Comment Archives: stories: Blogs
Re: “Former Oakland Blight Official Admits to Breaking Law”
Bob, what is the statute of limitations on the City taking further action against Renwick? My understanding is that the City did not even file the complaint with the FPPC, a private citizen did.
Santanna wrote the City's response to the Grand Jury report, that was post Dellums, saying she was going to get to the bottom of this etc.
Re: “Monday Must Reads: ALCO Sheriff to Stop Patrolling Oakland Streets; Gov. Brown OK’s $25.6 Million in Redevelopment Funds for Oak to Ninth”
The Tribune made it clear that the unemployment stat was for the Oakland Metropolitan Area, that includes a bunch of East Bay cities besides Oakland. Just as it means anywhere else in the country, the rate does not count people who have dropped out of the workforce; given up looking. There is an estimated number for that "true" unemployment rate for our area but probably not for just Oakland. There is no way that the "true" unemployment rate for the poor sections of Oakland is anything under 25% or that it has improved much in the last two years.
Re: “Gut Feeling: Pot Eases Crohn's Disease”
I completely agree with you Joel! I wonder who will be the first in the US?
http://www.change.org/petitions/test-the-d…
Re: “Thursday Must Reads: Quan’s Budget Would Add More Police, Cut City Staff; Liberal Groups Vow to Defund Dems Who Voted Against Background Checks”
The Mayor's entire budget is unsustainable, not just the compensation for police and fire fighters. Her own budget staff did a very competent job of describing the depth of the City's fiscal problems and promised that the forthcoming budget would at least begin to address the massive retirement and infrastructure obligations that have been ignored for over a decade, long before the Great Recession as our Mayor likes to say, could be blamed for our money problems.
The only lesson that the Mayor has learned from the City's fiscal mistakes of the past decade or two is not to manipulate the voters into approving a new parcel tax by threatening to close libraries and parks. That worked once before and then failed. A new scarier threat was needed this time: cut Head Start funding.
Sure like the champion of Oakland's Kid's First mandatory funding measure is really going to punish 3 and 4 year old innocents? Or that we would let that happen?
Like a "modest parcel tax" would make a dent in the structural fiscal imbalance of the City? That's a no never mind to our Mayor who learned her muni budgeting skills as head of the Council's finance committee for ten years. Her budgeting approach is best described as "budgeting by how much money you have in your checkbook."
Re: “It’s Time to Close the American Indian Public Charter Schools”
As a former student, I hated this school. It was a disgusting place to be. Although i passed with a C is almost all classes, it was the worse experience ever. They waste money on a restroom but can't have a gym or yard for P.E.? We were forced to walk to a park to do P.E. P.E. in AIPCS II's opinion is running all day. No REAL sports. On rainy days, we had to sometimes go in a classroom and do random push-ups or sit ups. If we were lucky we would get to get to go to the 3rd floor to do P.E.
Re: “Wallpaper Signs to Epic Records”
You have to check out his new video for “Good 4 it” check it: http://smarturl.it/Good4ItVideo
Re: “State Regulators Say Ex-Oakland Mayoral Candidate Marcie Hodge Broke Election Laws”
This report sounds personal once again. You are obsessed with this woman and her story. I don’t even think the media is chasing Sarah Palin stories like this. Okay, investigated, fined…fine paid….what next? Should we put her in the middle of town square (Eastmont Mall) with a scarlet letter. Please “journalist” get over it! Surely you can find something more poignant to report on than a woman who you feel stole 3% of the vote 3 years ago in the Oakland mayoral election. Great work Sherlock. Your keen detective skills, judicial diligence, and thorough reporting skills have……………well………..done what exactly? Moving on to real news….
Re: “Monday Must Reads: Lawmakers Seek to Reform Payday Lending; Yosemite Valley May Get Major Facelift”
Banning companies from offering loans is a bad move as far the free market in trade is concerned, limiting the amount they can charge and the add on costs that bump the 'loan' through the percentage ceiling is a better option however it is a sad state of affairs when loan sharks get legal or they become a part of the structure of daylight robbery that any government seems hog tied in preventing.perhaps there is a way of using the defunct banks that we all have a stake in to better use. http://speedyloansearch.com/payday-loans/
Re: “East Bay 4/20 Events Guide: Grass, Brass, and Fantastic Specials”
It's Snoop Lion now. Come on people keep up.
Re: “'Pot Farm' on Facebook May Be Grossing an Estimated $150K/Month”
they have made it impossible to play the game and finish the timed quests without paying smh
Re: “'Pot Farm' on Facebook May Be Grossing an Estimated $150K/Month”
shame they dont sort out complaints but they are quick enough to take your cash
Re: “Bin Laden's Abbottabad Compound Had A Pot Patch”
cannabis, the universally loved medicine
Re: “Mid-Week Menu: A Super-Sized Blue Bottle Cafe in Oakland, a Food Truck Garden in West Berkeley, and a New C.R.E.A.M. Shop in Walnut Creek”
Thanks, Ellen -- I fixed it.
Re: “Mid-Week Menu: A Super-Sized Blue Bottle Cafe in Oakland, a Food Truck Garden in West Berkeley, and a New C.R.E.A.M. Shop in Walnut Creek”
Thank you Luke! Can you make a note tho' that we will open for dinner Thursday-Saturday.
We appreciate you! All of us from @FuseBOX West Oakland. Ellen
Re: “Former Oakland Blight Official Admits to Breaking Law”
Len,
When Renwick left, Dan Lindheim was city administrator and John Russo was city attorney. It was at the end of the Dellums admin. -- before Quan was elected.
Re: “Former Oakland Blight Official Admits to Breaking Law”
If Renwick had been a cop accused of misconduct, the City's excuse for not firing her and taking away her retirement would be the binding arbitration clause of the charter that protects bad cops and bad fire and police contracts.
What's the excuse here? Who is responsible for the decision to just let her resign? Barbara Parker? Santana? The city's lack of action is an insult to the many honest building department employees who feel like chumps for not dipping their hands in the revenue stream of blight liens as it ran past them.
Re: “Oakland Veg Week Goes Gourmet”
There are many reasons why the number of vegans has doubled in the US in less than 3 years. Here are two uplifting videos to help everyone understand why so many people are making this life affirming choice: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKr4HZ7ukSE and http://www.veganvideo.org/.
Re: “Former Oakland Blight Official Admits to Breaking Law”
When was the last time any city employee charged with misconduct in their official duties was denied their full retirement benefits? Not Edergerly. Her nephew?
Re: “State Regulators Say Ex-Oakland Mayoral Candidate Marcie Hodge Broke Election Laws”
Hey! East Bay Express! How did you manage to leave out the most important part, the part that was reported by . . . the East Bay Express? This was probably a dirty trick to fool African-American voters. Your own reporting made a strong case that this was an awful, cynical, manipulative tactic that only worked because Hodge was willing to flout campaign laws and keep the source hidden.
Excerpts from http://www.eastbayexpress.com/SevenDays/ar…
(I)t was a surprise when Hodge entered the already-crowded Oakland mayor's race in early August. Recent polls show she has virtually no chance of winning. . .
Yet over the past two weeks, Hodge's mayoral campaign appears to be suddenly swimming in cash. Her face adorns giant billboards in East, West, and North Oakland. She's bought ads on Bay Area radio stations. And last week, she blanketed Oakland with a glossy, four-page mailer — an expense that typically ranges from $30,000 to $40,000.
So where did she get all that cash and why is she spending so much of it when she won't take the time to prepare for a debate? . . .
But it's not clear where she got the money — then or now. . .
Brooks and several other Oakland black leaders believe Perata, the king of big-money politics in Oakland, is once again helping his political protégé. "How would somebody who got her butt whupped by Desley Brooks and was censured by her Peralta colleagues suddenly have the money for billboards and radio ads?" asked Geoffrey Pete of the Oakland Black Caucus.
Hodge denied receiving Perata's assistance, but Brooks, Pete, and others think the former senator is trying to use Hodge to siphon black votes from two of his main competitors — Councilwomen Jean Quan and Rebecca Kaplan. . .
Hodge also seems to be mostly targeting black voters. Her radio ads have run on stations that are popular with black listeners, and her billboards are in predominantly black neighborhoods. So if her campaign is not about taking votes away from Kaplan and Quan, why would she target the black vote in a race when blacks make up about a third of the electorate and she will need support from throughout the city?
Re: “Lanesplitter Workers Quit in Protest”
Correction: Ms. Fox-Hodess is Berkeley unit chair of the UC Student Workers' Union, which covers academic student employees at all UC campuses. As a Riverside union member, I'm proud to see my local in solidarity with these workers.