Gearing up for next week’s anniversary of 100 days in office, Mayor Jean Quan spoke to the press on Thursday about her accomplishments and hopes for the upcoming months. “It seems like its gone very fast,” she said. “We’ve worked very hard to launch Oakland in a new footing.”
What is it about the Vietnamese sandwich? Some say it’s the fluffy French bread, others say it’s the sweet and spicy grilled meat, and some just love the pickled daikon radishes and carrots. Whatever your favorite ingredient, few will argue it’s a tasty combination of flavors.
Behind a small grey non-descript house near San Pablo Avenue and 60th Street in the Golden Gate neighborhood is a different kind of bicycle shop. As you walk down a path alongside the house, you pass chicken coops, Birds of Paradise and a vegetable garden full of beets, bok choy and broccoli. Past the garden, a door leads to a clean little studio full of tools and bikes. This is where Dan Woloz just opened a service-oriented bike shop called Bike Man Dan.
Gourmet and Modern Bride magazines went under. US News and World Report has gone digital-only. Apple launched a new iPad that lets people read National Geographic and The New Yorker online and also watch live TV. You might worry anything made with paper is … well, doomed. A stop by Issues magazine store, however, might quell those fears.
Facing a $21 million deficit, along with employee layoffs, service cuts and the probable closing of facilities, AC Transit doesn’t have a lot of breathing room. On Wednesday, the agency’s board of directors decided it can’t finance the estimated $625,000 it would cost to offer discount youth bus passes for Oakland Unified School District high school students over the age of 18.
Just as the hearing for the proposed Fruitvale gang injunction got underway on Tuesday, police officers entered the court and arrested Javier Quintero—one of the 40 alleged Norteño gang members named in the injunction—for a parole violation. Quintero was the first defendant to testify in the hearing, which began in mid-February, and has not missed a single day of watching the proceedings.
After the defense spent three days questioning Oakland police officer Douglass Keely, who was involved in creating the list of the 40 alleged Norteño gang members named in the Fruitvale gang injunction, prosecutors finally got a chance to cross examine him on Tuesday. The crux of their examination involved showing the judge dozens of photos of the alleged gang members’ tattoos and gang clothing, as well as graffiti in the Fruitvale neighborhood, that were meant to demonstrate that the defendants had been correctly identified as active gang members.
As the hearing over the proposed Fruitvale gang injunction grinds on, tension is rising between the two sides over how long the process is taking. On the prosecution’s side, the Oakland City Attorney’s Office wants the court to approve the proposed injunction as quickly as possible while the defense, which represents 27 of the 40 alleged gang members named in the injunction, wants to prevent its enforcement.
Long loved by East Bay residents, North Oakland’s mega-drugstore will close this summer due to plans to demolish and redevelop the shopping center where it is located. For decades this one-stop-shop has been a neighborhood institution, but now the store’s landlord has declined to renew its lease, slating it to close by the end of June.
Now in its 52nd year, the Oakland Museum’s “White Elephant” sale is legendary. So are the lines to get in and the lengths that folks will go to to be the first inside. What’s not so legendary – or the unsung heroes of the annual sale – are the ladies (and a few gents) of the Oakland Museum Women’s Board.
Alameda County Superior Court Judge Robert Freedman heard testimony from three more witnesses on Wednesday about the proposed Fruitvale gang injunction. There’s still no end in sight as to when the hearing will conclude and the judge will decide whether to impose the injunction against 40 alleged Norteño gang members in the Fruitvale neighborhood.
The stretch of Broadway between MacArthur Boulevard and Piedmont Avenue will be closed on weeknights for four weeks beginning Monday, February 28. This is due to construction for the Kaiser Permanente Hospital replacement project.
On Saturday, the Oakland Museum of California will kick off its new show Splendors of Faith/ Scars of Conquest, which features 110 pieces of art from the mission churches that dot the southwestern United States and northern Mexico. This is the first time many of the artworks will be seen outside of their original locations.
Abel Manzo, one of the alleged gang members named in the Fruitvale gang injunction, was the only person to testify in the hearing on Wednesday. His lawyer, Jose Luis Fuentes, used his line of questioning to paint a picture of Manzo as a person who had some minor run-ins with the police but was never involved in gangs.
Oakland City Council’s finance and management committee met Tuesday to discuss several city budget and finance issues, the most contentious of which was how to pay for the Police and Fire Retirement System.
Perched above a steaming stainless steel cauldron, Adam Lamoreaux rhythmically stirs the contents with a large metal oar. Inside, a thick amber-colored concoction of cracked grains and hot water simmers. As he continues to stir, a sweet malty smell fills the air. Lamoreaux looks down into the vat and studies his mixture, then says, “For the first two years of my daughter’s life, she thought I made oatmeal.”