Comment Archives
Re: “Richmond Councilman Gets Called on His Junk”
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Re: “Shuggie Otis”
Can't wait for this! The video for these releases is pretty awesome. http://smarturl.it/Inspiration_Wings
Re: “Thursday Must Reads: Chinese Firm Jumpstarts $1.5 Billion Oakland Project; Federal Judge Scolds Oakland Officials”
Why am I not impressed by the announcement of this deal?
I've lived here so long I've gotten cynical about those announcements.
I heard similar trumpeting of the dawn of new eras and projections of big boosts to local employment and city tax revenue when we committed ourselves to 20Mill/year to induce the Raiders to come back; for City Center, for Jerry Brown's 10k resident progam with Uptown, for the Ice Rink, for the Trans Asian Center etc.
Show me the big return on the City's investment that those projects have gotten us? Returns yes. But relative to the cost?
To say that this project is all private money is not accurate.
It's long been a done deal that 100% public waterfront property was converted to mostly private property at below market rate.
I was not part of the original Oak to 9th battles, but I do know that the project went thru because the many opponents who signed a petition to have the approval put to a public vote, were defeated because they ran out of money for lawyers. The main issue over which their petition was rejected by the court was later overturned in a different case of a different plaintiff.
It was not one of the City or City Attorney John Russo's finer moments in democracy.
That's history.
Now, we have to make sure our officials don't repeat the more recent history of the last real estate bubble by spending the temporary jump in building fees and transfer taxes that should come in a year or so, instead of paying down long ignored retirement and undone infrastructure liabilities.
There will be tremendous pressure brought to bear on elected officials by the non-security city workers to get their temporary cuts restored out of that temporary increase in revenue and the current jump from the current real estate bubble. Deja vue here we come.
http://www.contracostatimes.com/editorial/…
Len Raphael
Re: “'Pot Farm' on Facebook May Be Grossing an Estimated $150K/Month”
and everyother day rhey go into mantance and it gets worse
Re: “'Pot Farm' on Facebook May Be Grossing an Estimated $150K/Month”
if they make that much money why is the game missing up all the time
Re: “Shuggie Otis”
Incredibly excited to hear these tracks. I first caught wind of Shuggie's rerelease from NPR at http://smarturl.it/ShuggieNPR and am now hooked. :)
Re: “Uptown's New Loring Cafe Falls Short”
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Re: “The Bingo Kingpin”
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Re: “The Bingo Kingpin”
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Re: “The Port's Debt Problems Will Slow Army Base Project”
These development deals are usually sold as benefitting Oakland economically, but in time, they end up draining its coffers. It’s obvious who the losers are: the people of Oakland, whose schools, libraries, and police and fire departments are forced to operate with deeply inadequate funding (to the point of closure, in some cases). But who are the winners? Hard to tell, given how cloudy the political and financial connections are. It is interesting how some of the same players keep turning up in these deals, somehow managing to get a pass from politicians. It’s a recurring nightmare for Oakland. Private developers seem eager to invest in Oakland, but only if they are assured that public funding will fill in with whatever is needed down the road. And more money is always needed down the road.
The Oakland Zoo’s extravagant expansion plan for Knowland Park is just another iteration of this nightmare. The Zoo board is stacked with investment and real estate development people, and it has convinced city politicians to trust that this environmentally destructive project will benefit Oakland, selling it with the popular catchwords of “conservation”, “conservation education”, and (during the campaign for 25 years of public tax money in the last election) “humane animal care”. But it all turns out to be a lie: the Zoo’s version of conservation and education is to pave over acres of California native habitat to put in fake exhibits of that habitat. Its supposed dire need for public funds for animal care turned out to be an end-run to make funds available for this bloated and expensive development project. The Zoo does not have all the funding needed to build this thing, much less run it, or follow through on all the mitigation promises it has made to sell the project to regulatory agencies. Oakland doesn’t need more zoo than it already has. And it sure doesn’t need another financial obligation that would be, again, at the expense of basic childhood education and public safety.
Re: “The Port's Debt Problems Will Slow Army Base Project”
It is just really amazing how much is paid for so little in Public Financing of capitol projects. And it is stupefying how the costs are never even close as to what they are projected to be.
Like Public Finance is a big pig feed. No one is accountable. Then, when built, amazing fighting over who gets profits-like the periodic Coliseum division of spoils..
Aren't we all sick of this? If Port Expansion is profitable, private investment can do it, or it won't get done--it is unmarketable. Since when does the public sector generate economic growth? City Government? The Post Office? Civil Service? Unions?
Re: “Uptown's New Loring Cafe Falls Short”
Wow, quite the snarky review. I had a far different experience. I found the food excellent. The service was good but not great. The design elements are great fun, and a refreshing change from the ubiquitous "modern" styled establishments springing up all over. BTW - best bathroom around.
Re: “United Nations Tells Obama To Crack Down on Potheads”
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Re: “A Little Dab Could Doom Ya”
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Re: “The Port's Debt Problems Will Slow Army Base Project”
Does it make sense to have a billion dollar bond issue so the city can get 2 million dollars a year in new taxes? Sheesh, the taxes will not even pay the interest. Bonds are NOT free money.
Re: “Federal Raid on Oaksterdam Sapped Police Response to Oikos University Massacre”
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Re: “No More Cops Without More Cuts”
Getting a fully-staffed police department will require a profound change in the consciousness and behavior of Oakland's electeds. They will have to become aware of the ongoing dollar costs of overabundant crime: police overtime; medical and mental health costs; loss of productivity; failure in school of children traumatized by violence; opportunity costs such as businesses which avoid locating in Oakland because of crime. Electeds will then have to act as if making this city safe were actually the primary function of government rather than a luxury they think "we" can't afford.
Re: “The Port's Debt Problems Will Slow Army Base Project”
Payment on bond debt isn't just choking off opportunity on this port project--the city is still paying bond debt on other projects that haven't panned out as planned. That's another reason why more residents--and policymakers-- ought to be raising questions about the wisdom of the enormous Oakland zoo expansion, even if they don't care about sacrificing their special city-owned parkland and native wildlife habitat.
The City of Oakland continues having to pay off debt on the Measure G bond that residents passed to support the expansion of the zoo when it penciled out at $23 million. Today the project has ballooned to $72 million and only a fraction of it has been built. Since the zoo has sought through last fall's Measure A1 to get even more public funding for this large capital project, which is terrifically expensive not only to build but to operate (and it doesn't have the money to operate the facility it's got), then why on earth would the City incur even further debt?
Other major capital projects that have cost city taxpayers WAY more than they ever imagined include the Oakland Coliseum, the Fox Theatre renovation, and now likely the Army Base project. Somebody always convinces our city leaders that this is the latest and best economic remedy for what ails the city. But it turns out to be snake oil, and we are still paying for it years later.
Re: “Yelp and the Business of Extortion 2.0”
Yelp is clearly employing extortionist tactics. My business was intimidated into the add program at $300/mo. We are currently into them for $7200. Here are the facts:
- You can not remove a competitors ad on your page unless you pay them.
- Even as a paying business owner yelp has never responded to our concerns about very suspicious even irrelevant reviews posted on our page (even after flagging them and explaining why they are not legitimate)
- Responding to "user generated reviews" requires a clear facial picture of the business owner who is responding to the review. This would make sense if yelp required "users" (who post potentially damaging reviews that result in loss of sales) to have clear facial pictures on their profiles.
- We have been attempting to cancel our $300 per month subscription (automatically billed) for a week now and have not had any luck. The phone number on their customer support page is no longer in service. We have not received any response to our emails or phone calls to the senior account manager.
Yelp has to be stopped! Something has to be done! Are their any successful lawsuits happening? Help!
Re: “Shuggie Otis”
Great write up! the NPR write-up is really amazing! Shuggie is a legend!