[PUBLISH]
IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT FILED
___________________________ U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
December 10, 2002
No. 02-11578 THOMAS K. KAHN
___________________________ CLERK
D.C. Docket No. 00-02087-CV-CC-1
GEORGIA STATE DEPARTMENT
OF EDUCATION,
Plaintiff-Counter-
Defendant-Appellant,
versus
DERRICK C.,
ZENA CHERRY,
NORMAN CHERRY,
Defendants-Counter-
Claimants-Appellees.
____________________________
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Northern District of Georgia
____________________________
(December 10, 2002)
Before CARNES, HILL and FARRIS*, Circuit Judges.
________________________
*Honorable Jerome Farris, United States Circuit Judge for the Ninth Circuit, sitting by
designation.
CARNES, Circuit Judge:
The Georgia State Department of Education (“the Department”) brought this
appeal in order to have us decide whether the “stay-put provision” of Part B of the
Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, 20 U.S.C. §§ 1400-1491 (IDEA),
applies to a child who, at the time he turned three years of age and came within the
purview of Part B, disputed his Part B placement. That is an issue of first
impression in our court, and the Department says that we need to decide it so that
the district courts and parties involved in similar disputes will have some guidance.
However, our guidance-providing role is subordinate to our primary
responsibility which is to decide each appeal that is brought before us. Because the
lawsuit that led to this appeal was barred by the statute of limitations, we do not
address the merits issue involving the IDEA stay put provision. If the Department
had wanted that issue decided, it should have brought the case to court sooner.
I. FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY
Derrick C. is a child with autism and a language disorder. When he was one
year old, Georgia’s Department of Human Resources (“DHR”), which is
responsible for providing services under Part C of the IDEA, found him to be a
disabled child under Part C and placed him at the Walden School. As Derrick C.’s
2
third birthday approached, his family and DHR met with the Dekalb County
School District (“the District”) about his transition from Part C services which
were provided by DHR to Part B services which were to be provided by the
Department. The District provided an Individualized Education Program (“IEP”)
for Derrick C., but Derrick C.’s family rejected it. The family sought a due process
hearing to resolve its challenge to the IEP, and it requested the Department to keep
Derrick C. in the Walden School under the IDEA’s stay-put provision in Part B, 20
U.S.C. § 1415(j), pending resolution of that dispute. The Department refused to do
that.
During the time it took to resolve the IEP issues, Derrick C.’s parents kept
him at the Walden School at their own expense. Derrick C.’s parents and the
District resolved the IEP dispute in January 2000, when they agreed to continue
Derrick C.’s placement at the Walden School. The District refused to reimburse
Derrick C.’s family for the money it had spent keeping him at the Walden School
during the dispute, because the District believed that duty fell on the Department.
Derrick C. filed an administrative action against the District, seeking
reimbursement of the money that had been spent to keep him at the Walden School
while the issue involving his placement was being decided. Eventually, both
Derrick C. and the District agreed that the reimbursement issue was between
3
Derrick C. and the Department, so he added the Department as a party to the
administrative action on January 20, 2000.
On February 18, 2000, the Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) determined that
“[the Department] is responsible for Derrick C.’s ‘stay-put’ rights,” and she
ordered the Department to reimburse Derrick C. for the Walden School tuition, as
well as for costs incurred for speech and language services for Derrick C. during
the relevant period. According to Derrick C., from the end of February until
August 2000, he tried to have the Department implement the ALJ’s order, but the
Department refused to do so.
It was not until August 14, 2000, almost six months after the ALJ entered
her decision, that the Department filed its complaint in the district court appealing
the ALJ’s decision. Derrick C. moved the district court to dismiss on the ground
that, among other things, the Department’s action was barred by the applicable
statute of limitations, which he contended is the 30-day limitations period provided
in Georgia’s Administrative Procedures Act, Ga. Code § 50-13-19(b). The district
court disagreed, determining that the Department’s lawsuit was most analogous to
a claim under state law for monetary relief, which in Georgia carries a four-year
statute of limitations. It denied the motion to dismiss on statute of limitations
grounds.
4
On the merits, the parties filed cross-motions for summary judgment
(although Derrick C. called his a motion for final judgment). The district court
denied the Department’s motion and granted Derrick C.’s, entering judgment in his
favor based upon its conclusion that under the stay-put provision of Part B, 20
U.S.C. § 1415(j), Derrick C. is entitled to be reimbursed for the costs incurred for
his placement while the issue of his Part B placement was being resolved. The
Department appeals the judgment, arguing that the district court was wrong on the
merits. Derrick C. defends the judgment on the merits and also on the ground that
the Department’s action in the district court was barred by the statute of
limitations, anyway.1
II. DISCUSSION
The Department filed its action in district court to challenge the ALJ’s
decision in favor of Derek C. 176 days after the decision was issued. Whether that
was too late depends upon which statute of limitations applies. If, as Derek C.
1
The Department contends that Derrick C. cannot raise the statute of
limitations issue in this court because he did not cross-appeal the district court’s
ruling against him on that issue. That contention is wrong. See Sanchez-Velasco v.
Secretary of the Dep’t of Corr., 287 F.3d 1015, 1026 (11th Cir. 2002) (“An
appellee may, without cross-appealing, urge in support of a result that has been
appealed by the other party any ground leading to the same result, even if that
ground is inconsistent with the district court’s reasoning.”); accord, El Paso
Natural Gas Co. v. Neztsosie, 526 U.S. 473, 479, 119 S. Ct. 1430, 1434-35 (1982);
Blum v. Bacon, 457 U.S. 132, 137 n.5, 102 S. Ct. 2355, 2359 n.5 (1982).
5
contends, the applicable limitations period is the 30-day one found in Georgia’s
Administrative Procedures Act, Ga. Code § 50-13-19(b), the Department’s filing in
district court was 146 days too late. If, as the Department contends, the applicable
limitations period is the four-year one for unjust enrichment under Ga. Code § 9-3-
25, then the action was filed soon enough and with three-and-a-half years to spare.
Because the IDEA does not contain a statute of limitations, see generally 20
U.S.C. § 1415(i); Cory D. ex rel. Diane D. v. Burke County Sch. Dist., 285 F.3d
1294, 1296 (11th Cir. 2002), we “must borrow the statute of limitations from the
most analogous state statute, provided the borrowed limitations period is not
inconsistent with underlying federal policies.” Cory D., 285 F.3d at 1297 (internal
marks omitted). In doing that, we engage in a two-pronged analysis in which we
“(1) determine which Georgia statute is most analogous to the IDEA, and (2)
ensure the applicable limitations period is not inconsistent with the IDEA’s
objectives.” Id.
The closest decision on point is the Cory D. one, where we answered the
question of which statute of limitations applies to an action filed in district court to
challenge the IDEA placement component of an ALJ’s stay-put determination
under Part B. One party touted the 30-day statute of limitations period borrowed
6
from Georgia’s APA, while the other espoused Georgia’s two-year limitations
period for personal injury claims. Id. at 1295. We picked the 30-day one from
Georgia’s APA. Id. at 1301.
We first determined which Georgia statute was most analogous to the IDEA
by “look[ing] to whether the scope of judicial proceedings available to a plaintiff
under each state act is similar to the review available under the IDEA.” Id. at 1297
(internal marks omitted). Comparing the Georgia APA and the IDEA, we noted
several similarities between their scopes of review, including the fact that both
statutes: (1) provide for judicial review of agency determinations; (2) have
reviewing courts “act[] in a quasi-appellate manner” and “rely heavily on the
administrative record”; and (3) “mandate some level of deference to the findings of
an agency’s decision-maker.” Id. In contrast, our comparison of the IDEA with an
action for personal injury yielded no such similarities, because “an action for
personal injury is an independent claim which does not involve review of
administrative decisions.” Id. at 1298. We concluded that “[a] civil action under
the IDEA challenging an administrative hearing officer’s education decision after a
due process hearing, therefore, is more analogous to judicial review of an
administrative appeal than to causes of action for personal injury. As a result, the
Georgia APA is the most analogous state statute.” Id.
7
We then turned to the second prong of the limitations period borrowing
inquiry, which required us to determine if applying the Georgia APA’s 30-day
limitations period would be consistent with the IDEA’s objectives. Id. We
recognized that “[t]he fundamental objective of the IDEA is to empower disabled
children to reach their fullest potential by providing a free education tailored to
meet their individual needs.” Id. Noting the “split between the circuits . . . as to
whether this objective is better served by a short or more lengthy limitations period
for judicial appeals of final decisions by an educational agency,” we agreed with
those circuits favoring a short limitations period (the First, Second, Fourth,
Seventh, and Ninth Circuits). Id. We concluded that “a relatively short limitations
period best serves the policies underlying the IDEA,” because “[t]he most effective
means of ensuring disabled children receive an education tailored to meet their
specific needs is to provide prompt resolution of disputes over a child’s IEP.” Id.
at 1299. We held that the 30-day limitations period in Ga. Code § 50-13-19(b)
applied.
The district court did not have the benefit of our Cory D. decision at the time
it decided this case. If it had, we are confident that court would have reached the
same decision we do, which is that Georgia’s 30-day APA limitations period
governs IDEA Part B stay-put reimbursement decisions, just as it does IDEA Part
8
B placement decisions.
Attempting to persuade us to the contrary, the Department contends that
Cory D. is distinguishable because it concerned an action challenging a stay-put
placement decision while this case raises only the issue of who is to pay the cost
incurred by Derrick C.’s placement during one particular interval – the cost of his
continued attendance at the Walden School while the placement dispute was being
resolved. But most civil cases boil down to the issue of who pays, or who pays
how much, and we are unpersuaded by the argument that we should find this case
not as close to Cory D. as to Zipperer v. School Board of Seminole County, 111
F.3d 847, 851-52 (11th Cir. 1997).
The Zipperer case involved a disabled child who, having prevailed in his
placement dispute before an ALJ, brought an action in the district court for an
award of attorney’s fees under the IDEA, 20 U.S.C. § 1415(e)(4)(B).2 111 F.3d at
848. The district court granted summary judgment in favor of the defendant school
system on the ground that Florida’s 30-day statute of limitations applicable to the
appeal of administrative decisions applied, barring Zipperer’s action. We reversed,
holding that the four-year statute of limitations for claims based on statutory
2
We note that when the IDEA was amended in 1997, the attorney’s fees
provision of § 1415(e)(4)(B) was renumbered and is now § 1415(i)(3)(B). John T.
ex rel. Robert T. v. Iowa Dep’t of Educ., 258 F.3d 860, 864 n.2 (8th Cir. 2001).
9
liability under Florida Statute § 95.11(3)(f) applied instead. Id. at 848, 851-52. In
doing so, we used the familiar two-step borrowing analysis.
First, we first determined in Zipperer that the attorney’s fees claim was most
analogous to a claim based on statutory liability under Florida Statute
§ 95.11(3)(f). Id. at 851. In doing so, we presaged Cory D. by recognizing that the
shorter limitations period for appealing an administrative decision might apply in
the context of a substantive appeal under § 1415(e)(2). Id. at 850 n.1 (citing JSK
v. Hendry County Sch. Bd., 941 F.2d 1563, 1570 n.1 (11th Cir. 1991)). We
determined, however, that a § 1415(e)(4) claim for attorney’s fees is distinct from
an IDEA substantive appeal under § 1415(e)(2), and because § 1415(e)(4) provides
for an independent claim for attorney’s fees which the district court, not the
administrative agency, is to decide, Florida’s statutory liability claim is the most
analogous state statute for an IDEA attorney’s fees action. Id. at 851.
Second, in Zipperer we compared the policies underlying Florida Statute
§ 95.11(3)(f), the statutory liability provision, and the IDEA to see whether they
were inconsistent. Again, the distinction between a substantive appeal claim under
§ 1415(e)(2) and an attorney’s fees claim under § 1415(e)(4) played a pivotal role
in our analysis. We explained that “a short period of limitations for claims brought
pursuant to section 1415(e)(2) assures prompt resolution of disputes over education
10
plans for disabled children,” while “the resolution of claims for attorneys’ fees is
less urgent and, in reality, is more likely to be resolved by the attorneys’ interest in
prompt payment than by a short period of limitations.” Id. (internal quotation
marks omitted). Because “[a] four-year period of limitations, like the award of
attorneys’ fees to parents who are prevailing parties, is likely to encourage the
involvement of parents, as represented by attorneys, in securing appropriate public
educations for their children,” we concluded that “the application of a four-year
statute of limitations to claims for attorneys’ fees under the IDEA is consistent
with the policies of the federal statute.” Id. at 851-52. It was for those reasons that
we held in Zipperer that the four-year statute of limitations in Florida Statute
§ 95.11(3)(f) was applicable to the appellant’s claim. Id. at 852.
Zipperer and this case are somewhat similar because, in both, the placement
decision was determined prior to the filing of the action in district court, and the
issue before the court concerned the payment of money. But the different nature of
the monetary issues in Zipperer and this case puts distance between the two. In
Zipperer, the monetary issue was an attorney’s fees claim brought under
§ 1415(e)(4), which calls upon the role of a district court as a trial court. The
scope of judicial proceedings available to a plaintiff under the general state
statutory liability statute is similar to that under the attorney’s fees provision of the
11
IDEA because both involve the district court in its role as a trial court.
Here, in contrast, the monetary issue is whether Derrick C. should be
reimbursed for the Walden School costs. That issue is part and parcel of the stay-
put provision of § 1415(j). See Sch. Comm. of Burlington v. Dep’t of Educ., 471
U.S. 359, 369-72, 105 S. Ct. 1996, 2002-04 (1985)3; James ex rel. James v. Upper
Arlington City Sch. Dist., 228 F.3d 764, 767 (6th Cir. 2000). The issue, arising as a
claim under § 1415(j) of the IDEA, is initially determined by an ALJ, and when a
district court reviews an ALJ’s decision of such a claim it does so pursuant to 20
U.S.C. § 1415(i)(2) (2000), which is the amended version of § 1415(e)(2).4 When
3
Burlington concerned § 1415(e)(3), which has since been renumbered and
is now § 1415(j). James ex rel. James v. Upper Arlington City Sch. Dist., 228 F.3d
764, 767 (6th Cir. 2000).
4
When the IDEA was amended in 1997, § 1415(e)(2) became § 1415(i)(2).
King ex rel. King v. Floyd County Bd. of Educ., 228 F.3d 622, 625 (6th Cir. 2000);
Warren G. ex rel. Tom G. v. Cumberland County Sch. Dist., 190 F.3d 80, 83 (3d
Cir. 1999). Section 1415(i)(2)(A) provides:
Any party aggrieved by the findings and decision made under subsection (f)
or (k) of this section who does not have the right to an appeal under
subsection (g) of this section, and any party aggrieved by the findings and
decision under this subsection, shall have the right to bring a civil action
with respect to the complaint presented pursuant to this section, which action
may be brought in any State court of competent jurisdiction or in a district
court of the United States without regard to the amount in controversy.
20 U.S.C. § 1415(i)(2)(A) (2000).
12
the district court reviews an ALJ’s decision of that type, it sits as a quasi-appellate
court, not as a trial court. See Cory D., 285 F.3d at 1297. It sits as the district
court was sitting in Cory D., not as the district court was sitting in Zipperer.
The unjust enrichment claim analogy proffered by the Department involves
an independent claim in which the district court acts as a trial court, and for that
reason is less close to the case at hand than the APA appeal analogy in which the
district court sits in a quasi-appellate capacity to review the decisions of an ALJ.
As we decided in Cory D., the Georgia APA, Ga. Code § 50-13-19(b), is the most
analogous state statute. 285 F.3d at 1298.
Our inquiry does not end there, however, because we must compare the
limitations period of the Georgia APA, Ga. Code § 50-13-19(b), with the
objectives of the IDEA in order to determine if applying that 30-day limitations
period is inconsistent with those objectives. Cory D., 285 F.3d at 1298. According
to the Department, “the urgency that usually would apply because of the stated
IDEA policy for speedy resolution of disputes is not present here because of the
fact that [Derrick C. and his parents] settled their dispute with the local school
system as to the appropriate placement and services for Derrick under the IDEA
prior to the administrative decision that is challenged in this case.” But that does
not convince us a requirement that such appeals be filed within 30 days is
13
inconsistent with any IDEA objective.
To the contrary, a short limitations period is consistent with the objectives of
the IDEA, which include ensuring “that all children with disabilities have available
to them a free appropriate public education that emphasizes special education and
related services” and ensuring “that the rights of children with disabilities and
parents of such children are protected.” 20 U.S.C. § 1400(d)(1). And it is
consistent with the purpose of the stay-put provision, which is “to prevent school
districts from effecting unilateral change in a child’s educational program.”
Erickson v. Albuquerque Pub. Schs., 199 F.3d 1116, 1121 (10th Cir. 1999) (internal
quotation marks omitted).
Under the Department’s position, a child could be awarded reimbursement
costs by an ALJ, but not be able to enforce that decision until more than four years
later, because the Department would have that long to decide whether to appeal the
decision to federal court. That result would be untenable. The stay-put issues of
placement and reimbursement for the cost of placement are intertwined. Parents’
decisions about where to place their children while placement disputes are being
settled could well turn on whether they will be reimbursed for the costs of that
interim placement. Parents need to know sooner, rather than later, whether they
will be reimbursed so they can make educational decisions for their disabled
14
children accordingly. See Susquenita Sch. Dist. v. Raelee S., 96 F.3d 78, 87 (3d
Cir. 1996) (“Without interim financial support, a parent’s ‘choice’ to have his child
remain in what the state has determined to be an appropriate private school
placement amounts to no choice at all. The prospect of reimbursement at the end
of the litigation turnpike is of little consolation to a parent who cannot pay the toll
at the outset.”)5; see also Cory D., 285 F.3d at 1299 (“If the limitations period for
judicial review under the IDEA is too long, appropriate remedies will be delayed
by potentially protracted litigation.”).6
III. CONCLUSION
Because the Georgia APA, Ga. Code § 50-13-19(b), is the state statute most
5
We note that in Michael C. v. Radnor Township School District, 202 F.3d
642 (3d Cir. 2000), the Third Circuit stated that, where parents “unilaterally
remove[] a child from an existing placement determined in accordance with state
procedures, and put[] the child in a different placement that was not assigned
through proper state procedures,” those parents “act at their own financial risk, and
will recover only if they are correct that local authorities have failed to provide the
educational program to which their child is entitled under the IDEA.” Id. at 651.
That case is different from this one, because here Derrick C. was enrolled at the
Walden School pursuant to the state’s Part C procedures (although whether that
placement constituted the “then current placement” under § 1415(j) is a disputed
issue that we do not reach), and Derrick C.’s placement issue was resolved in his
favor through settlement.
6
We reject without further discussion the Department’s alternative argument
that it is entitled to have the limitations period equitably tolled because its delay in
filing the district court action was occasioned by its indecisiveness about whether
to challenge the ALJ’s reimbursement decision.
15
analogous to the IDEA, and because it is not inconsistent with the purpose of the
IDEA’s stay-put provision, we hold that its 30-day limitations period applies to the
Department’s action brought under 20 U.S.C. § 1415(i)(2)(A) challenging the
ALJ’s decision on reimbursement. Because the Department’s action was filed
outside that limitations period, the district court reached the correct result in
entering judgment against the Department.
AFFIRMED.
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Georgia State Department of Education v. Derrick C.
Court: Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit
Date filed: 2002-12-10
Citations: 314 F.3d 545
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