FOR PUBLICATION
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
CENTRAL VALLEY AG ENTERPRISES,
No. 05-16177
Plaintiff-Appellant,
D.C. No.
v.
CV-03-06366-AWI
(SMS)
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Defendant-Appellee.
OPINION
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Eastern District of California
Anthony W. Ishii, District Judge, Presiding
Argued and Submitted
March 13, 2007—San Francisco, California
Filed June 25, 2008
Before: Melvin Brunetti, William A. Fletcher, and
Carlos T. Bea, Circuit Judges.
Opinion by Judge Brunetti
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COUNSEL
Scott M. Reddie, Hilton A. Ryder and Todd W. Baxter,
McCormick, Barstow, Sheppard, Wayte & Carruth LLP,
Fresno, California; and Myron L. Frans and Walter A. Pick-
hardt, Faegre & Benson LLP, Minneapolis, Minnesota, for the
plaintiff-appellant.
Thomas J. Clark, Gilbert S. Rothenberg and Michelle B.
O’Connor, Tax Division, U.S. Department of Justice, Wash-
ington, D.C., for the defendant-appellee.
OPINION
BRUNETTI, Circuit Judge:
This bankruptcy appeal involves the intersection of 11
U.S.C. § 505(a) of the Bankruptcy Code, which generally
authorizes bankruptcy courts to redetermine a debtor’s tax lia-
bility, and the Tax Equity And Fiscal Responsibility Act of
1982 (“TEFRA”), which provides that the tax treatment of
partnership items ordinarily must be determined at the part-
nership level. After Chapter 11 debtor Central Valley Ag
Enterprises filed an objection to the Government’s $13.1 mil-
lion tax claim in its bankruptcy proceeding, the district court
dismissed the action on the basis that the statutory res judicata
provision in 11 U.S.C. § 505(a)(2)(A) deprives it of subject
matter jurisdiction to review the tax treatment of any partner-
ship item that has been administratively determined by the
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CENTRAL VALLEY v. UNITED STATES
Internal Revenue Service and has become final pursuant to
TEFRA. We disagree with that determination and additionally
hold that 11 U.S.C. § 505(a)(1) grants the district court sub-
ject matter jurisdiction to review the tax treatm