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October 23, 2009 by V Smoothe
Want to talk about something I haven’t covered? Do it here. You can find the previous open thread here.
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- Critical Chris: Please help find, and bring to justice, the callous, piece-of-shit motorist that committed a heinous act of hit-and-run vehicular homicide near downtown Oakland....
- Patrick: Furloughs, furloughs, furloughs. Since the vast majority of city workers don’t seem accomplish anything anyway, let’s just furlough them. Maybe...
- Ralph: I am without speech. It is almost mind boggling that this city can be this far in the red and our elected officials have had their heads in the sand for so long. They...
- Naomi Schiff: Patrick, what kinds of taxes do you think are fair?
- Patrick: As I’ve oft stated, parcel taxes are so unfair that it is almost criminal. They can legally base the amount on the tax on the size of the property, but of course,...
- CitizenX: We need to strike “bond issue” and “bonds” from this discussion. Regardless of what certain clueless Councilmembers might say, the City...
- Helen: At the meeting last week, the committee decided that they wanted some changes, and it’s coming back to them at their first meeting in January. I think it’s...
- len raphael: surprisingly not your typical council member/opd dog and pony show. (see my posting of last week). got a strong turnout of public safety activists from rockridge, a...
- Andrew: So, how did the meeting go last week?
- len raphael: LG, ask the cc members for what the projected annual deficit would be 1, 3, and also 5 years from the year endind June 2010 using optimistic, medium optimistic, and...
- Ken: @bennett: I would protest the banks, homebuilders, loan processors, real estate agents, central bank, but what would it do for me? at most I get arrested for chaining...
- Ken: @livegreen funny that anyone would advocate for a MBZ plant in Oakland where nobody can afford one..
Anyone noticed different police patterns recently? Over in funktown (ok, E 18th between Park and 14th Ave) I’ve seen a lot more cruisers in the evening and night over the past few days, wondering if anyone else has noticed anything. As far as I’m concerned it’s a positive change on the E 18th corridor.
Howzabout the report that the city auditor released about personnel practices in Oakland? And how the current city manager said that she’s “making it up”?
Ok, so push has come to shove. I’ve been asked again to apply for the Public Ethics Commission. Deadline is this Friday.
Is this just a generally crappy post? Is it volunteer? I’ve asked the head, haven’t heard back yet, but I don’t want a paid position as I don’t want folks thinking it’ll make me biased towards any given PoV. Is this viewed as a crappy job? I have a great full time job, don’t want/need another one. If this is something that’s truly independent and I can’ say/do what I want, i’m happy to do it. But if I have to toe a company line, i’m out.
Ack. Dunno what to do, i wish I knew 1/20th as much about Oakland Gov’t as VS…
Vivek,
I think it’s a genuinely important post, and yes it is volunteer. I think it’s very independent. The opening they have is for a candidate chosen by the committee, not by the mayor, which makes it even more independent.
The only line you have to toe is that you can’t be involved in certain political activities while you serve in this post. No campaigning, no endorsing, no fundraising, no precinct walking, etc…
len, you asked “City employee parking allowances: do they count as compensation for retirement calculations? Is there a list of them somewhere?”
Not sure if you mean free parking afforded employees in City garages, or car allowances. Regardless, neither would be included. Included in the PERS calculation are base wages/salary, certain premium pays and the value of any employer pickup of the required employee contribution. The City pickups up the 9% employee contribution for Police. This 9% is added on to their pay to calculate their retirement, as PERS considers it additional compensation.
The subject of free parking for certain employees comes up now and then as does the subject of car allowances. The 11/13/07 Fleet report to the Finance Committee discuss car allowances and the number of employees who receive it. The Professional/Supervisory Employee contract provides a monthly amount, plus mileage, for employees who use their private car at least 50% of the time in their work. It appears that most of the recipients are lawyers in the City Attorney’s Office. I was told that few if any of them actually claim any mileage and that the allowance is a little “gift” from the City Attorney to his staff. So glad that the City is flush with cash for such “gifts”.
Vivek – now is an important time at the PEC. It’s updating laws on lobbyists, contributions, transparency, & restrictions on PEC members related to marriage or domestic partnership. It might be helpful if you familiarize yourself with these.
You will go through a public vetting process. It’s not like a Supreme Court nominating process, but you’ll get a little scrutiny. Don’t want to scare you off – you should be okay.
I wish more people were involved right now. The PEC is amending and updating laws that will greatly affect the quality and transparency of Oakland’s local government for many years. People who are interested in a fair and transparent government should be paying attention and participating right now.
@Vivek B. I’ve been on the Landmarks Board for about 6 months now. In general, it has been a great experience. I’ve got to learn a lot more about the city. I feel I’ve made contributions that the planners/architects/historians/etc. normally involved with preservation might not have made. I think your business background could in a similar manner offer a fresh perspective to the PEC.
On the downside, it is a fair time commitment, and I find the filing of the Form 700 to be overly intrusive. You might find the Form 700 even more irritating than me, so you should be comfortable with it before applying.
@Tommy Saxondale maybe they are going to get some tasty rice ball salad at the Champa Garden.
Mmmm…Champa Garden…
Champa is good…even if u can taste the
change in Chefs.
We walk to Champa Garden…mmmm good. My favorite is the Rice Ball Salad as well.
“mmmm good”
Or as they say south of the Mae Khong, แซ่บอิหลี
Champa Garden is our go-to place for Lao/Isaan when Vientian Cafe is closed.
BTW, Andrew Simmons has an article just posted today on the KQED website about the “big three” Lao restaurants in E. Oakland – Champa Garden, Vientian, and Green Papaya Deli.
http://blogs.kqed.org/bayareabites/2009/10/27/lao-food-in-east-oakland/
nav, did you see the episode on Discovery on County Jail: Oakland about Santa Rita, which is actually in Dublin?
Robert, are you referring to the Discovery Channel series on gangs in Oakland? I didn’t get a chance to see it but heard that it was mostly a sensationalized crime hit piece on Oakland. I did hear that they had 8 Oakland gang unit cops going all around the city looking for one guy. I heard it was rather comical. It was like “is he here? No, OK” and they would leave and repeat the same thing somewhere else in the city. I also understand that they grossly overestimated the number of gang members in Oakland. They mentioned that there were 10,000 gang member in Oakland. That may be true of Alameda County, but not Oakland. OPD estimated about 1,000 gang members in Oakland.
Anyway, what did they mention about Santa Rita?
I didn’t watch it, but my understanding is that it was on the jail itself.
WHY CAN’T OAKLAND RECRUIT GREAT GREEN BUSINESSES LIKE SOLYNDRA? It will have Tech AND Manufacturing jobs. White Collar AND Blue Collar.
Solar firm Solyndra signs huge lease in Fremont
http://www.insidebayarea.com/news/ci_13660141#at
Because apparently, the city council is allergic to business.
Because the redevelopment folks are eternally messing around seeking retail and dreaming of condos instead of fostering manufacturing, technical, industrial businesses (with their better-paying jobs). And they have been steadily reducing the amount of land zoned for industry.
JR, you might be right. But aside from the CC, Oakland has two affiliates devoted to Business Development, CEDA and OBDC. With their emphasis in Business Development, including recruitment, what are THEY doing to recruit new Green jobs.
For all the talk in Oakland about Green jobs, I’d like to know when they’re going to have some announcements about some successes. Most businesses recruited seem to be filling the downtown buildings.
But what about companies that need hybrid offices & production space?
(This includes Tech companies BTW). Is this because we only have limited Light Industrial space, which can be flexible between Office & Manufacturing that many High Tech, Bio Tech and Green Tech companies like?
Granted, retail should be a top priority in Oakland, considering how much tax money the town loses to surrounding cities. But perhaps CEDA and OBDC have staff who aren’t very knowledgeable about this whole “green” thing, or science in general. Who are the members of these organizations and what are their backgrounds?
Winner of the return-the-phone call bet goes to….drum roll….Jean Quan’s office! Two days ago, I had left messages with Quan, Brooks and Desmona of Parks and Rec. Today, left message for Ignacio’s assistant. The inquiry was about trying to get a field for my high school rugby club.
There is a bullshite policy that the City has about not allowing people on grass fields from November through April. The kids I coach don’t weigh more than 180 and we don’t “pack down” or destroy the fields. Apparently, the City thinks that if kids practice on a field at night in the rain, it will damage the field/ WTF??? Like I’m sure in England and New Zealand they don’t allow their teams on grass in the rainy season….Quan’s assistant gave me a mini-lecture about parks and rec staff being laid-off.
The city has opened a new field-turf place in West Oakland, Raimondi, but really needs new fields. The real issue is that the City and OUSD need to work together to allow youth sports to use school fields during the winter and other months.
Last time I checked, you cannot simultaneously be breaking into cars and playing a game or running on a field or court. Let’s stop playing lip service to keeping kids occupied in the danger hours from 3 to 8 pm. Open up the school fields, especially the ones with lights, like Oakland High School.
Naomi, what type of manufacturing do you think Oakland can accommodate. I could be wrong but I think as a manufacturing site Oakland is at a competitive disadvantage. I assume that these mfg plants will need some engineers and we lack the engineering smarts found on the peninsula. To attract them we need to upgrade the schools. Businesses won’t relocate here if they can’t get the talent.
Mr. Spencer that field policy stinks. Doesn’t OUSD have a groundscrew? When I was a student our girls soccer team played an outdoor winter schedule. It wasn’t NE just Mid-Atlantic but it rained and snowed and in the spring the same fields were sometimes used for dressage and lax. Really don’t understand the OUSD problem.
The combination of waterlogged clayey substrate and semi-dormancy exacerbates turfgrass damage and is very costly to repair. Oakland’s policy may be “bullshite”, but it is based upon sound turfgrass management principles and economic reality.
The idea that a person who is less than 180 pounds doesn’t compact the soil in fields and/or cause damage to rain-soaked fields is not correct (or at least, not unless their feet are inhumanly large)–we can see plenty of compaction and field wear from soccer teams made up of young kids (e.g., 4th graders, junior high schoolers, etc.). Perhaps we’d like more money to maintain fields, or more money for field installation to amend or replace native soils below the turf, but that opens up a different can of worms…
I know it might not be visually-pleasing to some but I think the solution is more synthetic turf fields in more centrally-located places. (Over time, the field-turf fake stuff should be cheaper than the natural stuff.) Placement of these fields is the issue as kids in East Oakland without cars can’t easily get to the wilds of west Oakland for practice.) Berkeley built that nice complex down near the freeway but I know it took like 5 or 6 years of planning, etc. I’m just saying that it’s cheaper to spend on the front-end, engaging kids before they go to the streets, gangs, etc. Knowing how this City wastes money but comes after its residents for $ all the time, I just think it’s fair to ask for more access to fields or building a couple new fields.
Mike, why don’t you try and get some of the kids first money to do the renovations. It seems like a good use for the money.
Hi Robert,
You can email me at hirepimike@gmail.com with more details if you have them. I am not familiar with the program. We do have non-profit status for our club and have recently become independent, which is good news-bad news as we do need to go hustle for funds, etc. Shameless plug: http://www.oaklandwarthogsrfc.com
Thank you!
Ralph, I don’t see that we are at a competitive disadvantage as to industry. We do have many educated people who are commuting outward to get to jobs in other towns around the bay. There’s a whole pickup service that carries employees all the way to Google HQ, for example. We are at a great location for access in many directions. We have room for both retail and industrial. The thing about retail is: what kind? Many retail jobs tend to be dependent upon national companies with national financing, and when they pull the plug, they leave a hole. This can happen even when the local store is making money. (A prime example was Capwells/Emporium/Federated Dept. Stores, which made money here and owned its own building, but vacated due to the collapse of the national chain.) CEDA has a tendency to want to think big, chain-owned, and not necessarily locally-owned, and then fall victim to the general economic vicissitudes of national economics. Thus CEDA staffers of various generations have longed for department stores for the entire long decades I have lived here, with no success. It is time to come up with some more innovative models.
Naomi, I am still not sure what industry you are describing. I tend to think of industry and mfg as hard stuff like cars, fabrication, etc. Oakland has an educated population but they lean towards the professions – software, finance, law, medicine etc. From what I have seen in census reports we don’t have the engineering types who build stuff.
Big chains have not been in Oakland for one plain and simple reason – Oakland is a perceived black town with a crime problem. Local companies are dependent on local financing and customers. When they collapse, they leave a hole in the economy.
This being Oakland, you can’t go one way or the other. You are going to need a mix. Local stores do not always have the resources to do advertising as a result they rely on word of mouth to get the news out. National stores have the resources to do an ad campaign, which brings feet to the street. Local stores become free riders and benefit from the additional foot traffic.
In many cases people do comparison shopping. But if there is only one locally owned jean store in the neighborhood why would you travel to that store if you could travel to a location that had multiple jean stores. The local store could benefit by having more similar stores and density, but too many in Oakland rail against the density that would help the local stores.
I can make some educated guesses about C-E but by the time Federated made the purchase the demise of the downtown shopping district had already been written. And neighborhoods with high percentage of black people were seen as risky investment.
The available labor pool in Oakland is neither a plus or minus for the high tech industries. These industries do not look at the applicant pool in the local city when they decide where to locate, they consider their applicant pool to be the entire Bay Area. So they are looking much more at facility costs, tax structures, etc. when making the decision. Now the bad side for Oakland is that there is really little reason to give them tax incentives to locate here either, as the jobs created by these high tech companies are not going to go to Oakland residents. To a somewhat lessor extent, other manufacturing industries are going to be similar.
Robert and Ralph, I disagree with your comments to Naomi. I think there are pools of labor for both Manufacturing (& its cousin Distribution) and Tech/Engineering. We have lots of engineers who live here and commute elsewhere.
(Robert, I’m confused about your comments since you say as much but then say high tech companies are not going to go to Oakland residents).
The Bay Area is so anti-Republican, anti-defense research, anti-nuke, anti-military……why would any industry having any remote conection to the afore mentioned want to come to Oakland? ’s. We anti-war refugees from the 60’s and 70’s have reaped what we sowed. We made a mistake by excluding some kinds of research and hammering anyone with a military connection or job as an idiot. Of course some 60,000 military and civilian jobs are gone due to base closures (thanks Ron and the Republicans on this one.) No crying now . At least we are no longer a “target” in the event of a nuclear war. I am dismayed by Bay Area progressives (I used to be one.) So smart, smug and over- educated. No need to compromise on issues, the other side is always morally wrong, corrupt, evil and ignorant.
i have to find the report but Oakland (and SF) relative to the valley lack high number of people in the engineering professions. That is not to say, there are no engineers in Oakland and SF but many use that talent in other professions.
If I am an employer in addition to the tax incentives, I am going to go where there is a high supply of labor and the peninsula has that in spades. We need to incubate UC Berkeley business, take advantage of the biotech infrastructure provided by UCSF, Emeryville pharma, and UCB. We also have a creat opportunity to take advantage of green tech design but we need to recruit to make that successful. Green manufacturing is a dream.
livegreen, we are free to disagree so long as we remain civil.
Examples of some modest but encouragement-worthy businesses we might think about:
Downtown in grade A and B office spaces we have long housed a great many small to medium design businesses (including my own) who while not highly visible do a national business. These include planning and architecture, engineering of many kinds, landscape design, graphics, publishing, communications, and many web-based enterprises (consider: Pandora). Could we ramp this up a bit and strengthen this community?
We house many nonprofits, some of substantial size, renown, and power. Okay, we are trying to be a nexus of food-related business. A strong arts community that taken as a whole generates income, jobs, street traffic, image, and tourism needs to be fostered with attention to rents and zoning. We have a lot of services and professionals, attorneys and lawfirms; does CEDA ever look at these types of businesses as possible contributors to our city?
Just to throw out one idea: While everyone is trying to figure out what kind of bigboxish store they can plop onto Broadway near Pill Hill, why aren’t we pursuing an Alternative Transportation and Green Living Retail Zone? Let’s designate a piece of Broadway to muscle-powered, sustainable, green enterprises: yes, bikes and bike repair and bike accessories; but also sports clothing, small electric or other efficiently powered vehicles to replace the disappearing gas guzzlers; every kind of wheeled item such as great luggage carts, baby buggies, wheelchairs, scooters, little red wagons, wheelbarrows, skates, and strollers. Maybe also green home stuff like water cisterns, grey water systems, gardening gadgets, solar panel installation services for single-family and apartments, and perhaps energy-efficient appliances. Services for people who are upgrading and rehabilitating their homes and historic buildings that are part of Oakland’s fabulous architectural heritage. Reimagine Sears for the re-use oriented green resident. (Also, for you retail-minded folks: a store where one could buy decent quality hosiery and socks could do quite a lot of business.)
We need to look forward, not back at the just-burst balloon model, but really try to think about what’s next. We should not ignore the industries that are already here; let’s be sure to leave some areas available for light and even heavier industry. We do have plenty of parcels that could be better used, and we should not plan it all for the condos of 2003.
Okay, now I understand what type of businesses you are trying to attract. With regard to design work, architecture, foundations and all the others that you named above I do not disagree those are the very type of businesses that we should be going after to fill that Class A office space.
With respect to the professional services – medical, law, accountant. CEDA needs to bring those business into the fold. I was at $1 tasting at FSWB earlier tonight and had a very interesting discussion with a woman who works at CSU East Bay. The long and short Oakland is on the right path with bringing more people to the downtown. Many neighborhoods have 3 generations peacefully coexisting but what is missing are the services noted above.
The condos of 2003 are so yesterday. We need the green LEED condos of 2012. I have long been annoyed that you build to accommodate 10s of thousands of people but you don’t have the stuff to make them happy homeowners. I would be happy with green co-existing with bigbox.
Why aren’t businesses in Oakland? Please. Why aren’t businesses in SF? Because their CIty Councils only see businesses (real business, not retail, but even this applies to big-box retail) something to extort money from.
The cost (and more importantly, the hassle) of doing business in, say, San Leandro, Fremont or Hayward, or even South City, San Mateo etc are so much less than Oakland, Berkeley or SF, as to make the comparison laughable. No non-masochistic business/manufacturer/warehouser, etc would set up shop in Oakland, Berkeley or SF. Period.
Why aren’t businesses in SF? Really? What’s in all those tall buildings in downtown SF? Last time I checked, the city/county of San Francisco was the financial center of the west coast. What kind of businesses are supposed to be in San Francisco?
Meanwhile, Oakland would want to get whatever businesses it can get and stop being picky. Better yet, maybe it can successfully transition from industrial to something else the way South San Francisco and Emeryville did.
Specifically, for my education, please advise how the cost and hassle of doing business in SL, Fr, & Hayward are less than Oakland?
High tech startups prefer the south bay because of the abundance of campus style expandable space and venture capitalists.
Plus it’s a marketing plus to be in Sunnyvale, Santa Clara, Palo Alto etc. It’s a negative to be in Union City or Oakland or Concord. Somewhat positive to be in Berkeley or Alameda. Hayward is neutral and cheap.
SF now and in the height of dot com era Oakland was ok to be web design outfit, or a soft tech co like Ask
but not a heavy duty tech company. Same true for Manhattan. So it had little to do with crime, but more with the type and availability of real estate and density of like minded techies and financiers.
A small part of the decision to stay in Oakland for a growing high tech company would be comparing business tax rates (Oakland is one of the highest around for non manufacturers), but over the years most of the start-ups i’ve worked with simply chose those other locations even if the owners lived here.
I’d bet high tech incubators are a waste of tax money. Might be worth it for say food industry startups.
To me Oakland’s best shot at private enterprise are retail, and paper pushers: attorneys, consultants, accountants, and massage therapists, and convalescent facilities. LOL on the green manufacturing because cost of labor and facilities in the entire Bay Area is so high for relatively low margin stuff.
-len raphael
temescal
David, I think you are glass-half-emptying and need a bracing dose of optimism. For those of us who have been around for a long time, it is easy to fall into a “good old days” mentality. Let’s avoid it! We tend to forget the bad and only remember the things that were better once.
My own business has been here since the early 80s and is staying, for many reasons: we are functionally closer to downtown SF than people who live in SF, have always been able to get reasonable lease rates, can be in Sacramento in 90 minutes, and have a full range of business services available right here. Our employees are well-educated east bay residents, all but one from Oakland. While housing costs are high, they can afford to live in the east bay a lot more easily than they could in SF. And they can take advantage of public transit or bikes for the commute.
We do pay a substantial business tax. Therefore, I believe the City of O. is doing the right thing in offering new enterprises a start-up business tax incentive under their new program. We are also the beneficiaries of a large enterprise zone and quite a few small business incentive programs. (Note: “small businesses” can actually be multimillion dollar enterprises.)
Len, Re. Campus-Style offices, there are plenty of small & medium tech companies in Hayward, Fremont, Eastern SJ that are in buildings that are mixed-use. They can be used as offices, warehouses, and often have both (esp. for tech companies that market & warehouse tech products).
They are side by side with traditional businesses, such as the afore mentioned SF Herb Co. in E-SJ. I note the northern peninsula closer to the airport, like Millbrae, has a similar mix of businesses. When the Dot-Bomb happened the ones left in business were traditional brick-and-mortar next to the D-B survivors & some service industries.
This is why a mix of business & facilities that are flexible for different businesses are VERY IMPORTANT.
You say you favor retail and paper-pushers. That’s great for residential neighborhoods and the downtown office spaces, but then what would you do with the light-to-heavy industrial areas in Oakland?
LG, i’d encourage large non profit health care facilities to expand into the former industrial areas. including warehouses for old people. (including me in a couple of decades or less).
non profits are not my first choice, but i just don’t see light industry or high tech fabication happening here on a big scale. doesn’t hurt to aim for some green and food startups, who then move their mfg facilities to the boonies when they do well. at best, we’ll keep their design staff and back office people.
i’d say biotech startups, but we’re too densely populated for the risk of that
-len
len, aren’t there a host of bio-tech start-ups located in areas more densely populated. heck there is a stem-cell research park in SF.
Len, Large non-profit health care facilities? Please explain. You mean offices like Kaiser’s (that want offices like downtown) or medical facilities like hospitals? Or something else?
BTW a lot of the “former” industrial areas are CURRENT industrial areas. Oakland already has some of the businesses you mention won’t open here. Besides light manufacturing, Oakland IS bringing in more food companies.
If there are “former industrial areas” it’s not because of the businesses but because the CC didn’t want them there. That’s not free market, that’s Govt.
picking winners & losers.
Re. the tech fabrication, distribution & Green-tech (like Solyndra that I posted the link to) I think it’s both because we don’t have enough mixed-use facilities and because of Oakland’s reputation for crime. Cleaning up & building more mixed-use developments like the ones we’ve been discussing in the SL-Hawyard-Fremont-SJ corridor would bring them here just like it has there (IF crime is also reduced).
Those are the SAME light industrial areas that you & the CC want to get rid of but all those other cities are having great success using them to recruit businesses with.
lg, The skill workers who live in Oakland are not necessarily the ones that any high tech company that locates here will end up hiring. The labor pool for these workers extends out about 50 miles or so in radius. So while Oakland may get high paying jobs, they are no more likely to go to Oakland residents than jobs in SSF, Hayward or Emeryville. The local hires and local support jobs for the high tech (think cafes for the new workers to eat in) are lower skill and lower pay. Bottom line, in terms of labor pool for skill workers, Oakland, SSF, SF, Hayward, Richmod all look the same.
len, I hope you are kidding about the risk of biotech companies. The manufacturing everybody seems to want, even the green stuff, is far more dangerous to the neighbors and the environment that a biotech research company.
Robert, That’s a good point. However I do think that more businesses here means the chances will overall increase for people living here, and is an increased incentive for people to live closer to work. The closer the jobs are to home, the easier to get to, the more people here will be employed, or the more people will want to live here for convenience.
Re. the lower skill, lower pay work, that’s what we need for underemployed segments of society. Companies that employ broadly, creating a broad ecosystem of employment, jobs and wages are exactly what Oakland needs.
Finally businesses here will much improve Oakland’s tax base…
lg, my point was more that the available labor pool in Oak does not provide and incentive for companies to locate here, so Oak needs to figure out some other way to get industry/business to come here. Now personally I would prefer to work close to home, and I think that is true for many people. So if Oak were successful in luring companies here, some of those workers would probably end up relocating to Oak, with an overall improvement to the economy. Getting industry here would be a good thing for Oak, I am just not o sure that it is a good thing for industry without some type of incentive.
our cc could easily eradicate much of high tech and light industrial with a few bad zoning rules, but i doubt if anything they could do could greatly encourage those industries.
most of the economic forces buffeting oakland, affect entire western industrial world. where even five years ago, you could say western countries had an advantage in producing high intellectual content imagination tangible and intangible stuff, becoming much less true. many of those high tech engineering and scientific jobs left and are not coming back to high cost western countries unless there’s an advantage to be located near their customers.
interesting footnote, some of my high tech customers tell me that the bay area is so attractive to many potential employees, that they don”t have to pay higher wages here than they would in say Colo or Baton Rouge. (talking in the 125k -225k range).
LG, i didn’t mean back office health care admin offices, but patient care facilities. The vast majority of the staffing requirement for convalescent and assisted living facilities are non technical, high school, communication, and strong back skills. obviously higher skills needed for full care medical.
Industrial food absolutely suited to oakland. Knew latinos where multi generations worked at local cookie companies. kids had kids and dropped out of high schools to go to work there. never got of poverty. did produce some great local youth soccer players.
My knowledge of the risks of different types of bio tech activity to neighboring residents is zilch. But me i’d rather live next to a nuclear reactor than a recombinant lab working with animals. i know left wing and right wing techies who do know the science, who agree that bio tech is scary stuff in both social and technical ways that we ain’t prepared to deal with the consequences.
but i could see that the processes to manufacture some of this green stuff are hazardous. akin to prius drivers congratulating themselves on saving the earth by driving around on lead acid batteries.
-len
temescal
Oakland is definitely doing great in attracting restaurants, pubs and entertainment venues. Oakland has so much potential. There is so much that passes through Oakland to needlessly go somewhere else. Oakland should be attracting businesses because of its central location and its access to 2.5 million East Bay residents.
Why do hundreds of thousands of Bay Area residents pass through Oakland to get somewhere else? How about shortening those commutes over dangerous and inconvenient bridges. If only San Francisco developers who dig holes in the middle of downtown Oakland in order to squat on the land, would begin construction of their building, maybe Oakland could convince some of those San Francisco corporations to relocate to an area which is closer to their workforce.
Oakland is really where SF should be. In San Diego for example, you don’t cross the bridge to Coronado to go to your office. Oakland is not meeting its potential based on its natural geographic advantages. The question is why?
len, far more damage has been done to the environment and our health by traditional food science and animal breeding than has been done by anything in the biotech field. The biggest danger in living next to a biotech lab is from the nut jobs bombing the facility.
rbt, that could be, but i’d rather wait for ver 4.0 to know for sure.
in any event, depending on biotech to employee zillions of people in oakland ain’t gonna happen just because it’s not labor intensive and needs more phd’s than ged’s.
-len
len, what is this version 4.0 you are waiting for? Amgen, Genentech, OSI, CV Therapeutics, Gilead, BioMarin, XOMA….all biotech, all have a bay area presence…but like you say they need PhDs (MBAs, MDs, BS) and not GEDs. But the reality is the peninusla and San Diego are filling that niche.
Help keep the A’s where the belong — in Oakland. Go to: http://www.letsgooakland.com and sign our petition telling MLB to keep the A’s in Oakland.
I would love to keep the A’s in Oakland. I would like nothing more than to have a Camden Yards in Oakland. But what is the value in signing a petition if Oakland doesn’t take some initiative. If it is about more than the ballpark – hotels, arts, and entertainment just build. Back up the words with action.
As to hotels, yes please bring them to the Uptown. When visiting artists do stay, it would be nice if they could stay in Oakland not SF. When my parents come to town, it would be nice if they could stay in Oakland not SF.
It would be great if Oakland had a downtown convention center that could be in the running to host annual events such as the National Black MBA Assoc. or the National Hispanic Engineers etc…
Doug Boxer,
I’d like to keep the A’s in OAK but AK government should tell me that they can handle a MLB team. I don’t wan’t to spend one penny of tax $ on keeping them here (OK maybe that’s a bit negotiable but I would wqant to spend alot.) OAK CC just backed a BART boondoggle for $500mm, I know it wasn’t OAK money but the project is ridiculous and OAK CC looks ridiculous for backing it. OAK CC has had a history of getting screwed by major league teams, also a history of misspending funds, high taxes on her citizens, also a recent history of taxing ( parking fees without any thoughtful way of going about it.) I don’t think OAK gov’t can handle a major league team and stadium building project. If a proposal came up that was like SF’s it may be possible to support but the petition has nothing. Sorry can’t sign now.
Marleen, You mentioned a little while ago that the City Charter requires the Mayor to be a full-time position, and as such, this might be motivation for another lawsuit. I would like to request that you seriously consider this right now.
Timing is everything, esp. in the eyes of the public and the news. When other events are impacting the job of the Mayor, when he has even less time to perform his job (as his dealings with the IRS will obviously have), and when the public is well aware of this situation, the justification and support of such a lawsuit has never been more meaningful or would be more supported.
There are examples to support this, but in brief, a lawsuit on this subject right now would have a real impact. The Mayor might not even wait for it to go to trial for the results to be felt…
City of Oakland raises ad valorem taxes to cover bond repayments – Mayor of Oakland rides in city-provided chauffeur-driven limousine – Mayor of Oakland owes $239,000 in back taxes dating to 2005. It’s so pathetic you kind of have to laugh. I second livegreen’s motion – I’d be happy to be part of a class action lawsuit to rid our city of this detestable man. Any normal person would have the decency to resign. I guess he’s taking a page from Blagojevich’s playbook.
V, re. Tribune editorial board, who are the other members, what are their roles, is it a compensated position, etc. Do they make you sign a non disclosure agreement?
-len raphael
temescal
Help spread the word and join our Facebook group to keep the A’s in Oakland where they belong. We are now at over 13,200 members and counting!!
http://www.facebook.com/letsgooakland
As part of a larger plan to build new hotels, restaurants, and cafes, a new destination stadium will attract visitors from all over the region. We hope our ballpark will be a catalyst to bring new investment and jobs to Oakland.
The final plan to keep the A’s in Oakland will be implemented by the City of Oakland via official communications with Major League Baseball. Let’s Go Oakland’s plan is to demonstrate to the City and MLB that there is substantial and widespread support to keep the A’s in Oakland by building a new destination ball park in Oakland. We must do this by getting thousands of fans to sign our petition. Based on our understanding of MLB’s process, we believe this approach can lead to a new destination ball park in Oakland.
Please don’t forget to click on the link to sign the petition at either the FB page or the link provided below and remember to PASS IT ON by clicking the “Suggest to Friends” link at left, and invite everyone you know to join us. Help us keep the A’s in Oakland!
http://letsgooakland.com/
Thank you so much for the support and Go A’s!!!
OKLND. It wouldn’t be the same without the A’s.
Can someone riddle me this, why is it with every item before council, they state that they can’t look at one-offs but need to complete a comprehensive strategy to tackle x, y and z and the other? There is no try just do.
Because the city council is not completely competent?
I had a bad day today, started by patronizing my favorite cafe/small business, Jenny’s Cafe on Grand. Full disclosure: I am a parking scofflaw with 5 unpaid on the books. So, I am at the ATM getting some cash, after paying my $2 into the meter box, when I spot the pseudo-OPD cop car blocking me in. I know why he is there but I point out that I just spent $2 on parking. His partner, Cop 2, is booting someone else and I quickly figure I am in for it. Partner, Cop 1, tells me I am going to get booted (the coincidence is that I am within a week of going to DMV to pay tickets to register my car ). I am with my dog and gradually coming unglued.
Cop 2 is busy, so I realize that I have to go to the bank to get money to pay to get the boot off. I am about to put my dog into the car, which has all the windows down at 11 am on a cool morning, when Cop 1 says, “You can be arrested if you put your dog in an unattended car.” I say, “What?” He repeats, “You can be arrested if you put your dog in the car.” Cop 2 comes back and sticks the sticker on my car. I am pissed. Cop 1 has more or less threatened to arrest me for putting my dog into the car while I go into the bank 20-feet away. I tell the cops, “You are very full of rules today aren’t you?”
I call the OPD complaint line where an Officer Steinberg calls me back. I tell him I am A) Yes, pissed off about the boot but that is my fault and B) very ticked off that I have a cop threatening me with arrest for putting my dog in my car. Steinberg procedes to ask, “You are mad about the boot aren’t you?” I admit to it. He offers me the choice of “citizen mediation” or the internal affairs complaint. We keep talking and I make remarks that yes I pay taxes here and that I am get pissed off paying for cops after they beat people up. He tells me, “We don’t beat people up.” We have more words. I tell him that yes, I do want to make an internal affairs complaint for a cop threatening an arrest for the act of putting a dog in the car while I go to the bank to pay the City’s ticket.
What Sgt. Steinberg said next floored me, “WHAT IS YOUR OCCUPATION?” I wanted to tell him none of your f-ing business and what difference does it make? So I fudged and said legal consultant.
There, I feel a little better for venting but if the citizen complaint line is in the business of asking people their occupation then why bother complain. And, yes, I want my pound of flesh.
Mike, complaints like yours are why Oakland has ended up with more investigators for IA than it has for all other investigations. A totally baseless complaint that started off with your own refusal to obey the law.
Robert, now that I have cooled down I agree and will withdraw everything.
Wow Max, sounds like you’ve been dealing with a lot recently:
http://www.eastbayexpress.com/news/you_don_t_know_jack/Content?oid=1232930
Glad you were able to defend yourself…
Kudos to Robert Gammon for great coverage in the East Bay Express on another interesting view of the soft under belly of Oakland politics in the flats. Poverty funding continues to be an inside job for the chosen few who make the most noise (and threats). Those who suffer most in this tragicomedy are the much maligned and downtrodden poor of Oakland . They are the ones the funds are designed for and who are rarely served by the downtown administrators. For shame! What can be so difficult about distributing funds to those who really qualify? And thanks to Max for standing up to the West Oakland race charade. This stuff does not wash with the majority of the people who live there. West Oakland is a qreat place and so are it’s denizens.
Thanks guys, for the acknowledgement.
i like the way gammon got in a back handed complement of MA as “challenging the neighborhood’s traditional black and progressive power structure” Anti progressive. That’s fighting words in this town.
So which cc member proposed the 50k grant and who voted for it. Link to the council meeting?
-len raphael
temescal
It’s an important story about the Max Factor and city government. It shows what someone with instincts and intelligence does to get justice, or at least expose a fraud.The other lesson is that the media and Oakland power structure are sheep/lemmings for celebrating Mr. Jack.
So apparently, by some entity’s measure, we’re the third most crime-ridden city in the US. This honor was bestowed upon us by the same group who gave us a #5 ranking in 2008 vs. a #4 ranking in 2007. At which time Mayor Dellums seized upon this “improvement” as progress. What is his current excuse? Someone needs to shuffle the flashcards.
Barbara Boxer announces she’s trying to get funding for CompStat: “I am pleased to let you know that funding in the amount of $1,325,000 was included in the Senate version of this bill.”
Let’s hope it makes it through to the final bill. It’s worth fighting for, especially as our “City Leaders” show no signs of finding funds for it instead of their discretionary, especially “cultural”, projects.
Something of a non-sequitor, but I remember a ways back when a bunch of the pro-car folks on this here blog trumpeted the ability of drivers to pay for road infrastructure while public transit always receives subsidy.
To that end, I would recommend a second look: http://la.streetsblog.org/2009/11/24/new-report-road-funding-from-non-road-users-doubled-in-25-years/
Just for fun-
Oakland is confused.
How about the clothing store Melt on grand Avenue- their slogan “It’s not what you wear but how you wear it.” Hey kids for you it Is what you wear because you’re a clothing store – now out of business. Replaced by Tea shop and foot spa- shouldn’t this be the commercial for what 2 business don’t belong together. How bout a little toe jam with your crumpet.
On lakeshore they are confused as well you’ve got you high end chocolate store then your upscale fitness center then you Domino’s and Weight watchers…lemee outta here
Chris, Thanks for posting this.
Funny I was thinking of the same thing today when on Forum they were talking about “What would you pay for to make driving safer? Increased taxes for safer highways, blah blah blah” and I thought: In CA we’ve already paid for $40 billion in bonds for Hwy reconstruction funds, the 4th bore in the C, etc.
This State is crazy, & I’m not even a conservative. I wonder what bond measures they’ll come up with next year…
AC transit’s fare recovery is, what, 17%? (East Bay Express IIRC).
Gas taxes pay for 51% (and with an economic recovery some day, maybe), it’ll go back to 60%. Want to raise gas taxes? Fine, but again, a similar “recovery” rate for buses would require a $6 fare (or, heaven forbid, a rational pay & benefit scale for workers). I also don’t think the fare recovery covers capital costs, which again, are paid for by bonds typically.
Furthermore, that article is talking about federal roads & highways. What’s the rate for California?
Finally, 15% of federal gas tax dollars are diverted for transit. Well, 94%+ (and the percentage has only increased over decades) of Americans drive to work etc so again, a disproportionate amount of money is spent on transit projects that fewer people use.
There are two articles in Today’s paper that struck me.
One was on how poorly pets and the shelters that support them are doing during nationwide in this recession. The other is on Oakland Animal Care and control.
What some people do to animals is just horrible. Oakland ACC has to deal with all of it, and yet they are succeeding. We should really congratulate them on a job well done.
Thank you Animal Care and Control. You make me proud to be an oaklander, and supporter. This is a very bright spot for OPD (which runs the shelter)
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34117457/ns/us_news-the_elkhart_project/
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/11/25/BABV1AILRA.DTL
David,
User fees (gas taxes, registration, etc) covered 65% of road costs in 2007. ($124.5 billion fees of $192.7 billion road expenditures.) The 5 year average is over 70% covered.
The expenditures includes federal, state and local expenditures for both highways and local roads. It also includes highway law enforcement, e.g. California Highway Patrol.
The data is available here, http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/policyinformation/statistics/2007/
and you should be able to get enough information to pull out the CA specific data.
But as you indicate, car drivers pay for the bulk of road costs while transit users only pay a small percentage of transit costs.
Robert and David, how do you conclude that drivers are less subsidized than transit riders when your source identifies over fifty billion dollars in car subsidies? And you of course are not counting local sources – even here in supposedly progressive Alameda County, we pay for highways out of sales tax, and the City of Oakland subsidizes car parking out of the General Fund.
The fact is that the government is spending crazy sums encouraging people to drive, with more-efficient public transit getting only some scraps. What is the point of your argument? That because we subsidize cars more, and people then use cars more, that we should increase distorting subsidies? You guys sound like the Oakland City Council.
Not to mention, did you notice the news items this week on the highest ranked greenhouse gas emitters in California? Number one is the Richmond Chevron refinery.
This is nothing new, either. I worked on a comprehensive statistical book about refinery emissions in 1974-5, and it was among the highest-ranked polluters then too, before anyone was worrying about atmospheric warming effects. So when do we get to make this better? Right now we are all sharing a n atmosphere that is declining precipitously in quality, and there isn’t a spare available.
It’s some form of double-dipping! First they emit greenhouse gases to produce gasoline, then the driver puts the gasoline into the car so they can burn it and emit: pollution and greenhouse gases. That cost isn’t in your calculations anywhere, Robert and David, but the health consequences, air and water pollution consequences, and global warming consequences have a very heavy cost that we all pay. The transit rider is not running up these costs nearly as much.
AC Transit should be subsidized as much as it takes, and we should rebalance the equation to subsidize automobile driving much much less.
Good point, Naomi. And what are the costs to Oakland of being divided by highways built for suburban car commuters? It’s difficult to measure, but certainly costs the city enormous sums in lost property taxes, a poorer economic and neighborhood climate, and the heath consequences of pollution.
I would subsidize AC Transient more if I felt it could offer a viable alternative to the automobile. And with the great Mary King now the General Manager of AC, things will only get worse. Smaller buses running more frequently and getting rid of morbidly obese drivers to reduce fuel and health costs would also help.
As for Chevron, let’s run them out of the Bay Area along with auto use. The air and views from the Oakland hills will be prettier. I am not sure it will stop the irreparable harm cause by the violence in this city.
While we are at saving the world, let’s hammer PG&E. 80 percent of electricity in California comes from fossil fuelsl Not very green unless we turn off all the lights. We could have nuclear power, but….arghhh, not in my backyard.
Subsidize more and punish those who pay taxes and everything will be better.
Sorry, Naomi, the greenhouse hypothesis is a myth. lies by scientists.
i’m not talking about absolute subsidy dollars, i’m talking about as a percentage of costs, and it’s far greater for mass transit.
BIO, AC Transit does provide a viable alternative to the automobile. Oakland has a very high transit mode-share. Smaller buses don’t save money, that’s a popular canard – in fact, it’s quite the opposite, and ACT’s routes with the largest buses (like the 1R) are also the most cost-effective. Mary King is the interim manager, by the way, and the agency is searching nationally for a permanent director – not that I have any problems with Ms. King, a long-time public servant in Oakland, running the agency.
David, you are conveniently ignoring most car subsidies, from pollution to land-use to debt service on highways (which is what’s dragging California’s budget down). Global warming or no, the costs of manufacturing and using gasoline are immense, and public subsidies for drivers are only encouraging more use of these harmful and limited resources.
Cars are cheap. And gas is cheap.
And the ‘public subsidies’ again for driving, are smaller (as a percentage of funds) than user fees.
And AC transit is a viable alternative for the automobile if 1) you don’t value your time and 2) you’re not hauling any groceries/people etc. In terms of time, it’s cheaper to drive, and in terms of money as long as you’re driving yourself and one other person at least, it’s cheaper in terms of cash out the door.
Seriously, an example. I can ride the 1R to downtown Berkeley from my house. It will take about an hour, at least (I’ve done it, not counting the walk to the stop). I could drive the same distance (about 16 miles on google maps) in 15 minutes (done it repeatedly). Cost in gas: about $1.50-$1.75.
Bus: Incremental Cost in time (if I pay myself minimum wage): $5, plus fare= $7.
Even IF you capitalize your car cost etc, I’m paying maybe $3-$4 for a 16 mile trip.
Round trip bus costs me $14 in incremental time lost and fare, car costs me about half that.
It’s a no-brainer to drive, and that works for every distance but the Transbay bus (which I do take, plus carpool)
Modern cars hardly pollute (and I’m talking real pollution–carbon monoxide etc, not carbon dioxide, which doesn’t do anything, as we’ve seen from the scientists’ own emails). The only thing less productive than me sitting on a bus is sitting here typing on a blog:)
David, I don’t know whether you have children and grandchidren to suffer the consequences of environmental degradation. I worry not only about my own generation, but about those who will follow us, who surely deserve to inherit a habitable planet.
I have children and a grandchild and I worry less about air quality, which has improved since I was young, than I do about the degradation of public safety . I understand death by violence and emotional dysfunction is quite high for young people in this town. This is not Chevron’s fault.
Robert & David,
–Gas is cheap I’m part because of massive govt subsidies & tax $ to the gas companies. That should b factored in to your costs;
–Where in your link is the $40 Billion CA Bond for Hwy and Infrastructure taken into account? (This included both Hwy and Mass Trans, but mostly Hwy);
–The FHS’ initial cost was $425 BILLION. The cost of cars and highways is lower today only because some of the highest costs have already been spent to make them cheaper today;
–Remember the reason we have buses is because GM, Firestone & Standard Oil paid to have the Key System ripped out.
So if we need buses at all it’s because these 3 forced it on us.(It’s more than ironic to then say buses are too expensive so we should stop them all together!).
And if we then need to re-install rail infrustructure today at high costs it’s for exactly the same reason! Factoring in this history, cars would have to pay even more to make up for this massive dis-investment, then re-investment at taxpayer expense!
–I don’t know if you think mass trans shouldn’t exist, but u need some way for people who can’t afford to drive to get places…
–For that matter if you’re arguing that we shouldn’t have mass trans then one has to wonder what kind of conjestion would exist for drivers. You have to admdit there are at least some benefits for cars & drivers too.
–Cars enabled mass migration to the burbs. Then it costs mass transit a gazzilion $ to follow the masses, and you’re surprised?
If u think mass transit is too expensive, then the obvious solution is to stop it’s expansion to the suburbs and make it more efficient where it already is. Personally I wouldn’t mind this (or spending my tax $ on teachers, officers and making our businesses more competitive, or my own pocket…)
I also wouldn’t mind seeing some cost savings in BART salaries. I think the way BART is managed does a dis-service to everyone, including advocates of mass-transit, by making it so expensive to go to so few places. NYC is 10x better, even if dirtier. Then again we’re getting back to legacy costs…
I was going to do a long comment with diagrams and circles and arrows and all that stuff, but got busy, and lost the energy for writing something for folks, many of whom are less interested in data than in their own feelings about stuff. So in dto’s words, here are the facts.
If you ignore sales taxes on cars and related auto services, there is a subsidy for roads and highways. However, drivers pay about 95% of the full costs for operation of their cars and road construction and maintenance. Transit users on the average pay only 20 to 25%, with ACTransit users paying only 17% of operation only costs. So while my trip to San Leandro might go from $5.50 to $5.75 in my car, that trip on ACTransit would go from $2.00 to $12.00. Which do you think has a bigger impact on transportation decisions? So quit whining about the subsidy for cars distorting decisions because if all subsidies for transportation were eliminated it is mass transit that would suffer.
Now, as Naomi points out, there are good reasons for reducing dependence on gas powered cars, greenhouse warming and social justice being among them. But mass transit in general and bus systems in particular are a remarkably financially inefficient way to accomplish those goals. If you are seriously concerned about global warming you should be putting the money into electric cars, electric rail systems and those nuclear power plants. If you are really concerned about social justice, figure out a system for subsidizing car ownership for the poor, which would be cheaper than subsidizing buses, and provide far more equality for the poor and far better opportunities.
Rather than focusing on something that likely has marginal impacts on auto usage, highway subsidies, focus on looking for real solutions to the problems such as global warming and social justice. Buses do a poor job on either of those, and a financially inefficient job to boot. But as long a people continue to default to the idea that we should put more money into systems that are not used, we will never focus on looking for innovative solutions to our real problems. the default option should be to look for new solutions that do a good job of accomplishing our real goals.
Robert, I’d be interested to see how you square your argument with this: http://dc.streetsblog.org/2009/09/17/a-few-words-on-user-fees/
Chris, I really don’t see the need to reconcile with somebody who only looked at part of the picture, federal expenditures, and from the comment did not even do that correctly. My comment was about total expenditures on roads. And as I said, I lost a lot of energy for this compared to 2 days ago, but…
From the references in your earlier link, the federal highway agency indicates that there are about $122 billion is user fees from vehicles (includes gas taxes, registrations, tolls, etc.), net of collection costs. Same source give $193 billion for all road expenditures, including federal, state and local government on highways and local roads, and including highway law enforcement. This number also includes expenditures from bonds along with bond interest and redemption costs. So the total subsidy is around $70 billion. From DOT numbers, there were about 135 billion gallons of gasoline sold in the US, along with about 40 billion gallons of other fuels, much of which are used by vehicles on roads. But to be generous, considering only the gasoline sales, the subsidy would be accommodated by a $0.50 per gallon additional tax. With 20 miles per gallon average, this would be about 2.5 cents per mile. Now the average cost of car ownership is about $0.55/mile, so the additional cost to eliminate all (quantifiable) road subsidies would be around 5% of the cost of operating the car.
On the other hand, I fully agree with Ryan’s last comment, that this country needs a rational transportation policy. But when you fully account for all costs, it just might not work out quite the way you expect.
Gas is not cheap because of massive federal subsidies. Gas is heavily taxed. The companies that produce gasoline (and/or crude oil) are heavily taxed.
Gas is a cheap energy source on a dollar/BTU basis (relative, to, say, solar power) because of simple physics and chemistry. There’s nothing easier than sticking a big straw in the ground and sucking up some seriously concentrated energy. There’s nothing harder than trying to take a huge, diffuse energy blanket and concentrate it in your tank. it’s called entropy.
Naomi, I have kids. And to second the comment above, I’m way more worried about getting shot around 106th and MacArthur getting off the NX3 at 9 pm than air pollution, which may or may not shorten my 80th decade (and as pointed out above, has only gotten better; I remember just in the 1980’s the smog in San Diego and LA when I’d visit relatives, now it’s clear almost all the time down there).
Finally, mass transit in nearly all incarnations is not efficient use of funds as pointed out above. It’d be cheaper over all to take those clunkers and hand them out to poor people, or, heck, subsidize cabs. In certain cities, really only NYC, Chicago, and maybe Boston, DC and a handful of others in the USA, is the population density such that mass transit makes sense over all from a congestion point of view etc.
As for the Key Route, it wouldn’t be any cheaper today if it were in place. First off, it was slow. Second off, it would still need big capital spending. I lived in Chicago, the CTA and the ‘L’ was terribly slow (I could literally bicycle from my house to downtown, 6.5 miles away, faster than taking the train, without coming close to breaking a sweat, in summer), always short of capital funds, and still cost $1.75, now $2 for a fare.
Finally, city dwellers don’t understand the attraction of the ‘burbs. But once again, throughout human history, people have left the cities to smaller, less dense towns. In the past only the rich could afford it (the landed gentry), now the middle class can. You would prefer to socially engineer out this deep human desire to have a little yard, etc etc. It can’t be done. Period. Sorry. As my econ professor would say regarding socialism, “Great idea. Wrong species.”
So based on what David said, there should be in emphasis on population density in order to make mass transit practical. I think that is happening in the downtown/uptown/JLS/Lake Merritt parts of Oakland. David also mentioned that a suburban environment appeals to many people. I think Oakland can develop a suburban type of environment in the eastern parts of the city. I think it would be nice to have both environments in one city.
Dave and Robert, I really don’t mind your POV as I learn from the exchange of ideas. FTM I wouldn’t mind some if the Trans backers to respond to your points. In the meantime:
–The oil companies DO get subsidies for exploration (even when it’s subcontracted out). I do realize it would probably still b cheapest.
–Without any public trans you are going to have pubic parking issues in any dense areas. Cars alone simply can’t address that.
–Interesting point about giving electric cars away for free. Logistically very difficult especially with the rate of car thefts. Maybe subsidized Car Shares would b an intermediate solution? (+private companies could handle this);
–Key System: The point is not it’s past speeds. The point is it had established infrustructure. That’s what’s most expensive. More modern & efficient transport could easily have been placed on top of it.
–The history is important because it fundamentally Impacts the costs today. GM and the others tore out public rail in Oakland, LA, and other cities, roads and Hwys got massive infrastrucure subsidies instead, and then u say cars are cheaper? Duh, no surprise there.
Why shouldn’t newer public Trans receive the same subsidies for infrustructure that cars got? Especially as it solves the parking problems that eveyone having a car will present (and that u have not answered a solution for);
–I take your point about the cost of buses, and it’s the same with the cost of engines for trains and BART. If more questions were asked about these and other costs then it would probably become more efficient.
–Then there’s the same for labor costs, which in the Bay Area are holy even when BART employees earn on avg 100K+. Whenever more money is allocated labor points to the money and says they need more of it. This makes BART less efficient, & cost more.
But public transport and labor are holy, no matter the costs, so nothing is done to make them more efficient. Welcome, once again, to the all or nothing view of American politics. There is no in between anymore. Both the left and the right are responsible for being this IRRESPONSIBLE.
“throughout human history, people have left the cities to smaller, less dense towns”
This is patently false. Please, I would love to see any evidence to prove this. Throughout history cities were enormous magnets for excess population from the countryside and did not shed population out into the surrounding areas. This constant influx into cities was a necessity because, until the industrial revolution, cities were a net loss for overall population. Public health and the quality of life caused more deaths than births in every city, making it imperative that they attract rural populations in order to even maintain a stable head count, much less grow and prosper.
The urge to remove yourself from the city to the surrounding areas (whether we want to call them suburbs, garden cities, etc.) is only an invention of when cities reversed their death/birth rates and started becoming a net gain for population. This practice only became available for upper-middle class with the implementation of railroads and, most especially, street-car systems (funny that the street-car, now one of the urbanist’s best friends, was once the original tool of spreading sprawl. Land speculators would build street car systems out to parcels they owned and subdivided). True suburbs, in the sense that we know them today, only became a viable option once cars and highway systems were put in place. San Fernando Valley was still almost all farmland until the 1940s. Even areas like Lakewood(dead center in the LA bowl) were not fully developed until the 1950s.
So, if by “throughout human history”, you mean “the last 70 years”, then: yes.
This is patently false. Please, I would love to see any evidence to prove this.
>>
Look up archaeological evidence. There were suburbs of Babylon, Tenochtitlan, Mohenjo Daro, Rome, and other large cities in history. Rich Romans had their country houses etc for centuries.
http://www.latinamericanstudies.org/maya/caana.htm
” Archaeologists have uncovered what they say is a prime example of Maya suburbs in the ruins of Caracol in Belize.
Excavations by Dr. Diane Z. Chase and Dr. Arlen F. Chase, archaeologists at the University of Central Florida in Orlando, have revealed that
beyond the grand palaces at the core of Caracol, one of the largest Maya cities, lay crowded settlements of workshops and modest dwellings of
poor construction. They likened this to the poor neighborhoods and industrial zones that surround the centers of modern cities. ”
Try again. And seriously, if suburbs were so evil, people wouldn’t move there. Given a choice, people fled the cities in droves in the past century.
The magnitude of scale is so completely different that you cannot call them suburbs. That’s like saying the Temescal is a suburb of the DTO.
There were no suburbs of Rome, what are you talking about? Being exiled ten miles away was considered a similar punishment to death.
Scale is dependent upon mode of transportation. Cars driving on freeways at 65 mph is quite different from a human walking beside a fully laden donkey over an eroded, muddy surface. At 2 mph, Temescal is an hour away from DTO. In my car, I can drive from my home in Oakland to Napa in less time.
??? Rome had an extensive network of suburbs; the many enclaves of seaside villas around the Bay of Naples, for example. It is well-documented that our system of urban-suburban-exurban is derived from their early example. Our suburbs, as they have become denser, are just more “urban” in character than ancient Roman suburbs were. Don’t forget – Rome laid out much of the infrastructure around the Mediterranean – roads/highways, towns and cities that are still in use today.
And please, I’d like you to address the population issue. How could people “throughout history” be leaving dense cities for less dense country towns when cities had higher death rates than birth rates? Wouldn’t these cities simply empty out and die?
Patrick, you’re exactly right. Transportation DOES change the scale of what is possible. But transportation also completely alters the way in which we go about living. To that end, what does an area on the other side the city walls have in common with a far-flung exurb? Not much. To put them both under the term “suburb” and call it a day is a mischaracterization.
What’s more, throughout history, these “suburbs” have never been the preferred or dominant form of living, but rather auxiliary and subordinate to the city. It’s only in our era that this paradigm has shifted. I affix this less to “preference” and more to the FHA and the growth machine that it spawned in the wake of the Great Depression/WWII. People treat trends from the past as some sort of inevitable will of heaven. This is not the case.
His statement doesn’t state that people weren’t also moving to the cities. Population growth has always been upward (except during the black plague). Those people have to live/work somewhere. And as people moved into the cities, others left for the suburbs. Just as now. You can’t just use one city’s death and birth rates and ignore all other neighboring cities and towns. Land is finite. Population is not (at least so far).
And what city’s death rate exceeded birth rate over a meaningful period of time? If that were the case, all cities would be empty.
They may not have been dominant but they most certainly were preferred (at least during most of the year). Most ancient “suburbs” were the province of the wealthy – just like the suburbs of early 20th century America – the Main Line in Philadelphia, for instance.
And, yes, until recently, suburbs were subordinate to the city. Because the city was where wealth was generated, while the suburbs were where people lived. That lasted for nearly 2000 years. The Interstate system in the US ended that in our country.
But I think we need to look outside of the US – in what other country do we see “suburbs” like Walnut Creek planning for a new Neiman Marcus (augmenting their already fabulous array of retail), while the “city”, Oakland, with 7 times the population, has a ragtag Sears and a Wal-Mart? I think the answer is “pretty much nowhere”.
Again, to compare suburbs of the past with suburbs today is foolishness. That would be like comparing modern-day Oakland with ancient Rome. With the exception of human blood-sport, they have very little in common.
A suburb is simply a place that is not urban but depends upon a close, larger, urban neighbor for part of its economic viability.
Until recently suburbs were subordinate to the city….exactly….
Now, however, the hoi polloi can live in the suburbs, not just the rich. Guess what? The hoi polloi like the ‘burbs for the same reasons the rich do–a spot of land for yourself, less congestion, better schools etc. And yes, this is thanks to the automobile. Thank you, automobile, for democratizing the way people can choose to live.
And now, more than before, the suburbs are where the wealth is generated. Why? Because, at least in America (and actually in more European cities than you’d think), too many cities have become poorly-run, crime-ridden, over-taxed hellholes. The suburbs are cheaper, easier, and provide better services, and now, provide at least as much, if not more employment opportunities (Pleasonton of course has the highest median income in the East Bay).
If you want to improve cities/attract more people, make the cities more attractive. Improve schools, reduce crime, etc. And as we saw from 1998-2005 or so, we did see modest upticks in city populations around the country.
But again, you’re not going to socially engineer out the desire of many, if not the majority of people to have a SFR or at least a townhouse, a spot of land, etc.
You can’t say that suburbs were the realm of the wealthy alone and then turn around and say “…the city was where wealth was generated, while the suburbs were where people lived. That lasted nearly 2000 years”. It’s either one or the other. And it wasn’t where the majority of the people lived. They lived in the city. And worked there too.
“And what city’s death rate exceeded birth rate over a meaningful period of time? If that were the case, all cities would be empty.”
Practically every major city had a higher death rate than birth rate until the modern era. It’s entirely possible for that to be the case and still have cities survive: the countryside provided the inflow.
The desire for a SFR is not hard-wired into our DNA as humans. It’s simply a social trend that was similarly “socially engineered” for mass consumption in our country back in the 30s.
I’m not against SFR. I’m not even against suburbs. I’m just against convincing ourselves that a relatively new, dominant social trend is the apogee of human existence.
oops, when I referenced the “majority” of the poeple, I was speaking in terms of urban/suburban. Clearly, the majority of humanity had a rural existence until the late 20th century.
Re the Key System. GM and others did conspire to buy up streetcar lines, but this only worked because many lines, such as the Key System, were financially weak, had extensive deferred maintenance, and were poorly perceived by the population. So GM bought up the systems, and then sold buses to the resulting companies. Modern, clean buses were seen as a huge improvement over the decrepit streetcars. GM was in this to sell buses, it had little to do with cars. Although the popularity of cars was the major cause of the financial weakness of the streetcar lines. (Remember, the Key System had tracks on the Bay Bridge, the Transbay Terminal was designed for streetcars from the East Bay, and the Key System still could not compete with cars.) The remnants of the Key System were ultimately acquired by ACTransit in 1958.
In retrospect, the loss of the right of way was a tragedy, but it was not seen that way at the time.
History is important in understanding how we got here, but trying to right the wrongs of history is not a particularly good way to plot a path forward. Because you can’t change the past, you can only chnage the future.
According to the UN, this is the first year a majority of the world’s population lives in urban areas.
lg, I appreciate your questions. You are right, transit may do a good job to help alleviate parking problems, and rush hour congestion. But I find it amusing that the these problems are ones that impact the car dirvers themselves. Although it may explain the support for transit issues, the hope that others will take transit to make their own driving easier.
If you are seriously interested in finding solutions, you have to ask the right questions. When your question, “Why don’t we give more money to transit to make up for past wrongs?”, contains its own answer, you make not end up with the right answers.
Robert, The Key System was private, was not getting the big influx of public funds that established the Hwy system at the time (again $400 billion+), and the “decrepit streetcars” could have been replaced with newer ones.
The buses you’re complaining about are the ones the car companies gave us.
Also you’re approving of the buses when they replaced the key system but saying you’re against them today. Which is it?
Remember: Before the advent of cars all the Public Transport WAS private. The car companies got subsidized costs to build it’s infrastructure & ripped out the competition that wasn’t subsidized. Now you complain that Mass Trans shouldn’t be subsidized. So basically your for subsidizing cars but not Mass Trans.
If you don’t like the buses blame the car companies you’re lathering with praise. They should be taxed for the higher costs they left the public hanging with (ALL of it: the buses, the roads AND the rails that had to be re-started from scratch).
Again, I ask, for the umpteenth time: Since some form of Public Transport is needed to relieve auto congestion into the biggest cities (oakland, SJ but even more SF), what is your solution for this? Or are you going to dispute that there would be increased congestion without Mass Trans?
Robert, I think our last posts crossed each other. Re. drivers and Mass Trans riders not being the same, I don’t think that’s at all the case. Many people drive to a BART station. And if they weren’t riding BART they’d certainly be driving (that, or some of the jobs would leave SF, which I’m surprised isn’t happening faster).
The problems of yesterday are fundamentally the problems of today. It’s not just to “right a wrong” for the sake of it. It’s part of the funding solution!
It’s such an American thing to say, Oh the past is the past, we shouldn’t even think about it. Well, as Joe Biden said, “The Past is Prologue”. It’s fundamental to why we’re here today, and why mass trans is so expensive. So a solution to the past is also a practical solution for today (maybe not all, but part. I do agree costs of Mass Trans need to come down).
If you agree Mass Trans needs to have some role, and I agree that the costs of Mass Trans need to come down, and we take into account where we are today, where’s the overlapping solution?
The desire for a SFR might not be hardwired into human DNA, yet I find it interesting that the global trend is for 1) poor rural folks living in their huts, then 2) poor urban folks living in their tenements, then 3) rich folks moving back to SFRs in the countryside/suburbs, then 4) middle class folks moving back to SFRs in the countryside/suburbs. The only thing “new” about this trend is #4. This tells me that as soon as people have the choice and means to get their SFR (that’s nicer than their farm hut), they do. It might not be hardwired, but it’s pretty darn close.
But you know what, you can have much denser SFRs. My ‘hood in Chicago had SFRs on 3125 sq ft (standard Chicago lot is 25X125 ft) lots, and it worked fine. People in California have yet to discover that you can build a second story on your house. (along with dual pane windows, insulation, underground utilities, waste pipes in the walls, not on the outside of your house, which is fugly etc etc.)
Oh, and livegreen, yes, the public transit was private, in Chicago for example. The transit companies went bankrupt one by one, and were amalgamated and taken over by the CTA. And Chicago is twice as dense as Oakland, laid out on a grid started in 1837, and fundamentally all laid out by 1900, well before automobiles, so remind me how the general motors conspiracy laid waste to these privately run systems or how massive gov’t automobile subsidies for roads did so. And congestion in Chicago is unreal compared to Oakland. In my former residence, it would take easily 15 minutes to go 2 miles on a divided 4 lane city street (i.e. major thoroughfare). It rarely takes me more than 15 minutes to go from my hood to downtown or even Berkeley, 11-16 miles away. But yet, mass transit requires huge subsidies, and people prefer to drive for most trips etc etc even in Chicago. The only, what I would call “transit majority” city in the USA is NYC, and despite Bay Area protests to the contrary, there ain’t nothing about here that is NYC-like, except the R.E. prices.
D
Dude. I can’t believe you quoted Biden. One thing we can all agree on, is that man is an idiot.
I’m not against mass transit, but it is what it is, a subsidy for poor people and yes, costs are ridiculous. Sorry, but it’s true, especially here (again, the couple places where it’s not true is NYC, maybe Chicago and SF). Everybody else who’s employed and makes more than minimum wage drives everywhere, except maybe to work, due to the tolls etc. You won’t change that unless you make gas $10/gallon and/or somehow turn Oakland into Brooklyn. Ain’t gonna happen.
interesting question as to the current relation of temescal, montclair, fruitvale etc. bear to dto. historicially they developed as either suburbs, montclair, or quasis independent villages such as fruitvale or temescal.
does the General Plan promulgate a view of a city with a very dense core, then dense tendrils leading out of it along transportation routes? or does it just envision the dense transportation corridors without a core?
-len raphael
temescal
David, I agree the Mass Transit here is nothing like NYC. NYC isn’t nearly as nice looking as the BART trains but it goes a lot more places and costs a lot less. In large part because of the established infrastructure costs (& lower wages/benefits).
There are plenty of rich people living in Oakland but esp. SF. A lot more than in Walnut Creek and PL. Your theory about all the rich & MC moving out to the burbs is just plain wrong, at least today. It’s going in both directions, though because of RE prices just recently there’s been more vacating the entire Bay Area. For years big cities have been receiving a BIG influx of people. It all depends WHEN we’re talking about. Again, the Past is Prologue.
But then apparently you don’t like to look backwards. Just like the Allies after WW1. Or Sarah Palin. Lessons of history don’t exist. You’re 100% right and everybody else is 100% wrong (Iike all those rich folk living in SF, or Piedmont or the Oakland hills, instead of WC or PL). You’re going Rogue and ain’t nobody going to dissuade you…Dude…
LG, when you insist on quoting Biden, it’s really hard to take you seriously. When you ignore history (all those rich folks in SF buying their summer cottages on the Peninsula or Millsmont 100 years ago), it’s really hard to take you seriously. When you set up your straw woman with Palin, it’s really hard to take you seriously.
but that’s ok. Nothing’s going to dissuade you that you believe you can socially engineer humans to conform to what you think is the lifestyle they should lead. Your hubris would be amusing if it weren’t filled with the typical totalitarian tendencies inherent with failed socialist ideals from the past. You think I ignore history? Give me a break. Learn to love freedom. It’s not so bad.
PS. Didn’t we just have a few massive threads on how/why the MIDDLE class left/is leaving Oakland? Just like SF, there’s the bifurcation–rich people who can afford their mansion in the city (and summer homes elsewhere) and poor people who can’t afford to move. Middle class emulate the rich on a small scale by giving up the city and moving to the burbs.
Social engineering comes in many forms. The mortgage interest deduction is a fine example. So is fully funding freeway expansion while cutting transit funding. The late Paul Weyrich espoused commuter rail to the suburbs as an aid to keeping the missus home by reducing family expense of a second car. As to freedom, I can only say that when I started spending summers in Chicago at my grandfather’s house, the freedom of being able to go to museums (Science and Industry), libraries etc, by simply taking a bus sure beat the deal back in suburban DC where EVERYTHING was a several mile drive–meaning persuading parents to ferry us.
As to transit being a giveaway to the poor, the numbers don’t support that. The per rider $$ expended on buses (AC and similar) are a pittance compared to the costs of the commuter rail services for the largely upper middle wage earning riders of Metrolink, Metra, Caltrain, NJT, Metro-North. I should add that the very disdain shown for mass transit is why BART has always tried to portray itself as “commuter rail” with the cushy seats, carpet and ‘attitude’ toward short distance urban riders–who despite BART’s efforts are the backbone of ridership.
As to SFR, yes, the social engineering of the GI Bill and FHA, gave us suburban sprawl and the degradation of the cities, perhaps you would have preferred the “freedom” of unsubsidized mortgage rates and construction financing?
lg,
There is absolutely no inconsistency in saying that the buses in the 50s were preferred by the population over streetcars and also saying that buses are cost inefficient compared to cars today. First, 50 years have passed and therefore the situation could have changed. Second, a comparison of buses to streetcars, and a comparison of costs of cars to buses are different types of comparisons, and both could be true simultaneously. And finally, even if they were the same type of comparison, it would be fully logically consistent to say that buses are better than streetcars, and cars are better than buses. That would only lead to the conclusion that cars are better than streetcars, which never actually came up in the comments.
GM was NOT buying bus transit companies to dismantle them to sell cars, they were buying streetcar companies to dismantle them to sell buses. The car side of GM at the time is irrelevant. The financial troubles of the streetcar lines in the late 40s and 50s had nothing to do with the interstate highway system, if for no other reason that the highway system was not started until after the streetcars were failing, and and also because the highway system mostly does not compete with the urban streetcars. The big loser from the interstate highway system construction was actually the freight railroad systems. Which have largely recovered because in spite of (or because of) being private enterprises they are cost competitive with the trucks on the highway.
While you keep saying that the interstate highway system cost $400+ billion, which I will accept, that is not all subsidy. The bulk (90%) of initial costs were paid by federal gas taxes, and the remainder was paid by the states, mostly through other fees/taxes on cars. While you, and other transit advocates, have frequently stated that immense subsidies have been give to autos, there is never any documentation provided for that claim. Let alone a comparison to the subsidy for transit over the same period of time since the 50s. As I commented above, the current subsidy to autos seems unlikely to have a major impact on transportation decisions, unlike the subsidy to mass transit.
Now, about suburbs…
I can’t let this one pass: Chris Kidd: “You can’t say that suburbs were the realm of the wealthy alone and then turn around and say “…the city was where wealth was generated, while the suburbs were where people lived. That lasted nearly 2000 years”. It’s either one or the other. And it wasn’t where the majority of the people lived. They lived in the city. And worked there too.”
Your response to my statement doesn’t make any sense at all. How many people in Atherton make their wealth in San Francisco, Cupertino, Redwood City, Sunnyvale or San Jose? Probably all of them! Therefore, “the city was where wealth was generated, while the suburbs were where people lived”. Just like the suburbs of ancient Rome encircling the Bay of Naples – they were filled with the villas of the wealthy. Here’s a link to an article in the NY Times entitled (partially) ‘Along the Alban.; The Suburbs of Ancient Rome’. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9803E3D71F3FE73BBC4952DFBF66838D669FDE
And please stop putting words in my mouth regarding where the majority of people lived. I love a good argument but when the other person resorts to falsehoods it ceases to be fun. Ancient Rome had suburbs, which were the province of the wealthy, and that wealth came from Rome, not the suburb itself. Deal with it.
David, I never pointed to any socialist tendancies (like when I said the unions were asking for too much money?) You spout the typical right wing BS, the all or nothing, take it or leave it simpleness that makes it so easy to insult your opponents without really saying anything. And when I point out the flaws in your argument, whether it’s the quote from Biden in support of my argument, or all the rich living in SF, Piedmont & the Oakland hills who haven’t moved to the burbs, rather than address my point or counter intelligently with your own, you degenerate into insulting eveyone.
I think that speaks volumes about u, not me when I stand up to it.
Were you a bully when you were in school?
len, In English usage, Temescal would still be considered a suburb, in American usage, not so much, since it does not have a separate municipal identity.
Suburbs as we know them in America did not come in to existence until the late 1800s. By this I mean areas where people lived, but commuted in to a city on a daily basis to work. There were towns surrounding cities before this, but they did not have the same functional relationship to the city. This model did not exist until better transportation networks were developed, starting with heavy rail suburbs and horse drawn streetcar suburbs in the East. Although we think today of suburbs as being auto oriented, they were originally oriented around streetcars and rail. The Trestle Glen and Grand Lake areas in Oakland are the ones here that I am most familiar with. After WWII, the availability and popularity of the auto reoriented the next ring of suburbs to be auto oriented, think much of San Leandro developed in the 50s and 60s.
Given the history in the last 150 years, with people fleeing the city to live in the burbs as soon as they could financially, it is hard to argue that there is not a great desire for the lifestyle that the suburbs provided.
The conversation gets more ridiculous by the minute. What planet are you people from? Have any of you ever even been to a suburb? People move there because they can’t afford to live in the city, and constantly talk about how they wish they could afford to live in the city, or how maybe someday when the kids are grown and they don’t need so much space, they’ll be able to move back.
this discussion is mildly entertaining because it seems to be short on facts and long on theory. people fled the city because they did not want to live with brown and black people. period. end of discussion. full stop. post script: the advent of the interstate and freeway system made it possible for people to live further out from the city (work). bigger post wwii families and a desire for land were also a contributing factor. anyone not willing to accept this as gospel truth please feel to treat me to an adult beverage at either FSWB or SOMAR so we can air it out.
Robert, Not a transit activist, just asking questions to learn.
–The Key System wasn’t just streetcars, it was also rail.
–My point was that no matter the street cars or rail at the time, they could have been upgraded instead of scrapping the entire system. Just like BART or NYC Transit today. You have skipped over that point several times now.
–If upgrades had been done and the system kept in place, perhaps reduced in volume when the demand for cars was increasing, mass trans would b far cheaper than it is today.
–Now you might say that’s the past, it is what it is today. But it is that because GM and the others paid to make it that way, paid to market the auto as the future, paid to lobby the gov, paid to rip out the tracks, paid to eliminate the competition. Otherwise we’d still have the old rail lines, they’d b less costly than starting new rail from scratch, and with nicer cars on them (like BART or NYC) they’d be more comfortable.
With the transition from rail to car, it has been a widespread movement, beyond just the car companies. The public and local and national govt all bought into it. But this was, in the manner stated above, created and supported by the auto industry. It was further supported by the tendancy of Americans to not look longterm, to look at one thing at a time, and support wherever the money is today and not tomorrow.
So we ripped out the old rail, replaced it with cars, and then stuck in new rail. Talk about a waste of money…
–You mention the original $400 Billion was 90% paid for by the gas tax. I’ll look for that. If there’s a link you can pass along that would b helpful.
–Personally I’m not happy about the amount of bond money spent on either Mass Trans or Roads. Its not that I don’t think somehing should b spent upgrading and maintaining either, I do. It’s the ridiculously high amounts that are being spent and bleeding this state dry maxing out the amount of bonds CA can issue and the interest we all have to pay.
All those bonds are paid for, just spent today and left for future generations to pay.
–I’ve asked a couple times now Robert: How do we do some mass trans? Since (as you’ve admitted) some Mass Trans is needed to help relieve conjestion.
–I’m intrigued by your earlier comments that it would b cheaper to give cars to the poor. The logistics and support might be difficult but I think it’s worth consideration. For example, is working through Car Share or something similar viable? (I wonder if they’re already trying this?)
Robert, The Interstate Hwy System was paid for with User Fees:
http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/interstate/faq.htm#question3
People please read Streetcar Suburbs: The Process of Growth in Boston, 1870-1900.
Some might be interested in a fine recent book, “From Yard to Garden” by Chris Grampp, who has researched and thought deeply about the evolution of yards in cities and suburbs. I really enjoyed the book, and it is full of great photos. He addresses a lot of factors and historic developments without making heavy value judgments. While the book takes a more or less national perspective, he has lived and worked in the east bay for a long time, and teaches at Merritt College. (Ever thought about front setbacks as a tool of social engineering?) Here’s a teaser: Have you ever considered that while it seems de rigeur for California yards to be fenced, that is not at all the norm in the northeastern US?
Our numerous pedestrian stairways and walkways in Oakland were planned to enable people to reach transit lines; Oakland Heritage Alliance and several other groups occasionally present tours of Oakland neighborhoods, and explore how transit, housing, cars, and workplaces arose together. Don’t forget water transit, too! The thing about the Key System was the convenient streetcar-to-ferry link at the Oakland Mole, out in the Bay. My father-in-law’s dad commuted from the Temescal to SF, breakfasted on the ferry, and the whole trip took less time than it does today by car. (At the end of the 1950s his house was removed for construction of Hwy 24, alas.) The truly ridiculous thing about the Jack London Sq Ferry stop is that no transit serves it!
V, yup most suburbanites would prefer to live in the city, if that meant their current house payment got them a 20 year old 2,000 sqft house in Piedmont with a large flat yard. Then there’s a segment who would prefer to live in a 4,000 sft victorian in SF with a full bay view, fully restored.
The people i know who live in Orinda, Moraga, Pleasant Hill have not the slightest interest in trading their upper middle class abodes and clean quiet hoods for a 1,300 sft house with 80 years of deferred maintenance, and public schools you wouldn’t send your dog to.
They have heard about the great restaurant scene in Oakland, but they haven’t figured out how to get safely to and from the burbs to the restaurants. They want a bunch of OAC’s just for going to Oakland restaurants. Decent tax service would suffice.
Ralph, doubtless many whites and asians left cities to avoid browns and black skinn, or were forced to leave because they knew their resale values would drop (my father in law was a bigot who did his best to keep his neighborhood white, but when he decied the whole Bay area had too many of those kind of people, he realized he’d get best price selling to a young black family. which he promptly did before moving to Montanna).
But in the last decade or so, it’s been middle class blacks moving out or not moving to Oakland in the first place unless they could afford real nice places in the hills and private school. Red lining was over but it was whites and asians and latinos who moved into the flats of oakland.
-len
Naomi, just ordered From Yard to Garden” by Chris Grampp, after i read a reader review that Grampp likes backyard lawns. That takes courage for a Bay Area landscape writer.
Somehow I don’t think Patrick would approve.
A landscaper who does a lot of Berkeley work was laughing that many of his customers insist on low water usage plantings, but also insist on putting in so me much of it to get a lush look that they don’t save any water.
V, be careful speaking about that which you do not know. As an example, my parents lived in a small apartment at 18th and Grove in Oakland until 1950, at which time my father could afford to buy a property in San Leandro where he could raise a family. From what I know from talking to my father’s friends, and the parents of my childhood friends, that was a typical pattern for blue collar workers at the time. So yes, he moved to SL when he could afford to move from an apartment to a house.
I think len has covered the current situation.
lg: “The Interstate Hwy System was paid for with User Fees:”
yes that is what I have been saying.
Blacks moving into or out of the flats has nothing to do with redlining. At this point, blacks have options. 40 yrs of opportunity means that blacks don’t have to settle. So, if your options are a gritty bay area hood or a cleaner hood on the outside where you gonna go. Heck in recent years Tracy has been a destination.
Naomi, that sounds like an interesting book. I have my own theory about the fences, and it has to do with trees. In the east the forests give a large measure of privacy between the houses, and fences may be a substitute for that. Just my thought on this one.
lg, if your point is that transportation might have evolved differently if GM hadn’t ripped out the rails, that is a possibility. But then again, it is also possible that we could be in a very similar situation, with heavy subsidies for the streetcars lines in order to keep them operating.
i’ve followed the threads here about funding of public transit bus/rail and car/truck costs and I’m confused. Operating costs and costs funded by bonds seem to get lost or muddled by how the bonds are repaid.
My tentative conclusion is that other than maybe the initial big push to build the interstates, and the big alternative value of using local streets and highways for other purposes/modes, user fees seem to pay majority of the costs of fossil fuel private and trucker infrastructure. But purely to reduce personal income inequality, and to deal with envoirmental costs we have to increase the user fees paid by non bus vehicular users.
@ Robert, Actually Interstates DO compete with urban rail services. The Dan Ryan Expressway in Chicago (I 90) was touted as relieving traffic on the South Shore Drive–but on the first day both were jammed but Rock Island and Illinois Central commuter trains had 5000 fewer riders. In that era both routes had numerous stations/riders within city limits and routes operating within streets.
The building of the Interstates opened up further suburban sprawl which cut transit ridership of all modes as workers and soon employers moved out of the urban cores.
While some transit properties were bankrupt in the 40’s others were still making a profit into the mid 50’s.
As a side note, both SF and Chicago scrapped streetcar lines because of union staffing issues-buses were one man the streetcars two.
dv, statement was biggest loser, not only impact.
for a totally different type of streetcar suburb, check out Carville-by-the-Sea: San Francisco’s Streetcar Suburb, by Woody LaBounty
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/11/29/RVCS1AK6DH.DTL#ixzz0YGeI8CjN
Len, Re. the schools, you don’t specify the past or present. Presently all of the hills and most slope elementary schools are very solid. This includes for AfAm (AM) & Latino students even if there’s still a lag.
Except for Kaiser, the hills schools have less AM & L transfer students precisely because these schools are doing so well. The Slope schools still have sizable AM &L students both because they cross over slightly into the flatlands, because there’s more AM&L living in middle class neighborhoods, and because there’s more room for transfer students (though that’s changing for younger grades, as more neighborhood kids go public &/or local in the slope areas too).
OFCY has had been positive for many of these schools giving Enrichment Classes for poor kids that would not otherwise be able to pay for them (though that might change soon).
Although AM &L students grades at these schools are below Asian & Caucasian students (again, Kaiser being the exception), they are still solid and improving. The generalization that Oakland schools are bad is old. It is much more like the the micro-climates of the Bay Area: it depends on which schools.
Robert, Yes, understood. I only pointed to that because in your comment just prior you’d said gas taxes (I just figured I’d clarify, as opposed to the ongoing costs which are both gas and user fees, as you’ve mentioned).
–Key System, my understanding is they ripped out both the rail lines and the streetcar lines (hell, the train tracks on the Bay Bridge were only used for about 20 years. What a waste of money that was). Re. the capital costs of tracks and trains/cable cars vs. just trains/cable cars: the infrastructure for new tracks, new stations, new routes (including tunnels, acquiring property for the whole system, etc.), changing the bridge back and forth, had to add significant costs.
Yes, upgrading the trains/cable cars would have cost something, I’m only saying not as much. (Q. asside : I wonder if Muni & the Boston System use any of the existing cable car tracks, or is it all new?)
–Mass Trans competition from Interstates: They compete right here! All commuters to the Bay Bridge come in on either 880, 80, or 580.
–I wonder about how the costs were spread around for repaving all the local roads for cars, widening them, etc. after the tracks were torn out. That must have been a massive undertaking for Oakland and other municipalities.
PS. Re. Hwy 24, on Wikipedia somebody got in this little jab:
“Due to the traffic jams, commuters get extended views of the scenery.”
lg, david vartanoff brought up the interesting point that San Francisco and Chicago ditched their streetcar lines for reasons that had nothing to do with GM. So maybe if GM hadn’t interfered in Oakland our transit would look different today, but then again, maybe it would look just the same.
Robert, Understood. But GM did…Still curious about your thoughts about how to relieve some congestion through mass trans (limited?) & also about car-shares?
Len, I’m confused by your confusion re. the Bonds and how they’re repaid. As I
understand both Robert’s previous posts and then reading up on ISHS, a smaller but still significant portion of the costs of Interstates are paid for by States. CA voted to pay for a significant investment in it’s infrastructure (not just roads, but mostly) with a $20 billion bond initiative (Prop. 1B of 2006) that costs about $40 billion over 30years. So while I take Robert’s point that this is paid for, I question both whether the total amount was necessary or if we can afford so much of it?
(This was Perata’s baby, a give-back to his developer friends, so I guess he’ll run on how it stimulated our economy and he knew the recession was coming so he planned for this
.
BART & Mass Trans: Same thing. We need it, but how do we make it more efficient & affordable? It’s not all or nothing like the far-left and far-right like it to appear. & the Press rarely covers the in-between or shades of grey. It’s simply to costly and complicated for them to go into detail on complicated issues. They prefer OJ, Paris Hilton, Balloon Boy, Lady Gaga, Tiger Woods sprawled out on the road, and other important things. Or, in this case, are you for or against Public Transportation Bonds?
So these Highway & Public Trans might be paid for, but at what cost to our children? And to us? (It’s bad enough at $20 Billion at the outset. Imagine if it had been $30 or $40 billion costing $60 to $80 billion…). Oh well, we’ll just cut the schools. After all, kids can’t vote.
now that the game is over I can get back to a couple of responses here.
lg, I tend to agree with many others here, that the highway system has allowed society to make what seem to me to be very bad land uses decisions, with suburban sprawl wiping out farmland, increasing our energy usage, huge houses, vast lots, etc. Totally separate from the highway costs, bonds or otherwise, this is a burden our descendants will have to live with. And I would agree with len, that a partial solution to this is to raise energy taxes, although not just on gas but on all uses of fossil fuels.
I see several problems that arise from our dependence on cars – note I am not saying there is a problem with cars, but problems that arise from cars, and it is a critical difference. If you frame the problem as too many cars and not enough transit, then the only solution can be more transit. But the actual problems I see are:
Pollution and energy consumption. Pollution now from cars is mostly from greenhouse gases which is coupled to energy. The other major vehicular pollution these days is particulates, which mostly come from diesel engines, and buses are a significant contributor. If anyone else remembers, back in the 60s and 70s, you could not see across the bay on many days due to the brown haze from auto exhaust. That is mostly gone now due to pollution controls.
Social justice issues. The poor just can’t afford to own and operate cars, and so are forced into other modes of transportation.
Congestion. Actually this is a weak one for me. Since the biggest impact of congestion caused by too many cars is on the cars themselves. this in principle is self regulating, as it is negative feedback loop.
Parking. See congestion. Also, you can easily allow the free market to take care of the parking by allowing more private parking garages to be built.
When you think about the problems this way, you can envision other possible solutions.
Pollution – we are going to have to go to electric vehicles at some point, so the sooner the better. Car share might be a way to accomplish this sooner. Small societal changes would also really help. For example, when I was commuting to Fremont, an electric car with a 50 mile range would have worked out well – if society insisted that recharging stations be provided at work places. These shouldn’t be free, just available for use. A fifty mile range for an electric car is readily doable with today’s technology. The hundred mile range without the recharge is much more difficult and expensive, although Tesla has proven you can do it.
Social justice. No cheap answer, but the current mass transit system only serves to allow the liberals to feel that they have been pure of heart, without providing anything approaching true social justice. As I have mentioned, it would be cheaper, and provide far better social justice, to subsidize cars for the poor.
Congestion. Actually I think mass transit does a reasonable job of helping with this during rush hour. But as I mentioned, I do find it amusing that the thing that mass transit does well is a benefit to the cars you are trying to get people out of.
Now I don’t know that any of the suggestions above is the best or most cost effective answer to any individual problem. That is where discussion needs to come in. And it could be that mass transit is the most effective compromise solution because it addresses all of the problems to some extent. But until you frame the problem correctly, you can’t start to have the right discussion.
Now, for an out of the box idea that addresses all of the issues, better than mass transit, and at potentially zero cost government?
What about changes to laws and incentives to get people to work close to where they live. If 50% of the population lived within 5 miles of where they worked, gas usage would drop 10 to 20%, social justice would be greatly helped because you would be able to get to work without a car, and congestion would be greatly helped.
Another possibility is a switch to a 4 day, 10 hour day, work week. this would save 20 % of commute energy costs, and could help congestion if done right. Although not so much on social justice. But since this could be done with zero cost to society, maybe then you could take the transit subsidy and give it to the poor.
lg, yes to be specific, i was thinking of flatland elementary schools, even though flatland middle schools are probably bad too.
as of last summer, i heard from a couple of temescal residents that there were no openings in k for the slope schools. though local flatland school, emerson, shows definite signs of improvement, unless you have a lot of time and energy and optimism, you wouldn’t send your kid there if you had a choice.
btw, is it easier to transfer from out of district if your local school is on the failure list? or if your siblings attend ?
Claremont middle, seems to be holding it’s own, recovering slow but steady. But compared to a private school like Park or St Pauls? or the middle schools in Piedmont, Orinda, or (even) nice sections of WC.
-len raphael
Robert, I’m all for having people work closer to where they live. I think, however, that Oakland has done a poor job recruiting businesses to Oakland. This is not just white collar, but also blue collar. Until the bubble burst, the Planning Commission was turning all the light-industrial, mixed-use properties into Residential and Live-Work lofts. In turn a lot of warehouse owners let these units stand empty, waiting for a sale to developers.
They could have converted run down motels & vacant areas (the James example), but no, they wanted to rid the City of blue collar employers. Less blue collar employment base = more poor & more crime…
Now they’ve changed their policy only slightly: They want to turn all the light-industrial & mixed-use into Retail and/or Auto Retail. Even if it’s in very poor, high-crime areas where a retail store would be crazy to locate, and even while SL-Hayward-Fremont-North SJ recruit mixed-use employers that bring a solid tax base, and both blue & white collar jobs (like Solyndra)…
Of course crime doesn’t help in business recruitment. Catch-22.
Len, I think the very best Oakland Elementary schools are as good (or almost) as WC or even Piedmont. The next two tiers (mid-hill and slope) are rising steadily. A lot of people haven’t heard, and generalize, and then move without even looking into it.
Re. St. Paul’s, yeah but it costs $20,000. Head Royce is even more. (BTW, they’re a non-profit. Does tuition = a charity donation, so the rich can write off the whole tuition?)
Re. the Middle Schools, it would be nice to see Claremont continue to improve. In the meantime Montera and Edna Brewer already have. Last time I checked Edna Brewer was 70th percentile (which is average, but solid average) and 90th percentile in peer-to-peer (inner city schools). And it’s still going up, with more kids from Crocker Highlands, Cleveland, Glenview and Bella Vista going there every year. + they attract out of district from Claremont’s feeder schools…
That, btw, includes Kaiser’s high-scoring & Glenview’s solid middle scoring (above average) AfAm students.
Re. transferring from out-of-district, that’s a good question. For example, some of the Slope school parents, like Sequoia and Glenview, would often transfer up to Joaquin Miller, Montclair, Kaiser, etc. But more and more they’re staying put (+ it’s easier to make friends in the neighborhood & be active volunteers). So there’s probably just naturally less people transferring from these work-in-progress but steadily improving schools.
Siblings is the #1 criteria for preference. If OUSD does make it easier for out-of-district to transfer from “failure list’ schools (as u call it) then they probably keep it hidden. I’ve heard OFCY, however, does use geographic preference.
(Don’t know if this was written into the original Campaign literature, or the Measure, but they use it).
“What about changes to laws and incentives to get people to work close to where they live.”
hmm, company worker barracks? George Pullman built worker housing adjacent the factory and the Soviets did the same in many locations. Seriously, years ago, a ladyfriend was commuting from Berkeley to the far edge of Palo Alto. The insane Stockton/Lathrop to Sillicon Valley slog of today is no better. This waste of prime agricultural land is just dumb on all counts. As a society, we would be $$ ahead paying these workers to live closer to their jobs, or tele commute.
As to “giving cars to the poor” this mimics the Southern Pacific’s campaign to destroy what we now call Caltrain. They offered to buy vans for the paltry ridership in return for abolishing the service. The freight business along the route evaporated and SP was overjoyed to sell the ROW to the JPB for badly needed cash. Caltrain nows carries more riders than ever and the few freight cars move during off hours. I hope none of you really think scrapping Caltrain to replace the capacity with extra freeway lanes is a good idea.
lg, Oakland has done a poor job in recruiting business, but we still have almost as many jobs in Oakland as there are residents in the labor force. It is not a lack of jobs that is the fundamental problem, it is that workers don’t work where they live.
Robert, Point made. & since that’s the case, how do you propose Oakland gets more employers to hire locally, or get employees to live here?
I do think part of the solution is more jobs here, but I agree addressing your point is important.
PS. As noted in a prior discussion, and as an addition to somebody’s list, NYC has an income tax for workers who work but don’t live there…
That was from an addition to Patrick’s list under the last Budget discussion…
LG, tuition to private schools isn’t tax deductible, which is why is was always more tax advantageous to buy a house in an expensive area with good schools (eg piedmont or orinda) and deduct the real estate taxes, then to live in a mediocre area and pay big non deductible private school tuition. (i didn’t take my own advice in part because i preferred oakland).
both affluent public and private schools also expect hefty contributions from parents that are deductible.
btw, what’s definition of slope school? eg. is peralta slope or flatland? (i’d call it slope) even though same elevation as emerson.
Wouldn’t expect california to change the rules to allow local income taxes. at best, we’ll raise state taxes of various types and try to boost revenue sharing with localities.
Wonder if it’s legal to tailor a parcel tax to mimic an income tax, with exemptions based on say state income tax data, and city ok to pass 100% thru to tennants in rent controlled situations. probably depressed rents commercial and residential would keep the burden on property owners disproportionately.
Re. Head Royce, I only asked since they’re a Non-Profit and solicit donations from Foundations. A non-profit that benefits children of the wealthy? (with, of course, a few scholarships thrown in).
Yes, I’d describe Peralta as a slope school. It’s mostly an in-between description, not hills and not flatlands. They have a good mixture of both. Peralta’s API’s though are up with some of the hills. Wow are those good scores, including for minorities & socio-economically disadvantaged…
The challenges, again, that Slope schools have is they still have sizeable Minority and Socio-Economically disadvantaged students, and solid local participation too. But because of their geography OUSD & OFCY views them as hills schools. So OFCY is thinking of eliminating funding because of where they’re located, not because of the population they serve…
why are people hating on private schools? if it weren’t for private schools, we would not know how bad our public schools are. tuition is not deductible donations to private schools are deductible. by the way, universities are non-profits, yet no one asks if tuition to a university is tax deductible.
tuition barely cover 60 odd percent of a student’s education. the balance comes from the endowment.
unless someone in my family is holding out on me, private schools do not hardly benefit only the children of the wealthy.
Private schools are not uniformly better than public schools. I experienced both as a parent. I even know some relieved refugees who left Head Royce for public school.
There are two types of private schools established and accredited and others which I describe as fly by night sketch and some religious schools. It is the others category that are questionable schools. In some, if not many, cases the schools are not accredited by recognized authorities and that is a bit troublesome.
This is probably my biggest pet peeve with giving vouchers for kids to attend private schools. Private schools do not have to educate all of the unwashed masses, just some – there is limited space in any class. Thus not every kid is going to attend an accredited private schools. But ever since this whole voucher charter give a kid a fighting chance stuff started creeping into the national conversation, all sorts of bad private schools have tried to get rich quick. Don’t get me wrong there were unaccredited schools before; there are more now.
I even know some refugees from Oakland Public Schools who would kill to get into Head Royce or CPS. And a lot more relieved refugees from Oakland who left for Alameda or Berkeley to give their kids a better shot at a decent education. I am NOT, REPEAT, NOT saying Oakland schools cannot provide an education. I just beleieve there is a greater chance of children falling through the “cracks” and joining the great dumb down, media child, hipster, whatrever culture so pervasive in our communities. And as pot smoking becomes more legal in our fair City, more stoned kids will go to public school than do know. I don’t think this is as likely to happen at Head Royce or CPS. Take your chances with the kids, save some money, go public and you many loose them.
Having seen the “best” of California and Bay Area public school products at the UC-Berkeley, people around here have no clue as to how terrible even the “best” schools are.
They are utter crap compared to some no-name public school in bumble-land Wisconsin/Minnesota/Iowa. Seriously. The super-rich private schools here are almost as good as Catholic schools that cost 1/3 to 1/2 as much in “flyover country” in the upper Midwest. People need to experience both, get out of cloud-cuckoo-california land and get a clue.
by the way Ralph, your comment on private schools is a common myth about vouchers. In Milwaukee, for example, Messmer Catholic school pretty much takes everyone. Graduation rate is in the 90’s%, compared to the local public schools hovering in the 50’s%. Also over 90% go on to either 2 or 4 year schools, or the military. Most of Messmer’s students are on vouchers, almost all are from the inner city, and poor (and non-Catholic).
These schools are doing a much better job with the same student population compared to the local private schools. The difference? Better teachers, better discipline, and motivated parents.
while there is something to the joke that the main difference between private and public schools here, is that at private schools you have to pay for the right to complain, overall my experience with my kids and talking to others over the years is closer to David’s view. we used private thru 7th grade, and public thereafter. made sure to have kids active in local flatland sports activities with wide range (aka the D word) oakland kids.
David, i don’t know milwaukee, but something about your analysis about Messmer seems amiss. from what i understand of milwaukee, you pretty much gotta be dirt poor to participate in the voucher program and if the school doesn’t have a seat available then you don’t go. it does not seem likely for any private school to accept a every voucher child and still be a going concern as generally the tuition is greater than the cost to educate at a public school. Does this mean that more of the endowment supports more of the voucher kids and less to the paying student. sounds like a nasty subsidy.
As to west coast Independent Schools, I think they are different than the east coast schools Independents for a number of reasons
You guys are, once again, generalizing, and that is simply not at all the practical experience of what is happening on the ground. On the ground, the Elementary schools in the Hills are excellent, and the Slope schools are vastly improving. Two Middle Schools, Montera and Edna Brewer have already vastly improved, are continuing to do so, and still have room to improve even more (for all the reasons you’ve mentioned).
By the time they get to High School, I will grant you, there are the risks that you say. However I know people who have or are sending their kids to do the AP courses at Skyline and OakTech, and despite the risks, those kids are getting a solid education (as Ralph has mentioned the risks and the success depends not just on the schools but on the parents).
There is much work to do to improve the HS’s in Oakland to the degree the Elementary and Middle Schools have. But risks and all, the High Schools ARE showing signs of progress…
David, Re. your experience at Berkeley, I don’t know if your a professor there or what, but how do you distinguish between the prepared and unprepared CA PS students? That is, the unprepared ones would be easiest to spot (assuming there’s a way to know they’re from instate or they wouldn’t be there), but how do you know where the prepared ones are from (PubS vs. Private) if their lack of preparation doesn’t make them stand out?
Do you actually look into the background of each student and form a statistical model? Or is it just a “gut” analysis made from years of experience?
BTW, all this is said knowing that CA has a ways to go. Both Public & Private…
Don’t forget that the OUSD high schools are trying to educate a wide range of students – some well prepared, others hardly prepared at all, many kids with special needs, recent immigrants with language issues, etc. Those that are well prepared and motivated at the three remaining comprehensive high schools are getting an education equal to that at private schools and have a significant advantage – a much broader social education; they can deal with people from all sorts of backgrounds, not just those closest to their own class. Tech, Oakland High and Skyline send kids every year to the same top-notch universities that the privates brag about in their glossy promotional materials. That’s not to say they are perfect instititutions, but for many parents comfortable with the social scene at these schools (and willing to roll up their sleeves and get involved) they are an extremely attractive option. Many more kids coming from private middle schools are looking long and hard, some are coming (and not just as freshmen, but are transferring from privates after not being very impressed).
i don’t know where any of the schools are so I am unable to distinguish between flat. slope, and hill. Hopefully, the only test is not test score. I am curious how some schools raised test scores did they shift students around. But that takes more analysis and time I don’t have. that being said, lg is right, i do not believe schools need money, students need engaged, i’ll slap you into next week if you don’t do your hmwk, parents.
LG, high school API backsliding…are more foreign born students entering in the 9th grade. I ask because I have seen some of the textbooks used by OUSD students. The 11th grade history book actually has guidelines on how to write an essay.
Chris V, this idea that Independent Schools cater to the rich and are not diverse is bull. I get that percentage wise not even a third of the US pop over 25 has a college degree but it just seems to me that OUSD should be sending more than 10% of its graduates to college.
I was a TA in biochemistry, then head TA, then TA for biochem lab. These were wannabe pre-meds (well, a few of them did go and finish med school, and they truly were prepared). Quite a few were from the Bay Area, and the majority actually went to public schools from the informal “get to know you” surveys at the beginning of the semester, and those were often Piedmont, Palo Alto, Lafayette and other ‘top-notch’ public schools. These were the same kids who wrote “hella lot of enzyme activity” on their exams (could you quantify that, please?).
Ralph:
http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0523/p01s03-usgn.html
Messmer gets about 80 percent of its students through vouchers. Students put the name of the college they’re shooting for on their locker, and the daily attendance rate – often higher than 95 percent – is posted by the entrance. Nearly 90 percent of its students go on to a four-year college every year, says principal Jeff Monday.
Like all schools in the program, it can’t use selective criteria to admit students.
…
My mother graduated from Messmer! It was a very different school then, though. The nuns used to beat them, for instance.
You also have to remember that the public school systems in Wisconsin are first rate – not bottom-of-the-barrel like they are in most of California. From grade school on up – Wisconsin students are given a great education. You can’t start with functionally illiterate 14 year olds (which we do) and turn out college ready 18 year olds (and we don’t).
Heck, we start out with functionally literate 14 year olds in Piedmont and Palo Alto, spend a ton of money on them (well, the residents of the P & PA do), and still turn out students that are less prepared than some small town in Wisconsin. Makes ya think a little.
Ralph, Are you saying HS API scores are backsliding? Just clarifying as it wasn’t clear to me who’s saying that and I don’t think I did. My view is the HS’s need to make the most progress, but I could be wrong because that’s the area I’ve paid least attention too. Beyond the limited mentions about HS I’ve made.
Referring to the detail Chris V. goes more into, one hears more about OakTech and Skyline (including both positive & negative, and the diversity & wide spectrum of students and opportunities at both), and less about O-High. But Chris V. includes this among the other two, and for all the lowly opinions, O-High’s scores are only a tad below the other two. I’m curious why the lack of attention? (positive and negative, both).
Sounds like it’s time for OUSD, OFCY and J.Quan to travle to Wisconsin and see what’s going on. (Read: Junquet. But if they’ll actually study, learn and implement some programs I’m fine with it. That is a big if, but I stand by that condition).
Maybe we should ask Berkeley and Stanford to study the effects of cheese on childhood development?
David, thanks for that 80% number. I am guessing the voucher program probably breathed new life into Messmer. There were a number of Catholic schools in Detroit that eventually closed because of declining attendance (move of traditional attendees to the burbs). One school stayed and remade itself with a non-Catholic more black student body. There are Catholic schools in Baltimore that were originally in downtown Baltimore but as people started moving NW the schools also relocated. My gut tells me that Milwaukee and Messmer were in that same boat.
Now for your kooky, bay area kids who believe that more money is the solution. The Milwaukee choice program caps the voucher amount at the public school cost of education ($6K+/-). Acceptance is limited to the poorest of poor. You could be a genius or 5 grades below grade level. Only requirement is you must be poor. So tell me why can’t OUSD get 90% of its graduates to college with more money.
LG, backsliding is probably not the right word, the gains seen in the lower and middle schools seem to be lost at the high school level. I think 25% of the lower schools have APIs above 800 and there are only 2 high schools with numbers above 800.
Personally, I think we should move to an exam-based system of entrance/progression. Why should a student who has zero aptitude or interest in 8th grade be forced to continue to 12th? Not only does this throw money down the proverbial drain, but it also forces schools to focus/expend resources on those who will ultimately benefit the least. Oh, and no diploma? No welfare. We have got to “teach” people that their actions have consequences. Our current system rewards people for failure. And it’s working.
lg, roughly what percentage of total ousd elementary school population attends the schools you would call acceptable. (not a leading question, for all i know it is effectively high because of lower truancy)
-len raphael
I’m kind of surprised to hear David’s experience with Palo Alto and Piedmont students. You would think they would stand out. Shows how far we have to go.
Of course we need to take action where we can, and we have even more work to do for Oakland. I recommend people look into how they can help. Montclair Volunteers had a recent event with a lot of great (small) volunteer programs working in OUSD schools. Toni Smith and JQ attended.
http://www.montclairaction.com/home
Among those I recommend http://www.brothersontherise.org
They’re small and have just expanded from Edna Brewer Middle (one of the reasons Edna Brewer has improved so much) to Frick Middle, and maybe a couple others. Ralph volunteers at a program for High School students…
I recommend pitching in & volunteering (directly or remotely). It’s really needed and in the long-run it’s improving the Schools (combined with employment, safety & expanding the middle class base) that will improve Oakland.
Once my baby’s gone off to school, I can coach chess.
Now don’t get me wrong, I had some great, really excellent students, at least 3 of them, who I’d actually feel comfortable going to for anything medical. 3 out of 300 or so. I guess I thought it should have been higher for the best public university in the country. But what do I know, I went to the U of Wisconsin. What I do know is that I met a Piedmont High student who didn’t know what 1984 was about, I met a Palo Alto HS student who couldn’t handle basic calculus or even higher order algebra, and I had a student who clearly never received less than an “A” in her life break down in tears when I gave her a B+.
Anyway, Ralph, you’re right. Without vouchers, I think Messmer probably would have shriveled up and died, although maybe not as quickly as Detroit, as the Catholic school tradition is much stronger on the other side of Lake Michigan. (The joke in Wisconsin being, what religion are you, Lutheran or Catholic?).
You still realize more money is not the real solution, especially when it all just goes for pensions and retiree health care. My catholic schooling cost all of $2500/year at the most, and while a chunk of it was subsidized (by both a scholarship and the Archdiocese), I also know that the school had no pension plan, paid teachers worse etc.
Again, what’s different? Accountability, discipline, standards, and yes, parents.
it’s only fitting that our mayoral choice will be between dp who owes his rapid political rise to public sector labor union support; and to jq who is closely tied to oakland’s non-profit orgs. between the unions and the non profits .
between the unions and the non-profits, “they licked the platter clean”.
my hunch is that dp is in much better financial shape to say fu to the muni unions, then jq is to disinherit the non-profits. plus jq really believes in the philosophy of the non-profits and social programming.
dp follows the money. he knows the unions will forgive him after he moves on from oakland. they can’t afford to hold grudges.
-len raphael