City Government

Oakland “Locks Arms” to Aid Immigrant Children

Published

11 years ago

July 30, 2014

The Oakland City Council this week unanimously passed a resolution committing to aiding the humanitarian relief effort for unaccompanied immigrants to the United States, authored by Mayor Jean Quan, Vice Mayor Larry Reid and Councilmember Noel Gallo.

“The bottom line here is clear and urgent: we are talking about children who need our help, and Oakland stands shoulder to shoulder with everyone offering that help,” said Mayor Quan.

“This is a humanitarian crisis that requires a compassionate and urgent response,” said Councilmember Gallo. “We must do what we can to support the health and wellbeing of these children. Our goal is to ensure that these unaccompanied children get the services they need, and are able to move from federal shelter facilities into the homes of relatives or host families as they await the results of their immigration proceedings.”

Seeking to put teeth in the resolution, Gallo on Wednesday convened a meeting in the Mayor’s Office with representatives of over 30 churches, nonprofits and community groups to coordinate efforts to meet the children’s and families’ pressing needs. The representatives were mostly from Oakland but also from other East Bay cities and San Francisco.

Rev. Pablo Morataya

“We’re reacting to the situation, but we’re not prepared,” said Rev. Pablo Morataya, pastor of Primer Iglesia Presbiteriana Hispana on High Street in Oakland.

His church is supporting two families, one from Guatemala and another from Honduras, who are each living in one room in small apartments with relatives.

“The necessities are housing and legal assistance,” he said. “They are already in court up here. And there are young people coming into our city. We don’t know yet how many, but there are many, many of them.”

According to attorneys at the meeting, the young immigrants and adults are entitled to legal representation, but the government does not pay for it. To retain a private lawyer typically costs at least $6,000, and a case typically will take between two and three years.

Centro Legal de la Raza in the Fruitvale District is representing as many of the new immigrants as it can and is referring other clients to nonprofits and private attorneys who are willing to work without cost, said Barbara Pinto, an immigration staff attorney at Centro Legal.

Lariza Dugan-Cuadra

“Locally, we’re locking arms” to help the new arrivals, said Lariza Dugan-Cuadra of the central American Resource Center of Northern California in San Francisco. She said she knows of 60 families that are going to court in the next few weeks.

Oakland International High School has already taken in 50 immigrant children this year, “and we’re a small school,” said Carmelita Reyes, principal of the Oakland public school.

“We’ve been triaging the best we can, trying to find lawyers – it’s a nightmare,” she said. “Asking someone in the third grade who doesn’t speak English to (represent) themselves is ridiculous,” she said.

Gallo said that he is working closely with Supervisor David Campos in San Francisco, and Gov. Jerry Brown is willing to provide resources. But so far, the U.S. government is mostly talking about militarizing the border and has not been forthcoming with much aid to help take care of the children.

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The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of – December 31, 2025 – January 6, 2026

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January 2, 2026

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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

1 month 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.