United States v. 2020-10-22 | 19-56451 | EHOF LAKESIDE II, LLC V. COUNTY OF RIVERSIDE | nonprecedential | memorandum disposition |

NOT FOR PUBLICATION
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

EHOF LAKESIDE II, LLC, a Delaware
limited liability corporation,
Plaintiff-Appellant,
v.
RIVERSIDE COUNTY
TRANSPORTATION COMMISSION;
COUNTY OF RIVERSIDE; WESTERN
RIVERSIDE COUNTY REGIONAL
CONSERVATION AUTHORITY,
Defendants-Appellees.
No. 19-56451
D.C. No.
5:19-cv-01693-JGB-SHK
MEMORANDUM
*
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Central District of California
Jesus G. Bernal, District Judge, Presiding
Argued and Submitted October 8, 2020
Seattle, Washington
Before: GRABER and W. FLETCHER, Circuit Judges, and KOBAYASHI,
**
District Judge.

FILED
OCT 22 2020
MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
*
This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent
except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3.
* *
The Honorable Leslie E. Kobayashi, United States District Judge for
the District of Hawaii, sitting by designation.

EHOF Lakeside II, LLC (“EHOF”) appeals from the district court’s grant of
a Pullman abstention pending the resolution of EHOF’s earlier-filed state lawsuit.
See R.R. Comm'n of Tex. v. Pullman Co., 312 U.S. 496 (1941). Pullman abstention
orders are immediately appealable under 28 U.S.C. §§ 1291, 1292(a)(1), and we
affirm. See Porter v. Jones, 319 F.3d 483, 489 (9th Cir. 2003).
EHOF claims that Riverside County Transportation Commission, Western
Riverside County Regional Conservation Authority (“RCA”), and the County of
Riverside (collectively, “Defendants”) have taken its land without compensation in
violation of the Fifth Amendment. EHOF asserts that Defendants used the
county’s Multiple Species Habitat Conservation Plan (“MSHCP”) to delay its
project’s building entitlements in order to coerce EHOF into selling its property to
RCA for conservation. Now that EHOF has requested to sell to RCA, it alleges
that RCA is delaying an offer because it lacks the funds to purchase the land. After
first bringing an inverse condemnation and other claims in state court, EHOF filed
this claim under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 in federal district court.
We agree with the district court that all three requirements for a Pullman
abstention are satisfied here. See C-Y Dev. Co. v. City of Redlands, 703 F.2d 375,
377 (9th Cir. 1983). First, this dispute involves land use, a sensitive area of state
law. Id.; Pearl Inv. Co. v. City and Cnty. of San Francisco, 774 F.2d 1460, 1463
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(9th Cir. 1985). Second, resolution of the disputed state-law question—whether
the MSHCP requires payment in the current situation—could moot or significantly
alter the federal takings claim. See Kollsman v. City of Los Angeles, 737 F.2d 830,
833 (9th Cir. 1984). Third, the state-law question has not been resolved by
California courts and is undecided for purposes of Pullman. See Pearl, 774 F.2d at
1465.
EHOF chose to file its state-court inverse condemnation suit shortly before
the U.S. Supreme Court decided Knick v. Township of Scott, 139 S. Ct. 2162
(2019). In this circumstance, we need not decide the precise scope of Pullman in
the post-Knick world.
AFFIRMED.
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