Baltimore v. Pruitt

293 F. Supp. 3d 1
CourtCourt of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit
DecidedNovember 9, 2017
DocketCivil Action No. 16–452 (RBW)
StatusPublished
Cited by7 cases

This text of 293 F. Supp. 3d 1 (Baltimore v. Pruitt) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Baltimore v. Pruitt, 293 F. Supp. 3d 1 (D.C. Cir. 2017).

Opinion

REGGIE WALTON, United States District Judge

The plaintiffs, Blue Water Baltimore, Chester River Association, Gunpowder Riverkeeper, Midshore Riverkeeper Conservancy, Potomac Riverkeeper Network, and Waterkeepers Chesapeake, all non-profit environmental organizations dedicated to protecting local watersheds in Maryland, initiated this action against Scott Pruitt, in his official capacity as the Administrator of the United States Environmental Protection Agency (the "EPA"), challenging the EPA's approval of Maryland's 2012 Integrated Report of Surface Water Quality (the "2012 Integrated Report") under the Administrative Procedure Act (the "APA"), 5 U.S.C. §§ 701 - 06 (2012). See Complaint ("Compl.") ¶¶ 1, 4-11, 16. On July 18, 2017, the Court issued a Memorandum Opinion dismissing the plaintiffs' Complaint under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1) because their challenges were found to be moot. See Blue Water Balt. v. Pruitt, 266 F.Supp.3d 174, 183-84, 2017 WL 3049405, at *7 (D.D.C. July 18, 2017) (Walton, J.). Currently before the Court are the Plaintiffs' Motion to Alter or Amend the Judgment ("Pls.' Rule 59 Mot.") and the Plaintiffs' Motion for Leave to Amend Complaint ("Pls.' Rule 15 Mot."). Upon careful consideration of the parties' submissions,1 the Court concludes that it must grant both of the plaintiffs' motions.

*3I. BACKGROUND

The Court discussed the factual and statutory background of this case in its Memorandum Opinion issued on July 18, 2017, see Blue Water Balt., 266 F.Supp.3d at 175-79, 2017 WL 3049405, at *1-3, and will not reiterate those facts again here. In that opinion, the Court granted the EPA's motion to dismiss under Rule 12(b)(1) because the EPA's approval of Maryland's "2014 Integrated Report superseded the 2012 Integrated Report, thus mooting the plaintiffs' challenge to the reclassifications [of fifty-three water bodies] in the 2012 Integrated Report," id. at 180, at *5, and the plaintiffs' challenge did not meet the capable of repetition, yet evading review exception to the mootness doctrine, see id. at 183-84, at *7. In the accompanying Order, the Court dismissed the plaintiffs' Complaint "with prejudice." Order at 1 (July 18, 2017), ECF No. 24. On August 14, 2017, the plaintiffs simultaneously filed their motions,2 requesting that the Court modify its July 18, 2017 Order to redesignate that the dismissal of their Complaint is without prejudice and grant them leave to file an amended complaint to challenge the EPA's approval of Maryland's 2014 Integrated Report. See Pls.' Rule 59 Mot. at 1.3

II. STANDARDS OF REVIEW

A. Motion to Alter or Amend a Judgment

Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 59(e) permits a party to file "[a] motion to alter or amend a judgment" within "[twenty-eight] days after the entry of the judgment." Fed. R. Civ. P. 59(e). However, motions under Rule 59(e) are "disfavored," and the moving party bears the burden of establishing "extraordinary circumstances" warranting relief from a final judgment. E.g., Niedermeier v. Office of Baucus, 153 F.Supp.2d 23, 28 (D.D.C. 2001) (citing Anyanwutaku v. Moore, 151 F.3d 1053, 1057 (D.C. Cir. 1998) ). " Rule 59(e) motions need not be granted unless the district court finds that there is an intervening change of controlling law, the availability of new evidence, or the need to correct a clear error or prevent manifest injustice." Anyanwutaku, 151 F.3d at 1057-58 (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). A court must grant a Rule 59(e) motion "if [its] dismissal of the complaint with prejudice was erroneous; that is, the Rule 59(e) motion should be granted unless 'the allegation of other facts consistent with the challenged pleading could not possibly cure the deficiency.' " Brink v. Cont'l Ins. Co., 787 F.3d 1120, 1128 (D.C. Cir. 2015) (quoting Firestone v. Firestone, 76 F.3d 1205, 1209 (D.C. Cir. 1996) ).

B. Motion for Leave to File an Amended Complaint

Under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 15(a), the court should "freely give leave" to a party to amend its pleading "when justice so requires." Fed. R. Civ. P. 15(a)(2). Leave to amend should be granted *4"[i]n the absence of any apparent or declared reason-such as undue delay, bad faith or dilatory motive on the part of the movant, repeated failure to cure deficiencies by amendments previously allowed, undue prejudice to the opposing party by virtue of allowance of the amendment, [or] futility of [the] amendment." Foman v. Davis, 371 U.S. 178, 182, 83 S.Ct. 227, 9 L.Ed.2d 222 (1962).

III. ANALYSIS

A. Order Dismissing the Complaint with Prejudice

The plaintiffs argue that the Court erred in dismissing their Complaint with prejudice because "[d]ismissal of a complaint for jurisdictional reasons such as mootness should be without prejudice." Pls.' Rule 59 Mem. at 3.

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293 F. Supp. 3d 1, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/baltimore-v-pruitt-cadc-2017.