North Oakland Now
Happy Monday Oakland, Well, the Saints won the Superbowl, but most of the blog chatter seems to be about the commercials. Slate.com dedicated an entire two page post to dissecting the various commercials. Slate also ran an amusing bit on what the Superbowl would be like if directed by certain well-known directors. And this ABC7 story is technically from last Tuesday, but visiting teachers-in-training from South Africa, were in East Oakland last week, where they connected with students at Oakland’s…
Good morning Oakland, A fight of sorts broke out this week between John Burris, the lawyer representing Oscar Grant’s family and friends in various civil suits against Johannes Mesherle and BART and KTVU 2, the local TV station that reported a possible change in eye witness testimony on Thursday. (Warning: The links to KTVU start an auto-play, including sound.) The testimony is for the criminal case the city has brought against Mehserle, but may affect BART’s liability in the civil…
Hi there Oakland, On Tuesday night the Oakland City Council voted unanimously to approve stricter gun control laws. This was the first vote in favor of the measure proposed by Larry Reid of East Oakland. An interview with Reid and the complete story was reported in the New York Time Bay Area Blog by Oakland North’s own Melanie Mason. The first permanent piece of the bridge deck was hoisted into place yesterday, the Trib reports, marking a milestone for the…
Good morning Oakland, Don’t let the sunny morning fool you, Phil the Punxsutawney Groundhog has seen his shadow, which predicts six more weeks of winter. In brighter news, four of the Trib’s 2010 “Cream of the Crop” announced over the weekend — high school foot ball players who have been recruited to play for top college programs — come from Oakland and three of them will be wearing Oakland Tech’s own purple and gold on graduation day. The country’s newest…
Hello, Oakland! Koreatown may change its name. Under “pressure from non-Koreans”, the merchants association will meet to discuss “more inclusive” definitions for the area between Uptown and Temescal. Eyewitnesses to the killing of Oscar Grant may back up statements made by ex-BART police Officer Johannes Mehserle. A friend of Grant’s corroborated the former officer’s claim that he warned Grant he was going to Taze him just before he shot him. The Warriors lose to Oklahoma City, 112-104. Hey, Raider Nation. The…
Teenagers, their families and adult students seeking a key to higher education attended the Black College Expo in Oakland Saturday. “While African-Americans and Latinos graduate high school at just over a 50 percent rate, the biggest challenge to college cited by black, Latino and Asian-American students gathered at the expo was paying for college,” reports the Bay Area News Group. On Thursday, Montrera Middle School will mark the 50th anniversary of its wood shop program, the oldest in California. The…
Happy Saturday, Oakland! Construction on the new Tidewater Aquatic Center is making it tough for cyclists to access the Bay Trail. The trail has been closed since last summer, and will likely not be open again until the fall. A defunct Oakland cotton mill and three other Bay Area structures have just received historic status. The Warriors fell to the Charlotte Bobcats last night,
Good Morning, North Oakland! The assault trial of four members of the now-defunct Your Black Muslim Bakery begins today in Oakland. They are charged with badly beating a 42-year-old man on Dec. 31, 2008. Oakland police have identified the seventeen-year old killed in last night’s drive-by shooting on the 3500 block of Allendale Avenue. Two other men were also shot, and one remains in critical condition. The City of Oakland is suing a local company, claiming that the company was…
Good morning, Oakland! BART has reached a $1.5 million settlement with the mother of Oscar Grant’s daughter Tatiana. The woman filed a $50 million lawsuit against the transit agency after Grant was shot on a station platform on Jan. 1, 2009. An East Bay man who objects to the devilish connotations of the name “Mt. Diablo” is petitioning a federal agency to change the peak’s name to “Mt. Ronald Reagan.” The Contra Costa Board of Supervisors will discuss their options…