Bay Area

Unhoused Residents Claim OPD Harassment During Covid-19 Pandemic

Published

4 years ago

April 30, 2020

The Oakland Police Department in Downtown Oakland.

Unhoused Oakland residents say that officers from the Oakland Police Department (OPD) have been harassing and arresting them unjustly during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“We’re essential workers. We provide outreach to the community. There is no way, shape, form, or fashion we should even have been in that situation,” said unhoused resident Yanna Johnson, speaking of an incident on the evening of Friday, April 24 when police briefly detained her and arrested Leon Young, who is also unhoused, outside of The East Oakland Collective’s (EOC) headquarters near MacArthur Boulevard and 78th Avenue in East Oakland.

Before the incident, Johnson and Young had just finished doing work to provide essential needs to other unhoused people at risk for contracting COVID-19 who are temporarily sheltered in hotel rooms. EOC and Housing and Dignity Village (HDV), organizations that advocate for unhoused people, have fundraised to temporarily shelter those who are unsheltered and at risk for contracting COVID-19 at three different hotels.

Johnson and Young are lifelong Black Oakland residents. Needa Bee of HDV, who was helping at the hotels and was at the scene while the incident occurred says the police action was racially motivated.

“They targeted the Black folks who happened to be driving a luxury car that we got donated due to the work we’re doing,” said Bee.

Young says he was arrested due to a case of mistaken identity.

“[The officers] kept calling me this name: Emory, Emory, over and over again,” Young said.

One officer pointed a gun at Young’s face during the arrest.

“I got to fearing for my life,” said Young.

“Officers detained an individual at gunpoint who they believed at the time matched the description of a person wanted in connection with a prior shooting,” OPD media wrote in an email to Bay Area reporter Darwin BondGraham.

The same email also states that while “the officers determined he was not the shooting suspect,” Young was still transported to Santa Rita Jail because he had a no-bail warrant out in connection with an unrelated charge. He was released at eight the next morning.
Video of the incident that EOC’s Candice Elder posted to Facebook shows that some police did not wear masks during the incident and none wore gloves even while touching people. The Oakland Post emailed OPD media and asked if officers are required to wear gloves and masks in contact situations to protect themselves and the public from COVID-19 but have not yet heard a response.

In West Oakland, unhoused people living on and near Wood Street say there has been an increased police presence. Dayton Andrews of The United Front Against Displacement, a group that does clean up work around Wood Street and has recently installed handwashing stations and freshwater tanks at the site, says he’s seen police on site every weekend since shelter-in-place has started.

One unhoused Oakland resident told The Oakland Post his RV got stolen from Wood Street one night in mid-April so he sought shelter by putting pillows and a blanket in a van he said was “stripped and appeared abandoned.”

The resident said he saw a police officer and tried to tell him about his stolen RV, but while he was telling his story, the officer ran the VIN number on the van, which he found to be stolen, and arrested him for possession of a stolen vehicle, jailing him for a night. But the resident says he didn’t know the van was stolen.

Also in West Oakland, in the morning of April 24th and on 3rd and Peralta Streets, unhoused Oakland resident Paul Taj Schrager said that OPD and city workers pressured him to quickly move his three vehicles which blocked access to CalTrans land without, at first, offering to give him any aid with moving. The vehicles housed five people and his possessions, but one didn’t run.

“[They said] that we had an hour to move everything, and if not they’d come back with tow trucks. They were not very nice about it at all,” said Schrager.

Markaya Spikes, who lives nearby in a self-made home and says she had had previous interactions with the officers present, approached and helped mediate the situation. After discussion, Schrager says they agreed to let him into a city-sanctioned safe parking site.

When The Oakland Post contacted Schrager on April 27, he said he and the people he lives with never made it into the safe parking site. Instead, they moved to the other side of the street from where they had stayed previously.

“I was starting to pack and getting set to go, but I spoke with a person [at the safe parking site] that said I couldn’t just drive in,” said Schrager.

Zack Haber

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Alameda County

DA Pamela Price Stands by Mom Who Lost Son to Gun Violence in Oakland

Last week, The Post published a photo showing Alameda County District Attorney Pamela Price with Carol Jones, whose son, Patrick DeMarco Scott, was gunned down by an unknown assailant in 2018.

Published

2 days ago

April 22, 2024

Oakland Post

District Attorney Pamela Price with Carol Jones

Publisher’s note: Last week, The Post published a photo showing Alameda County District Attorney Pamela Price with Carol Jones, whose son, Patrick DeMarco Scott, was gunned down by an unknown assailant in 2018. The photo was too small for readers to see where the women were and what they were doing. Here we show Price and Jones as they complete a walk in memory of Scott. For more information and to contribute, please contact Carol Jones at 510-978-5517 at morefoundation.help@gmail.com. Courtesy photo.

Oakland Post

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Bay Area

State Controller Malia Cohen Keynote Speaker at S.F. Wealth Conference

California State Controller Malia Cohen delivered the keynote speech to over 50 business women at the Black Wealth Brunch held on March 28 at the War Memorial and Performing Arts Center at 301 Van Ness Ave. in San Francisco. The Enterprising Women Networking SF Chapter of the American Business Women’s Association (ABWA) hosted the Green Room event to launch its platform designed to close the racial wealth gap in Black and Brown communities.

Published

4 days ago

April 20, 2024

Oakland Post

American Business Women’s Association Vice President Velma Landers, left, with California State Controller Malia Cohen (center), and ABWA President LaRonda Smith at the Enterprising Women Networking SF Chapter of the ABWA at the Black Wealth Brunch.

By Carla Thomas

The Enterprising Women Networking SF Chapter of the American Business Women’s Association (ABWA) hosted the Green Room event to launch its platform designed to close the racial wealth gap in Black and Brown communities.

“Our goal is to educate Black and Brown families in the masses about financial wellness, wealth building, and how to protect and preserve wealth,” said ABWA San Francisco Chapter President LaRonda Smith.

ABWA’s mission is to bring together businesswomen of diverse occupations and provide opportunities for them to help themselves and others grow personally and professionally through leadership, education, networking support, and national recognition.

“This day is about recognizing influential women, hearing from an accomplished woman as our keynote speaker and allowing women to come together as powerful people,” said ABWA SF Chapter Vice President Velma Landers.

More than 60 attendees dined on the culinary delights of Chef Sharon Lee of The Spot catering, which included a full soul food brunch of skewered shrimp, chicken, blackened salmon, and mac and cheese.

Cohen discussed the many economic disparities women and people of color face. From pay equity to financial literacy, Cohen shared not only statistics, but was excited about a new solution in motion which entailed partnering with Californians for Financial Education.

“I want everyone to reach their full potential,” she said. “Just a few weeks ago in Sacramento, I partnered with an organization, Californians for Financial Education.

“We gathered 990 signatures and submitted it to the [California] Secretary of State to get an initiative on the ballot that guarantees personal finance courses for every public school kid in the state of California.

“Every California student deserves an equal opportunity to learn about filing taxes, interest rates, budgets, and understanding the impact of credit scores. The way we begin to do that is to teach it,” Cohen said.

By equipping students with information, Cohen hopes to close the financial wealth gap, and give everyone an opportunity to reach their full financial potential. “They have to first be equipped with the information and education is the key. Then all we need are opportunities to step into spaces and places of power.”

Cohen went on to share that in her own upbringing, she was not guided on financial principles that could jump start her finances. “Communities of color don’t have the same information and I don’t know about you, but I did not grow up listening to my parents discussing their assets, their investments, and diversifying their portfolio. This is the kind of nomenclature and language we are trying to introduce to our future generations so we can pivot from a life of poverty so we can pivot away and never return to poverty.”

Cohen urged audience members to pass the initiative on the November 2024 ballot.

“When we come together as women, uplift women, and support women, we all win. By networking and learning together, we can continue to build generational wealth,” said Landers. “Passing a powerful initiative will ensure the next generation of California students will be empowered to make more informed financial decisions, decisions that will last them a lifetime.”

Oakland Post

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MAYOR BREED ANNOUNCES $53 MILLION FEDERAL GRANT FOR SAN FRANCISCO’S HOMELESS PROGRAMS

San Francisco, CA – Mayor London N. Breed today announced that the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has awarded the city a $53.7 million grant to support efforts to renew and expand critical services and housing for people experiencing homelessness in San Francisco.

Published

4 days ago

April 20, 2024

Oakland Post

Mayor London Breed

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

Wednesday, January 31, 2024

Contact: Mayor’s Office of Communications, mayorspressoffice@sfgov.org

***PRESS RELEASE***

MAYOR BREED ANNOUNCES $53 MILLION FEDERAL GRANT FOR SAN FRANCISCO’S HOMELESS PROGRAMS

HUD’s Continuum of Care grant will support the City’s range of critical services and programs, including permanent supportive housing, rapid re-housing, and improved access to housing for survivors of domestic violence

San Francisco, CA – Mayor London N. Breed today announced that the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has awarded the city a $53.7 million grant to support efforts to renew and expand critical services and housing for people experiencing homelessness in San Francisco.

HUD’s Continuum of Care (CoC) program is designed to support local programs with the goal of ending homelessness for individuals, families, and Transitional Age Youth.

This funding supports the city’s ongoing efforts that have helped more than 15,000 people exit homelessness since 2018 through City programs including direct housing placements and relocation assistance. During that time San Francisco has also increased housing slots by 50%. San Francisco has the most permanent supportive housing of any county in the Bay Area, and the second most slots per capita than any city in the country.

“In San Francisco, we have worked aggressively to increase housing, shelter, and services for people experiencing homelessness, and we are building on these efforts every day,” said Mayor London Breed. “Every day our encampment outreach workers are going out to bring people indoors and our City workers are connecting people to housing and shelter. This support from the federal government is critical and will allow us to serve people in need and address encampments in our neighborhoods.”

The funding towards supporting the renewal projects in San Francisco include financial support for a mix of permanent supportive housing, rapid re-housing, and transitional housing projects. In addition, the CoC award will support Coordinated Entry projects to centralize the City’s various efforts to address homelessness. This includes $2.1 million in funding for the Coordinated Entry system to improve access to housing for youth and survivors of domestic violence.

“This is a good day for San Francisco,” said Shireen McSpadden, executive director of the Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing. “HUD’s Continuum of Care funding provides vital resources to a diversity of programs and projects that have helped people to stabilize in our community. This funding is a testament to our work and the work of our nonprofit partners.”

The 2024 Continuum of Care Renewal Awards Include:

$42.2 million for 29 renewal PSH projects that serve chronically homeless, veterans, and youth
$318,000 for one new PSH project, which will provide 98 affordable homes for low-income seniors in the Richmond District
$445,00 for one Transitional Housing (TH) project serving youth
$6.4 million dedicated to four Rapid Rehousing (RRH) projects that serve families, youth, and survivors of domestic violence
$750,00 for two Homeless Management Information System (HMIS) projects
$2.1 million for three Coordinated Entry projects that serve families, youth, chronically homeless, and survivors of domestic violence

In addition, the 2023 CoC Planning Grant, now increased to $1,500,000 from $1,250,000, was also approved. Planning grants are submitted non-competitively and may be used to carry out the duties of operating a CoC, such as system evaluation and planning, monitoring, project and system performance improvement, providing trainings, partner collaborations, and conducting the PIT Count.

“We are very appreciative of HUD’s support in fulfilling our funding request for these critically important projects for San Francisco that help so many people trying to exit homelessness,” said Del Seymour, co-chair of the Local Homeless Coordinating Board. “This funding will make a real difference to people seeking services and support in their journey out of homelessness.”

In comparison to last year’s competition, this represents a $770,000 increase in funding, due to a new PSH project that was funded, an increase in some unit type Fair Market Rents (FMRs) and the larger CoC Planning Grant. In a year where more projects had to compete nationally against other communities, this represents a significant increase.

Nationally, HUD awarded nearly $3.16 billion for over 7,000 local homeless housing and service programs including new projects and renewals across the United States.