Good afternoon council members if you could come to your seats so we can go ahead and get started
Good afternoon, and welcome to the council meeting of Tuesday
October 20th before I'll call roll
I will give speaker card instructions if you would like to speak on any agenda item
Please fill out a speaker's card and return it to the clerk representative at the front the speaker cards and the agenda are on
The front table you must fill out a speaker's card
Two hours at the start of this meeting this meeting was called at 3 32
So the last opportunity to turn in the speakers card will be at 5 32 today or before the item is called for discussion
whichever occurs first
As we get to a role for this meeting on role councilmember Brown aye councilmember five
present
Councilmember Gallo present councilmember Houston
Councilmember Ramachandran is excused councilmember Unger here. Councilmember Wong
Is also excused and chair Jenkins
Present showing six members present at this time
Do you have any?
No, Ramachandran
She's in the vicinity
Showing seven members present at this time
Do you have any announcements?
No announcements
my distinguished colleague
councilmember round reminded me that
It's helping this meeting. We are going to acknowledge the Oakland motto, which is love life and we have
People here to do the love life
anthem as well as a performance and
We are also going to hear from mr. Lacey who was pivotal in
Ensuring that we got love life passed. I remember watching that meeting
this is hard work.
And the hard work and dedication that Mr. Lacy has devoted
to ensuring that our city is a better place after experiencing
the tragedy that he did and so I encourage all everyone to
celebrate Oakland's model to ensure that we are living out
the model love life and I'm gonna pass it to councilmember
and Jenkins for your kind remarks.
Thank you to everyone who joined us yesterday
as we kicked off Love Life Week.
Today I'm honored to bring legislation officially
recognizing October 19th through the 25th
as Love Life Week in Oakland.
Yesterday I shared in my remarks
that Oakland's greatest strength has always been
its people, community.
our resilience, our compassion, and our willingness
to show up for one another.
And that spirit is at the heart of Love Life,
our city's official motto, honoring the life and legacy
of Loeche Lacy.
Mr. Donald Lacy, thank you so much for nearly three decades
of turning unimaginable loss into a movement rooted in love,
piece and community action.
In addition, I also want to recognize
Erin Walker of eGallery.
As you all entered into the chambers today,
you should have seen some beautiful artwork,
and so her artwork can be found of course at the eGallery.
But the artwork also reminds us of the power of art
and the power of art used to heal
and to bring communities together.
And so Love Life is more than just a motto,
it's a commitment that we must put into action every day.
And now I will turn it over to,
I believe it's Council Member Fife,
and Council Member Fife,
who will read the Love Life acknowledgement,
and we will hear also brief remarks from Mr. Donald Lacy.
Thank you, Council President Jenkins and Councilmember Brown.
I will be reading this Love Life acknowledgement
in honor of this very, very special week.
Thank you.
We acknowledge that in service to our beloved city of Oakland
and all people who inhabit this community,
adhering to the city of Oakland's official model,
Oakland Love Life, established in 2016
in memory of 16-year-old Loeche Lacey,
who lost her life to a senseless act of violence in 1997.
We enter into this space committed to embody love
as the guiding principle in our words, actions, spirit,
tone, intentions, and with regard to each other
and all who engage and enter into this meeting space.
We acknowledge love life as our motto
as we denounce violence in all forms
and the conditions that create violence.
We commit to working against these conditions
to create a safe space for all to operate
in love and peace on our streets.
We acknowledge that when we demonstrate love,
we also manifest qualities of respect, kindness,
grace, truth, understanding, humbleness, and forgiveness towards each other.
We commit to acts of love as an intentional force to generate tangible solutions in regards
to all policies, declarations, recommendations, resolutions, appointments, and actions.
We recognize as leaders we must set an example and precedent for those who have entrusted
us with these duties.
We accept the responsibility to make our city a better place by bringing inspiration instead
of insults, contribution instead of complaints, constructive feedback instead of criticism,
and even in our passion for all issues no matter how difficult we lead with a guiding
principle of love.
We ask that all who participate in this event and its proceedings to share with us in this
commitment and practice of exhibiting love, good faith, positive energy, and respect in
how you comment, present information, report out, or inform on this meeting.
We appreciate all contributions to the space and even when expressing hurt, harm, disappointment,
dispute or disagreement, we request that you lead in love with your heart.
We acknowledge love in practice even when there are differences in opinions, strategies,
procedures and process and we will seek to find common ground and tangible solutions
that demonstrate love for our city, its residents and all constituents.
We acknowledge and recognize that when we model this practice of love, it will establish
a norm that will resonate and be exemplified throughout our city and create the change
we all wish to see in our communities.
We acknowledge that when we lead with love we are able to uplift a thriving city rooted
in equity, equality, justice, inclusion and opportunity for all regardless of race, gender,
age, class, socioeconomic status, nationality, religion, housing status, sexual orientation
or political affiliation.
We acknowledge that when we uplift love,
we uplift those impacted by violence of all in any kind.
We acknowledge that when we uplift love,
we uplift traditions of our ancestors,
our arts, our culture, our businesses, our educators,
our unhoused, our civic servants,
and all who contribute to the fabric
and well-being of our community.
We commit to the action of love life
as our motto and our mantra.
Thank you.
Thank you, Council Member.
good evening my beloved city my beloved city council thank you all for your
service please uh allow me a little grace today is the anniversary of my
daughter's murder so just give me a little grace please 29 years ago today
around 6.30 p.m. Over 30 rounds rang out. My daughter, an innocent victim to the
intended victim of the shooting, seven bullets penetrated her body. She was
killed instantly. I'm broken. I'm flawed. I'm nowhere near perfect, but I try to
trust and obey the God that I worship, that he makes no mistakes. A few months
Prior to her death on this day, 29 years ago,
a friend of hers born on the same day as her,
James Valerie was murdered in West Oakland.
And she said to me,
Daddy, I'm tired of seeing all these young black kids dying.
So the Love Life Foundation, which is now our city model,
and thank you Councilmember Gayo
for being one of the five votes to get it passed,
is her vision.
She's a conflict resolution mediator,
McCliman's, a peace activist.
She always led with love.
How we're still operating 29 years later, only God knows.
Here we are, the 10th year anniversary of this motto,
and on the day it was passed, April 5th, 2016,
our annual budget was around $40,000 to $50,000.
And here we are today, 29 years later.
And I want to invite you all in this room
to support our 12 Love Life scholars
who were raising money before.
I don't get a salary, nor do I care to.
We're mostly volunteer organization.
70% of our budget goes to the youth
and their families and the services.
If ever there has been an organization
more deserving of support, and think of the impact,
An impact report came out and said,
we've reached 30,000 young people in 29 years.
30, and like I, and I'm about to wrap up.
I know my time is done.
And like to say, while I raised,
while I lost one, I've gained thousands.
And these youngsters are the blessing.
And lastly, I forgave on camera
the one man convicted of her murder.
Why?
Not because I necessarily wanted to,
because it's what God and my daughter would have me do.
So please, city council, mayor,
all the people assembled in this room,
this is God's vision, not mine.
This organization deserves ongoing support
so that when I'm dead and gone and meet my maker,
we're still serving young people.
Thank you all for your service.
Love life, peace and blessing.
And now we'll have a performance by Steneman.
Check, check.
Man, I go by Jordan Gomes, aka Stunnerman02,
and I'm ready to give you the best experience
of your life.
If y'all ready for that, make some noise!
Yeah!
Hold on real quick, hold on real quick.
Hey, man, I don't sound like y'all loving life too much.
Man, the energy right here,
we wanna take it all the way up here.
So we gonna do something simple called a call and response.
That means I'ma tell y'all what to yell,
and y'all yell it at me,
but this time we gonna do it differently.
You gonna do it from the bottom of your diaphragm,
and we gonna do it to celebrate 60 years
of Black Panthers.
So every time y'all, yeah, I wanna feel that.
So let's practice real quick.
When I say, I love, y'all say life.
I love, I love, that's what I'm talking about.
DJ Josh, you ready?
Drop that, come on.
Hey, we celebrating 60 years of Black Panthers.
Make some noise.
Yeah, when I say keep, y'all say God.
Keep, keep, when I say keep, y'all say God.
♪ Keep God, keep God ♪
♪ When I say love, y'all say life ♪
♪ Love, love, love ♪
♪ When I say love, y'all say life ♪
♪ Love, love, love, love ♪
♪ Hey, look, I'm big steppin' on the devil's head ♪
♪ When I can't see, I praise God ♪
♪ I get a head, partner got that devil's letters ♪
♪ It smell like devil's eggs, she on demon time ♪
♪ Tryna, whoa, you all fought in different drugs ♪
♪ Tryna get the most high ♪
♪ You don't wash yourself, you gettin' further from God ♪
♪ You need a pilgrimage, you need to go do the hush ♪
♪ All praise be to God ♪
♪ A hum do a lot ♪
♪ I pray for abundance now I thumb through a lot ♪
♪ I pray for an angel now she come through a lot ♪
♪ They try to box me until I got somethin' to pop ♪
♪ But I ain't got no problems cause I give it to God ♪
♪ You tired and you lookin' for some better days ♪
♪ You need to give it up to God he got some better ways ♪
♪ You can get anything you want ♪
♪ You just gotta pray but when you get it don't forget ♪
♪ You still gotta praise, aye ♪
♪ Keep God in your life ♪
♪ Keep God in your life ♪
♪ Keep God in your life ♪
♪ I need y'all to say it with me ♪
♪ When I say keep, y'all say God ♪
♪ Keep, keep ♪
♪ When I say run it, y'all say up ♪
♪ Run it, run it ♪
♪ If you a winner put your hands in the air, ay ♪
♪ If you love God put him in the air, ay ♪
♪ If you a winner put your hands in the air, ay ♪
♪ If you love God run it up, run it up ♪
♪ I wanna see your dance moves, come on, ay ♪
♪ Let me see your dance moves, keep going, ay ♪
♪ Let me see your dance moves, keep going ♪
Come on, ay, let me tell y'all, ay, I'm a genius.
That's why they got my lyrics up on genius.
You all up in somebody mouth, don't care about your eating.
Ay, all that bad food, now you got internal bleeding.
Y'all giving this to children?
This ain't what they needed.
Yo, P.A.'s balance off
cause you been messing with them demons.
Soul ties left, all in you, you been creeping.
Plus that dulena, same time he beaming.
You know I got the remedy, I put it in my speeches.
Take some bear berry, some onions and some peaches.
Lemon lime honey, agave have you vegan.
Golden seal ginger, regardless keep you even.
I'm trying to help my people.
They tell me that I'm preaching what I am.
You need to go and eat a salad, come on.
Hey, you need to go and eat a salad, come on.
Hey, you need to go and,
I need y'all to say it with me.
When I say eater, y'all say salad, eater, eater.
When I say keep, y'all say God, keep, keep.
Hey, E-A-T-A-S-A-L-A-D, E-A-T-A-S-A-L-A-D,
E-A-T-A-S-A-L-A-D, E-A-T-A-S-A-L-A-D, eat a salad.
And while we on this high,
I wanna make sure we talk to the most high.
So God, thank you for everybody here,
allowing them to come here for a common unity,
to serve our community through love, positivity,
in every way, mentally, physically, spiritually,
emotionally, psychologically, morally, financially,
environmentally, socially, professionally, and personally,
eliminating all silent battles,
making us feel light, and with that light shine bright.
And for all our ancestors not here,
the ones we may have lost to violence, health, anything,
we thank you for that reminder
that even though they may not be here physically,
they still big steppin' with us every way, every day.
Now all I wanna say is amen, and I say,
and we still winnin'!
What a, what a excellent way
to start city council meeting, Love Life.
I am very proud of you.
I am in an excellent way.
Inspiration, not insults.
And I hope that we remember that as this meeting goes forward,
that we keep up the love life acknowledgment.
And when you were reading that, Council Member Feibach thought
to myself, we need this at our city council meetings.
Not just council, right?
But the people who come to the city council meeting
the devil's busy the people who come saying they want to make Oakland a
better place inspiration and not insults let's move on now clerk love life
moving to item three modifications to the agenda procedural items including
but not limited to request to reschedule items from consent to not consent items
to the next council agenda speak on consent calendar register votes change
order of items reconsiderations pull items heading held in committee through
the chair we do have a request we receive notification that the post did
not publish our notices in the paper so we're going to ask when you make your
motion for the consent calendar that you continue items six point five and six
point seven to the next council meeting which I believe is November 3rd November
seven yes the final passages I make sure November 10th and I want to move item
5.2 the selection panel nominations for police commissioner appointment to the
top of the agenda and that will come before 4.1 so 5.2 will be the first item
and then we'll go in regular agenda order. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Any
more modifications? If not, we will, the clerk will read in 5.2. Skipping to item 5.2 to be
taken out of order adopt one of the following pieces of legislation a
resolution accepting the police commission selection panel slate of two
commissioners Jean Kwon and Nicholas O'Brien Kovari to serve on the Oakland
Police Commission or a resolution rejecting the police commission
selection panels slate of two commissioners Jean Kwon and Nicholas
O'Brien Kovari to serve on the Oakland Police Commission and we have 10
speakers on this item. Thank you. I'm Bert Jones from the city administration.
So I have a statement I need to read. Yesterday's selection panel nominee
Nicholas O'Brien Cavare formally withdrew from his, formally withdrew
from consideration to serve on the police commission. The nominee informed
our office that he works for a law firm that represent parties with pending
litigation against the city of Oakland. Today Mr. O'Brien Cavare acts to rescind
that today's election will be
in his written withdrawal and
that his eligibility to serve
be clarified. Oakland municipal
code section two point four
five point zero two five.
Provides that any attorney who
represents a person or entity
with a pending claim or
lawsuit against the police
department or any attorney who
represents a person or entity
that filed a claim or lawsuit
against the police department
we need to be able to do the
timing of these events staff
have no recommendations of the
nominee slate at this time.
Thank you.
So I colleagues have a
conversation with the city
attorney's office and we were
advised to.
First of all did you guys were
you guys able to hear what
bird said.
Okay so a one of the nominees
with drew and now wants to
still be on there so I was
advised by the city attorney
we are advised that we do not
allow the selection panel to
bring back the candidate.
That they want and another
candidate but we're advised to
reject the slate today so that
the selection panel has the
opportunity to bring forth the
candidates that they want.
Can you opine.
Through the chair yes so that's
correct I'm pursuant to charter
section six oh four C the
selection panel.
Must submit a single slate to
have a number of people that
are being accepted.
The resolution of the terms are
occurring at the same time and
so, you know, once the panel
submits those, that slate, the
city council must accept or
reject the entire slate.
If they don't do that within 60
days, the slate is deemed
accepted.
Councilmember Unger.
So can you explain why we can't
just have a slate of one person
it's the same issue that we've been going through.
I think it was well intentioned when it was written
that they wanted to take politics out of it,
but we only accept slates or reject slates.
We cannot bifurcate or have one candidate at a time.
Is the site just one person now?
No, it would be, oh, city attorney,
would you like to apply?
Ryan Richardson, Oakland City Attorney.
So the way the charter is written
is all of the selection panel seats
that are up for, to be filled at a given time,
have to be brought forward as a slate of names, plural.
And the council has to accept that entire slate
or reject the slate.
They can't bring forward one name at a time.
Council Member Houston in five.
Through the chair to the city attorney.
And this is what I asked prior could we do separately,
you know, for something like this could happen, right?
So through the city attorney is in any way through the law
the city and it's important to
know that we can have a slate of
one single person.
By councilmember younger just
said why couldn't we speak on
this is it somewhere in the long
to the chair to see the attorney
Ryan Richardson.
Is there something that we can
do so we don't come across this
again if something like this
happens again and that's why I
wanted.
One at a time anyway.
Through the chair the
requirement that the names be
that process would require a charter amendment.
Looking forward to it.
Councilmember Fife?
Will we be hearing from the public speakers then today?
Yeah, we'll be hearing from the public speakers.
We'll invite Mayor Quan up to speak.
Nicholas is here.
We'll invite him up to speak as well.
I just hope that when this next slate comes back,
Jean Quan doesn't somehow end up not on it,
that that's not what's happening here.
So I look forward to the next slate
that we receive from the body.
So I want to fully affirm that we
can provide the documentations that one of the candidates
withdrew his candidacy after questions from KQED.
And so we can provide that documentation
if someone wants to do a public records request.
This has nothing to do with any of the candidates,
and I see the chair of the selection panel
gingerly walking in here, if you want to have something to say.
Through the chair, I just wanted to clarify our office's advice.
So yeah, we, the candidate raised a question about whether he was eligible to serve based
on a provision in the municipal code that Burt read.
As we were looking into that, the candidate withdrew his nomination.
So we stopped looking into it.
Later the candidate asked to rescind that withdrawal.
So there's now two issues that we would need to have looked at which is, can he rescind
his withdrawal and is he eligible, both of which would have required more time than we
had in advance of this meeting.
So to clarify, we're not suggesting that either candidate is or is not qualified.
Our advice to reject this slate is to simply reset the clock, reset the board.
If both candidates are qualified, the selection panel can send them both back and the council
can vote them up or down. Councilmember Houston. Through the chair I just I want to know even though that it's rejected because of that condition is it possible to ask. Jean Quan a question that's very critical that really affected my. We will allow for questions of statements we will allow for statements and questions. After a public comment. Alex did you have something to say Mr. Chair. Okay.
Okay, and because of the amount of commenters, public speaking time will be 90 seconds.
Madam Clerk, please call in.
As I call your name, please approach the podium in any order, please state your name
for the record before me.
One moment.
Thank you.
question to the police selection chair just if it does turn out that O'Brien
Cavari is allowed to or his ultimately his nomination is rescinded do you all
have alternatives that you can present readily yeah yeah we have a reserve
pool okay yeah okay thank you and yes I want to hear from public comment thank
you so we'll do public comment then we'll allow the mayor to come up after
As I call your name please approach the podium in any order please state your
name for the record before beginning. If you're on zoom please raise your hands so
I can easily identify you. Just for now for the person the zoom cue with their
hand raised your name is not showing so please be prepared to
state your name once we get there. Stuart Chen, Josephine Wie, Joe Marr,
Alfred Lee Jesse Rosemore Mrs. Ahda Ola Bala
Kathy Leonard
Mr. Hazard and and janks in any order, please begin
Stewart come on up
Thank you. All right council president members of Council first half
I want to say I felt the love and a little disappointed that this
resolution is not going to be adopted this afternoon.
But regardless, I have a prepared statement,
90 seconds plus his, that gives me three minutes.
Good afternoon, members of City Council.
My name's Stuart Chen, and I'm here today
to strongly support the appointment of Jin Kwan
to the Oakland Police Commission.
I have known Jin for many, many years,
both as a public servant and as someone
who has remained deeply connected to Oakland.
Jean has devoted her life to serving this city.
First a school board member, then city council,
and then mayor of Oakland.
That experience has given her a deep understanding
of our city, our diverse neighborhoods,
and the complicated, yes, complicated challenges
surrounding public safety.
I have personally seen Jean's commitment to Oakland,
Chinatown, and the AAPI community.
She has consistently been present, engaged,
and willing to listen to our residents, seniors, merchants,
community leaders, particularly on issues of public safety.
And Chinatown knows about public safety.
We have had our shares.
The police commission has an important responsibility.
We need commissioners who understand the public safety
and police accountability are not opposing goals.
Both are essential to building trust
between law enforcement and the communities they serve.
Jean brings valuable perspective to this commission.
decades of institutional knowledge, community relationships,
and first-hand experience with Oakland City government.
We may not always agree on every single issue,
and no public official should be expected to do so.
What really matters is having someone
who's experienced, independent, willing to listen,
and committed to doing what she believes is right for Oakland.
Jean has spent much of her life serving this city.
I believe she still has so much more to give and contribute.
I respectfully ask the city council
to accept and support the appointment of Jean Kwon
to the Oakland Police Commission.
You want to stay up in case we need help?
I think it's very important to know that we have a relationship between the two.
We have a relationship between the two and we have a relationship between the two.
So we have a relationship between the two and we have a relationship between the two.
So our relationship between the two and we have a relationship between the two and we have a relationship between the two.
We have a relationship between the two and we have a relationship between the two and we have a relationship between the two.
So, I have to do this for a long time.
I have to do this for a long time.
I have to do it for a long time.
I have to do it for a long time.
So, I have to do it for a long time.
I have to do it for a long time.
I have to do it for a long time.
I want to say thank you very much.
I'd like to ask you all to join me in thanking you for your hard work.
I would like to thank you very much for your support and support.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
Thank you very much.
Thank you for your support.
Thank you very much.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
You gotta be brief.
So we gave you double the time for translation, so you've taken your 130 and now your person
translating has admitted in 30 seconds to translate.
Hello.
Good afternoon.
Honorable President, Council Member Kevin Johnson and all the council members.
His name is Zhou Ma. Zhou Ma is the President of the Toisan Family Association.
And also he is the guy who lead our Chinatown patrol team since 2021, March 1st.
And until now, we have been patrolling, I believe it's 2,068 days.
No matter day or morning, our patrol team will be there every day.
And my name is Josephine.
I am the Vice President of the Taisen Family Association.
Right now, I am going to simple Mr. Joma speech.
Mr. Joma is not only the president
of the Taishan Family Association,
he is also the Vice President
of the Oakland Chinatown Improvement Council,
and his special job at OCIC.
We have 15 seconds.
The time's up.
So, 10 seconds, Joe Ma is in his 80s.
He just came out of the hospital from ER.
He came to support Gene Kwan.
All that he just said, he strongly support Gene Kwan
to be on the police commission.
Thank you, guys.
Thank you.
Through the Chair to Miss Josephine,
I believe Josephine was translating for Mr. Ma.
She now has her own one minute and 30 seconds.
Okay, regarding the appointment of representative
to the Oakland Police Commissioner to help oversee the police governor's public safety
and law enforcement accountability.
I believe former Oakland Mayor Jean Kwan is a strong candidate for your consideration.
I have known Mayor Jean Kwan for 26 years.
Throughout those years, I have come to appreciate her familiarity with the Oakland communities
and her understanding of the People's Department and his role in maintaining public safety.
What has impressed me most about Mayor Jin Kuan is her genuine dedication to the community.
she was serving as mayor or after leaving the office, I have often seen her out on the
street meeting with local business owner and residents, listening to their concerns and
staying connected with the people she served.
She has also maintained a strong prison in Oakland, Chinatown, wherever the community
organized cultural celebration, public gatherings,
or community event.
Mayor Jin Khan is often there.
Her frequent interaction with residents
and local business reflects her long-standing commitment
to the community.
Based on my 26 years of knowing her,
observing her involvement in Oakland communities,
I believe her experience, community connection,
and understand of local concern.
Thank you ma'am, your time is up.
Thank you.
Those are the most lovely commenters we've had in some time.
I love Joe Mattu.
Anne Janks, District 3.
Just a couple of points of clarification.
First of all, I think that the thing that happened
with Nicholas O'Brien, I'm gonna mess up the other name,
had to do with his changing jobs.
I looked him up on LinkedIn.
And so I think that the job he took
engages more with lawsuits with the city of Oakland.
It's not like he got a call from the press and suddenly,
I think that's what happened.
But the other issue is I was at the selection panel meeting
and I didn't look it up
because I didn't know this was gonna be an issue.
So I'm not willing to like bet my car on him,
but I bet my bike.
At that meeting, they actually created three slates.
They created a slate of two that you already passed that
was the chair and the alternate.
And then they separated Jean Kwon and Nicholas O'Brien
into two separate slates, specifically
because, frankly, of the inappropriate actions
of this council previously in service of the police union
where people were being rejected.
And so they created different slates.
And if you go back and you look, I'll give you my bike
If I'm wrong, Nicholas was one slate,
and Jean Quahn was her own slate,
and therefore, I believe you still can vote
for Jean Quahn today, thank you.
Hi, Jesse Rosemore.
It's difficult to come here with love for my city.
Knowing that police oversight and accountability
is so important to it.
And watch our elected officials continue
to undermine the charter and selection process
that was meant to be independent from the meddling
of the city council.
It's kind of hard to talk about police commission appointments
and not think about what happened to Omar Farmer.
I asked Zach Unger in January, 2026,
if he was gonna reappoint,
if he was gonna approve the appointment of Omar Farmer
and Ricardo Garcia Acosta
when it would come back to the commission
after it was unceremoniously meddled with
in a politicized process by the city council.
He said he was not going to approve that appointment
because of HR issues that he was not at liberty to discuss.
This is a lie.
This is a lie that's meant to slander
and undermine a real true public servant
that really brought great accountability to our city,
and I'm so afraid of what the end of public,
of the end of federal oversight means at a time like this.
Zach Unger, if this was true,
if this was not a lie that you said to me
and many other people, then explain it.
Explain exactly what you meant,
this thing that you were not at liberty to discuss.
After, when what proceeded and proceeded that
is a politicized process that all of us could see.
And I'm so worried about what's gonna happen
with police oversight and accountability
when people like you lie like this to the public.
Thank you.
Good afternoon, Kathy Leonard, District One.
I'm here to support the appointment of Jane Kwan.
She is heavily involved in the community.
She served as a school board member,
I believe a school board member,
but definitely a council person and mayor.
And to this day, she is still involved in Oakland.
Out of all the past elected officials that I could think of,
she is still around and still contributing.
And so I think that she would be a great addition
to the police commission.
And I also have to say that I'm pretty upset
that Omar Farmer wasn't reappointed either.
He had the, he did the most research
of anybody on the police commission.
he always had pointed questions to the police department
and I believe that he was a threat.
He was a threat to the police officers association
and to the Oakland Police Department
and I believe there was some unhandedness
to get rid of him and replace him on the police commission
and it's a doggone shame because if we are really concerned
about police accountability, if we are really concerned
about the independence of the police commission
and the selection panel, we should let them do
their jobs thank you this is about procedures 604 3C of the commission
charter of the city's charter says you have to approve a slate if you don't do
it in this instance I said don't do it send it back until an acceptable slate
that you're willing to do I agree with the last speaker mr. former was an ideal
candidate but yet because of politics and we got politics right now that's
what we're dealing with there's no reason why mr. former should not been
appointed he had all the records credentials this is the first time I've
seen Ms. Quan here in the City Council chambers in a long time. Issues regarding the police
commission and police conduct or misconduct have come up. Where was she? Did she parade
a group of folks in here touting her past experience? I could talk about some of her
past experience but that's not what I'm here to do. The procedure requires you
approving a slate and if it's not acceptable, reject it. Thank You Mr.
Hazard your time is up. Moving to the Zoom speaker process of elimination I'm
guessing is Ms. Asada please unmute yourself and begin your comments. This
Mrs. Asada, first I want to talk about Bert Jones
and at the last meeting of the selection panel,
talking about Omar Farmer.
I didn't appreciate you laughing because you don't like
the way I present what you did in your selection panel
to Omar Farmer.
When Jean Kwan was interviewed, I'm against her,
when she was interviewed and asked why she wanted
to be on the police commission, she said,
because somebody asked her to do it.
history of involvement with the police department when she was Mars was
disastrous distract it was horrible chief Anthony bats resigned in 2011
citing highly restraint relationship with Jean Quang same thing happened with
Howard Jordan when he resigned in 2013 Jean Quang has had a deeply strained
relationships where she constantly politically clash with the police union
and the police leadership. As a city council member she voted to lay off
roughly 80 to 100 police officers. Now I could go on and on but it's important
that whoever's on the police commission should have a lack of a bias towards
police officers and it appears she does. You should be able to sit there and
and listen and work with the police officers union,
the police department.
They are not comfortable with her and I don't blame her.
Thank you, Ms. Olibala, that was the last speaker.
This is, Mayor Quinn, would you like to come and have words?
I'm passing around the page for the application
for the commission.
That summarizes my experience on police reform.
So first of all, I'd like to say the city of Oakland
has made a lot of progress in our work
with the police department.
And police reform doesn't mean that we're
less effective with crime.
In fact, the year that Jerry Brown was last mayor,
we had 125 murders.
Since then, we've reformed the police significantly,
And the murders have been in the 70s, I think,
which is about the rate it was when I left office.
So we, as a city, I think, should be proud of that,
and we should be proud of getting out
of the negotiated settlement agreement.
So people keep on asking me, do I really want to do this?
I was asked by Barbara Lee, who is my political heroine,
to be on the police commission.
And I think it's a pretty critical time for the city.
I want to make sure that we stay out of the federal trouble
and that we continue to grow towards democratic policing
in the city.
I think that's part of the important future for all of us,
for our grandkids in particular, now that I'm a grandma.
I want to make sure that all the work we've done
that we should be very proud of, particularly ceasefire.
I worked very hard on ceasefire,
learning from Chicago and Boston.
I was the first mayor to actually meet
with the federal monitor, which really surprised me.
I was thinking, no wonder we've been under federal control
for 10 years that the mayor hasn't been meeting
with the federal monitor.
did tough things, like we were the first large city to have all of our police wear badge campers.
And at that time it was very controversial, only I think Santa Cruz in our region at that time had done that.
But afterwards, one of my last conversations with one of my favorite captains was,
You said, you know, we weren't for that, but it's really actually been more fair to us
and has helped us more than we had feared at that time.
So this is sort of that time again.
You know, I don't expect to be loved by the police department, but I think I was always
fair.
And for those of you I've worked with, I am never running for anything again, so I don't
have to worry about the police officer's union putting in a million dollars in some kind
of political campaign for those of you who are worried about your political future, because
that really happened in Oakland.
Rebecca Kaplan and I had a million dollars spent against us when we first ran for city
Council. And I think that's one of the reasons Barbara wants me to be on this body is because
I don't have anything to lose. I can't be bullied. And I love the city. And I'm very
proud of the reforms that we've made. It's been a long time that we were under federal
control. I think the love for Barbara and the respect for Barbara finally got this out.
So that's my statement and what do you want to know Kenny?
Well one second. Is Nick here? Nick's not here?
Recosto.
Okay. No, he's in trial at Contra Costa County. I'll open it up to questions. It seems like.
I do. Kenny. Kenny.
I'm not sure I'm going to be.
of the.
Laws that they have were the police commission as a proof of a question for the police commission
as considered approved several significant policies changes over the past year can you
identify one specific policy or decision.
The commission has approved that you disagree with and it's a reason why I'm asking this
because it's coming back to one of the policies that was real significant and change and what
happened in my district.
provide the name of the policy explain what commission actually changed
identify and the provision you agree with and tell us what you would have
recommended instead and this is going to be going straight to something that I
was significantly involved with so councilmember let's kind of break that
question down right it seems to be several segments of it let's start with
I think the first thing that you asked was is there a policy from the police commission that you
Disagree with that. They've done in the past year. She disagreed with you. Okay, I think the decision to
Enrich the policy on immigration was an important one. I've looked at the draft
I've been following the draft because we we many years ago voted to be a sanctuary city
but I didn't don't think we foresee foresaw ice literally being in the middle of our cities
interfering with our processes and
Potentially demanding that the police assist them
So I think that was a good decision that it there's been a lot of thoughtful work done on it
I've been watching it change. I think that the fact that the
Commission has decided to take on a drone policy is also very timely and also could be a
National pay setting policy when we do it
So those are two policies two decisions that the kitchenit Commission has made this year that I fully support
But I said disagree
Okay, let me move on to this one. I'm the one that I wanted to really consider was the D geo J-0 for
What do you think, how that affected,
or what was your opinion on that one?
That was changed, because it was changed in January the 26th.
That revision went to the DG OM-041.
What do you think about this is one that's really
close to my heart, right here, that changed the public safety
issue in my district?
I don't quite understand.
OK, that was the vehicle pursuit policy.
That's very critical for the change that happened
in my district with the smash and grabs and stuff like that.
So it was three changes.
It was three changes.
What do you feel about those three changes?
Well, it's a pretty new change.
I'd like to see the data on how it's changed or at risk.
I see that in general.
I was looking at the complaints
and they're not easily, easy to find.
is mostly the numbers of them and the general areas of it.
That one got more publicity than I think of others,
mostly because the Oakland side did a fairly good job
talking about it, but until I see the data,
I don't really have a strong opinion
whether that was a good choice.
Okay, so let me read the three changes to you.
50 miles an hour restriction.
The commission approved removing the special restriction
requiring additional authorization.
Once the pursuit reached 50 miles an hour,
can you remember they were smashing and grabbing
into the stores in my district.
Officers must still assist the danger
they created by this pursuit.
So, authorized once the pursuit reached 50 miles an hour,
the offers must still assist the danger
created by this pursuit.
That was one.
The second one was protection for terminating the pursuit.
Remember that one, they had to do that.
The revised policy restores language protecting officers
and supervisors from criticism solely
for ending that pursuit.
Remember they was being criticized?
And the last one is this.
The officers may begin a pursuit.
They must notify the supervisors
and get approval to continue.
Those were the three serious changes to that pursuit policy.
Can you speak to each one?
When I was mayor, I did a lot of ride-alongs.
And probably about a dozen times I was in the car
when there was a shooting in our area.
In fact, in your district, as you remember,
I adopted the park on 98th and Avenue D
that used to be the home to the gangbangers
in that area, and I got to know all of the drug houses
in the neighborhood, and I often rode with the officers
when there were calls and shooting.
And sometimes I could give the officers directions
because they didn't know the drug houses
in the area between District 6 and District 7,
But because I'd walked that neighborhood again and again,
I knew where most of them were.
So in my experience, when that happened,
there was enough time, first of all,
most of the officers just took off anyhow,
but there was enough time for the officers
to get their supervisors permission
and to let them know that they were heading there.
So I personally, again, would like to see the data
in the change, but I think the most important thing is the safety of citizens in our community.
And so you don't want officers just going off by themselves anyhow.
You want the whole crew that's working that night to know where each other are.
And so again, I would like officers when possible to ask permission for the supervisors and
to be on the air so people know where each others are
and they'll be safer for the community.
Oh, okay, it really wasn't the answer for these three.
I'll let it go and see if any of my other council members
will like have a question.
Pause you.
Okay.
You're out of order.
Councilman Wall.
Thank you, Council President Jenkins.
First of all, I just wanna thank you
for your interest in this role.
I frankly think you're maybe a little overqualified,
but I think anyone who has dedicated their life
to public service to the city of Oakland
and actually wants to do this difficult
and incredibly time-consuming job, I commend anyone.
I also wanna commend you for your groundbreaking worth
with ceasefire that we continue to uphold
as a model for reducing gun violence
for today, I also think that we do desperately
need AAPI representation on this police commission.
And I hear all the time from the sex trafficking advocates
that I work closely with that you really did amazing work,
both as a district board city council member
as well as the mayor, so I wanna thank you for that.
Do you have any thoughts or ideas
in terms of the sex trafficking?
what are some of the ways that we're still the gaps,
things that we could pursue as a government.
You were related back to the police commission.
As it relates to OPD specifically.
You know, I just showed why the track on Friday.
And it looked like to me,
actually a lot of the girls were from out of town.
And I think that's because of the good work
we've done with the county, with the foster care system.
Because a lot of the girls, as no one knows,
I used to walk with him every Friday in his area,
because his area is one of the most heavily affected
by the drug, sex trafficking.
I don't know if that's your feeling, but the girls I saw,
at least on Friday night, looked like they
were from out of town.
And that's what happens, because we've got a rep, right?
And so they bring in the girls.
We did a lot of strategies with the county.
One of the first things I'd like to look at to make sure
that we in the county are clattering as much as we can,
particularly with the girls in foster care, to make sure.
I mean, literally when I was mayor,
I got a call from a foster mom that I know very well.
And the pimps literally came to her front door
and dragged out the girl that she was fostering.
And that's when we developed a system of safe houses
and safe apartments, like there's one in the district war,
which we established as apartments for girls
transitioning from foster care.
And we had to get extra security to keep the pimps
out of that area and to keep them safe.
So, I'd like to see us work more closely with the county to make sure we're doing that
coordinating again because people leave and a lot of this was based on relationships.
We established safe houses outside of Oakland and so I think we could do more coordination
again with nearby cities so that we can get the girls in safe places of the area and particularly
Because so many of them are from outside of the city, I think we need to have, um, if
we make the arrests on Friday night and we can keep them over the weekend, we need to
make sure that we have intervention with those girls to give them an alternative to see if
we could get them, even if they don't take advantage of it this time, but to let them
know that there are safe houses and places that they could go to get away from the life.
Thank you Mayor Kwan, and I will be supporting your appointment.
Thank you.
Councilmember Fife.
Thank you.
Through the chair to former Mayor Kwan, are you planning to come back if you're approved
for the slate with members of the community?
Are you coming back again to speak?
After all this trouble, of course.
This was a lot of work trying to run you guys all down.
You know, you've been very busy.
And so, you know, like I said, I'm not ready for office again.
I'd like to do some good, hard work for Barbara, stabilize the commission, stabilize our police
reforms, and continue to work particularly for the aging community, because I think the
issues of bilingual and immigrant citizens are a little different.
And so to me, it's not just the Asian community, but it's all our immigrant communities.
No one knows my Spanish is not that good, but I try.
The reason I ask is because, colleagues, I feel like if the slate is coming back and
Jean Kwan is a part of the slate coming back, this is not the best use of time to get into
this level of depth on questioning.
So I humbly request that we can move the agenda.
questions can be asked again when the slate comes back before this body and
particularly questions about sex trafficking while are important or more
are better suited for the Public Safety Committee versus a police commission
candidate. So I just wanted to state that we have a significant agenda and lots to
discuss, appreciate the time, but we had a whole concert at the beginning of this
meeting and I would love to move the agenda. I appreciate your time and for
the entire community coming out but I'm asking if we can move the agenda. So if
no one else has anything let's say council member Huse. Through the chair I
just have one more question and I said that the pursuit policy is dear to my
heart. It's dear to my heart and I just wanted to ask just one other question
about the pursuit quality policy because that would stop crime in district seven
and when that was a revised. What would you do if the pursuit and apprehensions
increased and collisions and injuries also increase with the revision of this
pursuit policy what would you do so your question is this this policy change
seems to be detrimental to the community and that people community people get
hurt yeah I would change it and with asked to change it right I think I can
I think everything we do in the city these days
has to be data supported, right?
And, but I also think training would have to be a part of it.
How people pursue, how they drive when they pursue,
I mean, I've done a lot of ride alongs.
I've felt much more uncomfortable
with some officers than others, right?
In terms of them being very knowledgeable about the streets,
particularly like in Maxwell Park area,
they're on the edge of his district.
People in the community have put up a lot of barriers,
and I've seen officers almost crash the car with me in it,
because they didn't know the neighborhood,
they didn't know the barriers.
So if we strengthen the beat system in particular,
where officers are assigned to a community,
and they get out of their car,
and they know that community,
they know where the barriers are,
They know where the drug trafficking houses are.
I'd feel much more comfortable.
Are you complete?
Yeah, I just wanted to know that through the chair
because it took so long.
The governor had to send a letter
to the police commission and it took like a year and a half
to even address this and get this changed.
It took so, so long and that's why these questions
are really important to me
because it changed the public safety in my district.
It changed.
Thank you so with that I'll make a motion
to reject the slate.
On the motion to adopt item two moved
by Council President Jenkins second by Council Member Brown.
Council Member Brown.
Aye.
Council Member Fyfe.
Aye.
Council Member Gallo.
Aye.
Council Member Houston.
Aye.
Council Member Ramachandran.
Aye.
Council Member Unger.
Aye.
Council Member Wong.
Aye.
And Chair Jenkins.
Aye.
Motion passes with a vote of eight ayes.
Going back to the regular order of the agenda,
starting with item 4.1.
Conduct a public hearing and upon conclusion,
receive an information report on the results
of the transient occupancy tax.
I need a motion to open the public hearing.
Second.
What was that, Councilmember Brown and Councilmember Fyfe?
Dio Brown.
I didn't see him in the queue.
So that was a motion by Councilmember Gayle,
seconded by Councilmember Brown.
in the public hearing Councilmember Brown aye councilmember five aye
councilmember Gallo aye councilmember Houston aye councilmember Ramachandran aye
councilmember Unger aye councilmember Wong aye chair Jenkins aye motion passes
with a vote of eight ayes I will read the item and complete conduct a public
hearing and upon conclusion receive an information report on the results of the
the transient occupancy tax, sharing agreement with ProSoccer LLC, known as Open Roots and
Soul Soccer Club.
We'll five minutes suffice.
We have four speakers on this item.
I'll do my best.
Yes.
Excellent.
Well, as DJ Josh pulls up the presentation, we'll get started.
Last year around this time, we were getting really excited about World Cup.
Coming to the Bay Area, the Roots and Soul Soccer Club were considering throwing their
Name into the hat and competing to have their practice facility selected by a World Cup team
To be used as a base camp during World Cup and today's informational report was requested by CED
Last October as a condition affording the item to the City Council and recommending approval at that time
And even though it's just an informational item no action before you today
The item is required to be heard by the full City Council as a public hearing to meet the requirements of state law
That's why we're here today
So backing up, last year, Economic and Workforce Development introduced a resolution that was cosponsored by Council Members Ramachandran, Council Member Angayo, that would authorize staff to negotiate a TOT or transient occupancy tax share agreement to incentivize theúRoots and Soul Soccer Club to work to attract a World Cup team to Oakland.
to Oakland. And the expense incurred by the Roots and Soul would be significant,
but we anticipated that there would be substantial positive economic and
fiscal impact to the city, and we wanted to encourage them to participate in the
process. So Council approved the resolution and the city administration
and the Roots and Soul subsequently entered into a tax-sharing agreement on
May 12, 2026, earlier this year. The agreement stipulated that if specific
performance targets were met, the city would share, share back up to $300,000 of incremental
general fund TOT revenue generated above the June 2025 baseline of $1.36 million during
the June 2026 FIFA World Cup tournament.
And the month of June was selected as a baseline because while the tournament officially began
on June 11th, teams report to team base camp about two weeks ahead of time and then the
The last local game was played at Levi's Stadium on July 1st, so to support staff's
ability to easily isolate and measure the impact, the month of June was selected.
Fast forward a year, and the Oakland Roots & Soul Soccer Club successfully met all performance
targets outlined under the agreement.
They secured the Australian men's national football team, the Socceroos, an official
FIFA World Cup team to use the Roots & Soul facility as the team's base camp.
They delivered community access through public watch parties, local neighborhood activations
and international business networking.
And the associated activity generated room night demand within the Oakland hotel stock
to exceed the target TOT increment threshold.
And according to Visit Oakland, every hotel in Oakland experienced higher occupancy and
upward room rate pressure.
One of the tools deployed was the East Bay Soccer Trail that matched World Cup games to
to events and watch parties in the East Bay,
dozens of Oakland businesses availed themselves
of this promotional opportunity.
And here are just a few pictures of events and activations
at Romandi, at Needo's, at the Oakland Athletic Club.
There was an open practice at the Roots Practice Facility,
a celebration at the Aloha Club, and Lot 2270.
Even convenience store markets benefited
from World Cup fever.
And all of this economic activity generated sales
for the businesses and sales tax revenue to the city.
but it's difficult to isolate the sales tax impact
and attribute it just to World Cup.
It's why the agreement focused
on the transient occupancy tax.
So as I noted before,
we selected the month of June as the baseline,
and the agreement was structured
so that the city would not be worse off
than the June 2025 baseline.
So the first condition is that we needed to collect
at least $1.36 million in base transient occupancy tax.
And our agreement was that we would share
up to $300,000 of increment above that baseline.
So we ended up collecting about 1.7 million in June of 2026.
So we retained the base amount of 1.36.
The roots in Seoul received the next increment of 300,000
as agreed upon.
And the city retained the $80,000 above that as well.
And what's remarkable is that even with five fewer hotels
in Oakland's inventory between June 2025 and June 2026
and 360 fewer hotel rooms, visitor activity in June 2026
increased TOT by 28%.
And then just because we were interested,
we looked back several years,
and the TOT in June of 2026 was the highest
it had been since June of 2022,
which was by the way when another major sporting event
took place, the Warriors playoff run
and winning the NBA championship.
So a large part of this June 2026 surge
is attributable to the fact that the soccer ruse
in their entourage all stayed at the Claremont Hotel.
The hotel has a Berkeley address as discussed in CED,
but 100% of the TOT comes to Oakland
from the Claremont Hotel.
And data shared by Visit Oakland indicates
that occupancy in Oakland was up from about 67%
in June 2025 to 73.6% in June 2026.
And the average daily rate increased from $128
to $147 June over June.
I'll just note, also, that the 3% of Measure C to visit Oakland, the zoo, the museum,
chabot, fairs, and festivals, that was also increased proportionally during the month
of June.
So, to wrap up, today's public hearing is a requirement of Section 53083 of the California
Government Code, which requires that when granting an economic development subsidy in
an amount of $100,000 or more, the information must be shared in a public hearing.
other than receiving this report no action is required and with that I'll
take any questions councilmember Brown thank you thank you so much for the
update I know that in CD we had a very good conversation on this item and so I
will make a motion to close accept the item and close the public hearing
council council member five and then Gaia yes very robust conversation and
community economic development committee thank you for reiterating that the
majority of the property is located in Oakland and that's where the TOT tax
goes to as the city of Oakland coffers and I will second the motion well I
I think to the motioner and the seconder,
I think the sponsor wanted some action in that.
Sure, but I put my hand out,
but I don't care, by the way.
Happy to remove my second.
Turn your mic off.
Justin, one, two.
Thank you for the information.
You know, have you taken a look at Miami,
the city of Miami?
They're going through a similar experience
where they had a huge golf course property
but their soccer team is building the stadium,
26C stadium but they did an overall program
and this is what Oaklands always been lacking.
We talk, talk, talk, but it's supposed to give me a picture.
Right, not only are they creating a stadium
for their soccer team but they're also developing
the hotels, the motels, the eating sources,
they're even putting a private high school
to bring people there, not just once in a time,
but to have a regular attendance.
So I would advise you economically
to take a look at what the city of Miami is doing,
because they're going through a similar experience,
but they're doing it more business economically,
Generating more resident, more participation
from the community as well as from outsiders coming in.
And I think that Oakland was certainly,
could utilize that model and be able to develop
what we currently have and not get into these arguments.
No, we're gonna play at Jack London Square,
build a stadium there.
No, we did it at the other end.
No, we're working on the stadium and the arenas still,
doing a lot of talking about it.
But hey, there's a model that's taking place in Miami
that you ought to take a second look at it
because they've gone a lot further,
more productive, more inclusive,
and at the same time, they're building that community.
And I would be happy to join you with that.
I have the data and information on that,
but Miami is a good model for us to look at
in terms of future development for the Coliseum, the arena,
and certainly for professional sports.
Thank you.
I'm happy to join you on that trip too.
Councilmember Houston.
Through the chair, thank you.
When we had that conversation about it being
at the Claremont Hotel,
my concern is you heard my robust questioning
on the pursuit policy.
If that pursuit policy would have been done
that year and a half prior,
it would be in the condition that it is.
I'm getting to the Coliseum.
I mean, getting to the roots of president.
We would have more individuals staying in my district.
And that's why I was so intense with this question
and about this pursuit policy.
So they stay in Claremont.
Where did they play?
They played in D6 and seven.
Why weren't they staying in D6 and seven
where we can have that revenue?
Even though the revenue goes to Oakland,
it still helps the starving and businesses there
so I just wanted to make that comment because it was a thorough comment
through the committee about where the the tax revenue came from it was
Claremont in Oakland or wasn't it and I did my research and it is in Oakland
the parking lot is thank you thankful for those TOT dollars so there was a
motion in the second to accept the report and close the public hearing or
did you know okay there was a motion by Councilmember Brown seconded by
councilmember Ramachandran to close a public hearing and receive I'm sorry
there are speakers for this item yes there are missus I to Ola Bala Lindsay
Berens David Peters and Saldan Hauser sorry if I said that incorrectly thank
you council president council members and director Kanat and Lindsay Behrens I
I live in the Laurel and I'm the president
of Oakland Roots and Soul SC.
When FIFA chose the Bay Area as a site
for the 2026 World Cup, we set out to make sure
Oakland and the East Bay shared in the economic impact
and the community energy of the world's largest
sporting event.
We secured an official FIFA home base
and hosted Team Australia.
The soccerers lodged at the Claremont Hotel
and flew in and out of the Oakland Airport.
With our Oakland sports group partners,
We built the East Bay Soccer Trail,
which promoted World Cup-related events
at local businesses across all seven
Oakland City Council District.
We hosted 21 watch parties for more than 15,000 fans,
all free.
We supported eight tournaments and clinics
that brought out local players.
We launched Australia a la carte,
an initiative that created Australian-inspired menu items
through partnerships with seven East Bay restaurants
and businesses.
We filled hotel rooms, restaurants, bars,
helping Oakland small businesses
and generating tax revenue for Oakland.
We also launched a Shepherd Ferry ground mural
at the Rainbow Rec Center,
the first ground mural by this famous artist in Oakland.
We are very grateful for the city of Oakland
and its partnership in facilitating our home base
and World Cup efforts.
We're proud of the economic impact
and the community building we accomplished
And we're going to come up with
a little bit more information
on this in connection with this
year's event and we can. Good
afternoon members of the city
council so some one house or
Jacqueline an improvement
district we are one of the
districts and organizations
that are a happy anecdote of
some of the- economic impact
that was illustrated by
director Ashley cannot and-
mentioned by a council member
guy oh and- Lindsay as as well-
is, in part, to unlock the economic development potential
and the social and cultural development potential
of bringing people to our waterfront.
The Roots collaboration was creative and meaningful
because we seized the opportunity of the World Cup
and it was extended far beyond the event.
From a multiple-day arts activation, Kultura FC,
which flexed the collaborations of dozens of artists
from Oakland and abroad, a community watch party,
it's already Sakaru Aussie-inspired tastings invented at Reims, California, Arab Street
food, original patterns, flight of beers. We also partnered with the Roots and Oakland
muralist Kalani, along with many hands from our community, to fill an entire intersection
with a Roots-inspired mural. And that's quickly becoming the epicenter of so many of our community
festivals and events. I invite you all to come down and see it.
And this obviously has tremendous potential to unlock as the council member discussed.
We look forward to an even greater presence and partnership with this movement, the Oakland
Roots and welcoming more people to find joy and connection at our waterfront.
Thank you so much.
David Peters, are you in the chambers?
Moving to our Zoom speaker, Ms. Asada Olabala, please unmute yourself and begin your comments.
Thank you, Madam Chair.
This item represents why it's important to vote no on Measure EE.
It's absolutely necessary that you have the opportunity as members of this city to have
transparency and accountability in an open forum.
I sit in meetings, I know what happened when this came up for the city to provide funding
for the remodeling of the roots facility.
You had an agreement with the city of Alameda, the city of Berkeley, all three cities to
contribute $300,000 to that remodeling project.
Alameda gave $300,000 approved by their council, Berkeley, nothing, zero,
and you gave $700,000 towards the remodeling.
Why did you do that?
Why did we overpay as a commitment for this project?
What we got back is not worth how you did not take care of the best interest of the city,
and obligations for all three cities to equally take responsibility for the contribution for
the remodeling project. I encourage the communities to stay on board and hold this council accountable
because they are participating in misleading the public on many items.
That was the last speaker unless David Peters is in chambers or on Zoom. I do not see him on Zoom.
Yeah, Councilmember Guy.
You know, I just have one more point on Miami.
They're even rebuilding their city hall.
They're leaving the old historic city hall,
but they're rebuilding their present city hall
to have more activity, more business related
in that whole development of that property,
that city-owned, but anyways, take a look at Miami's model.
It'll certainly give us a lot of ideas
how we can grow and generate revenue and support and community for the city of
Oakland. Thank you. Thank you. There is a motion by Council Member Brown
seconded by Council Member Ramachandran to close the public hearing and receive
and file this report. Council Member Brown? Aye. Council Member Fai? Aye. Council Member
Gallo? Aye. Council Member Houston? Aye. Council Member Ramachandran? Aye. Council
motion to move to Councilmember
Unger Councilmember Wong I and
chair Jenkins I motion passes
with a vote of eight I's going
to item 4.2 just need a motion
to open the public hearing.
So moved there was a motion by
councilmember Unger second by
councilmember Brown to open the
the motion is approved. I will.
Unevaded nuisance nuance sorry nuisances a real property after notice and opportunity to abate
And there are
Five speakers on this item. Thank you councilmember will five minutes of ice
Yes, that'll be more than enough
Please proceed
so we have a lot of laws in Oakland, but our laws are only as good as the enforcement behind them and
Enforcement only works if paying the price hurts more than simply folding it into the cost of doing business
So in Oakland, we set the maximum penalty for breaking our laws at a thousand dollars a day and we set it back in
1968 a lot of things have changed since 1968 and a thousand dollars
Doesn't buy what it used to so it's gotten to the point where
Some of our worst offenders in Oakland just continue with their bad behavior because they know they can afford it
That ends today with the legislation that our district one office is introducing
We are increasing the fines from a thousand dollars a day to ten thousand dollars a day and we're not doing this lightly
We are not talking about somebody who forgot to cut the grass last weekend or somebody who didn't bring their garbage cans in for an extra
Day, we are talking about the property owner who lets a building rot for years with broken windows and collapsing walls
We're talking about the guy who decides to use our public sidewalk as a junkyard
the unpermitted construction project
that just keeps putting up unsafe structures,
noise pollution, garbage pollution,
people who disrespect clear stop work orders.
These are the people who get notice after notice
after notice from the city who know exactly
what they're supposed to be doing
and have decided that just paying the fine
is worth it to them.
We are not creating a system that is haphazard or unfair.
This legislation still allows people
to abate the problem in good faith.
It still has an escalating ladder of fines
before we get to 10 grand and it gives latitude
to the city administration to work with offenders
to get on the right side of the law.
Somebody asked me how much money
this will bring into the city.
I hope it brings in nothing.
The goal is to get people to comply with our laws.
This is not a moneymaker.
This is about making our city livable.
We have no tolerance and we should have no tolerance
for the offenders who thumb their noses
at those of us who work hard to be in compliance
and that's what we're going to
do with the mutual standards of
our community so it's not
nineteen sixty eight anymore.
I'm proud to introduce this
legislation and I urge its
support because we need to
enforce our laws for real.
Thank you.
Thank you what that would you
like to make a motion.
I would like to make a motion
to.
Adopt item four point two.
Thank you councilman Houston.
Through the chair I just want
to just to share a point of.
that before I was elected in this seat I've been fighting illegal dumping and
graffiti vandalism homelessness for 15, 20, 20 something years. Before I was
elected I was one of the signers on measure RR six years ago that actually
changed that 1968 law. So I just want to make it clear that that that that not
that I've had myself on the back.
I just want it to be known that I've been fighting
this blight for years, I mean, with Supervisor Nate Miley
when we created the asset,
Alameda County Legal Dumping Taskforce years back
to address illegal dumping now as a statewide.
This is not new, I just wanna make it clear,
this is not new, this is something that I've been working
and now this is moving up to ten thousand which is good what I want to do is I
support it and we need to deter this is not about creating all these fines we
want to put people me I want to put people in jail for doing this cuz it's
a crime against my community it's a crime for a legal dumping to be dumping
in my community and I have to deal with this so I wish it was 20,000 25,000
community and I have to deal with this so I wish it was 20,000 25,000 and that's
why in my budget in my budget I put in money with my colleagues that supported
councilmember Brown, councilmember Jenkins to train the EEOs to collect that
evidence so it can go to the district attorney's office because we all know
that the city attorney's office only can do fines if I do a fine if I get fined
And I dumped something worth $20,000 on the street, and I'm only gonna get a $700 fine or $5,000 fine.
What's gonna happen? The EEOs actually create, document the hazardous and contaminated materials,
so they can take that data. I'm gonna say it again. Take that data to the DA's office to
deter this problem. So fines are okay. It's okay. And like I said, six years ago,
go to measure RR with Dan Cobb.
This was something that we pushed before I was elected.
I looked it up.
I see you on there as a signature.
You had no.
Council member Wong.
Thank you council member Unger for your work on this.
Just to confirm, this is a law that basically sets the cap.
So if we wanted to increase penalties
on a specific type of violation,
still have to change those ordinances. This is just an overall cap or does this
accomplish that as well? This doesn't change any of the ordinances about what
we can enforce. It just changes the amount that we can enforce to. So
anything that is already under our code that was maxing out at $1,000 a day is
now maxing out at $10,000 a day. If we want to peel off specific
ordinances that would have to be a different piece of legislation.
Okay, and I guess my question is less around whether we enforce them, but like the amount
that is enforced for a specific violation, we'd still have to change those laws.
No, so anything that was previously maxing out at a thousand is now maxing out at 10,000.
Okay, okay, great, and this would be enforced through code enforcement?
Code enforcement.
Okay, great.
Great thank you for drafting this all second the motion. Thank you. All right
It will go to councilman mic. I'll see turns this mic on and then we will go to the public speakers after that
As he turns his mic on
There we go. Okay. So the question that I have is
It's not so much racing
The fees is we don't do a good job collecting the fees that we are doing now
from whether it's met the
The cannabis operations and all the other businesses including your illegal dumping who's gonna out of this who's gonna enforce it
Who's gonna enforce we have fines now. The problem is with illegal dumping. We don't go and
Enforce the rules that we have
So I can ask you for a million, but who's gonna go and collect a million
What department and who's gonna be actually?
Be on the street enforcing the rules and policies and fees that we need to be collecting
Code enforcement. Who's that the code enforcement department? Oh, yeah
But they're not collecting now the fees that should be and that's why Oakland's out of control when it comes to the dumping and all
The other activity that's happening in your district and West Oakland and certainly in my case
We're not enforcing the rules. So I think you know what I'd like to hear I can raise the fee
to find you but who is going to go and collect the fee? Code enforcement. So we
have code enforcement officers who impose fees. We all of us just got an
email a couple of days ago about a smoke shop that was shut down because of the
fees that we'd assessed. We don't have enough code enforcement officers. I would
like to add more in the next budget. I believe they're in a hiring process to
hire more but the fact is we are collecting fees. Not as much as I'd like
to, but this sort of enforcement is what deters bad behavior.
So I don't think that the argument that we don't have enough people to collect fees suggests
that we should keep our fees at a level that is 50 years out of date.
Yeah.
But I think you've got to include that.
And I think that's been the challenge here.
We're going through the union negotiations.
Oh, we're not collecting the fees.
We're not collecting the taxes, and we don't have money to take care of the street.
I'm out there every day cleaning it now report it and it's we need to enforce the rules that I have
I have a lot of respect me wanting to get 10 million from you is not going to scare you away from doing it
So I have a lot of respect for our code enforcement department
They are doing as much work as they can with an incredibly short staff
They have said that this will help them do their job and I believe in them as the professionals on the ground
All right councilmember Houston then we will go to the public speakers and now people are anxious to speak on this
So I do support it I do
But when we did it in
2020 it was five thousand now we raised it another five thousand. He didn't stop it then
So another five thousand I feel that it may deter some and I'm going to support it
I support you Councilmember Unger. I'm saying this
that those EEOs that we were supposed to put on,
that we put in the budget, we just hired them, right?
I'm not sure if this budget, what we're going through now
with the budget is just gonna cut them
and we're gonna lose those.
We need to collect that data.
We've been doing this way too long.
I'm third generation Oakland, I've been here all my life.
I've been fighting this for over 20 years
and it's gotten worse, worse, worse, worse.
Finds, finds, finds, not collecting the money.
don't want to do it now.
And you don't want to do it
fine fine fine okay we don't
have you to do what.
You report somebody that did it
so we're going to give you a
reward didn't work.
What I'm saying is this I'm
supporting it.
But this fine and the slap on
the hand is not working it has
not worked for decades I also
want to point out that let me
people in jail.
It is embarrassing, embarrassing.
When I go home on the one way in DP Stokely,
and my mother can't get in her driveway
because somebody dumped in her driveway.
And what they dumped in the driveway
is things that have blood on it, things
that look like it came from out of a nursing facility.
What is that called?
That's called, I think, contamination.
I think that's called hazardous in a book that I read once.
And then my cat walks through it,
and it comes in the house, and it cuddles with me,
and I got wet on me that I can't see.
Think about that.
Just think about this.
Let me say this.
And I get angry when it comes to this.
And that's why I went to Supervisor Nate Miley,
and I said, listen, this is a crime against my community,
against my people.
So I'm going to say this in closing.
I've been working with the DA's office.
I asked for some simple things in the budget.
Simple, support my seniors.
Give us the basic needs of the city.
I didn't go with those high level complicated things.
Hire me some EEOs so they can collect data,
so they can prosecute these fools,
and I'm gonna say these fools crimes against my community.
I support this, council member Unger,
but I'm gonna say this,
we gotta take this to a different level,
And I'm willing to work with you Councilmember Unger to move this with the DA so we can
prosecute these fools and I'm going to say it this commuting crimes against my community
because I'm tired of it that my babies and it's embarrassing.
That's it.
So councilmember I think you make an important point and this might be a legal question is
what are the legalities for building in automatic adjustments for inflation inflation and civil
penalties through the chair unless I think my colleague is online who worked
in this ordinance but I think we'll probably have to get back to you on that
that's fine maybe some cleanup language might be appropriate as councilmember
Houston oh good miss lane I see you with your hand up if you would like to
address the council please go ahead thank you yes this is Laura Lane from
Oakland City Attorney's office I just want to explain that the ordinance the
existing ordinance allows the city administrator to issue at or designee to
issue a schedule of fines within this maximum of ten thousand dollars so it's
it's not anticipated that every violation would result in a ten
thousand dollar penalty that's just the maximum that all our ordinances can be
enforced under. So this ordinance applies to all of the departments that enforce nuisance
conduct. So it might not necessarily be building code enforcement, but it could also be,
for example, a nuisance business that has been declared a public nuisance by EWD or
you know some other some other other departments that that regulate nuisances.
Thank you and uh to councilmember Rauger and councilmember Houston I think
that question is important as we can help out future councils if legal by building in automatic
adjustments for inflation to these policies so that or to these fines so that they're not done
every 50 years so we'll see what the lawyers say but let's go to the public speakers.
I just also wanted to point out that we do have the ability to lean properties when they
Accrue significant fines. This makes it easier to get to the lean process if we have higher fines
As I call your name
Please of course recording me in the order please state your name for the record before beginning
we are participating via zoom, please raise your hand so I can easily identify you as
Custom we will take the folks in chambers first and move to the zoom speakers immediately after
the board of directors. Mr side all of all of our Kim Lucas Matthew. Lifts and. Jesse rose more Kathy Leonard. Go ahead. Kathy Leonard from district one so this all be started with measure our our which the golden gate community association I'm the board chair. Began this process with Dan Cal because of a company in the golden gate district. That was.
building unpurmitted building building on their business without obtaining
permits
harassing neighbors oh my god I could just go on and on so I'll just tell you
what it's about the most glorious example in Oakland is the booming
multi-million dollar Suprema meets distribution company which is subjected
the Golden Gate community to extreme noise heavy truck traffic road
And they'll keep in mind that
they've been making remote
obstructions and harassment for
the past 13 years.
While appealing every violation
notice and public nuisance
declaration.
In turn this attracts additional
bad actors to Oakland who are
willing to make similar
portions at the expense of their
neighbor's health while and
safety while draining the city's
limited resources.
So right now this company owes
the city over a million dollars
in attorney's fees with the
things are going to be done in
some way so it's going to be
something that needs to be done.
I can't believe that I'm
agreeing with with the
council person Houston on this
we finally got a lean put
against this guy's business.
But we do need to do more in
terms of enforcement.
Thank you miss Leonard your time
is up.
Hi Jesse Rosemore I think
councilmember guy raised a
pretty fair point about the
I think it's really important
that we enforce in practice
and it makes me think of the sex trafficking legislation
that council member Wong brought forward in February.
I was at the public safety committee meeting
a month ago when the semi-annual report for this came up
and we came to find out that this legislation
brought in zero dollars for the city
to be enforced further had never gotten enforced.
And we saw victims of sex trafficking
come to that committee meeting and say,
if you're gonna bring these laws forward,
you have to enforce them because everyone knows
that these aren't being enforced.
Of course, we see a very different rhetoric
from the council member when she talks
about this legislation and what has in fact
been happening in practice.
So I don't know what the future of this legislation
is gonna be in particular and how it's gonna be
be put into practice but seen what's happened with the sex trafficking legislation and how
we have council members that talk a lot about you know it's like it's like they talk about
what they want things to do instead of what they actually do and that cognitive dissonance
is is really impressive if it weren't so harmful thank you.
Thank you Mr. Rosemore moving to the zone speakers starting with Matthew Lisbon please
unmute yourself and begin your comments. I'm sorry to listen. Yes, I live next to a property owned by
Sue Prema who as previously mentioned has been just a continuous troublemaker acting with impunity
in the neighborhood no matter what we try. They're operating at all hours of the day just ignoring
all the rules, all the regulations. I strongly urge you to pass this proposal to help neighbors
like me all throughout Oakland who have to kind of suffer bad actors that are willing to
take the current fines that's just a cost of business. You need to make it prohibitive for them
in order to not just be able to eat that cost and continue indefinitely. Thank you. I see the rest of
my time. Thank you for your comments. Moving to Miss Ola Bala. Please unmute yourself and begin
your comments. Yes it's very unfortunate that uh not only in Oakland but throughout this nation
we have a culture of disrespect and so when I'm driving in Oakland the speeding the going through
red lights the illegal turns um the number of houses that are built without getting permits
and go on and on how people are not following rules or procedures that are mandated for the
best interests of the city. People just don't care. And that's across the board with many,
many spectrums where we have rules. And I can tell you this, you're going to be back at the table
to come up with ways because this is not going to be a deterrent. It's a culture
where people are not paying the fines, you have to go after them to make them pay the fines,
and it's that culture. And I've seen cultures that do care. And I go back to Japan,
where cleanliness, respect for property, respect for other people's well-being is in place.
We don't have it in place here. And it's gotten worse and worse. I don't know what's happening.
Maybe it's the Trump syndrome being passed down, I don't know.
It's even in the White House, it's across this nation and it didn't used to be,
I'm 81, it didn't used, years old, it didn't used to be this way.
Thank you Ms. Ollabala for your comments. Moving to the last speaker, Kim Lucas.
Please unmute yourself and begin your comments. Hi, can you hear me?
Yes. Okay, yeah, I totally support this ordinance. I've lived across the street
from suprema meets since 2013 when they massively expanded their warehousing and distribution
business. They doubled their warehouse freezer, built an open air loading dock right next to our
homes all without permits. To this day they continue to profit illegally out of these
unpermitted facilities. They've lost all their appeals. They've even expanded to a second
warehouse and a parking lot where they're now operating right next to homes at 3 a.m.
The noise is really extreme. There's dangerous obstruction of the public right of way with
trucks and forklifts six days a week starting at 3 in the morning. Honestly, it's ruined my health,
it's made my home completely unlivable and I feel really trapped here and I'm not alone in this.
There's been dozens of notices of violation. They've had every chance, every compliance plan,
and the nuisance just keeps growing as the business expands. It gets worse and worse.
They've sued the city at least five or six times. They've lost every time. The city is finally,
thankfully, suing Supremea. They've been violating the preliminary injunction that the court ordered
every single day, all day long. All three properties they're operating out of have been declared a
public nuisance thank you miss Lucas for your comments that was the last
speaker think we have a motion and a second in a comment from councilmember
Houston I'm through the chair I want to say thank you miss Leonard for
remembering that measure our are the Dan Cobb brought forward in 2020 that was
signed by myself no I'm councilmember Noel Gallo and Margaret Gordon and I
always say that fines aren't enough I wanted to find out through the chair
to the city attorney is it any way we can add standard operation procedures to this that locks into my budget priorities which were
Hiring the eeos training the eeos to be hazmat and contaminated training. How can we lock that in there? Because these fines are not enough
Through the chair to councilmember Houston if I understand your proposal that is not within the scope of how this item is noticed today, which is
specifically to amend Oakland Municipal Code chapter 1.08 to increase the
Civil penalties
So that would have to come back as a separate item and we can we can work with you on that
Okay, I just want to make sure that's okay with council member
Hunger well, this is his I just want to support him whatever he's doing
Yes, so this that that's that we cannot make that change to this ordinance tonight as noticed
And is there a way for this to
come up.
Okay so through the chair can I
work with the council member
hunger to to to beat this up
because like always say fines
are not enough.
And in my budget.
Is it may be small but it's huge
because it deters the problem
when you know that you're going
to get prosecuted instead of
fine.
Yeah I think adding enforcement
officers would be part of the
budget process and I support
motion to approve motion to
approve motion to approve motion
to approve motion there was a
motion by councilmember Unger
second by councilmember Wong to
close the public hearing and
approve this item for
introduction.
Councilmember Brown.
Councilmember five.
Councilmember Gallo.
Councilmember Houston.
Houston.
Councilmember Ramachandran.
Councilmember Unger.
Councilmember Wong.
Aye.
And chair Jenkins.
Aye.
Going to item 5.1. That was your last public hearing
Adopt the resolution affirming the mayor's appointment of Peter Smith to the city Planning Commission and you have four speakers on this item
Good afternoon council
Pressing Kilgore here W. Chief of Staff to Mayor Barbara Lee
The mayor would like to appoint Peter Smith serve on the Oakland Planning Commission later
You will also be voting on David Newton for the Planning Commission as well
As I mentioned at the Rules Committee last week Peter has a long history of service to the city
Including previously serving as a member and chair of the Planning Commission and as chair of the general plan Congress
Peter brings more than 35 years of legal experience including extensive work and land use
He has also served as a legislative serves as legislative council of California legislature and is currently a mediator and arbitrator
His prior experience in the Planning Commission where he served to one-year terms as chair
We believe gives them a deep understanding of the Commission's work and the land use issues facing Oakland
And I understand there were some questions questions the rules committee meeting
So I know that Peter is here to answer any questions that you have them. Thank you for consideration
Thank you. Can we get Peter?
two minutes
In person
Thank You president Jenkins members of the council. I'm really here to answer questions
I'd be delighted to give given the opportunity to serve on the Commission again
I do think the challenges today are very different than what we faced the 90s back then we had a significant regulatory reform
That was long overdue. We did that today
There are challenges such as what mr. Guy was referring to in terms of attracting
Economic development. I think we have a challenge in working with the port on many different planning issues
And and a lot of other things that I think will come up
And and councilmember five first asked me a question about one and displacement displaced housing regulations
I think we can have a say in that. I don't know if we have primary jurisdiction
Thank you
councilmember five
Tell you Michael. I didn't hear any of that. I think we need the microphone closer
Can you state just 30 seconds a little out? I
Yes, I took to note councilmember five's question at the Rules Committee
about displacement in housing.
I think that's an issue that the Planning Commission can have a role in the discussion,
even though it's not our primary jurisdiction, and I would welcome that discussion.
Thank you. Any questions?
I'll turn to you, Michael.
I'll second that.
Councilmember Houston.
Through the Chair, on planning, the processes of planning,
I put a committee together when I first became council.
brought in Gilcrest and Mr Gilcrest and everyone what's your thoughts about
it's always problems about planning is slow I'm working with someone in
councilmember Fife's district right now that I know for years that just some
stuccos and some windows he's having all these problems how do we streamline
because building we got places people want to stay people want to live people
like this gentleman I'm just mentioned,
he lost two loans because of the planning process.
What's your thoughts on streamlining planning?
It would certainly, California in general
and Oakland in specific have suffered
from over-regulation of many parts of the planning process.
I also think that a lot of well-intentioned laws
have become procedural traps
so that roadblocks go up that were not intended
to have been placed there.
I can think of several.
But certainly at the commission level,
we can streamline that effectively.
However, there is a significant administrative component
where the planning and zoning staff is preparing things
like an environmental impact report or a staff report.
We don't have as much say on that.
they control how that information comes to us,
we can act as an advocate to ask them to streamline it
and bring matters to us quicker.
Okay, and through the Chair, Les,
I created this called the Development Advisory Group
through the City Administrator's Office.
Look that up, because they're trying to streamline that,
so I'd like you to be involved with that.
Well, I appreciate that, and I'd very much like to.
I think it's important to also recognize
that there's a planning and zoning function,
which is the regulatory side,
and then there's a planning function
which is looking into the future
and seeing what we can do and need to do
to make sure the city grows and prospers.
Those are two distinctly different ones.
The second prong will be part of the general plan update,
which will come next spring.
I've read the draft, and it's a good start,
but I think there'll be a lot of robust discussions
over the next six months about things
like economic development across the city of Oakland,
whether it's your district or others.
Thank you.
I'd like you to work with Newley planning commissioner,
David Newton.
I want you guys to work close.
We've met.
Not yet.
Still gotta get the votes.
In my mind.
All right, thank you.
Let's go to public.
Oh, Council Member Wong.
I'd really like your answer to that.
I just ask that you be a fierce advocate
for more housing on the planning commission
because we truly need a lot more,
especially with AI coming to San Francisco and the prices of rent drastically going up.
Critical need and it's a very complicated regulatory structure.
I think we could do a lot to simplify that, a lot of the complications coming from the state.
But I do think we could do more.
Things like inclusionary zoning, zoning bonuses are something that not only will create hopefully more housing, but also more affordable housing.
Okay we're going to go to.
We're going to write thank you.
Thank you for that let's get to
the public on this.
As I call your name please
approach the podium in any
order please state your name for
the record before beginning.
You're on zoom please raise your
hand if you still wish to speak.
Jesse rose more miss us out of
all the ball of.
David Peters and Mr Hazard.
Hi Jesse rose more- I'm pretty
the state of the state of the-
You decide to say that they haven't done their research.
Have you perhaps done a Wikipedia search
on who Harvey Dillon is?
And on the ties of Peter Smith to Harvey Dillon?
And Councilmember Wong, we see that Halloween
has come a little bit early this year.
And your costume this year is progressive.
And maybe you'll want to lean into that costume a little bit
and reject an appointment to someone
who has such obvious connections to the far alt-right,
to MAGA to Trump. I mean we saw what this candidate said in rules I think he's
trying to correct his position a little bit now but there really needs to be more
robust talk about what we're doing with this appointment. I love Oakland and I
don't want to see our council do something that so undermines our city
with an appointment like this thank you thank you mr. hazard yeah I meant to
sign up for 4.1 on that transfer tax I think mr. Houston said the Claremont
Hotel is in Oakland no it's in Berkeley 41 Tunnel Road okay so along with what
But Ms. Solobale said, why would we pay subsidized $700,000?
We got a low vacancy rate in Oakland,
and you put somebody in the Claremont Hotel.
That doesn't make sense.
And we didn't get a return on that investment.
$700,000.
And you voted for it retroactively?
Hotel in Berkeley 947, 94507 something like that's the the address. So those of
you who think the Claremont Hotel is in Oakland you are sorely mistaken and I
like mr. Smith I've known of him for quite a number of years so that's a good
choice and what you did on the police commission it's unconscionable because
that should have been voted down should have been voted down thank you mr.
hazard your time is up moving to the zoom speaker miss Asada please unmute
yourself and begin your comment agree it's important to have people that can
do anything about gentrification or displacement of foundational Black people to ask them to do it.
But you can't ask anybody to do something the city is not doing itself. So you are not doing
anything related to gentrification that impacts foundational Black people in this city. You are
not doing anything related to the high displacement of Black people, foundational Black people in this
this city. It's just another reason why I'm voting from no on measure EE. We already have
the mayor making substantial recommendations to commissions in this city, and some of those
recommendations have failed miserably. It was so insulting for Jean Kwan to identify
that she wants to serve on the police commission because the mayor asked it to do. What about
her conviction to do the work.
And I think that's why a lot of these commissioners,
particularly that selection,
police selection committee panel,
with their agenda, they were put there
not to allow Mr. Farmer to have a chance to be on there.
So with her having more ability to make more appointments
to staffing jobs, department heads is ridiculous
in my way of thinking,
because I can't see this commission appointments
working well.
I believe that was the last speaker unless David Peters
is in the room or on Zoom.
Colleagues, there's a motion already?
Oh, Council Member Houston.
Thank you through the chair.
I made a misquote last time when I looked up
to Claremont Hotel, I did say that it is in Berkeley.
However, I did thorough, thorough research
in part of the parking lot is in Oakland
the city of. The city of the
Council member five
Council member Gail aye council member Houston aye council member Ramachandran
council member under
Council member Wong. I and chair Jenkins
Just waiting to tell
But I motion passes with a vote of seven eyes one excuse five
Going to item five point three
Receive an information report from the city auditor on the audit
Recommendation, I'm sorry the audit of capital improvement program financial management and implementing
Comprehension excuse me comprehensive systems
Policies and practices to enhance oversight of capital project delivery
There are two speakers on this item
Please proceed
All right. Good evening. Michael C. Houston, the city auditor.
I'm here to present on the capital improvement program financial management audit that we
conducted in August 2026. This was presented this audit at the public works and transportation
committee last Tuesday. And this presentation is going to be very similar, a hair shorter.
I recognize the city auditor, Stephanie Noble-Wilson and Marisa Lynn and senior performance auditor,
Jaylin Huang, who actually conducted the audit and is here with me this evening.
So the audit objective, we initiated the audit at the request of the Department of Transportation
Director back in 2024 or 2025.
The audit objective was to evaluate the financial management of the city's capital improvement
projects. The audit covers July 1st, 2022 through June 30th, 2025. So that's fiscal
years 2023, 24 and 25. So pages 10 to 23 of the audit report contains background. The
capital improvement program guides the city's strategic decisions informing the construction,
repair and replacement of capital projects, which are long-term investments in assets
like roads, parks, and other city infrastructure
that have a useful design life of at least 10 years.
The city relies on contractors to deliver capital projects.
All contractors can bid for open bid contracts,
while only pre-qualified contractors
can bid for on-call contracts.
Public Works and DLT are responsible
for managing the Capital Improvement Program.
Public Works oversees capital projects for public assets,
including buildings and structures,
parks and open spaces, sanitary sewers,
wastewater systems, and storm trains.
DLT manages transportation and street-related projects
like roads and sidewalks.
Prior to fiscal year 26,
the Construction Management Division
resided within Public Works
and was responsible for construction execution
for both Public Works and DLT capital projects.
And when a DLT project advanced to the construction phase,
responsibility for the contract transitioned to Public Works.
The Capital Contracts Division within Public Works administers contracts for both departments.
It is also responsible for assisting project managers in developing RFPs, bids, and bids
that follow state and city guidelines.
The Fiscal Services teams within both departments of Public Works and DLT review capital projects
payments submitted by resident engineers.
The Construction Management Division, Capital Contracts Division, and Fiscal Services teams
collaborate with project managers to deliver capital projects.
And so capital projects have five phases which are introduced on pages 19 and 20 of the audit
report and detailed in appendix A on pages 68 through 73.
So those are the five phases of the capital project.
From fiscal year 23 through fiscal year 25, the city spent about $300 million on capital
projects.
are the largest funding source. Measure KK accounted for 153 million dollars.
The first of our four findings is that the city can adopt more comprehensive
systems policies and practices to improve consistency oversight and
segregation of duties for capital project management and finding one is
covered in pages 26 through 49. So we review the capital management manual
of which is the primary source of guidance
for managing capital projects.
We found the manual specifies different contingency
percentages than are used in practice.
Management fund staff seek city council approval
for change orders that exceed 25%
of the contract base value.
But the manual advises seeking city council approval
at much lower percentages for higher contract base values.
The manual currently requires that the city
prepare official documents authorizing changes
to original scopes of work, costs,
and or project timelines within two weeks
of when the cost and time impacts
of an order to proceed are determined.
As exhibit 13 on page 29 shows,
in practice, the process to issue change orders
takes much longer.
The projects were reviewed took an average of 79 days
and a median of 35 days to issuance.
The construction management manual
is supposed to be the primary source
of policies and procedures in managing capital projects,
but neither Public Works or DLT have adopted the manual.
We recommend that Public Works and DLT
adopt the Construction Management Manual
and regularly review it to ensure
its policies remain relevant.
We also found that the city does not have
comprehensive guidance on required approvals
for change orders and orders to proceed,
orders to proceed, authorized contractors to begin work.
the manual lacks a policy on review and approvals
for time adjustments and change orders
that reduce the contract amount,
usually due to reductions to the scope of work,
which are called negative balance change orders.
An approval policy can help to ensure
the scope reduction is legitimate,
the change is thoroughly documented,
and it will not negatively impact project completion.
An approval policy would also control against
inconsistent approval practices.
There is also no formal guidance on amending on-call task orders which authorize the start
of professional services.
The capital contracts division advised that amendments exceeding 25% of the original task
order should receive city administrator or city council approval based on the contract
amount.
But we found that this recommended practice was disseminated via email rather than formal
policy.
Three on-call task order amendments we sampled lacked specified approvals.
Two on-call task orders below $250,000 with amendments above the threshold did not receive
city administrator approval.
One task order above $250,000 with amendments exceeding the 25% threshold was approved by
the city administrator, but not by the city council.
We also found that the construction change orders for a paving project moved forward
without City Council approval despite increasing the original work order amount by over 25%.
And we attribute all these inconsistencies to a lack of specific formal guidance on when
to obtain City Council approval.
So we also noted that the manual does not have clear approval requirements for orders
to proceed.
For work orders above $10,000 and less than $25,000, the manual does not specify the approval
authority and appears to have contradictory information on the authority of the supervising
civil engineer.
The manual does not provide guidance for issuing orders to proceed on their on-call contract.
This could lead to inconsistent practices and costs overruns.
So Public Works and DLT should create formal policies to define approval and review requirements
for time adjustments, negative balance change orders,
and change orders for on-call contracts.
From fiscal years 23 through 25,
the city spent $105 million or 41%
of its total contracted capital project
spending on on-call contracts.
We noted that the city has no centralized
or general guidance on when to use on-call contracts
or how to structure them.
And we noted that no existing policies or procedures
to find the allowable duration for on-call extensions.
So shown in Exhibit 17, here on page 39 of the audit report,
the city's on-call contracts were extended
an average of two years,
but the longest extension being four years.
There are also lack of guidance on issuing
and approving on-call task orders,
which could increase costs to the city
by reducing competition.
So we made two recommendations.
We recommended that the city administrator establish
a policy on when the city should use on-call contracts
and on-call task orders.
And we recommend Public Works and DLT
establish guidelines for determining
when to extend existing on-call contracts or initiate new ones.
Staff are not consistently following policies in a manual.
We observed multiple instances of staff's inconsistency
in following a manual.
Over half, or 34 out of 65, of sampled orders to proceed
were not issued in line with requirements.
11 out of 42 sampled on-call construction-related
change orders lacked contract change order memos
to describe proposed modifications to the work.
A change order of over $50,000 was not signed
by the assistant director and design manager.
10 out of 25 review task orders lacked
the required approvals, including authorization
from the capital contracts division,
assistant director, and the department director.
and in one instance staff issued a task order
to extend the contract's existing work
rather than issuing an amendment.
So we recommended that Public Works and DLT
generate regular reports to allow management
to monitor change orders,
and Public Works and DLT should train staff on policies
in the construction management manual
and monitor staff compliance with the policies.
Sorry to interrupt you,
I don't know if you see any of about five minutes left.
Okay.
So vacancy rates have been persistently high since 23, as shown in exhibit 19 on page 44.
Approximately half the construction management division,
civil engineer positions, remain vacant over the past three fiscal years and in fiscal year 25.
The Capital Contracts Division had over seven vacancies out of 14.6 FTE in that fiscal year.
The fiscal services teams in the public works and transportation departments have also experienced
high vacancies, as shown in exhibit 20 on page 45 on the screen.
Vacancies led to staff taking on multiple roles.
Taking multiple roles may result in reduced review of project decisions, over-reliance
on certain staff members, and introduce potential conflicts of interest.
Additionally, staffing shortages have caused delays in projects, especially D.O.T., where
high vacancy rates have slowed paving and street repair work.
So we recommend that both departments implement a comprehensive segregation of duties policy
that includes independent oversight, minimum approval signatory requirements, and designated
alternate approvers for staff serving and acting roles.
Departments should also configure the AP portal to prevent individual staff members from holding multiple roles and payment processes
Does city does have that eight the AP the capital
City does not have a centralized project management system for capital projects and you have to hobble together all these different
Systems or we have to refer to different systems just to get an accounting of the capital projects
There are no complete records for capital projects and there's inconsistent construction
logs in financial data and the lack of a centralized system makes it challenging to
monitor projects and maintain oversight.
So we recommend that the city develop that system.
We also are defining that the city can streamline and improve management of its payment process
for capital projects and this finding is covered from pages 50 through 56.
We noted that it takes a considerable amount of time to pay the contractors in many instances
due to the fact that a lot of contractors are working outside of AP portal.
So we recommended that the city enforce working through AP portal and, if needed, provide
technical assistance to contractors.
I don't know how to continue if I only have two minutes but take we have said can I just
take my time please continue okay okay um so to deter so I did that yeah the third finding
is that the city can improve its oversight of bond funds and this finding spans pages
The city has not provided adequate oversight of measure KK and measure U bond funds, which
are the largest funding sources for the city's capital improvement program.
We identified instances in which the city processed bond payments without proper review,
including one transaction that was incorrectly assigned to a bond fund and one transaction
that incorrectly charged a transportation project payment to a fund reserve only for
the city's sewer facilities. We also noted that the city has not conducted
annual required audits of the use of these funds and the city administration
has reported that it will start audits from fiscal years 25 through 27.
The Finance Department's Treasury Bureau and the Public Works and TLT fiscal
services teams in coordination with IT should enhance the AP portal to flag
potential errors and misspending. And the last finding, which covers two pages 60,
well three pages 60 through 62, is that short-term planning may affect the
effectiveness of capital project delivery. The City has open bidding on
projects that were not fully designed which has led to additional change
orders. Projects sometimes move to bidding before designs are complete,
largely due to bond and grant deadlines that require funds to be used within a
specific time frame. Of 92 change orders we reviewed, 5 could have been
avoided with more pre-construction planning. Gathering essential
information from other parties early in the planning process has been a
challenge in completing project designs. And while short-term planning can
and expedite project initiation, it can increase costs, extend timelines, obscure inadequate
preparation and cause additional change orders. Unlike jurisdictions that have adopted multi-year
capital plans, the city has not developed one since fiscal year 23. While the city has
some long-term planning efforts like the five-year paving plan and long-term sewer plans, it
lacks a comprehensive long-term capital plan,
and this limits effective planning and budget allocation.
So we recommended a long-term planning effort
in line with best practices, like the GFOA.
The GFOA advises jurisdictions to report annually
on project status and activities
and to develop a long-term capital plan
spending five to 25 years.
And we also recommend that public works of DOT should provide regular reports to the city council on the progress of the city's capital improvement plan and active capital projects, at least annually.
So we take the city administration, in particular public works of DOT, and IT, and finance, for their sustained cooperation throughout the audit process.
their responses to each of the audit recommendations
and timelines for implementation are included
in the back of the audit report.
Thank you, Mr. Auditor, for that report.
Council Member Brown.
Excellent, thank you so much.
As always, thank you, Auditor Houston and the team.
I know that it takes a lot of work
to put together such a comprehensive audit.
And yeah, so I wanted to say thank you for that.
So all over 90 pages of the report.
Thank you so much.
And so as you mentioned, at the very end,
to the members of the public and also my colleagues,
at the very end, there's a table
where it outlines the timeline.
So over the next two years,
it looks like both Public Works and Oak Dot,
as well as at times, the administration will be working
on some of these key findings.
And so I feel like most of my questions
are potentially maybe directed to maybe to the administration
because for example, let's see, where did I see that?
Yeah, so in one of the recommendations
it actually states that November of 2026,
which is coming in soon,
it says the Public Works and Transportation Department
should establish guidelines for determining
when to extend existing on-call contracts
or initiate new ones.
And this would be an initiative,
I guess led by the administration.
And so just wanted to get an update on that
and its timeline.
And I guess also just for members of the public,
I imagine that so much of the content
and the work on this is,
public works and transportation
for some time was operating together.
And now we have kind of a leadership separation
where we have Director Garland as well as Director Rowan.
And so I'm also curious how,
with the report that's kind of joint,
what does implementation of these recommendations look like?
Thank you for the question.
So for the audit, we did have a team at Public Works
and Department of Transportation that were heavily engaged
and responsive to the recommendations
and did work with the auditor to put together
that public timeline.
That group does continue to work together.
I don't have a specific update at this time,
but I'm happy to follow up.
Yeah, because when I'm looking at, for example,
the response to recommendation number four
in the chart on page 91, it says what I stated,
but then it says C above,
where it says that the city administrator
should establish a policy when the city should use
on call contracts.
And so I'm just noticing like a date discrepancy
because it says November and then it says C above,
which is now January.
And so I guess I would just,
I am curious like if we actually,
and it says that that would be a written update.
So I am curious like where we are
in the process of that draft.
I'm happy to get back to you with that.
I always say real just real quick I want to remind everyone that we do follow up on the status of the audit recommendations twice per year. But and also I take over my shoulder as the public works director who was yeah I would be interested in hearing from director Garland.
Good evening. I'm Liam Garland Oakland Public Works director. I think the November 2026 date there that is a little overly ambitious.
and that's really the January 2027 date
that is accurate for both of those items.
That's an error on my part.
Okay, thank you, thanks.
Councilman Wong, then I'm gonna go to the public speakers.
Thank you, excellent work as always.
I found particularly alarming your section
on the use of on-call task orders
and the fact that we've allowed, I think,
the amount at the largest of 8.4 million
compared to San Jose's sort of limit of 730,000.
So I think that was an excellent finding.
One thing I have a question is you've highlighted
this tension between, I think the,
you said that our policies around the use
of small local businesses are stricter,
and so that sort of decreases some of the competition
inadvertently, I think, or it can increase the cost.
And at the same time, we're hearing over and over again
from like the disparity study that we're not actually
contracting with many of our small and local businesses.
You seem to allude to the fact that
a qualifications-based procurement process
would help thread that needle.
Can you explain that?
I couldn't quite follow that in the report.
Yeah, thank you for the question, Council Member.
Yeah, we didn't, so the reason why we even brought
up the small and local business,
and the small business program was because
that was identified as a potential driver of costs,
in that it extends timelines and limits competition
because there's limited number, it limits the number,
theoretically limits the number of eligible contractors.
But we did not test that.
What we say in Appendix B is even when we have this program,
they're still having this program has not
made or expanded the number of contractors
who have received city business.
But that could be attributable to all kinds of things,
including waivers to it.
So we didn't really assess the effectiveness of the program,
but when we heard that this was a potential driver of costs,
that's why we looked at the terms.
So we did, but we did, to your point,
we do have a table here where we outlined the requirements,
and Oakland's are stricter than other cities.
Procurement, how does that differ
than what we do now, which I assume
It is lowest, lowest response, like lowest cost response.
You talk about that in the report.
Oh, the responsive.
Yeah.
Right.
I'm sorry.
Sorry, can you explain the qualifications-based
procurement process?
You discussed this in your report as something to look at.
I'm gonna have to remind myself, so I'll come back to you.
Okay, no problem.
I just have to look through the fine print
in the back of this appendix.
No problem, okay, thank you.
All right, let's go to the public speakers.
As I call your name, please approach the podium
in any order, please state your name for the record.
Two speakers, Jesse Rosemore and Mrs. Asada Olabala.
Hi, Jesse Rosemore.
For the love of my city and the city workers
that have been negotiating for a contract since March,
well, these negotiations are stalled
and they've been pointing out over and over and over
in the city and so forth.
That one in five positions in
our city are vacant.
It's difficult to watch the city
council sort of wax poetic about
the auditor's recommendations
when he's pointing out so
blatantly that these vacancies
are leading to all of these
findings and like what what and
this damage to our city and the
city services that we're that we
need to be providing.
It is the neglect of city services, it's the defunding of everything else of the things
that we really need for our city.
And I'd like to see some like real thought taken to that.
Our city workers are about to go on strike.
Is that going to make these situations that our city auditor is pointing out better or
worse?
They don't want to go on strike, but they're going on strike because our city administration
and our city council is not doing what they need,
what they've been asking for over and over and over again.
Council member Brown said that the OPOA contract
was negotiated in closed session.
Why has there been no public discussion
about something that bankrupts our future
and leads to more and more findings like this
from our city auditor?
It's insane.
Moving to our Zoom speaker, Ms. Asada,
please unmute yourself and begin your comments.
Yeah, one of the things that really stood out in this audit report was that the city has not provided adequately the oversight of measure KK and measure you bond funds.
The city has not yet conducted annual requirements of audit of use of those funds.
And because you haven't done audit,
we've had things happen like measure you funds being used
for the Lincoln Rec Center,
which the friends of the Lincoln Rec Center said
they were gonna fund it.
And the Hoover Durant community has been waiting
over 20 years for the remodeling
or the building of the library.
And you put this project in front of them.
And so no adequate opportunity to say measure you funds were
misused or unfairly used.
You also have two incidents in which the city proceeds process bond
payment without proper precision.
That's serious.
The city has not developed a long-term capital plan in recent years.
It also has concerns about staffing vacancies, concern about overpayment.
change orders a whole lot of things that we are having to deal with but Hoover
Durant deserves a library over the library over the thank you miss all
about that was the last speaker okay auditor then council member I'm
trying to then myself and then we'll take a vote on it to to revisit the
question that council member one asked so we noted in the audit report and the
very end, appendix B, one approach to minimizing costs for contracting capital projects is
using qualifications based selection. And so that approach involves firms competing
for contracts based on their experience of technical expertise rather than simply offering
to the lowest bid. So that's what you were. And then we cited the American Council of
Engineering companies endorsing that approach.
Thank you for your work on this. The three things that I'm especially concerned about
is the overspending without going back to counsel for approval, the change orders of
over $50,000 that doesn't get signed off by respective managers, and overpayments and
late payments and some of this is a little hard to fully understand the nuances of, but
I really hope that we can agree to, well that public works, I look forward to seeing the
changes to the manual that they put forward.
I guess my question is what happens in a situation where let's say the manual is changed and
overspending without coming back to council happens again.
was that project which I saw was in my district where it was $300,000 plus dollars overspend
where and you know we don't know the contractor we don't know which council when approved
it what happens if if it happens again like what's the consequence for it.
The consequence I might take a little time to answer that question but there are a few
recommendations to address what your, many of these recommendations are
intended to address those kinds of overages. Number one is just having
policies and procedures, prescriptive guidance, so that these things can be
consistent and accurate and in alignment with our rules, right? But then there's
having a system where these projects can be reviewed centrally so that it's easy
to refer to. We also call for the last recommendation is to bring the
project, bring capital projects to this body, right? And ideally they would be
brought to the City Council in a format where that would be seen. I don't know
what the consequence would be? Let me rephrase that, was there any consequence
for these other projects or do we not have, because we are not a council that
has any direction over departments. And so what happened like what happened in
these instances you saw of overspending by more than 30% in that one case by 200
something percent-plus, was there any consequence?
And is there something built into our legislation,
or is that a legislative thing that this body can maybe
have jurisdiction to take up?
I can answer the second part more comfortably, which is,
yeah, I think that it could, consequences, or I guess,
struggling to find a synonym for that,
but could be incorporated in policies and procedures
and legislation.
There were a lot of examples of exceptions,
as we call them, in auditor parlance in this audit report.
So I can't remember offhand what happened
in each of these cases.
But largely, there weren't necessarily
the kinds of consequences I think that you're describing.
Got it.
Thank you.
And if your team wouldn't mind sending a copy
of that PowerPoint, I thought that laid it out.
Well, is that PowerPoint?
Okay, yes, sorry, it was not in there.
Thank you.
Thank you, and so this question might be appropriate
for Director Garland, and as we are wrapping up
what's left of Measure U, and hopefully I'm here in 2028,
physically and mentally, but if so, I wanted to look at
I want to look at running a bond so that we can improve city infrastructures, specifically
senior centers, parks.
We have a horse park equestrian center in district six and we want to ensure that the
kids are able to go up there and enjoy a quality facilities and so as we're looking to upgrade
our facilities as a city, I want to know how much money is left and measure you, how much
money is left and measure KK as well.
President I don't have the numbers on the top of my head but if you look at
the categories within the measure there's one on parks and that is pretty
well subscribed meaning either they're already expenses that have hit those
parks projects or those expenses might be in the design phase and to complete
the project we need some of those future allocations from the bond measure on
And then the overall city wide
city facilities there's more
room in that portion of those
bond-funded projects.
So I want to explore that a
little.
Are we going to be able to spend
every penny of measure KK and
are we going to be able to
spend every penny of KK or
whatever?
Is that something that we're
going to be able to spend every
month on?
Is that something that we're
going to spend every month on?
of Measure KK and are we going to be able to spend every penny of Measure U before,
and hopefully I'm here in 2028, before asking the taxpayers to give us another bond potentially.
I'm going to see if our finance director agrees, but I think for KK we can say there's
a very good chance of that happening.
I suspect with especially some of the large facility projects that are getting funded
out of you, that those might be in construction, for example, as a potential new revenue measure
would be considered.
The council president, Brad Johnson, Director of Finance, it is highly likely that we will
have done most of the spending on our KFC funding by that point in time, by the time
the city of the park. And we'll
get to twenty twenty eight is
director Garland mentioned for
your vertical construction
projects. You will probably have
allocated the majority of those
categories but whether or not
we lost spent the money is a
question of the construction
phase- I would say that the
parks projects is director
Arlen mentioned are likely to
be completely- in the space
where we definitely need new
allocations- the two elements
that are not in public works
however are likely to be
completely spent- by that point
Funding sources and the affordable housing funding sources will be completely utilized by the time we get to the 2028 cycle
so those two other spaces that are non the non public works elements in addition to the public works parks elements are
Likely to be completely wiped out by 2028 and then last question. I'm gonna get to councilmember five
Do all of the projects have the requisite amount of funding to complete them
No, you probably have projects that are in design
Constructions phases that have been approved that are not complete for full
Development some of sometimes that's intentional because those projects are seeking
Additional grant matching funds in order to get to approval and that's a part of the process that I know
For instance DOT aligns with when they go out for some of these bigger rebuilds. They're often looking for federal or state matching funds
So the project at initiation may not actually have the full amount of money to complete it
that can also be true for certain key facilities as well.
But as Director Garland mentioned,
there are a number of projects that are probably
in the initial design study phase
that will need additional funding to come in
to actually complete and deliver them.
Thank you.
Council Member Fyfe.
Yeah, just briefly.
I just wanna agree with you Council President Jenkins
on the horse park.
I get calls and emails from them all of the time
And it's a service that is intended to benefit Oakland youth,
particularly underserved youth in communities
that don't necessarily get access to, is it equestrianism?
Yeah.
But also, just the CIP list, which in my district,
Malanga Center is on, or as one of the public speakers
said, the Hoover Foster Library, which we are actually
So I think that there's a lot of
influence moving towards building up.
We still need additional funds,
but the City of Oakland did purchase that
community foods grocery store to convert it into a library.
There are just so many things.
Mosswood, Moss House, our C.I.P. List is literally a mess.
The deferred maintenance that we have on so many facilities in
the City of Oakland is a challenge.
I'm trying to have this conversation without seeming like I'm blaming any individual department or or staff but I'm challenged to see how we get. To addressing this long launch of the city. And I think that's what I'm trying to do. I'm trying to have this conversation without. I'm trying to have this conversation without seeming like I'm blaming any individual department or.
I don't know if that's a question for the city administrator there are a lot of changes
coming we don't know if measure EE is going to pass but who's going to hold making sure
that all of these recommendations are followed up on and that the council even knows to well
we know now because you've unearthed all of these these challenges but I think that's
what we know now because you've unearthed
all of these challenges.
But the recommendations that you've provided,
I don't see who's gonna make sure
that they're getting done.
And I just wanna say for the record
and for all the people watching and my colleagues,
we could stop passing laws today
and have enough work to do,
just following up on all of the recommendations
from audit findings, from past legislation that we've done.
And if we just stop passing laws and just worked on where are we with A, B, C and D,
we would have enough work for the rest of our careers because that's how much we need
to follow up on in the city of Oakland to make sure things are done and done properly.
How do we get this done?
Whose responsibility is this?
Who does it sit with inside of staff through the chair to our interim city administrator
and the city auditor?
I'm happy to start.
As Auditor Houston knows, and as he mentioned before,
he does a bi-annual follow-up report.
I am extremely focused as the interim city administrator
on ensuring that all departments are looking at that report
and implementing the recommendations.
My department heads know that as well.
I think we have seen some extremely focused responses
and good activity in that front,
and I intend to keep doing that,
and I'll defer over to Auditor Houston.
Yeah, thank you for plugging our semi-annual audit
recommendation follow-up process.
For our part, we will make sure you don't forget
about the audit recommendations.
As far as them being implemented,
that's a different matter.
We are experimenting with different ways to emphasize
or highlight certain outstanding audit recommendations
that either have a big monetary benefit
or seem particularly timely for whenever cycle we're in.
And this cycle, for instance, we debuted our dashboard
where you could sort the recommendations
by policy lever that's required for implementing them.
So is it something that requires meaning confer?
Is it something that requires a bunch of city,
like money or some kind of investment in the system?
We're trying to find ways to,
because there's over 300 outstanding audit recommendations.
So we're trying to find ways that people can,
particularly you as a council member,
find or get your arms around them.
Like there might be some that only require
some kind of indoor departmental coordination.
There might be some that just require a policy,
and then some require direct legislation, right?
So I think just getting to know the recommendations
of what's standing in a way of their implementation
is a good first step.
And then also just this body is,
we rely on the body for providing the oversight
and setting kind of the city's policy priorities.
You complete this?
Yeah.
Council Member Gatto?
Turn your mic on.
Thank you for the information
and certainly appreciate that.
But for me, it's pretty much what Council Member Five asked.
And to the city administration,
what is the timeline that we have
to be able to respond and get the work done?
At the end of the day, you're providing information
of things we're not doing, should be doing, and we agree.
But somebody has to get the work done.
And so to the administration and your cooperation,
when can you come back to the city council
to give us a response in terms of
when are we gonna deal with everything from facilities
to, we talk a lot about East Oakland here.
We talk every day about the problems we have
with illegal dumping and all the trash
and all the negativity, but we do a lot of talking.
And the problem's still there.
And I go back tomorrow morning at six in the morning
Well, I'm picking up what I picked up today
and the week before,
but we're not enforcing and adhering to employees
that we have to get the job done.
So, city administrator,
when are we gonna get a response
on what is being presented today?
Thank you for that, council member.
We do have our city response attached to this report.
We have our biannual report outs.
I encourage you to, and they do come before this body.
If you have any questions about those,
I encourage you to reach out to me,
but we are laser focused.
Thank you.
Thank you, and just as an example,
we brought up facilities.
We have a parking lot sitting behind City Hall.
It's been sitting there for years
that we used to utilize not only for residents,
but also council members, but it's still sitting there.
And I mean, that's an example of work
that we need to get done in city administrator.
I mean, you were here and I was here
when we used to utilize that parking lot
behind City Hall.
And it's still there and not being utilized.
So I mean, that's an example of work
that we need to get done.
And I just do a lot of talking and complaining.
But at the end of the day, it's up to us
as elected officials and employees,
that we need to get the job done.
But so I'm looking forward towards the timeline
and it's certainly available to work with you
in terms of what we need to do to get open and move forward.
Thank you for that information.
So Councilmember Gallo, I completely concur with you
the facility behind us, right, that where it was parking.
So hopefully I'm here in 2028.
And if I am, council needs to work towards
going to the public with the bond
with these facilities that are the public's facilities
so that we can better utilize them.
As council member Five said,
Malonga is a challenge.
I'd say a mess, but it's a challenge, right?
These are facilities that people live,
that use, live, or horrible landlords.
I shouldn't say that in public.
But we definitely need to upgrade our facilities.
And I know there are a number of facilities
that you probably would want to
upgrade so councilmember Houston
are you ready for motion.
Yes I'm ready for motion to move
it but I just wanted to share
something and I might get off
subject but I'm just saying
something that I heard each one
of my council members say.
Councilmember guy said that the
next day.
He has to go clean it up again.
District seven is changing I'm
running them up out of district
seven.
So I don't have to go back and
clean up trash because.
if I catch them it's gonna be a different level so so here's the other
thing I heard about councilmember five said something about these policies
right we have enough right and and we don't need any any longer and that's
exactly why I repealed the encampment abatement policy and revised it and
didn't have to create another one and I just heard about EE I heard my council
I'm going to talk about EE.
In the budget, it's pieces of EE that's not in the budget,
so where's that money going to come from?
But that's probably why EE is not going to pass.
Councilmember, let's please keep it to the audit report.
Specifically around.
OK, I told you I might get off the subject, so excuse me.
Thank you for that.
We've got a motion, and you're second.
OK, let's take the vote.
There was a motion to receive and file this report,
moved by Council Member Houston,
seconded by Council Member Gallo.
Council Member Brown.
Aye.
Council Member Fai.
Aye.
Council Member Gallo.
Aye.
Council Member Houston.
Aye.
Council Member Ramachandran.
Aye.
Council Member Wong.
I'm sorry, Council Member Unger.
Aye.
Council Member Wong.
Aye.
Council Member President Jenkins.
Aye.
Motion passes with a vote of eight ayes.
Now moving to the.
We took public comment. There was only two speakers for that item. Jesse
Rosemore and Miss Asada. Moving to the consent calendar. That is all of the
sixes. Item 6.1. Approval of the draft minutes from the meeting of September
15th. Item 6.2 a resolution renewing and continuing the city's local emergency
due to AIDS. Item 6.3 a resolution regarding a declaration regarding
medical cannabis health emergency. Item 6.4 resolution regarding a declaration
of a local emergency on homelessness. Item 6.5 is an ordinance for S8
ordinance amendments just reminder that we do need to continue those items to
the next meeting. Item 6.6 an ordinance an amendment to ordinance number
12187 again continuing that to November 10th. Also item 6.7 an ordinance
amending OMC chapter 8.28 to improve waste disposal also needing to be
continued to November 10th. Item 6.8 a resolution for 2026 international LGBTQ
plus leadership leaders conference reimbursement. Item 6.9 a resolution
declaring October 18th through 24 as United Hate United against Hate Week. Item
Item 6.10, a resolution recognizing Love Life Week, 2026.
Item 6.11, a resolution for resolution support of Prop 1.
Item 6.12, a resolution opposing Prop 43.
Item 6.13, information report for professional services contract authorized by the city auditor
during fiscal year 25 through 26.
Item 6.14, a resolution for OPD Bay Area
PL services contract.
Item 6.15, a resolution for fiscal year 26 through 27.
OPD traffic safety grant.
Item 6.16, a resolution acceptance
of FEMA assistance to firefighter grant.
Item 6.17, a resolution to accept HUD
community project funding grant for Brooklyn Basin.
6.18 a resolution for appointment to the City Planning Commission
Adam 6.19 a resolution for opd paul coverdale 2026 grant
Adam 6.20 a resolution for a settlement for city of Oakland versus Alameda
Hotels Oakland LLC. I'm 6.21 a resolution
Surrendered and a abandoned vessel exchange grant
I'm sorry this item also
Requires our urgency and urgency boat
I'm 6.22 a resolution for parking citation system agreement extension
item
Six point twenty three a resolution for East 12th Street bikeway construction contract award
item six point twenty four a resolution
amending resolution number nine one zero nine one
item six point twenty five a resolution
For M. Okay way streetscape improvement construction management support services
item six point twenty seven a resolution for EPA San Francisco Bay program grant
Adam six point twenty eight and ordinance for San Leandro Creek Trail Cooperative maintenance agreement and site
license agreement
item six point twenty nine includes multiple pieces of legislation
for Oakland redevelopment successor agency termination plan
Item six point thirty a resolution for affordable housing funding and measure you capital funding authorizations
Item six point thirty one in ordinance for affordable housing trust fund ordinance update
Item six point thirty two a resolution for OPD firearm
relinquish mint grant
and that concludes your consent calendar and before discussion if you could just
Have the urgency finding and take the urgency vote for item six point twenty one. I attend a motion for those urgency items
Tracy Jones police services manager for Oakland Police Department
For item six point twenty one. I have a title change to read as well
Resolution authorizing the city administrator to accept an appropriate the fiscal year 2026 27
Surrendered and an abandoned vessel exchange grant in the amount of 75 thousand dollars
For abandoned vessel abatement and related services. I apologize. I apologize first. We need the
Urgency statement and then we can move to the take a vote on that
certainly
for a few reasons. So this grant term begins October 1st. Also, Gavin Newsom declared a
state of emergency. And so our marine unit is trying to remove the vessels as quickly
as possible and this funding will assist them in doing so. And that it helps to be able
to remove the vessels as quickly as possible because it becomes more expensive once the
the motion. Thank you for your work on the second. On the urgency motion moved by councilmember
younger seconded by councilmember Wong councilmember Brown. Councilmember five. Councilmember
Gail. Councilmember Houston. Councilmember Wong. I'm sorry councilmember under. Councilmember
motion to approve the motion.
authorizing a ten percent in kind personnel match of $7,500, three
authorizing a general purpose fund central services operations contribution
for associated services of $12,180, and for waiving the city's
advertising competitive bidding requests for proposals qualifications for
entering into professional services agreement with specialized vendors who
who can provide abatement, removal, storage and disposal
of abandoned vessels on an as needed basis
when marine unit experts determine such services
are required based on the type of vessel.
Thank you.
That would actually be an amendment
rather than a title change.
I will pass it to the parliamentarian
for further clarification.
Yes, through the chair to the body.
For clarity, I believe you're making an amendment
to the resolution,
which is to strike out the reference to,
well basically to remove the request for a waiver
of the local, small, local business enterprise requirements
so that if the body agrees would be removed
from the title of the resolution
and also from the whereas, excuse me, the resolved clause.
Yes, there is.
So it'd be removing the resolved clause
The city council finds a determinants that pursuant to ordinance number one three eight two five
And based upon the reasons stated above and in the city administrators of gender report accompanying the resolution
It's the best interest of the city to waive the local small local business enterprise requirements for vendors
Such as those listed above but not limited to that list first off to confirm. I believe that's the proposed amendment
Okay, great, thank you
So we can so then that that is the amendment that we would vote on when we vote on the consent calendar
Colleagues, I'd like to hear public comment first
As I call your name please approach the podium in any order
Please state your name for the record so I can make sure you have the appropriate amount of time and just as the council rules
a procedure state there is no seating time on the consent calendar and
Folks and chambers will be taken first and immediately after
We will go to the zoom speakers David Peters. I have you with two items
This is how to all the ball. I have you with multiple items on consent for the maximum amount of time
Mr. Hazard, I have you with the maximum amount of time
John mimosa
Marks, I have you with the maximum amount of time
Jesse Rosemore I have you with the maximum amount of time
Simeo Remy, I have you with a maximum amount of time, Donald Lacey, Sharon Lacey, Lois Downing,
Kevin Smith, and Marx. Go ahead, Mr. Hazard.
For the record, go to cleanoakland.com. You know, they still haven't identified those five suspects
that were arrested on August 13 and 15 with regards to the Fentanyl 3.8 grams of seizure
plus manufacturing apparatus.
So what's going on there?
I gave you this copy here, A-177-630.
It's my draft.
This appeal concerns the fundamental question of law.
may respond and avoid answering the actual allegation
of properly planned petition for written mandates
simply by giving those allegations
a different legal character relation
and then invoke an unrelated statutory validation procedure
that does not govern the pleaded claim.
Petitioner Gene Hazard verified pleading
unless a specific government act
after the Oakland City Council approved Ordinance 13833
advancing Measure A of the April 15th special election transaction use tax, newly installed
City Attorney Ryan Richardson allegedly calls the language submitted to the Alameda County
voters to contain the term sales rather than the language approved by the City Council.
Whether issues presented, whether the superior court erred by sustaining Respondents to Merr
without leave to amend where practitioners verified pleading the lead set after the city
council approved ordinance 13833 and the language of measure A, the city attorney allegedly
caused materially different versions of the measure to be submitted to the register of
voters.
Thus, the question on appeal is not whether respondents have supplied a preferred characterization
of petition's allegations.
The question is whether the fact actually alleged is so true for the purpose of the
of birth, state a claim for relief, where the pleading
states the cause of action under any legal theory.
We will be in the appeals court once my paralegal finishes
this draft.
It's real clear.
So you better be prepared to have a contingency
plan for the budget, because you have illegally
collected $30 million annually.
That's what this is all about.
So your city attorney put you in a pickle
by inserting sales in that Measure A in 2025.
That's what's on the table.
You can stick your head in the sand, Mr. Unger,
because you will talk about a sales tax
on January 9, 2025.
Thank you, Mr. Hazzard.
Your time is up.
Hi.
Good evening, Ann Marks with PG&E.
I am here really just to comment on Donald Lacy and the Love
Life Foundation, the Love Life Week.
It is such a wonderful, special thing
to honor him, his organization, their legacy.
As a company, we're very proud to support
gala that's happening on November 21st.
I want to make sure that everyone here is invited and makes it if you can to raise money
for those scholarships.
And it's a personal privilege, let me just say, I love the organization and I love that
in addition to supporting those young scholars, they're going to be honoring someone who's
a personal hero of mine and that's Miss Marilyn Washington Harris.
So it should be a wonderful night.
I hope everybody can be there.
if you believe in this city and believe in public safety,
please join us there, thank you.
Hi, Jesse Rosemore, there's a couple things
on this consent calendar about the coming election
and I really want a city council
that is responsive to the people of Oakland,
to the city workers that have been begging
for a fair contract for months.
So it's really hard to see that one of the people
on this dais is committing very obvious FPPC violations
with their social media account.
You cannot use a social media account
to conduct official city business,
to collaborate and cross post with other city departments,
to make official statements,
and then with the same account,
advertise your reelection campaign.
It's an FPPC violation.
Of course, nobody on this council
our city attorney and city
administrator.
Same thing, we don't have any
responses, so what is happening
with this blatant FPPC violation
being committed by councilmember
Wong ongoing on our social media
account, you know, councilmember
Brown and councilmember Ramachandra
have blocked a ton of us on their
social media accounts.
Councilmember Wong has been
taking to that as well, but we
still see right out there out in
the open the use of this account
to add to our social media
of this account to advertise a re-election campaign.
Myself and so many people want what's best for the city.
Me and some fellow canvassers had a knife pulled on us
while we were canvassing.
We will go back out again and again and again
for the love of our city to do what we know we need.
We need a council that is responsive to the people.
And so to see these blatant violations right in front
of us. We do what we do because we love this city. We don't do it for a weird
nurturing of our ego or I don't know what's going on. There's another thing on
this consent calendar about going over border wall recommendations and
rewarding a contract with a paving coming anyway. ICE is in this city now.
they are abducting our neighbors now and it is wild to come to this council and see no one here speak to what is happening now on
Our city streets. We have been asking for a policy that boxes in pro ice
Opd members and we have not gotten it from the head of our Public Safety Committee. We have seen nothing
We have asked about flock. We know that our
neighbors our vulnerable neighbors commute pattern data is in the hands of ice even though Rowena Brown is saying that I have not looked
state law which bans that we know that the feds have this anyway it is we you
know full well what I'm talking about we have seen nothing from this council to
do what needs to be done and you have had so long and you're doing nothing
I'm speaking my name is John Marx I'm speaking on consent items six point four
six point seven six point three zero and six point three one under item six
point four you were rubber stamping another renewal of Oakland's local
emergency on homelessness under item 6.30 you are authorizing 50 million to
measure you funds and under 6.31 you are permanently removing the 2027 sunset
date so former redevelopment trust funds can indefinitely bankroll operating
subsidies and homeless service contracts wait before you hand another blank check
without guardrails to Oakland's homeless industrial complex you keep renewing an
emergency declaration solely to keep the funding spigot open for unaccountable contractors while
human beings actually living on the pavement such as me and this dog are subject to abuse,
neglect, and no oversight. Removing the 2027 sunset date in item 6.31 without auditing how
these nonprofits treat unhoused people and where the money actually goes is legislative malpractice
and you know it. Meanwhile look at the hypocrisy of item 6.7. You're amending the municipal code to
require permits for anyone hauling bulky trash out of a property cleanup effectively criminalizing
informal community cleanups while the city administrator's own homelessness staff
refuse to provide basic sanitation shelter or even honest public health information that are
encampments. Do not remove the 2027 accountability sunset on item 6.31 and
stop treating the homeless emergency under item 6.4 as a slush fund for
contractors while abandoning the people on the ground. Thank you. If there's no
in-chamber speakers moving to the Zoom speaker, Ms. Asada-Labala, I have you
with the maximum cards. Please unmute yourself and begin your comments. Yes Madam
clerk, let me start by saying any item on the agenda that calls for a waiver and you have two
should go to the non-consent agenda with an explanation for the reason for waiver and not
just be rubber stamped. You just spoke to an item for which a grant fund begins October the 1st,
this is October the 20th. Then you're in that discussion just now about that particular item,
It says that you have to produce matching funds of $7,500.
What's the source of funding?
You never ask, what's the source of funding?
You have to ask that.
Item 611, 605, 617, 624, 630, 631, all are items that have to do with housing.
You are committing an unfair practice when you are looking at housing
and you're not looking at the impact of gentrification and you're not looking at the impact of being
a sanctuary city where people are coming into the city unauthorized but they are getting housing
and when they get housing from the foundational black people or the main group are not getting
housing that's why we are such large numbers on the streets if you look at item 6 9 6 10 6 8 6 12
never went to committee.
613 never went to committee.
615 was a contract where you extending the contract
without coming to counsel for a total of $1.9 million.
No contract should be extended.
And you also have on that same, without some type of vetting,
Rule 24, never went to the same rule,
never went to counsel.
Then you have 6.19,
accepting money from the Department of Justice.
Now you got this big issue with the Department of Justice,
but you sure will take their money.
Item 620 is a lawsuit for $600,000.
Are you clear on what this is about?
I'm clear, but that's a rule 28.
That means it never got discussed in any public way.
uh, item 6.26. There's a waiver of your sanctuary city contracting
prohibition. You're not serious about, because you've done this before in the
past. You're not serious about sanctuary city.
You've done this before. When it suits you to get what you need,
you will waiver your sanctuary city responsibility.
Lastly, you have item, let me see if I can find it real quick,
6.3 zero measure you funds for affordable housing.
If you would have kept that $30 million
from the Lincoln park and gave it to the housing,
you'd have $80 million.
Thank you, Ms. Isabella, your time was up.
If your name was called, please approach the podium
or raise your hand at this time.
All names have been called for this item.
Okay, thank you, colleagues.
Any comments, questions, comes under Brown.
Excellent thank you so much no no comments, but I'll make a motion to move the consent calendar as amended with
with
With the continued of six point five and six point seven
We have one a couple more additional clarifications on the deletions from the save grant item
I believe that you read in the title
Could you then say which deletions are in the paragraphs and that will be complete?
Yes again Tracy Jones police services manager for OPD these are the items to
amend and strike from the resolution the sixth whereas clause in the 12th
whereas clause the words and local small local business enterprise
requirements and striking the fifth further resolve clause.
Thank you. We have the motion a second. I would like to make a quick statement
about the item that I'm bringing forward. United Against Hate Week, just in
addition to Love Life Week, I wanted to talk a little bit about a movement that
that was also started here in Oakland
and recognize Anthony Rodriguez.
I know you couldn't get your speaker card in time,
but thank you for being here, Oakland resident,
very involved in the United Against Hate movement.
Since 2017, United Against Hate, again,
co-founded right here in Oakland,
was created in response to the rise of hatred and intolerance
that really resurfaced after the first Trump election.
It's become a national movement to spread messages of peace,
equity and solidarity in the face of violence.
You may remember the big, we, Oakland, named city,
stands United Against Hate.
That's these guys who have been doing this
and spreading it all over the country.
They also have a film screening tomorrow,
Minnesota Neighbors, from at the Grand Lake Theater,
filmed by District 4 resident, Patrice O'Neill,
in collaboration with United Against Hate.
So check it out and thank you, Anthony, Mr. Rodriguez,
and everyone else part of it for your work.
And I believe that's it.
On the consent calendar, we have a motion
by Council Member Brown,
seconded by Council Member Wong,
which includes continuing item 6.5,
6.6 and 6.7 in the amendment to item 6.21.
Council Member Brown.
Aye.
Council Member Fyfe.
I would like to register a no vote on item 6.26
due to the waivers for not complying
of the sanctuary city policies. Otherwise, aye. In the future please do those on item three. Council member that was a
aye on the rest of the consent calendar. Yes. Council member Gallo is excused. Council member
Houston. Aye. Council member Unger. Aye. Council member Wong. Aye. And chair Ramachandran. Aye. Noting that council members, council
the consent calendar passes with a vote of six ayes. Now I want to council member announcements.
Colleagues council member five the number. Thank you for my announcements for district
three this Saturday we are hosting a town hall on data centers and the forthcoming work
And so we're going to go through
the centers and the forthcoming
work of the moratorium so we'll
have city staff from our
planning and building department
there at Beth Eden Baptist
church.
In West Oakland at ten AM so I
invite people to get registered
and attend that that conversation
about what the moratorium means
moving forward and then the
following Monday right here in
city hall and here in room two
and we will also have city staff there to talk about their first quarter updates as well as what is happening around specific hot spots in
the district and
Other things that we're doing to address illegal dumping in the district. Thank you
Thank You, councilmember uncle
Councilmember uncle
What yes, oh, I thought you had no, no, I'm sorry. Okay, never mind. Um, I will make a quick announcement
Since councilmember guy Oh is not present. I wanted to uplift
The celebration he is leading on Latinx heritage month on Saturday in Fruitvale Village
In addition to that in my district
We have really fun Halloween events in both Montclair village on Sunday and the Laurel
on Saturday
Council member Houston. I
just wanted to congratulate Councilmember Brown and
President Kevin Jenkins when we had that event in DPS, Oakland and we brought the the city to
To our neighborhood. We brought the city of Oakland to districts have it
I want to thank you was beautiful people were out there. They were hyped up. They were happy. We were eaten
We were it was just a great event. I was so happy. I felt home. I felt home. So I just wanted to say that
Thank you
Moving to open form as I call your name, please state your name for the record and
I'll begin your comments of missus out of olibala press cod chair
Jesse rose more similar me mr. Hazzard
John mimosa Marcus
Miss Leonard
in any order
The Superior Court's error was prejudiced because they prevented consideration of a central
Statutory question California Constitution article 6 section 13 does not permit reversal for every
Technical error but the error here was not harmless the spear chord ruling
Prevented petitioner from obtaining judicial consideration of the central allegation
What language did the city council prove what language was submitted to the register of voters was their material different?
who authorized a difference and what legal authority permitted the change.
Also vote, uh, no on measure EE on November 3rd,
but stay tuned on this appeals court and don't let the city attorney, uh,
void giving you the full scope of the gravity of this issue.
I've been at this since May 19th, 2025 and I've completed.
I want to preface my comments by saying that a couple of years before the encampments were
disbanded, I would take my vehicle and drive at every encampment in North and West Oakland
and distribute food, clothing, bedding, anything you could think of, tents.
But recently, my client has been experiencing some trouble at her property on Breast Street.
But there's a woman who cut down a tree on her on her land
saying that she can't park her van adequately.
There's another guy this got a long
encampment in front of her property and she can't rent it.
So she's losing money and now people are breaking into her home.
So she's called three one one.
She alerted
to make. The city council
person fights office- the
homeless and minute encampment
administrator nobody's able to
help her. And she can't rent
her property so it's impacting
her. Hi Jesse rose more- it's
been brought to my attention
that when- someone like
councilmember Wong commits
blatant F. P. P. C. violations
that are. Way to remedy that is
to talk to the public ethics
commission but the public
What are we supposed to do?
It's hard to hear our, you Ramachandran talk about the Trump administration wax poetic
about that when we see a failure of democracy in our city politics, in our city of Oakland.
I want to have a city council one day that doesn't just listen to the editorial board
of the Oakland report and to the supposedly independent expenditure committees that are
controlling our city and controlling the city politic. What are we supposed to do?
What are we supposed to do? You defunded democracy dollars and now we're stuck
with this. And now I really hope we're not stuck with people like you. Thank you.
Mr. Marks, do you wish to speak during open forum? Good evening John Marks. I'm
putting on public record a textbook case of state created danger by the city
administrator's office at my former encampment at Second and Brush in Jack
london square roughly the first week of july a new homelessness employee from the city administrator's
office pulled up the second brush casually told us the rat tested positive for leptospirosis
got in his car and drove away no written notice no sanitation no shelter a local vet serving the
unhoused checked the cdc and county databases and found zero reports a month later that city
employee returned insisted it was true handed their entire camp three pairs of disposable gloves and
Three surgical masks for waterborne bacterial disease that isn't even airborne and drove off
Days later vector control verbally repeated the claim and left with zero help because left asparosis fatal to dogs
I was forced to flee second and brush to keep my service animal life
Which pushed me into a far more dangerous living situation worse the resident who stayed at second brush has been severely sick for several weeks
I'm giving this testimony without the consent to the current residences. It's
Thank you, mr. Marks your time is up
Moving to the zoom speaker, miss Asada. Ola Bala, please unmute yourself and begin your comments
Yes, I continue to say
You are not sorry you are out of order. Your time is up and another speaker is speaking
Okay, can you stop my time over please?
Thank you
I continue to say that you are not serious as a sanctuary city.
Your city hiring process calls for on hire.
You will need to provide a valid documentation such as a green card,
work permit or employment authorization document to fill out
the standard form one-ninth required for all US employees.
Now, unless you are ignoring,
because you tend to ignore the requirement to be a citizen,
Are you ignoring this as well?
And it's very interesting in order
to be an Oakland police officer,
you do not have to be a citizen.
You have to be someone applying for citizenship.
So I have some, in some cases,
I don't know who these officers are,
but people who are not citizens
have arrest authority in this city.
That's unfair.
Jean Kwon says that this is interesting.
The sanctuary policy she approved,
They hadn't even finished working on the sanctuary policy.
They're having a meeting tonight working on that.
Police.
Thank you, Ms. Aldamago.
That was the last open forum speaker.
Thank you.
I would like to call on Mr. David Newton
with the discretion of the chair to say a few words
as the practice is to allow nominees that are being voted
on for commissions to speak.
However, this was inadvertently glossed over,
so you may have your two minutes.
Council Member Houston, did you have,
was that related to Mr. Newton speaking?
Yes, it is.
I just wanted to say, the last is not least here.
It's the most powerful.
And I'm gonna say the child of the Panthers is here,
David Newton, and I just wanna congratulate him,
and thank you for allowing him to say a couple of words,
it's very powerful for him to
be because this is powerful for
him to be on this this
commission so David newton can
you come up her.
That the chair of the council
said you could.
Thank you the president.
Chair thank you council members
every one of you.
From start to finish district
one through seven thank you
It's a long journey being an Oakland resident, as we all know.
My blood brother is the son of Oakland, and I met with some people earlier, they were
saying we're sons of Oakland, yeah, but that's the son of Oakland, Ken Houston District Seven.
My dad is here, my fiance is here, my son is here.
I guess we're, I'm a third generation Oaklander.
1943 is when we came and landed here.
And somewhere through those Oakland journeys and struggles
and my dad is here, he's known me longer
than I've known myself.
I think I probably died in the ashes and then came back
because of the adversity.
But to quote a giant, he dreamed that he would have
Two, he would have a black boy, a black girl,
a white boy, and a white girl hold hands
and walk through this jungle.
And they've made movies, they call it Wakanda,
but this is the real Wakanda, this is Oakland,
and if you look at this board,
it is the embodiment of the dream that that man said in DC
that the council member Fife has on her shirt,
and properly so.
With that being said, the work continues,
And we have to protect our people.
It's been like a,
it's emotional for me because I made 47
and my uncle Huey P. Newton was murdered at 47.
And I knew that I felt in my heart
that this year would be like a fork
and maybe it would be catastrophic
or maybe it would be overly successful.
And I was promoted in my job that gives me
the ability economically to afford to take time off
and give that to the city of Oakland.
So my appointment as a planning commissioner,
it's not for me.
As Jean Quine said, someone asked her to do it.
Someone asked me to do this.
And it was the ancestors that are not in this room.
They asked me out of a clear blue sky
to apply for this position.
They asked me to represent them.
They asked me to do the right thing with integrity
and represent a legacy and a family of people
that have died for the struggle.
And that's for all of the Panther siblings.
That's for all of the people that have dedicated their lives
to impact in a positive nature.
Not to destroy each other, but to uplift each other.
And Council Member Wong, you have my support 100%.
My union backs you.
And they were supposed to come walk for you,
but in our world, it's costly not to be here.
Like we have to take off work.
My dad is 88 years old.
be eighty nine this year he sat here and I thank him for that and I don't want I
know I'm taking too much time but it's an emotional thing for me and my mission
my goal is to reactivate the opportunity for people that look like me
is to reactivate the opportunity for the disenfranchised it's the opportunity
to spark a match. The first brown person that was elected official name was Joe
Cotto, Noel Gio's district. I hope that my son or his children or people beyond
that can come to the planning commission and also be the mayor and also be
council members and put their hands on this city and make the city represent
what it should be which is Oakland and the world. And I mean
that literally because our geographical location is a dead
center point of the West Coast which is the closest point to
Asia which is the biggest manufacturer in the world. So if
you want to get that you have to come through here if you come
through here we should be the most successful city in the
world. And that's what my plan is. Thank you. Thank you Mr.
Good afternoon. This meeting is adjourned.