TROY L. NUNLEY, District Judge.
The parties, Plaintiff, R. Alexander Acosta, Secretary of Labor, United States Department of Labor and Defendants, Guitron Alcazar III, Inc. dba El Tapatio Mexican Cuisine, Amparo Alcazar, Hector Alcazar, and Susan Baker (collectively "Defendants"), through their respective attorneys of record, hereby jointly stipulate to an extension of the currently scheduled discovery deadlines as set forth below.
Pursuant to Rule 16, a party may seek modification of a scheduling order, including modification of a discovery cut-off date, "only for good cause and with a judge's consent." (Fed. R. Civ. P. 16(b)(4)). "Good cause" exists when a scheduling deadline "cannot reasonably be met despite the diligence of the party seeking the extension." (Schaffner v. Crown Equipment Corporation, No. C 09-00284 SBA, 2011 WL 6303408, at *2 [N.D. Cal. Dec. 16, 2011] citing Johnson v. Mammoth Recreations, Inc., 975 F.2d 604, 609 (9th Cir. 1992)). A party may establish good cause by showing: (1) that [he or she] was diligent in assisting the court in creating a workable Rule 16 order; (2) that [his or her] noncompliance with a Rule 16 deadline occurred or will occur, notwithstanding [his or her] diligent efforts to comply, because of the development of matters which could not have been reasonably foreseen or anticipated at the time of the Rule 16 scheduling conference; and (3) that [he or she] was diligent in seeking amendment of the Rule 16 order, once it became apparent that he or she could not comply with the order. (Hood v. Hartford Life & Accident Ins. Co., 567 F.Supp.2d 1221, 1224 [E.D. Cal. 2008] [citation omitted]).
The current deadline to complete all discovery is October 29, 2018.
The parties stipulate and agree to extend the discovery cut-off deadline because additional time is needed to adequately and fairly complete the discovery process.
The parties are currently diligently gathering and reviewing voluminous documents in the most efficient manner possible. However, as the Defendants have been working on gathering these documents, it has proven to require tedious and time-consuming tasks in order to be able to produce them. Depositions will be taken based on the review of these documents.
The current discovery deadline is fast approaching and is putting pressure on the parties, thereby creating a situation that may become more adversarial than otherwise need be.
Extending the discovery deadline pursuant to this Stipulation will allow the parties an opportunity to negotiate informally to complete the discovery process without further involvement of the Court.
The parties make this request to extend the discovery cut-off date after ultimately concluding that avoiding this request is not feasible.
In addition, the parties are interested in discussing resolution of this action short of trial but would like to review the voluminous documents currently being doing so. Extending the discovery deadline will allow the parties time to review said documents and discuss resolution of the matter prior to the discovery deadline; in the event the case does not resolve, the parties will have time to conduct additional discovery before the discovery deadline.
AS SUCH, THE PARTIES STIPULATE AND AGREE TO THE FOLLOWING:
I attest that concurrence in the filing of this document has been obtained from its signatories.
I, Kristin S. Ellenburg, hereby certify that on September 21, 2018 a true and correct copy of the foregoing document was filed with the Court and served electronically through the CM-ECF (electronic case filing) system to all counsel of record to those registered to receive a Notice of Electronic Filing for this case on September 24, 2018.
I declare under penalty of perjury under the laws of the State of California that the foregoing is true and correct. Executed at Sacramento, California, on September 21, 2018.
Upon consideration of the foregoing Stipulation, and good cause appearing therefore,
IT IS HEREBY ORDERED: