City Government

Will Coliseum City Plan Benefit Oakland Residents?

Published

11 years ago

October 2, 2014

City officials seem to be moving full steam ahead on a plan to knock down the Oakland Coliseum and replace it with a glitzy Coliseum City – which could include up to three sports areanas as well as hotels, entertainment, housing, retail and restaurants – even though no money so far has been found to put the project in motion.

If the proposal is approved by the Coliseum’s Joint Powers Authority, along with the Oakland City Council and the Alameda County Board of Supervisors, the zoning and other permit amendments will be in place if the financing can be put together.

Seeking funding, Mayor Jean Quan announced in the spring that she secured funding from the crown prince of Dubai, but that promise has not been substantiated.

However, the mayor now says she has worked out an agreement to build at least part of the deal – a new Raider’s Stadium in exchange for giving free land to the team to build the $900 million to $1.2 billion project.

As part of the deal, city and Alameda County taxpayers will pay off $120 million they still owe for the 1990s overhaul of the Coliseum that would be demolished. In addition, the city would pay for other subsidies to prepare the site.

At a public hearing Wednesday night at City Hall at the Planning Commission, many residents raised concerns that the officials want to build a new city in East Oakland and bring new people into the area while ignoring the people who live in the existing city.

They say the city is rushing to approve the Coliseum City plan, which does not offer sufficient guarantees of local jobs and moderate- and low-income housing and, more generally, ignores the needs and voices of the East Oakland community that surrounds the proposed project.

In addition, they argue that the community was not involved for two years when the plan was drafted and now only have less than two months to comment on the 168-page draft Coliseum Area Specific Plan and the extensive draft Environmental Impact Review documents, reportedly developed at a cost of over $5 million.

“(This plan) may not happen, but is it going to serve the people in East Oakland?” Asked Nehanda Imara from Communities for a Better Environment (CBE), who was concerned about the zoning amendments.

“This is a deal between the planners, the developers and the city,” said another speaker. “This has nothing for the people who live here,” to mitigate the environmental and noise problems they will experience as a result of the project.

“The people who lived here the longest, we get all the burnt of it,” the speaker said. “It’s just not right.”

“This is a low-income housing area (in East Oakland),” said Anwan Zeidi. “When you start putting in something like this, you are going to drive the people out.”

In an interview with the Post, Coliseum area businessman Bob Schwartz complained about the whole process.

“This thing has been worked on for two years,” he said. “There was supposed to be community input, and money was in the budget for it,” but there was no outreach to the affected community, he said.

“Now, we’re asked to comment on it when the plan is done and is very hard to change,” he said. “They want to pass this almost immediately.”

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Activism

Remembering George Floyd

BLACKPRESSUSA NEWSWIRE — Minnesota State Attorney General Keith Ellison acknowledges that the Floyd case five years ago involved a situation in which due process was denied, and five years later, the president is currently dismissing “due process. “The Minnesota Atty General also says, “Trump is trying to attack constitutional rule, attacking congressional authority and judicial decision-making.” George Floyd was an African American man killed by police who knocked on his neck and on his back, preventing him from breathing.

Published

7 days ago

June 2, 2025

Oakland Post

Mural showing the portrait of George Floyd in Mauerpark in Berlin. To the left of the portrait the lettering "I can't Breathe" was added, on the right side the three hashtags #GeorgeFloyd, #Icantbreathe and #Sayhisname. The mural was completed by Eme Street Art (facebook name) / Eme Free Thinker (signature) on 29 May 2020. (Wikimedia Commons)

By April Ryan
BlackPressUSA Newswire

“The president’s been very clear he has no intentions of pardoning Derek Chauvin, and it’s not a request that we’re looking at,” confirms a senior staffer at the Trump White House. That White House response results from public hope, including from a close Trump ally, Georgia Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene. The timing of Greene’s hopes coincides with the Justice Department’s recent decision to end oversight of local police accused of abuse. It also falls on the fifth anniversary of the police-involved death of George Floyd on May 25th. The death sparked national and worldwide outrage and became a transitional moment politically and culturally, although the outcry for laws on police accountability failed.

The death forced then-Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden to focus on deadly police force and accountability. His efforts while president to pass the George Floyd Justice in policing act failed. The death of George Floyd also put a spotlight on the Black community, forcing then-candidate Biden to choose a Black woman running mate. Kamala Harris ultimately became vice president of the United States alongside Joe Biden. Minnesota State Attorney General Keith Ellison prosecuted the cases against the officers involved in the death of Floyd. He remembers,” Trump was in office when George Floyd was killed, and I would blame Trump for creating a negative environment for police-community relations. Remember, it was him who said when the looting starts, the shooting starts, it was him who got rid of all the consent decrees that were in place by the Obama administration.”

In 2025, Police-involved civilian deaths are up by “about 100 to about 11 hundred,” according to Ellison. Ellison acknowledges that the Floyd case five years ago involved a situation in which due process was denied, and five years later, the president is currently dismissing “due process. “The Minnesota Atty General also says, “Trump is trying to attack constitutional rule, attacking congressional authority and judicial decision-making.” George Floyd was an African-American man killed by police who knocked on his neck and on his back, preventing him from breathing. During those minutes on the ground, Floyd cried out for his late mother several times. Police subdued Floyd for an alleged counterfeit $20 bill.