Public Policy
Roseanne Barr is running for president. It was clear, when she addressed a packed house at Oaksterdam University on Thursday night, that the bulk of the crowd was there to hear her say that out loud. Former Democratic Georgia congresswoman Cynthia McKinney delivered an introduction to the evening, cutting directly to the chase. “We are meeting here,” she said, “because the Peace and Freedom Party had the courage and the smarts to nominate Roseanne Barr as their presidential candidate.”
In a crowded boardroom and to strong applause, the OUSD board unanimously passed an agreement yesterday that resolved to address the Office of Civil Right’s (OCR) compliance review of the district’s discipline of African American students.
For the two years since Jean Quan was elected mayor in Oakland’s first ranked-choice voting election, the voice of her administration—through multiple turbulent situations—has been Susan Piper, who retired last month as Quan’s official spokesperson.
Oakland residents registered to vote at a special Tuesday event called National Voter Registration Day, a nationwide nonpartisan campaign to sign up as many new voters as possible in a single day.
Amidst the clamor of construction and downtown traffic Tuesday, a crowd of patients, nurses and doctors met outside of Kaiser Oakland’s pediatric building to support National Childhood Cancer Awareness Month. Adorned in school bus-yellow t-shirts emblazoned with “Little Kids Get Cancer, Too,” health care providers and families gathered outside the hospital’s pediatric unit in downtown Oakland. Together, the group rallied to promote childhood cancer awareness and celebrate patients’ personal triumphs against the disease. The gathering was conceived by Clarence Berger-Greer,…
As BART accommodates more bicycles on its trains than ever before—more than 8,000 on weekdays in 2010—riders, bicyclists and transit planners are eyeing the transit system’s bike policy closely.
As Gov. Jerry Brown decides whether he will sign the California Domestic Workers Bill of Rights (AB 889), reactions to the bill and the prospect of monitoring and enforcing its stipulations —which include overtime pay, mandatory rest and meal breaks, and fair sleeping conditions for workers—remain mixed.
A growing number of food stamp recipients are using their benefits at Oakland farmers’ markets. But profits from such transactions could decline if a proposed $16.5 billion cut to the federal food stamp program passes in Congress.
Reacting angrily to the protest that broke up Tuesday night’s Oakland City Council meeting, city officials said Wednesday that they were working to establish new policies designed to prevent further such disruptions during regular meetings. “It was my decision to close the meeting down, after I saw that there was no way that Occupy Oakland was going to leave the council chambers and allow us to conduct the business that we’re supposed to do, as elected officials,” City Council President Larry…