First District, Division 2 Upheld Trial Court Decision to Award Some Fees and Costs to Teacher, But Not All of Them.
Well, we report on all areas of the law. This one is a curious case, where a teacher untimely filed for fees and costs, but the trial court cut teacher a break and still awarded a little under one-fifth of requested fees and costs. Better than nothing, you might say. Teacher still appealed. Did he win or lose? Verdict to come.
In San Ramon Valley Unified School Dist. v. Cahn, Case No. A126905 (1st Dist., Div. 2 Oct. 28, 2010) (unpublished), tenured physical education teacher beat an administrative “for cause” dismissal proceeding . Teacher then filed a costs memorandum and fee motion pursuant to Education Code section 44944(e)(2), which provides that the governing school board shall pay the expenses and reasonable attorney’s fees incurred by the employee at the hearing. However, the real rub is that the Education Code does not specify the procedure for recovering section 44944(e) fees. Under the normal CCP and CRC procedure, teacher untimely filed a fee/costs request aggregating about $233,000. The lower court, despite finding the requests untimely, awarded teacher fees and costs of a little over $44,000. Miffed, apparently, teacher appealed.
Verdict: fee/costs award affirmed.
The appellate court essentially determined that normal fee/costs procedures should be followed with respect to section 44944(e) requests, finding tacit support in reasoning from Fontana Unified School Dist. v. Burman, 45 Cal.3d 208, 225, 225-226 n. 18 (1988).) Given the procedural context of this case, other nuances did not apply. Also, there was no abuse of discretion in the lower award when one considers that teacher could have been out of luck completely.