Opinion ID: 790169
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The DOE's Position on Appeal

Text: 30 The DOE challenges the district court's awards of attorneys' fees in four respects. First, the DOE contends that M.S. and M.L. are not prevailing parties eligible for attorneys' fees because they did not obtain decisions on the merits in their administrative hearings and because the so-ordered settlement agreements, over which the IHOs did not retain enforcement jurisdiction, did not constitute consent decrees. Second, the DOE argues that the community for determining the appropriate hourly rate for attorneys' fees should be the community of practitioners who appear before the DOE for IDEA hearings, rather than the community of practitioners in the federal district in which the fee application was commenced. Third, the DOE argues that the district court abused its discretion in determining that rates of $350 to $375 per hour were reasonable for the Parents' counsel's representation with respect to administrative hearings, because such representation is simply of a different `kind and quality' than the more sophisticated legal services required to vindicate statutory or constitutional rights in a federal forum. Appellant's Br. at 53, A.R. ex rel. R.V. v. N.Y. City Dep't of Educ.; see also Appellant's Br. at 29-30, S.W. ex rel. M.M. v. Bd. of Educ. (Dist.Two). Finally, the DOE asserts that fee disputes in federal court are ancillary to the underlying administrative proceedings, and, consequently, the district court erred in awarding S.W. and M.M. fees at a higher rate for their fee application in the district court than for representation during administrative proceedings.