Development
Brahm Ahmadi of West Oakland has been trying for years to open the People’s Community Market—his planned 10,000 to 20,000 square-foot grocery store—in the middle of an Oakland food desert. The People’s Community Market, as envisioned, would focus on serving the low-income families of West Oakland, and in 2013, Ahmadi campaigned to raise initial seed money. Through direct public offerings, or investment crowdfunding, he raised $1.2 million from about 400 shareholders. Challenges in finding a location for the store have delayed…
The local conversation about development and displacement in Oakland made its way to the University of California, Berkeley in form of a play and panel at Anthony Hall on Tuesday evening. The play “We Go Boom” explores the effect of the tech industry in Oakland by dramatizing the future ribbon cutting at Uptown Station—a real-life project to develop the area above the 19th Street BART Station and the Sears Building at 20th Street and Broadway. The development site was bought…
Under the morning clouds, the Frank Ogawa Plaza in downtown Oakland was chilly as organizers got ready for the 20th Annual Oakland Earthexpo Environmental Sustainability Fair. At 9 am on Wednesday, around 100 tables were in place to start the fair, but most of them were empty. Slowly, vendors began to drift in, setting up their signs, merchandising and sign-up forms, as the sun started to warm the place and curious people began to visit the stands. But by noon,…
The Oakland City Council chambers were filled to capacity on Tuesday evening for a special meeting of the Oakland Redevelopment Successor Agency, which is responsible for creating and enacting urban redevelopment plans in Oakland. Some of the most-discussed items on the agenda were the treatment of the city’s temporary part-time workers, a resolution in support of Assembly Bill 65, a proposed state bill that would fund body-worn cameras for local law enforcement agencies, and the development in the Oakland Coliseum…
Unlike most of his classmates at Skyline High School in Oakland, Allan Qin, a shy 18-year-old, finishes class at noon and goes straight to work at the Emeryville headquarters of Peet’s Coffee & Tea. His day is just getting started. A high school senior, Qin has been working at Peet’s in technological support for more than five months. Opportunities for low-income students to find work are hard to find, and meaningful work is even more rare.
Oakland workers earning minimum wage will see an increase on their checks next payday due to a citywide wage increase that took effect Monday. The boost from $9 to $12.25 an hour may sound great to employees, but it wasn’t an easy change for some small business owners. The minimum wage increase was initiated by a group called Lift Up Oakland, which collected over 33,000 signatures to place Measure FF on the November ballot. It passed with 81 percent of the…
The Oakland housing market has gotten so high-priced that some residents have decided to think creatively and chosen a shipping container as their home.
In 1923, world-renowned escape artist Harry Houdini came to Oakland. He hung 112 feet above the ground from one Oakland’s most iconic buildings—then nearly brand-new—to entertain thousands of spectators as he escaped from handcuffs and a straightjacket. Ninety-two years later, the Tribune Tower continues to be one of the main attractions in the city’s downtown skyline; it overlooks the Port of Oakland, Lake Merritt and Oakland City Hall. The tower was built between 1922 and 1923 by Joseph Russell Knowland,…
These local makers, and the idea of Oakland as a “maker city,” have been a central point in Schaaf’s run up to being sworn in as mayor, down to the transportation (an Oakland-made art car) she used at her victory press conference.