Mayoral Race
Not all Oaklanders will be looking at the same ballot tomorrow: while every resident is eligible to vote for citywide offices, the winners of several local offices will be determined by voters in specific districts. To see which offices and candidates you’ll have a chance to vote for, check out Oakland North’s political district maps.
Oakland mayoral candidate Terence Candell isn’t an easy man to ignore—in fact, he believes it is one of the keys to being elected mayor of Oakland. “What do I say to the people who think that I’m going to scare people away? I say good!” he said. “Its about time that they met a real black man who doesn’t back down when someone gets scared.”
This information helps voters make informed decisions, and helps the public detect any potential conflicts of interest that might tempt an official to use her office for personal gain. In California, this information is recorded on a document called the “Statement of Economic Interests,” or Form 700 under the state’s Fair Political Practices Commission.
In anticipation of the 2010 election, Oakland North asked the 10 candidates for Oakland mayor two questions: what distinguishes you from the other nine hopefuls and what would your top two priorities be as the city’s next mayor?
Of the ten people running for mayor in Oakland this fall, Arnold Fields—Arnie to his friends, and if you’re voting in Oakland, he considers you a friend—may be the candidate whose campaign most resembles his life before politics. Between appearances on the campaign circuit, Fields still pulls double duty as a real estate broker and as the owner and operator of Revolution Café, a West Oakland coffee shop and bar that doubles as his campaign headquarters.
At 30, Young is the youngest of Oakland’s ten candidates for mayor this election season. On a crowded ballot, where the candidates are predominantly in their 40s, and clawing for ways to set themselves apart from one another, his drastic age difference draws attention. “No one can relate to the youth better than the youth,” he says. “Youth is strength. It’s untapped resources that Oakland has yet to use.”
Oakland mayoral candidate and local businessman Greg Harland hopes to address the majority of Oakland’s problems—high crime, unattended street maintenance, and increased parking fees and fines—using business sense.
It’s the First Friday in October, and Art Murmur is in full swing. Local ’zines, art depots and thrift shops are peddling their wares in between galleries packed with inebriated merrymakers. The atmosphere is hardly political, and yet mingling with the crowd is Don Macleay, one of Oakland’s ten mayoral candidates. “Let me tell you,” he says, thrusting fliers into the hands of passersby, “say ‘Hi, I’m a politician,’ and people will shy away from you. But say, ‘Hi, I’m with the Green Party,’ and people will take your card.”
Oakland’s Asian Cultural Center forum brought the ten mayoral candidates together to share their views on issues important to Asian American communities including equal language access, crime prevention and business revitalization.