Opinion ID: 3153870
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Timeliness of D.G.’s Action

Text: If § 1415(i)(2)(B) does not apply, what limitations period does? If the cause of action for attorneys’ fees was created after December 1, 1990, the answer would be four years. See 28 U.S.C. § 1658(a) (creating default limitations period for new federal causes of action); Jones v. R.R. Donnelley & Sons Co., 541 U.S. 369, 380–82 (2004) (explaining the scope of § 1658(a)). But as noted above, “[t]he cause of action for attorney’s fees [under the IDEA] was first created in 1986.” City of Northampton, 60 F. Supp. 3d at 269. For older causes of action with no express limitations period, “[i]t is the usual rule that . 7 See, e.g., Scokin v. Texas, 723 F.2d 432, 436–38 (5th Cir. 1984) (borrowing two-year state limitations period in action under the IDEA’s predecessor); Adler v. Educ. Dep’t, 760 F.2d 454, 456–60 (2d Cir. 1985) (similar); see also Hickey v. Irving Indep. Sch. Dist., 976 F.2d 980, 982–84 (5th Cir. 1992) (adopting Texas statute of limitations for personal injury claims under the Rehabilitation Act); Levy v. Kan. Dep’t of Soc. & Rehab. Servs., 789 F.3d 1164, 1169, 1171–74 (10th Cir. 2015) (noting that the Rehabilitation Act’s sovereign immunity waiver provision was enacted pursuant to the Spending Clause and borrowing two-year, personal injury state limitations period for claims under that statute). 8 See Buckhannon Board & Care Home, Inc. v. West Virginia Department of Health & Human Services, 532 U.S. 598, 609–10 (2001) (rejecting the “catalyst theory” for awarding attorneys’ fees under civil rights statutes, and holding that “prevailing party” status requires some judicial imprimatur); Hensley v. Eckerhart, 461 U.S. 424, 433–37 (1983) (outlining standards for determining reasonable attorneys’ fees). 13 Case: 15-20079 Document: 00513266158 Page: 14 Date Filed: 11/10/2015 No. 15-20079 . . a court ‘borrows’ or ‘absorbs’ the local time limitation most analogous to the case at hand.” Lampf, Pleva, Lipkind, Prupis & Petigrow v. Gilbertson, 501 U.S. 350, 355 (1991). “State limitations periods,” however, “will not be borrowed if their application would be inconsistent with the underlying policies of the federal statute.” Occidental Life Ins. Co. of Cal. v. EEOC, 432 U.S 355, 367 (1977). Federal law may be borrowed instead “only ‘when a rule from elsewhere in federal law clearly provides a closer analogy than available state statutes, and when the federal policies at stake and the practicalities of litigation make that rule a significantly more appropriate vehicle for interstitial lawmaking.’” Reed v. United Transp. Union, 488 U.S. 319, 324 (1989) (quoting DelCostello v. Teamsters, 462 U.S. 151, 172 (1983)). The district court determined that if § 1415(i)(2)(B) does not apply, the most analogous state provision is the thirty-day period for appealing an adverse agency decision under the Texas Administrative Procedures Act. See Tex. Gov. Code Ann. § 2001.176(a) (West 2015). D.G. asserts that we should borrow Texas’s two-year general tort statute of limitations, or one of several other state-law limitations periods for independent causes of action. This disagreement echoes the split among courts that have decided which statute of limitations to borrow for IDEA fees actions. 9 The Sixth and Seventh Circuits 9 NCISD argues for the first time on appeal that, if the court must borrow a statute of limitations, it could look to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 54, which provides that a motion for attorneys’ fees must “be filed no later than 14 days after the entry of judgment” unless a statute or court order provides otherwise. Fed. R. Civ. P. 54(d)(2)(B)(i). Of the dozens of cases that have borrowed a limitations period for IDEA fees actions, none of which we are aware has turned to Rule 54, and we do not either. “[R]esort to state law remains the norm for borrowing of limitations periods,” and adopting a federal period is a “narrow exception” reserved for “unusual” cases in which the federal rule is clearly more analogous and more consistent with statutory policies. Reed, 488 U.S. at 324 (quoting DelCostello, 462 U.S. at 171). This is not one of those rare cases: as courts have recognized, Rule 54(d)(2) is inapposite because it presupposes a final judgment in federal court and a fees request brought by motion in the same court, whereas § 1415(i)(3)(B) contemplates the filing of a new civil action in a new forum. See Brandon E., 621 F. Supp. 2d at 1018 (citing additional cases); see also McCartney C. ex rel. Sara S. v. Herrin Cmty. Unit Sch. Dist. No. 4, 21 F.3d 173, 175 (7th Cir. 14 Case: 15-20079 Document: 00513266158 Page: 15 Date Filed: 11/10/2015 No. 15-20079 have applied relatively short administrative appeal periods, reasoning that IDEA fees actions are ancillary to the underlying administrative proceedings. 10 The Ninth and Eleventh Circuits have applied multi-year statutes of limitations for actions based on a statutory liability, finding short limitations periods inconsistent with the Act’s policy goals and stressing that unlike an appeal from an agency decision, an IDEA fees action seeks relief that the agency below had no authority to award. 11 We need not deepen this circuit split today. Because even assuming arguendo that the thirty-day administrative appeal period applies, we agree with the only circuit to have considered the issue that the time limit for a party that prevails at an administrative IDEA hearing to seek attorneys’ fees does not begin to run until the aggrieved party’s time for challenging the hearing officer’s decision expires. See McCartney C. ex rel. Sara S. v. Herrin Cmty. Unit Sch. Dist. No. 4, 21 F.3d 173, 175–76 (7th Cir. 1994); see also Dell v. Bd. of Educ., 32 F.3d 1053, 1063 (7th Cir. 1994). The parties agree that D.G. filed his action 120 days after the hearing officer’s decision. So if a thirty-day limitations period for the filing of D.G.’s fees action started upon the expiration of NCISD’s time for challenging that decision—ninety days pursuant to § 1415(i)(2)(B)—this suit would be timely. The Seventh Circuit’s rule is sound. If a limitations period shorter than ninety days (such as Texas’s thirty-day administrative appeals period) ran from the date of the hearing officer’s decision, the prevailing party would have 1994) (“But we are dealing . . . not with a motion for fees, but with an independent lawsuit seeking fees.”). Further, NCISD identifies no IDEA-specific policy that would make a fourteen-day limitations period “significantly more appropriate” than any state-law candidate. 10 See King, 228 F.3d at 623–27; Powers, 61 F.3d at 555–58; Dell v. Bd. of Educ., 32 F.3d 1053, 1063–64 (7th Cir. 1994). 11 Meridian Joint Sch. Dist., 792 F.3d at 1063–64 & n.9; Zipperer v. Sch. Bd., 111 F.3d 847, 851–52 (11th Cir. 1997). 15 Case: 15-20079 Document: 00513266158 Page: 16 Date Filed: 11/10/2015 No. 15-20079 to file a new lawsuit seeking fees before the aggrieved party has to decide whether to challenge the decision in court. And that could burden “courts and litigants . . . with a blizzard of protective suits filed before the plaintiff knows whether he has even the ghost of a chance of obtaining relief.” McCartney C., 21 F.3d at 176. The Ninth Circuit has echoed this concern. See Meridian Joint Sch. Dist. No. 2 v. D.A., 792 F.3d 1054, 1063–64 (9th Cir. 2015) (criticizing “the anomalous result that the party that prevailed before the hearing officer would have to decide whether to file an action seeking attorneys' fees before the party that lost before the hearing officer decided whether to seek judicial review”). And in a different IDEA context, we too have criticized rules that would force parties to “file ‘protective complaints.’” Ruben A. v. El Paso Indep. Sch. Dist., 414 F. App’x 704, 707 (5th Cir. 2011) (citation omitted). In addition to encouraging the filing of protective complaints in an already-overburdened court system, running a short limitations period from the time of the hearing officer’s decision would leave little time for parents and school districts to agree on attorneys’ fees and costs without resorting to litigation. That would contravene Congress’s intent that IDEA fees and costs will “[u]sually . . . be agreed to by the public agency,” and that parents will only sue for fees when “no agreement is possible.” Duane M. v. Orleans Parish Sch. Bd., 861 F.2d 115, 119 (5th Cir. 1988) (quoting H.R. Rep. No. 99-296, at 5 (1985)). Although adopting a multi-year limitations period as D.G. urges would also alleviate these problems, we believe it more prudent to resolve this case without unnecessarily deepening disagreement among the circuits. See Staff IT, Inc. v. United States, 482 F.3d 792, 800 (5th Cir. 2007) (“We acknowledge the existence of the circuit split on this issue, but need not—and therefore do not—resolve this issue today.”). The only arguments NCISD offers against the Seventh Circuit’s rule are its already-rejected contention that § 1415(i)(2)(B) applies to this action, 16 Case: 15-20079 Document: 00513266158 Page: 17 Date Filed: 11/10/2015 No. 15-20079 authorities discussing entirely different limitations periods, and an inapposite discussion of “equitable tolling.” And the only other case the parties have identified that considers this issue adopts the Seventh Circuit’s rule. See Gray v. Metts, 203 F. Supp. 2d 426, 430 (D. Md. 2002) (“[T]he statute of limitations for filing a suit for attorneys’ fees as the prevailing party in an IDEA administrative hearing does not run until the time for appeal has passed.”). For the above reasons, we hold that the time limit for D.G. to seek attorneys’ fees in this case was at least thirty days, and did not begin to run until ninety days after the hearing officer’s decision, when NCISD’s time for seeking review of that decision expired.