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Cal Women's Rowing Team member Jill Costello passed away from complications due to lung cancer on June 24th 2010 and at the age of 21. A San Francisco event and run called Jog For Jill has been established and will be held this Sunday, September 12th at 5 PM. Two members of the Cal Women's Crew team were at the Cal vs. Davis football game wearing Jog For Jill shirts, and were kind enough to provide the video interview above. Below are the other details from the event website, where you're encouraged to pre-register here CLICK FOR SITE : Pre-Registration: Online/$25 Day of Registration: 4:00 p.m./$30 Shotgun Start: 5:00 p.m. After run/walk celebration: 6:00 p.m.- 8:30 p.m. Event Location: Golden Gate Park Music Concourse Bandshell S Tea Garden Drive San Francisco, California 94118 Participants are encouraged to pre-register. Only pre-registered participants will be guaranteed a walk/run T-shirt. T-shirts will be limited to the first 2500 day of regis

The latest news in the Oakland Mayor's Race has the Oakland League of Women Voters still sticking to it's decision to exclude Oakland Mayoral Candidates from its September 23rd forum and for a booya-boogie list of reasons explained before in this space . This, after the Sierra Club opened its previously restricted forum to all candidates. The lack of Oakland League of Women Voters cooperation to open its September 23rd Forum leads this blogger to ask if the LVW is being paid off by certain elements of the Oakland Business Community, specifically, the Oakland Chamber of Commerce, not to have an open forum? Given my conversations with a number of people, payoff can come in different forms, like forum sponsorship. Since I was told that the League Of Women Voters was approached by the Oakland Chamber of Commerce to have a restrictive forum, it's fair to assert that for all practical purposes a payoff was in play. Otherwise, the LVW would have said "no" to t

Blogging random thoughts on Labor Day 2010 in Oakland. First, say Chip Johnson, my friend, can you name all of the candidates running for Mayor of Oakland without a list to assist you? A bottle of wine says you can't do it on video . Talking to Don Perata is great, and it was a great column, but we need more coverage from you - try doing all of them! Besides, Don skipped the Forum. He had a reason, but Perata's not Mayor; acting like he is will not win the prize. ...Still, I'm starting to see Perata lawn signs... Second, this blogger has video from the Oakland Mayor's Race Forum on Jobs from last Thursday, but thankfully so do a number of Oakland blogs. That means I can wait and take my time. Yeah! In fact, I have a backlog of videos that are of a higher priority than the Forum, and I will explain why below. But interviews with Oakland District Two Councilmember Pat Kernighan and her challenger Jennifer Pae, and an upcoming interview with Joe Tuman hav

Oakland Councilmember Jean Quan  The latest Oakland Election News has Oakland Mayor's Race candidate Jean Quan and Oakland City Council District Two Candidate Jennifer Pae and Oakland's current City Auditor Courtney Ruby landing the endorsement of The Wellstone Democratic Renewal Club of Oakland. The Wellstone Democratic Renewal Club's (WDRC) endorsement process started with a meeting last Thursday night, where members nominated candidates for consideration. For Oakland Mayor, only two candidates were named for consideration: Councilmembers Rebecca Kaplan and Jean Quan. For Oakland City Council District Two, only Jennifer Pae was named for consideration and not the incumbent Pat Kernighan. For City Auditor, only Ruby was named for consideration. The WDRC counted ballots and on Monday announced the votes for endorsements, and released the results on its website on Monday. Here's the full list of Oakland and Berkeley WDRC endorsements: Oakland Propositio

Regular readers of this space know this blogger travels to Atlanta, Georgia to help Mom and just keep her company almost every month. My mother lost her husband and my stepfather in 2005 and to prostate cancer. (In fact, my Mom had breast cancer, and my father and stepfather passed away from prostate cancer in 2005, so that was a hard year.) Fortunately between good friends nearby and my aunts and uncles just four hours by drive in Tennessee, and then me, she's not without company. Even though it's hard on me as an only child, and I'll explain why later in this post, I do enjoy my company with my Mother and for several reasons. First, she knows who I am as a person. Second, I don't know how much life I have to share with her, she's a breast cancer survivor, so things she may said or done that have bothered me in the past, don't impact me anymore. Third, she's my only family member. And finally, my stress goes away when I'm here. We're out in

 Berkeley Prof. Michael O'Hare  The UC Berkeley Letter To Students On California by Berkeley Professor Michael O'Hare is one that California Gubernatorial Candidates Jerry Brown and Meg Whitman should see because both are part of the generations that Michael O'Hare points to as essentially responsible for the decline of California, but for different reasons. Jerry Brown was Governor of California when Prop 13 (also called AB 8), the legislation reducing property taxes to 1 percent, was passed in 1978. Prop 13 us widely pointed to as the legislative device that robbed California of the tax revenue is used to provide the public services it was known for. Meg Whitman never voted or bothered to register to vote, or participated in California Government and politics , but now thinks she can run the state.  The idea of running for governor somehow entered her head 26 months ago. Who Is Michael O'Hare? Michael O'Hare is Professor of Public Policy At The UC

20-year-old 5 feet 7 inch, 240 pound, brown eyed and black haired Andrew Barrientos is armed, dangerous, and on the run after shooting a Fremont police officer who was trying to serve a search warrant at an East Oakland house at 2009 Auseon Ave, according to Oakland Police Spokesperson Jeff Thomason. Fortunately, the unnamed Fremont Officers's injuries are not life threatening. He's being treated for a leg wound at Highland Hospital. Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums issued this statement: Our hearts and prayers are with the Fremont police officer shot this afternoon, his loved ones, his fellow law enforcement officers and the City of Fremont family as they cope with this latest incident of senseless violence. On behalf of the Oakland community, I thank him for his law enforcement service and express my deep regret that this dedication has resulted in injury on our streets. I support Chief Batts and the men and women of the Oakland Police Department in pursuing every lead to

According to an email from Richard Lieberman, KPIX Channel Five in San Francisco has suffered a rash of departures due to the terrible economy. Richard's become the recorder of change in San Francisco Bay Area Media via his blog Rich Lieberman Report . In fact, Rich's so good some of the local newspapers and news websites quote his scoops without crediting him . Not here. Anna Duckworth  Here's Richard's info: Jeffrey Schaub sent me a list of the prime talent that have left or were removed from KPIX these past two years-- Manny Ramos Tony Russomanno Bill Schechner John Lobertini Rick Quan Barbara Rodgers Jeffrey Schaub Hank Plante Anna Werner Lisa Chan Sue Quan Anna Duckworth John Kessler Sydnie Kohara? Wendy Tokuda as anchor Wow, I wasn't aware so many people left, especially Anna Duckworth and John Kessler? But that's what I get for being on planes back and forth to Atlanta and New York City so much. Also sad to read of the pa

In an effort to keep you as consistently informed about the Oakland Mayor's Race as possible, this blogger assembled the first playlist of interviews of Oaklanders running for Mayor. Don MacLeay  This playlist, however, is not complete and but it will be, and soon. As of this writing, it contains 8 videos of seven of the 10 candidates, totaling approximately 140 minutes, and 6,051 views (and counting). So far, Terrance Candell, Greg Harland, Councilmember Rebecca Kaplan, Don MacLeay, Councilmember Jean Quan, and Joe Tuman (with an asterisk), have been interviewed. Kaplan represents two videos with one more to be added. Tuman and Harland both have one more video each coming to the set, and in Tuman's case a full 30 minute conversation. And I have to talk to Marcie Hodge, Arnie Fields, and Larry Lionel Young. The playlists do not include forum videos or Oaklanders impressions of the candidates, or the race itself. That will be in a separate playlist. As to h

Senator Don Perata Seeking to help define The Oakland Mayor's Race, KPIX Channel Five elected to conduct a poll of 591 "likely voters" in Oakland. The poll, of which this blogger has not seen the actual questions but may square with anecdotal reports, says that Former Senator Don Perata got 41 percent of 1st choice votes, Oakland City Councilmember Jean Quan got 26 percent of 1st choice votes, and Councilmember Rebecca Kaplan got 14 percent of 1st choice votes. The other candidates combined earned 12 percent of 1st choice votes. When asked for a second choice those who picked Kaplan went Perata, and those who went for Quan picked Kaplan. But the CBS report never mentioned the 3rd choice results. What this means is that CBS has some weird interest in not mentioning the names of the other candidates. In other words, their poll reporting is either sloppy, lazy or fixed. Why in hell would Channel Five have any interest in the Oakland Mayors race to the degre

Councilmemer Pat Kernighan  Just about an hour ago this blogger posted the news of Oakland City Council District Two  (Glenview, Chinatown) Candidate Jennifer Pae picking up a valuable endorsement in the form of Alameda County Supervisor Keith Carson. In the blog post, I offered the view that perhaps the backing of Carson "may be the beginning of the end." May. Even with that, and with the overall tone of communicating that Pat was in a battle, I got this hot email from Councilmember Kernighan: Zennie, Perhaps you are jumping to conclusions about the "beginning of the end" for moi. Would you like to report the facts that I have the endorsements of Attorney General Jerry Brown, Supervisor-elect Wilma Chan, Supervisor Alice Lai-Bitker and Council President Jane Brunner, among others? Do you know that the leader of every NCPC and neighborhood group in my district supports me because I have worked hard every day for the past five years advocating for

Jenn Pae A slowly developing challenge to Oakland City Council District Two Councilmember Patricia Kernighan now has the magical look of an upset effort. Alameda County Supervisor Keith Carson has announced he's backing Jennifer Pae as the next District Two Councilmember for Oakland. "I am honored to have the support of Supervisor Keith Carson," said Pae. "Supervisor Carson has a long history of protecting working families and I look forward to working with him on ways we can invest in Oakland." Jennifer Pae is a 28-year-old Korean American community organizer who has been involved in a number of grassroots political efforts in Oakland. Pat Kernighan It's not the only bit of news from Jenn's campaign: she's also out-raised the incumbent Councilmember Kernighan by (according to the last reporting period) over $10,000, or $36,638 versus $20,393. While Pat reportedly has raised $47,000 overall, and before her last cocktail-oriented

Don, are you out polling? For some time candidates in the Oakland Mayor's Race, let alone Oaklanders, have not had a handle on who the real front-runner in the Oakland Mayor's Race was. And no wonder; no one had done a poll. Well, as of this writing, that's changed. Someone's conducting a poll of Oaklanders, but what's n not known by this space is who's doing the poll. The only clue available that a poll is in the works is this Tweet: davidcolburn - I've been polled twice on the Oakland mayor's race in past 48 hours. Is everyone getting calls, or am I just lucky? about 6 hours ago via TweetCaster The concern here is for the design of the poll. Does it mention each of the ten candidates for Mayor to determine awareness? Is it done by one of the candidates, or another group or organization? How many people are being contacted? Whatever the case, a poll of the Oakland Mayor's Race is being conducted. A fair speculation is that it

Joe Tuman  When this blogger got an email from a person who was concerned that Joe Tuman's campaign was placing lawn signs where they should not be, and wanted to know where to file a complaint, it was discounted because there was no photo or video to go with the email.  No proof. Instead, it seemed logical to connect the person who sent the email directly with the Joe Tuman campaign; they followed up with the complainer, copying this blogger in the process. But what seemed to be a small issue's slowly turning into a bigger one. Here's the latest two Tweets from Joe Tuman's Twitter account: Our Yard Signs seem to be disappearing....? Someone is not happy about Oakland changing for the better! about 5 hours ago via Facebook Are Yard Signs seem to be disappearing? Keep an eye out as someone is not happy about changing Oakland for the better. And to be fair, here's the email sent that I wasn't going to post at first. Since the Tuman campaign's compl

EBYD.  Greg Harrland's running... Yep. Another forum is coming up for the Oakland Mayor's Race. It's the Alameda County Democratic Lawyers Club Forum on September 10th. Held at Everett and Jones Restaurant in Jack London Square at 12 Noon that day, every mayoral candidate has been invited to what's both a forum and an endorsement meeting. East Bay Young Democrats (EBYD) Behind Current Events On its website on the Oakland Mayor's Race , the East Bay Young Democrats explain that "there are three main contenders for the cities top position, and goes on to mention Oakland Councilmember Rebecca Kaplan, Former Senator Don Perata, and Councilmember Jean Quan, and that's it. The web page was created before the June 10th mayoral forum at First Unitarian Church and never updated. Here's an assist. There are 10 candidates for Mayor of Oakland: Terrance Candell, Arnold Fields, Greg Harland, Marcie Hodge, Councilmember Rebecca Kaplan, Don Macleay,

Mayor Goodman Just when it seemed San Jose was the only city that wants the Oakland Athletics to leave Oakland and move to a planned new stadium there, enter Las Vegas. According to Ballpark Digest , Oscar Goodman, the Mayor of Las Vegas, said his city has entered talks about building a 45,000 seat domed ballpark for an American League team and representatives of that team are involved. While Mayor Goodman did not mention the Oakland A's by name, it's widely known in the media that Las Vegas has been a favored option for A's managing owner Lew Wolff, and as recently as last year. Also, according to the Sports Business Daily , MLB Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig reportedly met with Mayor Goodman and "A's Execs" as recently as last year, a rumor that neither MLB or the Oakland A's would confirm. Las Vegas Mayor Goodman said that the talks were in "the early stages" and that they may not go anywhere, saying "I’m not going to tell y

This is a quick supplemental and update to this blogger's last Oakland Mayor's Race blog post on Councilmember Rebecca Kaplan's call to the Oakland Sierra Club Chapter's Volunteer Chairman Kent Lewandowski, asking if he and the organization would open the scheduled Wednesday, August 25th Oakland Green Mayoral Forum (from 5:30 PM to 7:30 PM) at East Bay Community Foundation 353 Frank Ogawa Plaza Oakland, CA) to all candidates. Well, after all of that, The Sierra Club cleaned it's own air and made it fresh-smelling again , well, to everyone except the Oakland Climate Action Coalition. (Geez, how many non-profits do we have!?) A email was just received from Kent Lewandowski, which reads as follows: Zennie, We are proceeding with the forum and are inviting all the candidates. I have the following candidates listed on the registrar of voters filing report (see page 22): 1. ARNOLD FIELDS 2. DON MACLEAY 3. DON PERATA 4. GREG HARLAND 5. JEAN QUAN 6. JOE

As this blogger has written, The (yeah, capital "T") Oakland Mayor's Race is going to get even more interesting and today, Thursday, is proof. Pay attention to this blog post if you enjoy laughter and guffaws, and you know you do. First, Councilmember Rebecca Kaplan phoned to say she called Kent Lewandowski, volunteer Chairperson for the Northern Alameda County Group of the Sierra Club, San Francisco Bay Chapter, and the author of what's still the most awful email in Oakland Politics ever seen by this blogger, to ask him to include all of the candidates. I must admit, this is funny If you're just getting wind of this fart the Sierra Club broke, Kent Lewandowski sent an email to almost every candidate in the Oakland Mayor's Race (except Arnie Fields), to inform them and by "cc" this blogger that because they were not "viable" candidates, they would not be part of the Wednesday, August 25th "Oakland Green Mayoral Forum."

Don Perata  Breaking Oakland Mayor's Race news! This blogger just received a late night email announcing that Former State Senator Don Perata will skip the planned Sierra Club Forum for Wednesday, August 24th. Perata Campaign Manager Rhys Williams explains that... Senator Perata will not participate in forums that aren't open to all candidates. Now that there is an official list of candidates, Senator Perata believes it is only fair, democratic, and respectful that all those voices have an opportunity to be heard. That was one goal of Oakland's new system of voting. Readers of this space will recall that The Sierra Club Volunteer Chairperson Kent Lewandowski, sent what this blogger called an awful email explaining that The Sierra Club was going to exclude candidates it considered "not viable." Again, The Oakland Mayor's Race has thirteen candidates: Tim Brown, Terrance Candell, Arnold Fields, Sharika Gregory, Greg Harland, Marcie Hodge, Counc

Earlier, Kent Lewandowski, volunteer Chairperson Northern Alameda County Group of The Sierra Club, San Francisco Bay Chapter, wrote a rather, and this blogger will state again, stupid email to the Oakland Mayor's Race candidates Kent says aren't "viable." Which is why this blogger's not returning from Georgia in time to attend it: If you've not seen the email from Kent representing the Sierra Club, here, again, it is: from Kent to candell1@yahoo.com, dluvcan@yahoo.com, candidate@macleay4mayor.org, info@arniefields.org, info@harland4mayor.com, mhodge@peralta.edu, LL.Young@prurealty.com cc zennie@zennie62.com date Tue, Aug 17, 2010 at 12:41 AM subject Green Oakland Mayoral Forum - Sierra Club signed-by gmail.com hide details 12:41 AM (21 hours ago) Dear Candidate, Thank you for your interest in participating in the "Green Oakland" forum sponsored by the Sierra Club. We made the decision to invite the 3 candidates who are