Councilmember Pat Kernighan On Oakland's Economic Crisis

At the press conference explaining the settlement between the City of Oakland and the Oakland Housing Authority I talked with District 2 Councilmember Pat Kernighan about Oakland's Economic Crisis. In our talk, she explained that $38 million was cut from the budget, but that she expects to see a shortfall of about $50 million by the spring of 2009.

She explains there was "no choice" in the cutting decisions that were made. Either layoff people or everyone takes a paycut. They opted for the latter.

On a happy note, we talked about how Lakeshore had revived, the Grand Lake Market on Saturdays as well as Trader Joe's and the number of new restaurants opening in downtown Oakland. This talk was before the BART shooting, as a note.

BART Shooting: Nancy Nadel On Police and People of Color

I talked with Oakland District 3 Councilmember Nancy Nadel at the BART Shooting Community meeting held January 8th 2009. Here, Nadel expresses her concern about the use of police "deadly force" on people of color.

Comcast Cable Has Terrible Service; Oakland Should Cut The Franchise Agreement

Comcast Cable has enjoyed a long standing franchise agreement in Oakland, which is why it seems every apartment has the service at the exclusion of any alternative.  That monopolistic setup has led to some very bad behavior on the part of the cable giant.  


For example, Comcast has a system where if one is late for a payment, then pays it to get current, they still count a penalty charge for the number of days the payment was late, which is charged on top of what is owed but does not show up until months later.  


In other words, you could late pay, think your bill is current, then three months later be informed that you still owe them for past months, even if you thought and they told you that you were current. It's a very weird billing system that does not serve customers well and could cause customers to think Comcast was scamming them.  


That's why I stopped Comcast and went to satellite service.  I'm of the view that I should not have to pay to get a communications transmission -- that was true in the old days and we should return to that state of affairs.  It's making being informed a class-determined affair: the more you can pay the more you get.  That's not what a well-functioning society deserves.


So in that sprit, I propose a reworking of the Oakland Franchise agreement under the matter of customer service.  The simple adjustment has to be a reworking of it such that billing late fees are not delayed in their reporting; they're a simple percentage of the bill immediately applied and reported and there's no fee that "kicks in" after so many days.  


Here's a link to the City's agreement: http://clerkwebsvr1.oaklandnet.com/attachments/11098.pdf 

Richmond Hate Crime Claimed - Alarm To Those Who Think All Is Well

This story below reminds me -- in a remote way -- of a small but disturbing matter that happened at Cafe Van Kleef and to me.


I was talking to a couple of fellow Cal grad friends who were both white and female when I made a motion that accidentally bumped into this person as he walked by. No big deal, to me. But this guy said "That was intentional" and after I said it wasn't and he was reacting weirdly, then said "It's reverse discrimination in Oakland" -- he was White.


I told him to go away as that was sick. This matter reported in the Sf Chronicle is worse:

(02-01) 18:40 PST -- Brandon Manning says he never saw it coming.


One minute he was hanging out with seven seemingly friendly guys in a park, the next he said he was on the ground, the blows coming from all sides, a fist or foot landing hard enough to fracture six bones in his face.


But it was the words accompanying the blows that made Manning, 24, think he was about to die.


"Coon." And then, "How do you like this, you f-ing n-?"


A week after the Jan. 24 incident, Richmond police officers arrested seven East Bay teenagers on suspicion of felony assault with a deadly weapon - a hate crime investigation delayed five days because of a police clerical error.


The seven are white. Manning is black.


"I don't understand how somebody could do that in this day and age," Manning said Sunday. "I never, never thought it would happen to me."


Not in California and not in the East Bay, Manning said.

Preventing hate crimes is our job as a society regardless of color. If you're White and see this happening to someone, get involved, otherwise the way society turns is partly your fault.