DeKalb commissioners approved Tuesday a $420,000 settlement in a whistleblower lawsuit brought by a former county employee.
The settlement is still to be finalized in court. But former procurement officer Teresa Slayton — who in her 2018 complaint said she was fired because she alerted officials to bid-rigging, collusion and corruption in the county’s Department of Watershed Management — would receive nearly $228,000 in exchange for dropping the lawsuit.
Her attorneys would receive a little over $192,000.
Slayton’s lawsuit was originally filed in DeKalb County Superior Court before being moved to the U.S. District Court in Atlanta. Online records suggest the case was scheduled to go to trial in January.
The county commission’s discussion of the proposed settlement was held behind closed doors, as is permitted by Georgia law. The county administration declined to provide further comment.
Slayton referred questions to her attorneys, who did not immediately respond to inquiries from the AJC.
According to her suit, Slayton started working as a senior procurement agent for the county in August 2016. She was a team lead for purchases related to the billion-dollar overhaul of the county’s water and sewer systems.
In court documents, Slayton said she was demoted after informing supervisor Warrick Sams and chief procurement officer Talisa Clark about a myriad of issues within the watershed department. Those issues allegedly included a contractor overbilling the county through...
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