Politics
The Oakland City Council’s Community and Economic Development Committee approved a community benefits package for the project at its meeting on Tuesday afternoon, moving the item to the city council for approval and giving the council the chance to decide if it wants to approve a series of recommendations aimed at making sure Oakland residents—and especially those who live in West Oakland—have access to the 3,000 jobs the project is expected to create.
Since California Governor Jerry Brown announced in early January that he would end redevelopment programs to help the state deal with its budget deficit, Oakland officials have been scrambling to find ways to salvage city positions that were paid for with redevelopment dollars. The elimination of the redevelopment agency, which will take effect by Feb. 1, blew a $28 million hole in a budget that city leaders had spent months balancing – one that was already constrained by other cuts in the state budget.
The idea behind the concept of “mutual matching” is to find the best fit between a teacher and the school community in which they work. That concept is on the bargaining table now in discussions between the officials from the Oakland Unified School District and Oakland Education Association, as they discuss a proposal that would change the way teachers are assigned to schools in the district.
Violence prevention programs funded by Measure Y are working, according to a report presented at the Oakland City Council meeting on Tuesday night. But not well enough, councilmembers and speakers from the public responded.
About 75 Rockridge residents gathered for the monthly meeting of the Greater Rockridge Neighborhood Crime Prevention Council and to hear a presentation from an electronics company representative on video cameras the company makes for residents to place on their property, and in their neighborhood.
The owners of the Oakland Tribune have sent a cease and desist letter to the publisher of the “Occupied Oakland Tribune,” a newspaper and website devoted to coverage of the Occupy protests.
Oakland will have a new charter school in the fall, but two schools that wanted to leave the Oakland Unified School District to become charters will have to stay. Meanwhile, two charter schools that already exist within the district will be around for at least five more years after the school board renewed their charters Wednesday night.
The City of Oakland will take over the Oakland Redevelopment Agency’s affordable and low income housing programs, assume responsibility for the agency’s enforceable obligations and oversee the dissolution of the agency this spring. In a tense city council meeting that unexpectedly went into closed session Tuesday night, Oakland city councilmembers unanimously elected the City of Oakland to serve as the successor agency, and successor housing agency, to the Oakland Redevelopment Agency. The agency will close its doors February 1, s…
About 40 people crowded the lobby of Oakland’s City Hall, demanding an impromptu audience with city councilmembers after a meeting of the council’s Community and Economic Development Committee was unexpectedly canceled Tuesday afternoon.