Community

BOSS staffers joined hands with Albany High School students to help some 1,000 people address a variety of health and social needs at their first homeless resource fair held in Oakland. Based on an event the organization holds in San Francisco called the Homeless Project Connect, executive director Donald Frazier said he decided it was time to try the project in the East Bay.

Oakland has become a city of mosts: the most unaffordable city in America, the fourth most expensive city, and the city with the fastest growing inequality, according the Brookings Institution.

Oakland Hacks, or OHacks for short, is the first hackathon run by high school students in Oakland. A hackathon is an event at which people come together to create something through computer programming, from apps to websites. Sometimes they have a theme, a specific topic like music or sports, or participants will create something to be used for their community or to help the environment. OHacks does not have a theme like this, but its workshop format, with many mentors supporting students, focuses on getting beginners interested in computer science. OHacks is scheduled from 9 a.m. until 9 p.m., but other hackathons can last for 24 or 36 hours, or even a whole weekend.

Jay runs a non-profit in Oakland called Hip Hop for Change. His goal is to create a more positive image of hip hop that does not reinforce the stereotypical images perpetuated by the mainstream music industry. “We’re trying to put our real image out there, so people can see our real culture, instead of making stereotypical tropes of our culture to entertain themselves with,” Jay said. “Those tropes that criminalize our black and brown youth.”

OAS is an open admission shelter that takes in all animals brought in by the public or an animal control officer. “We’ve seen a significant uptake in the number of owner surrenders,” said Rebecca Katz, director of the shelter. “Gentrification has been good for Oakland’s economy, but there are people who are impacted by it negatively and there are people losing their homes.”

Wearing a shirt with ruffles running down the front and a bright golden bowtie, children’s author James Kennedy bounced up from a chair and briefly introduced a longtime children’s favorite, My Father’s Dragon, before pressing a key on his computer that started a video on the projector screen. Kennedy was hosting his annual 90-Second Newbery Film Festival in Oakland on Saturday, showing short clips filmed by children and teenagers based on Newbery Medal-winning books. Between his wardrobe choices and excited…

Mike Saidi has never received flowers from his wife on Valentine’s Day, but he would not mind it if he did. After all, Valentine’s Day is his favorite holiday and flowers are his favorite plants. “I get very excited about the holiday,” he said. “Every minute of it counts to do things and do it the best way you know it.” Saidi, originally from Iran, is the owner of Helen’s Flower Shop in Oakland. This Valentine’s Day is his 30th…