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Art gets political at West Oakland gallery

With the election season underway, nine artists will have the chance to express their political beliefs through art on Friday night at the Transmission Gallery in West Oakland.

The show, titled “Unrestricted,” aims to not only raise political awareness of this year’s presidential election, the environment and immigration issues in the United States, but to also help give artists a chance to show work that typically doesn’t get shown, said Ruth Santee, the gallery’s owner and director. “With the energy of the elections, we decided to have a political show,” she said. “Political work doesn’t usually get seen. If you are too overt, people have the tendency of not showing it.”

Oakland residents drop off jumbo-sized trash

More than a hundred Oakland residents descended into San Leandro over the weekend to participate in the free Bulky Item Drop-Off event. The event, sponsored by the Oakland Public Works Agency and Waste Management of Alameda County, took place at the Davis Street Resource and Recycling Center.

At Castlemont, new school year brings changes, challenges

As Norman Ospina, the school attendance clerk and a translator at Castlemont High School in East Oakland, crossed the courtyard on a crisp overcast fall morning, he spotted a young man he believed had been involved in a campus brawl on September 21. Ospina, whose students call him “Mr. O,” placed his index finger over his mouth, and nodded in the direction of the student on the other side of the courtyard. The student instantly revealed a smile that was…