

invent a new rationale for exercising such discretion.

Dissenting, Judge Bea stated that because the City had 

reached a final decision which denied plaintiffs’ request to 

be excused from executing and recording a lifetime lease to 

their unit, he would vacate the district court’s order 

dismissing the takings claim and remand the case for further 

proceedings. 

COUNSEL

Jeffrey W. McCoy (argued), James S. Burling, and Erin E.

Wilcox, Pacific Legal Foundation, Sacramento, California; 

Paul F. Utrecht, Utrecht & Lenvin, LLP, San Francisco, 

California; Thomas W. Connors, Black McCuskey Souers & 

Arbaugh, LPA, Canton, Ohio; for Plaintiffs-Appellants.

Kristen A. Jensen (argued) and Christopher T. Tom, Deputy 

City Attorneys; Dennis J. Herrera, City Attorney; City 

Attorney’s Office, City and County of San Francisco, San 

Francisco, California; for Defendants-Appellees.

OPINION

FRIEDLAND, Circuit Judge:

In the City and County of San Francisco (the “City”), 

ownership of multi-unit buildings is often shared by different 

people through a form of property ownership known as a 

tenancy in common. For years, those in the City who sought 

to convert their tenancy-in-common property into 

individually owned condominium property had to apply for 

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PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO 5

permission to do so through a lottery system. Because 

conversion rights were granted through the lottery to only a 

very limited number of properties each year, a backlog 

developed. To clear that backlog, the City temporarily 

suspended the lottery in 2013 and replaced it with the 

Expedited Conversion Program (“ECP”), which allowed a 

tenancy-in-common property to be converted into a 

condominium property on the condition that its owner 

agreed to offer any existing tenants lifetime leases in units 

within the converted property. 

Peyman Pakdel and Sima Chegini (collectively, 

“Plaintiffs”) purchased an interest in a tenancy-in-common 

property in 2009 and soon thereafter rented their portion of 

the property to a tenant. When the ECP began, Plaintiffs and 

their co-owners applied to convert their property. Plaintiffs 

initially advanced through the application process without a 

hitch: They agreed to offer their tenant a lifetime lease as a 

condition of converting and duly received final approval 

from the City to convert. During this process, they had 

several opportunities to request an exemption from the 

lifetime lease requirement but did not do so. Nevertheless, 

at the eleventh hour, they balked. Refusing to execute the 

lifetime lease they had offered to their tenant, Plaintiffs 

instead sued the City, contending under various theories that 

the lifetime lease requirement violates the Takings Clause of 

the Fifth Amendment. 

The district court dismissed Plaintiffs’ takings claims 

because they had not sought compensation for the alleged 

taking in state court, which was required by Williamson 

County Regional Planning Commission v. Hamilton Bank of 

Johnson City, 473 U.S. 172 (1985). That state-litigation 

requirement has since been eliminated by Knick v. Township 

of Scott, 139 S. Ct. 2162 (2019), so it is no longer a proper 

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6 PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO

basis for dismissal. But because Plaintiffs did not ask the 

City for an exemption from the lifetime lease requirement,

they failed to satisfy Williamson County’s separate finality 

requirement, which survived Knick and thus continues to be 

a requirement for bringing regulatory takings claims such as 

Plaintiffs’ in federal court. We therefore hold that their 

takings challenge is unripe, and accordingly affirm.1

I.

A.

Tenancy in common is a form of shared property 

ownership in which “each owner has an equal right to 

possession and use of the entire property.” Marcia Rosen & 

Wendy Sullivan, From Urban Renewal and Displacement to 

Economic Inclusion: San Francisco Affordable Housing 

Policy 1978-2014, 25 Stan. L. & Pol’y Rev. 121, 134 n.57 

(2014). In San Francisco, many multi-unit buildings are coowned as tenancies in common. See Carolyn Said, Strangers 

Sharing Mortgages, SFGate (Aug. 25, 2005), 

https://www.sfgate.com/realestate/article/Strangers-sharingmortgages-Many-would-be-2645563.php. Co-owners of such 

properties can “make agreements among themselves[] to 

give each owner an exclusive right” to occupy or use a 

particular unit within the building. Tom v. City & County of 

San Francisco, 16 Cal. Rptr. 3d 13, 16 (Ct. App. 2004). In 

a condominium, by contrast, “each owner has exclusive 

ownership and possession of a single unit and common 

1 Plaintiffs asserted other constitutional claims as well, which the 

district court dismissed with prejudice. We address Plaintiffs’ appeal of 

the dismissal of those claims in a concurrently filed memorandum 

disposition. Plaintiffs also asserted state law claims, which the district 

court dismissed as procedurally barred. Plaintiffs have not appealed the 

dismissal of those claims.

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PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO 7

ownership only for the common areas.” Rosen & Sullivan, 

supra, at 134 n.57.

Owners of tenancy-in-common units may hope to 

convert those units into condominiums in order to attain 

superior title and improved credit opportunities. 

Condominium owners in San Francisco may also derive 

significant economic value from selling their properties after 

conversion because, in contrast to most tenancy-in-common 

properties, condominiums are not subject to the City’s rent 

control laws once sold by the converting owner. 

In 2009, Plaintiffs purchased a tenancy-in-common 

interest in a six-unit San Francisco building (the “Building”), 

which, by agreement with their co-owners, afforded 

Plaintiffs the right to exclusively use one unit (the “Unit”). 

They rented the Unit to a tenant, intending to move in 

themselves when they retired. Plaintiffs also contracted with 

their co-owners to take all steps available to convert the 

Building into condominiums, which would allow them to 

gain independent title to their respective units.

At the time Plaintiffs purchased and rented out the Unit, 

the City granted condominium conversion rights using a 

lottery system. Under the lottery system, only 200 units 

were granted permission to convert each year, and a 

considerable backlog of conversion applications 

accumulated. In 2013, the San Francisco Board of 

Supervisors acted to clear this backlog by enacting 

Ordinance 117-13 (the “Ordinance”), which suspended the 

conversion lottery until 2024 and replaced it with the ECP. 

The ECP allowed property owners to convert their tenancyin-common properties into condominium properties subject 

to an application fee and certain conditions. Most notably, 

the ECP required owners who did not occupy their units 

themselves and instead rented to tenants to furnish 

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8 PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO

incumbent tenants with “a written offer to enter into a life 

time lease” for the converting unit (the “Lifetime Lease 

Requirement”). S.F. Subdivision Code § 1396.4(g)(1).2 

Owners who extended a lifetime lease were entitled to a 

partial refund of the ECP application fee. See S.F. 

Subdivision Code § 1396.4(h). The Lifetime Lease 

Requirement was designed to mitigate an adverse effect that 

the City feared would result from the accelerated conversion 

of tenancy-in-common properties into condominium 

properties under the ECP—“a large number of tenants 

[displaced] into a very expensive rental housing market.” In 

other words, the ECP sought to achieve the City’s objective 

of temporarily allowing more condominium conversions 

while also limiting the displacing effects of such 

conversions.

In 2015, Plaintiffs and their fellow Building owners

submitted an ECP application to the San Francisco 

Department of Public Works (the “Department”). Following 

a public hearing, the Department approved their tentative 

conversion map in January 2016.3 In November 2016, 

Plaintiffs signed an agreement with the City committing to 

offer a lifetime lease to their tenant, and in fact offered their 

tenant such a lease. In that agreement, Plaintiffs specifically 

“covenant[ed] and agree[d] that [they] w[ould] not seek a 

waiver of the provisions of the [ECP] applicable to the 

Lifetime Lease Units” after that stage of the approval 

2 A similar, but narrower, requirement existed under the lottery 

system. Converting owners were required to offer lifetime leases to 

tenants aged 62 or older and to permanently disabled tenants. See S.F. 

Subdivision Code § 1391(c). There were also some limits on rental rates 

and increases for units occupied by such tenants. See id.

3 A “tentative map” is “a map made for the purpose of showing the 

design of a proposed subdivision.” S.F. Subdivision Code § 1309(k).

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PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO 9

process. In exchange for offering the lifetime lease, 

Plaintiffs sought and received a partial refund of the ECP 

application fee. See S.F. Subdivision Code § 1396.4(h). 

Their final conversion map was approved in December 

2016.

Until that point, Plaintiffs had given the City no 

indication that they objected to the Lifetime Lease 

Requirement. But on June 9 and again on June 13, 2017—

six months after they secured final approval to convert—

Plaintiffs “requested that the City not require them to 

execute and record the lifetime lease,” or “in the alternative 

to compensate them for transferring a lifetime lease interest 

in their property.” Consistent with Plaintiffs’ previous lack 

of objection to the Lifetime Lease Requirement and their 

prior express agreement not to seek a waiver of ECP 

requirements after November 2016, the City refused both 

requests.

B.

Instead of executing and recording the lifetime lease, 

Plaintiffs sued the City in federal district court, asserting an 

as-applied challenge to the Ordinance under 42 U.S.C. 

§ 1983. The Complaint alleged that the Lifetime Lease 

Requirement effects a regulatory taking of Plaintiffs’ 

property without just compensation in violation of the 

Takings Clause.4

 Because the Ordinance contains a clause 

4 Plaintiffs alleged in the alternative that the Lifetime Lease 

Requirement effects an exaction, a physical taking, and a private taking. 

But because these alternative theories plainly fail as a matter of law, we 

analyze Plaintiffs’ takings challenge as a regulatory takings claim. The 

Lifetime Lease Requirement is not an exaction under Nollan v. 

California Coastal Commission, 483 U.S. 825 (1987), and Dolan v. City 

of Tigard, 512 U.S. 374 (1994), because it is “a general requirement 

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10 PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO

providing that the filing of any legal challenge to the 

Lifetime Lease Requirement triggers a suspension of the 

entire ECP with respect to tenant-occupied units for the 

duration of the litigation, this lawsuit has halted the City’s 

processing of ECP applications for properties with tenantoccupied units since June 2017.

The district court granted the City’s motion to dismiss 

Plaintiffs’ Complaint because Plaintiffs had not sought 

compensation for the alleged taking of their property through 

a state court proceeding. Plaintiffs timely appealed.

II.

We review de novo grants of motions to dismiss. Naruto 

v. Slater, 888 F.3d 418, 421 (9th Cir. 2018). “We may affirm 

the district court’s dismissal on any grounds supported by 

the record.” Tritz v. U.S. Postal Serv., 721 F.3d 1133, 1136 

(9th Cir. 2013).

imposed through legislation,” rather than “an individualized” 

requirement to grant property rights to the public imposed as a condition 

for approving a specific property development. McClung v. City of 

Sumner, 548 F.3d 1219, 1227–29 (9th Cir. 2008), abrogated on other 

grounds by Koontz v. St. Johns River Water Mgmt. Dist., 570 U.S. 595 

(2013). And the Lifetime Lease Requirement does not amount to a 

physical taking because Plaintiffs voluntarily applied for conversion 

under the ECP. See Yee v. City of Escondido, 503 U.S. 519, 527 (1992) 

(“The government effects a physical taking only where it requires the 

landowner to submit to the physical occupation of his land.”); FCC v. 

Fla. Power Corp., 480 U.S. 245, 252 (1987) (law limiting the rent that 

utility companies could charge for leasing space on utility poles to cable 

television operators was not a physical taking because the utility 

companies “voluntarily entered into [the] leases with [the] cable 

company tenants”). Finally, as explained below, Plaintiffs’ private 

takings claim is simply a reframing of their regulatory takings claim.

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PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO 11

III.

“Constitutional challenges to local land use regulations 

are not considered by federal courts until the posture of the 

challenges makes them ‘ripe’ for federal adjudication.” S. 

Pac. Transp. Co. v. City of Los Angeles, 922 F.2d 498, 502 

(9th Cir. 1990). In Williamson County Regional Planning 

Commission v. Hamilton Bank of Johnson City, 473 U.S. 172 

(1985), the Supreme Court articulated two independent 

ripeness requirements for regulatory takings claims. First, 

under the finality requirement, a takings claim challenging 

the application of land-use regulations was “not ripe until the 

government entity charged with implementing the 

regulations ha[d] reached a final decision regarding the 

application of the regulations to the property at issue.” Id. at 

186. Second, under the state-litigation requirement, a claim 

was not ripe if the plaintiff “did not seek compensation [for 

the alleged taking] through the procedures the State ha[d] 

provided for doing so.” Id. at 194. 

A.

The district court dismissed Plaintiffs’ takings challenge 

under the state-litigation requirement. While this appeal was 

pending, however, the Supreme Court in Knick v. Township 

of Scott, 139 S. Ct. 2162 (2019), eliminated that requirement. 

The Court held in Knick that “[t]he Fifth Amendment right 

to full compensation arises at the time of the taking, 

regardless of post-taking remedies that may be available to 

the property owner.” Id. at 2170. Accordingly, a plaintiff 

need not seek compensation in state court to ripen a federal 

takings claim. Id.

In light of Knick, Plaintiffs’ failure to seek just 

compensation in state court no longer bars them from 

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12 PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO

bringing their takings claim in federal court in the first 

instance.

B.

The City nevertheless maintains that Plaintiffs’ takings 

claim is unripe under the first Williamson County 

requirement, which prohibits a plaintiff from filing suit 

“until the government entity charged with implementing the 

regulations has reached a final decision regarding the 

application of the regulations to the property at issue.” 473 

U.S. at 186. Knick left this finality requirement untouched, 

so that aspect of Williamson County remains good law. 

Knick, 139 S. Ct. at 2169 (“Knick does not question the 

validity of this finality requirement, which is not at issue 

here.”); see also id. at 2174 (noting that Williamson County 

“could have been resolved solely on the . . . ground that no 

taking had occurred because the zoning board had not yet 

come to a final decision”); Campbell v. United States, 932 

F.3d 1331, 1340 & n.5 (Fed. Cir. 2019) (recognizing that the 

finality requirement “remains good law under Knick”). 

Plaintiffs do not contend otherwise; they instead argue that 

they satisfied the finality requirement. We agree with the 

City, however, that Plaintiffs’ takings claim remains unripe 

because they never obtained a final decision regarding the 

application of the Lifetime Lease Requirement to their Unit.

1.

Williamson County illuminates the rationale for and 

scope of the finality requirement. There, a county planning 

commission disapproved a landowner’s proposed plat for 

developing a tract of land after determining that the plat 

violated various zoning regulations. 473 U.S. at 181. Local 

government entities “had the power to grant certain 

variances” from the zoning regulations that would have 

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PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO 13

resolved many of the commission’s objections to the plat. 

Id. at 188. Yet the landowner did not seek such variances. 

Id. Instead, the landowner brought suit in federal court 

alleging that the commission’s application of the zoning 

regulations amounted to a taking of the property. Id. at 182. 

The Supreme Court held that the takings claim was not ripe 

in part because factors central to determining whether a 

regulatory taking occurred—such as “the economic impact 

of the challenged action and the extent to which it interferes 

with reasonable investment-backed expectations”—“simply 

cannot be evaluated until the administrative agency has 

arrived at a final, definitive position regarding how it will 

apply the regulations at issue to the particular land in 

question.” Id. at 191. Williamson County thus made clear 

that the finality requirement “is compelled by the very nature 

of the inquiry” required in a takings case. Id. at 190.

The Court has further emphasized that the finality 

requirement “responds to the high degree of discretion 

characteristically possessed by land-use boards” in granting 

variances from their general regulations with respect to 

individual properties. Suitum v. Tahoe Reg’l Planning 

Agency, 520 U.S. 725, 738 (1997). In light of “such 

flexibility or discretion,” courts cannot make “a sound 

judgment about what use will be allowed” by local land-use 

authorities merely by asking whether a development 

proposal “facially conform[s] to the terms of the general use 

regulations.” Id. at 738–39; see also MacDonald, Sommer 

& Frates v. Yolo County, 477 U.S. 340, 348 (1986) 

(explaining that “[a] court cannot determine whether a 

regulation has gone ‘too far’ until it knows how far the 

regulation goes,” which requires “a final and authoritative 

determination” of how the regulation will be applied to the 

property in question). And “[b]y requiring [a plaintiff] to 

seek recourse at the local level” before bringing a federal 

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14 PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO

takings claim, the finality requirement “enable[s] us to 

respect principles of federalism which counsel in favor of 

resolving land use disputes locally.” Guatay Christian 

Fellowship v. County of San Diego, 670 F.3d 957, 979 (9th 

Cir. 2011).

Accordingly, under Williamson County, “a final decision 

exists when (1) a decision has been made ‘about how a 

plaintiff’s own land may be used’ and (2) the local land-use 

board has exercised its judgment regarding a particular use 

of a specific parcel of land, eliminating the possibility that it 

may ‘soften[] the strictures of the general regulations [it] 

administer[s].’” Adam Bros. Farming, Inc. v. County of 

Santa Barbara, 604 F.3d 1142, 1147 (9th Cir. 2010) 

(alterations in original) (quoting Suitum, 520 U.S. at 738–

39). This rule means that a plaintiff must “meaningful[ly]” 

request and be denied a variance from the challenged 

regulation before bringing a regulatory takings claim. S. 

Pac. Transp. Co., 922 F.2d at 503. But “[t]he term 

‘variance’ is not definitive or talismanic; if other types of 

permits or actions are available and could provide similar 

relief, they must be sought.” Id.; see also, e.g., McMillan v. 

Goleta Water Dist., 792 F.2d 1453, 1455, 1457 (9th Cir. 

1986) (holding that a takings claim became ripe when the 

plaintiffs’ request for an exemption from a moratorium on 

new water connections was denied by the water district). 

Plaintiffs who “have foregone an opportunity to bring their 

proposal” to use their property in a manner that diverges

from the regulation alleged to effect a taking “before a 

decisionmaking body with broad authority to grant different 

forms of relief” therefore “cannot claim to have obtained a 

‘final’ decision.” S. Pac. Transp. Co., 922 F.2d at 503.

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PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO 15

2.

The San Francisco Department of Public Works is a 

decisionmaking body with broad authority over 

condominium conversions in the City, including discretion 

to grant relief from conversion requirements. See S.F. 

Subdivision Code § 1312(a) (vesting discretion in the 

Director of Public Works to “authorize exceptions to any of 

the substantive requirements set forth in [the Subdivision] 

Code and in the Subdivision Regulations” upon “application 

by the subdivider”); Cal. Gov’t Code § 66473.5. Plaintiffs, 

however, did not ask the Department for an exemption from 

the Lifetime Lease Requirement during the ECP approval 

process, even though they concededly had opportunities to 

do so.

Plaintiffs could have sought an exemption at or leading 

up to the January 7, 2016 public hearing held on their 

conversion application. Before that hearing, as required by 

local and state law, Plaintiffs and their Building co-owners 

submitted a tentative conversion map for the City’s 

approval. See S.F. Subdivision Code § 1303(c); Cal. Gov’t 

Code § 66473.5. The tentative conversion map included a 

promise to extend lifetime leases to existing tenants, without 

noting any objection from Plaintiffs to that condition of 

conversion.

The City notified Plaintiffs and the public that in the 

twenty days before the Department’s proposed decision on 

the tentative map, any interested party could raise objections. 

See S.F. Subdivision Code § 1396.4(c)(2) (providing that 

“any interested party may file a written objection to [a 

conversion] application” before the Department rules on a 

tentative map); Cal. Gov’t Code § 65009(b)(1) (providing 

that interested parties may challenge a map application at 

“the public hearing or in written correspondence delivered 

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16 PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO

to the public agency prior to, or at, the public hearing”). 

Again, Plaintiffs did not object to the requirement that their 

proposed plan include an offer of a lifetime lease.

It appears that Plaintiffs could also have objected to the 

Lifetime Lease Requirement by appealing the Department’s 

approval of the tentative map. See S.F. Subdivision Code 

§ 1314(a) (“The proposed subdivider[] or any interested 

party may appeal to the Board [of Supervisors] from a final 

decision of the Director [of Public Works] approving, 

conditionally approving, or disapproving a Tentative 

Map.”). The notice of tentative approval sent to Plaintiffs 

informed them of their right to appeal, stating: “This 

notification letter is to inform you of your right to appeal this 

tentative approval. IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO FILE AN 

APPEAL OF THE TENTATIVE APROVAL: You must do 

so in writing with the Clerk of the Board of Supervisors 

within ten (10) days of the date of this letter.” Plaintiffs, 

however, did not even attempt to appeal.

Plaintiffs do not dispute that they gave no indication of 

any reservations about the Lifetime Lease Requirement 

despite having had these opportunities to request an 

exemption. To the contrary, after allowing each objection 

period to lapse, they forged ahead with the conversion 

process and entered into a written agreement with the City 

to provide a lifetime lease to their tenant, in which they 

expressly waived their right to thereafter seek an exemption 

from the Lifetime Lease Requirement. Plaintiffs also 

applied for and received from the City a partial refund of the 

ECP application fee—a refund only available to property 

owners who offered lifetime leases to their tenants. See S.F. 

Subdivision Code § 1396.4(h). It was not until six months 

after Plaintiffs had obtained final approval of their 

conversion map, and seven months after they had committed 

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PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO 17

to offering a lifetime lease in exchange for the benefits of 

conversion, that they finally asked “the City not [to] require 

them to execute and record the lifetime lease.”

The dissent asserts that Plaintiffs’ belated attempts to 

request an exemption satisfied the finality requirement.5 

Dissent at 26. But by that point, Plaintiffs’ request was 

untimely and expressly waived. Takings plaintiffs cannot 

make an end run around the finality requirement by sitting 

on their hands until every applicable deadline has expired 

before lodging a token exemption request that they know the 

relevant agency can no longer grant. In Williamson County, 

the Supreme Court expressly rejected the landowner’s 

position that it could satisfy the finality requirement by 

5 We note that Plaintiffs themselves did not even advance this 

argument until their supplemental reply brief, where it was mentioned in 

passing in a footnote. In the same footnote, Plaintiffs suggested that any 

request for an exemption would have been futile because “the City had 

no discretion to waive the lifetime lease requirement.” They offered no 

argument or evidence to substantiate this assertion; they cited only 

section 1396.4(g) of the Ordinance, which says nothing about depriving 

the City of discretion to waive the Lifetime Lease Requirement. In light 

of the City’s open-ended solicitation of objections to the conversion 

application, we cannot assume that an exemption request would have 

been futile.

We have no examples before us of exemptions from the Lifetime 

Lease Requirement, but that does not mean exemptions would have been 

unavailable. Because Plaintiffs’ lawsuit halted the ECP for all tenantoccupied properties, the City has not had any opportunities to consider 

exemption requests. Moreover, given that the Lifetime Lease 

Requirement was animated by concerns of widespread displacement of 

tenants, it is possible that the City would have been more amenable to 

exemption requests from individual owners, like Plaintiffs, who were 

seeking to convert a single unit that they planned to move into 

themselves, than from landlords who sought to convert multiple 

properties.

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18 PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO

“request[ing] variances from the Commission . . . after the 

Commission approved the proposed plat,” which would 

have been too late under the commission’s regulations. 473 

U.S. at 190. That the commission would still theoretically 

have had the power to grant a variance after plat approval 

was apparently immaterial to the Court’s analysis. The 

Court explained that the landowner’s “refusal to follow the 

procedures for requesting a variance” was fatal to its 

contention that “the Commission’s disapproval of the 

preliminary plat was equivalent to a final decision that no 

variances would be granted.” Id.

Moreover, we have held in the analogous context of the 

then-binding state-litigation requirement that when a 

plaintiff missed deadlines or failed to comply with other 

requirements for ripening a federal takings claim, the claim 

must be dismissed. See Daniel v. County of Santa Barbara, 

288 F.3d 375, 381 (9th Cir. 2002) (“[T]he failure of [the 

plaintiffs] to seek just compensation meant that they never 

created ripe federal takings claims,” and such failure “cannot 

now be cured because the applicable state limitation periods 

have long since expired.”); see also Pascoag Reservoir & 

Dam, LLC v. Rhode Island, 337 F.3d 87, 96 (1st Cir. 2003) 

(“[A takings] claimant cannot be permitted to let the time for 

seeking a state remedy pass without doing anything to obtain 

it and then proceed in federal court on the basis that no state 

remedies are open.” (quoting Gamble v. Eau Claire County, 

5 F.3d 285, 286 (7th Cir. 1993))). Other courts of appeals 

have reached similar conclusions. See Liberty Mut. Ins. Co. 

v. Brown, 380 F.3d 793, 799 (5th Cir. 2004) (“By failing to 

utilize available state remedies for obtaining compensation, 

[the plaintiff] has prevented itself from meeting the second 

ripeness requirement of Williamson County. Further, 

because the three-year prescriptive period for an inverse 

condemnation action [under state law] has now expired, . . . 

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PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO 19

[the plaintiff] has permanently prevented the claim from ever 

ripening.”); Pascoag Reservoir, 337 F.3d at 94 (similar); 

Vandor, Inc. v. Militello, 301 F.3d 37, 39 (2d Cir. 2002) 

(similar); Gamble, 5 F.3d at 286 (similar); Harris v. Mo. 

Conservation Comm’n, 790 F.2d 678, 681 (8th Cir. 1986) 

(similar).

The rationale for such a rule was straightforward: If a 

plaintiff could have bypassed the (then-existing) statelitigation requirement and “obtain[ed] jurisdiction in the 

federal courts simply by waiting until the statute of 

limitation bars the state remedies,” the state-litigation 

requirement would have been meaningless. Pascoag 

Reservoir, 337 F.3d at 95 (quoting Harris, 790 F.2d at 681). 

This rationale applies with equal force to the finality 

requirement. Allowing a takings claim to proceed when a 

variance or exemption was not requested at the proper 

junctures would undermine the purposes of the finality 

requirement by eliminating local officials’ opportunities to 

exercise discretion and by presenting federal courts with illdefined controversies. See Guatay Christian Fellowship, 

670 F.3d at 977 (“[T]he final decision requirement . . . is the 

sole means by which a court can know precisely how the 

regulation at issue would finally be applied to the property” 

in question, and “accords with principles of federalism . . . 

by encouraging resolution of land use disputes at the local 

level.”); see also FERC v. Mississippi, 456 U.S. 742, 767 

n.30 (1982) (“[R]egulation of land use is perhaps the 

quintessential state activity.”). The dissent does not explain 

how the finality requirement can retain any force if a takings 

claim brought by a plaintiff who made no attempt to follow 

the prescribed procedures for obtaining a final decision can 

be considered ripe. By allowing property owners to bypass 

state and local governments’ processes for making land use 

decisions, the dissent’s approach would subvert principles of 

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20 PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO

comity and federalism. Williamson County prohibits us 

from going down that path. See 473 U.S. at 186–91.

Plaintiffs protest that requiring them to have sought an 

exemption through the prescribed procedures amounts to 

imposing an administrative exhaustion requirement in the 

guise of a finality requirement. It is true that, in general, 

“there is no requirement that a plaintiff exhaust 

administrative remedies before bringing a § 1983 action.” 

Williamson County, 473 U.S. at 192. But the Court in 

Williamson County nevertheless held that, in the takings 

context, a property owner’s failure to seek a variance 

through procedures made available by the local land-use 

authority meant that the authority had not reached a final 

decision. See id. at 193. The Court explained that the 

finality requirement would have been satisfied only by a 

“conclusive determination” by the local land-use authority 

“whether it would allow [the property owner] to develop the 

[parcel of land] in the manner [the owner] proposed.” Id. at 

193. Here, Plaintiffs never “proposed” that the City exempt 

them from the Lifetime Lease Requirement. They gave the 

City no inkling that they wanted an exemption, and therefore 

gave it no opportunity to exercise its “flexibility or 

discretion” to grant such an exemption. See Suitum, 520 

U.S. at 738. At bottom, Plaintiffs’ argument is that because 

they ignored the finality requirement for long enough, it no 

longer applies to them. As Williamson County made clear, 

that is not correct. 473 U.S. at 190 (“[I]n the face of [the 

property owner’s] refusal to follow the procedures for 

requesting a variance, . . . [the owner] hardly can maintain 

that the Commission’s disapproval of the preliminary plat 

was equivalent to a final decision that no variances would be 

granted.”).

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PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO 21

Instead of attempting to ripen their claim during the 

proper course, Plaintiffs knowingly waived their right to 

seek an exemption. We therefore affirm the dismissal of 

Plaintiffs’ takings claim as unripe.6

3.

Plaintiffs offer two further arguments in an attempt to 

save their takings claim from dismissal, neither of which is 

persuasive.

a.

Plaintiffs first argue that, even if their regulatory takings 

claim is unripe, their first cause of action—which alleges 

that the ECP effects a “private” taking because it benefits 

private individuals rather than the public—is exempt from 

the Williamson County ripeness requirements. We disagree.

6 The dissent contends that dismissing Plaintiffs’ takings claim on 

the ground that they have foregone their opportunity to ripen it “is a 

merits ruling rather than one about ripeness.” Dissent at 27. Certainly, 

the contingent nature of Plaintiffs’ interest in condominium conversion 

would tend to undermine their claim that the conversion effected a 

taking. See Bowers v. Whitman, 671 F.3d 905, 913 (9th Cir. 2012) 

(explaining that there is no taking “if the property interest [at issue] is 

contingent and uncertain or the receipt of the interest is . . . 

discretionary” (quotation marks omitted)). But as cases like Daniel and 

Pascoag Reservoir illustrate, the consequence of the failure to timely 

ripen a takings claim is that the claim must be dismissed before its merits 

can be evaluated. See Pascoag Reservoir, 337 F.3d at 96 (affirming 

dismissal of takings claim with prejudice because the plaintiff’s “failure 

to bring a timely suit for compensation under state law has led to the 

forfeiture of its federal taking claim.”); Daniel, 288 F.3d at 381 

(affirming dismissal of takings claim with prejudice because “the failure 

of [the plaintiffs] to seek just compensation meant that they never created 

ripe federal takings claims”).

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22 PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO

Even if some category of “private” takings claims could 

be exempt from the finality requirement, which is a question 

we need not decide,7 Plaintiffs’ characterization of their 

claim as a “private” takings claim is foreclosed by Rancho 

de Calistoga v. City of Calistoga, 800 F.3d 1083 (9th Cir. 

2015). In that case, a mobile home park (Rancho) alleged 

that the City of Calistoga’s mobile home rent-control 

ordinance, which limited the magnitude of annual rent 

increases, effected “an unconstitutional private taking 

because any purported ‘public use’ [was] pretextual.” Id. at 

1092. Rancho insisted that the “real purpose” behind the 

ordinance was to provide rent subsidies to mobile home 

tenants, which violated the Supreme Court’s admonishment 

in Kelo v. City of New London, 545 U.S. 469 (2005), that 

“the sovereign may not take the property of A for the sole 

purpose of transferring it to another private party B.” 

Rancho de Calistoga, 800 F.3d at 1092–93 (quoting Kelo, 

545 U.S. at 477). We explained, however, that, where no

physical seizure such as that in Kelo had occurred, a private 

takings claim alleging “public takings motivated by a 

‘private purpose’” was “simply a renaming of [a] regulatory 

takings claim.” Id. at 1092 (citation omitted). That is, 

Rancho’s argument was an attempt to “refram[e]” its 

challenge to an alleged regulatory taking as a private takings 

claim “through an attack on the stated purposes of the rentcontrol scheme.” Id. at 1092–93.

7 Plaintiffs cite only precedent holding that “a plaintiff alleging [a 

private] taking would not need to seek compensation in state proceedings 

before filing a federal takings claim” under the state-litigation 

requirement of Williamson County. Armendariz v. Penman, 75 F.3d 

1311, 1320 n.5 (9th Cir. 1996) (en banc), overruled in part on other 

grounds as recognized in Crown Point Dev., Inc. v. City of Sun Valley, 

506 F.3d 851 (9th Cir. 2007).

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PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO 23

Plaintiffs’ private takings theory fails for the same 

reason. Like Rancho, they allege that the Lifetime Lease 

Requirement is “intended to favor a particular private party 

with only incidental or pretextual public benefits.” Also like 

Rancho, Plaintiffs argue that “the City has taken their 

property for the sole purpose of benefiting another private 

party” in violation of Kelo. Where, as here, full possession 

of the property has not been seized, such a challenge is at 

bottom a regulatory takings claim subject to Williamson 

County’s finality requirement—which, as explained above, 

Plaintiffs cannot satisfy.

b.

As a last resort, Plaintiffs urge us to excuse them from 

the finality requirement in this instance as an exercise of our 

discretion. Because Williamson County’s ripeness 

requirements are prudential, not jurisdictional, we do have 

some discretion whether to impose them. See Guggenheim 

v. City of Goleta, 638 F.3d 1111, 1118 (9th Cir. 2010) (en 

banc). But none of the circumstances that prompted the 

exercise of discretion in the cases Plaintiffs rely on for this 

argument are present here.

First, there are no concerns in this case about different 

claims proceeding simultaneously in state and federal court, 

as in Town of Nags Head v. Toloczko, 728 F.3d 391 (4th Cir. 

2013).8

 See id. at 399. Second, the City here raised the 

ripeness issue at the first opportunity, in contrast to the 

defendant city in Yamagiwa v. City of Half Moon Bay, 523 

8 Plaintiffs’ non-takings claims will not generate piecemeal 

litigation. As discussed in the concurrently filed memorandum 

disposition, Plaintiffs’ unreasonable seizure, due process, and equal 

protection claims incurably fail as a matter of law on the merits and so 

were properly dismissed without leave to amend.

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24 PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO

F. Supp. 2d 1036 (N.D. Cal. 2007), which acted in bad faith 

by not asserting ripeness as a defense until more than two 

years into the case, following the completion of trial. See id. 

at 1108. Third, this case is unlike

Guggenheim, in which we opted not to impose the statelitigation requirement on the plaintiffs because we 

concluded that their takings claim failed on the merits, “so it 

would [have been] a waste of the parties’ and the courts’ 

resources to bounce the case through more rounds of 

litigation.” 638 F.3d at 1118. Plaintiffs here have urged us 

not to reach the merits of their takings claim in the first 

instance, because “the parties have [not had] an opportunity 

to develop a factual record that would allow this Court to 

properly analyze” the claim. The rationale of Guggenheim

thus has no applicability in this case.

In sum, none of the cases Plaintiffs use to argue that they 

should be excused from the finality requirement presented 

circumstances analogous to those here, and we see no reason 

to invent a new rationale for exercising such discretion.

IV.

For the foregoing reasons, we affirm the district court’s 

dismissal of Plaintiffs’ takings claim. 

AFFIRMED.

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PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO 25

BEA, Circuit Judge, dissenting:

The majority is correct about the state of the law on the 

“ripeness” of takings claims brought under 42 U.S.C. 

§ 1983, in the wake of Knick. It remains the case that a 

plaintiff may not bring suit for an unconstitutional regulatory 

taking until “the government entity charged with 

implementing the regulations has reached a final decision 

regarding the application of the regulations to the property 

at issue.” Williamson County Reg’l Planning Comm’n v. 

Hamilton Bank, 473 U.S. 172, 186 (1985); see Knick v. 

Township of Scott, Pa., 139 S. Ct. 2162, 2169 (2019). 

However, because the City here has indeed reached such a 

final decision, I would vacate the district court’s order 

dismissing the takings claim and remand the case for further 

proceedings.1

Williamson County’s “finality requirement is concerned 

with whether the initial decisionmaker has arrived at a 

definitive position on the issue that inflicts an actual, 

concrete injury,” not whether a request for “variances” 

followed the decisionmaker’s administrative procedures. 

Williamson County, 473 U.S. at 193. A takings claim is ripe 

if, at the moment a suit is filed, it is possible for the court to 

know “how far the regulation goes,” that is, whether and to 

what degree a regulation or ordinance will be enforced 

against the plaintiff. See Palazzolo v. Rhode Island, 533 

U.S. 606, 622 (2001) (citation omitted). If the record is clear 

that “no variances will be granted,” then the court knows the 

scope of the regulation, it will be enforced as written, and the 

claim is ripe. Williamson County, 473 U.S. at 191. Requiring 

1 I concur in the memorandum disposition filed concurrently that 

affirms the district court’s dismissal of the Plaintiffs’ other constitutional 

claims.

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26 PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO

plaintiffs to adhere to specific administrative procedures for 

requesting “variances” from a regulation, rather than simply 

evaluating whether a decision about the application of a 

regulation is final, is not mandated by Williamson County

and risks “establish[ing] an exhaustion requirement for 

§ 1983 takings claims,” something the law does not allow. 

See Knick, 139 S. Ct. at 2173; see also McGuire v. United 

States, 550 F.3d 903, 909–10 (9th Cir. 2008).

The majority’s description of the Plaintiffs as never 

having “obtained a final decision regarding the application 

of the Lifetime Lease Requirement to their Unit,” is belied 

by the facts. Majority Op. at 12. On June 9 and 13, 2017, the 

Plaintiffs specifically requested that the City excuse them 

from executing and recording a lifetime lease to their Unit. 

The City refused these requests on June 12 and 13, 2017. At 

least by June 13, 2017, the City’s position was final. The 

Plaintiffs were required to execute and record the lifetime

lease; there would be no variance. The majority correctly 

notes that the Plaintiffs made their requests to the City after 

several notable events had occurred: (1) they had missed the 

official window for appealing the tentative approval of their 

subdivision map; (2) they had entered into a contract with 

the City to offer the tenant a lifetime lease; (3) they had 

offered the lifetime lease to the tenant; (4) they had received 

a refund of $8,000 from the City in exchange for offering the 

tenant a lifetime lease; and (5) they had their final 

subdivision map approved. But none of this bears on the 

question whether the City had reached a final decision that 

required the Plaintiffs to comply with the lifetime lease 

requirement.2 The City’s rejections of the Plaintiffs’ belated 

2 This is not to say that these are irrelevant considerations in 

evaluating the merits of the Plaintiffs’ claims. But the limited question 

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PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO 27

requests were clear and final. Accordingly, the Plaintiffs’ 

claim was ripe.

The majority dismisses the City’s rejection of the 

Plaintiffs’ requests to be excused from the lifetime lease 

requirement and the unavoidable conclusion that this was a 

final decision by the City, because the majority finds the 

Plaintiffs’ requests were “untimely and expressly waived.” 

Majority Op. at 17. But such a holding is a merits ruling, 

rather than one about ripeness. The proper venue for 

evaluating, in the first instance, whether the Plaintiffs’ claim 

may be defeated by waiver, equitable estoppel, or any other 

defense is in the district court on remand. Cf. Dodd v. Hood 

River County, 59 F.3d 852, 863 (9th Cir. 1995) (reversing 

the district court’s holding that a takings claim was not ripe 

but remanding to consider whether the defense of collateral 

estoppel applied).

The majority supports its conclusion that the Plaintiffs 

lost their ability to ripen their claim because they did not 

follow the City’s administrative procedures and object 

earlier in the process, by citing to cases that applied the nowdefunct state-litigation requirement from Williamson 

County.

3 See Majority Op. at 18–19. Though Williamson 

here is whether the merits of the claims were ripe for review in the district 

court.

3 The only Ninth Circuit case the majority references for this holding 

is Daniel v. County of Santa Barbara, 288 F.3d 375, 381 (9th Cir. 2002), 

which it cites for the proposition that if “a plaintiff missed deadlines or 

failed to comply with other requirements for ripening the claim, the 

claim must be dismissed.” Majority Op. at 18. The majority is 

overreading the case. Daniel, beyond being about the Williamson County

state-litigation requirement and not the finality requirement, did not 

involve generic “missed deadlines”; it involved the failure of plaintiffs

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28 PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO

County mentioned the failure of the plaintiff to comply with 

regulations for requesting variances, see 473 U.S. at 190, it 

did so in a context where, unlike here, the plaintiff had 

requested no variance, or other relief, whatsoever. The 

majority has no direct authority for its holding that a request 

for a variance or exemption to a land-use ordinance, made 

and denied after the administrative deadline for filing 

objections, cannot satisfy Williamson County’s requirement 

that “the administrative agency has arrived at a final, 

to commence an action for compensation within the applicable state 

statute of limitations. The difference is significant. Before Knick, failure 

to seek compensation through state proceedings for an alleged taking of 

property not only deprived a plaintiff of potential payment, it also meant 

that no cognizable constitutional violation had occurred. This was 

because a taking was not without just compensation, and thus the Fifth 

Amendment was not violated, until the state had denied a request to 

compensate a plaintiff for property taken. See Williamson County, 473 

U.S. at 194–95, overruled Knick, 139 S. Ct. at 2172. Therefore, a failure 

to file a claim for compensation within the state limitations period was 

conclusive that there was no cognizable constitutional violation.

But even after Knick, a failure to file a takings claim in the district 

court within the timeframe of the state’s statute of limitations bars relief, 

since claims brought under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 are subject to a state’s 

statute of limitations for personal injury claims. See Wilson v. Garcia, 

471 U.S. 261, 276 (1985). Seeking a variance from a land-use restriction 

beyond the deadline outlined in a city regulation or ordinance does not

have the same consequence. Statutes of limitations, unlike local land-use 

ordinances, are not “subject to the decision[s] of a regulatory body 

invested with great discretion,” to issue waivers or exemptions. Suitum 

v. Tahoe Reg’l Planning Agency, 520 U.S. 725, 739 (1997). The only 

hope for a plaintiff who fails to commence an action within the period of 

the state’s statute of limitations is that a future state legislative act will 

amend the statute and extend the limitations period. Whereas a plaintiff 

seeking a variance from a land-use ordinance after the deadline may 

petition a local board, possessed with great discretion, simply to consider 

his untimely request and grant him relief.

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PAKDEL V. CITY & CTY. OF SAN FRANCISCO 29

definitive position regarding how it will apply the 

regulations at issue to the particular land in question.” Id. at 

191.

Moreover, the very City ordinance that allows the 

majority to assume that any request to be excused from the 

lifetime lease requirement may not have been futile, despite 

all practical indications to the contrary, allows the Director 

of Public Works to “authorize exceptions to any of the 

substantive requirements” in the City Subdivision Code or 

regulations. See S.F. Subdivision Code § 1312(a) (emphasis 

added). Surely the same discretion that would have allowed 

the Director to excuse the Plaintiffs from the lifetime lease 

requirement would have also allowed the Director to treat 

the Plaintiffs’ waiver requests as timely. At worst, it seems 

the Plaintiffs missed a deadline imposed by an ordinance that 

the City, through the Director of Public Works, had broad 

authority to waive. The City denied these requests for 

variances when they were made and has confirmed in the 

proceedings before us that there is nothing more that the 

Plaintiffs may now do to be excused from the lifetime lease 

requirement. By any common understanding of the word, the 

City’s decision is final.

In sum, the Plaintiffs twice requested to be excused from 

the lifetime lease requirement. The City denied these 

requests in a final decision, and the Plaintiffs’ takings claim 

is ripe for adjudication. The majority ignores the Plaintiffs’ 

requests for variances from the lifetime lease requirement 

because of when they were made, and elevates adherence to 

administrative procedure above the question of whether the 

City has reached a final decision. Because of this error in the 

majority’s opinion, I respectfully dissent.

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