Lough v. Washington State Department of Social and Health Services

Opinion

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5 6 7 UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 8 WESTERN DISTRICT OF WASHINGTON AT TACOMA 9 10 ROBERT LOUGH, CASE NO. 3:20-CV-5894-JCC-DWC 11 Plaintiff, ORDER GRANTING DEFENDANTS’ 12 v. MOTION FOR EXTENSION OF DISPOSITIVE MOTIONS DEADLINE 13 WASHINGTON STATE DEPARTMENT OF SOCIAL AND 14 HEALTH SERVICES, et al., 15 Defendant.

16 This is a civil rights action brought pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983. Pending before this 17 Court is Defendants’ Motion for an extension of the dispositive motions deadline. Dkt. 66. 18 Plaintiff objects to an extension. Dkt. 67. 19 Defendants request a 30-day extension of the dispositive motions deadline, currently 20 October 1, 2021. Dkt. 66; Dkt. 36. Defendants state that discovery is ongoing after a meet and 21 confer on August 25, 2021 resulted in refined discovery requests and a pending settlement offer. 22 Dkt. 66 at 2. Moreover, according to Defendants, each of the three attorneys assigned to this case 23 24 1 have jury trials in the next 30-days, and due to COVID-19 their office is short-staffed, which has 2 increased and complicated everyone’s workload. Id. 3 Plaintiff objects to this extension, arguing that extending the deadline will further delay 4 his case and that Defendants have had ample opportunity to prepare for and file dispositive

5 motions. Dkt. 67 at 2-3. Plaintiff also indicates that he rejected Defendants’ settlement offer and 6 is still waiting for discovery documents. Id. at 3. Although Plaintiff does not claim he will be 7 prejudiced by the proposed extension, he does argue that granting it “would be a manifest of (sic) 8 injustice”. Id. 9 Pursuant to local rule, a motion for relief from a deadline should be filed before the 10 deadline lapses. LCR 7(j). The party requesting the extension must show good cause for the 11 extension. Fed. R. Civ. P. 26(b), 6(b)(1). In addition, and extension “normally will be granted in 12 the absence of bad faith on the part of the party seeking relief or prejudice to the adverse party.” 13 California Trout v. Fed. Energy Regulatory Comm’n, 572 F.3d 1003, 1027 n.1 (9th Cir. 2009). 14 The Court finds Defendants have shown good cause for an extension of the dispositive

15 motions deadline, that Defendants are not acting in bad faith, and that a brief extension will not 16 prejudice Plaintiff. Accordingly, it is ORDERED: 17 1) Defendants’ motion (Dkt. 66) is granted. The Parties may now file dispositive 18 motions on or before November 1, 2021. 19 20 Dated this 21st day of September, 2021. 21 A 22 David W. Christel United States Magistrate Judge 23 24