Oakland Focus News | Oakland News Online Blog

From what I was told, it was a kick-ass concert. Here's a sample.

I'll get back to politics, but here's some fun. My good friend Beth Schnitzer invited me to Pier 39s Fleet Week Party held October 5th 2007 on the roof of the parking lot at Pier 39 in San Francisco. It's a killer event that drew over 600 people and provided a great backdrop for products and events from various sponsors from Bauer's Limousines -- http://www.bauerslimousines.com -- to Sheri's Berries. There's great food and music and people, like Movie Critic Jan Wahl. This is the first movie in a series.

From SFGate.com today (10-24) 08:50 PDT OAKLAND -- Law enforcement officials raided numerous locations in Oakland today as part of a multi-agency investigation into heroin trafficking, authorities said. The citywide busts occurred at 6 a.m. and involved Oakland police officers, Alameda County sheriff's deputies and agents with the federal Drug Enforcement Administration and the FBI. San Francisco police and Internal Revenue Service agents also were involved, said Officer Roland Holmgren, an Oakland police spokesman. The raids focused on a tar heroin trafficking organization based in the Central Valley with distribution cells in Oakland and elsewhere in the Bay Area, Holmgren said. The group had the capacity to distribute between to 50 and 100 pounds of tar heroin a month, police said. Officials plan to release more details at a news conference this afternoon. That's all the information provided.

From Rockridge News, which really needs to be in blog form. An interview with City Councilwoman Jane Brunner by Stuart Flashman, RCPC boardmember, and member, RCPC Planning and Project Review Committee In 1998, the city of Oakland updated itsGeneral Plan, the fundamental document defining the city’s land use patterns. Almost 10 years later, the city has not yet revised all of its zoning ordinance to fit with what the General Plan says. The Rockridge News talked to Jane Brunner, city councilwoman for North Oakland, about this zoning upd a t e process and what it might mean for Rockridge. Councilwoman Brunner will be an invited speaker at the RCPC’s October 18 General Meeting on the topic of the Rockridge/ Temescal Zoning Update and the future of Rockridge. Rockridge News: Thanks for taking the time to speak with me about zoning in Rockridge and Temescal. Let’s start with a simple question – what is zoning about? Jane Brunner: Zoning really is taking a look at how many housing units,...

From Oaklandnet.com About Ron Dellums Contact the Office of the Mayor Ron Dellums 1 Frank Ogawa Plaza 3rd Floor Oakland, CA 94612 officeofthemayor@oaklandnet.com T: (510) 238-3141 F: (510) 238-4731 An Oakland native, Ron Dellums grew up on Wood St in West Oakland, attended Oakland schools and graduated from Oakland Tech, Merritt College (AA), SF State (BA), and UC Berkeley (MSW). Ron served two years active duty in the United States Marine Corps, Following graduate school, Ron worked as a psychiatric social worker for the California Department of Mental Hygiene. He then directed various programs in Bayview/Hunters Point before becoming Director of the Hunters Point Youth Opportunity Center. Subsequently, he was Director of employment programs for the SF Poverty program and then Senior Consultant on manpower programs for Social Dynamics Inc, a leading Bay Area consulting firm. In 1967, he was elected to the Berkeley City Council and in 1970 to the US House of Representatives. He repr...

This is the forth day of the raging series of fires that have destroyed or damaged 1,750 homes, closed 100 businesses, and scorched 263,000 acres of land. All of this has resulted in over 500,000 people being displaced from their homes over this time. I've heard reports of people coming down just to volunteer to help. If you're anywhere but there, it's hard to understand exactly what's going on or the enormity of it, untill you see something like this Google Map here. The map shows that it's not one fire but many fires spread around a vast area. I count 20 in all, and raging in size from the 200,000 acre Witch Fire to the 160 acres Walker Fire. Whatever the case, the fires -- even the small ones -- are very large in size. So large, they dwarf the 1991 Oakland Hills Fire. That disaster covered 1,520 acres; this one consists of several blazes, all save for three between 10 and 100 times larger than the Oakland Hills Fire. It's a series of fires too la...

East Bay Blog reports... Over 100 gathered in front of Oakland City Hall for a demonstration and march in Oakland on October 22, joining with people in cities across the country on the “National Day of Protest Against Police Brutality, Repression and the Criminalization of a Generation." The largest group of participants were the families and friends of those who had been murdered by the police, who marched behind a banner which read “Stolen Lives: Killed by Law Enforcement." There were many family and friends of of Gary King, Jr., a 20-year-old youth who was murdered by police on September 20. Gary King was grabbed by the dreadlocks, brutalized, tasered and shot in the back by officer Patrick Gonzales, who had mistaken King for someone else. Gonzeles, who has been responsible for shooting several other young Black men in the last few years, stood with his foot in Gary’s back as he lay dying on the ground.