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Are Local Authorities “Kidnapping Parents in the Middle of the Night?”

Published

13 years ago

January 25, 2013

Pablo Paredes of 67 Sueños migrant youth worker advocate organization testifies at ICE hearing on Jan. 10. County Supervisor Richard Valle listens at far left.

By J. Douglas Allen-Taylor

With members of the Alameda County Board of Supervisors saying they have no power to prevent the county sheriff from continuing federal immigration violation holds at the county jail, a packed meeting room of immigrant families and advocates told supervisors recently that the practice causing widespread economic and psychological uncertainty in county immigrant communities.
At the request of federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the sheriff’s office puts two-day detainers on more than 80 Santa Rita Jail inmates a month on suspicion of immigration law violations, with more than 75 percent of them ending up being turned over to immigration authorities.
Students of immigrant parents, people identifying themselves as undocumented workers, and immigration rights advocates told members of the two-person Public Protection Committee of the board of supervisors this month that the ICE Secure-Communities (S-Com) holds and arrests were particularly hard on families that lose their breadwinners.
“Oakland lost 131 lives to violence last year,” Pablo Paredes of 67 Sueños migrant youth worker advocate organization testified to the two-member Public Protection Committee hearing this month.
“What I’m here to tell you is that [Alameda County’s] investment in S-Com is your investment in killing the next baby in Oakland. Violence is not born in a vacuum,” he said. “Violence is born in situation where alternatives disappear, where frustration increases, where my Daddy’s not home tonight. Where my Mom is not home tonight.
“When a breadwinner is deported, [the remaining single parent has to] balance the low wages that they throw at them because they are undocumented, [and so they have to] neglect their children. That leads to ‘who is raising our kids?’ The streets are raising our kids. The dealers on the corner are raising our kids. That’s why so many of our sisters are turning into prostitutes. That’s why so many of our children are coming to school high.”
Paredes said that instead of investing in families, cooperation with federal immigration authorities is “investing in kidnapping parents in the middle of the night.”
One teenage Latina girl identifying herself only as Diana said the S-Com holds and deportations are “breaking up families just like they did to mine. My aunt and uncle got deported, and that affected me as well as their children. It ruined their family, their childhood, their lives, and their dreams. The [Alameda County sheriff’s deputies] should do their own job and let ICE do theirs.”
Several of the speakers said that while the forced deportations do not make Alameda County safer-since the majority of those deported from the county are either non-violent offenders or have not committed any state or local crimes at all-with some adding that the deportees themselves can face danger in returning to their home countries.
Sylvia Brandon Perez, a volunteer with the East Bay Interfaith Immigration Coalition, a naturalized American citizen from Cuba and a retired immigration attorney, told the story of one Alameda County man from Guatemala who had applied for asylum “because he was afraid if he was returned to his country, he would be killed.
He was arrested because he was parked at a yellow line, waiting for his wife who was at a PTA meeting at a school in Hayward. He was deported to Guatemala. Within three months he had been shot and killed, leaving two U.S.-born children and a wife.”
And Maria Kelly, a Berkeley-area immigration rights worker and a Syrian-American, said she had several family members who are in the country on tourist visas. “If they overstay their visas and they get pulled over for something like a broken tail light or whatever and they’re sent back to Syria, what are they being sent back to?

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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.

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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

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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.