Solebury Twp. v. Dep't of Envtl. Res

In Solebury Twp. v. Dep't of Envtl. Res., 593 Pa. 146, 158, 928 A.2d 990, 997 (2007), our Supreme Court approved the use of these factors, but concluded that this Court had applied the four factors too conservatively. The Supreme Court noted first that, based upon the language of Section 307(b) of the Law, EHB's discretion to award attorneys' fees also encompasses its ability to adopt standards by which it may evaluate fee requests. Nevertheless, the Supreme Court observed that Section 307(b) of the Law did not contain language used in other federal fee-shifting statutes limiting the definition of the term "prevailing party." Therefore, because the language of the federal fee-shifting laws did not track our own and did not clearly reflect the same public policy underlying our fee-shifting provision, our Supreme Court held that the decisions interpreting those federal laws could not support EHB's narrow application of the Kwalwasser test with regard to a request for fees under Section 307(b) of the Law.