Bay Area

City Destroys Self-Made Homes

Published

5 years ago

October 24, 2019

While establishing a fire lane and cleaning a portion of a Home Depot parking lot where around 50 unhoused residents live, on Oct. 22 and 23 Oakland’s Department of Public Works (DPW) destroyed over a dozen self-made wooden homes and left those displaced with no alternative housing options.

“It’s nothing but it keeps a roof over my head,” said José Vargas about his thin, high-ceilinged, self-made home with a bed, couch and TV in an interview with the Oakland Post a few days before the demolition. He lived there with his partner, Jillian Wright, but was disassembling the home during our interview to save the wood, which he says he purchased at Home Depot for about $300.

“If the city gets to [my home] first, they’ll just destroy it,” said Vargas.

Vargas has lived in Oakland since his family came from Mexico when he was 3 years old. He had stable housing and worked in a restaurant until his father passed away three years ago. Since then, he’s lived by Home Depot, in an encampment that residents call The Community of Grace (COG).

COG has been under scrutiny since at least last November 2018, when the site’s City Councilmember Noel Gallo talked with KCBS about the site’s crime and squalid conditions. A walk through the site reveals large trash piles, living and dead vermin, and human waste. But the residents, most of whom are long-time Oakland residents priced out of their former housing claim that most residents leave Home Depot alone and that the city refuses to provide dumpsters, do consistent trash pick up, and provide adequate toilet services.

Vargas says he first found out he could no longer keep his home on Oct. 14, when the city put a notice on it saying it was a fire hazard. Vargas and his partner, Wright, understood the concern as one of their previous self-made homes recently caught fire, but they were frustrated that the city offered no alternative housing.

Wright says that for more than four months she has been on a waiting list for the city’s Community Cabins program, which offers temporary shelter in shared 10’x12’ cabins, but hasn’t been able to enter the program. Oakland North reported in September that the Community Cabins can only currently offer beds to 195 participants.

“This is as an attack on curbside communities,” said Candice Elder of The East Oakland Collective (EOC). “They’re citing self-built homes for fire-code violations that normally only apply to your traditional single-family home.”

Elder was on site when the city destroyed about 20 self-made homes between 81st and 85th Avenues beneath the BART tracks in East Oakland in mid-September.

At the city’s request, EOC successfully raised funds to provide replacement tents but the group refused to do it for the city again as they want the city held accountable.

“There should be a time period when residents can address any safety or fire code concerns to see if they can get their self-built structures more safe,” said Elder. “But the city is jumping straight to the extreme of destroy.”

EOC was able to negotiate with the city to allow some structures to remain for residents in particularly vulnerable situations. Two single mothers were able to keep their homes, as were an elderly couple.

The city’s leniency did not extend to residents with disabilities. A total of at least 13 homes were destroyed, including one belonging to Amy Krawkowskeie who has both cerebral palsy and a traumatic brain injury. The Oakland Post interviewed her partner, Kayla Krawkowskeie, as she packed up all of the couple’s belongings on October 22, hours before her home was destroyed.

“The fact that they’re demolishing our house is ridiculous,” Kayla said, who felt that she was being punished for other people’s lack of common sense. “We just need to be more careful about not cooking inside of places like this.”

Unlike the vast majority of other displaced residents, the city offered Amy and Kayla Krawkowskeie space in a Community Cabin site for six months. Although the couple preferred to stay in their former home as they had lived at COG for four years, they accepted the offer after the city destroyed their home.

The Oakland Post e-mailed Noel Gallo for comment on this story but did not hear back. The Post also e-mailed Assistant City Administrator Joe DeVries, who wrote the policy for The Community Cabins program, but did not hear back.

The city plans a similar operation in the private lot that borders the Home Depot lot and also has self-made homes, on Oct. 29 and 30.

Zack Haber

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Oakland Post: Week of December 25 – 31, 2024

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of December 25 – 31, 2024

Published

5 hours ago

December 26, 2024

Oakland Post

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Bay Area

Glydways Breaking Ground on 14-Acre Demonstration Facility at Hilltop Mall

Glydways has been testing its technology at CCTA’s GoMentum Station in Concord for several years. The company plans to install an ambitious 28-mile Autonomous Transit Network in East Contra Costa County. The new Richmond facility will be strategically positioned near that project, according to Glydways.

Published

2 days ago

December 24, 2024

Oakland Post

Image of planned Richmond facility courtesy of Glydways.

The Richmond Standard

Glydways, developer of microtransit systems using autonomous, small-scale vehicles, is breaking ground on a 14-acre Development and Demonstration Facility at the former Hilltop Mall property in Richmond, the Contra Costa Transportation Authority (CCTA) reported on social media.

Glydways, which released a statement announcing the project Monday, is using the site while the mall property undergoes a larger redevelopment.

“In the interim, Glydways will use a portion of the property to showcase its technology and conduct safety and reliability testing,” the company said.

The new Richmond development hub will include “over a mile of dedicated test track, enabling Glydways to refine its solutions in a controlled environment while simulating real-world conditions,” the company said.

Visitors to the facility will be able to experience on-demand travel, explore the control center and visit a showroom featuring virtual reality demonstrations of Glydways projects worldwide.

The hub will also house a 13,000-square-foot maintenance and storage facility to service the growing fleet of Glydcars.

“With this new facility [at the former Hilltop Mall property], we’re giving the public a glimpse of the future, where people can experience ultra-quiet, on-demand transit—just like hailing a rideshare, but with the reliability and affordability of public transit,” said Tim Haile, executive director of CCTA.

Janet Galvez, vice president and investment officer at Prologis, owner of the Hilltop Mall property, said her company is “thrilled” to provide space for Glydways and is continuing to work with the city on future redevelopment plans for the broader mall property.

Richmond City Manager Shasa Curl added that Glydways’ presence “will not only help test new transit solutions but also activate the former Mall site while preparation and finalization of the Hilltop Horizon Specific Plan is underway.

Oakland Post

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Alameda County

Last City Council Meeting of the Year Ends on Sour Note with Big Budget Cuts

In a five to one vote, with Councilmembers Carroll Fife and Janani Ramachandran excused, the council passed a plan aimed at balancing the $130 million deficit the city is facing. Noel Gallo voted against the plan, previously citing concerns over public safety cuts, while Nikki Fortunato-Bas, Treva Reid, Rebecca Kaplan, Kevin Jenkins, and Dan Kalb voted in agreement with the plan.

Published

2 days ago

December 24, 2024

Oakland Post

Oakland City Council voted on a plan to balance the $130 million deficit at their last regular meeting of 2024. The plan reduces police spending by $25 million, temporarily closes two fire stations, and guts the cultural arts programs. iStock photo.

By Magaly Muñoz

In the last lengthy Tuesday meeting of the Oakland City Council for 2024, residents expressed strong opposition to the much needed budget cuts before a change in leadership was finalized with the certification of election results.

Oakland police and fire departments, the ambassador program, and city arts and culture will all see significant cuts over the course of two phases.

Phase 1 will eliminate two police academies, brown out two fire stations, eliminate the ambassador program, and reduce police overtime by nearly $25 million. These, with several other cuts across departments, aim to save the city $60 million. In addition, the council simultaneously approved to transfer restricted funds into its general purpose fund, amounting to over $40 million.

Phase 2 includes additional fire station brownouts and the elimination of 91 jobs, aiming to recover almost $16 million in order to balance the rest of the budget.

Several organizations and residents spoke out at the meeting in hopes of swaying the council to not make cuts to their programs.

East Oakland Senior Center volunteers and members, and homeless advocates, filled the plaza just outside of City Hall with rallies to show their disapproval of the new budget plan. Senior residents told the council to “remember that you’ll get old too” and that disturbing their resources will only bring problems for an already struggling community.

While city staff announced that there would not be complete cuts to senior center facilities, there would be significant reductions to staff and possibly inter-program services down the line.

Exiting council member and interim mayor Bas told the public that she is still hopeful that the one-time $125 million Coliseum sale deal will proceed in the near future so that the city would not have to continue with drastic cuts. The deal was intended to save the city for fiscal year 2024-25, but a hold up at the county level has paused any progress and therefore millions of dollars in funds Oakland desperately needs.

The Coliseum sale has been a contentious one. Residents and city leaders were originally against using the deal as a way to balance the budget, citing doubts about the sellers, the African American Sports and Entertainment Group’s (AASEG), ability to complete the deal. Council members Reid, Ramachandran, and Gallo have called several emergency meetings to understand where the first installments of the sale are, with little to no answers.

Bas added that as the new Alameda County Supervisor for D5, a position she starts in a few weeks, she will do everything in her power to push the Coliseum sale along.

The city is also considering a sales tax measure to put on the special election ballot on April 15, 2025, which will also serve as an election to fill the now vacant D2 and mayor positions. The tax increase would raise approximately $29 million annually for Oakland, allowing the city to gain much-needed revenue for the next two-year budget.

The council will discuss the possible sales tax measure on January 9.