Public Policy

Council approves $300,000 salary for police chief, locals protest Promised Land closure

Tension between residents and city council grew at Tuesday night’s meeting when councilmembers passed controversial resolutions including paying nearly $300,000 a year to city’s new police chief and establishing cell-site simulator which can be used by police officers. Protestors also gathered and spoke against city’s demolishing a self-organized homeless camp by force last Thursday.

Undocumented in 2017: A student protected by DACA

Evangelina Sanchez came to the United States when she was seven years old. Now she’s a student at California State East Bay, thanks to Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA). DACA is just one of Obama’s orders that President Donald Trump has threatened to overturn before taking office. That threat alone has changed things for Sanchez’s family.

Protesters against the Dakota Access Pipeline march to Oakland banks

On a brisk Friday afternoon at around a quarter to 1 pm, a group of about 30 people gathered at Frank Ogawa Plaza in downtown Oakland to protest the $3.7 billion Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL). Some came with their children. A few carried signs that said “Water is Life.” The Dakota Access Pipeline, which is set to be built by energy giant Energy Transfer Partners to carry crude oil extracted from North Dakota’s Bakken Shale fields to refineries in Texas,…

Thousands turn out for Women’s March Oakland to support women, human rights

Despite the gloomy weather, tens of thousands gathered at Madison Park near downtown Oakland on Saturday to participate in one of the three branches of Women’s March Bay Area, a demonstration to support women and human rights. The three Bay Area marches—in Oakland, San Francisco and San Jose—are among the more than 600 locally-organized “sister marches” of the Women’s March on Washington, which is now expected to draw as many as half a million participants. The marches are nonpartisan and…

As night falls, Oakland demonstrators begin another inauguration protest march

After a day of marches, public speeches and rallies, as night fell and the rain came down, demonstrators gathered once again in downtown Oakland to march in protest of Donald Trump’s inauguration. Earlier in the day, a small group had gathered in front of the Ronald V. Dellums Federal building, and several marches and student gatherings had convened near Frank Ozawa Plaza, where people recited poetry and passed a microphone around to let people express their concerns about the new administration….

Oaklanders march through downtown to protest Trump inauguration

Around noontime, as the newly-sworn in President Donald Trump prepared to join the parade that would take him to the White House, a crowd gathered in Frank Ogawa Plaza outside of Oakland City Hall to protest his inauguration. The protest was the second one held downtown on Friday, following a small gathering outside the Ronald V. Dellums Federal Building early in the morning. Afterward, demonstrators had migrated over to the plaza, where groups set up tents, handed out literature and offered…