City Government

Op-Ed: Tell Oakland City Council: This is an Emergency; Stop Evictions and Rent Increases

Published

10 years ago

February 26, 2016

Oakland Post

Dr. Kitty Kelly Epstein

By Kitty Kelly Epstein

There is an emergency in Oakland. The policies that prevail in Oakland City Hall are going to drive most of us out of Oakland, unless we stand up.

The land, the resources, the tax money and the city staff time that belong to Oakland residents are being spent almost entirely on developments to house wealthy non-Oaklanders in buildings that none of our current residents can afford to live in.

The emergency is clear from a city report: “Oakland’s market rate rents are well above what is affordable to the typical Oakland renter.”

A majority, 60 percent, of Oakland residents are renters.

The city’s document goes further. The rental rate for a typical 2-bedroom apartment increased 40 percent in one year to $2,950.

A resident earning the Oakland minimum wage would have to work 185 hours a week to afford that apartment.

The actual rent that the typical Oakland resident can afford is $700 a month. There are no rentals in that price range.

The answers proposed by elected officials are ridiculously inadequate.

The city is now talking about maybe, possibly, building a small amount of affordable housing. It’s too little, too late.

Even if the city carried out any of the tiny number of affordable projects they have mentioned, by the time they are built, most of those individuals who need such housing would be gone from the city or joining the homeless on the street.

Meanwhile, the city is continuing to give public land that belongs to all of us to private developers to build even more units that none of us can afford to live in.

We are the city of the Black Panthers, of labor organizing and the longshore union (ILWU) that strikes against apartheid. We are the city of Barbara Lee and her historic stand against war.

We are the city whose residents said we valued diversity more than anything else as the Continued from page 1 reason we live here.

And some of our residents, led by Alliance of California for Community Empowerment (ACCE) and Causa Justa: Just Cause, have bravely stopped people from being evicted from their homes.

Most recently, East Lake United for Justice stopped the City Council from giving away another prime piece of public land to wealthy, for-profit developers.

Time Magazine said we “stole Wall Street’s mojo” during the Occupy movement. Those of us who are not yet involved in the housing movement need to get our mojo back or we’ll all be driving in from Antioch for a nostalgic glimpse of our lake.

We need drastic action from the City Council to declare a state of emergency and a moratorium on evictions and rent increases, until city officials can work out exactly how they will correct the situation so that we are to be able to stay in our homes in our beautiful city.

For a copy of the City of Oakland report, “Citywide Rental Survey,” go to http:// www2.oaklandnet.com/oakca1/groups/ceda/documents/ report/oak056016.pdf

If you want to get involved, email housingmojo@gmail. com

Kitty Kelly Epstein is a professor and Oakland resident. She hosts Education Today on KPFA 94.1 and authored the book, “Organizing to Change a City” (2012), Peter Lang.

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Oakland Post: Week of December 31, 2025 – January 6, 2026

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

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2 weeks ago

January 2, 2026

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Oakland Post: Week of December 24 – 30, 2025

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of – December 24 – 30, 2025

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3 weeks ago

December 25, 2025

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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

4 weeks 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.