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Candidates For Oakland’s District 5 Share Their Platforms

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Incumbent Noel Gallo

East Oakland native and District 5 incumbent Noel Gallo touts his Oakland public education with pride. He’s been holding his city council position since 2013 and before that, he served 20 years as a member of the Oakland Board of Education. 

 In his time on the City Council, Gallo helped create the Police Commission and is committed to reducing the police department budget by 50%. He says he is committed to reimagining public safety and believes in providing a model of counseling for youth that is from the school level to street level as a form of violence prevention.

Gallo supports affordable housing, currently working with the Unity Council to continue Phase 2 development for housing in transit areas that includes 30 units of housing for the homeless. He has helped the Native American Health Center develop 110 units on International Boulevard next to the health center. He is also working with the Agnes Memorial Church to create senior housing.

Gallo is open to negotiating the leasing of the Coliseum land that is publicly owned in order to maintain control of how it is used by the city, rather than sell it or sell the Oakland Port to private entities. 

To learn more about Noel Gallo’s campaign go to https://www.noelgalloforoakland.com/

Zoe Lopez-Meraz

Zoe Lopez-Meraz has worked in the medical fields of physical therapy, transplant, and urology and volunteers at the Berkeley Free Clinics. She puts a high value on supporting teachers and education. She wants to decriminalize homelessness, sex work, and drugs as she says on her website all three disproportionately affect people of color and create a revolving door of criminalization.

Since 80% of calls to OPD are non-violent, Lopez-Meraz says reinvesting into the community from the money saved in the 50% decrease in OPD’s budget would make sense. She sees a great need for addressing mental health in the community so that police are not the first responders to mental health crises. 

On sheltering and housing issues, Lopez-Meraz holds a straight-forward stance. If it’s vacant, take the property, repurpose vacant lots, warehouses, empty hotel rooms and vacant units using state emergency funding that is already available. She said the city creates policies with no real plan for execution.

Lopez-Meraz does not support the project proposed to build 3,000 units of high-end housing and a ballpark on the Oakland Port property. She thinks more support should be placed in existing infrastructure and more should be done to boost business in East Oakland. 

To learn more about Zoe Lopez-Meraz’s campaign go to https://www.zlm4oak.org/

Richard Santos Raya

Long-time Bay Area resident Richard Santos Raya has a background as a classroom educator and lawyer. He says he wants to connect with those who are looking to work on labor, racial, housing, and economic justice.

Regarding OPD, Raya says one of the first things that can be done is to curb police spending and police injustice is to address rampant overtime funding. A huge drain on city coffers, it also incentivizes police to make arrests near the end of their shift in order to rack up overtime pay. He also says malpractice or brutality cases should not be paid out of taxpayer money, instead possibly from the police pension fund. 

On homelessness, Raya says that in addition to the construction that has already been undertaken and Tuff sheds, he believes Oakland needs to convert existing housing to deeply affordable housing. 

He says there should be a partnership with local land trusts and recommends removing housing from the unstable, untenable rental market into a more sustainable holding pattern. Small landlords need incentives to maintain their housing at below affordable rates. 

Raya does not support a new ballpark at the Oakland Port.  He wants to keep the public land at Oakland Coliseum and says it’s important to retain the Oakland A’s at that site. 

To learn more about Richard Raya Santos’ campaign go to https://www.santosraya.com/

 

Michelle Snider

Associate Editor for The Post News Group. Writer, Photographer, Videographer, Copy Editor, and website editor documenting local events in the Oakland-Bay Area California area.
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Oakland Post: Week of March 13 – 19, 2024

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of March 13 – 19, 2024

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Oakland Post: Week of March 6 – 12, 2024

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of March 6 – 12, 2024

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Who are the Alameda County District 4 Supervisor Candidates’ Top Campaign Contributors?

Below, we’ve listed each candidate’s 10 highest campaign contributors. For Miley, two of his top campaign donors also bought their own advertisements to support him and/or oppose Esteen through independent expenditures. Such expenditures, though separate from campaign donations, are also public record, and we listed them. Additionally, the National Organization of Realtors has spent about $70,500 on their own independent expenditures to support Miley.

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Jennifer Esteen. (Campaign photo) and Supervisor Nate Miley. (Official photo).
Jennifer Esteen. (Campaign photo) and Supervisor Nate Miley. (Official photo).

By Zack Haber

Nate Miley, who has served on Alameda County’s Board of Supervisors since 2000, is running for reelection to the District 4 supervisor seat.

Jennifer Esteen, a nurse and activist, is seeking to unseat him and become one of the five members of the powerful board that sets the county’s budget, governs its unincorporated areas, and oversees the sheriff, Alameda Health System, and mental health system.

District 4 includes most of East Oakland’s hills and flatlands beyond Fruitvale, part of Pleasanton and unincorporated areas south of San Leandro like Ashland and Castro Valley.

Voting is open and will remain open until March 5.

In California, campaign donations of $100 or more are public record. The records show that Miley has received about $550,000 in total campaign donations since he won the previous District 4 election in March 2020. Esteen has raised about $255,000 in total campaign donations since she started collecting them last July. All figures are accurate through Feb. 20.

While Miley has raised more money, Esteen has received donations from more sources. Miley received donations of $100 or more from 439 different sources. Esteen received such donations from 507 different sources.

Below, we’ve listed each candidate’s 10 highest campaign contributors. For Miley, two of his top campaign donors also bought their own advertisements to support him and/or oppose Esteen through independent expenditures. Such expenditures, though separate from campaign donations, are also public record, and we listed them. Additionally, the National Organization of Realtors has spent about $70,500 on their own independent expenditures to support Miley.

Nate Miley’s top campaign contributors:

The California Apartment Association, a trade group representing landlords and investors in California’s rental housing business, has spent about $129,500 supporting Miley’s election bid through about $59,500 in ads against Esteen$55,000 in ads supporting Miley, and $15,000 in campaign donations.

The independent expenditure committee Preserve Agriculture in Alameda County has spent about $46,025 supporting Miley through about $27,200 in their own ads, and $18,825 in donations to his campaign. Preserve Agriculture has supported reelection efforts for former Alameda County DA Nancy O’Malley, and Sheriff Greg Ahern, a republican. It’s received funding from ChevronPG&E, and a the California Apartment Association.

Organizations associated with the Laborers’ International Union of North America, or LiUNA, have donated about $35,000 in total. Construction and General Laborers Local 304, a local chapter of the union representing which represents over 4,000 workers, donated $20,000.

Laborers Pacific Southwest Regional Organizing Coalition, which represents 70,000 LiUNA members in Arizona, California, Hawaii and New Mexico, donated $15,000.

William ‘Bill’ Crotinger and the East Oakland-based company Argent Materials have donated $26,000. Crotinger is the president and founder of Argent, a concrete and asphalt recycling yard. Argent’s website says it is an eco-friendly company that diverts materials from landfills. In 2018, Argent paid the EPA $27,000 under a settlement for committing Clean Water Act violations.

Michael Morgan of Hayward, owner of We Are Hemp, a marijuana dispensary in Ashland, has donated $21,500.

Alameda County District 1 Supervisor David Haubert has donated $21,250 from his 2024 reelection campaign. He’s running unopposed for the District 1 seat.

SEIU 1021which represents over 60,000 workers in local governments, non-profit agencies, healthcare programs, and schools in Northern California, has donated $20,000.

UA Local 342, which represents around 4,000 pipe trades industry workers in Contra Costa and Alameda counties, donated $20,000.

The union representing the county’s deputy sheriffs, Deputy Sheriff’s Association of Alameda County, has donated $17,000.

Becton Healthcare Resources and its managers have donated $14,625. Becton’s mission statement says it provides “behavioral health management services to organizations and groups that serve the serious and persistent mentally ill population.”

Jennifer Esteen’s top campaign contributors:

Mary Quinn Delaney of Piedmont, founder of Akonadi Foundation, has donated $20,000. Akonadi Foundation gives grants to nonprofit organizations, especially focusing on racial justice organizing,

Bridget Galli of Castro Valley has donated $7,000. Galli is a yoga instructor and a co-owner of Castro Valley Yoga.

Rachel Gelman of Oakland has donated $5,000. Gelman is an activist who has vowed to redistribute her inherited wealth to working class, Indigenous and Black communities.

California Worker Families Party has donated $5,000. The organization’s website describes itself as a “grassroots party for the multiracial working class.”

David Stern of Albany has donated $5,000. Stern is a retired UC Berkeley Professor of Education.

Oakland Rising Committee—a collaborative of racial, economic, and environmental justice organizations—has donated about $3,050.

Fredeke Von Bothmer-Goodyear, an unemployed resident of San Francisco, has donated $2,600.

Robert Britton of Castro Valley has donated $2,500. Britton is retired and worked in the labor movement for decades.

Progressive Era PAC has donated about $2,400. Its mission statement says it “exists to elect governing majorities of leaders in California committed to building a progressive era for people of color.”

East Bay Stonewall Democrats Club has donated $2,250. The club was founded in 1982 to give voice to the East Bay LGBTQIA+ communities.

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