Posts Tagged ‘blight’
Oaklanders tackle illegal trash dumping in their neighborhoods
Illegal dumping has plagued the city of Oakland for more than 20 years. Today, the problem is worse than ever and it is affecting residents, businesses and government leaders alike.
Read MoreCity Council approves ordinance to hold banks responsible for blighted homes in default process
The city of Oakland has a program that charges fines for banks that fail to maintain blighted homes that have been foreclosed upon that the bank now owns. On Tuesday night, the city council voted unanimously to expand those controls to include homes going through the default process.
Read MoreEx-offenders and low-income youth help reduce vandalism in Oakland through graffiti abatement program
Oakland Community and Economic Development Agency has partnered with service organizations to create job opportunities for out-of-work youth while mitigating blight in the city’s commercial corridors. The city’s partnership with Men of Valor, a non-profit re-entry program in East Oakland that provides housing, job training and other services to high school drop-outs, recovering addicts and the formerly incarcerated, has proven so successful since it began in June—removing about 114 graffiti markings from 88 businesses along Foothill and International boulevards—that in October CEDA decided to expand the program and take on new partners.
Read MoreBeating back Oakland’s blight
In Oakland’s Frank H. Ogawa Plaza, building inspector Ed Labayog walks past a line of nearly a hundred people waiting to apply for a job with the city on his way to the street where his car is parked. Wearing a black button-up City of Oakland shirt and carrying a bag containing case files, a camera, and his lunch, he’s setting out to find blighted properties. For Labayog, seeking out trash, graffiti and signs of crumbling structures on private property is his job.
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