Cleveland Heights Mayor Kahlil Seren Defends Wife's Unofficial Role at City Hall Amid Rising Turmoil, Staff Departures

Accusations of a hostile work environment at Cleveland Heights City Hall have narrowed to Mayor Kahlil Seren and his “first lady” Natalie McDaniel Credit: Mark Oprea

When Dan Horrigan recently resigned as the City Administrator of Cleveland Heights after less than three months on the job, his ensuing comments about his departure brought to public light a simmering issue that had been festering for a while.

Horrigan, the former mayor of Akron, shared the reason behind his mere months on the job with a reporter for the Akron Beacon Journa l. Horrigan was cryptic but clear: a tense office culture at Mayor Kahlil Seren’s City Hall was the focal point of his resignation.

“I raised a number of workplace safety and hostile work environment issues that involved a member of the mayor’s family that were not addressed, and it kind of made the administration of my duties untenable,” he said.

Horrigan had elaborated, in private communications to Seren on March 14, who he was really talking about: the mayor’s wife, Natalie McDaniel.

“The work situation is untenable at this point,” he told Seren. “I realize that this is a difficult and personal situation, but your wife’s presence here at City Hall has caused a number of employees to feel uncomfortable and on at least one occasion, unsafe.”

“Quite frankly,” Horrigan added, “her directing staff in their official capacity is improper and unethical.”

Seren himself has faced internal and external criticism that’s run the gamut from concerns about expenditures in an overdue budget proposal to funding at Cain Park.

For the dedicated and watchful residents of Cleveland Heights, Horrigan’s drive-thru stint under Seren wasn’t an anomaly. Danny Williams, the City Administrator before Horrigan, retired after a year in office. Joe Sinnott, Williams’ predecessor, after a year, as well. As did Patrick Costigan, Seren’s assistant, in January. As did Jessica Rosenblatt, a marketing specialist. As did three finance directors, two Parks & Recreation directors, a communications director, a payroll administrator and the general manager of Cain Park.

In a general sense, at least a dozen current and former employees told Scene, there’s a culture of intimidation that’s gotten out of control, and McDaniel is a co-star.

“During my time there, there was a constant atmosphere of fear,” Jessica Rosenblatt, a former marketing manager for Cain Park who quit last August, told Scene. “The mayor does act more like a dictatorship. And if you do upset him, or his wife, you know, your job is at risk.”

For several members of City Council, McDaniel’s influence at City Hall is more of a symptom of Seren’s wrangling of his executive seat more than, say, a matter of happenstance.

“I’ve heard she has meltdowns in City Hall,” one told Scene. “She’s gone ballistic at employees, reprimanding them. She sits in hirings and firings. She has a keycard to get in and out of offices. It’s all just ridiculous.”

“I just don’t understand why she’s there,” another said. “That’s my biggest confusion at this point.”

In the public eye, McDaniel appears as mysterious as she might seem to those at City Hall she’s helped hire and fire.

She’s lived in Cleveland Heights for at least a decade and been married to Seren for about that long. She was at his swearing-in for City Council on February 18, 2015. She worked for the Department of Veterans Affairs for eight years. Her tenure alongside Seren is a lot more unclear: McDaniel’s not listed in the Cleveland Heights staff directory, or on the city’s website at all.

And McDaniel is not a stranger to accusations of workplace hostility.

Natalie McDaniel, Seren’s wife, at a city meeting holding Seren’s key access card in an undated photo. Credit: Submitted Photo

In September 2015, McDaniel sued the VA for forcing her back to the office after she claimed her Post Traumatic Stress and anxiety gave her a right to work from home. McDaniel said she was forced to quit, the suit reads, due to a “hostile work environment/harassment; discrimination based on race and gender (McDaniel is Black), disability and retaliation.”

A judge dismissed the case, in February 2019, opining that McDaniel did not have sufficient proof that, a summary judgment reads, a “few, isolated incidents of alleged harassment do not create a hostile work environment.”

In a half-hour interview with Scene on Monday, in a board room at Cleveland Heights City Hall, Seren defended McDaniel’s role over the past two years, framing his wife’s position as a natural extension of his seat. McDaniel, he said, is his “first lady.” She is unpaid. She has no “formal set of duties.” She is a sidekick to his political reach. (None of which is mentioned in the city charter.)

It is “as you would expect from any person in any public office who has a partner in their life—this is not unusual,” Seren said.

“One would expect that Barack Obama sought Michelle Obama’s counsel on many things. You would expect that Richard Celeste sought Dagmar Celeste’s counsel on many things,” Seren added. “You would expect these things because it makes sense. This is a person who knows me well. This is a person who understands.”

As for the emails pointing to an incident involving McDaniel on March 13, Seren asserted that an independent firm has been hired to look into accusations of hostility. Seren said he received “no complaints of that nature” until Horrigan’s mention of it surfaced in the middle of March.

Since Seren took his oath of office on January 1, 2022, the 46-year-old former city councilman adopted a wholly rigid and stern philosophy around bringing Cleveland Heights away from its financially distraught past. Seren admires a Lean Six Sigma-type of approach to managing City Hall’s denizens—an office mindset obsessed with waste reduction and worker efficiency. He even hired a performance coordinator, Andrea Heim, last year, to advance “that ethos across all departments,” as a 2024 Mid-Year Report states. (Last week, Heim was put on administrative leave, multiple sources confirmed.)

Cleveland Heights Mayor Kahlil Seren Credit: Courtesy Kahlil Seren

“I don’t think that everybody has an understanding of sort of what process-improvement methodology is for,” he told Scene.

“My goal is always to make the work that people do for the city as easy as possible,” Seren added. “I have no desire to make it harder for any public employee to do their job. I think that there are always ways for us to find unnecessary steps in processes and remove them—so no, I don’t think we’re setting the bar too high.”

As for the departure of three city administrators and other employees in recent years, Seren responded: “There are certain things that—it’s sort of not really okay to say about a departing employee getting into their personal lives.” A

And as for Horrigan: “Unfortunately, again, we come back to this sort of jumping to conclusions,” he said, “and determining that what a director says as they’re leaving is not credible unless it’s something that they already believe.”

If Seren chooses to run for re-election, he’ll go up against contenders in a September primary election, then again in a November general election. Based on past comments, it seems Seren feels fine exiting the seat without further controversy, and, as he phrased it in a December Council meeting, take his talents elsewhere. “I’ll be fine,” he told the room. “I can land on my feet. I have opportunities elsewhere.”