City Government

Gallo Wants City to Help Clear Debris at Fruitvale Home Depot

Published

6 years ago

June 28, 2019

Construction workers Roberto Lopez and Ron Ramirez live in the Community of Grace homeless encampment near Home Depot in the Fruitvale District. They run a kitchen at the site to feed their fellow community members. Photo by Zack Haber.

Councilmember Noel Gallo is calling for the city to remove unhoused residents living near Home Depot’s Fruitvale store.

Many residents at the encampment, however, claim they have nowhere else to go and that the city makes the location unsanitary by providing inadequate services.

Gallo is concerned Home Depot will leave Oakland, taking jobs with it, because he claims the homeless make customers feel unsafe and are trashing the location.

“That’s not their home and that’s not their property,” said Gallo. “If we don’t provide jobs, then we’re all going to be homeless.”

Responding, Markaya S., who has lived near Home Depot for five years, said, “Home Depot wants all the trash and debris gone, but in order for that to work, the city has to work with us.”

Markaya and her fellow encampment residents, which she estimates number about 100, call their set-up The Community of Grace (COG).

Many COG residents collaborate to take care of each other and stay safe. They do research using California’s Megan’s Law website and kick out those convicted of sexual offenses, have meetings when problems arise, maintain a protected kids’ zone and run a kitchen that provides food for residents.

COG resident Uce Taylor claims that the city picks up trash about twice a month, though not consistently, and refuses to provide a dumpster. Residents usually organize waste into giant piles for pick up.

“Sometimes if it’s been too long since a (trash) pick up, we’ll gather together and rent a dumpster,”said Taylor.

When they are able to organize trash into a dumpster, the city picks it up quickly. But the rental cost is too expensive for residents to do that regularly.

Gallo does not deny the city’s inconsistent trash pick up but says he helps out personally to help clean up.

“I help pick up their stuff every week with volunteers,” Gallo said. “I’ve been doing that for six years.”

While the city has provided three portable toilets, residents feel there aren’t enough and they quickly overflow.

Their complaints are valid according to Service Sanitation, a company that rents out portable toilets and recommends providing 15 toilets for a group of 50 people if they’re changed weekly.

Home Depot has pressured Gallo to remove the encampment. A letter from the company’s regional Vice President Steve Knott, sent on March 20, cites “frequent occurrences of malicious theft.”

But COG residents claim that very few people have stolen from the store. One official told the Post there have been no thefts since February.

Knott’s letter also asks the city to “immediately remove and relocate the inhabitants to a viable location,” but residents claim the city is not providing an appropriate place for them.

The city’s Tuffsheds and RV sites for homeless people do not have enough space for everyone, and even if they did, they are not desirable or accessible places, according to many COG residents.

Markaya, who lives in a tiny home she built, sees living in a Tuffshed as a downgrade. But even if she wanted to move into one, she has children. and the city does not allow children to live in its tuff shed sites.

Taylor lives in an RV but could not move into a city approved RV site because his RV is non-operational.

Many COG residents have jobs and see the combination of high rents and low wages as the biggest challenges to securing housing.

Markaya works full time at a job where she makes $15 an hour, a salary that, according to reports from glassdoor.com, is similar to many worker’s wages at Home Depot.

Her income is too low for her to rent an apartment. Roberto Lopez and Ron Ramirez, who live at COG and run its kitchen, work as construction workers. Although they build buildings in Oakland, they can’t afford to live in one.

“What would fix this problem would be changing the cost of living to match wages,” said Markaya.

Zack Haber

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Oakland Post: Week of May 21 – 27, 2025

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of May 21 – 27, 2025

Published

3 days ago

May 25, 2025

Oakland Post

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IN MEMORIAM: Nate Holden, State Senator and Longtime Los Angeles Councilmember, Dies at 95

Los Angeles County Supervisor Janice Hahn described Holden as “a lion” in the State Senate and a force to be reckoned with on the Los Angeles City Council.” Hahn added that she learned a lot working with Holden when she was a new councilmember.

Published

1 week ago

May 19, 2025

Oakland Post

Former Los Angeles Councilmember and California State Sen. Nate Holden. File photo.

By Bo Tefu, California Black Media

Former Los Angeles City Councilmember Nathaniel “Nate” Holden, a prominent figure in the city’s politics, passed away at the age of 95, his family confirmed on May 7.

Holden, who represented South Los Angeles for 16 years on the City Council and served one term in the California State Senate, was widely regarded as a forceful advocate for his community.

Los Angeles County Supervisor Janice Hahn described Holden as “a lion” in the State Senate and a force to be reckoned with on the Los Angeles City Council.”

Hahn added that she learned a lot working with Holden when she was a new councilmember.

Holden’s journey to political prominence began in the segregated South, where he was born in Macon, Georgia, in 1929. He often recalled the childhood moment when he first heard the governor of Georgia vowing to continue suppressing Black people.

“Doing the best you can for the people. Law and order. Make sure that people’s communities are safe. I did it all,” said Holden, reflecting on his legacy.

Holden is survived by his sons, including former California Assemblymember Chris Holden, who represented a district in Southern California that includes Pasadena and Altadena in Los Angeles County and cities in San Bernardino County.

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Oakland Hosts Town Hall Addressing Lead Hazards in City Housing

According to the city, there are 22,000 households in need of services for lead issues, most in predominantly low-income or Black and Latino neighborhoods, but only 550 to 600 homes are addressed every year. The city is hoping to use part of the multimillion-dollar settlement to increase the number of households served each year.

Published

1 week ago

May 18, 2025

Oakland Post

iStock.

By Magaly Muñoz

The City of Oakland’s Housing and Community Development Department hosted a town hall in the Fruitvale to discuss the efforts being undertaken to remove lead primarily found in housing in East and West Oakland.

In 2021, the city was awarded $14 million out of a $24 million legal settlement from a lawsuit against paint distributors for selling lead-based paint that has affected hundreds of families in Oakland and Alameda County. The funding is intended to be used for lead poisoning reduction and prevention services in paint only, not water or other sources as has been found recently in schools across the city.

The settlement can be used for developing or enhancing programs that abate lead-based paint, providing services to individuals, particularly exposed children, educating the public about hazards caused by lead paint, and covering attorney’s fees incurred in pursuing litigation.

Most of the homes affected were built prior to 1978, and 12,000 of these homes are considered to be at high risk for lead poisoning.

City councilmember Noel Gallo, who represents a few of the lead-affected Census tracts, said the majority of the poisoned kids and families are coming directly from neighborhoods like the Fruitvale.

“When you look at the [kids being admitted] at the children’s hospital, they’re coming from this community,” Gallo said at the town hall.

In order to eventually rid the highest impacted homes of lead poisoning, the city intends to create programs and activities such as lead-based paint inspections and assessments, full abatement designed to permanently eliminate lead-based paint, or partial abatement for repairs, painting, and specialized cleaning meant for temporary reduction of hazards.

In feedback for what the city could implement in their programming, residents in attendance of the event said they want more accessibility to resources, like blood testing, and information from officials about lead poisoning symptoms, hotlines for assistance, and updates on the reduction of lead in their communities.

Attendees also asked how they’d know where they are on the prioritization list and what would be done to address lead in the water found at several school sites in Oakland last year.

City staff said there will be a follow-up event to gather more community input for programming in August, with finalizations happening in the fall and a pilot launch in early 2026.