People
17-year-old Sophie Elkin, named Oakland’s 3rd Youth Poet Laureate in August, writes about what she knows: the grit and grandeur of Oakland’s people and places and the less tangible but no less real world of adolescence. After a childhood struggling to come out to herself and her parents, Sophie hopes her poetry will help other women to find their voices the way she has.
Mayoral candidate Joe Tuman joined local business owners and residents to voice support for reducing parking meter costs and parking fines in Oakland.
Crossing guards do more than just make sure students get to school safely.
Courtney Ruby, 47, is no stranger to politics. Now in her eighth year as Oakland’s elected city auditor, she’s entered a large crowd of candidates seeking to unseat incumbent Mayor Jean Quan. “I have proven leadership experience,” she said. “I’ve been under the hood of almost every department, I know what’s broken, and I have the skills to fix it. I have turned a troubled agency into performing model audit organization.” She is running on the promise of keeping public…
The issues for Tuman are public safety and economic development. In his view, the absence of economic development keeps part of the city in poverty and poverty is at the root of most crime. The absence of economic development also means that the city does not have the tax base and revenue growth that it needs to afford sufficient numbers of police officers to respond to a growing crime problem.
Mayoral candidate Patrick McCullough, an electronic technician and lawyer, asserts he has “the experience from working with people in all levels of society that is essential to bring the change Oaklanders have been wanting for a long time.” If elected, McCullough, 59, said he would address Oakland’s deficit problems alongside its unfunded liability issue. He proposes restructuring city government by reducing the number of highly-paid managers whose presence he finds undesirable. He also wants to change the management structure of…
Libby Schaaf, a District 4 councilmember who announced her run for mayor last year, is hoping her policies on transparent government, safety, education and Oakland’s economy will win her City Hall’s top office in November. Schaaf, 48, has been involved in Oakland’s local government since 1999, when she worked as chief of staff for then-council president Ignacio de la Fuente. The former lawyer later served as top aide to Mayor Jerry Brown, and then as an executive for the Port…
When he turned 23, Army veteran Peter Y. Liu came home from Iraq and found that there wasn’t a job waiting for him in his military specialty, journalism. The largest metropolitan newspapers on the West Coast were in the midst of downsizing. Now at 33, after a decade of working in the nonprofit, insurance and real estate sectors, Liu has declared his candidacy for Oakland mayor. He is running a frugal campaign, limited to $1,000 of his own funds, highlighting…
Tax specialist Nancy Sidebotham, 69, said she’s run for the Oakland City Council six times. She’s never won a seat. But, to her mind, she’s never lost either. “There’s not too many candidates that lose, and stay involved,” said Sidebotham, who’s lived in Oakland for more than 50 years, and served on the Community Policing Advisory Board, Neighborhood Watch and Shop Oakland boards, among other organizations. “I continue to stay involved and continue to work for my community.” The East Oakland…