Crime
Scroll down to see each frame of this slideshow. As the Occupy Oakland protests continued this winter, so did confrontations between Oakland Police Department officers and protesters. In the most recent incident, which happened on January 28 after Occupy Oakland supporters attempted to take over the Kaiser Convention Center in order to transform it into a social center, over 400 protesters were arrested, many after police encircled marchers and did not allow them a clearly indicated avenue to disperse. That…
At the beginning of the year, the Oakland City Council started preparing to merge parking enforcement services with the Oakland Police Department to save the city money.
Under the policy at the time, each parking enforcement employee would have been subject to the lowest level of background checks that all OPD employees are subject to, which stirred controversy.
Detention Dialogues is the first immigration detention visitation program in California. Each week one of 40 trained volunteers visits detainees, mostly from Central and Latin America. Their hope is to bridge the gap of isolation by visiting detainees on a regular basis and supporting them throughout their detention by contacting family members on their behalf, connecting them to attorneys and forging a bond with the outside American world.
The Oakland Green Party held a public forum Friday evening at Humanist Hall in downtown Oakland, where members of other political parties as well as members of the public were invited to brainstorm ideas for Oakland’s future and form an alliance before the next city government elections.
Following a late night shootout at a taco truck earlier this month, food vendors are organizing to respond to a surge in violent robberies of their businesses.
With over 65 million Americans reported to have an arrest or conviction on their record, it seems nearly impossible for an employer to hire a person that does not have a criminal history. But Soul’s Restaurant in East Oakland has one goal: to provide jobs to those men and women struggling to transition back into non-institutionalized society.
The City of Oakland’s Citizen’s Police Review Board met Thursday night for the first time since postponing a forum that was scheduled for Feb. 9 on police response to Occupy Oakland. But the board did not hold the much-anticipated forum, and instead discussed why the meeting was postponed, where a suitable location for the forum would be, what would be discussed, and when.
Oakland Mayor Jean Quan has had a tumultuous first year in office. Since her first day one year ago, the mayor has been faced with overseeing severe budget cuts and scores of layoffs of city workers, as well as the resignation of the city attorney and the chief of police, battles with Occupy Oakland, an undermanned police force that is close to federal receivership and is battling a debilitating crime problem, and not one, but two efforts to recall her from her job.
But through it all, Quan said she’s “optimistic” about what’s in store for the city during her State of the City address at City Hall on Wednesday night.
During another contentious meeting Tuesday night, the City Council deadlocked over a resolution aimed at increasing the policing of protests. The resolution would have made protests that block streets without a permit illegal, and allowed the city administrator to use “whatever lawful tools” required to prevent protesters from hindering everyday business operations.