Oakland Focus News | Oakland News Online Blog

Yesterday, this blogger filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to the City of Oakland and to the following offices: The Oakland City Attorney, the City of Oakland Office of Economic Development, The Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum Authority, The County of Alameda County Administrator's Office, and The City of Oakland's City Administrator's Office. The email with letter attached stated: Pursuant to the state open records act, I request access to and copies of all emails, written letters and correspondence, and studies of any kind regarding the budget and operation and management of the Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum, and future development plans for baseball, football, and basketball stadiums in Oakland and over the time period from today back to 1/1/2008. I ask that the agencies wave fees for copies of studies and emails (which can be printed out from a computer) and to avoid charging greater than the the cost to make a black and white copy of a document.

Chevron's part of Richmond in that it's the city's largest employer. Richmond needs Chevron to provide not just jobs but help for the many non-profit community service programs that Chevron's in position to help with. Chevron lost a court battle regarding its environmental impact report. What Chevron must do and reportedly will do is comply with the courts request to the letter. Chevron should also stop making noises that it will leave Richmond in the city's time of need. What certain Richmond elected officials and so-called activists need to do is stop with the emotional saber-rattling that reads like a Fox News Cable program but from the left, and start with smart deal-making that gets to a win-win for both the City of Richmond and Chevron. That has not happened under the current political leadership in Richmond. Mayor Gayle McLaughlin, while being a very nice person, is more of an activist than a deal-maker. The good Mayor does not seem interested in

The location at 389 Grand Avenue of what was once my favorite Oakland, California hang, The Golden Bear, has been closed for what seems to be about a year now. It was most recently called "Dapper" which was an odd name for a bar to this blogger. It was a nice place that seemed to cater to one type of young, black, Hip Hop-oriented audience. Dapper had a weird vibe: if you weren't exactly and narrowly from that group, you could feel uncomfortable. It's almost like how Cafe Van Kleef in downtown Oakland has changed. It seems to fit a young, white grunge artist crowd and if you're not part of that group, it can feel weird. But, I must confess to some interestingly fun one-night stands out of Cafe Van Kleef. Being bald is fun, but I digress. Someone has filed an application to reopen Dapper bar and some residents in Oakland's Adams Point neighborhood are upset about it. One person just didn't see the reason for a bar there. I disagree. Bars i

Governor Brewer's creating a psychotic environment That the Arizona illegal immigration law is psychotic is without argument. The law, approved by Arizona Governor Jan Brewer, calls for the identification, prosecution, and deportation of those presumed guilty of illegal immigration.  This is where the environment that invites psychotic behavior is created and why the law itself is psychotic. First, we must understand the definition of the word "psychotic." To be psychotic is to have a "loss of contact with reality, usually including false ideas about what is taking place or who one is (delusions) and seeing or hearing things that aren't there (hallucinations)" according to a definition at Google Health . What's interesting and directly apply to the Arizona illegal immigration law and its drafters and implementers are the symptoms of psychotic behavior: Abnormal displays of emotion Confusion Depression and sometimes suicidal thoughts Disorg

New York, NY - On Tuesday night, the Oakland, California City Council passed a resolution to study configurations for, but not build, an AC Transit Bus Rapid Transit system through Oakland's spine from Telegraph Avenue to along International Blvd. Even though the resolution was supported by the Oakland City Council, it was not without a fire-breathing argument from legendary Oakland City Councilmember Larry Reid. Reid and his constituents feared that a dedicated bus transit lane set would turn International into a kind of "freeway" that divided East Oakland. Reid said that people from North Oakland would not travel down to East Oakland to spend money anyway. I watched the City Council hearing from a distance back east and with sadness because it looked like a terrible racial issue, with older African Americans arguing that their neighborhood was essentially being invaded and destroyed by AC Transit. This blogger completely understands Larry Reid's fears, but

This NFL Draft installment (thanks to the Inn at Irving Place, part of the Small Luxury Hotels of The World brand) comes from New York, Radio City Music Hall - Former Cal-Berkeley and now Detroit Lions 2010 NFL Draft 1st round pick Running Back Jahvid Best sat down with the media for the first time after he was selected by the Lions as the 30th pick in the first round. Jahvid Best seemed relieved to have gotten over with the whole thing. Plus, note Cal Alums that Best was wearing a RED TIE! More on that below, because I got after him about it. Here's the transcript of the interview, with some corrections to match the video above that the FastScripts people missed: JAHVID BEST: I feel great. This is a dream I've had since I was a little kid growing up just to play in the NFL. So this moment here, just experiencing it with my family and my friends and just getting selected is just amazing. Q. What about (Cal Defensive Tackle) Tyson (Alualu) going ahead of you?

Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums made a rare visit to the Oakland City Council tonight, Tuesday, and for the purpose of breaking a tie vote on an alternative created by Councilmember Jean Quan to a resolution that if passed would have taken money from the Oakland public campaign financing program and put it into a plan for educating voters on the new Instant Run-Off Voting system. Quan's alternative split money $100,000 for campaigns, and $100,000 for IRV education. The current City of Oakland program provides just over $200,000 for public campaign financing. In other words, the city helps you by providing matching funds. The Mayor stepped forward after a lively but brutally nasty two-minute statement by Oakland's number one gadfly Sanjiv Handa. Sanjiv accused the City of Oakland and its City Council of being "greedy" because incumbent councilmembers running for reelection didn't want to have competition. While this space agrees with Sanjiv in principle, Handa&

The terrible death of 59-year-old Tiansheng Yu one again sheds light on a problem that has plagued Oakland for some time, yet many don't want to talk openly about it. This space has, and will continue to do so. The City of Oakland has a problem with young black men who just walk around picking people who they think are welcome targets for violence. I blogged about this problem many times. In the case of the " mugging over at Wayne Avenue in 2007 ,"a man who lived on the 300 block of Wayne Avenue in Adams Point was mugged at gunpoint. Someone in the area two black men do the crime in what was described as an "underlit driveway." In 2006, a young woman walked around China Hill, Haddon Hill, and Grand Lake posting a letter called Muggings on Athol . The letter, as I wrote then in Oakland Focus , stated a painful fact: that whites are the targets of assault and theft crimes committed by African Americans in the area. She wrote: We are faced with two d

Susan Mernit, Oakland Local Founder and Executive Editor, was kind enough to post her interview with Oakland's At-Large Councilmember Rebecca Kaplan at Zennie62.com and at SFGate.com, and here at Oakland Focus. The Rebecca Kaplan interview's a to-the-point discussion of her reasons behind her decision to run. (A bit of disclosure: Rebecca Kaplan's communications director is a blogger and editor at Oakland Local.) Before the text is presented, this blogger has to make one observation: Councilmember Kaplan said she's thought "for months" about running for Mayor. Given that she's barely two years into her time as Councilmember, it seems safe to say Kaplan was not happy being Oakland's At Large elected official and wanted to be Mayor of Oakland as far back as after the first year of her term. But that's this blogger's observation: I yield the floor to Susan Mernit: When Rebecca Kaplan announced last week she had formed a committee to ex

See: city of oakland, mayor of oakland, ron dellums, jean quan, don macLeay, jean quan, greg harland, maya dillard smith, terrance candell The City of Oakland, California Mayor's race is more crowded than you think. It's not just Don Perata, Don MacLeay, Oakland District 4 Councilmember Jean Quan, and Rebecca Kaplan. The Oakland Mayor's Race has ten candidates, nine of them fully known and the last one still largely "under the radar." The full list of Oakland Mayor's Race candidates consists of incumbent Ron Dellums, Don Perata, Don MacLeay, Jean Quan, Greg Harland, Maya Dillard Smith, Terrance Candell, and an tenth person who's still not ready for prime time, but will be. Ten choices for Mayor of Oakland, California. This blogger just got off the phone with Greg Hatland, who's an Oaklander who graduated from Oakland High School in 1964 and lives close to California Attorney General Jerry Brown in the Oakland Hills. Hartland, who's we

The City of Oakland, California Mayor's race is more crowded than you think. It's not just Don Perata, Don MacLeay, Oakland District 4 Councilmember Jean Quan, and Rebecca Kaplan. The Oakland Mayor's Race has ten candidates, nine of them fully known and the last one still largely "under the radar." The full list of Oakland Mayor's Race candidates consists of incumbent Ron Dellums, Don Perata, Don MacLeay, Jean Quan, Greg Harland, Maya Dillard Smith, Terrance Candell, and an tenth person who's still not ready for prime time, but will be. Ten choices for Mayor of Oakland, California. This blogger just got off the phone with Greg Hatland, who's an Oaklander who graduated from Oakland High School in 1964 and lives close to California Attorney General Jerry Brown in the Oakland Hills. Hartland, who's website is at Harland4Mayor.com , decided to run for Mayor because Oakland has been a focus of crime for as long as he could remember and wante

The Oakland Salon Beatdown Video is back in the news as the trail starts in April. According to ABC News Channel 7 in the Bay Area, the pretrial hearing was held in Alameda County Superior Court, Department 104. Melissa Seals is the owner of the Oakland hair salon where she was the focus of a brutal beatdown by not one, but six women in the spring of 2009. The women entered the salon and two started the attack while one made a video of it. They then stole her merchandise and raised the blinds so people walking by could see what they were doing, according to The Huffington Post . Here's the ABC News video (Warning: it's graphic): The ABC video reports that in 2010, 36-year-old Melissa Seals is suffering from Post-Tramatic Stress Disorder. One of the attackers is named Kavina Bryant, who attended the hearing. Bryant is the woman in the green sweat pants and blue halter top who does much of the beating of Seals. Another woman, who Melissa Seals identifies as "

Richard Aguirre is an until now largely unknown Democratic candidate for Governor of California taking on California Attorney General Jerry Brown. In the video above, posted today April 17th, Aquirre walks in with the perfect activist-running-for-something attire of jeans, t-shirt, and pony tail, and expects to be taken seriously. Richard v. Jerry at the convention The result, even if that's his brand, is he's in a damaging video he posted on YouTube which shows him not being taken seriously. Richard Aguirre first challenges Jerry Brown to a debate in his speech, then allows himself to be shown yelling at Brown from the back of the ballroom at the California Democratic Convention. After that, much of Richard Aguirre's camera time is spent on a not so merry chase of Brown around the convention, yelling for him to debate like a Chihuahua might bark at a Doberman Pincher. Geez. Finally Richard Aguirre gets to within reach of Brown, who keeps going without st