Opinion ID: 1965367
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: indispensable party issue

Text: Given HUD's role in this particular landlord-tenant relationship under its HAP contract with the landlord, the first question is whether HUD (or, more accurately, the United States) is an indispensable party under Super.Ct.Civ.R. 19(a)a threshold jurisdictional issue raised by Multi-Family for the first time on appeal: [8] Rule 19(a) provides: (a) Persons to be joined if feasible. A person who is subject to service of process and whose joinder will not deprive the Court of jurisdiction over the subject matter of the action shall be joined as a party in the action if (1) in the person's absence complete relief cannot be accorded among those already parties, or (2) the person claims an interest relating to the subject of the action and is so situated that the disposition of the action in the person's absence may (i) as a practical matter impair or impede the person's ability to protect that interest or (ii) leave any of the persons already parties subject to a substantial risk of incurring double, multiple, or otherwise inconsistent obligations by reason of the claimed interest. If the person has not been so joined, the Court shall order that the person be made a party. If the person should join as a plaintiff but refuses to do so, the person may be made a defendant, or, in a proper case, an involuntary plaintiff.... See Flack v. Laster, 417 A.2d 393, 399-400 (D.C.1980) (noting that if indispensable party cannot be joined under Rule 19(a), action must be dismissed). No one claims that HUD's joinder is required to afford complete relief as between landlord and tenant. Super.Ct.Civ.R. 19(a)(1). The Rule 19 issue begins with Super.Ct.Civ.R. 19(a)(2) and initially concerns HUD, which certainly has an interest relating to the subject of the action, id., namely a potential claim against the landlord for an abatement of HUD's financial contribution for the tenant's apartment. Putting aside the question whether HUD actually claims that interest within the meaning of Rule 19(a)(2), [9] we note, first, that HUD's absence from this lawsuit will not impair or impede, Super.Ct.Civ.R. 19(a)(2)(i), HUD's ability to protect its interest. HUD can enforce its own rights against the landlord under the HAP contract, see supra note 1, and no judgment in this case, to which HUD is not a party, can have a preclusive effect on those contract rights. See generally Smith v. Jenkins, 562 A.2d 610, 617 (D.C.1989); Rhema Christian Ctr. v. Board of Zoning Adjustment, 515 A.2d 189, 192-93 (D.C.1986); Henderson v. Snider Bros., 439 A.2d 481, 484-85 (D.C.1981) (en banc); RESTATEMENT, (SECOND), JUDGMENTS § 34(3) (1982). There is, finally, the question under Super.Ct.Civ.R. 19(a)(2)(ii) of the impact on the landlord: [10] whether HUD's absence from the lawsuit will leave Multi-Family subject to a substantial risk of incurring double, multiple, or otherwise inconsistent obligations by reason of [HUD's] claimed interest. The answer is no. Focusing first on potentially inconsistent obligations, id., amicus points out in its brief, and we agree, that the D.C. Housing Code standards imposed on the landlord do not conflict with the federal housing standards imposed by HUD on properties receiving project-based Section 8 assistance. Compare 24 C.F.R. § 886.113 (housing quality standards) with 14 DCMR §§ 400.1-899.1 (housing code). Absent such a conflict, therefore, the landlord will be subject to both federal and local law; in this context there is no federal preemption. See Cruz Management Co., 633 N.E.2d at 389-90; Housing Auth. of Newark v. Scott, 137 N.J.Super. 110, 348 A.2d 195, 198 (App.Div. 1975). This means that the tenant and HUD can litigate separately to enforce District of Columbia and federal housing standards, respectively. See Cruz Management Co., 633 N.E.2d at 389-90. But, of critical significance here, dual lawsuits would not subject the landlord to inconsistent obligations to provide decent, safe, and sanitary housing; both the tenant and HUD would cite essentially the same housing code requirements. See id.; compare 24 C.F.R. § 886.113 with 14 DCMR §§ 400.1-899.1. The next concern is whether the landlord confronts a  substantial risk of incurring double ... obligations to the tenant and to HUD for housing code violations. Super.Ct.Civ.R. 19(a)(2)(ii) (emphasis added). Of major significance is the fact that HUD cannot seek a rent abatement from the project owner-landlord without first giving the owner notice of, and an opportunity to cure, the alleged code violations. See 24 C.F.R. § 886.123(a) & (d); HAP contract, supra note 1, § 26b; Cruz Management Co., 633 N.E.2d at 389. Both in a memorandum to the trial court and in its post-argument brief in this court, see supra note 2, the tenant represented that HUD has never notified the landlord about the need for corrective action, and neither the landlord nor HUD (as amicus ) has claimed otherwise, despite unquestioned opportunity to do so. Furthermore, no one claims that, at this late date, HUD could piggyback on the notice Multi-Family has received from the tenant in this litigationespecially because the tenant's notice in the form of a defense and counterclaim in the eviction action did not give the landlord an opportunity to cure. See 24 C.F.R. § 886.123(d). Without expressly ruling on the rights of HUD (who is not a party) under the contract, I can say, nonetheless, from this notice analysis that Multi-Family, the landlord here, does not face a substantial risk of a double obligation for rent abatements payable to the tenant and to HUD, even if we were to rule that the tenant is entitled to 100% of the abatements the trial court ordered ($4,218.35). See supra note 4. I reach this conclusion without having to rely on the proposition that the landlord could implead HUD during the abatement phase of the eviction proceeding if worried about a double recovery. We recognize, as amicus points out, that sovereign immunity might inhibit such an effort if HUD were to resist joinder. It is important to note, however, that Multi-Familywhich is the only party claiming on appeal that HUD is an indispensable partynever sought to join HUD at trial. Therefore, but for the untested possibility that HUD might have resisted joinder, Multi-Family has no excuse for raising the double recovery issue for the first time on appeal. It arguably follows that, insofar as the landlord's interest is at issue under Rule 19(a)(2)(ii), that interest has been waived. As the Supreme Court noted in elaborating on Federal Rule 19: [T]he defendant may properly wish to avoid multiple litigation, or inconsistent relief, or sole responsibility for a liability he [or she] shares with another. After trial, however, if the defendant has failed to assert this interest, it is quite proper to consider it foreclosed. Provident Tradesmens Bank & Trust Co. v. Patterson, 390 U.S. 102, 110, 88 S.Ct. 733, 738, 19 L.Ed.2d 936 (1968) (emphasis added). The landlord cannot effectively argue against a Rule 19(a)(2)(ii) waiver on the ground that there was no reason to believe a court would order 100% of the abatements paid to the tenant, and thus that there was no reason to try to implead HUD to avoid the possibility of a later suit leading to double recoveryby the tenant and by HUD of the abatements allocable to HUD's subsidy. As elaborated below, the landlordas Multi-Family itself contendshad every reason to be concerned that the trial court might not properly award a portion of the abatements to HUD, a non-party to the litigation. Consequently, the landlord also had reason to know that, as between tenant and landlord, with HUD out of the picture, there were sound arguments for awarding 100% of the abatements to the tenant, rather than permitting the landlord to retain all of HUD's paymentsallocable in part to unsafe or unsanitary premisesthat unquestionably would be refundable as rent abatements to the tenant if the housing were not subsidized by a third party. [11] In sum, neither HUD's nor the landlord's interests will be adversely affected in a way that makes HUD an indispensable party under Rule 19(a). Having considered all relevant elements of the Rule, I conclude that this action properly went forward without HUD (the United States).