Yesterday’s budget meeting via Twitter

I had hoped to write a real blog post yesterday or today, but yesterday flew by and today I woke up with a nasty cold and I can’t really focus. So you won’t get a super-excited post from me about City Attorney John Russo’s opinion, issued yesterday, that clearly states that the Council must implement [...]

December 14-20 Oakland Political & Community Events

Wednesday, December 16h – AC Transit Meeting on Service Adjustment Plan
At AC Transit’s regular Board meeting, the Board will be voting on final approval of the service adjustment plan. They also will be voting on changing transfer policy so that transfers would be valid for 2 hours, instead of the current 1.5 hours. This was [...]

Remember to vote, and then start thinking about the other special election

I hope you’ll join me in voting down all the state ballot initiatives today, but as soon as you do that, it will be time to start thinking about the next election. That’s right, on July 21st, Oakland will be holding its own special election to deal with our local budget crisis. (Wasn’t this supposed [...]

April 20-25 Oakland Political & Community Events

Monday, April 20th – City Visions Radio presents “What’s Next for Oakland’s Downtown – Ten Years After the 10K Project”
So the title of this show sounds pretty inacuous and interesting – I think it’s a good idea to reflect back on former plans to see how they went. But the description I received from the [...]

The whole story on Oakland’s proposed marijuana tax

On Tuesday, the Finance Committee took the first big step towards placing a marijuana tax on the ballot. And despite the Tribune’s take on this issue, this tax, if passed, will not just apply to the four medical cannabis dispensaries currently operating in Oakland.
Let me back up a bit though, since the entire story is [...]

James Anthony: OPD steps in to enforce medical cannabis regulations

This guest post was written by James Anthony, a land use attorney who works with legitimate legal medical cannabis dispensaries in Oakland and elsewhere. He is a former City of Oakland community prosecutor (Neighborhood Law Corps 2003-2005) and a member of the Board of Directors of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition.
Last Friday, the Oakland Police Department [...]

(Dis)respect for the City Council

There’s been something on my mind for the past several months that I was reminded of on Tuesday night, as I watched the Public Safety Committee meeting. I often hear Oakland residents blaming all of Oakland’s problems on one council member (the council member varies based on the person), to the point where they accuse [...]

Monday Morning Distractions – Surfing the interwebs

I don’t know about you, but I need some distractions right about now. Really, can it be Tuesday night already? I can’t take the anticipation anymore!
To distract myself this weekend, I finally got caught up on blog posts and found some distractions that made me smile. Hope they make you smile too:
David at Brooklyn Avenue [...]

Finding Living in the O

So one of the fun parts about writing a blog is you get to see how people stumbled onto your blog. There are a lot of predictable search terms that lead people to my blog – Rebecca Kaplan, Oakland, medical marijuana, people searching for a comparison of San Francisco and Oakland, etc. But then there [...]

A somewhat jarring return to Oakland

Yesterday was my first real day back in Oakland from Burning Man (since I spent all day Tuesday unpacking and cleaning playa dust off everything I brought). Unfortunately, I had to wake up and put on a suit and go to work. I don’t normally wear a suit to work, but I was headed for [...]