Safety
A four alarm fire spread through the Oakland hills Tuesday. Oakland Police Department officers evacuated an estimated 100 homes in the Monte Vista Villas housing development.
Oakland’s Urban Search and Rescue team hadn’t deployed in nine years. But three weeks ago, when Oakland Fire Battalion Chief Robert Lipp answered the call to respond to Hurricane Harvey, they mobilized a team in under four hours. Immediately following their deployment to Texas, they were re-tasked to assist with rescue efforts in Florida.
In November, Californians passed Proposition 57 by a 64.5 percent vote. Formally known as the California Parole for Non-Violent Criminals and Juvenile Court Trial Requirements Initiative, and strongly endorsed by Governor Jerry Brown, Oakland’s former mayor, the new law attempts to ease prison overcrowding by increasing parole opportunities for inmates and changing how juvenile offenders are charged. Now local and state agencies are grappling with the complexities of putting Proposition 57 into effect and debating the effects it will have…
BART riders are on high alert after a mob of teens robbed passengers two weekends ago. BART Police officials and the agency’s board of directors responded at a board meeting on Thursday with plans to prevent this from happening again.
The family of Ghost Ship fire victim Edmond Lapine II files a wrongful death suit against the Ghost Ship building owner, neighbors, master tenant and promoters for the party where the blaze started.
The residential building at 2551 San Pablo Avenue caught fire in the early-morning hours of March 27, killing four people and displacing more than 100. That day Strauss started a crowdfunding page to collect donations for displaced residents. It wasn’t the first time he’d done this—as a founding member of the Oakland Warehouse Coalition, Jonah Strauss had collected donations for survivors of the Ghost Ship fire and their next of kin.
On Tuesday night, the council heard reports by working groups created by Mayor Libby Schaff’s Executive Order 2017-1 on January 11, calling for improving building and fire safety in non-permitted spaces while avoiding displacing their residents if code violations aren’t life-threatening. Should tenants have to be relocated, the order calls for the city to provide more relocation assistance. The order also calls for more notice for inspections; strengthening the Just Cause Ordinance, which prohibits landlords from evicting tenants except for specific reasons like failure to pay rent and illegal activities; as well as steps towards legalizing non-conforming spaces and reforming the city’s events permits system.
Oakland’s six-month program to provide fundamental public services and housing resources at its first sanctioned homeless encampment is two-thirds complete. Yet with less than two months to go, the city is still left with lots of work to reach its goal.
Over 60 community members including artists and performers affected by the December 2, 2016 Ghost Ship fire gathered at Oakland City Hall Monday night for a special meeting of the city council to discuss tenant issues in the wake of the tragedy.