Oakland Focus News | Oakland News Online Blog

More at Zennie62.com | Follow me on Twitter! | Get my widget! | Visit YouTube | Visit UShow.com YouTube.com , Yahoo , MySpace , Metacafe , DailyMotion , Blip.tv , StupidVideos , Sclipo and Viddler What started as a calamity threatening to divide America has seemingly ended in a planned beer bust at the White House, courtesy of President Barack Obama himself. The ill-advised ( in my opinion ) arrest of Harvard Professor Henry Lewis Gates by Cambridge Police Officer Sgt. James Crowley four days ago caught the attention of the nation, but it was President Obama's comment that the Cambridge Police "acted stupidly" and the rather terrible response by the Cambridge Police Union at its press conference , which created a much-needed national conversation about race, law enforcement, and American culture. Regardless of where you stand on this issue, there's no doubt that it has been the political talk of the day, even if much of it was disjointed, nas

I found this on YouTube and its worth a good look. Here' what was written at ckellogg05: The personal development teacher at the 2009 Berkeley/Oakland AileyCamp at Cal Performances, Shawn Nealy, talks about the class and shows examples of the campers drawings about their role models. The nationally acclaimed youth program, conceived by Alvin Ailey, founder of Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, and locally produced by Cal Performances, combines ballet, jazz, modern and African dance instruction with personal development and creative communication classes and field trips. The camp is tuition free and admits under-served middle school students ages 1114 from the Berkeley, Oakland, Richmond and Albany Unified School districts; the camp is located on the UC Berkeley campus.

More at Zennie62.com | Follow me on Twitter! | Get my widget! | Visit YouTube | Visit UShow.com The latest news in the Chevron / Richmond oil refinery issue is that California Attorney General Jerry Brown wants to step in and mediate the negotiations between the oil giant and the City of Richmond. In working to do this, Brown's scored a point on San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom in the California Governor's race. According to the San Jose Mercury news and Contra Costa Times (yeah, I know they're merged), Brown appeared before the Richmond City Council and a "standing-room-only" crowd of 350 people, most reportedly laid off union workers from the Chevron facility, who's reconstruction effort was halted by court order in the wake of a lawsuit by environmentalists challenging the environmental impact report for the venue, costing them their jobs (I wonder if Dennis Roos was there ?). The Richmond electeds passed a resolution supporting the involvem

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 It's all over the Internet: Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates was arrested by Cambridge police officer Sgt. James Crowley after trying to pry open the lock, which was already damaged, to his own Cambridge home with the help of his driver, who picked him up from a trip to China. President Obama, in a press conference on his health care initiative, chimes in by saying "the Cambridge Police acted stupidly." President Obama's totally right. Here's why. Professor Gates problem was that he was being "an uppity black man" against an officer who looked for "uncommon" versus "common" elements to connect with Gates - no connection, or "uncommon leads to an arrest. On the plane from Chicago to Atlanta yesterday, I was in firs

More at Zennie62.com | Follow me on Twitter! | Get my widget! | Visit YouTube | Visit UShow.com Oakland has a new set of taxes I think are much needed and should not be a massive burden on the citizens already hurt by job losses and the credit crunch. In a very cool mail-order voting style, which really gets those people who care about the issue to actually vote for it with a chance of passing, Oakland Measures C,D,F, and H all passed, a dramatic reversal over the revenue-increase killing outcome of many of the November choices, reflecting the then-worsening economy. Now, Oakland can and will tax the gross receipts of all "cannabis businesses" with a tax of about 1.8 percent which will raise over $200,000, on top of a new 14 percent hotel occupancy tax (high, yes) for the Chabot Space and Science Center and the Oakland Museum and the convention center; meanwhile Measure 00 was reduced, which I'm not cool about but it helped solve the deficit problem, and pr

More at Zennie62.com | Follow me on Twitter! | Get my widget! YouTube , Yahoo , MySpace , Metacafe , DailyMotion , Blip.tv , StupidVideos , Sclipo and Viddler Consistent followers of my videos and Oakland Focus Blog will r emember my coverage of the proposed 1100 Broadway building in downtown Oakland at the historic Key System Building site, as well as the terrific Rocky Rische-Baird-created mural at the corner. The 20-story structure is planned as a spec office building that will dramatically transform the center of Oakland and give the American President Lines (APL) office building across the street on Broadway a lovely sibling. Its construction next to the giant APL Building will mark the first time two modern skyscrapers were constructed right next to each other but from different developers and not part of an overall master-developer plan in the history of Oakland. By contrast, the Kaiser and Ordway buildings were erected by The Kaiser Corporation, and the Fede

The East Bay Express reported on an incident at Berkeley High earlier this year, that happened because a white student wrote the word "nigga" on their Facebook page. While some see it as an issue of lack of diversity training, and I agree, I think something else is at play: the impact of hip-hop culture. In the multi-racial world of Hip-Hop blacks using such a term is so common that whites who are consumers of the music think everyone who's black uses the term. Of course, that's not true at all. The reality is that it's has a lot of negative images and many blacks, myself among them, don't want the word to be uttered by anyone. Period. This can be confusing to anyone white who's parents aren't giving them the proper training. Couple that with the fact that there are people who still use the word offensively and you've got a real powderkeg problem. The best solution is for people to learn that even if you hear it, it's not right to use it,

OAKLAND — A panel that is helping the city select its next police chief is paring down the field of candidates and could submit a list of finalists to Mayor Ron Dellums as soon as this week, officials said. The position became open when former Chief Wayne Tucker stepped down Feb. 28, and about 40 people applied for the job. About a quarter of those people were interviewed by a panel of police chiefs and law-enforcement experts last week, City Administrator Dan Lindheim said. The finalists who emerge out of that group will return for another interview with Lindheim, Dellums and possibly others before the mayor makes a final selection. "We're continuing the interview process and should have it wrapped up in a matter of weeks," Dellums spokesman Paul Rose said.

More at Zennie62.com | Follow me on Twitter! | Get my widget! In the third installment of my series on the " Top 10 on Twitter " in different cities , I took a new look at Oakland today and found some dramatic changes. But first, from Dharmesh Shah's awesome Twitter Grader app, here's the list by name, score, and number of followers: 1. MistahFAB - 99.99 - 22,971 2. acedtect - 99.97 - 16,206 3. mollywood - 99.97 - 20,539 4. zennie62 - 99.95 - 5,878 5. mc_lars - 99.8 - 3,912 6. ktvu - 99.8 - 2,445 7. bulldogreporter - 99.8 - 1,736 8. mariedenee - 99.8 - 2,397 9. stocktwits - 99.8 - 85,623 10. pandora_radio - 99.8 - 26,844 The news? Well, compared to two day ago when I started this, I jumped from number 7 to number 4. How? Well, I really didn't set out to improve my Twitter Grade from 99.8 to 99.95. What happened was that in losing followers - which happens all the time - I gained a better score! I was up to about 6,000 fol

Getting a deal to build at the former Oakland Army Base is turning into an exercise of patience for front-runner AMB/CCG, the team led by Rotunda and Fox Theatre developer Phil Tagami. The city of Oakland's economic development committee on Tuesday stalled the start of negotiations with Tagami's team to develop the city's 108-acre share of the base, possibly until late September. The same team is considered a front-runner among three applicants vying to develop the Port of Oakland's 168-acre share of the base, but Thursday the three-member Maritime Committee failed to forward a recommendation to the full Board of Port Commissioners.

More at Zennie62.com | Follow me on Twitter! | Get my widget! YouTube , Metacafe , DailyMotion , Blip.tv , Sclipo and Viddler Who's on the "Top 10" list of Twitter users in Oakland, Los Angeles, and San Francisco? There's no question but that Twitter, the microblogging service, has become a "must be on" new media system with an engaged and loyal core group of users, all microblogging about events, activities, news and opinion. The San Francisco-based firm has grown from small beginnings just three years ago to 19 million visitors (or 17 million if one goes by the digital research service ComScore.com ) in April in what was a dramatic 83 percent jump over March, and in that month alone Twitter went from 9.8 million visitors to 17 million visitors, perhaps the fastest expansion of a new media service in the short history of the industry. It's clear that Twitter, as Eric Schonfeld with the tech industry website TechCrunch.com said , is workin

More at Zennie62.com | Follow me on Twitter! | Get my widget! The giant 100-acre Oakland Army Base is the focus of a development competition between two groups led by people well-known to many Oaklanders: "AMB/CCG" (for AMB Property Corporation and the "CCG" is California Commercial Group) is directed by Phil Tagami, of California Commercial Investments, and who redeveloped two Oakland landmarks the Fox Oakland Theater and the Oakland Rotunda, and Federated Oakland Associates, who's boss is Michael Johnson, the developer of several multi-unit housing projects in the San Francisco Bay Area, and the builder of the San Francisco version of Yoshi's Jazz Club.   The Oakland Army Base  The developers are engaged in a competition with the Oakland City Council as the final "decider". The winner gains the right to enter into an "Exclusive Negotiating Agreement" with the Oakland Redevelopment Agency, which will lead to the production o

More at Zennie62.com | Follow me on Twitter! | Get my widget! YouTube , Yahoo , MySpace , Metacafe , DailyMotion , Blip.tv , StupidVideos , Sclipo and Viddler On July 1st, Contra Costa Superior Court Judge Barbara Zuniga issued a decision that altered Richmond, California's economic course for the future. She ordered the oil giant to rewrite its environmental impact report (EIR) because of environmentalists' contention that the EIR was flawed and that a newly refurbished Richmond refinery would not produce lower carbon emissions than the current facility. Her decision was hailed as a victory for "the little guy" by my friend San Francisco Chronicle Columnist Chip Johnson. But his column made me ask "Who's really the little guy, here?" So in a search for the answer to my query, I did some digging and found a person who represents the real "little guy": Dennis Roos. But before we meet Roos, a brief recap is in order. Two Sid

More at Zennie62.com | Follow me on Twitter! | Get my widget! Visit YouTube You know, in this whole matter of retaining the A's in Oakland, as much as I've been upset with the City of Oakland and this newly developed Oakland subculture that wants to keep the city small, and as impressed as I am with the determination of San Jose to try and yank the team from Oakland, there's one perception I can't escape at all: San Jose just plain doesn't deserve the Oakland A's. The A's are an embeded element of Oakland's cultural history, as much as The Port of Oakland, the Hell's Angels, or The Black Panthers, The Oakland Athletics have been here during the decades that saw the rise of the Oakland Raiders as an NFL power. They were witness to, and considering the political friendships at the time during the 70s, a part of the growth of Oakland's black political base. The A's played a key role in the 1989 Loma Piereta Earthquake, and were impa

From BooksFromTLCGraphics on YouTube: Trailer for book titled "Straight Outta East Oakland," by Harry Louis Williams II Firstborn Walker wants desperately to flee the mean streets of East Oakland and attend a prestigious university. With no job, he turns to the one person who can help him secure the money for college -- a charismatic, ultra-violent crack dealer. Now part of the Black Christmas mob, will Firstborn catch that triple life sentence, catch a hot one through his forehead, or escape the game altogether? This powerful book tells his story.

From usshaolinkungfu at YouTube Oakland Chinatown Night Market 2009 Presented by the Oakland Chinatown Chamber of Commerce July 11, 2009 U.S. Shaolin Kung Fu kicked off the Night Market with an exhilarating kung fu performance that thrilled the crowds! This talented young group proudly shared their amazing skills through a variety of forms, traditional weapons, self-defense tactics, and cooperative and constructive team work- and theyve embraced this demonstration with both poise and enthusiasm. Finally a very special appreciation to Master Sun for his breath-taking performance that got the audience up on their feet! U.S. Shaolin Kung Fu was honored to have performed at this wonderful and culturally enriching event!

I just read - briefly - the matter of the $900,000 contract that was given to Mark Lundquist's firm for construction management. But I have to be really honest and get after the Tribune's Matt Krupnick and Thomas Peele for writing the article as if Harris was giving a contract to a friend, then benefiting from the contract himself. I write that because the article states how Harris and Lundquist were involved in the ownership of a radio station, then wrote how much Lundquist made off the no-bid contract. Now, that I've written that, I'll explain this: anyone who can see knows that Mark and Elihu have known each other for years. But also it should have not been a "no-bid" contract and I think that's where Elihu screwed up. But to defend a man I worked for, I will write that Elihu works to hire good people and has little patience with job screw ups. He believed - I'm sure - that what he did was the right thing to do. For those who may think Elih

More at Zennie62.com | Follow me on Twitter! | Get my widget! Visit YouTube YouTube , MySpace , Metacafe , DailyMotion , Blip.tv , Sclipo and Viddler On Saturday July 11th at 5: 30 PM, I walked out of a cafe on Grand Avenue near Lake Merritt in Oakland and noticed that sweet smell that comes after a light rain and a weird amber tint of the sidewalk below me, so I looked up and was surprised by an incredible site: a remarkable double rainbow that stretched overhead and to the left and right of me.  It was such an amazing event that people came out of ZZA's and Sidebar restaurants just to take pictures of it; fortunately, I had my small Flip Video Camera.   Double rainbow in Oakland There were two rainbows, one on top of the other in a perfect arch. It was such a site that people came out to their balconies to see it, and car traffic on Grand Avenue slowed because drivers were craining their necks to get a better look at it. What was remarkable was how robust the d

More at Zennie62.com | Follow me on Twitter! | Get my widget! YouTube , Yahoo , MySpace , Metacafe , DailyMotion , Blip.tv , StupidVideos , Sclipo and Viddler Peter Jackson, the Academy Award-winning producer and director of the Lord of The Rings Trilogy and King Kong took on a new and exciting movie project in 2007 that's a documentary-style movie about an alien encampment in South Africa. Called "District 9" it's set for release August 14th and features perhaps the most realistic take on the age-old story of aliens visiting Earth I've ever seen thus far. In District 9 , a giant alien ship hovers over Johannesberg, South Africa. In total the ship and its crew have been there for 28 years. Over that time, a generation, they're forced into slum-like conditions in an area called "District 9". Reportedly a government agent become a friend to the aliens and becomes a human host for their biotechnology. The Alien Encampment and th

More at Zennie62.com | Follow me on Twitter! | Get my widget! YouTube , Yahoo , MySpace , Metacafe , DailyMotion , Blip.tv , StupidVideos , Sclipo and Viddler In the BART labor contract matter, one of the issues that's upset me is the union's request for a three percent wage increase. Now, I'm pro-union, that's not the issue, but we're in a terrible recession, perhaps a depression, and many people are unemployed or just trying to maintain employment. But even with that, we have BART's union workers asking for a raise! With such a request, we have the right to ask "Are you the BART worker giving riders the great service they deserve? Well, if the actions of this BART Rockridge station agent are any example, the answer's "no." I used BART to ride into San Francisco for a light dinner, and after parking at Rockridge, walked into the station as I always do, but noticed that the station agent booth was empty. I couldn't beli