Barry v. City of Los Angeles

── Barry v. City of Los Angeles ── Court: Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit Date: May 26, 2026 Category: General NOT FOR PUBLICATION FILED UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS MAY 26 2026 MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK U.S. COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT MIKE BARRY; TRPMOI FAMILY No. 25-1038 TRUST; ROYAL HOSPITALITY GROUP, D.C. No. INC., doing business as Mirage Hospitality 2:24-cv-01189-JAK-JPR Group, Inc., Plaintiffs - Appellants, MEMORANDUM* v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES, a municipal corporation, Defendant - Appellee, DOES 1-10, inclusive, Defendant. Appeal from the United States District Court for the Central District of California John A. Kronstadt, District Judge, Presiding Submitted May 21, 2026** Pasadena, California Before: LEE, BUMATAY, and SUNG, Circuit Judges. * This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3. ** The panel unanimously concludes this case is suitable for decision without oral argument. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2).  Mike Barry, Trpmoi Family Trust, and Royal Hospitality Group, Inc. (collectively, “Barry”) appeal the district court’s order dismissing Barry’s state-law claims and deferring his federal claims under the abstention doctrine of R.R. Comm’n of Tex. v. Pullman Co., 312 U.S. 496, 497 (1941). We have appellate jurisdiction over orders of abstention. 28 U.S.C. § 1291; Confederated Salish v. Simonich, 29 F.3d 1398, 1407 (9th Cir. 1994). We review de novo whether the elements for abstention are met and then for abuse of discretion as to the district court’s ultimate decision to abstain. Gearing v. City of Half Moon Bay, 54 F.4th 1144, 1147 (9th Cir. 2022). We affirm. A federal court may abstain under the Pullman doctrine only if “(1) the case touches on a sensitive area of social policy upon which the federal courts ought not enter unless no alternative to its adjudication is open, (2) constitutional adjudication plainly can be avoided if a definite ruling on the state issue would terminate the controversy, and (3) the proper resolution of the possible determinative issue of state law is uncertain.” Am. Encore v. Fontes, 152 F.4th 1097, 1122 (9th Cir. 2025). First, this case involves a sufficiently “sensitive area of social policy” because it arises out of the City of Los Angeles’s land-use planning. “We have long held that land use planning is a sensitive area of social policy that meets the first requirement for Pullman abstention.” Gearing, 54 F.4th at 1150 (simplified). For example, we have held a city ordinance was a prototypical example of land-use 2 25-1038 planning justifying Pullman abstention when it restricted short-term hotel occupancy in favor of long-term residential units. San Remo Hotel v. City & County of San Francisco, 145 F.3d 1095, 1105 (9th Cir. 1998). Here, Barry challenges an ordinance that classifies hotel units as either for transient occupants or for residential tenants. Thus, just like in San Remo Hotel, Barry’s suit touches on land-use planning and meets the first element for Pullman abstention. Second, a federal constitutional issue may be avoided by a definitive state- court ruling because if Barry succeeds on his state-law claim for a writ of mandate, the federal issues in the case will be mooted or narrowed considerably. See Sinclair Oil Corp. v. County of Santa Barbara, 96 F.3d 401, 409 (9th Cir. 1996); Gearing, 54 F.4th at 1150–51 (holding that this requirement was satisfied where a state-