By Jovanka Beckles & Rebecca Kaplan

We write as leaders who have endorsed Pamela Price for Mayor, and who have endorsed Cat Brooks for Mayor, to urge that all of us—regardless of who we have endorsed as our first choice—to unite together for the future of Oakland, to use all of our voting power.
Oakland has “ranked choice voting” allowing people to list a first, second, and third choice candidate.

We urge that anyone who is listing Cat Brooks as their first choice, list Pamela Price as their second choice, and anyone who is voting Pamela Price as their first choice, list Cat Brooks as their #2.

Oakland is at a crossroads, with record levels of homelessness, housing displacement and wrongful evictions. The current mayor has refused to treat this like a real emergency, and not yet taken needed actions with public lands, RVs and more.

The Schaaf administration even managed to “misplace” over $2 million that Council had authorized for emergency tenant assistance that would have helped protect renters facing displacement.

Oakland also faces repeated problems of police misconduct being covered up by the highest levels of the administration.  The former police chief acted to cover up and allow repeated acts of sexual misconduct against a minor girl by multiple police officers —and Mayor Schaaf publicly defended him at a press conference and refused to bring disciplinary action, and publicly said he’d done nothing wrong.

More recently, when police arrested a community leader and advocate for bicycling while Black, Schaaf did not ask to drop the charges and has not taken corrective action.

When Federal ICE agents came into West Oakland last August and tore apart a local family to send someone for deportation, Schaaf not only authorized OPD to help them, she also publicly spread ICE’s false propaganda about crimes that the family hadn’t actually committed.

Oakland deserves better. We need a Mayor who is committed to justice and is committed to serving the needs and protecting the well-being of everyone in our community, including those who have been most left behind.

Some of our communities are suffering disproportionately —from air pollution and toxins, from violence and from housing displacement. Their needs cannot keep being ignored while harms like illegal dumping and blight are also left to spread unabated.
We can, and must, unite for the sake of our communities.

Attorney Pamela Price, and activist and executive director Cat Brooks provide us the best opportunity to help the people of Oakland and to elect a Mayor who will put public needs first.

We urge voters to use their power and use their votes. Thanks very much for your consideration.

Sincerely,

Jovanka Beckles and Rebecca Kaplan

Jovanka Beckles is a two-term Richmond City Councilmember. She is currently a candidate for State Assembly (15th district), running to build a California for the many, not just the few. She has endorsed Pamela Price for Mayor of Oakland.

Rebecca Kaplan is the at-large council member for the city of Oakland, who was re-elected citywide by a large margin in 2016, and authored Oakland’s vacant property tax to fund homeless solutions (Measure W). Kaplan has endorsed Cat Brooks for Mayor of Oakland.

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