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Questions About Oakland Promise: If It Wasn’t a Nonprofit, What Was It? What Happened to the Money for Scholarships for Kids?

Published

6 years ago

September 12, 2019

Questions continue to surface about the organization and accountability of “The Oakland Promise,” Mayor Libby Schaaf’s signature initiative that has raised millions of dollars since 2015 to help low-income families “to triple the number of high school graduates who …complete college by the year 2024.”

Though the promise’s lofty goal is widely popular among Oakland residents, that support has not silenced demands for full transparency about what the legal status is of this organization is—which has operated out of the Mayor’s Office — and how it is spending public money and resources.

Oakland Promise is now widely perceived as a nonprofit organization — but that has not always been the case, at least until recently.

The organization was not listed as one by Guidestar, a website designed to provide “the highest-quality, most complete nonprofit information available.” Nor was Promise registered as a nonprofit with the State Attorney General.

According to an email to the Oakland Post on Aug. 29, 2018, Oakland Promise was described by its backers as a “public-private effort” backed by four organizations: the City of Oakland, the Oakland Unified School District, the East Bay College Fund and the Oakland Public Education Fund.

Since July, however, Oakland Promise has become a nonprofit, merging with the East Bay College Fund and taking over its nonprofit status, according to the East Bay Times. Mialisa Bonta, president of the Alameda Unified School Board and wife of Assemblyman Rob Bonta, has become the organization’s CEO, taking over the leadership from David Silver, who is a city staffer in the Mayor’s Office.

Another question surrounds what has happened to the money the city gave Oakland Promise to set up college saving accounts for children.
A copy of a Public Records Act request forwarded to the Post asked for information about the total of $1,150,000 that the city budgeted in 2015 to Oakland Promise for these savings accounts.

But according to the city’s Finance Department on Aug. 16, “The city has not yet made payments on behalf of Oakland Promise from funds earmarked for this program in the adopted budgets for 2016-17, 2017-18 (and) 2018-19. The requested documents (canceled checks) do not exist.”

Council President Rebecca Kaplan explained in an email why she has asked City Auditor Courtney Ruby to audit Oakland Promise.
“Many people have been asking the questions I sent to the auditor, and many members of the public — even the League of Women Voters — have expressed concern about the Oakland Promise funds. It is perfectly reasonable for anyone to want to know where the money is. This is large amounts of tax-payer funds that were promised to be used to set up college savings accounts for each Oakland kid, as they enter kindergarten.” “We want to know where the money is, and where the college savings accounts are — which were supposed to be set up each year, starting in 2015,” Kaplan said. “By now, they should have grown a lot if they had been set up as promised and as funded in the City of Oakland budget, for the Kindergarten to College Program.”

Asked about Kaplan’s request for the audit, the Mayor’s Office replied, “Kaplan wants Oakland taxpayers to fund her petty political vendetta masquerading as an audit. And tragically she’s targeting the Oakland Promise — a program started by the City of Oakland to send low-income kids to college with scholarships and mentors. She needs to immediately withdraw this taxpayer funded political score settling because it hurts taxpayers and kids.”

Responding, Kaplan said, “The Mayor’s Office says I’m asking for tax payer money, but that is flatly false. I am not requesting any money. I have asked our independently elected City Auditor for help getting information about where the college savings accounts they promised for Oakland youth are. The auditor is paid a regular salary.”

The Alameda County League of women Voters (LWVO) expressed concerns about Oakland Promise when Mayor Schaaf and the Promise organization backed Measure AA last November, which would have created a $198 parcel tax to provide funding for Oakland Promise for 30 years. In its voters’ guide, the League took a neutral position, saying, “We found it unclear how moneys in the Oakland Promise Fund would be spent.”

Measure AA won more than 50 percent of the vote but failed to pass because it needed a two-thirds majority. That ruling is now being challenged in court, and according to observers, the case may take three years and end up at the state Supreme Court.

According to its website (Oaklandpromise.org), the organization consists of four programs:

• Brilliant Babies, “a college savings account seeded with $500 as an early investment and source of inspiration for [parents] baby’s bright future,” according to Oakland Promise;

• Kindergarten to College, which “Open(s) an early college scholarship seeded with $100 for all Oakland public school kindergarten students;”

• Future Centers, which creates college and career advising center on middle school and high school campuses, replacing services lost by the public schools as a result of cutbacks;

• College Scholarships and Completion, which provides $1,000 annual scholarships to students going to community colleges and up to $4,000 a year for students attending four-year colleges.

Questions that remain to be answered are how many $500 accounts have been set up through Brilliant Babies; how many $100 scholarships have been established through Kindergarten to College; how many Future Centers have been set up and how many hours of support they have provided to students; as well as how many community college and four-year college scholarships have been awarded.

During the years before Oakland Promise became a nonprofit, the Oakland Public Education Fund served as the organization’s fiscal sponsor. The Ed Fund can share budgetary information, such as IRS Form 990, audited financial statements, Form 1023 and all correspondence in relation to the production and completion of this document, including an IRS Determination Letter — according to Maggie Croushore, director, development, of Oakland Promise.

By deadline, the Post had not received that data nor an answer questions about the cost that Public Education Fund charges to serve as Oakland Promise’s fiscal sponsor and numbers of students and families served by the programs.
Promise staff said they would meet with the Post next week.

Croushore told the Post that during the three years, 2015-18, the Oakland Promise spent a total of $19.9 million or 94.7 percent of its budget on program costs ($11.3 million) and scholarships and saving accounts ($8.6 million).

During that time, the initiative spent $1.1 million or 5.29 percent on administrative expenses. Total revenue during the three years was $33.5 million. However, now that the Oakland Promise has become a nonprofit, costs of administrative overhead could potentially increase if most the organization’s 47 employees are paid out of the budget instead of being provided without cost by the City, OUSD and other agencies.

In an email to the Post, Schaaf spokesperson Justin Berton said:“The nature of the Oakland Promise has always been a collaboration with OUSD and community partners to send underrepresented kids from Oakland to college with scholarships, mentors, and the life skills to end patterns of generational poverty and institutionalized racism.”
Oakland Promise has sent more than 1,400 Oakland kids to college, seeded more than 500 ‘Brilliant Baby’ scholarships and worked tirelessly to support Oakland families, said Berton.
For more information, go to Gene Hazzard’s website: www.cleanoakland.com

Ken Epstein

Posts by Ken Epstein

Related Topics:Libby Schaaf Oakland Promise rebecca kaplan

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Alameda County

Oakland Council Expands Citywide Security Cameras Despite Major Opposition

In a 7-1 vote in favor of the contract, with only District 3 Councilmember Carroll Fife voting no, the Council agreed to maintain its existing network of 291 cameras and add 40 new “pan-tilt-zoom cameras.”

Published

16 minutes ago

December 21, 2025

Oakland Post

At the International Association of Chiefs of Police Conference, Flock Safety introduces new public safety technology – Amplified Intelligence, a suite of AI-powered tools designed to improve law enforcement investigations. Courtesy photo.

By Post Staff

The Oakland City Council this week approved a $2.25 million contract with Flock Safety for a mass surveillance network of hundreds of security cameras to track vehicles in the city.

In recent weeks hundreds of local residents have spoken against the camera system, raising concerns that data will be shared with immigration authorities and other federal agencies at a time when mass surveillance is growing across the country with little regard for individual rights.

The Flock network, supported by the Oakland Police Department, has the backing of residents and councilmembers who see it as an important tool to protect public safety.

“This system makes the Department more efficient as it allows for information related to disruptive/violent criminal activities to be captured … and allows for precise and focused enforcement,” OPD wrote in its proposal to City Council.

According to OPD, police made 232 arrests using data from Flock cameras between July 2024 and November of this year.

Based on the data, police say they recovered 68 guns, and utilizing the countywide system, they have found 1,100 stolen vehicles.

However, Flock’s cameras cast a wide net. The company’s cameras in Oakland last month captured license plate numbers and other information from about 1.4 million vehicles.

Speaking at Tuesday’s Council meeting, Fife was critical of her colleagues for signing a contract with a company that has been in the national spotlight for sharing data with federal agencies.

Flock’s cameras – which are automated license plate readers – have been used in tracking people who have had abortions, monitoring protesters, and aiding in deportation roundups.

“I don’t know how we get up and have several press conferences talking about how we are supportive of a sanctuary city status but then use a vendor that has been shown to have a direct relationship with (the U.S.) Border Control,” she said. “It doesn’t make sense to me.”

Several councilmembers who voted in favor of the contract said they supported the deal as long as some safeguards were written into the Council’s resolution.

“We’re not aiming for perfection,” said District 1 Councilmember Zac Unger. “This is not Orwellian facial recognition technology — that’s prohibited in Oakland. The road forward here is to add as many amendments as we can.”

Amendments passed by the Council prohibit OPD from sharing camera data with any other agencies for the purpose of “criminalizing reproductive or gender affirming healthcare” or for federal immigration enforcement. California state law also prohibits the sharing of license plate reader data with the federal government, and because Oakland’s sanctuary city status, OPD is not allowed to cooperate with immigration authorities.

A former member of Oakland’s Privacy Advisory Commission has sued OPD, alleging that it has violated its own rules around data sharing.

So far, OPD has shared Flock data with 50 other law enforcement agencies.

Oakland Post

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Activism

Lu Lu’s House is Not Just Toying Around with the Community

Wilson and Lambert will be partnering with Mayor Barbara Lee on a toy giveaway on Dec. 20. Young people, like Dremont Wilkes, age 15, will help give away toys and encourage young people to stay in school and out of trouble. Wilkes wants to go to college and become a specialist in financial aid. Sports agent Aaron Goodwin has committed to giving all eight young people from Lu Lu’s House a fully paid free ride to college, provided they keep a 3.0 grade point average and continue the program. Lu Lu’s House is not toying around.

Published

13 hours ago

December 20, 2025

Oakland Post

Tania Fuller Bryant, Zirl Wilson, Dremont Wilkes, Tracy Lambert and Dr. Geoffrey Watson. Courtesy Oakland Private Industry

Special to the Post

Lu Lu’s House is a 501c3 organization based in Oakland, founded by Mr. Zirl Wilson and Mr. Tracy Lambert, both previously incarcerated. After their release from jail, they wanted to change things for the better in the community — and wow, have they done that!

The duo developed housing for previously incarcerated people, calling it “Lu Lu’s House,” after Wilson’s wonderful wife. At a time when many young people were robbing, looting, and involved in shootings, Wilson and Lambert took it upon themselves to risk their lives to engage young gang members and teach them about nonviolence, safety, cleanliness, business, education, and the importance of health and longevity.

Lambert sold hats and T-shirts at the Eastmont Mall and was visited by his friend Wilson. At the mall, they witnessed gangs of young people running into the stores, stealing whatever they could get their hands on and then rushing out. Wilson tried to stop them after numerous robberies and finally called the police, who Wilson said, “did not respond.” Having been incarcerated previously, they realized that if the young people were allowed to continue to rob the stores, they could receive multiple criminal counts, which would take their case from misdemeanors to felonies, resulting in incarceration.

Lu Lu’s House traveled to Los Angeles and obtained more than 500 toys
for a Dec. 20 giveaway in partnership with Oakland Mayor Barbara
Lee. Courtesy Oakland Private Industry,

Wilson took it upon himself to follow the young people home and when he arrived at their subsidized homes, he realized the importance of trying to save the young people from violence, drug addiction, lack of self-worth, and incarceration — as well as their families from losing subsidized housing. Lambert and Wilson explained to the young men and women, ages 13-17, that there were positive options which might allow them to make money legally and stay out of jail. Wilson and Lambert decided to teach them how to wash cars and they opened a car wash in East Oakland. Oakland’s Initiative, “Keep the town clean,” involved the young people from Lu Lu’s House participating in more than eight cleanup sessions throughout Oakland. To assist with their infrastructure, Lu Lu’s House has partnered with Oakland’s Private Industry Council.

For the Christmas season, Lu Lu’s House and reformed young people (who were previously robbed) will continue to give back.

Lu Lu’s House traveled to Los Angeles and obtained more than 500 toys.

Oakland Post

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Activism

Desmond Gumbs — Visionary Founder, Mentor, and Builder of Opportunity

Gumbs’ coaching and leadership journey spans from Bishop O’Dowd High School, Oakland High School, Stellar Prep High School. Over the decades, hundreds of his students have gone on to college, earning academic and athletic scholarships and developing life skills that extend well beyond sports.

Published

13 hours ago

December 20, 2025

Oakland Post

NCAA football history was made this year when Head Coach from Mississippi Valley State, Terrell Buckley and Head Coach Desmond Gumbs both had starting kickers that were Women. This picture was taken after the game. Courtesy photo.

Special to the Post

For more than 25 years, Desmond Gumbs has been a cornerstone of Bay Area education and athletics — not simply as a coach, but as a mentor, founder, and architect of opportunity. While recent media narratives have focused narrowly on challenges, they fail to capture the far more important truth: Gumbs’ life’s work has been dedicated to building pathways to college, character, and long-term success for hundreds of young people.

A Career Defined by Impact

One of his most enduring contributions is his role as founder of Stellar Prep High School, a non-traditional, mission-driven institution created to serve students who needed additional structure, belief, and opportunity. Through Stellar Prep numerous students have advanced to college — many with scholarships — demonstrating Gumbs’ deep commitment to education as the foundation for athletic and personal success.

NCAA football history was made this year when Head Coach from
Mississippi Valley State, Terrell Buckley and Head Coach Desmond
Gumbs both had starting kickers that were women. This picture was
taken after the game.

A Personal Testament to the Mission: Addison Gumbs

Perhaps no example better reflects Desmond Gumbs’ philosophy than the journey of his son, Addison Gumbs. Addison became an Army All-American, one of the highest honors in high school football — and notably, the last Army All-Americans produced by the Bay Area, alongside Najee Harris.

Both young men went on to compete at the highest levels of college football — Addison Gumbs at the University of Oklahoma, and Najee Harris at the University of Alabama — representing the Bay Area on a national level.

Building Lincoln University Athletics From the Ground Up

In 2021, Gumbs accepted one of the most difficult challenges in college athletics: launching an entire athletics department at Lincoln University in Oakland from scratch. With no established infrastructure, limited facilities, and eventually the loss of key financial aid resources, he nonetheless built opportunities where none existed.

Under his leadership, Lincoln University introduced:

Football
Men’s and Women’s Basketball
Men’s and Women’s Soccer

Operating as an independent program with no capital and no conference safety net, Gumbs was forced to innovate — finding ways to sustain teams, schedule competition, and keep student-athletes enrolled and progressing toward degrees. The work was never about comfort; it was about access.

Voices That Reflect His Impact

Desmond Gumbs’ philosophy has been consistently reflected in his own published words:

“if you have an idea, you’re 75% there the remaining 25% is actually doing it.”
“This generation doesn’t respect the title — they respect the person.”
“Greatness is a habit, not a moment.”

Former players and community members have echoed similar sentiments in public commentary, crediting Gumbs with teaching them leadership, accountability, confidence, and belief in themselves — lessons that outlast any single season.

Context Matters More Than Headlines

Recent articles critical of Lincoln University athletics focus on logistical and financial hardships while ignoring the reality of building a new program with limited resources in one of the most expensive regions in the country. Such narratives are ultimately harmful and incomplete, failing to recognize the courage it takes to create opportunity instead of walking away when conditions are difficult.

The real story is not about early struggles — it is about vision, resilience, and service.

A Legacy That Endures

From founding Stellar PREP High School, to sending hundreds of students to college, to producing elite athletes like Addison Gumbs, to launching Lincoln University athletics, Desmond Gumbs’ legacy is one of belief in young people and relentless commitment to opportunity.

His work cannot be reduced to headlines or records. It lives on in degrees earned, scholarships secured, leaders developed, and futures changed — across the Bay Area and beyond.