Oakland Focus News | Oakland News Online Blog

From LakeViewFriends on YouTube. (I wish these video channel owners would let me know when they put out a video!) who wrote: "This is a short video about the history of Lakeview Library, near the top of Lake Merritt in Oakland, California"

From Contra Costa Times on YouTube - The Oakland Women's Rowing Club (OWRC) has been rowing on Lake Merritt since 1916. The Ladies of the Lake as they are known, row every Wednesday morning. Their ages range from 50-80s.

Lake Chalet interior The Lake Merritt Boathouse is being transformed into what will be one of the Bay Area's most popular restaurants: The Lake Chalet . The new restaurant will be the focus in part of a ribbon cutting ceremony Thursday, August 6th at 2 PM reopening the historic boathouse. According to conversations I've had with employees, the new outdoor waterfront eatery setting will be just plain awesome. The creators of the Lake Chalet are known for the landmark Beach Chalet and Park Chalet in San Francisco at Ocean Beach.

More at Zennie62.com | Follow me on Twitter! | Get my widget! | Visit YouTube | Visit UShow.com YouTube , Yahoo , MySpace , Metacafe , DailyMotion , Blip.tv , StupidVideos , Sclipo and Viddler Thursday, President Barack Obama held a "Beer Summit" , as some have called it, with Harvard Professor Henry Lewis Gates, Jr., Cambridge Police Sergeant Officer James Crowley, and Vice President Joe Biden, bring an end to an unfortunate but necessary event in American Cultural history, and starting a new chapter in American race relations. It was the first time in American and world history a sitting president met publicly with a white police officer and the person the officer arrested, a black man. And to add to the moment, the president is African American. I think the teachable moment President Obama referred to was that two gentlemen of seemingly different stripes but of one culture can not only meet, but (as they agreed to do) meet again and again.   Sgt. ...

More at Zennie62.com | Follow me on Twitter! | Get my widget! | Visit YouTube | Visit UShow.com On YouTube.com Yesterday I posted a blog entry which contained set of videos from the YouTube channel of "EASTOAKLAND106", and contained scenes that were shocking. One showed two young black men basically exacting an ugly form of "street" justice on a white man in East Oakland. The other videos were created during "The Sideshow", an activity featuring muscle cars revved to full-throttle by their drivers, spinning donuts in the middle of the intersection of 106th and Mac Arthur Blvd. The YouTube channel contained other videos that together gave the viewer a real picture of what was going on (or "going down") in that part of Oakland. I made the decision to create the blog to get the attention of the normally placid blog reader, tossed a steady diet of texts about celebrities, sports, and Erin Andrews . These videos showing the rea...

I'm writing this from the comfort of a suburban Atlanta home office, listening to Darrel Carrey talk to the Oakland City Council regarding the need for jobs and the importance of redeveloping the Army Base. He is one of 75 speakers and 165 speaker cards (double-counting plus?) and there's a lot of emotion. While the favorite to win the right to negotiate with the Oakland Redevelopment Agency is AMB/CCG over Federal Oakland Partners, it seems in failing to communicate with the Oakland Film Center people, Phil Tagami, who represents the developer team, has angered a ton of folks and they've come to the Oakland City Council to express their anger. Well, not Darrel. Long-time Oakland activist Joyce Roy asked how a developer could get this far without talking to the Oakland Film community. Yikes. This is going to be a long agenda item. After about 50 speakers, the council's talking. Even with the film community's issues with how they perceive Phil treated th...