Government

The Joint Center Applauds U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand and U.S. Senator Gary Peters for Today’s Appointments of Top Staff of Color

LOS ANGELES SENTINEL — The Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies commended U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) and U.S. Senator Gary Peters (D-MI) for their recent appointments of top staff of color.

Published

7 years ago

January 6, 2019

Oakland Post

By Sentinel News Service

The Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies commended U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) and U.S. Senator Gary Peters (D-MI) for their recent appointments of top staff of color. Senator Gillibrand hired Joi Chaney as chief of staff and Senator Peters promoted Zephranie Buetow to serve as legislative director.

“As a native of Michigan, I am particularly proud that Senator Peters has elevated Zephranie Buetow to a top policy position in his Washington, DC office–she joins just two other African Americans who serve as legislative directors in the Senate,” said Joint Center President Spencer Overton. “As Congress returns to work and continues to fill more than 300 top staff positions, I urge Members to continue making diversity and inclusion a priority. Doing so sends the right message to all communities starting from day one.”

Gillibrand’s and Peters’s appointments are indicative of a wave of diversity hires of top staff of color. According to the Joint Center’s live tracker, four new chiefs of color have been hired by returning Senators. Two (including Chaney) are Black women, one is Asian American/Pacific Islander woman, and one is Latino.

“Black women play a vital role in our democracy. By appointing Joi Chaney to lead her Senate office, Senator Gillibrand is playing a leading role in the Senate by recognizing that the talent and experiences of people of color matter in policymaking,” said Joint Center Black Talent Initiative Director Don Bell. “Hiring top staff is integral to creating a culture of diversity and inclusion, and it is necessary to ensure that our democracy is truly representative and accountable to all.”

In 2015, the Joint Center issued a report, Racial Diversity Among Top Senate Staff, finding that African Americans accounted for 13 percent of the U.S. population and 22 percent of those who identified as Democratic voters, but less than 1 percent of top Senate staffers. With these appointments, along with others announced over the past two weeks, Senators of the 116th Congress are well on their way toward changing these statistics.

The official bios for the new top staffers can be found below:

Joi Chaney will join Senator Kirsten Gillibrand’s (NY) office as its Chief of Staff at the end of January after running Equal Pay Today, a project of Equal Rights Advocates that works in coalition to close the gender wage gap and engage new and diverse constituencies in the fight for equal pay. She is returning to government service after serving in the Obama Administration at the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission as a political appointee in the Office of the Chair. This is her second tour in the Senate, where she was previously Policy Director and Counsel of the Senate Democratic Policy Committee under then-Majority Leader Harry Reid. Joi is also an alumnus of Planned Parenthood Federation of America. Joi is a graduate of Howard University and Harvard Law School.

According to the Office of Senator Peters, Zephranie Buetow is a graduate of the University of Illinois with a B.A. in Speech Communications. She also earned an M.S. in Communication from Illinois State University and a J.D. and M.A. in Cultural and Educational Policy Studies from Loyola University Chicago. She is currently Deputy Legislative Director and Counsel for Senator Peters. Prior to joining Peters’ office in 2015, she worked for former U.S. Senator Mary Landrieu (D-LA). While attending law school, Buetow interned in the Chicago Offices of U.S. Representative Bobby Rush (D-IL) and U.S. Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL). She also served in the Illinois Army National Guard.

This article originally appeared in the Los Angeles Sentinel.

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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 days 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.”

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1 week 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.

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Families Across the U.S. Are Facing an ‘Affordability Crisis,’ Says United Way Bay Area

United Way’s Real Cost Measure data reveals that 27% of Bay Area households – more than 1 in 4 families – cannot afford essentials such as food, housing, childcare, transportation, and healthcare. A family of four needs $136,872 annually to cover these basic necessities, while two adults working full time at minimum wage earn only $69,326.

Published

1 week ago

December 20, 2025

Oakland Post

Affordable housing is the greatest concern for consumers, it’s followed by the cost of groceries. Courtesy photo.

By Post Staff

A national poll released this week by Marist shows that 61% of Americans say the economy is not working well for them, while 70% report that their local area is not affordable. This marks the highest share of respondents expressing concern since the question was first asked in 2011.

According to United Way Bay Area (UWBA), the data underscores a growing reality in the region: more than 600,000 Bay Area households are working hard yet still cannot afford their basic needs.

Nationally, the Marist Poll found that rising prices are the top economic concern for 45% of Americans, followed by housing costs at 18%. In the Bay Area, however, that equation is reversed. Housing costs are the dominant driver of the affordability crisis.

“The national numbers confirm what we’re seeing every day through our 211 helpline and in communities across the region,” said Keisha Browder, CEO of United Way Bay Area. “People are working hard, but their paychecks simply aren’t keeping pace with the cost of living. This isn’t about individual failure; it’s about policy choices that leave too many of our neighbors one missed paycheck away from crisis.”

The Bay Area’s affordability crisis is particularly defined by extreme housing costs:

Housing remains the No. 1 reason residents call UWBA’s 211 helpline, accounting for 49% of calls this year.
Nearly 4 in 10 Bay Area households (35%) spend at least 30% of their income on housing, a level widely considered financially dangerous.
Forty percent of households with children under age 6 fall below the Real Cost Measure.
The impact is disproportionate: 49% of Latino households and 41% of Black households struggle to meet basic needs, compared to 15% of white households.

At the national level, the issue of affordability has also become a political flashpoint. In late 2025, President Donald Trump has increasingly referred to “affordability” as a “Democrat hoax” or “con job.” While he previously described himself as the “affordability president,” his recent messaging frames the term as a political tactic used by Democrats to assign blame for high prices.

The president has defended his administration by pointing to predecessors and asserting that prices are declining. However, many Americans remain unconvinced. The Marist Poll shows that 57% of respondents disapprove of Trump’s handling of the economy, while just 36% approve – his lowest approval rating on the issue across both terms in office.