In our December 26, 2009 post, we reported on the misfortune of the Silverado-Modjeska Recreation & Park District, which was ordered to pay a prevailing developer about $358,000 in attorney’s fees. Well, there is a follow-up to this brewing saga.
District, which has an annual budget of $222,304, has appealed the $358,000 fee award. It claims that the hourly rates of developers’ attorneys, ranging between $792-$845 per hour, were “astronomical” in nature and not adequately supported except for one associate attorney’s “belief” that the rates are the prevailing rates in the Orange County legal community.
Next up is the developer/respondent’s brief. As well put by Teri Sforza, staff writer for The Orange County Register, in her OC Watchdog May 7, 2010 article, “We’ll keep you posted, as the toad and the day care center hang in the balance”—a reference to some of the issues in the underlying environmental dispute that eventually resulted in the contested fee battle.
Above: An illustration by E. H. Shepard for the 1930 edition of Kenneth Grahame’s The Wind in the Willows.