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New Interim Mayor Nikki Bas Takes Office, Announces Balanced Budget

“The Council made difficult but clear decisions last night,” Mayor Bas said in a statement released Thursday. “With yesterday’s budget adoption, the City of Oakland is on track to maintain our immediate fiscal health and our emergency reserves are at the required level.”

Published

5 months ago

December 24, 2024

Oakland Post

Nikki Fortunato Bas. Courtesy photo.

‘The Council made difficult but clear decisions,’ said Bas

Kaplan proposed for Interim District 2 Council seat

By Post Staff

Oakland City Council President Nikki Fortunato Bas was sworn in interim mayor on Wednesday and immediately sat down with City Council members to rebalance the city’s budget, closing a projected deficit and maintaining emergency financial reserves.

“The City now seeks to move forward in strong collaboration with its Labor partners and the community-led Budget Advisory Commission toward long-term fiscal sustainability,” she said. “We all deserve to feel safe and secure, whether we’re taking our kids out to play, running our essential small businesses, parking our car on the street, or walking home at night.”

Bas took over as mayor from Sheng Thao, whose last day in office was Tuesday after losing a recall election in November.

“Thank you for choosing me to serve as your mayor. As the first Hmong American woman to become the mayor of a major American city, it has been the honor of my lifetime. I am deeply proud of the progress we created together,” Thao said.

Bas, in her final remarks as a councilmember, proposed that the City Council appoint Kaplan to replace her until the April election.

“As you know Councilmember Kaplan is retiring, she is willing to serve in this interim capacity. She is a resident of District 2 in Jack London, will not run for the seat in the special election; and I believe that she is uniquely qualified to jump in and immediately help to serve our District 2 residents, as well as key projects moving forward, and of course help lead the city’s biennial budget process,” Bas said.

At its meeting this week, the Council affirmed the City Administrator’s budget balancing actions, utilizing unrestricted and transferred funds to help fill the gap and provided direction and strategies to close the remaining need.

The proposals include finding new revenue from increased events and success at the Oakland Coliseum/Arena and other sources, making any further cuts a last resort.

They also proposed to immediately collect unpaid business taxes by doing an internal audit and strengthen controls on OPD overtime overspending.

Said Councilmember Kaplan, “It is vital to protect core public services, and the long-term fiscal solvency of our city. I am honored that the extra available funds I had previously identified have been confirmed, and are being incorporated into budget strategies, allowing Oakland to reduce cuts and restore reserves. In addition, important public serving and revenue-generating functions are being strengthened, including to reduce blight and provide safer, cleaner streets.”

Councilmember Kevin Jenkins (District 6) said, “The Fire Department, which had been preserved from cuts in July, was able to rapidly stop the Keller Fire from growing out of control, which prevented a repeat of the horrific loss of life and loss of homes that took place during the 1991 Oakland Hills Fire.”

According to a Mayor’s Office press statement, Oakland’s investments in the Oakland Police Department and the Department of Violence Prevention have yielded the fastest and most dramatic reduction in homicides in the city’s history.

The City’s deep investments in public safety over the past year continue to pay off, with homicides down 35% year-to-date and overall crime down by 34% since last year. The Public Safety Leadership team is very strong with OPD Chief Floyd Mitchell, DVP Chief Dr. Holly Joshi, OFD Chief Damon Covington, and their deputy chiefs having over a century of collective experience in Oakland.

The budget proposals preserve Oakland’s Ceasefire violence intervention strategy, prioritize OPD patrol and investigations, and continue services to improve 911 response times, with currently 71% of calls answered within 15 seconds or less — a dramatic improvement over the prior year, the press statement said.

Oakland’s investments in sidewalk repair, street paving, clearing abandoned autos, and safer conditions on our roadways are improving both safety and quality of life. The proposals restore funding for important and needed bicycle and pedestrian safety projects, street paving, and parking enforcement, the statement said.

The Council is considering a sales tax ballot measure for the April 15 special election. The proposed half-cent sales tax increase would raise approximately $29 million annually. Ongoing revenue generation and improved efficiencies would help address the City’s structural deficit in the next two-year budget.

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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

2 hours ago

May 25, 2025

Oakland Post

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Chevron Richmond Installs Baker Hughes Flare.IQ, Real-time Flare Monitoring, Control and Reduction System

While the sight of flaring can cause concern in the community, flares are essential safety systems that burn pollutants to prevent them from being released directly into the atmosphere. They activate during startup and shut-down of facility units or during upsets or equipment malfunctions. The typical flare stack is about 200 feet high so that vapors are well above street levels.

Published

6 days ago

May 19, 2025

Oakland Post

Image courtesy The Richmond Standard.

The Richmond Standard

Chevron Richmond recently installed flare.IQ, a real-time, automated system that will improve the facility’s flaring performance.

The technology, developed by Panametrics, a Baker Hughes business, uses sensors to monitor, reduce and control flaring in real time. It collects and assesses data on refinery processes, such as temperature, pressure, gas flow and gas composition, and adjusts accordingly to ensure flares burn more efficiently and cleanly, leading to fewer emissions.

“The cleaner the flare, the brighter the flame can look,” said Duy Nguyen, a Chevron Richmond flaring specialist. “If you see a brighter flame than usual on a flare, that actually means flare.IQ is operating as intended.”

“A key element in Baker Hughes’ emissions abatement portfolio, flare.IQ has a proven track record in optimizing flare operations and significantly reducing emissions,” said Colin Hehir, vice president of Panametrics, a Baker Hughes business. “By partnering with Chevron Richmond, one of the first operators in North America to adopt flare.IQ, we are looking forward to enhancing the plant’s flaring operations.”

The installation of flare.IQ is part of a broader and ongoing effort by Chevron Richmond to improve flare performance, particularly in response to increased events after the new, more efficient hydrogen plant was brought online in 2019.

Since then, the company has invested $25 million — and counting — into flare minimization. As part of the effort, a multidisciplinary refinery team was formed to find and implement ways to improve operational reliability and ultimately reduce flaring. Operators and other employees involved in management of flares and flare gas recovery systems undergo new training.

“It is important to me that the community knows we are working hard to lower emissions and improve our flaring performance,” Nguyen said.

Also evolving is the process by which community members are notified of flaring incidents. The Community Warning System (CWS), operated by Contra Costa County is an “all-hazard” public warning system.

Residents can opt-in to receive alerts via text, e-mail and landline. The CWS was recently expanded to enable residents to receive notifications for “Level 1” incidents, which are considered informational as they do not require any community action.

For more information related to these topics, check out the resources included on the Chevron Richmond, CAER and Contra Costa Health websites. Residents are also encouraged to follow @chevronrichmond and @RFDCAOnline on Facebook and X (formerly Twitter), where additional information may be posted during an incident.

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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

7 days 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.