Uncategorized

We Have Come a Long Way But Still Have Far to Go

Published

13 years ago

January 18, 2013

By Jesse
Jackson

When President Barack Obama is sworn in for his second term, his hand will rest not only on President Abraham Lincoln’s Bible, but on Dr. Martin Luther King’s, too.
As the ceremony falls on the federal holiday celebrating Dr. King’s birth, the civil rights leader would no doubt be proud as an African-American president is sworn in on the steps of a Capitol built by slave labor, about 170 miles from Jamestown where slave ships landed.
We have come a long way.
But Dr. King would not be satisfied. He marched to his own drummer, and wanted to be remembered as a “drum major for justice.” He worked tirelessly for change, but he never took his eyes from the prize.
He understood there must be a creative tension between the political and the prophetic.
The political seeks the popular, and attempts the possible. The prophetic seeks the moral, states the truth, and challenges the limits.
For Dr. King, bipartisan agreement had little value in itself. There was bipartisan agreement on slavery. Abolition was outside the consensus. There was bipartisan agreement on segregation. The Montgomery bus boycott, the Selma march for voting rights were outside the box.
When Lyndon Johnson pushed through the Voting Rights Act, stating that “We shall overcome,” Dr. King praised him. But he challenged Johnson’s war in Vietnam, and the retreat on the war on poverty. He spent part of his last birthday organizing a poor people’s march on Washington, prepared to commit civil disobedience to force the nation’s attention on the poor.
We know what Dr. King would be focused on today. Nearly one in four children is being raised in poverty. More than 46 million people struggle with poverty in this wealthy nation.
Nearly 18 million households are “food insecure.”
Millions are facing foreclosure. School budgets are being starved, even as jails are stuffed. An extreme and obscene gulf exists between rich and poor, with working families suffering mass unemployment, falling wages and increasing insecurity.
There is a growing racial polarization as African Americans and Latinos, the greatest victims of the Great Recession, are the last to recover from it. Schools today are more segregated than they were in Dr. King’s time, but now no one talks about it.
The U.S. also has a larger military budget than at the height of the Cold War, and drones in six countries are likely generating more terrorists than they are killing.
Dr. King would no doubt celebrate the re-election of an African-American president, but he would not stop there. He would challenge the limits of the current debate. He would be organizing mass civil disobedience to call the nation back to its senses — and to demand action against poverty, violence and the endless war that has shredded our Constitution, wasted lives and squandered scarce resources.
The partisan is too petty to address the unpopular. The bipartisan is too limited to speak the truth. Dr. King told us that “there comes a time when silence is betrayal.” He understood that the movement for justice would often offend the majority. We would make progress, he argued, “not through the complacent adjustment of the conforming majority, but through the creative maladjustment of a nonconforming minority.”
The second inauguration of Barack Obama on the day we celebrate Dr. King’s birthday reminds us how far we have come. But Dr. King would demand that we look clearly at how far we have to go. It is not a time for complacent celebration.
We cannot accept mass unemployment, grinding poverty and endless war as a new normal.
On Dr. King’s birthday, it’s time to mobilize the creative maladjustment of citizens of conscience once more.

Oakland Post

Posts by Oakland Post

Uncategorized

Oakland Housing and Community Development Department Awards $80.5 Million to Affordable Housing Developments

Published

6 months ago

June 17, 2025

Oakland Post

Special to The Post

The City of Oakland’s Housing and Community Development Department (Oakland HCD) announced its awardees for the 2024-2025 New Construction of Multifamily Affordable Housing Notice of Funding Availability (New Construction NOFA) today Five permanently affordable housing developments received awards out of 24 applications received by the Department, with award amounts ranging from $7 million to $28 million.

In a statement released on Jan. 16, Oakland’s HCD stated, “Five New Construction Multifamily Affordable Housing Development projects awarded a total of $80.5 million to develop 583 affordable rental homes throughout Oakland. Awardees will leverage the City’s investments to apply for funding from the state and private entities.”

In December, the office of Rebecca Kaplan, interim District 2 City Councilmember, worked with HCD to allocate an additional $10 Million from Measure U to the funding pool. The legislation also readopted various capital improvement projects including street paving and upgrades to public facilities.

The following Oakland affordable housing developments have been awarded in the current round:

Mandela Station Affordable

238 Affordable Units including 60 dedicated for Homeless/Special Needs
Award: $15 million + previously awarded $18 million
Developer: Mandela Station LP (Pacific West Communities, Inc. and Strategic Urban Development Alliance, LLC)
City Council District: 3
Address: 1451 7th St.

Liberation Park Residences

118 Affordable Units including 30 dedicated for Homeless/Special Needs
Award: $28 million
Developer: Eden Housing and Black Cultural Zone
City Council District: 6
Address: 7101 Foothill Blvd.

34th & San Pablo

59 Affordable Units including 30 dedicated for Homeless/Special Needs
Award: $7 million
Developer: 34SP Development LP (EBALDC)
City Council District: 3
Address: 3419-3431 San Pablo Ave.

The Eliza

96 Affordable Units including 20 dedicated for Homeless/Special Needs
Award: $20 million
Developer: Mercy Housing California
City Council District: 3
Address: 2125 Telegraph Ave.

3135 San Pablo

72 Affordable Units including 36 dedicated for Homeless/Special Needs
Award: $10.5 million
Developer: SAHA and St. Mary’s Center
City Council District: 3
Address: 3515 San Pablo Ave.

The source of this story is the media reltations office of District 2 City Councilmember Rebecca Kaplan.

Oakland Post

Posts by Oakland Post

Activism

Oakland Housing and Community Development Department Awards $80.5 Million to Affordable Housing Developments

Published

10 months ago

January 30, 2025

Oakland Post

Rebecca Kaplan, interim District 2 city councilmember. File photo.

Special to The Post

The following Oakland affordable housing developments have been awarded in the current round:

Mandela Station Affordable

238 Affordable Units including 60 dedicated for Homeless/Special Needs
Award: $15 million + previously awarded $18 million
Developer: Mandela Station LP (Pacific West Communities, Inc. and Strategic Urban Development Alliance, LLC)
City Council District: 3
Address: 1451 7th St.

Liberation Park Residences

118 Affordable Units including 30 dedicated for Homeless/Special Needs
Award: $28 million
Developer: Eden Housing and Black Cultural Zone
City Council District: 6
Address: 7101 Foothill Blvd.

34th & San Pablo

59 Affordable Units including 30 dedicated for Homeless/Special Needs
Award: $7 million
Developer: 34SP Development LP (EBALDC)
City Council District: 3
Address: 3419-3431 San Pablo Ave.

The Eliza

96 Affordable Units, including 20 dedicated for Homeless/Special Needs
Award: $20 million
Developer: Mercy Housing California
City Council District: 3
Address: 2125 Telegraph Ave.

3135 San Pablo

72 Affordable Units including 36 dedicated for Homeless/Special Needs
Award: $10.5 million
Developer: SAHA and St. Mary’s Center
City Council District: 3
Address: 3515 San Pablo Ave.

The source of this story is media reltations office of District 2 City Councilmember Rebecca Kaplan.

Oakland Post

Posts by Oakland Post

Alameda County

Oakland Acquisition Company’s Acquisition of County’s Interest in Coliseum Property on the Verge of Completion

The Board of Supervisors is committed to closing the deal expeditiously, and County staff have worked tirelessly to move the deal forward on mutually agreeable terms. The parties are down to the final details and, with the cooperation of OAC and Coliseum Way Partners, LLC, the Board will take a public vote at an upcoming meeting to seal this transaction.

Published

11 months ago

January 11, 2025

Oakland Post

Alameda County Board of Supervisors Chairman David Haubert. Official photo.

Special to The Post

The County of Alameda announced this week that a deal allowing the Oakland Acquisition Company, LLC, (“OAC”) to acquire the County’s 50% undivided interest in the Oakland- Alameda County Coliseum complex is in the final stages of completion.

Oakland has already finalized a purchase and sale agreement with OAC for its interest in the property. OAC’s acquisition of the County’s property interest will achieve two longstanding goals of the County:

The Oakland-Alameda Coliseum complex will finally be under the control of a sole owner with capacity to make unilateral decisions regarding the property; and
The County will be out of the sports and entertainment business, free to focus and rededicate resources to its core safety net

In an October 2024 press release from the City of Oakland, the former Oakland mayor described the sale of its 50% interest in the property as an “historic achievement” stating that the transaction will “continue to pay dividends for generations to come.”

The Board of Supervisors is pleased to facilitate single-entity ownership of this property uniquely centered in a corridor of East Oakland that has amazing potential.

“The County is committed to bringing its negotiations with OAC to a close,” said Board President David Haubert.