-17-
making the COLA calculation, unless the Court of Appeals to which
an appeal would lie had held otherwise. Golsen v. Commissioner,
54 T.C. 742, 756-757 (1970), affd. 445 F.2d 985 (10th Cir. 1971).
This case is appealable to the Court of Appeals for the
Ninth Circuit, which has decided that January 1, 1986, is the
correct date for purposes of calculating the COLA adjustment
under section 7430. Huffman v. Commissioner, supra at 1151.
Accordingly, we find January 1, 1986, to be the applicable date
from which to make the adjustment in this case. Id.
We use the Consumer Price Index of All Urban Consumers (CPI-
U) published by the U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor
Statistics, to adjust the $75 hourly limit for increases in the
cost of living. We award petitioner attorney's fees at an hourly
rate not to exceed $102.44 for 1994, $104.29 for 1995, $107.37
for 1996, and $109.83 for 1997.6
1. 1994
Petitioner's attorney billed 2.6 hours for the time
incurred in connection with preparing and drafting the Tax Court
petition in the instant proceeding. We find this amount of time
6 The index for the 1982-84 CPI-U is 100; for Jan. 1,
1986 it is 109.6. The CPI-U index is 149.7 for December 1994,
the average index is 152.4 for 1995, 156.9 for 1996, and for July
1997 the index is 160.5. At the time of this decision, the
average index for 1997 is not available. Thus, we must use the
index for July, which is a midyear index. Accordingly, the
maximum hourly rate is $102.44 (149.7/109.6 x $75) for 1994,
$104.29 (152.4/109.6 x $75) for 1995, $107.37 (156.9/109.6 x $75)
for 1996, and $109.83 (160.5/109.6 x $75) for 1997.
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