Opinion ID: 176919
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Expiration of the PSA

Text: Despite the expiration of the PSA, we conclude that this appeal is not moot because the challenged conduct is capable of repetition yet evading review. The capable of repetition, yet evading review exception to mootness applies only where `(1) the duration of the challenged action is too short to allow full litigation before it ceases, and (2) there is a reasonable expectation that the plaintiffs will be subjected to it again.' Biodiversity Legal Found., 309 F.3d at 1173 (quoting Greenpeace Action v. Franklin, 14 F.3d 1324, 1329 (9th Cir.1993)). The challenged PSA satisfies both of these criteria. First, the duration of the challenged PSA was too short to permit full litigation. The duration of a challenged action is too short where it is almost certain to run its course before either this court or the Supreme Court can give the case full consideration. Id. The PSA had a term of three years, but remained in force for two additional years because neither party exercised its right to terminate it after the first three years. For purposes of determining whether the PSA's duration was so short as to evade review, we consider only the Agreement's mandatory three-year term. We have applied the evading-review doctrine where the `duration of the controversy is solely within the control of the defendant.' Anderson v. Evans, 371 F.3d 475, 479 (9th Cir.2004) (quoting Biodiversity Legal Found., 309 F.3d at 1174). Similarly, here, because the PSA's extension for an additional two years was solely within the District's control, we will apply the evading-review doctrine if the duration not within its sole controlthree years would be too short to allow for full judicial review. We have acknowledged that three years is generally too short to allow a case seeking a declaratory judgment regarding the legality of [an agreement's] provisions [to] proceed beyond district court review. Int'l Ass'n of Machinists & Aerospace Workers, Local Lodge 964 v. B.F. Goodrich Aerospace Aerostructures Grp., 387 F.3d 1046, 1050 (9th Cir.2004). Indeed, the course of this litigation demonstrates that three years is too short for us or the Supreme Court to give the case full consideration; it has already been pending for nearly six and a half years. Even without counting the three years in which the district court stayed the case pending Ninth Circuit and Supreme Court decisions, this litigation has taken over three years to reach us, and the Supreme Court has not yet had a chance to consider it. This case therefore satisfies the evading review portion of the capable of repetition, yet evading review doctrine. Second, this case also satisfies the capable of repetition requirement. The defendants have not met their burden to show that there is no reasonable expectation that the plaintiffs will be subjected to a PSA again. See Ackley v. W. Conference of Teamsters, 958 F.2d 1463, 1469 (9th Cir.1992) (It is the defendant, not the plaintiff, who must demonstrate that the alleged wrong will not recur.). In support of its claim that it will never enter into a PSA again, the District offers only a declaration by its Vice Chancellor attesting that seventy-five percent of Measure E funds have been expended, that the remaining funds have been committed to projects that cannot be completed because of insufficient funds, that the District does not anticipate entering into a new PSA due to present economic conditions, and that the passage of Measure E was unprecedented and, in his opinion, a once in a lifetime event. [3] This declaration does not adequately demonstrate that the District will not enter into a PSA again. Indeed, twenty-five percent of Measure E funds remain, and it would be unreasonable to assume that the District will never use those funds just because they currently lack sufficient funding to complete the projects to which those funds have been committed. Moreover, the Vice Chancellor's assertion that the District does not anticipate entering into a new PSA [b]ecause of present economic conditions implies that it may resume construction, and accordingly enter into a new PSA, once the economic situation improves. Because the District has not shown that it will not enter into another PSA in the future, and because the duration of the PSA is too short to allow for full judicial review, the expiration of the PSA does not render the plaintiffs' claims for declaratory and injunctive relief moot.