Highlights from last night’s Council meeting

Did you skip the show last night? Had something better to do with your Tuesday evening than stare at KTOP for seven straight hours? Don’t worry. I watch these things so you don’t have to. Here’s what you missed: Read more

Measure OO: the worst thing on your ballot

For some reason, I find myself, way more often than you’d think anybody would, arguing with people about how much people pay attention to local government. Ever the pessimist, I maintain that significantly more than half the population doesn’t have even the faintest idea what goes on at City Hall, or maybe even who the Mayor is, and doesn’t care to learn. Most people tell me I’m wrong, and that everyone, if nothing else, reads Chip Johnson, which gives them at least a modicum of insight into the workings of Oakland’s government.

Maybe. We’ll find out one way or another soon enough, because Measure OO on this November’s ballot is a pretty damn good metric of whether people pay even a little bit of attention or they just show up at their polling station and vote at random. Read more

Budget debate over, for now.

So the Council passed their budget adjustment last night and we get to stop worrying about it for a while. Well, for a little while, anyway. As time goes on and we either do or don’t receive the revenue we budgeted for, the Finance & Management Committee will have to make monthly adjustments. Read more

Save the arts? At the expense of what, exactly?

So, tonight the City Council hopes to finally pass their second budget for the year and close the $42 million deficit hanging over our heads. The biggest point of contention tonight is likely to be suspension of the Cultural Arts funding program.

What program, you ask? Here’s the deal. Every year, we award grants to roughly 70 non-profits and individual artists to, well, make art. Read more

We’ll be keeping the park rangers after all

So, it looks like the City won’t be shutting down on Fridays after all. (Or closing parks!) You may recall that when Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums submitted his budget proposal a couple of weeks ago, he left a $10 million deficit and told the Council to figure out how to close it (offering them three options). Subsequently, Dellums explained that he actually didn’t want the Council to make their own decision, and instead expected to save the money by closing the City every Friday, cutting the pay of every non-sworn employee by 20%. Read more

So, you wanna serve your city?

In the comments section of my post about the OHA Board appointments (a lively discussion that I tragically never found time to engage in, btw. I am still hoping to get something up about the discussion of the appointments at the City Council soon.) there were a number of questions about how one gets appointed to various city boards. Read more

What Measure Q? More broken promises from the City of Oakland.

So the biggest point of protest during the public comment period of Tuesday’s budget meeting was the proposed elimination of the Library’s Second Start Adult Literacy Program. The Second Start people played the pity card big time, Read more

Dellums on the budget

So, last night, the City Council had its first special budget workshop of this year’s second round of budget adjustments. The first round took place last spring, and culminated in the Council approving a mid-cycle budget with $15 million in cuts. Read more

Things that are lame about Oakland

Exhibit A: The City’s new logo. Seriously. I hate it. Look at the old Oakland tree: Read more

The 8.2 million dollar question

So on Friday, HUD released the allocations for funding from the Housing Rescue Package, and, sadly, Oakland didn’t fare particularly well. Instead of the $30 to $60 million some were expecting, we got a kind of sad $8.2 million. Read more

Mayor’s new budget proposal now available

You can view it here (PDF). I haven’t had a chance to digest the whole thing yet, so I’m going to hold off on commenting until I do, but here’s the basic plan, as outlined in the letter (PDF) the Mayor sent to city staff: Read more

Jane Brunner and Nancy Nadel say no to anti-nepotism ordinance

So earlier this summer, Oakland City Council Ignacio De La Fuente introduced an anti-nepotism ordinance (PDF). It first came to the Finance and Management Committee before recess, and it failed to pass onto Council.

A revised ordinance (PDF) came back to the Finance and Management Committee today. Read more

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