Community

Oakland’s highly controversial composting collection rates have now dropped thanks to a city council vote Tuesday night to amend the $1 billion waste collection contract signed earlier this summer with Waste Management and California Waste Solutions.

A proposed rule by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) could spell the end of a project in Oakland to create a free or low-cost Wi-Fi network for the city’s residents.

Ace Monster Toys, a North Oakland-based hackerspace, hosted its first-ever Arduino Night on Wednesday, as a handful of attendees had a chance to tinker with microcontrollers. Microcontrollers, which are small low power computers that don’t require a keyboard, mice or monitor to work, can be found in gadgets that control something as simple as a button that turns on a light or moves a toy robot.

A teen text-line and an older men’s support group prove Alameda County’s progressive suicide prevention initiatives that focusing on the two groups remaining the most at risk in recent years: teens and elderly men.

OR (my first sentence):

Alameda County Crisis Support Services is making strides in suicide prevention developing innovative programs—a teen text line and an older men’s support group—tailored to the two populations most at risk: youth and elderly men.

Before sunrise on October 17, survivors of suicide and those who have lost loved ones to suicide will gather on the shores of Oakland’s Lake Merritt for the 7th Annual Out of the Darkness Community Walk, a fundraiser for the American Foundation of Suicide Prevention.

Members of the organization March for Elephants, many of whom are Oakland Zoo staffers, and their supporters marched on Saturday to celebrate the law’s passing as well as protest the ongoing ivory trade in China. The event was called Global March for Elephants – San Fransisco.

On Friday morning, the Oakland Police Department Ceasefire Team and the FBI arrested five people and recovered weapons and drugs in a raid targeting the Ghost Town gang.

Merritt’s new law enforcement pre-academy program hopes to recruit students of color to the Oakland Police Force. In a department whose officers’ past use of force against minorities fueled generations of distrust, that can be a hard sell.

Oakland’s City Council took steps Wednesday night to address the city’s current housing problem by unanimously approving the “Housing Action Plan and Policy Framework” set out in the “Oakland Housing Equity Roadmap.” The policy seeks to prevent the displacement of long-time residents, build new affordable housing, and improve housing habitability and tenant health while maintaining affordability.