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Carol Delton Letter to Oakland School Board and Superintendent

While it was announced as Item G-1 of the 10/14/2021 Budget and Finance Committee Meeting, no documents were ever posted and, at the meeting, the Committee Chair announced the discussion would not take place and that she was receiving messages about running over time.

Published

4 years ago

October 21, 2021

Isabelle Price

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Dear Board Directors and Superintendent,

I am deeply concerned about the proposal to cut $2 million from the 2022-23 budget in supposed lieu of another Blueprint Cohort, and even more deeply concerned about the process that has had ZERO public exposure and ZERO committee discussion before it comes to the Board for a vote.

I will first address the $2 million figure, why I question it, and why you should, too. During the 5/12/2021 Board meeting, staff provided an update, including financial analysis, of the Cohort 1 and 2 school changes.

Attachment 2-Financial Impact Summary to Resolution 2021-0128 showed that when facilities costs were taken into consideration, the changes actually cost the district an aggregate $700, 896.33– without the facilities changes, the reduction in expenditures would have been $619,454.24. However, these numbers did not take into account the students who left OUSD altogether after a closure/merger. In the presentation, a slide documenting the use of the Opportunity Ticket also included these numbers: 14 students from Roots (9%), 37 students from Kaiser (17%) and 14 students from SOL (15%), left OUSD.

Without counting the loss of siblings to OUSD enrollment and without counting other students whose loss from the district may not have been presented, students leaving the district from just those three schools approaches a million-dollar loss of LCFF funding that has not been factored in.

As a result, it is difficult for me to believe that any plan of closures and mergers could result in a $2 million savings. Looking over the years prior to the pandemic, it was clear that in years when OUSD closed schools, the district lost enrollment and in years when OUSD did not close schools, enrollment was up.

Second, it is deeply troubling that while paying lip service to transparency and public vetting of decisions in committees, this item was listed for but was not actually presented at the Budget and Finance Committee meeting on 8/14/2021. If it is too difficult to get the relevant fiscal information to the B&F Committee on the current meeting cycle, I suggest a swap with the Facilities Committee.

I also suggest that, since B&F has reduced its regular meetings by half since 2020, that, when necessary, B&F meetings go until 8:30 or 9 pm. Hopefully, this is less taxing on staff than meeting multiple times per month.

In closing, I feel I have done my due diligence as a community member in researching these numbers and especially in attending the Budget and Finance Committee meeting last Thursday in anticipation of hearing the district’s presentation on item G-1.

This Board continues to lift up the work of committees as a means of engaging the public in decision making. Clearly, that is not happening, and I hope each of you will refuse to vote on items that have not been through the vetting process you have declared should happen. I encourage you also to re-visit the extensive presentations to the Board made on 5/12/2021 on the first two cohorts (Item M 21-0852) to judge for yourselves whether current projections seem reasonable in light of data drawn from actual experience.

Looking over the projections prior to those cohorts, and in particular prior to the Kaiser closure, you will also see under-projections of enrollment loss.

Finally, please consider that the enrollment loss pattern for this year that seems to be emerging would be 400% worse if it followed the percentages of district enrollment loss occasioned by recent closure/mergers.

Thank you for your attention.

Carol Delton sent this email to school district officials and community members on Oct. 17, 2021.

Isabelle Price

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#NNPA BlackPress

Poll Shows Support for Policies That Help Families Afford Child Care

BLACKPRESSUSA NEWSWIRE — New national polling shows persistent voter concern about the affordability and availability of child care for working parents, alongside broad support across key demographic groups for federal child care policies that help families afford care.

Published

1 day ago

March 2, 2026

Oakland Post

By First Five Years Fund

New national polling shows persistent voter concern about the affordability and availability of child care for working parents, alongside broad support across key demographic groups for federal child care policies that help families afford care.

The national survey was conducted by UpOne Insight on behalf of the First Five Years Fund from January 13–18, 2026.

Key findings include:

• Parents need help: 80% of voters say the ability of working parents to find and afford child care is either in a state of crisis or a major problem.

• This is an affordability issue: 82% believe federal child care funding will help lower costs for working families — including 69% of Republicans, 84% of Independents, and 94% of Democrats.

• And there continues to be strong support (62%) for the Child Care and Development Block Grant (CCDBG), a federal program that makes it possible for hundreds of thousands of families to afford safe, quality care for their children while parents work or go to school, including a majority of Republicans, 63% of Independents and 72% of Democrats.

• Support for funding child care programs remains strong: 75% believe child care funding should be increased or kept at current levels — including 75% of Republicans, 85% of Independents, and 97% of Democrats.

• 74% say funding for child care is an important and good use of tax dollars, including a majority of Republicans, three-quarters of Independents, and nine in ten Democrats.

FFYF Executive Director Sarah Rittling said, “Voters across the country are sending a clear message: federal child care and early learning programs work. These investments help parents stay in the workforce, strengthen families, and support healthy child development. They have also long had strong bipartisan support in Congress. At a time when affordability is top of mind for families, continued federal funding is essential to ensure child care remains accessible and within reach.”

First Five Years Fund works to protect, prioritize, and build bipartisan support for quality child care and early learning programs at the federal level. Reliable, affordable, and high-quality early learning and child care can be transformative, not only enhancing a child’s prospects for a brighter future but also bolstering working parents and fostering economic stability nationwide.

We work with Congress and the Administration to identify federal solutions that work for families with young children, as well as states and communities. We work with policymakers to identify ways to increase access to affordable, high-quality child care and early learning programs for children. And we collaborate with advocacy groups to help align best practices with the best possible policies. http://www.ffyf.org

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Oakland Post: Week of February 25 – March 3, 2026

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of – February 25 – March 3, 2026

Published

2 days ago

March 1, 2026

Oakland Post

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#NNPA BlackPress

Trump’s MAGA Allies are Creating Executive Order Plan to Steal the 2026 Midterms

NNPA NEWSWIRE — The document that could lead to an executive order proposes using the claim that China interfered with the 2020 elections as grounds to “declare a national emergency.” The move would be an unprecedented step that would grant Trump new authority over the voting systems in the U.S.

Published

4 days ago

February 27, 2026

Oakland Post

By Lauren Victoria Burke, NNPA Newswire Correspondent

A group of MAGA pro-Trump activists, who say they are working in coordination with the White House, are circulating a 17-page draft executive order that would claim without evidence that China interfered with the 2020 presidential election. Donald Trump lost the 2020 presidential to President Joe Biden by over 7 million votes. Since Trump lost to Biden in 2020, he has repeatedly claimed that the election was “stolen” without evidence. The report of a group of “Trump allies” preparing an executive order to give Trump power over elections was first reported by The Washington Post.

The lies around the right-wing campaign that pushed falsehoods that the 2020 election was stolen was trafficked through right-wing media, particularly Fox News. Fox News was then sued for defamation for the claims by Dominion Voting Systems. Fox lost the case and had to settle for the largest defamation amount on record of $787.5 million in April 2023.

The document that could lead to an executive order proposes using the claim that China interfered with the 2020 elections as grounds to “declare a national emergency.” The move would be an unprecedented step that would grant Trump new authority over the voting systems in the U.S.

The story in The Washington Post arrives as Trump increasingly signals that he may take actions that would alter the result of the 2026 midterms. The Republicans are widely expected to lose as their approval ratings plummet as a result of a failing economy under Trump. Over 50 members of Congress have announced they will retire this year and not return in 2027.

The Trump Department of Justice, which now has a large image of Trump on the side of it, “sued five new states Thursday [Feb. 26, 2026] demanding access to their unredacted voter rolls — escalating a campaign that has been rejected by multiple federal courts and faces resistance from Republican-led states as well,” according to Democracy Docket, a group that works to protect voting rights.

Trump claimed back in late 2020, the last year of his first term, that he had the authority to issue an executive order related to mail-in voting for the 2020 elections — which he would then lose. But the Constitution states that control of elections lies with the states. As the GOP works to place hurdles in front of voting, Democrats worked to make voting easier.

In March 2021, President Biden signed an executive order calling on federal agencies to expand voting access as part of the Biden Administration’s effort “to promote and defend the right to vote for all Americans who are legally entitled to participate in elections.”

Trump’s focus is clearly on altering the November 2026 midterm elections. Trump’s polling numbers and the elections and special elections that have taken place around the U.S. over the last year clearly indicate that Republicans are about to be hit by a blue wave of Democratic victories.

Lauren Victoria Burke is an independent investigative journalist and the founder of Black Virginia News. She is a political analyst who appears on #RolandMartinUnfiltered and hosts the show LAUREN LIVE on YouTube @LaurenVictoriaBurke. She can be contacted at LBurke007@gmail.com and on twitter at @LVBurke