diff --git a/docs/en_US/release_notes_9_16.rst b/docs/en_US/release_notes_9_16.rst
index d33387ce5a5..7dfd532959a 100644
--- a/docs/en_US/release_notes_9_16.rst
+++ b/docs/en_US/release_notes_9_16.rst
@@ -51,6 +51,7 @@ Bug fixes
   | `Issue #9762 <https://github.com/pgadmin-org/pgadmin4/issues/9762>`_ -  Fix the "Cannot read properties of undefined (reading 'map')" crash in the desktop runtime when a menu refresh is triggered before the application menus have been received.
   | `Issue #9766 <https://github.com/pgadmin-org/pgadmin4/issues/9766>`_ -  Fixed an issue where a server's custom foreground colour was not applied to the object counts (children count) and column type labels shown in the object explorer.
   | `Issue #9828 <https://github.com/pgadmin-org/pgadmin4/issues/9828>`_ -  Fix tool calls failing against OpenAI-compatible providers that emit empty/null name, arguments, or id fields in streaming continuation deltas.
+  | `Issue #9829 <https://github.com/pgadmin-org/pgadmin4/issues/9829>`_ -  Fixed installation on Python 3.9 (e.g. RHEL/Rocky/AlmaLinux 8 and 9) failing with "No module named 'pkg_resources'" by pinning setuptools below the version that dropped pkg_resources for Python 3.9.
   | `Issue #9854 <https://github.com/pgadmin-org/pgadmin4/issues/9854>`_ -  Fix the JSON editor stripping trailing fractional zeros (e.g. 10.00) and rewriting large integers in jsonb values, which corrupted unmodified numbers when saving.
   | `Issue #9864 <https://github.com/pgadmin-org/pgadmin4/issues/9864>`_ -  Fixed a regression where the rectangular (block/column) text selection in the code editor stopped working; restored the default Alt+drag selection without re-introducing the crosshair cursor on Alt+F5 (#9570).
   | `Issue #9868 <https://github.com/pgadmin-org/pgadmin4/issues/9868>`_ -  Warn before opening a very large JSON/JSONB value in the data grid cell editor, which could freeze pgAdmin, and let the user choose whether to proceed.
@@ -67,4 +68,4 @@ Bug fixes
   | `Issue #9988 <https://github.com/pgadmin-org/pgadmin4/issues/9988>`_ -  Provide an actionable error when 'openid' is in OAUTH2_SCOPE but OAUTH2_SERVER_METADATA_URL is not set, instead of a cryptic Authlib failure.
   | `Issue #10027 <https://github.com/pgadmin-org/pgadmin4/issues/10027>`_ -  Fix the spurious "Crypt key is missing" error and logged traceback in the Query Tool new-connection endpoints after a backend restart, by surfacing it as the standard CRYPTKEY_MISSING response so the client recovers transparently.
   | `Issue #10029 <https://github.com/pgadmin-org/pgadmin4/issues/10029>`_ -  Fixed a regression where the rectangular (block/column) text selection in the code editor stopped working; restored the default Alt+drag selection without re-introducing the crosshair cursor on Alt+F5 (#9570).
-  | `Issue #10059 <https://github.com/pgadmin-org/pgadmin4/issues/10059>`_ -  Fix the generated SQL for editing a SQL-language function/procedure whose body contains the word "return" (e.g. a RETURNING clause), which was wrongly treated as a SQL-standard body and produced a statement without the AS $BODY$ wrapper.
\ No newline at end of file
+  | `Issue #10059 <https://github.com/pgadmin-org/pgadmin4/issues/10059>`_ -  Fix the generated SQL for editing a SQL-language function/procedure whose body contains the word "return" (e.g. a RETURNING clause), which was wrongly treated as a SQL-standard body and produced a statement without the AS $BODY$ wrapper.
diff --git a/requirements.txt b/requirements.txt
index 3c288fb0d1b..c2b44b10a56 100644
--- a/requirements.txt
+++ b/requirements.txt
@@ -55,7 +55,8 @@ pytz==2026.*
 # pinned for https://github.com/andfoy/pywinpty/issues/545
 pywinpty==2.0.*; sys_platform=="win32"
 qrcode[pil]==8.*
-setuptools==82.*
+setuptools<82; python_version <= '3.9'
+setuptools==82.*; python_version > '3.9'
 SQLAlchemy==2.*
 sqlparse==0.*
 sshtunnel==0.*