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About 130 people showed up at International Community School Thursday for an Oakland Unified School District career fair, where recruiters were trying to fill 97 teaching vacancies, particularly for bilingual and special education teachers and paraeducators. “We have strong dual language programs, especially in Spanish and English. We want our students to be multilingual and we want to honor their multilingual backgrounds,” said Sarah Glasband, director of OUSD’s recruitment and retention team. “So we really want to cultivate multilingual educators…

Record rainfall last winter mitigated California’s severe drought and brought a slow start to fire season. But the wet weather hasn’t reduced the threat.  The heavy downpours that bombarded the Bay Area and the relatively cool weather that followed kept vegetation from drying out in the spring and early summer. But as the summer wears on, that vegetation will become fuel for fires, said Ranyee Chiang, director of the Meteorology and Measurement Division at Bay Area Air Quality Management District. …

Oakland City Council passed an ordinance Tuesday making it a crime to organize, facilitate or promote sideshows.  The ordinance passed with six votes — councilmembers Kevin Jenkins and Janani Ramachandran were absent. Councilmember Noel Gallo originally proposed a stricter ordinance in December that would also have made it a crime to watch a sideshow, but that proposal was rejected and revised.  The revisions remove any mention of spectators and “bystander participants.”  The city has sought to deter people from participating…

Getting around town might get a lot easier, especially for college students in the East Bay. The Metropolitan Transportation Commission wants to subsidize 20,000 annual Bay Wheels passes for community college and public university students across the Bay Area, with the addition of 600 electric bikes and 19 stations in Oakland. The rollout would begin in 2027 if a proposed contract between Lyft and the Metropolitan Transportation Commission comes to fruition. The project is part of the larger Plan Bay Area…

Hasheem Bason, 33, charged with murdering an Oakland dentist in August, pleaded not guilty last Tuesday.  Bason, of Stockton, also is charged with slaying while lying in wait, special circumstances of killing for financial gain and use of a firearm, among other offenses.  At 2 p.m, on Aug 21, Dr. Lili Xu was shot and killed when she and her boyfriend pulled up to a curb on the 1000 block of Fifth Ave. in Oakland’s Little Saigon neighborhood.  The Oakland…

Music and the smell of grilled meat and seafood wafted in the air as people grabbed food, browsed necklaces and earrings and watched street performances on Telegraph Avenue in Oakland Friday.  Thousands of people attend Oakland First Fridays – a free monthly event that  features local vendors, from 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. on Telegraph Avenue between 27th Street and West Grand Avenue.  But its future is uncertain, as organizations struggle to meet the event’s expenses.  First Fridays costs about…

Driving in Oakland can sometimes feel like a video game, swerving around potholes to avoid a flat tire or damage to the undercarriage of your car. Potholes have become one of the few apolitical issues that everyone, besides maybe the tire repair shop, can get behind.  “Potholes are an unnecessary added stress,” says Oakland resident Logan Marshall. Some are so deep, you can instantly pop a tire driving over them, he added.   According to a 2019 Metropolitan Transportation Commission…

For nearly 20 years, the Oakland Unified School District has paid the consequences of relying on the state to bail it out of financial trouble.  During that time, it has slashed the budget, cut salaries, laid off staff and closed schools, as it tries to repay a $100 million emergency loan it borrowed in 2003, when the district fell under state receivership. And the cuts keep coming  — with 11 schools set to close, merge or downsize in the next…