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Undaunted by critics of her leadership, incumbent Oakland Mayor Jean Quan, the first Asian American woman elected to lead a major U.S. metropolis, is fighting to keep her job at City Hall. Her platform stresses a lifetime of service, from her days as a councilmember working to keep libraries open, to her Peace in the Parks program aiming to unite families in East and West Oakland. Raised by a single immigrant mother, Quan was an activist in the Third World Liberation Front Strike and…
When he turned 23, Army veteran Peter Y. Liu came home from Iraq and found that there wasn’t a job waiting for him in his military specialty, journalism. The largest metropolitan newspapers on the West Coast were in the midst of downsizing. Now at 33, after a decade of working in the nonprofit, insurance and real estate sectors, Liu has declared his candidacy for Oakland mayor. He is running a frugal campaign, limited to $1,000 of his own funds, highlighting…
Tax specialist Nancy Sidebotham, 69, said she’s run for the Oakland City Council six times. She’s never won a seat. But, to her mind, she’s never lost either. “There’s not too many candidates that lose, and stay involved,” said Sidebotham, who’s lived in Oakland for more than 50 years, and served on the Community Policing Advisory Board, Neighborhood Watch and Shop Oakland boards, among other organizations. “I continue to stay involved and continue to work for my community.” The East Oakland…
Former Occupy spokesperson Jason ‘Shake’ Anderson, a U.S. Navy veteran, artist and activist, is a candidate for Oakland mayor. “What I see in the city is a lot of dysfunction, a lack of leadership and a lack of direction,” said the 38-year-old Oakland native, citing the resignation of the city administrator and multiple police chiefs in recent years. Under his “new and fresh leadership,” he said, the government could hire the best people for the “two most important jobs in…
Attorney and Oakland mayoral candidate Dan Siegel has some big plans for the city. And he wants your vote. “I have the ideas, experience, and ability to be a great mayor of the city of Oakland,” Siegel said. He faces a tough field that so far includes 14 other competitors for the city’s top job. The longtime civil rights lawyer and independent candidate has a detailed proposal to combat what he feels is the biggest issue facing Oakland: the threat…
Bryan Parker embraces being an outsider. Although Jean Quan appointed him to the Port Commission in 2012, most know him as a former healthcare and tech executive. He sees his lack of political experience as an advantage in his run to become Oakland’s next mayor. Parker pointed to his record of business leadership, saying that as vice president, general manager of real estate and internal growth at healthcare company DaVita Inc., he grew his division’s budget from $400 million to $800…
An Iraq war veteran who was struck in the head by a police bean bag during an Occupy Oakland protest in 2011 received a settlement of $4.5 million Friday from the city.
Occupy Oakland marked its two-year anniversary Thursday with a celebratory gathering at Frank Ogawa Plaza in downtown Oakland.
Councilmember Noel Gallo’s ordinance prohibiting demonstrators from carrying “tools of violence” went through final passage at Tuesday night’s Oakland City Council meeting, effectively banning items such as hammers, shields and knives from protests. The ordinance was brought up again before the council in light of the protests against George Zimmerman’s acquittal this summer in the Trayvon Martin case in Florida; specifically, after Drew Cribley, a waiter at Flora, was struck in the head with a hammer during the protests. “Hammer”…