The Sacramento City Attorney's office today dismissed nine misdemeanor cases of protesters arrested at the Occupy Sacramento encampment at Cesar Chavez Park - and pro bono lawyers said they expected dozens of cases to be dismissed over the next week.
Another seven people are scheduled to have their charges dismissed Friday. Another nine, including anti-war mom Cindy Sheehan, will have charges dropped early next week.
In all, charges are expected to be dismissed or not filed against 40 individuals, the City has indicated to Occupy Sacramento lawyers. The Sacramento Police have arrested 84 people at the park since October 6.
The dismissal took place as police departments have cracked down on Occupy encampments in New York City, Oakland, Portland and other cities throughout the nation, apparently as part of a coordinated effort by federal agencies under the Obama administration to squash dissent.
"After evaluating the facts of each case and criminal history of each defendant, the City Attorney's office has determined that the arrest and jail time that each dismissed defendant served achieved the People of the State of California's demand for substantial justice," City Attorney Eileen Teichert said in a statement.
The office said it would move forward with prosecuting those protesters with multiple arrests for "violating" the park hours ordinance. The city is proceeding with charges against nine defendants.
Vindication for the Constitution
"This is a step in the right direction," said Josh Kaizuka, one of 36 volunteer lawyers assisting on the case, in reacting to the dismissals.
"This is vindication for the Constitution and the Bill of Rights," said Cres Vellucci, the vice-chair of the ACLU Board of Directors in Sacramento, who was arrested October 6 for being at Cesar Chavez Park beyond a curfew.
"There is no doubt that Defendant was participating in an organized meeting intended to vocalize a community's disapproval of our nation's distribution of wealth," Kaizuka said in the filing. "This dissent was a political statement, and was, by all accounts, conducted in a peaceful manner...defendant was vocalizing his dissent at precisely the place where we, as a community, would expect: the town square."
Kaizuka said, in the "Demurrer," that by arresting Vellucci and 83 others since Oct. 6 at Cesar Chavez Park, city officials and police "impermissibly interfered with constitutionally protected speech, at a place that for over 150 years has been the platform to protest for the right of speech and assembly. Cesar Chavez Plaza, in fact, is built on the location of the original California State Capitol Building site."
Kaizuka called the charges "vague," and asked the court to throw out the case.
Karen Bernal, chair of the Progressive Caucus of the California Democratic Party (whose certification is currently in limbo) is one of the 9 defendants whose case was dismissed today. Bernal was arrested on October 16, along with Cindy Sheehan and other protesters.
"I'm happy that the case was dismissed, but I'm thinking about all of the money that the city spent on arrests and prosecution of protesters when there are so many other real problems that the city has to deal with," said Bernal after her case was dismissed.
The protesters were originally arrested for "unlawful assembly." However, District Attorney Jan Scully, stating that "no crime had been committed," refused to prosecute the protesters for exercising their First Amendment rights.
In an Orwellian move condemned by civil rights lawyers, the City of Sacramento then decided to prosecute the protesters on new charges - remaining in the park after curfew and loitering.
Arrests coordinated with Homeland Security and other federal officials?
As the police crackdowns continue, an investigative news piece in the examiner.com on November 15 revealed that the repression of the Occupy movement was apparently aided by officials from Homeland Security and other federal law enforcement agencies (http://www.examiner.com/top-news-in-minneapolis/were-occupy-crackdowns-aided-by-federal-law-enforcement-agencies).
"Over the past ten days, more than a dozen cities have moved to evict 'Occupy' protesters from city parks and other public spaces," wrote Rick Ellis, Minneapolis Top News Examiner. "As was the case in last night's move in New York City, each of the police actions shares a number of characteristics. And according to one Justice official, each of those actions was coordinated with help from Homeland Security, the FBI and other federal police agencies."
"The official, who spoke on background to me late Monday evening, said that while local police agencies had received tactical and planning advice from national agencies, the ultimate decision on how each jurisdiction handles the Occupy protests ultimately rests with local law enforcement," according to Ellis.
"According to this official, in several recent conference calls and briefings, local police agencies were advised to seek a legal reason to evict residents of tent cities, focusing on zoning laws and existing curfew rules. Agencies were also advised to demonstrate a massive show of police force, including large numbers in riot gear. In particular, the FBI reportedly advised on press relations, with one presentation suggesting that any moves to evict protesters be coordinated for a time when the press was the least likely to be present," said Ellis.
Vellucci said the revelations by Ellis appeared to confirm what he witnessed at the Occupy Sacramento encampment since the city cracked down on the peaceful, legal protest.
"From the first day in Sacramento, it was obvious the police were waiting for media to leave, as if they were trained to do so," said Vellucci. "Now there's evidence that waiting for press to leave, coming out in overwhelming numbers (and using 'curfew' laws was all part of advice Sacramento and other cities received from the federal government, including the FBI and Homeland Security."
For example, Vellucci said that although the curfew begins at 11 pm, the police didn't begin arresting people until 12:15 am on the first night of the arrests. "They didn't start arresting people until the media was out of the park," said Vellucci.
He also noted the overwhelming show of force by the police during the arrests. "Sacramento had as many as 44 vehicles and 80 officers for 4 arrests," emphasized Vellucci. "There were an average of over 20 police vehicles and 40 officers clad in riot gear each night of the arrests."
"Now it all makes sense that somebody from the federal government was advising the city on their crackdown," said Vellucci.
Vellucci noted that Occupy Sacramento lawyers have made a State Public Records Act request of the city to release all of the communications between the police, city staff, City Council and Mayor and the costs incurred regarding the repression of Occupy Sacramento. The city has delayed releasing the documents by two weeks.
* That being said, with the gun enhancement, the minimum prison sentence is now 5 years, with a maximum of 14 years. Alameda DA Nancy O'Malley said that she was disappointed about the verdict, but that Mehserle will be going to prison.
* SFist and SF Appeal will be updating with the latest news, as will the SF Chronicle. Of course, check out some of the local Oakland blogosphere, including OaklandSeen.
The jury has reached a verdict in the criminal case against BART officer Johannes Mehserle in the shooting death of Oscar Grant in January 2009. The verdict will be read from the Los Angeles courtroom at 4pm today.
The jury could either find Mehserle not guilty, or it could convict him of one of thee crimes: (1) second degree murder (15 years to life), (2) voluntary manslaughter (3-11 years), and (3) involuntary manslaughter (2 to 4 years).
The jury's deliberations were short (about 6 1/2 hours total). This is generally seen as a positive sign for the defendant, since juries typically take much longer before convicting someone of murder. This suggests to me a verdict of acquittal or one of the two manslaughter charges. We'll see in about 20 minutes.
Regardless of the verdict, please let the demonstrations that follow be peaceful. Edit by Brian: There will be a Peace Rally at Oakland City Hall at 6pm tonight. Together, we can retain the positive, constructive, and communal spirit of Oakland.
Oakland City Attorney John Russo wrote an excellent op-ed about the Regulate, Control & Tax Cannabis Act of 2010 that I thought was worth sharing. As the City Attorney of the first city in the country to regulate the sales of medical marijuana, Russo has seen first hand that regulation can improve public safety and believes the same can be accomplished statewide and beyond with the passage of the initiative:
As the City Attorney of Oakland — a city where dozens of people are killed in drug-related murders every year — my primary concern is the war on marijuana’s collateral damage to public safety.
Black market marijuana is a main source of fuel powering the vast criminal enterprises that threaten peace on our streets and weaken national security on our borders. According to the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, the Mexican drug cartels get more than 60 percent of their revenue from selling marijuana in the United States.
Money is the oxygen of these organizations. For decades, our approach to fighting violent drug gangs has been like trying to put out a house fire with a watering can. Why not try shutting off the fire’s oxygen supply?
Russo’s right. The war on drugs has been an utter failure, not only at curbing the use of illegal drugs but also at ending violence. Cannabis regulation is a way to curb this violence and to stop needless arrests that waste tax payer dollars:
The cost of enforcing prohibition is hard to estimate. We spend hundreds of millions of dollars and countless law enforcement hours arresting people for low-level marijuana crimes, further overburdening courts and prisons. Jail beds needed for marijuana offenders could be “used for other criminals who are now being released early because of a lack of jail space,” the state Legislative Analyst’s Office wrote.
More than 61,000 Californians were arrested for misdemeanor marijuana possession in 2008. That same year, about 60,000 violent crimes went unsolved statewide. The reality is that resources tied up fighting marijuana would be better spent solving and preventing violent felonies and other major crimes.
Regulating and controlling marijuana is really a law-and-order measure. It takes marijuana off street corners and out of the hands of children. It cuts off a huge source of revenue to the violent gangsters who now control the market. And it gives law enforcement more capacity to focus on what really matters to Californians — making our communities safer.
It’s time we call marijuana prohibition what it is — an outdated and costly approach that has failed to benefit our society. In November, we will finally have the chance to take a rational course with the Regulate, Control and Tax Cannabis Act.
Oaklanders like Russo have seen firsthand that marijuana regulation and taxation works. Now it’s up to us to spread that message to the rest of the state to ensure the passage of this initiative in November.
For a while now, the Oakland Airport Connector has been the subject of much controversy. To get about 2 miles, the OAC would cost well over $100 million, and would swallow up much of the Bay Area's stimulus funding. Just to add another head scratcher to the mix, the OAC wouldn't take passengers from the Coliseum station to the airport any faster than the current AirBart, especially an optimized AirBart with bus rapid transit lanes (BRT).
Local transportation advocates have been fighting the OAC for a while now, and grassroots leaders, with groups such as TransForm leading the charge, seem to have thrown the monkey wrench in the system that just might have finally killed this crazy idea.
After almost exactly a year of trying to make the Oakland Airport Connector (OAC) project equitable and cost-effective, it looks like we've finally won the original battle. Back in February 2009, more than a 100 advocates urged the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) not to provide stimulus funds to the OAC and instead to provide the funds to all the regional transit agencies to prevent service cuts and fare hikes.
MTC didn't agree, but a year later, the Federal Transit Administration has told MTC that this is the only reasonable course of action.
FTA sent a letter to BART and MTC today saying that there's simply not enough time to implement BART's corrective action plan that had been mandated by FTA, and that MTC should turn to plan B and revert the $70 million in stimulus funds back to the regional transit agencies. (Living in the O)
You can read the full FTA letter here (PDF). With any luck that money will be distributed post haste to local transit agencies to help develop BRT projects and hopefully avoid some service cuts.
H/t to Living in the O. Becks has been doing absolutely amazing work, and the blog's a must-read for everybody East Bay-ish.
Disclosure: I am working on a part time, short term basis for TransForm on the Oakland Airport Connector campaign. However, the thoughts expressed in my posts on this subject are my own and should not be construed to be those of TransForm.
You hopefully have already noted that the MTC hearing on the Oakland Airport Connector (OAC) is tomorrow (Wednesday) at 10am, but you might not know about the nationwide transportation day of action on which the hearing coincidentally falls. Several advocacy groups will be joining together to hold a mock funeral to mourn the loss of transit lines in the Bay Area due to lack of funding for operations. After the funeral, advocates will march to the MTC hearing to urge them not to provide further funding to the OAC.
Though the timing of these two events is coincidental, they are tied together quite closely. While the state and federal government have been slashing operating funds, the stimulus bill has pumped tons of money into capital improvements for transportation. So while BART and MTC may end up wasting more than half a billion dollars on the OAC, including $70 million in stimulus funds, BART, AC Transit, and Muni are slashing service and raising fares.
It's time we get our priorities straight, not only by prioritizing public transit over highway expansion, but also by prioritizing operations funding within transit funding. What is the use of a shiny new bus if we can't afford to pay someone to drive it? What is the use of an extension to the Oakland Airport that will only draw 400 new riders a day, when it will suck funding from the entire BART system?
Please attend the funeral tomorrow to mourn public transit losses and then head over to the MTC meeting to win back some of this transit funding by halting funding to the OAC.
Yesterday, I checked out Capitol Weekly, as I do every Thursday and was excited to see that one of their weekly features focused on the Oakland mayor’s race. Well, I didn’t stay excited for too long. In “Experts Expound,” they asked a bunch of Sacramento “experts”:
“Don Perata is running for mayor of Oakland — a job he’s always wanted. Can he beat Ron Dellums? Why or why not?”
As any Oaklander would know, this is an absurd question to ask. Dellums isn’t running! Perata made this clear in his media interviews this week. And if Dellums ran again, Perata would crush him - it would be embarrassing.
• Asm. Mike Davis has released a get to know you video in his race for the 26th Senate seat, the seat vacated by Mark Ridley-Thomas when he won the LA County Supervisor's race over Bernard Parks. His main opponent is Asm. Curren Price. The election is tomorrow.
• Local governments who took losses during the dissolution of Lehman Brothers want a bailout of their own. Apparently caveat emptor no longer applies as we head toward a slippery slope of bailouts for everyone. Yes, multiple investors lost their shirts on Lehman, through no fault of their own, but I fail to see how that demands a cash transfer from the Treasury.
• A new study links student obesity and proximity between schools and fast-food restaurants. I hope that study didn't cost too much, because it's completely intuitive. And I have no problem with urban planners who take this information into account when zoning areas around schools. There's a public health responsibility for government here.
• California is going to try to sell about $4 billion of bonds this week. It's not a particularly huge sale, but the response should be telling. Joel Fox notes that if we have problems selling these, don't hold your breath on the lottery securitization. With the recent bond rating decrease, they won't be an easy sell. Although, first-day sales yielded about $2.4 billion, almost half of the overall goal. John Myers examines why. I'd guess that investors know they'll get a great yield because they're demanding a high interest rate because of the state's fiscal troubles. With interest rates near zero, these are some of the best deals out there. But more bonds sold means more future payouts that hit taxpayers' bottom line.
• Finally, our condolences go out to the families of the Oakland Police officers gunned down this weekend. The incident is a profound tragedy for the City of Oakland and the entire state.
Last night, I went to Gavin Newsom’s town hall at the Rotunda in downtown Oakland. Overall, I wasn’t surprised by the event. He touched on many subjects - health care, education, improving the environment - and his overriding theme for the evening was that while many candidates talk about these issues, he has shown real progress on them. He did fail to mention though that many of the projects he took credit for last night (like universal health care) actually originated in the Board of Supervisors. But that’s pretty typical - he’s a politician and of course is going to take credit for everything he possibly can.
I really appreciated the fact that he took almost an hour of unfiltered questions from the audience. And I could not have been much more pleased when our new AC Transit Director, Joel Young, asked the first question. Joel explained that the state had defunded public transit and asked if Newsom, as governor, would restore public transit funding.
Newsom responded that public transit is so important for the environment and briefly answered, “Yes,” that he would restore the funding. But then instead of explaining why or how, he jumped into a long-winded speech about high speed rail. He started off by saying that he wanted to tell us about a project that he knew not all of us supported because it barely passed. This is a strange thing to say because 63% of Alameda County voters voted in favor of Prop 1A.
He then explained how high speed rail was going to change the state, creating jobs and changing how we thought about and used transportation. He talked about his vision for the “Grand Central Station of the West,” which is what some are calling the Transbay Terminal. Energetically, he explained how this would greatly improve the Bay Area region, making it easy to get from downtown to downtown (Oakland to SF).
And that was it. That was his answer to an AC Transit Director.
On Wednesday I wrote a piece on Huffington Post and another at Open Left talking about the centrality of fixing the foreclosure crisis to any recovery from the economic meltdown. Since the toxic assets at the center of the meltdown are based on mortgages that are entering foreclosure at a rate of one every 13 seconds, we have to address foreclosure as a part of getting America back on its feet.
The Homeowner Affordability and Stabilization Plan (HASP), announced in Phoenix on Wednesday by President Obama, which will help up to an estimated 9 million families, is a good first step - and the first serious effort by the Federal government to confront the challenge. But just because there was an announcement does not lessen the urgency of the problem. We are still in a situation where four families every minute enter the foreclosure process. We believe there must be a moratorium on foreclosures until HASP is fully implemented.
So yesterday we at ACORN launched the Home Defenders campaign in seven cities - a campaign to force the question of moratoriums and to press the urgency of this crisis into the consciousness of elected officials on the state and national levels. This is a campaign of refusal and resistance, refusal by distressed homeowners to cooperate with the foreclosure process and resistance to attempts to evict them from their homes. And in some cases it is a campaign of getting people back into their homes.
I wanted to give everyone a report-back from our activities yesterday, which is in the extended text.
KTVU Channel 2 and other Bay Area stations have been showing video of, and the SF Chronicle are reporting about angry protests in Oakland over the horrific BART police shooting of unarmed man Oscar Grant on New Year's Day:
A protest over the fatal shooting by a BART police officer of an unarmed man mushroomed into a violent confrontation tonight, as a faction of protesters smashed a police car and storefronts, set several cars on fire and blocked streets in downtown Oakland....
The protest started peacefully shortly after 3 p.m. at the Fruitvale Station in Oakland, where BART police Officer Johannes Mehserle shot 22-year-old Oscar Grant of Hayward to death early New Year's Day. BART shut down the station well into the evening commute, although the demonstration there was peaceful.
However, shortly after nightfall, a group of roughly 200 protesters split off and head toward downtown Oakland, prompting the transit agency to close the Lake Merritt station.
Oakland Police Officer Michael Cardoza parked his car across the intersection of Eighth and Madison streets, to prevent traffic from flowing toward Broadway and into the protest. But he told The Chronicle that a group of 30 to 40 protesters quickly surrounded his car and started smashing it with bottles and rocks.
More at Daily Kos. It includes this YouTube video showing how Oaklanders have lost faith in the police - taunting arresting officers "why don't you shoot him?" and "pigs go home."
I've specifically tried to avoid calling this a "riot" and oversensationalizing this, because the protest's turn shouldn't take away from the real story here, which is the growing intensity of public outrage over the obviously unjustified shooting death of Oscar Grant at Fruitvale Station by BART officer Johannes Mehserle. Mehserle has refused to answer questions about the shooting, and BART police have apparently been VERY slow to get information.
The shooting death, and the public outcry, may well be predictable outcomes of three decades of militarizing the police, limiting and eroding fundamental Constitutional protections of individual rights, and a deliberate decision by many Americans to simply abandon cities like Oakland to their fate.
When police officers feel they can act with impunity, the public loses faith in their honesty and their ability to fairly offer justice. Police brutality and even murders have become all too commonplace in many American communities. And let us not forget that many of the practices of Guantanamo Bay were first tried out in American prisons.
Whatever happens in Oakland tonight, and in the coming days and weeks, it should hopefully become clear that America's approach to policing needs to undergo a fundamental change. Of course, Oakland was the scene of a similar turning point 40 years ago with the rise of the Black Panthers. We will see whether this time the right choices are made.
This morning, after some bus mishaps (omg, I can’t wait for BRT!), my girlfriend and I arrived in front of Oakland City Hall for the Join the Impact rally for equal rights. It was a beautiful sunny day, and it was great to see thousands of advocates gathered in Frank Ogawa Plaza.
The crowd was incredibly diverse - filled with people of every age, gender, race, and sexual orientation. And there were so many families - kids everywhere! It was great to run into so many people I know and to see so many others I’d never met before. Serendipitously, one of the first people I ran into was Matthew, my precinct walking partner on election day. We formed a special bond that day, a bond that can only be formed by going door to door in a hilly precinct where most doors were up several flights of stairs. It was so great to see that the election results hadn’t gotten him down too much and that he was still working towards marriage equality.
Several LGBT leaders gave moving speeches throughout the day, but the star of the show was Coby, a boy whose parents started an LGBT family coalition. He started off saying that for many years he didn’t know that there were people who didn’t approve of his parents’ union. He didn’t realize that his family was different from others because, well, they’re his family. Coby went on to explain that when he heard kids at his school make fun of gay people, he thought it was because they didn’t understand what it meant to be gay. His mothers then made an effort to educate the students at his school, and ultimately, he thought that kids understood this issue more than many adults and should have more say in our society.
PRESIDENT \ V.P. - BARACK OBAMA \ Joe Biden
This will be a close race! Phone-banking to swing states-including Colorado-continues at your local Obama or United Democratic Campaign headquarters. Go to http://my.barackobama.com/page... to find the Obama office near you.
U.S. Congress - C.D. #s 1-53 - Vote for the Democrat in your district!
IF you live in one of these two districts, please volunteer/contribute to your candidate's campaign:
~ C.D. #4 - Charlie Brown [www.charliebrownforcongress.org] - This district is our best chance to turn a red district blue in California this year. He is running against Tom McClintock, the most ideologically conservative legislator in the state and a carpetbagger from Southern California. Charlie Brown, he's "a good man."
~ C.D. #11 - Jerry McNerney [www.jerrymcnerney.org] - The Democrats, with tremendous grassroots activism, took this seat two years ago, but the Republicans are spending huge amounts of money to take it back. Let's make sure we send Mr. McNerney, a leader in renewable energy, back to Congress.
California State Senate:
~ S.D. #3 - Mark Leno
~ S.D. #5 - Lois Wolk [www.loiswolk.com] - This is an open seat that we must keep in the Democratic column.
~ S.D. #7 - Mark DeSaulnier
~ S.D. #9 - Loni Hancock - Since I live in this district, I will take this opportunity to say that we are very fortunate to have Loni representing Oakland and other East Bay communities in the St. Senate. Among her accomplishments, she was successful this year in getting passed and signed into law a 'Clean Money' pilot program.
~ S.D. #11 - Joe Simitian
~ S.D. #19 - Hannah-Beth Jackson [www.jackson4senate.com] - This district is our best hope at picking up a Democratic seat in the St. Senate. Please do what you can to help her win against a very conservative opponent who is misleading voters about his own record.
~ S.D. #23 - Fran Pavley
~ S.D. #27 - Alan Lowenthal
~ S.D. #39 - Christine Kehoe
California State Assembly - A.D. #s 1-80 - Vote for the Democrat in your district! IF you live or work in one of the following districts, please volunteer/contribute to your candidate's campaign. These are expected to be very close races.
~ A.D. #10 - Alyson Huber - www.alysonhuber.com
~ A.D. #15 - Joan Buchanan - www.joanbuchanan.com - If you live in the Bay Area and want to help the Democrats gain seats in our state legislature, please contact the Buchanan campaign and help in any way possible. 925-806-0560 ~ A.D. #26 - John Eisenhut - www.johneisenhut.com
~ A.D. #65 - Carl Wood - www.wood4assembly.org
~ A.D. #78 - Marty Block - www.martyblock.com
~ A.D. #80 - Manuel V. Perez - www.manuelperezforassembly.com
LOCAL RACES:
Oakland City Council (at-large seat) - REBECCA KAPLAN -
Rebecca is exactly the type of person we need on the Oakland City Council. She is smart, progressive, experienced and accomplished. She will shake things up on the city council and move it in a more progress-oriented direction. She is a former civil rights attorney, policy advocate, environmental activist, and yes, a 'community organizer'. She understands the array of issues facing Oakland residents and will work hard to make Oakland a more safe and livable city. She is well-known for being able to work with a broad cross-section of people and personalities. Currently, she's an elected member of the A/C Transit Board of Directors. She is endorsed by the Alameda County Democratic Party, the MGO Democratic Club, the Sierra Club, East Bay Young Dems, Assembly Member Sandre Swanson, Supervisors Keith Carson and Nate Miley, and a wide array of organizations, elected officials and community leaders. www.kaplanforoakland.org
Mayor, City of Berkeley - TOM BATES - Mayor Bates has shown leadership and brought people together to get things done in Berkeley. He's endorsed by Congresswoman Barbara Lee, the Sierra Club, and a broad range of organizations, public officials and community leaders. See www.tombates.org/index.htm for details on his priorities.
Judge - Superior Court (Alameda County seat #9) - DENNIS HAYASHI -
Dennis, a public interest attorney, is highly qualified to be a superior court judge. He is a former attorney with the Asian Law Caucus, and was director of the Office of Civil Rights at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services under President Clinton. He was also the director of the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing. We desperately need more public interest attorneys as judges. He is endorsed by the Sierra Club, the Alameda County Democratic Lawyers Club, former Attorney General Bill Lockyer, and numerous state and local elected officials, as well as several judges. Dennis will make a superb Superior Court judge. www.dennishayashi.com
San Francisco County Supervisors:
District #1 - ERIC MAR - Eric is an elected member of the S.F. Board of Education, a civil rights attorney, college lecturer, and long-time progressive political activist. He's been recognized for his civic involvement, leadership, and passionate advocate for human and civil rights. He is committed to working at City Hall and in the Richmond district for working families, thriving neighborhoods, and responsive local government. To volunteer on his campaign, go to www.ericmar.com.
District #3 - DAVID CHIU (rank #1) - As a former civil rights attorney, counsel to a U.S. Senate subcommittee, neighborhood activist and leader, former deputy district attorney, member of San Francisco's Small Business Commission, affordable housing advocate, and Democratic Party activist, David has the breadth and depth of experience to be an excellent supervisor-responsive, innovative, smart ideas. http://votedavidchiu.org TONY GANTNER (rank #2) - Experienced neighborhood and environmental activist, Tony would also be a good Supervisor.
District #4 - CARMEN CHU - She's moderate-to-conservative by San Francisco standards, but this is the Sunset district and her principal opponent is even more conservative.
District #5 - ROSS MIRKARIMI - Ross has been a very good supervisor for this district and he deserves reelection. He reaches out to groups of people in his district and strives to develop and support innovative and compassionate ideas and proposals.
District #7 - SEAN ELSBERND - Has only token opposition and will be reelected easily in this relatively moderate-to-conservative district.
District #9 - no recommendation - Many good progressive candidates in this district, including David Campos and Mark Sanchez.
District #11 - JULIO RAMOS (rank #1) - Julio is an attorney, elected member of the San Francisco Community College Bd. of Trustees, an experienced trial lawyer, and former Coro Fellow. I've known Julio for nearly 10 years and I'm confident that he would be an excellent county supervisor. He's progressive, compassionate, and is committed to focusing his energy on crime prevention, services to seniors, helping at-risk youth, improving neighborhoods and creating clean streets, and expanding educational opportunities for local residents. www.julioramos.org
JOHN AVALOS (rank #2) - Former supervisorial aide, Avalos would also be a good county supervisor.
BART Bd. of Directors
Tom Radulovich (district 9) - Smart environmental leader. He's been a very good BART director.
A.C. Transit Bd. of Directors
Chris Peeples (at-large)
Greg Harper (ward 2)
East Bay Municipal Utility District Bd. of Directors
Doug Linney (ward 5) - Environmental leader on the EBMUD Board. Certainly deserves reelection.
East Bay Regional Parks District Bd. of Directors
Norman LaForce (ward 1) - Norman has shown important leadership as a long-time advocate for parks. He is currently the chapter chair of the Sierra Club and an experienced attorney for environmental causes. He will be an excellent EBRPD board member.
Trustee, Peralta Community College District
Marlon McWilson (area 2)
San Francisco Community College District -
Several good candidates. I recommend the following four candidates:
Natalie Berg
Milton Marks
Chris Jackson
Rodel Rodis
San Francisco Board of Education:
Several good candidates. I recommend the following four candidates:
Norman Yee
Sandra L. Fewer
Kimberly Wicoff
Jill Wynns
City Council, Daly City - Judith Christensen - She's a teacher, is supported by the environmental community, and she's been a breath of fresh air on a stale city council. She deserves re-election.
Mayor, City of Fremont - Gus Morrison - Former Mayor Morrison would do a far better job as mayor once again than either the incumbent or his other opponent. Vote to put Gus back in the Mayor's office.
City Council, Orinda - Victoria Smith - She's done a good job on the Orinda City Council and deserves re-election. Go to www.voteforvictoria.com for more information.
Mayor, City of Sacramento - Heather Fargo - Mayor Fargo is running against a former Pro Basketball player who has no experience in government. Her opponent is being put forth as a candidate by development interests who do not like Ms. Fargo's policies. She'll do a better job than her challenger. Vote to re-elect her. For info on her priorities, experience and endorsements, or to volunteer, go to www.fargoformayor.com
Los Angeles County Bd. of Supervisors (2nd district) - Mark Ridley-Thomas -
Ridley-Thomas is the more progressive of the two candidates. He is a former L.A. City Councilman and a current State Senator. We will miss him in Sacramento, but he will make an excellent County Supervisor. He is endorsed by the L.A. County Democratic Party, Sierra Club, Members of Congress Jane Harmon, Brad Sherman, Howard Berman, Hilda Solis, Planned Parenthood, and dozens of other elected officials and community leaders. Go to www.ridley-thomas.com to learn more.
Santa Clara County Bd. of Supervisors (2nd district) - Richard Hobbs - Endorsed by the Santa Clara County League of Conservation Voters and the local Sierra Club chapter. That's good enough for me.
Last night, I couldn’t sleep. Out of nowhere, I had started to feel really sad, and at first I couldn’t figure out why. Then I realized that I was worrying about the passage of Prop 8, which would take away my right to marry the woman I love.
When the California Supreme Court ruled in favor of same-sex marriage, I couldn’t have been much happier. It was inspiring to watch some of the first same-sex marriages happen at Oakland City Hall. It gave me so much hope for the future of our state, and for the first time, my girlfriend and I started to think seriously about the possibility of marriage.
But now I’m facing the reality that this right could be ripped away from me. A few months ago, I thought Prop 8 was sure to go down. The polling looked good, and I thought that the thousands of same sex couples who were getting married would shift this debate forever. Didn’t everyone at least peripherally know one same sex couple who had gotten married?
I’m getting fed up with the Bay Area mainstream media. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised, but all of them have completely missed the boat on what the Rebecca Kaplan vs. Kerry Hamill race for Oakland at-large city council is really about.
Over the past week, the Chronicle, East Bay Express, and Bay Guardian have all depicted this race in essentially the same way, as the progressive outsider vs. the Perata-machine backed candidate. I understand that this makes a nice, simple story that fits into a few hundred or thousand words and doesn’t require the reporter to do much investigative work, but that’s not what the race is about.
So I wanted to make something clear - I am voting FOR Rebecca Kaplan, and not against Kerry Hamill or for that matter, against Don Perata or his political machine. I actually have no problem with Kerry Hamill. I think she cares a lot about Oakland and would make a fine city council member - I don’t think the city would crumble (anymore than it already has) under her watch.
But unfortunately for Kerry, she’s not just running against a decent opponent. She’s running against one of the most intelligent, committed and creative people I’ve ever known.
These past few days have driven me crazy with anticipation. The organization I work for introduced our first California bill this year and managed to pass it through the Assembly and Senate, but now we’re waiting to hear if Governor Schwarzenegger will sign or veto it. He only has until midnight tonight so I keep reloading his web page, checking the news - I even called up my friend who works in Perata’s office to see if he had any inside information (he didn’t).
So I had to do something last night to get my mind off of this. I went down to the United Democratic Campaign headquarters in Oakland, which is also housing Rebecca Kaplan’s campaign and the California Democratic Party.
I hadn’t done any phoning for Rebecca since June so it took a few calls to get back into my groove, but once I did, I was so happy I had gone down there. If you’ve never phoned for a candidate or issue before, it might seem strange, but electoral phoning is extremely therapeutic. You have to focus, pay attention, take cues from voters, so there’s no energy left to think about anything else. It really is a great form of meditation.
Seems about time to have one of these open thread thingys. Some interesting stuff I saw:
Swing State Project upgraded CA-50 (Bilbray-R vs. Liebham-D) from Safe Republican to Likely Republican. Liebham's fundraising was fairly good, and the district is only R+4.6, certainly not out of the realm of possibilities.
Woo! Am I glad that we’re finally approaching June 3rd. Besides being tired of the pointless election mailers pouring out of my mail box every day, I finally feel like I can take a bit of a break and maybe get back to volunteering for some of the otherissues I care about.
That said, these last couple of months have been a lot of fun. I hadn’t done any kind of campaign work since 2004 and it was great to get out there again to talk to voters. I passed out flyers at my local farmers market, phoned Oakland voters weekly, and finally got to do some door to door outreach this weekend in Berkeley.
Here are some my random thoughts and observations about voter outreach on election day eve:
I spent last weekend in San Diego, and as usualwhen I travel, I couldn’t help myself from comparing the city to Oakland. It’s been a couple years since I’ve visited San Diego, and I realized that though I’ve been there at least a dozen times, I’ve never spent even 24 hours there in one visit and I’ve never really gotten to know the city.
When remembering San Diego, I often thought of the one factor that’s true in the southern California cities I know better - sprawl. And this part I remembered correctly. San Diego is incredibly spread out, and it seemed difficult to get between most neighborhoods without a car. Oakland’s not the most compact city, but I feel like it’s fairly easy here to get from almost any neighborhood to the next, as long as you’re willing to hop on the bus or BART and maybe even transfer to another bus.
And just as I had remembered, it did seem as if pretty much everyone in San Diego had a car. Parking was sometimes difficult in popular neighborhoods - not San Francisco difficult, but certainly more competitive than most parts of Oakland.
But there were a couple things about San Diego that surprised me.
