Public Policy
William Bratton’s caused a stir in Oakland, and he hasn’t even arrived yet. The former top cop in Los Angeles and New York has been contracted by Strategic Policy Partnership, a law enforcement consulting group based in Massachusetts, to join a group of six policing experts tasked with improving public safety in Oakland.
The California Highway Patrol will stay in Oakland, adding two extra months to their policing presence that started in November 2012. That’s the decision the City Council made Tuesday night, when the approved a memorandum of understanding for $162,000.
Every holiday season Nancy DeWeese and her husband, Gary, host a Christmas party. But it’s not your average family gathering, because this is not your average family. At these parties, three dozen children from all walks of life, including the couple’s four biological kids, gather to share in a common experience: Each child has spent part of their lives growing up at the DeWeese family home in Moraga. “They see each other and they’re like, ‘Oh, we started out as…
In part two of a four-part series that will be published over the course of two weeks on Oakland North, meet the six new police consultants who have just been hired by Oakland to help reduce crime citywide. Each member of the panel has a different task and will be evaluating Oakland for a period of six months and before the panel makes its recommendations to the city. Robert Wasserman Robert Wasserman is a national law enforcement and security expert and the…
Oakland’s hired the crime consultants and approved the $250,000 bill, setting in motion the plan to bring in six law enforcement experts—including former Los Angeles top cop William Bratton—as the city’s latest attempt to curb its rising violent crime rate.
Tuesday’s City Council took up issues including taxi medallion fees, the controversial Astro Park dog play area, and the recent shooting at February’s Art Murmur event, but all three issues were ultimately tabled.
Alameda County shoppers are adjusting, if reluctantly, to the single-use bag ban that went into effect January first. The Reusable Bag Ordinance, passed a year ago by Alameda County Waste Management Authority, is intended to abate waterway pollution by limiting the distribution of single-use carryout bags and coaxing people to opt for a reusable alternative.
Judge Gordon Baranco donned his robes at the last minute, putting them on over a grey suit and a tie on which a reindeer tugged Santa in a sled. Baranco normally hears cases in the Alameda County Superior Court, but today he was presiding over a ragtag crowd in a well-used community center, where the homeless and formerly homeless defendants had gathered to have the fines associated with minor offenses waived. Baranco stood in front his makeshift bench, a rectangular…
Federal district court judge Thelton Henderson is one of the biggest names in Oakland right now, as the city waits to see who he will appoint to take over parts of the city’s police department as part of an infamous 13-year legal battle that nearly thrust the Oakland Police Department into federal control. Henderson, a federal judge in the Northern district court of California, has presided over the case for a decade, nearly since its beginning, when the city settled…