City Government

Oakland Housing Is in “State of Emergency,” Say Housing Activists

Published

10 years ago

November 20, 2015

A number of housing rights activists are calling on the City Council to declare a housing “state of emergency” – to temporarily freeze rents and place a moratorium on all evictions – while the council passes laws to slow down the displacement of Oakland families, seniors and other long term residents.

“Everyone acknowledges there is housing crisis, but the City Councilmembers don’t do anything,” said James Vann, a member of the Oakland Tenants Union and a veteran housing rights activist.

“They need to declare an affordable housing state of emergency, and they need to declare a moratorium on evictions and enact a rent freeze,” he said.

Vann says a temporarily eviction moratorium and rent freeze are legal if the council passes a state of emergency, though such a decision would require support of 75 percent of councilmembers.

He pointed out that these emergency declarations were passed recently by the city council in the City of Alameda.

Civil attorney Dan Siegel, a leader of the Oakland Alliance, supports declaring a state of emergency to allow the council to freeze rents and place a moratorium on evictions.

“You could start out by banning all evictions, and then perhaps empower the rent board to make exceptions to allow property owners to tell their side of story (at a hearing),” he said.

Siegel also called on the mayor to work with other cities to repeal state laws that restrict the right to pass strong rent control measures.

“I would love to see Mayor Schaaf meet with mayors of other major cities to develop a common point of view and put pressure on the legislature,” he said.

Margaretta Lin, formerly a city staffer who spent several years working to produce a comprehensive Housing Equity Roadmap, spoke to the Post about some of the major steps in the roadmap that the mayor and City Council could take to slow down displacement.

One proposal is to pass a condo conversion law, which would close a loophole allowing the conversions of buildings with two-to-four units.

“At present 29,000 units are at risk. They are not protected by the law right now,” she said.

The city also has to do more to stop evictions, she said.

“We have a lot of holes in city’s laws to protect tenants,” said Lin. “We don’t have consistent relocation requirements, and no department in the city is set up to enforce the laws the city already has.”

The City Attorney’s Office could do, but it would need more funding, she said.

James Vann said a strong rent control ordinance is on the council agenda, but, “We don’t know if the City Council will have the guts to pass it,” he said.

Under the present rent adjustment law, which was written by landlords, tenants must know their rights and have to file a petition with the board, Vann continued.

“All the onus on the tenants,” he said. “The landlords can do anything they want, and it becomes legal if the tenants do not file a petition complaining about it.”

Oakland has 405,000 people living in 92,000 households. Sixty percent are renters.

Less than one half of one percent of tenants file a petition in a year, said Vann.

Vann said the Oakland Tenants Union has already submitted a rent control proposal to the Mayor’s Housing Cabinet. If the cabinet rejects or does not act on the proposal by February, the tenant group is going to begin an initiative campaign to put rent control on the November ballot.

Vann also proposed fees that landlords would have to pay to evict tenants.

“I think there ought to be a cost to evict a tenant,” he said. “It should be something that would discourage landlords, perhaps the costs of relocation and first month’s rent.”

Lin said that the city must do something to stop ongoing foreclosures, especially the loss of homes by low-come residents and elders on fixed incomes.

According to Lin, there is an existing plan, which has yet to be implemented, to sell distressed properties to a national nonprofit that would keep people in their homes.

This would replace the existing practice where the homes are sold in bulk to hedge funds and banks like Wells Fargo.

The city needs to pass a bond to create “homeowner preservation fund,” she said.

“It costs only $50,000 to a keep homeowner in the home, but it costs $500,000 to build a new housing unit,” she said. “We need an infusion a lot of money, not just for affordable housing but a fund to keep homeowners and tenants in their homes.”

*This article is the first is a series in which the Post is interviewing some of the local leaders who are frontline fighters against gentrification – for affordable housing, decent paying jobs and protected status for churches and artists.

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Activism

Oakland Hosts Town Hall Addressing Lead Hazards in City Housing

According to the city, there are 22,000 households in need of services for lead issues, most in predominantly low-income or Black and Latino neighborhoods, but only 550 to 600 homes are addressed every year. The city is hoping to use part of the multimillion-dollar settlement to increase the number of households served each year.

Published

8 hours ago

May 18, 2025

Oakland Post

iStock.

By Magaly Muñoz

The City of Oakland’s Housing and Community Development Department hosted a town hall in the Fruitvale to discuss the efforts being undertaken to remove lead primarily found in housing in East and West Oakland.

In 2021, the city was awarded $14 million out of a $24 million legal settlement from a lawsuit against paint distributors for selling lead-based paint that has affected hundreds of families in Oakland and Alameda County. The funding is intended to be used for lead poisoning reduction and prevention services in paint only, not water or other sources as has been found recently in schools across the city.

The settlement can be used for developing or enhancing programs that abate lead-based paint, providing services to individuals, particularly exposed children, educating the public about hazards caused by lead paint, and covering attorney’s fees incurred in pursuing litigation.

Most of the homes affected were built prior to 1978, and 12,000 of these homes are considered to be at high risk for lead poisoning.

City councilmember Noel Gallo, who represents a few of the lead-affected Census tracts, said the majority of the poisoned kids and families are coming directly from neighborhoods like the Fruitvale.

“When you look at the [kids being admitted] at the children’s hospital, they’re coming from this community,” Gallo said at the town hall.

In order to eventually rid the highest impacted homes of lead poisoning, the city intends to create programs and activities such as lead-based paint inspections and assessments, full abatement designed to permanently eliminate lead-based paint, or partial abatement for repairs, painting, and specialized cleaning meant for temporary reduction of hazards.

In feedback for what the city could implement in their programming, residents in attendance of the event said they want more accessibility to resources, like blood testing, and information from officials about lead poisoning symptoms, hotlines for assistance, and updates on the reduction of lead in their communities.

Attendees also asked how they’d know where they are on the prioritization list and what would be done to address lead in the water found at several school sites in Oakland last year.

City staff said there will be a follow-up event to gather more community input for programming in August, with finalizations happening in the fall and a pilot launch in early 2026.

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Alameda County

Oakland Begins Month-Long Closure on Largest Homeless Encampment

At 8 a.m. sharp, city workers began piling up trash and dismantling makeshift homes along the nearly five-block encampment. City crews blocked off streets from 14th Ave to 17th Ave, between E. 12th and International Blvd, due to the Safe Work Zone Ordinance that was passed by the city council in 2022 to protect workers from harassment during cleanings, according to a city spokesperson.

Published

8 hours ago

May 18, 2025

Oakland Post

The City of Oakland began sweeping their largest homeless encampment on E 12th St. Monday morning. Advocates claim that the city has not done its due diligence with providing ample resources or outreach for residents at the encampment. Photo by Magaly Muñoz.

By Magaly Muñoz

The City of Oakland began a three-week-long breakdown of the largest homeless encampment in the city on E. 12th Street on Monday morning. Residents and advocates said they are devastated about the displacement of dozens of people.

Jaz Colibri, one of the many advocates at the closure, said the encampment sweeps were “intense and terrifying” to witness. They claimed that several residents, many of them non-English speakers, had not been aware that the sweep was happening that day because of a lack of proper communication and outreach from Oakland.

Colibri added that the city had done a Census “many months ago” and “had not bothered to count people since then”, meaning dozens of individuals have missed out on housing and resources in the last few weeks because the city doesn’t offer outreach in multiple languages.

“Basically, [Oakland] dropped the ball on actually getting to know everybody who lives here and then creating a housing solution that meets everyone’s needs,” Colibri said.

City spokesperson Jean Walsh told the Post that notices of the closure operation were posted in Spanish and Chinese prior to Monday, but did not clarify if outreach was done in those languages as well.

Nearly a dozen Oakland police vehicles, California Highway Patrol officers, and Oakland Public Works staff were gathered along E 12th waiting for residents to pack up their belongings and move away from the area.

Advocates said residents “felt unsafe” due to the hefty law enforcement presence.

One city worker, who was picking up debris near 16th Ave, said, “They’ve known we were coming for a long time now” in reference to resident confusion about the sweeping.

The state doubled down on its requirement to get cities and counties to deal with their homelessness crisis at a press conference Monday afternoon. Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office released a “model ordinance” that is intended to provide a starting point that local municipalities can use to build from and adjust in creating their own policies on encampments, if they haven’t done so yet.

Newsom said “No more excuses, time to deliver” after the state has poured hundreds of millions of dollars into solving the issue.

Oakland was awarded a $7.2 million grant from the state in 2024 to close long-standing encampments in the city, including camps at Martin Luther King, Jr. and 23rd Street, and Mosswood Park.

Residents at these encampments were offered wraparound supportive services, temporary shelter, and eventually will be transitioned to permanent supportive housing, according to a city statement from last year.

Residents who accepted housing at these three encampments were moved into newly acquired property, formerly the Extended Stay America Hotel in West Oakland, which will first serve as interim housing for up to 150 individuals and couples in 105 units, and in the coming year, will be converted into 125 units of permanent housing.

Walsh said as of May 2, “32 residents of the recently closed Mosswood Park encampment moved into the Mandela House program” and as of May 12, “41 residents of the East 12th Street encampment have already accepted offers to move to the Mandela House.” The city will provide final numbers of how many accepted and moved into housing after the closure operation is over.

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Barbara Lee

WNBA’s Golden State Valkyries Kick Off Season with Community Programs in Oakland

“The Golden State Valkyries are more than a team—they’re a movement,” said Oakland Interim-Mayor Kevin Jenkins. “Their touchdown in Oakland marks a new era of opportunity, inspiration, and equity in sports. This partnership reflects our city’s deep commitment to uplifting women, investing in youth, and building a community where every dream has a place to grow. We’re proud to welcome the Valkyries to The Town.”

Published

10 hours ago

May 18, 2025

Oakland Post

The Valkyries came to Oakland City Hall with a “Hoopbus.” Present were (from left to right): City Councilmembers Noel Gallo, Rebecca Kaplan, Zac Unger and Rowena Brown; Oakland Mayor-elect Barbara Lee, Valkyries President Jess Smith, a Valkyries team representative and Deputy Mayor LaNiece Jones. Photo courtesy Rebecca Kaplan’s office.

Team installs new nets at playgrounds, holds flag-raisings at City Halls in Oakland and S.F.

Special to The Post

The Golden State Valkyries brought the excitement of their inaugural season to every corner of the Bay Area with a full slate of community celebrations leading up to their historic home-opener against the Los Angeles Sparks at the Chase Center in San Francisco on Friday.

The week featured flag-raising ceremonies at city halls in Oakland and San Francisco, three “Violet Net” installation days at Oakland parks to encourage basketball play, fun “Hoopbus” takeovers at multiple schools presented by Kaiser Permanente, and player appearances.

In total, 90 violet nets were installed on 45 basketball courts across 34 public parks throughout Oakland this week. A list of the parks receiving violet nets can be found at Valkyries.com.

About the Golden State Valkyries

The Golden State Valkyries, the WNBA affiliate of the seven-time NBA Champion Golden State Warriors, were announced as the 13th WNBA franchise on Oct. 5, 2023. According to Norse mythology, Valkyries are a host of warrior women who are fearless and unwavering – flying through air and sea alike.

This brand is Golden State’s modern interpretation of Valkyries: strong, bold, and fierce. Tipping off during the 2025 WNBA season, the team is headquartered in Oakland and will play home games at Chase Center in San Francisco. For Golden State Valkyries’ assets, including team logos, visit valkyries.com.