J.T. v. Dist. of Columbia

652 F.Supp.3d 11

J.T., Plaintiff, v. DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, Defendant.

Civil Action No. 19-cv-989 (BAH)

Civil Action No. 22-cv-91 (BAH)

United States District Court, District of Columbia

Signed January 23, 2023

Douglas Tyrka, Tyrka & Associates, LLC, McLean, VA, for Plaintiff.

Tasha Monique Hardy, Steven Nathan Rubenstein, Office of Attorney General/DC, Civil Litigation Division, Washington, DC, for Defendant.

MEMORANDUM OPINION

BERYL A. HOWELL, Chief Judge

Plaintiff J.T. seeks attorneys' fees and costs, totaling $415,042.55,¹ pursuant to the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act ("IDEA"), 20 U.S.C. § 1415(i)(3)(B)(i)(1), from the District of Columbia ("the District") for her counsel's services in connection with two administrative due process proceedings she has pursued over the previous six years on behalf of her minor son. Pl.'s Mot. for Att'ys' Fees ("Pl.'s Mot. 2017 HOD"), 22-cv-91, ECF. No. 9; Pl.'s Mot. for Att'ys' Fees ("Pl.'s Mot. 2019 HOD"), 19-cv-989, ECF. No. 48. While the parties generally agree on plaintiff's entitlement to reasonable attorneys' fees as a prevailing party—though defendant disputes the timeliness of one of her requests—the question of what constitutes "reasonable" fees remains hotly debated. In this case, as in so many other IDEA fee disputes before this Court, the core disagreement concerns how best to model the prevailing market rate in the relevant community so that the judicially-mandated awards of IDEA attorneys' fees most closely approximate a fictional universe in which IDEA litigation rates are shaped by a free market.

The creation of that fictional universe has proven elusive. Several decades since the enactment of the IDEA, this Circuit does not seem any closer to settling on a method for calculating reasonable rates for litigation under this important statute, let alone a method that can be easily applied in all IDEA proceedings without major follow-on fee litigation. In recent years, the use of the same decades-old matrix advanced by the plaintiff here to calculate her requested rates has been upheld by one panel, see Salazar ex rel. Salazar v. Dist. of Columbia, 809 F.3d 58, 63-65 (D.C. Cir. 2015), only to be questioned by another, see Eley v. Dist. of Columbia, 793 F.3d 97, 104-05 (D.C. Cir. 2015), or rejected, see id. at 105 (Kavanaugh, J., concurring) ("I would simply add that, in my view, the United States Attorney's Office Laffey matrix is appropriate for IDEA cases."). Those decisions were mere months apart, creating substantial confusion for IDEA litigants and their counsel, as well as the district court. A potential solution presented itself when the United States Attorney's Office for the District of Columbia ("DC-USAO") generated a new fee matrix in 2015, in an effort to respond to many of the identified deficiencies with the then available matrices, which solution was cautiously adopted as a path out of the morass of dueling Circuit authority. See, e.g., Jones v. Dist. of Columbia, No. 15-cv-1505 (BAH), 2019 WL 652349, at *6 - 14, 16 (D.D.C. Feb. 15, 2019); DL v. Dist. of Columbia, 267 F. Supp. 3d 55, 66-72 (D.D.C. 2017). Yet that approach, too, was rejected by the D.C. Circuit. DL v. Dist. of Columbia, 924 F.3d 585, 591-93 (D.C. Cir. 2019).

As a result, to date, almost fifty years after enactment of the predecessor to the IDEA in 1975, see 20 U.S.C. § 1400(c)(2), the law in this Circuit remains unsettled whether a fee matrix exists that can reliably be applied in IDEA proceedings to determine reasonable attorneys' fees. These difficulties are to everyone's detriment. The goal of the IDEA is to ensure the provision of a "free appropriate public education" to all disabled children, see id. § 1400(d)(1)(A), but legal and judicial resources that may be better spent on the consideration of the merits of IDEA challenges are instead diverted to the resolution of long, hard-fought fee litigation; the District of Columbia diverts more of its resources towards "fees-for-fees;" and the unpredictability of the judicial fee awards likely makes attracting competent counsel to help parents and children navigate and enforce their rights under the IDEA more difficult. Fee calculations should not turn into "a second major litigation," Hensley v. Eckerhart, 461 U.S. 424, 437, 103 S.Ct. 1933, 76 L.Ed.2d 40 (1983), but in IDEA disputes, that is exactly what they reliably and too frequently become.

In yet another attempt to tackle these issues, plaintiff's motions will be granted in part. She is entitled to attorneys' fees and costs as to both the underlying IDEA challenges, but not at her requested rates. Defendant successfully establishes that its proffered rate matrix—the newly developed "Fitzpatrick Matrix," first generated in 2021 by the DC-USAO—represents a clear improvement over plaintiff's requested matrix, the so-called LSI Laffey matrix, in its modelling of the prevailing market rates for complex federal litigation in the District of Columbia. Plaintiff will therefore be awarded fees at Fitzpatrick Matrix rates.

I. BACKGROUND

Plaintiff, J.T., is the mother of a child with special needs, V.T., who has initiated multiple proceedings under the IDEA against District of Columbia Public Schools ("DCPS") since 2015. See J.T. v. Dist. of Columbia, 496 F. Supp. 3d 190, 195-99 (D.D.C. 2020) (summarizing history of J.T.'s IDEA proceedings). Plaintiff's various Due Process Complaints have challenged several of her son's Individualized Education Programs (IEPs) (or lack thereof) and school placements, and in some instances sought judicial review of the administrative determinations in this Court, pursuant to 20 U.S.C. § 1415(i)(2). The facts underlying these multitudinous proceedings have been fully detailed in this Court's previous opinions in J.T. v. Dist. of Columbia, No. 17-cv-1319 (BAH), 2019 WL 3501667, at *2-3 (D.D.C. Aug. 1, 2019), and J.T., 496 F. Supp. 3d at 195-99, and as such will only be related briefly in relevant part below.

Here, plaintiff seeks to recover some portion of the attorneys' fees she incurred in these IDEA proceedings, which a court may "in its discretion . . . award . . . to a prevailing party who is the parent of a child with a disability." 20 U.S.C. § 1415(i)(3)(B)(i)(I). These requests stem from two particular administrative determinations and ensuing challenges, in which she contends she was the prevailing party. See Pl.'s Mem. Supp. Mot. for Att'ys' Fees ("Pl.'s Mem. 2017 HOD") at 2, 22-cv-91, ECF. No. 9; Pl.'s Mem. Supp. Mot. for Att'ys' Fees ("Pl.'s Mem. 2019 HOD") at 2, 19-cv-989, ECF. No. 48.

Her first request centers on a November 27, 2017 Hearing Officer Determination, which afforded her partial relief on a due process complaint she had filed earlier that year. Pl.'s Mot. 2017 HOD, Ex. 2., November 2017 Hearing Officer Determination ("2017 HOD") at 2, 13-14, 22-cv-91, ECF No. 9-3. That complaint alleged that DCPS had denied V.T. a free appropriate public education (FAPE) because the IEP developed for him in 2017 was inappropriate to meet his needs. Id. at 3-4. While the complaint originally "alleged 12 ways in which [V.T.'s] 2017 IEP was inadequate," by the time of the hearing the challenges "had been winnowed down to seven reasons that the 2017 IEP failed to provide V.T. with an appropriate education." J.T., 2019 WL 3501667, at *3. In particular, the complaint alleged that:

the IEP (1) permitted too large a class size; (2) permitted too high a student-to-adult classroom ratio; (3) did not require a quiet classroom or limit noise and distractions outside the classroom; (4) did not appropriately limit groups permitted outside the classroom; (5) did not appropriately limit hallway activity; (6) did not mandate that V.T. would remain with the same small group of students for the entire school day; and (7) did not prescribe a location where V.T. would receive educational services.

Id. Ultimately, the hearing officer found that the 2017 IEP was appropriate and that DCPS had met its "responsibility for ensuring that [V.T.]'s IEP adequately m[et his] needs and [was] not overly restrictive." 2017 HOD at 10-13. Nonetheless, plaintiff was granted partial relief in that DCPS was ordered to conduct an observation of V.T., schedule a meeting with J.T. and DCPS personnel, and update V.T.'s IEP and school placement based on the observation and a discussion of J.T.'s concerns. Id. at 13-14.

Plaintiff then sought judicial review of the 2017 HOD insofar as her claim that the 2017 IEP was inappropriate had been denied, see J.T., 2019 WL 3501667 at *3, but the case was dismissed as moot because the parties had since agreed to a new IEP in 2018, and plaintiff "ha[d] not sought retrospective relief for the year that V.T. was educated pursuant to the 2017 IEP," id. at *4-6. The D.C. Circuit affirmed. J.T. v. Dist. of Columbia, 983 F.3d 516, 528 (D.C. Cir. 2020).

Plaintiff's second fee request concerns a November 20, 2019 Hearing Officer Determination (2019 HOD), which concluded that DCPS had denied V.T. a FAPE for the 2019-2020 school year to date and awarded much of the relief requested. See Admin. Record at 3-13, 19-cv-989, ECF No. 28-1. The underlying complaint had followed a series of other due process hearings and determinations regarding V.T.'s school placement, after which DCPS had failed to assign V.T. to any school at all for the 2019-2020 school year, despite its attempts to locate an appropriate school. See id. at 6-8. The complaint alleged that this failure amounted to the denial of a FAPE and requested, among other things, funding for V.T.'s home schooling until DCPS provided an appropriate school placement. Id. at 20-23. The hearing officer agreed, finding that, although "diligent and fairly consistent" efforts had been made to assign V.T. to an appropriate school, because DCPS did not manage to finalize V.T.'s new IEP prior to the 2019-2020 school year and did not offer him an appropriate educational placement, it denied him a FAPE. Id. at 11....