Oakland Mayor's Race: Rebecca Kaplan On Joe Tuman And Voting

Sierra Club thinks Joe Tuman isn't "viable"

Oakland At-Large Councilmember and Oakland Mayor's Race candidate called this blogger regarding the blog post entitled "Oakland Mayor's Race: Rebecca Kaplan Fears Joe Tuman," where it was reported that Kaplan recommended that Joe Tuman not be the second choice for those voting for her.

That information came from the Bay Area Wellstone Democratic Renewal Club's email forum, where long time Oakland local business supporter, political activist, and friend Pamela Drake wrote this:

Rebecca Kaplan contacted me and said that she is NOT recommending Tuman and that she refers voters to the East Bay Express article to make their own decisions. I apologize for repeating an incorrect report,
Pamela

So Rebecca's phone call was puzzling, but as they say on the street, it is what it is. What Kaplan said to this blogger is that she encourages voters to make the selection they think is best. Also, Kaplan notes correctly that Drake is a supporter of Councilmember Jean Quan for Mayor. Even with that, it seems that Drake was just trying to get the right representation of who's backing whom.

For example, prior to the message above, Drake wrote this:

Interestingly, although Jean has publicly recommended that her voters put Rebecca as their number 2 choice, Rebecca has reportedly suggested Tuman as her number 2 choice and Quan as her number 3. Tuman is fairly conservative and does not even support Measure BB (the Measure Y fix). This is a disappointment to supporters of Jean (1) and Rebecca (2).
Pamela

Then, to clarify for those who may be lost at this point, Drake wrote this:

Rebecca Kaplan contacted me and said that she is NOT recommending Tuman and that she refers voters to the East Bay Express article to make their own decisions. I apologize for repeating an incorrect report,
Pamela

Okay?

Kaplan Loves Tuman

Councilmember Kaplan wants it known that she has love and respect for Tuman and the two have become friends.  She has nothing against him.

The intent of the original blog on this wasn't to imply that Kaplan disliked Tuman, just that she was reconsidering recommendations because of his rising popularity.

Kaplan Calls Grand Lake's Allan Michaan

True to her desire to mend fences, a rare quality in Oakland politics, Kaplan also said she did call  Grand Lake Theater Owner Allan Michaan.

Michaan, who supports Tuman, has been a critic of the draconian Oakland Parking Enforcement strategy Kaplan supported, and Kaplan herself because of it.  This is an issue Kaplan's sensitive to and needs to make an outright statement that she's no longer supportive of the efforts that have harmed so many Oaklanders.

More coming soon.

Oakland Mayor's Race: Oakland Tribune Prejudice Angers Greg Harland

Greg Harland

One big problem that's plagued the Oakland Mayor's Race and that apparently still exists is how some Bay Area media organizations ignore some of the candidates running for the office of Mayor of Oakland.

That practice has angered Oakland Mayoral Candidate Greg Harland because he wan't contacted by either the Oakland Tribune / Bay Area News Group or The San Francisco Chronicle.

Harland was upset to the point where he referred to one post as saying "that says it all," and it was a column by Mercury News / Oakland Tribune columnist Tammerlin Drummond which reads:

"We began by whittling down the list of 10 candidates to the four who actually merited voter consideration: Kaplan, Perata, Councilwoman Jean Quan and political analyst/university professor Joe Tuman." 

Ok, let's let loose here. That statement is a freaking joke. The only reason Joe Tuman was placed in the Tribune's "merited voter consideration" hopper was because Tuman's name recognition with Oakland's white Montclair / Oakland Hills region was high. Or to look at it another way, Terrance Candell is well-known in black and Latino East Oakland, where his prep school is located on 73rd Street, but the Oakland Tribune didn't even talk to him.

The Oakland Tribune and Tammerlin Drummond should be ashamed, but they're not. This space is not complaining about their selection of Councilmember Rebecca Kaplan to endorse, only the way they did it. The Tribune process was not open, and race and class prejudiced to boot.   Thus, unfortunately, it taints the selection of Kaplan.

That's right, race and class prejudiced. In other words this blogger can hear the Tribune's demons saying about Candell "He's a blowhard brotha who thinks he can be Mayor, so why talk to him?" and about Harland "Who? Never heard of him," and about Green Party Candidate Don Macleay, "Ah. Who? OK. Nice guy." You get the idea.

In other words, different kinds of prejudice applied to different Oakland Mayoral candidates. The real joke is that none of the Oakland Tribune or SF Chronicle reporters has any experience in working for a mayor in Oakland's City Hall, either. So how would they know how to evaluate a Mayoral Candidate? They don't.

You have to have experience in the office in order to evaluate a candidate that is running for office, so you can recognize the qualities that person has which are appropriate for the office.  The Oakland Tribune and the SF Chronicle lack that experience.  By contrast, this blogger has worked for two Oakland mayors - Elihu Harris and Jerry Brown, and sat on the Sports Task Force for Ron Dellums before quitting in protest.  (I'm still proud of that.)

It's one thing to pretend to be a policy wonk, crunching numbers over a local legislative idea. But it's quite another to understand that when a developer contacts the Mayor's Office and wants to build in, say, a location that happens to be in Councilmember Nancy Nadel's District Three (Downtown and West Oakland), it's a good idea to know to contact her office to get them in the loop.

It's one thing to know the population of Oakland, and another to know how to dig through Mayor's Office files to find projects that were of importance, but were left undone. That's one thing I did when I first worked for Elihu Harris on the first day on the job - it's something every mayoral candidate should consider doing.

That's why I ask each candidate what kind of office they're going to have, and how will it be ran. The Tribune and Chronicle people don't have the experience to even think of asking that kind of question. It's a question that of the candidates I've talked to thus far, Don Perata gave the best answer to, but not by much.

It's also why I asked about Tax Increment Financing at one forum, only to find that of all of the candidates, Marcie Hodge, who I didn't expect to get it, actually had a good general answer.

The point is, you as media person have to talk to each candidate, because in doing so you learn something about that person's abilities for the office that you didn't know before.

Look at it this way: Lionel Wilson was a judge before he was elected Oakland's first black mayor.  He went on to serve for three terms and is arguably the best mayor Oakland's ever had.  If Tammerlin Drummond had her way she may have delayed Oakland's election of its first black mayor.

Stay tuned.