IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT

No. 16-30025

M. C. MOORE. as father and next friend to minors Joyce Marie Moore, Jerry 

Moore, and Thelma Louise Moore,

 Plaintiff 

v.

TANGIPAHOA PARISH SCHOOL BOARD, a corporation, 

 Defendant - Appellant

v.

DONALD C. MASSEY, Court Appointed Compliance Officer, Tangipahoa 

Parish School Board, 

 Movant - Appellee

Appeal from the United States District Court 

for the Eastern District of Louisiana

Before STEWART, Chief Judge, and SMITH and DENNIS, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM:

In this decades-old school desegregation case, Defendant Tangipahoa 

Parish School Board (the Board) appeals the district court’s order doubling the 

compensation of Donald Massey, the part-time Court Compliance Officer 

(CCO) tasked with monitoring the integration efforts of the Tangipahoa Parish 

United States Court of Appeals

Fifth Circuit

FILED

December 6, 2016

Lyle W. Cayce

Clerk

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School System. Massey, in addition to arguing that we should affirm on the 

merits, has also moved to dismiss the appeal alleging that we lack jurisdiction. 

We conclude that we have jurisdiction and affirm.

I

This desegregation case was filed in 1965. In 1967, the district court 

entered a comprehensive order establishing certain student assignment and 

facilities requirements aimed at assisting the school district in achieving 

unitary school system status. Since then the district court has exercised its 

jurisdiction over this matter and has issued numerous additional orders aimed 

at reaching this goal. As relevant here, in 2008, the district court created the 

current CCO position, a part-time monitor tasked with ensuring that the 

parties comply with the court’s orders. As set forth by the district court, the 

CCO 

shall review and assure that the school district implements the 

provisions of this Order, collaboratively work with and provide 

assistance to the Chief Desegregation Implementation Officer, 

offer suggestions to the school district as to possible methods or 

procedures which might be implemented to further enhance 

desegregation aims, and prepare an annual report to the parties 

and the court as to the progress of the school district’s 

implementation of each of the provisions of this Order.

The district court appointed Massey to this position in August 2014; at the time 

the position’s monthly salary was $4,000.

In 2015, Massey asked the Board for a raise but the Board denied his 

request. Massey then filed a motion with the district court seeking 

compensation at an hourly rate. The Board and the plaintiffs jointly opposed 

the motion. The district court granted the motion, but rather than imposing 

an hourly rate as Massey had requested, the court increased his monthly 

salary to $8,000 per month. The Board appealed.

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II

We must first address whether we have jurisdiction to hear this appeal. 

The Board argues that jurisdiction lies pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1292(a)(1) or 

alternatively under the collateral order doctrine. Because we conclude that we 

have jurisdiction under § 1292(a)(1), we decline to consider whether we would 

also have jurisdiction under the collateral order doctrine.

Typically, appellate jurisdiction is limited to “final decisions of the 

district courts.” 28 U.S.C. § 1291. That is, decisions “by which a district court 

disassociates itself from a case.” Swint v. Chambers County Comm’n, 514 U.S. 

35, 42 (1995). But under 28 U.S.C. § 1292(a)(1), we also have jurisdiction over

appeals from “[i]nterlocutory orders of the district courts . . . granting, 

continuing, modifying, refusing or dissolving injunctions.” “A district court 

‘grant[s]’ an injunction when an action it takes is ‘directed to a party, 

enforceable by contempt, and designed to accord or protect some or all of the 

substantive relief sought in the complaint in more than a temporary fashion.’”

In re Deepwater Horizon, 793 F.3d 479, 491 (5th Cir. 2015) (quoting Police Ass’n

of New Orleans Through Cannatella v. City of New Orleans, 100 F.3d 1159, 

1166 (5th Cir. 1996)) (alteration in original); see also Integrity Collision Ctr. v. 

City of Fulshear, 837 F.3d 581, 586 (5th Cir. 2016) (order directing city to 

including towing company on the non-consent tow list was an injunction 

subject to enforcement by the district court and thus appealable under Section 

1292(a)(1)). “A district court ‘modif[ies]’ an injunction when it ‘changes the 

obligations imposed by the injunction.’” In re Deepwater Horizon, 793 F.3d at 

491 (quoting CHARLES A. WRIGHT & ARTHUR R. MILLER, FEDERAL PRACTICE 

AND PROCEDURE § 3924.2 (3d ed. 2014)) (alteration in original). “This court 

takes a practical view of what constitutes a modification, ‘look[ing] beyond the 

terms used by the parties and the district court to the substance of the action.’” 

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Id. (quoting In re Seabulk Offshore Ltd., 158 F.3d 897, 899 (5th Cir. 1998))

(alteration in original). 

In the school desegregation context, the courts of appeals routinely 

exercise appellate jurisdiction under § 1292(a)(1) over orders like the one at 

issue in this case. “[E]quitable decrees that impose a continuing supervisory

function on the court commonly . . . contemplate the subsequent issuance of 

specific implementing injunctions” and “[e]ach such injunction is appealable 

regardless of finality.” People Who Care v. Rockford Bd. of Educ., Sch. Dist.

No. 205, 171 F.3d 1083, 1086 (7th Cir. 1999). In People Who Care, a case 

challenging a budget order entered by a magistrate judge for the purpose of 

funding school integration, the Seventh Circuit observed that the initial 

desegregation decree was essentially “an injunction generator” allowing the 

district court to exercise its ongoing supervisory function to ensure the school 

district achieved and maintained unitary status. Id. This is analogous to 

what is happening in this case. The initial decree issued by the district court 

in 1967 was “an injunction generator,” and the district court’s order that the 

Board increase Massey’s salary is a subsequent injunction that flows directly

from that original order, and is thus “appealable regardless of finality.” See id. 

We thus conclude that this court has jurisdiction.1

 

1 We note that there is tension among our precedents interpreting and applying 

§ 1292(a)(1). Although this court takes a “practical view” as to what constitutes a 

modification of an injunction, we have also said that when an order is not expressly an 

injunction or a modification of an injunction but has the “practical effect” thereof, the order 

must have “serious, potentially irreparable consequences” in order for jurisdiction to lie. See, 

e.g., Sherri A.D. v. Kirby, 975 F.2d 193, 203 & n.14 (5th Cir. 1992) (“orders which explicitly 

grant or deny injunctive relief are immediately appealable as of right,” but “orders 

which . . . have the practical effect of denying an injunction, but do not do so in explicit terms, 

are immediately appealable if the order threatens ‘serious, perhaps irreparable 

consequences’ and can be effectively challenged only by an immediate appeal”). Deepwater 

Horizon, however, suggests that an appellant must always show “serious, perhaps 

irreparable consequences” to confer jurisdiction under § 1292(a). 793 F.3d at 492. But see 

Brumfield v. La. State Bd. of Educ., 806 F.3d 289, 297 (5th Cir. 2015) (interpreting an order 

as an injunction even though it did not explicitly state it was for injunctive relief, but not 

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III

With respect to the merits, the Board argues that the district court 

abused its discretion by increasing Massey’s salary from $4,000 per month to 

$8,000 per month. The Board also argues that the district court erred in 

referring to the CCO position as a “special master” under Federal Rule of Civil 

Procedure 53 and that even if it did not err in that regard, the district court 

based its decision on unreliable and irrelevant information.

We review the district court’s determination of Massey’s salary for an 

abuse of discretion. See Samnorwood Indep. Sch. Dist. v. Tex. Educ. Agency, 

533 F.3d 258, 267 (5th Cir. 2008) (citing Swann v. Charlotte–Mecklenburg Bd.

of Educ., 402 U.S. 1 (1971)). “A district court abuses its discretion if it bases 

its decision on an erroneous view of the law or on a clearly erroneous 

assessment of the evidence.” United States v. Texas, 601 F.3d 354, 362 (5th 

Cir. 2010) (quoting Ross v. Marshall, 426 F.3d 745, 763 (5th Cir. 2005))

(internal quotation marks omitted).

The fact that the district court referred to Massey as a special master is 

a distinction without a difference. Although the CCO position was created 

pursuant to the court’s inherent authority in fashioning equitable remedies, 

see Ex parte Peterson, 253 U.S. 300, 312 (1920), the Board points to no authority 

to support its argument that the court’s inherent power differs in any 

meaningful way from its authority pursuant to Rule 53 to appoint special 

masters, see Ruiz v. Estelle, 679 F.2d 1115, 1161 n.240 (5th Cir. 1982) (“Beyond 

the provisions of [Rule 53] for appointing and making references to Masters, a 

Federal District Court has the inherent power to supply itself with this 

instrument for the administration of justice when deemed by it essential.” 

 

discussing the consequences before determining that the court had jurisdiction). Because 

jurisdiction would be proper under any of these interpretations of § 1292(a)(1), we decline to 

resolve these tensions.

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(quoting Schwimmer v. United States, 232 F.2d 855, 865 (8th Cir. 1956))

(internal quotation marks and citations omitted)), amended in part, vacated in 

part, 688 F.2d 266 (5th Cir. 1982). Therefore, the district court’s 

characterization of Massey as a special master was not an abuse of discretion.

Nor did the district court abuse its discretion by relying on Rule 53 in 

calculating the increase in Massey’s salary. Under Rule 53(g)(1), “the court 

may set a new basis and terms [for the master’s compensation] after giving 

notice and opportunity to be heard.” The fixing of fees and costs for a special 

master rests within the court’s discretion. Gary W. v. State of La., 601 F.2d 

240, 245 (5th Cir. 1979). After giving both sides an opportunity to brief this 

issue, the district court issued its order raising Massey’s salary.

The district court applied the “Hart formula,” derived from Hart v. 

Community School Board of Brooklyn, New York School District. No. 21, 383 

F. Supp. 699 (E.D.N.Y. 1974), in determining Massey’s compensation. In Hart,

the court concluded that “a reasonable fee would be based upon about half that 

obtainable by private attorneys in commercial matters.” Id. at 767; see also

United States v. Yonkers Bd. of Educ., 108 F.R.D. 199, 202 (S.D.N.Y. 1985) 

(noting that courts have emphasized the public nature of such work in setting 

reasonable fees well below those charged in commercial legal matters). 

Applying this as a baseline, the court determined that $140 per hour was an 

appropriate hourly rate for the CCO position. The court then multiplied this 

number by the average number of hours that Massey worked per month as 

CCO.

The Board does not dispute that the hourly rate the court calculated was 

reasonable; rather the Board argues that the district court erred in accepting 

that Massey worked seventy hours per month on average in performing his 

duties as a CCO. First, the Board argues that the district court erred in relying 

on a summary that Massey provided in calculating his salary. The Board 

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argues that this summary only included the total number of hours worked and 

descriptions of the tasks performed, but was not itemized and did not include 

time entries. The Board offers no authority, nor have we found any, that 

supports its argument that Massey was required to extensively document his 

activities, or that he had to provide specific documentation in order to receive 

a salary increase. We therefore conclude the court did not abuse its discretion 

in relying on the information that Massey provided in calculating his salary.

Second, the Board argues that the district court improperly credited 

Massey with time spent working as a CCO when many of the tasks that Massey 

reported to have performed were outside the scope of his duties and 

responsibilities as a CCO. Such reported activities included organizing and 

moderating “community meetings” to discuss bullying and forming a blue 

ribbon panel to discuss issues concerning “at-risk kids” in the school district. 

The Board argues that these issues are beyond the scope of the district court’s 

desegregation orders and therefore the district court should not have counted

those activities when calculating Massey’s compensation as CCO. 

We cannot say that the district court’s decision was an abuse of 

discretion. School integration is an enormously complex enterprise that 

requires consideration of an enormous number of factors. Cf. Swann, 402 U.S. 

at 27 n.10 (“There is no universal answer to complex problems of 

desegregation; there is obviously no one plan that will do the job in every 

case.”). Efforts to achieve unitary status are bound to have a far reaching 

impact and unpredictable consequences across the school district. In this case,

the district court has issued orders related to student discipline and special 

education programs. The Board’s interpretation of the CCO’s role in 

overseeing the district’s integration efforts is far too narrow. The CCO’s 

responsibilities—which include “offer[ing] suggestions to the school district as 

to possible methods or procedures which might be implemented to further 

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enhance desegregation aims”—are broadly defined and therefore it is 

reasonable to allow him some flexibility in how he carries out his duties. The 

district court has exercised its oversight over this case for many years and is 

well-versed with regard to the details and progress of the integration efforts 

and the role that the CCO plays. We therefore find that the district court did 

not abuse its discretion when it took Massey’s reported activities into 

consideration when it calculated his new salary. 

IV

For the foregoing reasons, the district court’s decision is AFFIRMED.

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