New assistant Cincinnati city manager fired from last job, left another job after dispute

Cincinnati's new Assistant City Manager Natasha Hampton comes to the job having been fired as city manager from her last public sector job and after leaving an assistant city manager job prior to that after "disagreements" led to a settlement, The Enquirer has found.

But that doesn't worry City Manager Sheryl Long, who hired Hampton. Hampton, who started Monday, is set to earn $189,000 a year. Hampton's salary is higher than the two current assistant city managers' pay. Billy Weber earns $180,307 a year and Virginia Tallent earns $176,114 a year.

Long told The Enquirer, via email: "Natasha's 26 years of experience speaks for itself, and the conversations I've had with her references have been incredible. In introducing her to key city staff, I can see that she'll hit the ground running. I can't speak to any of the details regarding Natasha's previous employment − I'm focused on her time as assistant city manager here in Cincinnati. I place my full confidence and trust in her abilities and desire to serve the citizens of Cincinnati."

A memo from Long to the mayor and council members about Hampton's hiring says Hampton has two decades of public sector experience, serving as acting city manager, assistant city manager, chief marketing officer and director of human resources in Florida and North Carolina. Her portfolio, the memo goes on to say, includes water and wastewater treatment, public works, fiscal control, facilities construction, emergency management, human resources and union/employee relations.

Hampton, the memo says, has a doctorate in business and leadership, a master's of public administration and a bachelor's degree in political science.

She is also the author of the books: "High Heel Leadership: The Art of Being a Woman in Power," published in 2020, and "When the Heel Breaks: The Guide to Re-engineering Broken Leadership, and Creating Transformative Leaders," published last month.

Hampton declined to comment on her past employment, saying only that she is excited for the job.

"I am thrilled to join a city administration that shares my professional values and ethics and look forward to working for the people of Cincinnati,” she said in an email.

Hampton's rocky road to Cincinnati

Hampton's resume, provided by the city of Cincinnati, shows Hampton has most recently been president and CEO of her own Coral Springs, Florida, consulting firm, HHL Management and Consulting Inc., and worked as a senior consultant for Imagine That Performance LLC in Tampa, Florida. She has also been working as an adjunct professor at Atlantis University and St. Thomas University, both in Miami.

Prior to that, Hampton worked in the public sector. She worked for the city of Miramar, Florida, from 1997 to 2018.

A Google search of Hampton showed newspaper stories that said Hampton was fired as city manager of College Park, Maryland. And before that she left her job with the city of Rocky Mount, North Carolina, with a $65,000 settlement "to settle fully any and all claims, which could be the subject of any litigation or disagreement between them," according to the agreement.

Neither city was willing to say exactly what happened at those two jobs. Hampton would not comment, and Long did not answer questions related to Hampton's previous employment.

Hampton worked in Rocky Mount from 2018 to April 2021. She last served as an assistant city manager and acting city manager.

The Telegram newspaper in Rocky Mount reported in 2021 that Hampton had some sort of disagreement that led to her filing a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. At a May 10, 2021, meeting, Rocky Mount City Attorney Jep Rose announced Hampton was no longer employed by the city and received a $65,000 settlement that "settled all the disagreements" between the city and Hampton. Rose did not offer any more details, according to a video of the meeting reviewed by The Enquirer. A spokesman for the city of Rocky Mount declined to comment further.

The settlement, reviewed by The Enquirer, said $31,750 of the settlement is back pay. The remaining part went to Hampton and her attorneys. While the city was considering a settlement Hampton was placed on paid administrative leave and was not permitted to come into the office. The settlement also called for Hampton to resign and to never seek employment with the city again.

In her book, "When the Heel Breaks," Hampton said she left her job in Miramar because "the organization's philosophies and leadership were changing and moving in a direction that no longer aligned with my core values," so she moved to North Carolina for the Rocky Mount job. In Chapter 4 she wrote: "Shortly after my decision to begin my new chapter (in Rocky Mount), I began to notice things weren't working out as smoothly as I had hoped. What I thought were strange feelings that would periodically come over me, I now understand was a spiritual imbalance."

In Rocky Mount, she wrote, she was traveling back and forth to Florida. Her father died, her health was suffering and she was getting a divorce after her husband cheated on her, she wrote in her book.

She wrote that in Rocky Mount she was "labeled an employee in need of executive coaching." The coaching happened three times per week, for four hours at a time, she wrote.

"The career I had dedicated my adult life to was quickly becoming something I wish I could forget," Hampton wrote. "The experience with having not one or two, but three women in leadership who set out to create an agenda against me that would unjustly undermine my life's work as a professional was deliberating."

Later she wrote: "I found myself in a place of accusations and being misunderstood."

"My own experience with workplace retaliation taught me so much about the system," Hampton wrote. "I discovered that whistleblowers, zero-tolerance retaliation or harassment protections do very little to protect."

Hampton wrote she was eventually "locked out and prohibited from entering facilities for reasons I was not made aware of, I remained loyal to the company and waited for remedy." During this time, she was sexually harassed, she wrote, though she gave no details.

Finally, she wrote, that it was she who quit: "When I came to 'It's my time to quit' moment," I had to assess everything spiraling out of control in my life." She did not reference the settlement.

Fired for 'discrepancies'

Hampton was fired before she even started at would have been her next job, as city manager of College Park, Maryland, according to reporting by The Diamondback, an independent student newspaper associated with the University of Maryland College Park.

The Diamondback reported the city terminated Hampton's employment "due to discrepancies in information she provided to the city."

Hampton was hired in May 2022 as the College Park city manager and even moved there, according to the story. In July 2022, three days before Hampton was supposed to start work, College Park City Council unanimously terminated Hampton.

Hampton, The Diamondback story says, speculated she was fired related to her involvement in the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission settlement with Rocky Mount, but the city denied that was why − though they didn't say what the discrepancies were.

An email to the city of College Park seeking information was not returned.

A trio of degrees

Hampton comes to the job with three degrees. She has a bachelor of arts in political science and public administration from Florida Memorial University, a master of public administration from Nova Southeastern University and what she describes on her resume as an "honoris causa" doctor of business and leadership from Cornerstone Christian University in Maitland, Florida. Cornerstone has the same name as a Christian school in Michigan, but the Maitland, Florida, university is in an office park and offers online degrees. Its Facebook page in one post says it's based in Africa. It also says Cornerstone Christian University is "100% online or at a distance, requires no classroom or attendance."

About Hampton's city hall package

In Cincinnati, Hampton's role is a new, third assistant city manager position. There have been three assistant city managers in the past and Hampton is needed to help with the workload, Long said. It comes at a time when Mayor Aftab Pureval has called the city's finances dire and the city officials are supporting the sale of the city-owned railroad in the November election because Pureval fears without the $1.6 billion proceeds "we will be on the path for the slow death of the city." Assistant City Managers all have a hand in crafting the budget, which is ultimately Long's job.

It was also not that long ago, in 2018, that Cincinnati had its own issues with a city manager, forcing out Harry Black after a tumultuous tenure. Black came to the city having had issues at previous jobs that were not publicly disclosed at the time of his hiring.

Hampton's compensation package includes:

• An annual salary of $189,000.

• Standard sick leave of 104 hours and vacation leave of 80 hours.

• Health care.

• Up to a $5,500 retirement match, in addition to the city's pension system.

• Reimbursement for relocation expenses.

This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Cincinnati’s new assistant city manager fired from last job