T-Mobile Northeast LLC v. The Town of Barnstable

United States Court of Appeals
For the First Circuit
No. 19-2121
T-MOBILE NORTHEAST LLC,
Plaintiff, Appellee,
v.
TOWN OF BARNSTABLE, ET AL.,
Defendants, Appellees.
NANCY SNELL; LORRAINE O'CONNOR,
Putative Intervenors, Appellants.
APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS
[Hon. Denise J. Casper, U.S. District Judge]
Before
Lynch, Selya, and Kayatta,
Circuit Judges.
Paul Revere, III on brief for appellants.
Thomas Scott Thompson, Courtney DeThomas, Patrick J. Curran
Jr., and Davis Wright Tremaine LLP on brief for appellee T-Mobile.
August 7, 2020
SELYA, Circuit Judge. Plaintiff-appellee T-Mobile
Northeast LLC (T-Mobile) wants to operate a wireless
telecommunications facility in an existing church steeple in a
bucolic Cape Cod community. It sought the required municipal
permissions and, when it was unsuccessful in obtaining them, it
sued the Town of Barnstable (the Town), two of its agencies, and
a coterie of municipal officials in the United States District
Court for the District of Massachusetts pursuant to the
Telecommunications Act of 1996 (TCA). See 47 U.S.C. § 332(c)(7).
Two local residents (appellants Nancy Snell and Lorraine O'Connor)
sought leave to intervene. T-Mobile opposed their motions, and
the district court denied them. This appeal followed. Discerning
neither legal error nor abuse of discretion, we affirm.
I. BACKGROUND
We briefly rehearse the relevant facts and travel of the
case, drawing upon facts proffered by the appellants in support of
their nearly identical motions to intervene and supplementing
those proffers with undisputed facts contained elsewhere in the
record. See B. Fernández & Hnos., Inc. v. Kellogg USA, Inc., 440
F.3d 541, 543 (1st Cir. 2006). Our starting point is in 2017,
when T-Mobile obtained a building permit to install an antenna
array concealed within the steeple of South Congregational Church
in the Centerville section of the Town.
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The appellants — who own properties abutting the Church
and represent a civic group called Centerville Concerned Citizens
(CCC) — entered the fray in April of 2018. At that time, CCC
petitioned the Town's Building Commissioner to revoke T-Mobile's
permit on the ground that the Centerville Village District had
been designated a District of Critical Planning Concern (DCPC) and
was therefore subject to zoning restrictions prohibiting the
installation of wireless telecommunications facilities. In July
of 2018, the Commissioner denied CCC's request as untimely but
nonetheless issued a stay of the permit.
T-Mobile spent the next nine months seeking relief from
the Town's Planning Board and Zoning Board of Appeals. At every
turn, CCC and the appellants appeared in opposition and
participated in hearings. At the end of the line, though, the
Zoning Board of Appeals denied T-Mobile's requests for a variance
and a special use permit, largely adopting CCC's argument that the
board lacked jurisdiction to grant relief under the operative DCPC
regulations. Similarly, the Planning Board denied T-Mobile's
application for a regulatory agreement to install the antenna array
in the church steeple and ancillary equipment in the church
basement.
Having exhausted all available avenues for local relief,
T-Mobile repaired to the federal district court. Its complaint
asserted TCA claims against the Town, the Planning Board, the
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Zoning Board of Appeals, and the members of each board in their
representative capacities.1 Enacted by Congress to accelerate the
development of personal wireless networks nationwide, the TCA
limits local land-use regulatory authority over the placement and
construction of such networks and creates a federal cause of action
for parties adversely affected by local regulations that
transgress those limitations. See 47 U.S.C. § 332(c)(7);
Omnipoint Holdings, Inc. v. City of Cranston, 586 F.3d 38, 45-47
(1st Cir. 2009); Nat'l Tower, LLC v. Plainville Zoning Bd. of
Appeals, 297 F.3d 14, 19-20 (1st Cir. 2002).
T-Mobile challenged the Town's denial of regulatory
relief as unsupported by substantial evidence, an unlawful
prohibition on the provision of wireless services, and an exercise
in regulatory excess. See 47 U.S.C. § 332(c)(7)(B). The Town
disputed these challenges and interposed a salmagundi of
affirmative defenses.
More than two months after the commencement of suit, the
appellants moved to intervene as of right, see Fed. R. Civ. P.
24(a), or in the alternative, to intervene permissively, see Fed.
R. Civ. P. 24(b). They anchored their motions on claims that they
1We recognize that simplicity has its virtues. Because the
individual defendants are sued in their representative capacities
and because the two boards are municipal appendages, we proceed as
if the Town was the sole defendant. Our decision, of course,
encompasses all of the named parties.
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were abutting landowners who had a stake in both enforcing the
DCPC zoning regulations and in upholding the decisions of the
Town's land-use boards. T-Mobile opposed the motions. Ruling on
the papers, the district court summarily refused the requests for
intervention. This timely appeal ensued.
While this appeal was pending, the district court
granted summary judgment in T-Mobile's favor on the merits of its
TCA claims. See T-Mobile Ne. LLC v. Town of Barnstable, No. 19-
CV-10982, 2020 WL 3270878, at *9 (D. Mass. June 17, 2020). The
court concluded that the Town's denial of regulatory relief was
not supported by substantial evidence and served, in effect, as an
unlawful prohibition on the provision of wireless services. See
id. at *5-8. T-Mobile advised us of this decision, see Fed. R.
App. P. 28(j), suggesting that the ruling bolstered its argument
that the proposed intervention was untimely. The appellants did
not reply to T-Mobile's Rule 28(j) letter.
II. ANALYSIS
The Civil Rules establish two modes of intervention:
intervention as of right, see Fed. R. Civ. P. 24(a), and permissive
intervention, see Fed. R. Civ. P. 24(b). The appellants claim an
entitlement to both modes. We first discuss the standard of review
and then discuss each of the appellants' claims.
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A. Standard of Review.
We review a district court's denial of a motion for
intervention as of right through an abuse-of-discretion lens. See
Negrón-Almeda v. Santiago, 528 F.3d 15, 21 (1st Cir. 2008). We
use the same abuse-of-discretion lens when reviewing the denial of
a motion for permissive intervention. See Int'l Paper Co. v.
Inhabitants of Town of Jay, 887 F.2d 338, 343 (1st Cir. 1989). We
remain mindful, of course, that the abuse-of-discretion standard
is not a monolith: within it, abstract legal rulings are
scrutinized de novo, factual findings are assayed for clear error,
and the degree of deference afforded to issues of law application
waxes or wanes depending on the particular circumstances. See
Candelario-Del-Moral v. UBS Fin. Servs. Inc. of P.R. (In re Efron),
746 F.3d 30, 35 (1st Cir. 2014); Cotter v. Mass. Ass'n of Minority
Law Enf't Officers, 219 F.3d 31, 34 (1st Cir. 2000).
We add, though, that in the Rule 24(a) context, abuse-
of-discretion review has a special gloss. A district court's
discretion to deny a motion to intervene as of right is
circumscribed by Rule 24(a)'s explicit directive that the court
"must" allow intervention as of right by parties who satisfy the
enumerated requirements. See Cotter, 219 F.3d at 34.
Because of its relationship to the standard of review,
we pause to draw out a common thread that runs through all of the
appellants' arguments. They assail the cryptic nature of the
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district court's summary denial of their motions to intervene. In
their view, the court's failure to explicate its reasoning amounts
to a per se abuse of discretion, requiring vacation of its order.
This argument is unavailing.
The appellants offer no precedential support for their
ipse dixit that brevity in denying a motion for intervention,
without more, constitutes a per se abuse of discretion. What is
more, the case law is inhospitable to this notion. See, e.g.,
Ungar v. Arafat, 634 F.3d 46, 51 (1st Cir. 2011) (rejecting claim
that district court abused discretion by conclusorily denying
intervention as of right because appellate court could review
record and "gauge whether the court applied the . . . factors
appropriately"). Where, as here, the district court does not state
its reasons for denying intervention, abuse-of-discretion review
simply becomes less deferential because "there is nothing to which
to give deference." Cotter, 219 F.3d at 34. In other words,
"[w]here . . . the district court made no specific findings, we
can do so, relying on the record." Geiger v. Foley Hoag LLP Ret.
Plan, 521 F.3d 60, 64 (1st Cir. 2008); cf. R & G Mortg. Corp. v.
Fed. Home Loan Mortg. Corp., 584 F.3d 1, 12 (1st Cir. 2009)
(stating that "when a trial court's order is imprecise, the court
of appeals frequently 'can comb relevant parts of the record to
discern the authoring court's intention'" (quoting Negrón-Almeda,
528 F.3d at 23)).
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The upshot is that where, as here, the district court
summarily denies a motion to intervene, the court of appeals must
review the record as a whole to ascertain whether, on the facts at
hand, the denial was within the compass of the district court's
discretion. See Ungar, 634 F.3d at 51 & n.4; cf. Geiger, 521 F.3d
at 64-65 (holding that district court did not abuse discretion by
summarily granting intervention where "record amply demonstrate[d]
that [intervenor] satisfied the requirements of Rule 24(a)"). It
is against this backdrop that we turn to the denial of the
appellants' motions.
B. Intervention as of Right.
To prevail on a motion for intervention as of right, a
putative intervenor must demonstrate (1) the timeliness of her
motion; (2) a concrete interest in the pending action; (3) "a
realistic threat" that resolution of the pending action will hinder
her ability to effectuate that interest; and (4) the absence of
adequate representation by any existing party. R & G Mortg., 584
F.3d at 7. It is black letter law that a failure to satisfy any
one of these four requirements sounds the death knell for a motion
to intervene as of right. See Ungar, 634 F.3d at 50-51; Pub. Serv.
Co. of N.H. v. Patch, 136 F.3d 197, 204 (1st Cir. 1998). In this
instance, the most obvious shortcoming in the appellants'
asseverational array relates to the fourth requirement: adequacy
of representation. We start — and end — with that requirement.
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To demonstrate inadequate representation, a putative
intervenor must show that no existing party fairly represents her
interests. See Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v. President &
Fellows of Harvard Coll., 807 F.3d 472, 475 (1st Cir. 2015).
Although this requirement typically demands only a showing that an
existing party's representation may prove inadequate, see
Conservation Law Found., Inc. v. Mosbacher, 966 F.2d 39, 44 (1st
Cir. 1992), such a showing necessitates more than empty conjecture,
see Patch, 136 F.3d at 207 (cautioning that this requirement "is
more than a paper tiger"). As we have said, a party pursuing
intervention as of right "must produce some tangible basis to
support a claim of purported inadequacy" of representation. Id.
This requirement has additional bite when a would-be
intervenor's objective aligns seamlessly with that of an existing
party. In such a situation, a rebuttable presumption of adequate
representation attaches. See Students for Fair Admissions, 807
F.3d at 475; B. Fernández, 440 F.3d at 546. So, too, when a would-
be intervenor seeks to appear alongside a governmental body in
defense of the validity of some official action, a rebuttable
presumption arises that the government adequately represents the
interests of the would-be intervenor. See Maine v. Dir., U.S.
Fish & Wildlife Serv., 262 F.3d 13, 19 (1st Cir. 2001); Daggett v.
Comm'n on Governmental Ethics & Election Practices, 172 F.3d 104,
111 (1st Cir. 1999); Patch, 136 F.3d at 207.
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These presumptions hold sway here. With respect to
T-Mobile's TCA claims, the Town and the appellants share the same
ultimate goal: each of them is seeking to vindicate local land-
use regulations and uphold the Town's administrative
determinations. In addition, the presumption that a governmental
entity defending official acts adequately represents the interests
of its citizens applies full-bore, given the Town's vigorous, no-
holds-barred defense of its refusal to grant a variance or other
regulatory relief to T-Mobile. See, e.g., Mass. Food Ass'n v.
Mass. Alcoholic Beverages Control Comm'n, 197 F.3d 560, 567 (1st
Cir. 1999) (applying this presumption when there was "no doubt
that [government defendant] was zealously interested in upholding
the validity of the [challenged] statute").
To defeat these presumptions, the appellants would have
had to put forward "a strong affirmative showing" that the Town
does not adequately represent their interests. Patch, 136 F.3d at
207 (quoting United States v. Hooker Chems. & Plastics Corp., 749
F.2d 968, 985 (2d Cir. 1984)); see B. Fernández, 440 F.3d at 546
(explaining that putative intervenor must "offer 'an adequate
explanation as to why'" existing party's representation is
insufficient (quoting Maine, 262 F.3d at 19)). Such a showing
would have had to consist of "'something more than speculation as
to the purported inadequacy' of representation." Students for
Fair Admissions, 807 F.3d at 475 (quoting Moosehead Sanitary Dist.
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v. S. G. Phillips Corp., 610 F.2d 49, 54 (1st Cir. 1979)). Here,
however, the appellants made no such showing in the district court.
Instead, they offered only conclusory arguments, founded entirely
on speculation and surmise.
To illustrate, the appellants — in struggling to portray
the Town's representation as deficient — worry that the Town
"ultimately may settle this matter" and suggest that the Town
"appears to be adopting a litigation strategy that seems
inadequate." But there is no meat on these bones; the appellants'
conjectures are tendered without either specificity or record
support. For aught that appears, the Town has conducted a robust
defense, and the appellants have not identified even a single
shortcoming in its handling of the litigation. A showing of
inadequate representation cannot rest on so flimsy a foundation.2
To cinch the matter, a court ordinarily may deem an
existing party's representation adequate if that party is likely
to raise the putative intervenor's preferred arguments and it seems
improbable that the putative intervenor will add any missing
element. See United Nuclear Corp. v. Cannon, 696 F.2d 141, 144
2 For the first time on appeal, the appellants attempt to
raise the specter of a poorly conceived legal strategy on the
Town's part. Few principles are as entrenched in this circuit as
that, "absent the most extraordinary circumstances, legal theories
not raised squarely in the lower court cannot be broached for the
first time on appeal." Teamsters Union, Local No. 59 v. Superline
Transp. Co., 953 F.2d 17, 21 (1st Cir. 1992).
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(1st Cir. 1982). Given the circumstances of this case, the
district court was entitled to invoke this rule of thumb. After
all, the appellants' neither identified any arguments that the
Town was unlikely to advance nor articulated any convincing reason
that might have led the district court to believe that they would
inject some missing ingredient into the Town's defense.
That ends this aspect of the matter. Because the
appellants failed to make a cognizable showing of inadequacy of
representation, we affirm the district court's denial of their
motions to intervene as of right.
C. Permissive Intervention.
We need not linger long over the district court's denial
of the appellants' motions for permissive intervention. Under
Rule 24(b), a district court may, in its discretion, allow the
intervention of any party who "has a claim or defense that shares
with the main action a common question of law or fact." Fed. R.
Civ. P. 24(b)(1)(B). Although the appellants cross this threshold,
that does not get them very far: they must offer some persuasive
reason as to why the district court abused its discretion in
denying intervention.
When deciding whether or not to allow permissive
intervention on behalf of persons who share common issues of law
and/or fact with an existing party, a district court "must consider
whether the intervention will unduly delay or prejudice the
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adjudication of the original parties' rights." Fed. R. Civ. P.
24(b)(3). Additionally, the court may "consider almost any factor
rationally relevant" to the intervention determination. Daggett,
172 F.3d at 113. The court "enjoys very broad discretion in
granting or denying [such a] motion." Id.
In the court below, the putative intervenors argued that
their status as abutting landowners gave them defenses that shared
common questions of law and/or fact with the defenses asserted by
the Town; that this status rendered them aggrieved persons under
Massachusetts law, see Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 40A, § 17 (establishing
right of appeal by "[a]ny person aggrieved by a decision of the
[zoning] board of appeals"), impliedly repealed on other grounds
by Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 185, § 3A; and that, therefore, they should
be permitted to intervene. This argument turns state law upside-
down: even if we assume that "aggrieved person" status under state
law factors into the permissive intervention calculus, the
putative intervenors' insistence that they have such status is
misplaced. Far from being aggrieved by the Town's denial of
regulatory relief, the appellants seek to uphold that denial. They
are, therefore, not aggrieved persons within the contemplation of
the Massachusetts statute. See Prudential Ins. Co. of Am. v. Bd.
of Appeals of Westwood, 469 N.E.2d 501, 503 (Mass. App. Ct. 1984)
(explaining that abutters who opposed site plan did not qualify as
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persons aggrieved by zoning board's rejection of plan because "they
were presumably benefited by it").
To the extent that the appellants' motions for
permissive intervention can be construed to cut a wider swath, the
record amply supports their denial. To begin, a district court
considering requests for permissive intervention should ordinarily
give weight to whether the original parties to the action
adequately represent the interests of the putative intervenors.
See Kowal v. Malkemus (In re Thompson), 965 F.2d 1136, 1142 n.10
(1st Cir. 1992). As we already have explained, see supra Part
II(B), the appellants made no showing that the Town would fail to
represent their interests adequately.
Relatedly, a district court mulling permissive
intervention is free to consider whether "the applicants may be
helpful in fully developing the case." Daggett, 172 F.3d at 113.
Here, the appellants' motion papers did not articulate what, if
anything, they would contribute to the vitality of the Town's
defense. Faced with this silent record, the district court was
not obliged to conjure up unpleaded allegations. Cf. United States
v. Zannino, 895 F.2d 1, 17 (1st Cir. 1990) (explaining that
"[j]udges are not expected to be mindreaders," with the result
that litigants are expected "'to spell out [their] arguments
squarely and distinctly,' or else forever hold [their] peace"
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(quoting Rivera-Gomez v. de Castro, 843 F.2d 631, 635 (1st Cir.
1988))).
If more were needed — and we do not think that it is —
Rule 24(b)(3) directs courts to consider whether permissive
intervention "will unduly delay or prejudice the adjudication of
the original parties' rights." This directive is especially
important in TCA cases because a core purpose of the TCA is to
minimize delay in resolving disputes about the construction of
wireless telecommunications facilities. See 47 U.S.C.
§ 332(c)(7)(B)(v) (requiring courts to "hear and decide [TCA
actions] on an expedited basis"); Omnipoint Holdings, 586 F.3d at
47 (explaining that TCA "stresses the need for speedily deploying
telecommunications and seeks to get prompt resolution of
disputes"). Multiplying the number of parties in a case will often
lead to delay. Cf. Daggett, 172 F.3d at 113 (noting that district
court's "thought that the addition of still more parties would
complicate a case" was "plainly a permissible consideration").
With this in mind, we think it evident that permitting intervention
in TCA actions by parties who — like the appellants — do not appear
poised to add anything of meaningful value to the litigation would
unduly hinder the efficient resolution of TCA cases. See id.
(finding it within district court's discretion to consider that
case "badly need[s] to be expedited" and that "more parties would
complicate" matters unnecessarily).
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The short of it is that a district court's discretion to
grant or deny motions for permissive intervention is very broad.
See Travelers Indem. Co. v. Dingwell, 884 F.2d 629, 641 (1st Cir.
1989); Int'l Paper, 887 F.2d at 343. We will set aside such a
decision only upon a showing of a clear abuse of that broad
discretion. See Travelers Indem., 884 F.2d at 641. On this
record, there is no principled way for us to say that the district
court abused its discretion in denying the appellants' motions for
permissive intervention.
III. CONCLUSION
We need go no further. For the reasons elucidated above,
the order denying intervention is
Affirmed.
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