Drake Talk Oakland | Making a difference in Oakland & beyond
79 FOLLOWERS
Welcome to Drake Talk Oakland! Pamela Drake has been an political activist in Oakland and the Bay Area since 1973.
Drake Talk Oakland | Making a difference in Oakland & beyond
2y ago
Confusion in Search of Solutions, Looking under Every Rock
I have been doing battle on Next Door, yes I know, and also on facebook with the folks who roundly denounce our city council for not fixing everything, and I mean everything even-if it’s something they have no control over. If we want things fixed or least ameliorated so they are less vexing, it’s very important that we first know how stuff works. Who can do what at the most basic level and how can we get them to do it? In terms of the City of Oakland, the first thing to know is that a few years ago, city administrators decided to make ..read more
Drake Talk Oakland | Making a difference in Oakland & beyond
2y ago
Charter Cities
Oakland is one of many charter cities in the state of California which means rather than being governed by California General Law, our city has a little more leeway in deciding how to organize the provision of services and who can do what. Services, you say, what services? Yes, we know, there’s lot of disatisfaction with the level of services in the City of Oakland now.
Problems, Problems, and they run the gamut:
We see a city overrun with the encampments of its long term unhoused residents, many of them from families who have been here for generations, crime that is being calle ..read more
Drake Talk Oakland | Making a difference in Oakland & beyond
2y ago
New Budget amid Dueling Narratives
The news media has been working overtime to devise a narrative on Oakland’s recent 2 year budget brouhaha. As soon as it passed, the dueling headlines began spinning so fast that anybody really paying attention got a bit dizzy as they swirled about us.
What’s the decision, what did we do? Sorry to tell you, it’s not as easy to define as many of our low information voters would like to hear. And when those of us on the left shared our memes to communicate our hopes to each other, we may have inadvertently contributed to the confusion and anxiety. Why did the ..read more
Drake Talk Oakland | Making a difference in Oakland & beyond
2y ago
Contact: Anne Janks Release: June 25, 2021
510-213-2953
Oakland City Council Passes Budget that begins to
Replace Police in Low-Level 911 Calls
The Mobile Assistance Community Responders of Oakland (MACRO) was first proposed in June 2019 at a Police Commission hearing about policing in the unhoused community at St. Columba Church and culminated with the pilot design developed by over 40 community groups in a report by the Urban Strategies Council in June 2020. Yesterday, the Oakland City Council passed a two-year budget that provides over $6 million for a MACRO pilot.
“MACRO ..read more
Drake Talk Oakland | Making a difference in Oakland & beyond
3y ago
We have a chance to begin to end the cycle of violence, fear, retribution, fear and violence now and we must take it.We must fund MACRO and give it a chance to work-remembering that more will be expected of it than policing.
When policing fails to prevent or solve crimes, as it inevitably does, we respond by giving them more money which so far has not worked well.I heard our DVP Chief Cespedes speak at the vigil at the Lake and he said we have the talent and brains to find solutions to cure our terrible violence and we do. Give his department enough funds to try.
And remember to fund the parks ..read more
Drake Talk Oakland | Making a difference in Oakland & beyond
3y ago
Warning: this may be viewed as being in poor taste or just tasteless by the truly ernest.
Eeek, We Don’t Have an Assemblyrep Right Now!
Did anybody notice, that our Assemblyguy got promoted to top cop? Oh, heh, turns out many folks have noticed and they are already measuring the curtains, stocking up on Capitol Corridor tickets and checking the refrigerant in their cars before motoring up to Cowtown, that is, Sacramento. But wait, I saw this gaggle, met them, talked to them. I even like most of them, the little I know about them…. but aren’t there are still more unqualified folks out there li ..read more
Drake Talk Oakland | Making a difference in Oakland & beyond
3y ago
Why we interviewed 3 out of many candidates
This is a special election, in fact a special election primary on June 29th, to be exact, because our former Assemblyman Rob Bonta was elevated to State Attorney General and now that seat, which is predominately in Oakland, is vacant. Given the election window, any successful candidate had to be ready as soon as the chute opened. That meant, not just a desire to run and a website-but money on hand, endorsements ready to declare and most staffing poised to organize a short but intensive campaign. Whoever had not already done that, stands almost no cha ..read more
Drake Talk Oakland | Making a difference in Oakland & beyond
3y ago
Photo credit-Elijah Nouvelage/AFP/Getty Images
Press Statement
Oakland, CA.The Coalition for Police Accountability commends all those who have worked to make Derek Chauvin accountable for murdering George Floyd. The prosecutors, the witnesses and the jury have done their jobs and, in this case at least, justice was served. There are many more cases of police killing Black people that still must be prosecuted before we can say that the tide of injustice has been turned, but we should savor this moment and hope that that real change is coming.
Of all the methods of making police a ..read more
Drake Talk Oakland | Making a difference in Oakland & beyond
3y ago
Press Advisory
Oakland, California, April 9, 2021 — Yesterday the Coalition for Police Accountability, an
Oakland-based public interest organization focused on civilian law enforcement
oversight, announced that it has filed a lawsuit in Alameda County Superior Court
under the California Public Records Act and the California State Constitution to force
the City of Oakland to perform its required public disclosure obligations concerning
governmental records of meetings between City representatives and representatives of the Oakland Police Officers’ Association.
In January 2021, the Coalition re ..read more
Drake Talk Oakland | Making a difference in Oakland & beyond
3y ago
Press Advisory
Oakland City Council Voices Strong Support for Immediate Implementation of MACRO
Alternative Emergency Response Could Pilot Within Months-
Oakland, Ca. The Tuesday, March 16th Oakland City Council began with overwhelming support during public
comment for Mobile Assistance Community Responders of Oakland (MACRO), the alternative
emergency response model that was developed to respond to a broad range of non-violent
emergency calls without police. The votes to create a division within the fire department to
house MACRO and to direct the city administrator to expeditiously implemen ..read more