One of the three who filed the complaint, Gilbert M. Jefferson, said he hoped the case would be a model for resolving discrimination cases outside the courtroom.
Avis, however, rents to young people only if a state forces it to, as New York did in resolving a discrimination suit that ended in 1997.
The tentative settlement, reached Wednesday night, is contingent upon also resolving individual discrimination lawsuits against Ford, said James Fett, a lawyer in Pinckney, Mich., who represents clients in one of the lawsuits seeking class-action status and seven individual complaints.
Secretary Tom Vilsack has said his agency is committed to resolving past discrimination cases, and government officials insist they are working to ensure that the plaintiffs get a quick and equitable settlement.
And the University of Kansas recently resolved a discrimination complaint filed by a former male swimmer who alleged that the university had been providing athletic slots to a disproportionate number of women.
Talks aimed at resolving a discrimination dispute involving Allstate and more than 6,500 agents and former agents have broken off, both sides said yesterday, and specialists in employment law say they think it is now likely that the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission will take the insurer to court.
Verizon entered into a consent decree in 2002 that resolved employment-discrimination lawsuits filed by the agency in 1997 and 1999 against Bell Atlantic and Nynex.
The terms included new equal opportunity training; the creation of a new system to log, investigate and resolve complaints of discrimination; and the publicizing of its non-discrimination policies.
Many companies, alarmed by the increasing size of payouts to resolve harassment or discrimination claims by employees, have bought insurance policies over the last decade to protect themselves.
Her supporters say that despite the outcome, which was dictated first by the university's needs and then by the Supreme Court, she demonstrated her resolve to fight discrimination.
