He was an experienced member of the human resources department at the water utility serving the nation’s capital — by the federal government’s account, a high performer with no warnings in his file. In September 2023 he was fired anyway, and government lawyers said the person hired into his place was substantially younger and less qualified. That termination, and others like it in the same department, grew into a federal age discrimination lawsuit. It has now ended with DC Water agreeing to pay more than $200,000 and to change how it treats the older people who work there.
Nearly $217,000 and a court-supervised consent decree
The District of Columbia Water and Sewer Authority, the independent authority that provides water and wastewater service for Washington, will pay nearly $217,000 in monetary relief to settle an age discrimination lawsuit brought by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. The EEOC announced the resolution on July 8, 2026. The case ends in a consent decree, a settlement entered and enforced by the court, which means DC Water resolved the claims without a trial and without any finding of liability.
Money is only part of the decree. It prohibits future age discrimination and requires DC Water to take affirmative steps to prevent it: enhanced non-discrimination policies, notices telling employees about their rights, and advanced training for the utility’s human resources and management officials on the federal law prohibiting discrimination, the utility’s own non-discrimination and complaint policies, and the officials’ obligations under both.
For an employer the size of DC Water, that training provision may matter as much as the check. The people required to sit through it are exactly the people who run terminations.
What the EEOC said happened inside the HR department
According to the EEOC’s lawsuit, DC Water fired the high-performing, experienced older HR employee in September 2023 and replaced him with a substantially younger and less qualified candidate — one of multiple terminations of older workers in that department, the commission said. Because the case settled, these remain allegations rather than court findings, and they should be read that way…