Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-14-05053/USCOURTS-caDC-14-05053-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Edna Doak
Appellant
Jeh Charles Johnson
Appellee

Document Text:

United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued May 8, 2015 Decided August 18, 2015

No. 14-5053

EDNA DOAK,

APPELLANT

v.

JEH CHARLES JOHNSON, SECRETARY, US DEPARTMENT OF 

HOMELAND SECURITY,

APPELLEE

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the District of Columbia

(No. 1:12-cv-01177)

Anabia Hasan argued the cause for appellant. On the 

brief was Alan Lescht.

John C. Truong, Assistant U.S. Attorney, argued the 

cause for appellee. With him on the brief were Ronald C. 

Machen Jr., U.S. Attorney at the time the brief was filed, and 

R. Craig Lawrence, Assistant U.S. Attorney. Michelle Lo, 

Assistant U.S. Attorney, entered an appearance.

Before: GARLAND, Chief Judge, and MILLETT and 

WILKINS, Circuit Judges.

Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge MILLETT.

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MILLETT, Circuit Judge: Edna Doak suffers from a 

variety of debilitating conditions that caused her to miss a 

significant amount of work, with little or no predictable 

pattern or advance notice to her employer, the United States 

Coast Guard. She sought various accommodations from the 

Coast Guard, which granted many of her requests. But it 

denied her requests for a later start time and the option to 

telecommute, among others, because the Coast Guard 

determined that those accommodations were neither justified 

by the medical documentation Doak had submitted nor 

compatible with her job duties. The Coast Guard eventually 

fired Doak when her attendance did not improve.

Doak then sued the Secretary of the Department of 

Homeland Security (the Department in which the Coast Guard 

is housed) (“Coast Guard”) under the Rehabilitation Act, 29 

U.S.C. §§ 701 et seq., alleging that it had unlawfully denied 

her accommodations and terminated her in retaliation for 

requesting those accommodations. The district court granted 

summary judgment to the Coast Guard on the grounds that 

Doak was not a qualified individual able to perform her job 

duties even with reasonable accommodations and that she had 

produced no evidence that would permit a reasonable jury to 

find that the Coast Guard retaliated against her. We affirm.

I

Statutory and Regulatory Framework

Congress enacted the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, 29 

U.S.C. §§ 701 et seq., “to ensure that the Federal Government 

plays a leadership role in promoting the employment of 

individuals with disabilities,” id. § 701(b)(2). To that end, the 

Act requires that federal employers provide “reasonable 

accommodations to the known physical or mental limitations 

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of an otherwise qualified individual with a disability.” 42 

U.S.C. § 12112(b)(5)(A) (provision of the Americans with 

Disabilities Act that is incorporated into the Rehabilitation 

Act, see 29 U.S.C. § 791(g) (2012) (to be recodified at 29 

U.S.C. § 791(f), see Pub. L. No. 113-128, § 456(a), 128 Stat. 

1425, 1675 (2014))); see also 29 C.F.R. § 1614.203(b) 

(applying to the Rehabilitation Act the standards in the 

Americans with Disabilities Act regulations, 29 C.F.R. Part 

1630). An “otherwise qualified individual with a disability,”

42 U.S.C. § 12112(b)(5)(A), is an individual who has “a 

physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one or 

more major life activities,” id. § 12102(1)(A), and who “can 

perform the essential functions” of her job “with or without 

reasonable accommodation,” id. § 12111(8).

In determining the “essential functions” of a job, 

“consideration shall be given to the employer’s judgment as

to what functions of a job are essential[.]” 42 U.S.C. 

§ 12111(8). If an employer “has prepared a written 

description before advertising or interviewing applicants for 

the job, this description shall be considered evidence of the 

essential functions of the job.” Id. The Equal Employment 

Opportunity Commission (“EEOC”), in turn, has issued 

regulations defining as “essential functions” those 

“fundamental job duties of the employment position the 

individual with a disability holds or desires.” 29 C.F.R. 

§ 1630.2(n). In deciding what is “essential,” the EEOC’s 

interpretive guidance first “focuses on whether the employer 

actually requires employees in the position to perform the 

functions that the employer asserts are essential.” 29 C.F.R. 

Pt. 1630, App. § 1630.2(n). If so, then the question of 

essentiality comes down to “whether removing the function 

would fundamentally alter that position.” Id.

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The Rehabilitation Act also prohibits retaliation against 

an individual for exercising her rights under the Act. As 

relevant here, the Act makes it unlawful to “coerce, 

intimidate, threaten, or interfere with any individual in the 

exercise or enjoyment of, or on account of his or her having 

exercised or enjoyed * * * any right granted or protected by 

this chapter.” 42 U.S.C. § 12203(b).

The Rehabilitation Act requires individuals to exhaust 

administrative remedies before they can file suit to enforce 

the Act’s protections. See Barkley v. United States Marshals 

Service, 766 F.3d 25, 33 (D.C. Cir. 2014); see also 29 U.S.C. 

§ 794a(a)(1). For claims against federal agencies, exhaustion 

requires submitting a claim to the employing agency itself. 

See Kizas v. Webster, 707 F.2d 524, 543–544 (D.C. Cir. 1983) 

(describing administrative exhaustion process for federal 

employees as set forth by Title VII, 42 U.S.C. §§ 2000e-5(b), 

-16(c), and EEOC regulations promulgated under Title VII); 

29 U.S.C. § 794a(a)(1) (incorporating certain “remedies, 

procedures, and rights set forth in” Title VII); Barkley, 766 

F.3d at 34 (same process under the Rehabilitation Act). 

The procedures governing administrative remedies for 

discrimination claims against federal agencies are set forth in 

EEOC regulations. See generally 29 C.F.R. Part 1614. Those 

regulations provide the procedural framework for processing 

complaints of discrimination not just under the Rehabilitation 

Act, but also under a panoply of federal anti-discrimination 

laws, including Title VII, 42 U.S.C. §§ 2000e et seq. 

(discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, and 

national origin), the Age Discrimination in Employment Act, 

29 U.S.C. §§ 621 et seq., the Equal Pay Act, 29 U.S.C. 

§ 206(d) (sex-based wage discrimination), and the Genetic 

Information Nondiscrimination Act, 42 U.S.C. § 2000ff. See 

29 C.F.R. § 1614.103(a). 

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One of those regulations requires individuals who believe 

they have been the victim of unlawful discrimination under 

the relevant laws to consult with an Equal Employment 

Opportunity (“EEO”) Counselor at the agency where they are 

employed or sought employment “prior to filing a complaint 

in order to try to informally resolve the matter.” 29 C.F.R. 

§ 1614.105(a). “An aggrieved person must initiate contact 

with a Counselor within 45 days of the date of the matter 

alleged to be discriminatory or, in the case of personnel 

action, within 45 days of the effective date of the action,” id.

§ 1614.105(a)(1), although that deadline has exceptions, id.

§ 1614.105(a)(2).

If that informal counseling fails to resolve the matter, the 

aggrieved individual may then file a complaint with the 

agency that allegedly discriminated against her. See 29 

C.F.R. § 1614.106. The filing of that complaint begins the 

formal administrative grievance process, through which the 

agency investigates, considers, and decides the merits of the 

complaint. See id. §§ 1614.107–110. Once that process 

concludes or stalls, the Rehabilitation Act authorizes the filing 

of a lawsuit in federal court by “any employee or applicant for 

employment aggrieved by the final disposition of [her 

administrative] complaint, or by the failure to take final action 

on such complaint.” 29 U.S.C. § 794a(a)(1).

Factual Background

From November 2007 until October 2010, Edna Doak 

worked in the Office of Acquisition Resources Management 

at the United States Coast Guard, first as a Program Analyst, 

then as a Management Program Analyst. Her day-to-day 

responsibilities included monitoring the budget for the Coast 

Guard’s Surface Program, making procurement requests, and 

attending in-person meetings with a program manager and 

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support team to plan for the building of boats. Doak’s 

supervisors were Greg Cohen and Rory Souther. Doak’s unit

normally operated between the hours of 6:00 a.m. and 6:00 

p.m., Monday through Friday. When authorized, employees 

could work flexible schedules within those hours as long as 

they were physically present in the office during the core 

business hours of 9:30–10:30 a.m. and 1:30–2:30 p.m. 

Doak’s start time was 8:15 a.m., the latest in her unit. Her 

schedule consisted of eight “nine-hour days” and one “eighthour” day, with a regular day off, every two weeks. 

Doak suffered from hypothyroidism and depression. In 

the summer of 2009, Doak suffered closed head trauma in a 

car accident, exacerbating her depression and resulting in 

hyperthyroidism, migraines, pain in various locations

throughout her body, muscle spasms, memory loss, and 

obstructive sleep apnea. Doak accordingly submitted a 

request for intermittent leave under the Family and Medical 

Leave Act (“FMLA”), which the Coast Guard approved in

September 2009. 

Doak’s illnesses and the side effects of her prescribed 

medications caused her to miss a significant amount of work 

over the next few months and often made it difficult for her to 

get to work on time. Around December 2009 or January 

2010, Cohen met with Doak to discuss her work-attendance 

issues. Cohen returned Doak to working an eight-hour day, 

and explained that he would reauthorize the nine-hour, 

regular-day-off schedule once her attendance improved. He 

also informed Doak that she was using up her leave balances

at a rapid clip. 

On January 19, 2010, Cohen notified Doak in writing that 

she had nearly exhausted her twelve weeks of FMLA leave

and had negative balances of 233 hours of sick leave and 

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35.15 hours of annual leave. Cohen also explained to Doak 

that her continued absences and late arrivals were having a 

negative impact on the office’s work. He added that Doak’s 

repeated failures to request leave in advance violated the

procedures for requesting leave, and that continued failure to 

follow those procedures could result in disciplinary action. 

Cohen also specifically invited Doak to tell him if she needed 

an accommodation to do her job.

After receiving that memorandum, Doak was again 

absent without leave on January 25 and January 26, 2010. On 

the day of the first absence, Cohen wrote Doak another 

memorandum, reminding her of the appropriate procedures 

for requesting leave and asking her to tell him if she had a 

medical condition that required accommodation. On February 

22, 2010, Cohen officially reprimanded Doak by letter for 

both the January 25th and 26th absences without leave and for 

failing to follow leave-request procedures. 

Doak sought her union’s assistance with this issue, after 

which the Coast Guard agreed to hold the letter of reprimand 

in abeyance while Doak provided medical documentation to 

support her absences. On March 9th, Doak notified Cohen 

that she was submitting three letters from her doctors directly 

to the Coast Guard’s medical review team. The medical 

review team determined that Doak’s letters failed to justify 

her absences. As a result, Cohen issued a “Request for 

Medical Documentation” on March 24th, that directed Doak 

to provide additional information, by April 9th, on the “nature 

or diagnosis of [her] current condition(s),” including 

“[r]ecommendations regarding any specific accommodations 

that are warranted to enable you to perform the essential 

functions of your position[.]” J.A. 138–139.

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A week after the April 9th deadline, Doak submitted her 

first request for accommodation and supporting medical 

documentation to human resources. She included a letter 

from her doctor, Elizabeth P. Berbano, explaining that Doak 

suffered from major depressive disorder, obstructive sleep 

apnea, hyperthyroidism, and migraines. Dr. Berbano 

recommended the following accommodations for Doak: (i) 

telecommuting; (ii) full-spectrum light for her work space; 

(iii) an anti-glare computer screen; (iv) a cubicle in an area 

free from cold air currents; (v) a work schedule of 11 a.m. to 

7 p.m. due to Doak’s difficulty getting up in the morning; and 

(vi) the option of weekend hours to make up for missed 

weekday hours. 

A Coast Guard doctor, Erica Schwartz, reviewed Dr. 

Berbano’s letter and recommended that Cohen provide as 

accommodations the full-spectrum light and an anti-glare 

computer screen, along with noise-canceling headsets and a 

dark, private area for her use when medically necessary. Dr. 

Schwartz did not address the requests for telework, weekend 

hours, and a later schedule, but later testified that the omission 

was due to her view that those requests were not medically 

supported.

On May 6th, Cohen provided Doak with a noisecanceling headset and an anti-glare screen for her computer, 

permitted her to wear sunglasses in the office as needed, 

asked that three lights above her desk be turned off, and 

identified break rooms that she could use as necessary for 

medical reasons. Cohen also offered to move Doak to a 

cubicle in an area that was darker, albeit farther away from 

her work team. In a memorandum to Doak, Cohen explained 

that he did not approve an 11:00 a.m. start time because 

Doak’s position required her to interact daily and frequently

with various staff, and Doak would be unable to perform 

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those duties with the modified schedule, burdening other 

employees who would have to pick up work she could not 

perform. 

Doak replied to Cohen on May 21st, proposing a 

“temporary 10:00am–6:30pm schedule for a month or two.” 

J.A. 459. Doak also explained that, although the new darker 

cubicle location offered to her “does have the conditions to 

reduce the occurrence of migraines,” she did not want to 

“move there because it is away from my team and ‘project 

interactions’ would be largely reduced.” J.A. 460. Cohen 

responded that a 10:00 a.m. start time was unworkable, and 

offered instead to change Doak’s start time from 8:15 a.m. to 

9:00 a.m.

On May 24th, Cohen issued the official reprimand for 

Doak’s absences without leave in January on the ground that 

she had failed to provide adequate documentation to justify 

them. Cohen further noted that Doak had been absent without 

leave for approximately 23.5 hours the week of May 10th, and 

that she had accumulated an additional 99 hours of 

unscheduled absences in just the last two months. Cohen 

further explained to Doak that she had hundreds of hours of 

negative balances of annual leave, sick leave, and leave 

without pay.

Seven weeks later, Doak submitted another letter from 

Dr. Berbano. The letter explained that Doak “suffers from 

periodic migraines” and “[w]hen she experiences acute onset 

of a migraine, she is incapacitated due to the pain and cannot 

concentrate on the tasks at hand, whether at her job or at 

home.” J.A. 462. Dr. Berbano recommended that Doak be 

given a start time of 9:30 a.m. or the option to telecommute

while she adjusted to new medication.

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The chief doctor of the Coast Guard’s Division of 

Occupational Medicine reviewed Dr. Berbano’s letter and 

concluded that it did not medically justify “an arbitrary start 

time of 0930 instead of 0830 or 0900.” J.A. 466. The chief 

doctor also opined that, in light of Doak’s unpredictable 

condition, Doak could not work a fixed schedule because her 

conditions and the treatment for them completely and 

unpredictably incapacitated her.

On July 23rd, Doak met with her supervisors, Souther 

and Cohen, to address her ongoing attendance issues. Doak 

agreed to a 9:00 a.m. start time, but soon proved unable to 

arrive at that time with any consistency.

On August 9th, Cohen provided Doak with a notice 

recommending that she be terminated because of her (i) 

“medical inability to perform the essential duties of [her]

position,” including “maintain[ing] [a] regular work 

schedule,” and (ii) extensive hours during which she was 

absent without leave. J.A. 197. The notice indicated that, 

from January 31, 2010 to August 9, 2010, Doak missed 

approximately 52% of her scheduled work hours. The notice 

further explained that Doak’s position required her to be in 

the office on a daily basis due to the need to interact 

frequently with project staff. After weighing the matter

further, Souther ultimately decided, on September 30, 2010,

to terminate Doak’s employment, effective October 8, 2010.

Procedural Background

Doak contacted an EEO Counselor at her employer on 

October 6, 2010, to challenge her termination. Doak and the 

Coast Guard then entered into a settlement agreement, 

allowing Doak to retire in lieu of termination. Doak revoked 

that agreement shortly thereafter, and on February 22, 2011, 

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she filed a formal complaint with the Office for Civil Rights 

and Civil Liberties at the Coast Guard’s parent agency, the 

United States Department of Homeland Security, alleging that 

the Coast Guard had unlawfully discriminated against her on 

the bases of race, national origin, disability, sex, and age, and 

that her supervisors had retaliated against her exercise of her 

rights under the Rehabilitation Act. The Office issued its 

final decision rejecting Doak’s complaint on June 19, 2012, 

finding that the Coast Guard “engaged in good faith efforts to 

accommodate” Doak. J.A. 294. The Office further concluded 

that Doak’s supervisors offered a legitimate, nondiscriminatory, and unrebutted reason for terminating Doak: 

her “medical inability to perform the essential functions of her 

position due to her inability to maintain a regular schedule, 

and her significant number of [absences without leave].” Id.

Doak filed suit against the Secretary of Homeland 

Security on July 18, 2012. She alleged that the Coast Guard 

discriminated against her in violation of the Rehabilitation 

Act by (i) twice reprimanding her and then firing her on 

account of her disability (the “disparate treatment” claims); 

(ii) failing to provide reasonable accommodations for her 

disability (the “accommodation claims”); and (iii) firing her in 

retaliation for requesting reasonable accommodations (the 

“retaliation claim”). The Secretary moved to dismiss the 

accommodation and disparate treatment claims under Federal 

Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1), arguing that Doak had not 

properly exhausted her administrative remedies because her 

contact with the EEO Counselor was untimely, and that 

default stripped the district court of jurisdiction over those 

claims. The Secretary also moved for summary judgment on 

all of Doak’s claims. 

The district court granted the Secretary’s motion to 

dismiss Doak’s accommodation claims for lack of subject

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matter jurisdiction. Doak v. Johnson, 19 F. Supp. 3d 259, 

268–270 (D.D.C. 2014). The court explained that Doak 

requested accommodations on April 16, 2010 and July 16, 

2010, and the Coast Guard responded on May 6th and July 

20th. Id. at 268–269. Because Doak first contacted an EEO 

Counselor on October 6, 2010—78 days after the July 20th 

response—the court concluded that Doak had not complied 

with the regulatory requirement that such contact occur within 

45 days of the allegedly discriminatory action, 29 C.F.R. 

§ 1614.105(a)(1). Id. at 268–270.1 

In the alternative, the district court granted the 

Secretary’s motion for summary judgment in its entirety. As 

to the accommodation claims, the court reasoned that Doak’s 

requested schedule constituted an “open-ended ‘work 

whenever you want schedule’ that is unreasonable as a matter 

of law.” Doak, 19 F. Supp. 3d at 276. The court also ruled 

that attending regular on-site meetings was an essential 

function of Doak’s job that no reasonable accommodation

would have enabled her to perform. Id. at 278–280.

As to the retaliation claim, the district court concluded 

that Doak’s claim failed because she had not proffered any 

evidence to rebut the Coast Guard’s legitimate, nondiscriminatory reason for its action: that it terminated Doak 

due to her repeated absences, failure to comply with leave 

procedures, and the detrimental effect Doak’s absences had 

on her coworkers. Doak, 19 F. Supp. 3d at 280–281.

 1 The court applied the same reasoning to the disparate treatment 

claims arising from the letters of reprimand and the notice 

proposing termination. Doak, 19 F. Supp. 3d at 270 & n.13. Doak 

has not raised any disparate treatment claims on appeal.

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II

Analysis

Jurisdiction

The district court concluded that it lacked subject matter 

jurisdiction over most of Doak’s claims because Doak failed 

to comply with the regulatory requirement that an aggrieved 

person contact an EEO Counselor “within 45 days of the date 

of the matter alleged to be discriminatory[.]” 29 C.F.R. 

§ 1614.105(a)(1). Although the Coast Guard never objected 

to the timing of Doak’s complaint in the administrative 

proceedings—and, in fact, issued a final administrative 

decision disposing of Doak’s administrative complaint on the 

merits—the district court believed it was duty-bound to 

consider the administrative mistiming anyway. The district 

court read Spinelli v. Goss, 446 F.3d 159 (D.C. Cir. 2006), to 

hold that timely administrative exhaustion is a jurisdictional 

requirement under the Rehabilitation Act. 

Spinelli does not reach that far. In Spinelli, this court

addressed the jurisdictional consequence of a plaintiff’s 

wholesale failure to file an administrative complaint or to 

obtain any administrative decision at all. 446 F.3d at 162. 

This court held that federal court “jurisdiction depended on 

the ‘final disposition of [an administrative] complaint.’” Id. 

(alteration in original) (quoting 29 U.S.C. § 794a(a)(1)). 

Because the plaintiff in Spinelli never filed an administrative 

complaint, there was never any final administrative 

disposition of a complaint, or any reviewable final 

administrative action at all. Id. Under those circumstances, 

Spinelli held that the court lacked jurisdiction over the 

plaintiff’s claims. Id. 

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That is all Spinelli held. In so ruling, the court did not 

attach irremediable jurisdictional consequence to every 

procedural misstep that happens during exhaustion of the 

administrative process. And certainly not for defaults that 

occur in the informal process created by EEOC regulation as a 

non-statutory step preceding the formal agency exhaustion

required by statute. To the contrary, this court has ruled that 

“the administrative time limits created by the EEOC erect no 

jurisdictional bars to bringing suit.” Bowden v. United States, 

106 F.3d 433, 437 (D.C. Cir. 1997); see also Steele v. Schafer, 

535 F.3d 689, 693 (D.C. Cir. 2008) (45-day time limit in 29 

C.F.R. § 1614.105(a) is subject to equitable tolling). Instead, 

those time limits “function[] like statutes of limitations,” and 

thus “are subject to equitable tolling, estoppel, and waiver.” 

Bowden, 106 F.3d at 437. While those cases involved claims 

under Title VII rather than the Rehabilitation Act, nothing in 

the Rehabilitation Act or the EEOC regulation warrants 

treating the same administrative time limit differently based 

on which claims are involved.

 

Spinelli thus does not bar jurisdiction here because Doak 

filed and received a final disposition of her administrative 

complaint. As this court has held, issues concerning how a 

claimant participates in that administrative process, both 

procedurally and substantively, are not of jurisdictional 

moment. Koch v. White, 744 F.3d 162, 164–165 (D.C. Cir. 

2014) (failure to participate properly in administrative review 

of Rehabilitation Act claim can be “excused” by the district 

court, and thus is non-jurisdictional). 

That approach, moreover, accords with recent Supreme 

Court precedent holding that “procedural rules, including time 

bars,” are jurisdictional only “if Congress has clearly state[d] 

as much.” United States v. Wong, 135 S. Ct. 1625, 1632 

(2015) (internal quotation marks omitted). Congress has not 

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done so here. Nothing in the Rehabilitation Act refers to 

administrative time limits at all, let alone “in jurisdictional 

terms” or in any way suggesting that the jurisdiction of the 

district courts hinges on timely compliance. Zipes v. Trans 

World Airlines, Inc., 455 U.S. 385, 394 (1982). Since

Congress has not “‘clearly state[d]’ that the rule is 

jurisdictional,” we will not treat it as such. Sebelius v. Auburn 

Regional Medical Center, 133 S. Ct. 817, 824 (2013) 

(alteration in original) (quoting Arbaugh v. Y&H Corp., 546 

U.S. 500, 515–516 (2006))).

Because the deadline for contacting an EEO Counselor is 

not jurisdictional, Doak’s failure to comply with it may be 

waived by the agency. And that is what the Coast Guard has 

done. It never raised the 45-day time limit during the 

administrative proceedings. Indeed, it “not only accept[ed]

and investigate[d] [Doak’s] complaint, but also decide[d] it on 

the merits—all without mentioning timeliness[.]” Bowden, 

106 F.3d at 438. Having done so, the Coast Guard “now has 

no legitimate reason to complain about a judicial decision on 

the merits.” Id. at 438–439.

The same reasoning disposes of the Coast Guard’s 

argument that Doak’s failure to cooperate with its 

investigation bars her claim. Dismissal based on an 

employee’s failure to cooperate in the investigation is justified 

only when the lack of cooperation “forces an agency to 

dismiss or cancel the complaint by failing to provide 

sufficient information to enable the agency to investigate the 

claim.” Wilson v. Pena, 79 F.3d 154, 164–165 (D.C. Cir. 

1996). That did not happen here. “Because the agency was 

able to take final action on the merits of [Doak’s] complaint, 

h[er] suit cannot be barred solely for any default in 

responding to the agency’s request for information.” Id. at 

164; see also Koch, 744 F.3d at 164–165.

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The Accommodation Claims

“We review de novo the district court’s grant of summary 

judgment, and can affirm only if the record demonstrates both 

that ‘there is no genuine issue as to any material fact,’ and 

that ‘the moving party is entitled to a judgment as a matter of 

law.’” Solomon v. Vilsack, 763 F.3d 1, 8 (D.C. Cir. 2014)

(quoting Pardo–Kronemann v. Donovan, 601 F.3d 599, 604 

(D.C. Cir. 2010)).

To withstand summary judgment on her accommodation 

claims, Doak had to come forward with sufficient evidence to 

allow a reasonable jury to conclude that (i) she was disabled 

within the meaning of the Rehabilitation Act; (ii) her 

employer had notice of her disability; (iii) she was able to 

perform the essential functions of her job with or without 

reasonable accommodation; and (iv) her employer denied her 

request for a reasonable accommodation of that disability. 

See Solomon, 763 F.3d at 9.

Doak assails the district court’s conclusion that her 

request to change her work hours to an 11:00 a.m. start time, 

with optional weekend hours and the ability to telecommute,

sought an “open-ended ‘work whenever you want schedule’ 

that is unreasonable as a matter of law.” Doak, 19 F. Supp. 

3d at 276. We agree with Doak. “[I]t is rare that any 

particular type of accommodation will be categorically 

unreasonable as a matter of law.” Solomon, 763 F.3d at 10. 

Certainly nothing about the accommodations Doak requested, 

on their face, suggests that they are so inherently unworkable 

for all employees in all workplaces that the law would 

categorically disqualify them from consideration. Quite the 

opposite, the Rehabilitation Act expressly recognizes “job 

restructuring” and “part-time or modified work schedules” as 

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reasonable accommodations, 42 U.S.C. § 12111(9)(B), and 

the federal government’s own personnel regulations permit 

agencies to establish work schedules that are compressed or 

have substantial flexibility in their hours, 5 C.F.R. 

§ 610.111(d).

Doak’s claim fails nevertheless because, even with her 

desired schedule accommodation, Doak would have been 

unable to perform an essential function of her job: being 

present in the office to participate in interactive, on-site 

meetings during normal business hours and on a regular basis. 

The Coast Guard proffered substantial evidence that inperson attendance at such meetings was an essential function 

of Doak’s job. A December 18, 2009 progress note in Doak’s 

file, for example, states: “Due to * * * [required] daily 

meetings with project managers and staff and required 

interaction with the project team and other surface business 

managers[,] [Doak] will be behind her contemporaries due to 

absences this period.” J.A. 115. Cohen’s January 19, 2010 

memorandum similarly explained that Doak’s job “requires 

daily interaction with the project staff, contracting, and 

resource staffs,” and that her “unplanned absences do not 

allow us to provide timely support to [a particular boatbuilding project].” J.A. 120. Cohen again noted in his 

August 9, 2010 notice proposing Doak’s termination that a 

“critical part” of Doak’s job was “[p]roject interaction,” 

which required her “to be in the office during normal work 

hours in order to interact with project staff.” J.A. 201. 

Finally, Souther explained in his termination decision that

Doak’s “frequent unscheduled absences prevent [her] from 

participating in program meetings and other work group 

collaboration essential to full performance, creating an undue 

hardship on co-workers required to perform these 

responsibilities on [Doak’s] behalf.” J.A. 212–213.

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A later start time would not have allowed Doak to fulfill 

those responsibilities because Doak’s original 8:15 a.m. start 

time was already the latest start time on her team. Once 

Doak’s disabilities delayed and disrupted her attendance still 

further, her inconsistent schedule made holding same-day 

meetings especially difficult. In the four months preceding 

her termination, Doak had proven unable to arrive even as late 

as 9:00 in the morning on a regular basis, and she often did 

not arrive at all. The Coast Guard showed that Doak’s 

absences undermined her ability to perform her job because

“not all of” Doak’s “job functions were portable due to the 

customer service expectations, which largely require on-site 

presence to fulfill.” J.A. 429. “Spontaneous meetings” with 

various personnel “occur frequently[,] * * * often requir[ing]

attendees to review the same documentation at the same 

time.” Id. Some files could not be conveniently accessed 

remotely, and the pace of work “can sometimes be too fast for 

anything other than on-site presence.” J.A. 430. Co-workers 

had to step in to pick up the slack, often on short notice, due 

to Doak’s frequent and unpredictable absences and late 

arrivals, causing them an “undue burden” and “negatively 

impact[ing] the accomplishment of the agency’s mission.” 

J.A. 431–432.

There is also evidence that Doak’s unpredictable 

migraines incapacitated her, regardless of the time of day or 

where she was located. As Dr. Berbano explained, when 

Doak experiences a migraine “she is incapacitated due to the 

pain and cannot concentrate on the tasks at hand, whether at 

her job or at home performing routine activities of daily 

living, such as cooking and doing chores.” J.A. 462. And the 

medicine Doak would then have to take to treat the migraines 

would “completely incapacitat[e] her while she is under the 

influence of the medication[.]” Id.

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Doak failed to come forward with evidence reasonably 

disputing any of that. In fact, all Doak points to is a single 

sentence in her declaration stating conclusorily that “an 11:00 

a.m. start time would not have interfered with my ability to do 

my job because there were few project interactions,” and then 

added the non-responsive observation that “I had not been 

required to travel or attend an off-site class in over a year.” 

J.A. 250. That sentence, devoid of any detail, explanation, or 

evidentiary corroboration, contradicts Doak’s own deposition 

testimony, in which she confirmed that, by May 2010, her job 

involved interactive meetings “on a regular basis.” J.A. 538. 

It also contradicts Doak’s own pre-litigation actions in which 

she declined to relocate to a cubicle in a darker area, even 

though it would have reduced “the occurrence of migraines,” 

because it was “away from [her] team and ‘project 

interactions’ would be largely reduced.” J.A. 460. At her 

deposition, Doak confirmed that was the reason she declined 

the proffered accommodation. J.A. 539. 

In short, the documentary and testimonial evidence in the 

record—including Doak’s own testimony—points only one 

way, demonstrating that it was essential to Doak’s job that she 

be present for interactive meetings during normal business 

hours and that the accommodations she requested would not 

have enabled her to perform that function. Doak’s bare, 

conclusory statement to the contrary in her declaration—

without any supporting detail—is insufficient to create a jury 

issue in light of overwhelming and undisputed evidence that 

included her own prior sworn testimony. See Pyramid Sec. 

Ltd. v. IB Resolution, Inc., 924 F.2d 1114, 1123 (D.C. Cir. 

1991) (“Courts have long held that a party may not create a 

material issue of fact simply by contradicting its prior sworn 

testimony.”). Because Doak was unable to perform this 

essential function of her job even with reasonable 

accommodation, the Coast Guard was entitled to summary 

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judgment on her accommodation claims. See Carr v. Reno, 

23 F.3d 525, 529–530 (D.C. Cir. 1994) (employer entitled to 

summary judgment because plaintiff’s job required physical 

presence to manually pick up and code papers by a daily 

deadline and her requested accommodation would not have 

enabled her to perform that essential function); see also 

Samper v. Providence St. Vincent Medical Center, 675 F.3d 

1233, 1238 (9th Cir. 2012) (employer entitled to summary 

judgment because on-site regular attendance was an essential 

function for neo-natal nurse and plaintiff’s requested irregular 

schedule compromised that essential function).

The Retaliation Claim

To establish a prima facie case of retaliation based on 

circumstantial evidence, a plaintiff must show that “(i) ‘[s]he 

engaged in statutorily protected activity’; (ii) ‘[s]he suffered a 

materially adverse action by h[er] employer’; and (iii) ‘a 

causal link connects the two.’” Solomon, 763 F.3d at 14 

(alterations in original) (quoting Jones v. Bernanke, 557 F.3d 

670, 677 (D.C. Cir. 2009)). If a prima facie case is 

established, the burden shifts to the employer to produce a 

“legitimate, nondiscriminatory reason” for its action. Wiley v. 

Glassman, 511 F.3d 151, 155 (D.C. Cir. 2007) (internal 

quotation marks omitted). Once the employer does so, the 

plaintiff must respond with “sufficient evidence to create a 

genuine dispute on the ultimate issue of retaliation” by 

showing either directly that “a discriminatory reason more 

likely motivated the employer,” or indirectly that “the 

employer’s proffered explanation is unworthy of credence.” 

Solomon, 763 F.3d at 14 (internal quotation marks and 

brackets omitted).

Doak contends that the Coast Guard terminated her in 

retaliation for her accommodation requests. The Coast Guard 

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responds that it had a legitimate, non-discriminatory reason 

for terminating Doak: her inability to maintain a regular 

schedule and presence in the workplace, and her frequent and 

unpredictable absences without leave. Those are the reasons 

that Souther, Doak’s supervisor, gave when he made the 

ultimate decision to terminate her employment. Because the 

Coast Guard came forward with a “legitimate, non-retaliatory 

justification for [its] actions,” Solomon, 763 F.3d at 14, the 

only question is whether Doak’s evidence “creates a material 

dispute on the ultimate issue of retaliation,” Jones, 557 F.3d 

at 678. 

Doak’s evidence fails to do so. She points to a “causal 

temporal link” between her April and July 2010 

accommodation requests and the Coast Guard’s proposed 

termination of her employment in August 2010, sixteen weeks 

after her first accommodation request and three weeks after 

her last one. Appellant’s Br. 24. But to survive summary 

judgment, Doak had to offer “positive evidence beyond mere 

proximity.” Solomon, 763 F.3d at 16 (internal quotation 

marks omitted). To fill that evidentiary gap, Doak argues that 

her attendance was improving in the summer of 2010, 

suggesting that the Coast Guard used her absences as a pretext 

for unlawful retaliation. That claim just does not hold up to 

summary judgment standards. 

To begin with, Doak points to her statement in a 

declaration that, “by mid-July [2010,] I was able to arrive by 

9:30 a.m. on most days if I did not have a migraine or body 

pain.” J.A. 251 (emphases added). That statement—which 

suggests that Doak still arrived late when she suffered from 

migraines or body pain and even sometimes when she did 

not—cuts against her as much as for her. 

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In her declaration, Doak also states that her union 

representative “did an analysis indicating that my attendance 

was improving and that as of July 31, 2010” she was “at 85% 

attendance.” J.A. 252. But Doak’s attendance exceeded 

eighty percent only for the two pay periods preceding July 

31st; it was far worse before those periods. More importantly, 

her attendance declined right afterward, in the weeks 

preceding her termination. As Souther explained in his 

termination decision, “[a]lthough your unscheduled absences 

decreased briefly after you received the Notice of Proposed 

Removal, your unscheduled absences have continued and 

increased significantly since 10 September 2010.” J.A. 212. 

Doak offered nothing to dispute that. 

More to the point, “improving” is not the same thing as 

“improved.” Doak’s fleeting increase in attendance still fell 

short of what her job requires, and it made no meaningful 

impact on the overall percentage of scheduled work hours that 

she missed. Doak has thus failed to cast any reasonable doubt 

on, or create any disputed question of material fact 

concerning, the Coast Guard’s asserted non-retaliatory reason 

for terminating her. For that reason, the district court properly 

granted summary judgment to the Secretary on the retaliation 

claim.

III

Conclusion

Doak’s failure to timely contact or cooperate with an 

EEO Counselor does not deprive the court of jurisdiction to 

decide this case. We affirm the district court’s grant of 

summary judgment to the Secretary on Doak’s 

accommodation and retaliation claims.

So ordered.

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