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Car In Lake Merritt Oakland, Saturday Morning , a photo by zennie62 on Flickr. According to social media reports, a woman, unidentified, apparently, accidentally drove her car into the waters of Lake Merritt in Oakland, California. The accident was reported on Twitter and this blogger found it via the use of the social search engine SocialMention.com, and during a search for "Lake Merritt." The photo was placed by @BarakaBlue and them retweeted by @TjaderDaRaider on Twitter and with this tweet: : "Yes that is a car upside down in lake Merritt." That it was a woman was reported by @MissKimmie123: @MissKimmie123 Miss Kimmie Action by the lake I heard a crash then a splash then hella oh my gods, a woman just drove her car in to Lake Merritt never a dull moment UPDATE: According to @BarakaBlue a "heroic dude" jumped into the waters of Lake Merritt to pull the woman from her car. Then Oakland Police and what was described as "medic and f...

Oakland News on the changing state of blogs in Oakland - part one. Oakland Blog Shrinkage First, what happened to blogs like OaklandSeen and Good News In Oakland ? The OaklandSeen blog started by long-time Oakland political activist and KPFA Morning Show star Aimee Allison has not produced a single new blog post since late May - it's June 24th now. And this tweet was issued June 8th and pointed to some kind of problem: OaklandSeen has been undergoing a few technical difficulties. Thank you for your patience. Keep watching this space for more Oakland LOVE... The most recent, most prominent blog post pointed to Oakland Seen's recently gained "Making Democracy Work" award, presented by the Oakland League Of Women Voters. That's the same award given to this blogger for work during the Oakland Mayor's Race - thanks again! But whatever's happening, and sources have pointed to some difficulties between editorial staff and management, let's hope O...

Deanna Santana, who came to the City of Oakland in 1995 and worked in what was then called the City Manager's Office and is now called the City Administrator's Office under the Oakland / Jerry Brown version of the strong-mayor system, was unanimously approved as Oakland's new City Administrator, replacing Interim City Administrator P. Lamont Ewell. Ms. Santana started in the City Manager's Office when Craig Kocian was held the title, then remained as Kocian left for Colorado, and gave way toward then-Interim City Manager / Economic Development Director Kofi Bonner. When Robert Bobb was hired as City Manager in 1997, and Bonner returned to his role as head of the Community and Economic Development Agency that year, Santana remained in the City Manager's Office, but had the primary assignment of the Police Department. In 1999, Deanna left for San Jose and has remained at the City Manager's Office as Deputy City Manager for 12 years. Her most recent assignm...

Oakland Rapper and Actor Tupac Shakur turns 40 today, and yet while he's not with us, his spirit is. The legendary poet-rap writer was gunned down in 1996, and by four-shots from a gunman in Las Vegas (the video mistakenly reports 1994 as the year Mr. Shakur was murdered. Now, a man named Dexter Isaac says he was responsible for the 1994 shooting and robbery that, for some time, Sean (P Diddy) Colmes was said to have been responsible for. Isaac also offered that he was paid $2,500 to go after Tupac Shakur. Think about that. A man was paid less money that some people make in a month to kill Tupac Shakur. Mr. Isaac must be a sad sack to even think of doing that - messing up his life and Mr. Shakur's for a measly $2,500. That's just plain nuts, but also shows you how screwed up our culture can be. Meanwhile, Tupac lives on with us in his way.

Well, with former Oakland City Attorney and Alameda County City Manager John Russo's blessing, Barbara Parker, who Russo mentioned in my video interview with him as one of his lieutenants who "handles the (Oakland City) council's agenda," now has the title of "Acting City Attorney." Here's the press release from the City of Oakland: OAKLAND, CA - Chief Assistant City Attorney Barbara J. Parker, a longtime Oakland resident and second in command of the City Attorney's Office, will take over as Acting City Attorney effective 11:30 a.m. today. In a letter sent Friday to the Mayor and City Council, outgoing City Attorney John Russo wrote that Parker will serve as Acting City Attorney "to assure a seamless transition with an experienced, eminently qualified attorney in charge of the Office until the Council makes its appointment decision." The City Council passed a resolution declaring the Office of City Attorney vacant as of June 13. ...

The person in this video above reportedly broke into a 28-year old woman's home in Oakland, and was allegedly in the process of stealing a box of "electronics" when she caught him via cellphone camera. Here's the full video: He's described as "a black man in his early 40s, five feet nine, 160 pounds, with a bald head," but as you can tell he's more light-skinned black or a person of color, who may be black or Latino. According to reports, the woman didn't scream or call 911. And after the man left her home at her request, then he reportedly returned and sexually assaulted her. She was sent to the hospital for treatment, then released. What I can't help asking is why didn't she call, or try to call, the police when the dude left the house the first time? Also, in the video she sounds rather calm for someone who was supposedly taken by surprise by the man. She says "can you please leave. How did you get in here?...

UPDATE: Joel Young Issues Must Read Statement - Click Here. According to Indy Bay, which is all over this story, AC Transit Board Of Director's member Joel Young , who had a promising political career and filed to run for the California State Assembly (District 16) against the incumbent Sandre Swanson in 2012, is seeing it go off the rails in a sex scandal.  Young is accused of domestic violence by his ex-girlfriend, who was granted a restraining order against him, that was filed on March 16th, 2011 and became active April 5th. A hearing on the domestic violence complaint is set for August. Reportedly, Young's ex-girlfriend found him in bed with another woman in March. The woman confronted Mr. Young, who allegedly attacked her, and she was hospitalized. Later, she called the police to file a report, but it's not clear from Indy Bay that an arrest was made. Meanwhile, Young filed his own restraining order against his ex-girlfriend on April 14th, and said that...