EDITOR’S NOTE: Oakland Report’s charter reform series is exploring Oakland’s city charter and how it potentially could change — a question that Oakland voters may be asked on the ballot in November. This installment is focused on the city council’s consideration of increasing its own pay through the charter reform mechanism. Read all eleven Charter Reform series articles.

Council set to vote on a change that would give council members up to 125% pay raises

City Council meeting, June 16, 2026, agenda item #5.2

Oakland city council is set to vote on a change to the Oakland city charter that would give the city council members up to 125 percent pay raises. The pay raises would come through a ballot measure that would require voter approval.1

Oakland Report readers will recall that city council is currently negotiating with its public employee unions who are demanding pay raises, even after the council previously awarded city employees cumulative 79% raises over ten years, increasing their pay 2.5 times higher than inflation during that same period.

Those same unions recently campaigned for a new parcel tax on Oakland homes and businesses to extract even more tax revenue from Oaklanders. Voters rejected the new tax, Measure E.

Meanwhile, the city council on Friday declared a state of “extreme fiscal necessity” for the fourth year straight in order to divert restricted, voter-approved tax funds to other purposes.

The city’s finance department has forecast a structural budget shortfall of $115 million to $135 million annually through 2030.

Councilmembers could receive salary and benefits far above the area median income

The proposal from Mayor Barbara Lee’s hand-picked “working group” on charter reform recommends amending the Oakland city charter to make city council positions full-time, prohibit outside employment, and set compensation through a benchmark survey of other “strong-mayor” cities such as Los Angeles and San Diego.

• Oakland’s current city council salary is $108,803, and is set to rise to $114,678 on July 1, 2026.2

• By comparison, the median household income (which often includes multiple earners) in Oakland is approximately $102,000.3

• San Diego pays its council members a salary of $183,545,4 and Los Angeles pays $244,727.5

• If the proposed Oakland city council member raises are approved by voters in a charter amendment, city council members’ salaries would increase 69 percent if matched to San Diego council pay, and up to 125 percent if matched to Los Angeles council pay.

• Los Angeles council members are the highest-paid municipal lawmakers in the nation. This high pay is largely due to a long-standing policy linking their salaries to those of municipal judges, resulting in salaries far exceeding peers in cities like New York and San Francisco.6

Read this related article:

The council is set to approve the charter reform measure tomorrow — pay raise included

On Tuesday, the City Council is scheduled to vote on a resolution that would place mayor Barbara Lee’s charter reform measure on the November 3 general election ballot.

The charter reform measure has been discussed almost entirely as a referendum on executive power, that is, whether Oakland should become a “strong-mayor” city.

Largely absent from that debate is the eighth of the measure’s nine stated changes: a provision that would hand the Public Ethics Commission (PEC) the authority to reset how much council members are paid.7

The PEC’s membership is appointed by the mayor, city attorney, city auditor, and by the PEC itself.8

The measure would make council service formally full-time, prohibit outside employment, and replace the council’s current cost-of-living-only salary mechanism with a benchmarking process tied to “comparable full-time public officials.”9

Oakland Report previously reported that, depending on the “comparable” cities chosen, Oakland council members’ pay could increase by as much as 125 percent, raising their total compensation up to an estimated $318,145 per year once full-time benefits are included.10

No set limits on city council members’ pay

“Other cities use clear benchmarks: for example, Los Angeles ties council salaries to municipal judges’ pay.”

— Mayor’s Charter Reform Working Group report

Under the proposed charter language, beginning in 2027 the PEC would set council member salaries every two years, benchmarked to the pay of full-time city council members and county supervisors in “comparable” California jurisdictions.

The change also would apply cost-of-living adjustments every two years, capped at five percent.11

A parallel provision would formally assign the PEC the job of also setting salaries for the mayor, city attorney, and city auditor.12

The current council member salary is $108,803, and is scheduled to rise to $114,678 on July 1, 2026 — already well above Oakland’s median household income (which often includes multiple earners) of about $102,000.13

The ballot measure itself does not name the comparison cities; it leaves the selection to the PEC. But the mayor’s hand-picked “working group” that drafted the proposal — which was composed primarily of people with long-standing personal and political ties to mayor Barbara Lee — offered clear clues about which cities it had in mind.

The “working group’s” report calls for a salary survey of similarly sized strong-mayor cities, and specifically cites Los Angeles as a benchmark city for council pay.

Furthermore, their report repeatedly holds up Los Angeles and San Diego as the strong-mayor cities Oakland should emulate.14

For council members weighing a measure that would hand the mayor sweeping new authority while reducing their own, naming Los Angeles and San Diego — cities that are far larger in population than Oakland — appears to signal what full-time status could be worth: a financial incentive for council members to approve the other elements of the charter reform measure that reduce the council’s and professional staff’s power and transfer it to the mayor.

With full-time benefits, the total compensation increases by 20–40% – and council members’ total compensation could exceed $300,000 per year

If voters approve the proposal to designate Oakland city council members as full-time employees, Oakland would also pay health premiums up to the Bay Area Kaiser rate ($3,039 per month for family coverage), plus CalPERS pension contributions, insurances, and payroll taxes.15

Including full-time benefits at current costs, Oakland city council members could receive up to $318,145 per year in total compensation, if their salaries are set to the Los Angeles benchmark.

If the charter reform is approved and salaries are benchmarked to other large cities, the total annual employer cost per Oakland council member will increase substantially. Assuming an eight-member council, the total fiscal impact varies based on the chosen benchmark:

As of July 2024, the annual base salary for Oakland city council members currently is $108,803, which is higher than the area median income of $102,000.16

Council member salary currently is adjusted based on the Consumer Price Index (CPI) for the preceding two years, with a maximum increase of five percent per year.17

The City of Oakland pays its full-time employees 100 percent of the monthly premium up to the Bay Area Kaiser rate, which for 2026 is a maximum of $3,039.04 per month for family coverage.18

Additionally as full-time employees, council members would participate in the state retirement system, CalPERS, which offers lifetime defined-benefit pension plans. The city makes substantial employer contributions to its employees’ pension plans, calculated as a percentage of payroll — a long-term financial liability to taxpayers. Employee contribution rates vary by tier, such as 13 percent for Tier III in the city’s 2026 Benefits Matrix.19

The official misdirection: a ‘process,’ not a raise

The “mayor’s working group’s” proposal characterizes its pay raise recommendation as “not intended to automatically increase salaries,” but as a way to create a “fair, transparent, and standardized” compensation process.

It also asserts that the full-time pay is an “equity” measure that would allow people who are not already well-to-do to serve.20

The mayor’s office has described the charter reform package as a fix for a “fragmented” chain of command.21

Notably, the mayor already has exclusive hiring and firing authority over the city administrator, the city’s professional chief executive who oversees all city employees, operations and services, and is ultimately responsible for the city’s police response, road paving, illegal dumping, and every other aspect of city services.

The claim that the proposed change is “not intended to automatically increase salaries” is misleading, because it would, by design, result in potentially significant pay raises for the mayor and council.

It stands to reason that benchmarking Oakland elected official’s pay to larger, higher-paying cities — as strongly implied by the “mayor’s working group’s” recommendations, and implemented by a PEC which is partly appointed by the same elected officials who stand to receive those pay raises — is likely to produce substantial pay raises.

Notably, the pay raise element of the proposed charter reform measure is not tied to Oakland’s own budget condition, nor to the compensation the city pays its own employees.

A deafening silence

To date, neither the mayor nor any council member have offered any substantive public remarks or debate about the pay raise provision — its potential size, its timing, or its justification.

The discussion at city hall has almost exclusively centered on executive authority and oversight. The compensation change has passed without a defense, a challenge, or an explanation from the officials it would benefit.

One thing to watch at tomorrow’s council discussion is whether the mayor or any council member is willing to say, on the record, that their own performance warrants a raise of this magnitude at a moment when the city is again declaring “extreme fiscal necessity” and confronting structural budget deficits exceeding $115 million per year.

Oakland voters will be asked to approve a single charter reform measure bundling executive power, council oversight tools, full-time service, and a new salary mechanism into one yes-or-no question.

The pay provision is the part of that bundle with the most direct financial benefit to the people advancing it — and the part that has been explained to the public the least.

The “mayor’s working group” offered no specific dollar amounts, and no cap on how high city council and mayoral pay could rise under their proposal, yet there has been scant attention paid by either the city council or the local media to identifying these specifics.

It is reasonable to assume that avoiding discussion of the proposed pay raises for elected officials — a major element of the charter reform proposal — is a conscious strategy to avoid drawing attention or triggering public opposition to the measure, because giving pay raises to elected officials is generally unpopular with voters.2223

The result is that the one element of the measure that would directly benefit the officials voting to place it on the ballot has received the least scrutiny.

Read this related article:

Why are pay raises included in the charter reform proposal?

Taken in the context of Oakland’s long history of corruption, for example the recent indictment of former mayor Sheng Thao on federal corruption charges, the proposal to increase council members’ compensation raises a number of ethical questions:

If city council members’ livelihoods depend on re-election, does that incentivize them to be even more susceptible to influence by special interests that can help them keep their lucrative jobs and accrue more benefits, not to mention the political powers of their office?

How will the prohibition against outside employment be monitored and enforced? What if they take outside work anyway – who would take the action to enforce violations? If council members break the rule, would Oaklanders just have to wait until the next election, or try to mount an expensive recall campaign? Would their council pay be suspended? Would city council members take action against their council colleagues? Or would literally nothing happen?

Is giving council members substantial pay raises really just a political play to prevent the council members from actively opposing the charter reform proposal’s key element of giving the mayor more power and the city council less power, by promising the council members a big financial payday?

WE ARE 100% SUPPORTED BY YOU

Oakland Report provides accurate, unflinching, data-driven reporting and analysis that you will find nowhere else. If you value our work, please donate. All contributions go directly to sustaining and growing our 501(c)(3) nonprofit work:

Donate to Oakland Report

Learn more

Oakland Recap provides summaries of public meeting proceedings that catch our attention. In this installment, we review the comments made by Oakland city council members at yesterday’s special budget meeting.

Editor’s note

City Council special budget meeting, June 12, 2026.

Yesterday the Oakland city council voted to declare a “severe and unanticipated financial event,” ten days after voters rejected Measure E.1

Measure E was a $34-million-per-year parcel tax that was initially conceived and designed by city council members.2

It then dropped off the council’s agenda, and later reappeared as a ‘citizen-sponsored’ initiative — written and funded by the city’s public employee unions — that only required a simple majority vote instead of the two-thirds required by state law for council-sponsored special taxes.3

Oakland voters rejected the tax, with 54% opposed as of the latest tally.

Yesterday’s city council declaration of an “unanticipated financial event” suspended voter-approved protections on previous voter-approved tax measures in order to divert those promised tax funds to other purposes.

Read this related article:

The council also voted to make amendments to mayor Barbara Lee’s proposed budget and advance it to a final council vote for approval by June 30.

Notably, the budget amendments council approved yesterday included $2.4 million to purchase fire trucks with money from the General Purpose Fund. The Yes on Measure E campaign previously claimed that the Measure E parcel tax was needed to fund the purchase of fire trucks.

At various times during the Yes on E campaign, firefighters union representatives threatened that fire services would be decreased if the measure did not pass.4

Read this related article:

Another point of contention among council members was a recommended $250,000 gift to Oakland Unified School District (OUSD) to assist with lead abatement at schools where unsafe levels of lead were found in the drinking water.

After a series of public comments demanding that the council give more funding to senior centers, council member Kevin Jenkins proposed giving $200,000 of the money to the senior centers instead.

Also during the meeting, council member Zac Unger made clear that he intends to continue to pursue pay raises for city employees despite the city’s budget challenges, and falsely alluded that Oakland Report claimed that pay raises had already been given.

Council member Noel Gallo later noted that the city was in the midst of union contract negotiations, “and it’s gonna cost us millions.”

Read this related article:

Gallo also reminded the council that the city has around 800 fully funded but vacant positions (valued at an estimated $136 million) with no clear plan to fill them.

Gallo then stated that, “I just don’t want to make the mistakes that other cities do — they go bankrupt.”

The video at the top of this article compiles the council members’ remarks that caught our attention. Transcripts of their remarks are provided below.

‘Our babies are drinking lead and we wonder why they’re fighting at First Friday.’

CARROLL FIFE:

[…]

I don’t know what is happening with OUSD, but it is unconscionable that our babies are drinking lead and we wonder why they’re fighting at First Friday.

Right?

And at the same time, we need to hold OUSD accountable for what they’re doing with their budget. Council member Gallo talks about it all the time.

So while we’re in a budget crisis, I find it very difficult to support financially what other public agencies are doing if they’re if they’re mismanaging their budgets. I’m troubled by that.

And, I know, I heard our seniors. I have two senior centers here. I am the elected representative of the downtown Oakland Senior Center and the West Oakland Senior Center.

West Oakland [senior center] has not been opened. It’s so behind schedule, and they’re talking about not being able to feed seniors.

I’m concerned about the senior food program and hopefully the program I’m putting together today, the pilot program will be able to help assist with getting food out to the seniors. It’s the fastest growing population in the city of Oakland, and we are not serving them.

So even though $250,000, $200,000 is a drop in the bucket, it’s more than they anticipated getting today. And so, I want to see what we can do to support those seniors.

And then we need to go back to the school board. We might need to be going to some school board meetings, and meeting with our counterparts for District 3 and District 7, about how our our babies are being served.

[…]

‘Absolutely embarrassed that our seniors have to come here and do the song and dance’

KEVIN JENKINS

[…]

This is my fourth year on council. I’m [a] senior member of city council and just absolutely embarrassed that our seniors have to come here and do the song and dance every single year.

It’s absolutely imperative that we find a long-term funding source so that we can support our seniors in their golden years.

Council member Houston, I want to just absolutely applaud you for wanting to extend the hours every single year. They come here every single year, and we do this again, and again, and again.

I think it’s time for us to put our heads together and figure out how we can support our seniors going forward.

So with that, I want to change the allocation of the sugar-sweetened beverage [tax], from $250,000 to OUSD, to $50,000 going to OUSD and $200,000 going to support our seniors, and we need to continue to work to support our seniors.

[…]

‘I don’t want to make the mistake that other cities do — they go bankrupt’

NOEL GALLO:

[…]

Remember, I have six unions we got to settle with, and it’s gonna cost us millions.

Also, I have 800 and something vacancies that we approved last year, but we never filled them.

I can’t get my streets cleaned, man. I can’t buy my trucks. I can’t take care of law enforcement to help me on the street.

But we’re going to sit here and do a lot more talking.

I need to have a management budget that’s clear before I start approving all these other things. I’m going to do this, do that over here.

Then I wind up once again with the public, “Well, I can’t take care of your street because I don’t have the money.”

I just don’t want to make the mistake that other cities do — they go bankrupt.

We’re right now discussing making agreements, but you don’t know what you have in terms of money because we haven’t settled the biggest challenge, and that’s going to be settling our union contracts: fire department, police department and all the other unions that we got to settle.

That’s not going to be, you know, a 25-cents deal that we got to come up with.

We’re going to have to find out, what can I do additionally for a service, once I take care of my employees…

[Jenkins interrupts: Call the question.]

…and so anyways.

[…]

‘I love that new fire engine smell’

ZAC UNGER:

[…]

I sat here a year ago and talked about the “nobody’s happy budget.” You know, today, I think I’m happy to sit here and say that our council amendments constitute the “nobody’s crazy budget.”

Our amendments from the budget team are a model that is reasonable, accountable and sane.

And, you know, I’m not going to belabor the details here because I think my colleagues have done a great job with highlighting all of the all of the council amendments.

But a couple of things that I do want to focus on are the $2.5 million in safe parking and hotel vouchers for our our unhoused neighbors, which I think is an incredibly important thing.

The $50 million in already approved bond money that we accelerated towards affordable housing production.

And, of course, I also love that new fire engine smell. So adding two fire rigs is is crucial.

But I think that the values that we lead with as a council budget team are key here. We’re doing things in a way that we haven’t always done in the past.

We added no new employees to the general fund in our council amendments. We funded no recurring expenses out of one time revenues. We brought four voter approved measures out of fiscal emergency and into full compliance with voter mandates. And our single biggest line item expenditure in the council amendments was an investment in paying down our long term pension obligations.

While I am hopeful that we can pass a budget here today, I want to emphasize that we are by no means done.

Despite what you may have been told by some reports about Oakland, our non-sworn employees did not receive a raise last year. Zero percent. We are losing valuable, talented workers because of this.

And speaking for myself here, I commit to working to make sure that we can offer a compensation package to all of our employees, both sworn and non-sworn, that like our council budget amendments, is reasonable, accountable and sane.

So I thank you all for everybody’s work on this. I thank you for your participation.

[END OF TRANSCRIPT]

A video of the council members’ comments appears at the top of this article. A link to the full video of the city council special budget meeting is available in Endnote 1.

4

Oakland Report contributors. “It’s legal to lie in campaigns – but that doesn’t make it right.” Oakland Report, May 24, 2026. https://www.oaklandreport.org/p/its-legal-to-lie-in-campaigns

---

WE ARE 100% SUPPORTED BY YOU

Oakland Report provides accurate, unflinching, data-driven reporting and analysis that you will find nowhere else. If you value our work, please donate. All contributions go directly to sustaining and growing our 501(c)(3) nonprofit work:

Donate to Oakland Report

Learn more

Oakland Agenda Watch provides summaries of upcoming public meeting agenda items that catch our attention. In this installment, we take a closer look at today’s special meeting of Oakland city council.

More broken promises

Oakland city council special meeting, Jun. 12, 2026, agenda item #5.

Oakland city council is set to formally declare a ‘severe and unanticipated financial event’ for the fourth year in a row.1

If the council declares a ‘severe and unanticipated financial event,’ it will again suspend voter-mandated requirements for the use of multiple tax funds — and allow the mayor and council to divert those restricted funds to other purposes.

With today’s resolution, the mayor and city council appear set to break the following legal, financial, and political promises:

• The 700-officer minimum police staffing requirement of Measure NN (2024)

• The ‘Democracy Dollars’ public campaign financing of Measure W (2022)

• The parks maintenance guarantee of Measure Q (2020)

• The ‘Sugar-Sweetened Beverage Tax’ spending restrictions and advisory board requirements of Measure HH (2016)

• Divert money from the Affordable Housing Trust Fund

• Use one-time revenues for ongoing expenses in violation of the city’s Consolidated Fiscal Policy.

According to the city staff report, approximately $33.9 million in restricted funding would be diverted.

The staff report warns that without the declaration, the mayor’s proposed budget “would not be legal to adopt.”

The vote will come ten days after Oakland voters rejected Measure E, the $34-million-per-year parcel tax that Mayor Barbara Lee, the city council, and a coalition of city employee unions had presented as necessary to sustain multiple basic city services.

Mayor Lee also stated that Measure E was needed to keep the promises the city previously made to voters in past tax measures, most notably Measure NN.2

Read this related article:

As of the most recent tally, Measure E was failing with 54% of voters opposed. Mayor Lee has conceded the measure will not pass.3

As Oakland Report previously reported, the roughly $34 million per year that the Measure E parcel tax would have charged Oakland residents and businesses is almost exactly the same amount as the $33.9 million the city now says it needs to divert from previous voter-approved tax measures.4

Measure E was styled as a grassroots ‘citizen-sponsored’ initiative, but it bore many hallmarks of an ‘astroturfing’ effort,5 engineered to exploit a change in election law that allows a special tax to pass with a simple majority of votes instead of the usual two-thirds otherwise required by state law.

As Oakland Report reported in October, the city council worked extensively in committee to develop a new public safety-focused tax measure to charge another $40 million per year to Oakland residents and businesses.6

But shortly after the committee completed the draft text of the proposed tax measure, it dropped off the committee schedule and never advanced to the full council.

There appears to be no public record of the committees or council formally voting or directing city staff to abandon the measure.

Read this related article:

A few months later, the proposed parcel tax reappeared as a ‘citizen-sponsored’ measure prepared and funded by the city’s public employee unions — most notably Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 1021, International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers (IFPTE) Local 21, and International Association of Fire Fighters (IAFF) Local 55.

The political committee that qualified and promoted Measure E, “Oaklanders for a Safe, Clean & Healthy City,” raised over $1.1 million — most of it from city unions — and spent an estimated half a million dollars on paid signature-gatherers to qualify the measure for the ballot.78

Notably, the same city unions that funded the Measure E campaign were and are significant donors to the political campaigns of the elected officials who negotiate union contracts on behalf of the city — and who will cast today’s vote on the resolution to divert voter-approved restricted tax funds to the general fund.

See this related video:

Councilmember Janani Ramachandran, who chairs the council’s finance committee, confirmed in a media interview that the council plans to vote on the ‘unanticipated financial event’ declaration so the city can keep collecting an estimated $47 million from the previous Measure NN parcel tax without complying with the measure’s 700 police officer minimum.

Ramachandran attributed the shortfall to a “recruitment and retention issue.”9

Oakland Report has extensively reported on the city’s use of ‘extreme fiscal necessity’ and ‘severe and unanticipated financial event’ declarations to evade voter-mandated restrictions on the use of dedicated tax funds.10111213

What follows is an examination of what the council is about to declare, what it has declared before, and why the word ‘unanticipated’ is worthy of additional scrutiny.

1. Override fiscal policy and use one-time money for ongoing costs

The first component of the resolution overrides the city’s Consolidated Fiscal Policy.14 The policy was adopted in part because of Oakland’s history of using one-time money to cover ongoing costs.

Put in household terms, this is something akin to selling your car to pay for next month’s rent.

The Consolidated Fiscal Policy requires the council to direct one-time money toward paying existing debts (such as municipal bonds), reducing pension liabilities, correcting negative fund balances, and replenishing emergency budget reserves.

The policy expressly prohibits using one-time money to cover ongoing costs such as payroll and routine services.

However, the council may override this fundamental fiscal policy by resolution — which it has done repeatedly.

2. Another ‘unanticipated financial event’ – and another broken promise

The resolution declares a ‘severe and unanticipated financial event’ and asserts that the city cannot budget for the 700 sworn police officers required by Measure NN, the $47-million-per-year parcel tax and parking surcharge voters approved in 2024.15

The city has yet to honor the 700-officer requirement. Its current midcycle budget funds only 678 officers, and around 60 of those police officer positions currently are vacant. Due to worker’s compensation and other forms of leave, the actual number of police officers on active duty is even lower: around 500.

City staff calculate that in order to meet the 700-officer requirement, three additional police academies — which the report says is not feasible — would be needed at a cost of $11.8 million. An additional $7.0 million would be needed in ongoing costs for the additional officers, totaling $18.8 million.

Read this related article:

3. Suspending parks maintenance requirements, again

The resolution also suspends Measure Q’s park maintenance requirement. Voters approved that 20-year parcel tax in 2020 — currently nearly $189 per single-family home — on the promise that the money would preserve and enhance parks services, not replace existing funding.

The midcycle budget exceeds the measure’s 55 percent cap on using parks revenue for pre-existing operational costs.

According to the staff report, meeting the legal requirements voters approved in Measure Q now will cost an additional $1.9 million.

4. ‘Democracy Dollars’ on hold, again

The council also will be voting to suspend the minimum budget set-aside for the ‘Democracy Dollars’ public campaign financing program.

The ‘Democracy Dollars’ program was approved and funded by Oakland voters in 2022 with Measure W. The program was never implemented.

The staff report says that meeting the requirements in Measure W now will cost an additional estimated $4.8 million.

5. Soda tax restrictions stripped

The resolution suspends both the requirement to consult the Sugar-Sweetened Beverage Tax Community Advisory Board before appropriating Measure HH revenues and the restrictions on how those revenues are used.

According to the staff report, following the board’s recommended allocations would require another $7.5 million.

6. Affordable Housing Trust Fund money diverted

The resolution also would authorize the city to divert Affordable Housing Trust Fund money — a set-aside from former Redevelopment Agency funds — to balance the general fund budget.

The city intends to modify the share of affordable housing fund revenues from the current 75 percent for the General Purpose Fund and 25 percent for the affordable housing fund, to 80 percent and 20 percent, respectively.

This would divert approximately $4.4 million away from the affordable housing fund to the general fund.

Additionally, the city intends to make a one-time transfer of roughly $2.2 million (reduced to about $859,000 after a partial repayment under the city’s “Roadmap to Fiscal Health”).

7. A promise to ‘prioritize’ restoring the funds later

Notably, the resolution conveys the council’s intention to ‘prioritize’ restoring the diverted funds if new money appears later.

However, this non-binding promise comes with a broad list of exceptions including: projected deficits, maintaining current staffing, legal restrictions, or conflicts with labor agreements.

What the city says was ‘unanticipated’

Multiple voter-approved tax measures come with restrictions on the use of funding that can be waived only upon a council declaration establishing “the existence of a severe and unanticipated financial or other event.”

This leads to a question: what was the ‘unanticipated’ event?

The staff report asserts that there were three such events:

1. Lower-than-hoped Real Estate Transfer Tax revenue

Real Estate Transfer Tax is collected by the city every time a property is sold. It is widely-known best practice in municipal finance to regard this revenue as highly volatile, because it is subject to the often unpredictable ebbs and flows of real estate sales in any given year.

According to the staff report, this funding source ‘fell’ from $138.4 million in fiscal year 2021-22 to a forecasted $72.0 million in fiscal year 2026-27.

The report attributes this change to high inflation and interest rates, and to permanent post-pandemic changes in economic activity.

In fact, the $138.4 million figure from fiscal year 2021-22 was a high-water mark for this type of revenue. That year, the city’s adopted budget anticipated only $94.6 million in Real Estate Transfer Tax revenue. So it actually came in over 46 percent higher than the projection.

Conversely, the city anticipated $110.4 million in fiscal year 2023-24, but it actually collected only $57.6 million — over 47 percent lower than anticipated.

Over the past ten years, the city has collected anywhere from a low of $57.6 million to a high of $138.4 million.

Notably, this source of revenue actually increased in the two years that immediately followed the COVID-19 pandemic. In the most recently completed fiscal year 2024-25, this revenue exceeded the ten-year average of approximately $92 million.

Responsible municipal finance practice dictates that governments should not overestimate its forecasts for this revenue source, nor depend on it too heavily for ongoing operating costs.

The city is aware of this volatility, thus it included in its Consolidated Fiscal Policy that the real estate transfer tax should be expected to fund no more than 15% of its General Purpose Fund.

2. Rising pension and medical costs

According to the city’s financial reports, the city’s annual pension benefit payments grew from $362 million in 2016 to $477 million in 2025, a 32% increase in nine years.

The city’s combined net pension liability — meaning total debt — exceeded $1.85 billion as of fiscal year 2023.

The city’s five-year financial forecast projects continued $100 million-plus annual budget deficits through the end of the decade — driven largely by pension obligations that are locked in by labor agreements and will compound regardless of future hiring decisions.16

The city’s own Roadmap to Fiscal Health projected that pension costs will rise another $70 million by 2031. The pension administrator, California Public Employees Retirement System (CalPERS) publishes contribution schedules years in advance.

These are among the most foreseeable — and challenging — cost increases in municipal finance.

3. The Oakland Coliseum payment that wasn’t

The city council in fiscal year 2024-25 irresponsibly budgeted $100 million from the sale of its share of the Oakland Coliseum Complex, despite not having secured the money.

As has been widely reported, the hoped-for $100 million in payments never materialized, and only $5 million has been paid to date.

The report notes that the hoped-for $100 million from the Coliseum sale equals roughly one-eighth of annual General Purpose Fund spending, and claims that the resulting revenue gap when the payments were not timely made “was not known at the time Measure NN legislation was drafted for signature collection.”

Read this related article:

The city saw it coming

The staff report concludes that the three above-noted events are the greatest pressure on city resources since at least the 2008 financial crisis, and that the pressure they created is ‘severe, unanticipated, and ongoing.’

However, it stands to reason that such events — which were easily foreseeable and documented in the city’s own financial reports for years — cannot be simultaneously ‘unanticipated’ and ‘ongoing’ for four years straight.

The report’s opening sentences confirm this seemingly self-contradictory reasoning when it cites “the continuing impact from severe and unanticipated financial events stemming from prior budget cycles.”

It is reasonable to assert that a financial shortfall that stems from prior budget cycles over multiple years is not unanticipated.

It also is reasonable to believe that Oakland’s budget problems are now its baseline condition, fully documented in the city’s own five-year forecasts, which have consistently projected structural deficits of $115 million to $135 million annually through 2030.

A permanent emergency, declared annually

As Oakland Report wrote last month, the phrase, “severe and unanticipated financial event” can be reasonably construed as meaning unprecedented calamities like the Great Recession of 2008 or the pandemic crash of 2020 — sudden, external shocks that no reasonable budget could absorb.

However, the record of the city’s past declarations suggests that the financial events that precipitated them were foreseen and largely avoidable.

June 2023 — parks maintenance suspended.
The council declared extreme fiscal necessity to suspend Measure Q’s parks maintenance requirement, acknowledging that the proposed budget simply did not meet the measure’s 55% threshold.

The cited “events” were: a $360 million two-year deficit that emerged after federal pandemic relief ran out (of which there was ample advance warning); the city misjudged its transfer tax revenues; and the city council signed generous pay raises and benefits for its workforce during a period of remarkably high inflation.17

Additionally, Measure Q had by that time accumulated nearly $22 million in unspent funds because the city had failed to perform the promised work. Furthermore, homelessness carry-forwards exceeded allowable limits — findings later documented by the city auditor.

In the same period, the city fell short of Measure C’s minimum library support in that measure’s very first year of collection, and again declared a ‘severe and unanticipated financial event’ to evade the legal requirements and keep collecting that tax too.

July 2024 — Oakland Coliseum payments fail to materialize.
The council again declared a state of extreme fiscal necessity, this time citing a $177 million deficit — while simultaneously adopting a budget that was premised on the Oakland Coliseum sale revenue, which was not actually secured and ultimately did not materialize.18

June 2025. The council declared again — this time invoking, for the first time, Measure NN’s waiver to budget only 678 officers against the measure’s 700-officer minimum. The council’s action came just seven months after voters approved the measure on the explicit promise of maintaining at least 700 officers.

Additionally, the council approved a budget that closed a $265 million two-year budget shortfall partly by assuming roughly $40 million per year from a new tax that had not been written, placed on the ballot, or approved by voters. That tax later became Measure E.

Once again, the budget was balanced on revenue the city did not have; once again the fallback was the emergency declaration.

June 2026. Today, the mayor and council are set to make their broadest declaration yet, suspending six voter protections in one resolution — after the speculative revenue (Measure E) failed, as the speculative revenue (the Oakland Coliseum payments) failed before it.

Help us reach our goal of 10,000 subscribers.

Subscribe now

Share

The financial mismanagement behind the “emergency”

The deeper problem with the “unanticipated” loophole is that nearly every component of Oakland’s fiscal distress was either predicted in the city’s own documents or directly caused by the city’s own choices.

An embarrassment of riches

Oakland is not a poor city government. Total governmental revenues have nearly doubled since 2013 and now exceed $1.6 billion per year, growing at roughly 4.7% annually — faster than inflation — even as the city projects nine-figure budget deficits.

Oakland collects the highest taxes per capita in the state among comparable cities, according to some reports. Since 2020 alone, voters have approved roughly $150 million in new annual taxes. Yet the city’s deficit continued to grow.

Even with that record-high revenue base, a recent audit found the city failed to collect approximately $12 million in business taxes it was owed.19

Spending goes up while services stagnate

The city, like all municipal governments, is a service organization, and therefore rightly spends most of its money on personnel. The structural deficit is, at bottom, a personnel cost problem.

Yet the city council has repeatedly chosen to increase the city’s personnel spending at precisely the moments it claimed ‘severe and unanticipated’ financial emergencies.

The cost-of-living adjustments (that is, employee pay raises and benefits) the city council approved during the post-pandemic inflation spike were identified by multiple observers as a direct contributor to the $360 million deficit declared in 2023.

By 2023, average total compensation (wages plus benefits) for a full-time City of Oakland employee had reached approximately $237,000 — a 79% increase over ten years, far outpacing peer cities, driven largely by a benefits load worth 72% on top of base salary.

Read this related article:

Next week, the city council will vote whether to approve a charter reform proposal that, among other things, would raise city council pay by an estimated up to 125% — which would be among the highest council compensation in the nation.20

The council is set to vote on the proposed charter reform measure and council pay raises during a time when a fiscal emergency declaration is in effect and the finance department forecasts nine-figure budget deficits through 2030.

Meanwhile, Oakland carries roughly 840 vacant, unfrozen positions. This budget capacity is worth up to $136 million per year — a figure that nearly matches the projected annual structural deficit. These unfilled, unspent positions artificially inflate the claimed deficit and, with it, the severity of the purported ‘extreme fiscal necessity.’

Video clip 1. Mayor Barbara Lee presented her proposed budget to the city council on June 1, stating that it is “built only on revenue that we can reliably project” and “does not include any layoffs for our city staff.” (Source: City of Oakland)

Mayor Barbara Lee ruled out the most valuable budget leverage from the start

Mayor Lee assured the public that her FY 2026-27 budget proposal — the budget today’s emergency declaration exists to legalize — was “balanced and responsible,” “built only on revenue that we can reliably project,” and “does not include any layoffs of our city staff.”

As noted above, personnel costs are rightly the city’s largest expense category by far, and the line item the city’s own forecasts identify as the biggest expense-side driver of the structural deficit.

A budget that rules out personnel cost reductions in advance — including concession bargaining, eliminating vacant positions, and layoffs — announces that the dominant cost driver is untouchable.

The city’s elected leaders, including the mayor, ostensibly represent the voters, and are the city’s fiduciary board of directors that negotiates with the city’s unions on behalf of the city.

By taking layoffs off the table in this context, at a time when the city is actively negotiating new labor agreements with its unions, the mayor is sending a clear message to those unions that the balancing will come from everywhere else: from parks maintenance voters paid for, from the affordable housing fund, from the police staffing voters were promised, and from the campaign finance program voters enacted.

Declaring “no layoffs” during labor negotiations, in the midst of a ‘severe and unanticipated’ fiscal emergency is a mirror image of the emergency declaration itself: the one commitment the mayor treats as binding is one voters never voted on.

Help us continue to hold the city accountable. Donate to support our nonprofit work.

Become a supporting member

Raiding restricted funds: the broken piggy bank

Given the evidence, financial data, and substantive context around the declaration, it is reasonable to state that this appears not to be an ‘unanticipated’ financial situation, in the commonly understood sense of the phrase.

Rather, it appears to be the continuation of a long-running practice: when the General Purpose Fund runs short due to the city’s chronic financial mismanagement, the city council routinely diverts funds that were previously placed off-limits by Oakland voters, sound accounting practices, and potentially, the law.

Read this related article:

In every case noted above, the primary intent of suspending the funding restrictions appears to be to evade the city’s obligations while continuing to collect the taxes voters approved for those obligations.

Each individual maneuver is presented as temporary, regrettable, and legally authorized.

Taken together, they lead to an impression of a city government that treats every restriction on its spending — mandated by voters, by the city’s own fiscal policy, or by responsible financial management — as merely a suggestion to be evaded at the city council’s discretion.

Oakland Report is by no means comprehensive in our coverage of public meetings in Oakland. The scope and frequency of public meetings are far more than we can presently cover. You can see the full June 12 city council special meeting agenda and reports at the city’s meeting calendar.

WE ARE 100% SUPPORTED BY YOU

Oakland Report provides accurate, unflinching, data-driven reporting and analysis that you will find nowhere else.

If you value our work, please donate. All contributions go directly to sustaining and growing our 501(c)(3) nonprofit work:

Donate to Oakland Report

Learn more

Video clip 1: Warning: graphic content. Compilation of unsanctioned after-hours party scenes in the streets near the official First Friday event. (Source: Instagram / various accounts)

PART ONE OF A SERIES

Editors’ note

Oakland Report is launching a multi-part series this summer that will take a closer look at Oakland’s First Friday festivals and the neighboring Uptown district, and the efforts by festival organizers and the city to maintain safety and order during and after the official event.

We’ll examine data and evidence related to the increase in criminal activity that takes place during unofficial after-hours gatherings in the streets near the First Friday street festivals — much of them focused in the neighboring Uptown arts and entertainment district.

The city of Oakland has long struggled to contain these unsanctioned gatherings, and announced this week a new plan to curb them.

We’ll also delve into the rich history and importance of the Uptown neighborhood, including marquee destinations like the Fox and Paramount theaters, and the ecosystem of eateries, bars and other venues around them.

As we move through the series, we plan to take deeper dives into the economic vitality and development of arts and entertainment in Uptown — and follow up on the city’s safety efforts at the First Friday festivals and unsanctioned after-parties throughout the summer.

A cherished street festival and community asset

Oakland First Fridays is a long-running street festival held on the first Friday of each month in the Koreatown-Northgate (KONO) neighborhood. The official festival is held from 5:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. on Telegraph Avenue from West Grand to 27th Street, and features food, art, performances, and other attractions.

The free event draws up to 30,000 people depending on the season and weather, according to the official First Fridays website.1

A 2014 economic impact report concluded that the festival generated an estimated $52,000 per month in revenue (in 2014 dollars) for participating merchants and vendors — well above the average revenue on non-festival Fridays.2

First Fridays is a cherished event that celebrates Oakland’s vibrant culture, art, and business communities, and introduces thousands of people across the Bay Area region to the extraordinary and unique city of Oakland.

But this success has not been without its challenges. Almost since the festival’s beginning in 2013, unsanctioned after-hours gatherings in nearby neighborhoods have posed persistent public safety problems.

Late-night crime increased 44% during unsanctioned street gatherings after the First Friday festivals

Oakland Report analyzed Oakland Police Department (OPD) crime data to test whether crime actually does increase during the unsanctioned late-night street gatherings that routinely occur a few blocks south of the official First Friday festivals.

Our analysis found consistent, significant spikes in crime during these unofficial after-hours gatherings — concentrated just south of the official festival event area.

The landmark Fox Theater at 1807 Telegraph Avenue is located a few blocks south of the official First Fridays festival area, and appears to be the (unofficial, unwilling) focal point of the unsanctioned after-hours street gatherings.

Oakland Report analyzed every crime incident recorded within a quarter-mile radius of the Fox Theater between 5:00 p.m. Fridays and 6:00 a.m. Saturdays from January 2007 through May 2026.3

We then compared crime incidents on the first Fridays of each month and the Fridays one week before and one week after, regardless of whether a First Friday festival was held.

We then focused on just the 150 dates when official First Friday festivals took place, excluding the years before the festival came into being in 2013, and periods when the festival was on hiatus.4

Key findings:

• Late-night crime incidents increased an average 44% during unsanctioned street parties a few blocks away and shortly after First Friday festivals. On the nights of First Friday festivals, the quarter-mile radius area around the Fox Theater averaged 5.6 crime incidents a night, as opposed to 3.8 crime incidents on the Friday nights in the previous and following weeks. The crime increases occurred almost entirely in the late hours past 9:30 p.m.

• Crime was higher during the late-night hours after the official festivals ended. Festival nights averaged 3.6 incidents after 9:30 p.m., compared to 2.1 incidents on non-festival Fridays. Meanwhile, the earlier evening hours of 5:00 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. showed almost no difference.

• Crime in the study area a few blocks south of the festival was consistently lower on the first Fridays of the month when there were no festivals. The first Fridays of the month when no festivals were held experienced roughly the same baseline rate of crime as other non-festival Fridays (around 3 to 4 incidents per non-festival Friday night).

• Crime incidents skewed more violent in the late-night hours after First Friday festivals. Assaults, robberies, weapons, and threats made up around 32% of festival-night crime incidents, compared to approximately 20% of crime incidents on non-festival Fridays.

Explore the data

Correlation is not causation

Several important caveats apply to this data.

The data is composed of reported crimes, and does not include crimes that occurred but were not reported to police.

Approximately 5% of the crime records in the dataset were timestamped at exactly midnight, suggesting that these may have been default system settings for crimes that occurred at other times on their respective dates. This relatively small percentage of reported crimes were excluded from the data.

Correlation is not causation. There are likely other factors at play, aside from the festivals, that contribute to the statistics shown in the crime data. While the increased late-night crime is clearly correlated to the First Friday festivals, no causal link is established by the data itself.

However, it stands to reason that when a large number of people are in a given area it is likely to result in more property crime independent of any one cause. Notably, auto burglary and theft are the most frequently reported crimes in the data used for this analysis.

It also is reasonable to consider the possibility that some high-spirited festival attendees may choose to linger in the area after the festival, and that new attendees may arrive shortly after the festival ends in order to participate in the unsanctioned after-hours street gatherings that routinely follow it.

Additionally, the correlation between festival dates and a spike in crime in the area during the late-night unsanctioned street gatherings that follow the festivals is such that it can reasonably be construed to be at least partly due to the presence of large crowds at the festivals, which take place on a memorable recurring event date — and public awareness and notoriety, built over many years, that unsanctioned late-night street gatherings routinely follow the festival.

Data indicates that late-night crime skewed more violent on festival nights after the official events ended

On the nights of First Friday festivals, violent offenses — battery, robbery, weapons, and related violent crimes — made up about 32 percent of reported crime incidents, compared to roughly 20 percent on the Fridays in the preceding and following weeks, and 16 percent across all non-event first Fridays of the month.

A partial list of notable violent incidents that have occurred during the late-night hours after First Friday festivals includes:

• May 2, 2026: Seven pedestrians, including a juvenile, were hospitalized after a reckless driver crashed onto the sidewalk near the Fox Theater around 1:30 a.m. Oakland police said the victims were allegedly targeted after a street brawl. The driver fled the scene on foot but was stopped by bystanders and later arrested.56

• April 18, 2026: Two people were killed in a shooting and a subsequent retaliatory shooting in East Oakland (about five miles from the festival). Authorities said the violence stemmed from a dispute that began at the First Friday festival.7

• September 6, 2025: Two people were killed and at least four others wounded in a series of early-morning shootings across downtown Oakland, not far from the festival area. Police said the initial investigation found no evidence connecting the violence to the festival. Police union representatives blamed the crowds for fostering the incident, and understaffed police for limiting the ability to curb and enforce the violence. First Friday organizers objected to suggestions that the crimes were linked to the festival.89

• July 5, 2024: A woman was fatally shot at approximately 10:45 p.m. on the 1900 block of Telegraph Avenue — a few blocks south of the festival area, and not long after that night’s First Friday festival had ended.1011

• May 5, 2022: A sideshow (reckless driving street takeover) erupted at Broadway and Thomas L. Berkley Way alongside the First Friday area during the festival. Police recovered a firearm, made multiple arrests, and towed dozens of vehicles.12

• October 6, 2018: Five people were injured in a shooting around three hours after the festival and a few blocks away near 19th Street and Telegraph Avenue, prompting organizers to cancel the following month’s event to review security measures.1314

• February 1, 2013: A man was fatally shot and three other people were wounded on the 2000 block of Telegraph Avenue near the festival shortly after the festival ended. Police described it as a targeted shooting. The city and festival organizers responded by shrinking the festival’s footprint, shifting the festival end time to earlier in the night at 9:00 p.m., and restricting alcohol.15

The city this week rolled out a new public safety strategy intended to curb the chaotic after-hours gatherings

The City of Oakland distributed a community safety plan at a Wednesday town hall meeting held in Fox Square Park on 19th Street and Telegraph Avenue across from the Fox Theater. (The new park is currently under development in partnership with Oakland School for the Arts, which is located in the Fox Theater building.)

The safety plan outlines coordinated crowd control and public safety operations for Friday and Saturday nights along Telegraph Avenue and Broadway, focused on the First Friday festival on June 5.

First Fridays Security Plan

849KB ∙ PDF file

Download

The city of Oakland distributed paper copies of this security plan at a ‘town hall’ event held at Fox Square Park (located across the street from the Fox Theater building) on June 3, 2026.

Download

The plan also was described in a press release the city issued yesterday, along with supportive quotes from city officials.16

It describes the safety measures as building on operational efforts the city previously announced on March 5.17

The new plan asserts that the First Friday festivals are “safe, successful, and invaluable,” and attributes community concerns to “unrelated incidents” in adjacent Uptown and Downtown areas that occur “usually several hours after” the festivals end.

The plan outlines five categories of action for the June 5 festival:

1. Public safety. OPD to provide enhanced staffing during the festival and into late evening across Downtown, Uptown, and KONO, reinforced by California Highway Patrol and Bay Area Rapid Transit Police “when resources are available.” Additional enhanced activities to include enforcement of unpermitted vendors, alcoholic beverage sales, and illegal parking.

2. Violence prevention. The Department of Violence Prevention to “provide preventative support based on their mission and jurisdiction if needed in advance,” and Mobile Assistance Community Responders of Oakland (MACRO) to provide patrols for behavioral and well-being issues.

3. Public health and substance use. Code Enforcement, Alameda County Health, and Oakland Fire Marshal to provide enhanced monitoring of illegal alcohol and drugs.

4. Clean streets. City crews to provide street sweeping and clean up after the event.

5. Public access and transportation. City to conduct strict parking enforcement, road closures and “no parking” zones on Broadway and Telegraph Avenue from 15th to 20th Streets.

Four intersections will close to through traffic (16th/Telegraph, 19th/Broadway, 17th/San Pablo, and 17th/Telegraph), with barriers used for street closures.

The city recommends taking BART, AC Transit, or rideshare services if traveling to or through the area, and notes the availability of the Telegraph Plaza and Franklin Plaza parking garages.

Personnel categories and geographic enforcement areas are outlined in the plan without quantifying staffing levels, budget, or duration beyond the single June 5 date. The plan does not define any metrics for evaluating the effectiveness of the measures.

The safety plan, and the city’s proactive communication of it, signals that after years of escalating challenges and community concerns from residents and businesses, the city appears to be taking an all-hands-on-deck approach to curb the unofficial late-night street gatherings that routinely occur after the festival.

Don’t miss a beat. Donate to support our nonprofit work.

Donate to Oakland Report

The next installment in this series will focus on the history and business operations of the Fox Theater and the central role it plays in the economic growth and vitality of the Uptown arts and entertainment district.

Future installments will focus on other notable venues and businesses in the area, and will follow the First Friday festivals, the unsanctioned after-hours street gatherings, and the city’s efforts to contain them throughout the summer.

We also plan to take a closer look at the Oakland Arena, the city’s largest and arguably best-known sports and entertainment venue.

Do you have something to say about this topic, or the broader topic of economic development in Oakland? We want to hear from you! Write to us.

WE ARE 100% SUPPORTED BY YOU

Oakland Report provides accurate, unflinching, data-driven reporting and analysis that you will find nowhere else. If you value our work, please donate. All contributions go directly to sustaining and growing our 501(c)(3) nonprofit work:

Donate to Oakland Report

Learn more

Oakland Agenda Watch provides short summaries of key items on upcoming public meeting agendas that catch our attention. In this installment, we take a closer look at today’s city council review of the mayor’s charter reform working group proposal – a question voters may be asked to decide in November.

The mayor picked the panel — and also picked the questions they were allowed to ask

City council meeting, June 2, 2026, agenda item #5.2.

The city council is set to review the most significant overhaul of Oakland’s political structure since 1998: a shift to a ‘strong-mayor’ system that would grant the mayor sweeping new executive powers, award potentially substantial pay raises to city council members, and dramatically reorganize authority across City Hall.1

The proposal grew out of the recommendations of the ‘mayor’s charter reform working group.’

There’s a simple test for any government advisory body: look at who picks the members, who writes the questions, and who gains from the answer.

On all three criteria, Mayor Barbara Lee’s working group was set up from the start to arrive at its unsurprising recommendation: that Oakland hand its mayor significant new powers.

This characterization is evident in the working group’s own documents. The working group was built in a way that kept its actual deliberations off the public record — no posted agendas, no open meetings, no sign-off from the City Council.

Also telling is what the working group never put on the table: the government reforms Oaklanders have actually asked and voted for.

The mayor hand-picked the ‘working group’ — and picked the questions they would (and wouldn’t) ask

Political charter reform was a focus of Mayor Barbara Lee’s campaign platform, and her office hand-selected a ‘working group’ to study it.2

The mayor’s office chose all the working group’s members — none of the other elected city council members were afforded the opportunity to also select members.3

The mayor selected two nominally nonpartisan groups — the League of Women Voters of Oakland and San Francisco Bay Area Planning and Urban Research Association (SPUR) — to run the working group meetings and the overall process.4

According to a letter from working group’s key representatives — many of whom have long-standing ties to the mayor — Mayor Lee set the working group’s goals and then ‘stepped back’ from direct engagement in the group’s work:

“Mayor Lee … convened the Working Group, set the initial goals, and then stepped back.”

— Mayor’s Charter Reform Working Group, letter to the City Council5

Notably, ‘stepping back’ after hand-picking a working group composed mostly of supporters, then writing the questions they were to ask or avoid, isn’t the same as neutrality.

It stands to reason that the person who stands to gain most from a strong-mayor government is the person who defined what the panel was allowed to study — the mayor.

Critics noticed.

The Oakland Charter Reform Project, which opposed the ‘strong-mayor’ form of government in favor of the widely-used ‘council-manager’ system, called the result unsurprising from a panel exclusively chosen by the mayor.6

Read this related article:

Mayor Lee publicly reinforced the ‘strong-mayor’ conclusion months before the working group’s recommendations were presented to the city council.7

SPUR, one of the working group facilitators, had publicly favored a stronger Oakland executive for years.8

So did former Mayor Libby Schaaf, who publicly endorsed the strong-mayor approach as the working group process was underway.9

Built to deliberate in private

The mayor’s decision to appoint a ‘working group’ instead of an official city advisory body was a critical component of the overall process — one that almost inevitably would lead to a recommendation favored by and largely benefiting the mayor.

Most public bodies in California are required by law to conduct their business in the open. The state’s open-meetings government ‘sunshine’ law — the Ralph M. Brown Act — forces city councils, their committees, and advisory bodies to post agendas in advance, let the public watch them deliberate, post official minutes of proceedings, and keep no decisions hidden.10

But the law has a well-known gap. It generally does not cover a body that a single official creates on their own, as opposed to one a city council establishes by formal vote.11

The mayor’s political charter reform ‘working group’ exploited that gap. Mayor Lee convened it herself, as part of her 100-day plan; the city council never created it by resolution, and the council neither appointed nor confirmed a single member.12

Read this related article:

Because it was the mayor’s creation rather than the full elected council’s, it carried none of the Brown Act’s obligations.

No posted agendas. No public deliberations. No minutes of who argued what.

The mayor’s office hand-picked the members, handed them the questions, and let them deliberate privately to reach a conclusion — all without the transparency that a formal city advisory body would have been required to follow.

Help us reach our goal of 10,000 subscribers

Subscribe now

It’s worth being precise about what was public. The Working Group held listening sessions and community meetings across the city, and that outreach was open to those who chose to attend.13

But there is a difference between public outreach — events where residents are invited to give input — and public deliberation, where you can watch the body weigh the evidence, review its deliberation and minutes in writing and on video, and evaluate how it reached its decision. Oaklanders got the first. They never got the second. The actual deliberations happened out of view, then arrived as a finished recommendation.

Ironically, the mayor’s working group was created to improve government ‘transparency and accountability’ — two of its three stated goals — yet it did its own work in a way that avoided the transparency laws typical advisory bodies are required to follow.

It did this during a time when Oakland’s leaders were already under fire for open-government lapses.

In September 2025, the City Attorney found that private meetings on the city’s encampment policy had violated the Brown Act.14

In April 2026, an Oakland resident filed a lawsuit against the city for failing to produce records through the California Public Records Act related to Oakland Measure E.15

The framing defined the finding

The working group’s scope, set by the mayor, defined its destiny. The group was given three goals: clarify who does what in the city government, strengthen financial management, and improve accountability.

Each sounds neutral. But together, they quietly assume the answer. Once you define Oakland’s problem as ‘unclear lines of authority,’ the fix narrows to ‘draw a clearer line’ — and the clearest line that also happens to be easiest to sell to voters is to have one boss at the top.

However, this sets aside the fact that the American system of government was designed specifically to have checks and balances so no one person or group can have exclusive or excessive power. The Founders of our system of government built this concept into virtually every aspect of our government’s structure.

“We have a magical unicorn hybrid system that isn’t replicated.”

— Corey Cook, working group member, on Oakland’s current charter16

Critics of Oakland’s odd governmental structure treat it as the root of Oakland’s troubles. But the city government’s political structure is just one branch of a much larger, far more complex tree of municipal dysfunction.

Four other causes of Oakland’s dysfunction were defined as off-limits from the panel’s scope from the start.

1. Voters overwhelmingly support term limits, and Oaklanders have voted to put them in place before.

Oakland’s council members face no enforced term limits — even though they are overwhelmingly popular, and Oakland voters have approved them before.

In November 2022, Measure X passed easily, limiting council service to no more than three terms. It then became tangled in a lawsuit focused on other aspects of the measure, and the status of term limits was left unresolved.17 18

Notably, SPUR, one of the working group facilitators, wrote the original case for those term limits, arguing they’d boost competition and curb the power of incumbency.19

A new political ‘reform’ process aimed at accountability might have included the accountability tool voters already chose — term limits. This process defined it out of consideration from the start.

2. Who actually runs the day-to-day operations of the city — and who’s that person’s boss.

In a ‘council-manager’ form of government, the city council hires and can fire the official who runs the city organization: the city manager, known in Oakland as the city administrator. Under a council-manager form of government, a poor-performing or corrupt administrator can be removed by a city council vote at any time.

Under a strong mayor system, the city administrator is accountable only to the mayor.

What if, for any number of reasons, the mayor prefers to keep a poor-performing or corrupt executive, accountable only to them? The only way out is the next election or a costly mayoral recall.20

Don’t miss a beat. Donate to support our nonprofit work.

Donate to Oakland Report

That’s the core trade-off, and it’s the lever that most increases day-to-day malefeasance.21

“A 2025 study using rigorous methods ‘finds robust evidence that the council-manager form reduces the risk of corruption.’”

— Afonso & Nelson, Public Administration Review22

Supporters of the mayor’s plan answer that clear authority makes wrongdoing easier to spot and pin down, and that their model still lets the council confirm the administrator and adds new oversight tools.23

That’s a fair point, but it’s a defense of a choice the panel made, not evidence that it studied the alternative fully — especially in light of Oakland’s very recent and concerning issues with mayoral corruption24 and city administrator performance.25

3. Oakland’s dysfunction is largely caused by ineffective city operations, poor service delivery, and failed leadership — not the political org chart

The operational failures Oakland residents see every day are much larger than a missing mayoral veto. They’re due in no small part to a famously dysfunctional city staff organization.

Despite an operating budget of over $2 billion per year, and some of the highest tax revenues per capita in the state among comparable cities, Oakland has run a structural deficit topping $100 million a year.26

The city’s latest budget cut more than 400 jobs, most already empty.27 As of late 2024, about one in four city jobs sat vacant.

“Staffing levels have not grown over the last 20 years.”

— SPUR, on Oakland’s workforce28

The city’s Human Resources department — the office that does the hiring — has itself run a vacancy rate near 45%, while workers leave faster than the city can replace them.29

This list of organizational issues goes on, far longer and deeper than the scope of this article.

Read this related article:

Not all of this dysfunction is caused by the shape of the city’s political org chart. The bulk of it is caused by endemic financial, hiring, and management issues — the day-to-day operations of which are primarily handled by city staff — throughout the Oakland city organization. And the working group’s own FAQ quietly admits the charter won’t fix it:

“Service improvements ‘require investment, capacity, and leadership beyond the charter.’”

— Charter reform working group FAQ

The working group that was given the goal to ‘strengthen financial management’ delivered a political power realignment focused on the mayor who appointed the group, then conceded that its recommended realignment won’t fix what residents complain about most.

4. A rarely-used election system that throws votes away

Oakland elects its mayor and council by ranked choice voting — a rare system that the vast majority of other cities, counties and states do not have, and which several have rejected outright.30

The ranked choice system drew criticism after 2022, when former mayor Sheng Thao — who trailed in the first voting round, was later recalled, and now faces a federal bribery trial on charges she denies31 — won after later automated voting rounds.

Read this related article:

Critics, led by 2022 candidate Loren Taylor, say the ranked choice voting system silences voters whose ballots get ‘exhausted’ and dropped before the final count.

“Ranked-choice voting ‘isn’t working,’ Taylor said, calling it a form of voter suppression.”

— Loren Taylor, as quoted in The Oaklandside, reporting Taylor’s 2022 concession32

Defenders counter that the ranked choice system lets voters who didn’t back a finalist still shape the result, and saves the cost of separate runoffs.

But most people appear to disagree. Only a handful of jurisdictions in the entire nation use ranked choice voting, though it has existed for decades.33

The gaps in the process

Look at the four things left out of the working group’s process: term limits, council control of the administrator, fiscal management, and ranked choice voting. Every one of these things would constrain incumbents or pull power away from a single office. Every one was placed outside the panel’s scope. The levers left inside all pointed the same direction.

Two more moves fit this pattern.

When a genuine middle-ground ‘third option’ surfaced, a hybrid of strong-mayor and council-manager, the working group and its backers characterized it as a confusing one-off — even though most speakers at a council rules committee meeting to review the proposal favored a professionally managed model, by the Oakland Charter Reform Project’s count.34

Read this related article:

The case for the working group strong-mayor recommendation leans on polling, including a survey run for SPUR, one of the working group’s facilitators.

Skeptical observers — ourselves included — would say that a process that uses opinion polls to confirm its recommendations isn’t empirically testing an idea. It’s building a campaign.

The case for the working group’s proposal

Honesty requires naming some of the strongest defenses of the working group’s recommendations.

The group did real work: dozens of interviews and more than 750 residents engaged across every council district. The process was run by two nominally nonpartisan groups, based on the mayor’s initial directions. Several independent polls show majority support for a strong mayor whose veto the council can override.35

Supporters also stress that their model isn’t a pure strong-mayor design — it keeps a council-confirmed administrator and adds subpoena power for the council and an independent budget analyst.

All true. But none of it answers the core problem with the working group and its recommendations: engaging 750 residents in a closed process, ungoverned by California’s and Oakland’s sunshine laws, doesn’t matter much if the questions allow only one narrow set of potential answers. The problem isn’t how hard the panel worked. It’s how and where the boundaries were drawn before the work began.

A leading question got a leading answer

The working group was hand-selected and convened by the Mayor, staffed by her office, working from goals she set, guided by facilitators who already favored a strong executive.

At the mayor’s initial direction, the group was then effectively guided away from fully considering term limits, council control of the administrator, fiscal mismanagement, and the voting system.

As a result, the working group wasn’t asked an open question to ‘reform’ Oakland’s government. It was asked a leading one. The working group answered in the way leading questions tend to do.

Oakland’s dysfunction is real, and the case for reform is strong. But voters deserve a process that asks what’s actually broken — not one designed to confirm the answer its sponsor appeared to want before the first meeting began.

WE ARE 100% SUPPORTED BY YOU

Oakland Report provides accurate, unflinching, data-driven reporting and analysis that you will find nowhere else. If you value our work, please donate. All contributions go directly to sustaining and growing our 501(c)(3) nonprofit work:

Donate to Oakland Report

Learn more

Oakland Recap provides summaries of public meeting proceedings that catch our attention. In this installment, we review the comments made by members of city union International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers (IFPTE) Local 21 at this morning’s city council special budget meeting.

‘I stood in a photo with you before I knocked doors for Measure E.’

City Council special budget meeting, June 1, 2026.1

This morning, representatives from Oakland public employee union IFPTE Local 21 demanded that the city deliver promised pay raises, abandon proposed benefit changes, fill vacant positions (around 25 percent of IFPTE-represented positions are vacant), and extend work-from-home policies.

The union members also demanded that the city convert sworn police positions to ‘civilianized’ roles that would be filled by IFPTE union members.

Over a series of comments, IFPTE union members reminded the city council of their union’s support for Measure E.

IFPTE has donated over $120,000 to the Yes on E campaign, and its members have assisted with campaign rallies and door-to-door canvassing efforts.

“Mayor Lee, council member Wang, council member Ramachandran, I stood in a photo with you before I knocked doors for Measure E on Saturday. Will you stand in actual solidarity with us now, with your workforce?

“To the other council members who have received support, endorsement from the city's unions, will you stand in solidarity with us? Your actions are what matter now.”

— Elliot Goodrich, city transportation engineer and IFPTE Local 21 member, June 1, 2026

“Labor organizations have worked really hard to help elect many of the people sitting around in this room.”

IFTPE union members also reminded the mayor and council members of the union’s past political support for their election campaigns.

“Many of you have described yourselves as labor-friendly leaders, and labor organizations have worked really hard to help elect many of the people sitting around in this room.

“We're asking you to demonstrate that commitment by standing with the workers who keep this city functioning every single day.

“I'm asking council to direct the city's bargaining team back to the table with a serious commitment to retaining workers and reaching a fair agreement.”

— Noel Pond-Danchik, transportation planner and IFPTE chapter membership director

“Whispers of the S-word: strike”

One of the union members issued a warning that the union is so disgruntled about the city’s negotiations over the upcoming union contract renewal, that there are “whispers” of a union strike.

“As of late last week, the city administration's bargaining team has requested that Oakland city workers not only receive no cost of living adjustment, as well as reduced health care, pension and other benefits.

“They have rejected our telework proposal, which is a no-cost proposal. At the very least, they should be able to accept something that's no cost.

“We were asked to work for less and with less. The administration has offered these takeaways to most bargaining units and people are so upset, all I've heard is whispers of the S-word, strike.

“This is not a threat.”

— Cody Meschinger, construction engineer and IFPTE chapter vice president, June 1, 2026

A video of the union members’ comments appears at the top of this article. A link to the full video of the city council special budget meeting is available in endnote 1.

1

City of Oakland. “FY 2026-27 Mayor’s Proposed Midcycle Budget.” City Council special budget meeting video, June 1, 2026. https://oakland.granicus.com/player/clip/7538

---

WE ARE 100% SUPPORTED BY YOU

Oakland Report provides accurate, unflinching, data-driven reporting and analysis that you will find nowhere else. If you value our work, please donate. All contributions go directly to sustaining and growing our 501(c)(3) nonprofit work:

Donate to Oakland Report

Learn more

EDITORS’ NOTE — MAY 30, 2026

This article about Oakland city council’s perusal of a ‘menu of taxes’ originally appeared in Oakland Report on Oct. 27, 2025.

We are republishing it today to give our readers a look back at Measure E’s origins as a city council-initiated tax measure — driven by the city’s desire to extract an additional $40 million per year from Oaklanders, and the council’s search for a tax ‘recipe’ that had ‘all the right ingredients to hit the spot and make the sale to the voter.’

As Oakland Report reported in the months that followed, the city council later appeared to ‘hand off’ the parcel tax measure to its public employee unions, who placed the measure on the ballot as a ‘citizen-sponsored’ initiative, thus reducing the voter approval threshold from the two-thirds required by state law for city-sponsored special taxes, to a simple majority.

This apparent ‘hand off’ is currently the subject of a lawsuit alleging that the City of Oakland used its largest public employee union, Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 1021, to ‘front’ what should have been a council-sponsored parcel tax — and buried the evidence by ignoring nearly every Public Records Act request.

Oakland Report and other outlets have since reported that public employee unions and their backers spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on paid signature-gatherers to qualify Measure E for the June 2 ballot — and have spent over $1 million to date on advertising and other campaign activities in support of the measure.

Our Oct. 27, 2025 article described the genesis of Measure E, in a city council committee, months before it coalesced into its current form.

We, the editors, are republishing this article today in order to provide relevant context and background information to help our readers understand how Measure E came to be, and why it took the form shown on the ballot.

— The editorial board

OAKLAND REPORT • OCTOBER 27, 2025
BY SEAN S. REINHART

‘Death and taxes’: Oakland City Council is the one who knocks

The city council finance committee spitballs ideas to extract an additional $40 million in taxes from its residents and businesses

Oakland has a lot of taxes. It is difficult for the average person to keep track of them all, much less to fully comprehend their true scope and purpose. Many line items on the tax bill are mysteriously labeled and require hardcore research to figure out what they are, like the one labeled simply, “City of Oakland 1.” (It’s the Pension Override Tax that Oaklanders have been paying since 1981.)

Oakland’s various property-related taxes currently add up to nearly 1.5% of a typical home’s value. That’s an $11,150 property tax bill each year for the median home1 in Oakland. And it’s far more than the 1% limit established2 by Proposition 13, owing to Oakland’s extensive use of parcel taxes and overrides.

Property taxes are not the only taxes that are remarkably high. Oakland’s sales tax was raised in April to 10.75%. Only one California city has a higher rate: Lancaster/Palmdale in Los Angeles County.3

Yet Oakland intends to ask voters to give even more. The city appears determined to raise another $40 million in taxes from residents and businesses. When city council passed the city’s fiscal year 2025-2027 budget last June, it added $40 million of hoped-for new tax increases to its budget to make ends meet. That is something akin to taking a second mortgage on your home, based on hoped-for income from a new job that you haven’t even applied for yet.

[Editors’ note: This deep dive on potential tax increases, a major topic on the Oakland City Council Finance & Management Committee meeting agenda for October 28, replaces our Agenda Watch column for this week.]

The Oakland tax mill

New tax measures appear on ballots in seemingly every election cycle these days, and voters often approve them. Yet Oakland’s streets and sidewalks continue to be clogged with trash, its police force continues to be woefully understaffed, and its political leaders’ financial decision-making continues to be most charitably described as questionable at best.

The government collects taxes in order to provide the services that most people agree the government should provide. This is a necessary arrangement that most reasonable people agree with, and a foundational aspect of government.

But when the government fails to provide a level and quality of service that is reasonably commensurate with the amount of taxes it collects, then what? When the ship of government is sinking into a financial abyss, its heavy ballast dragging it ever down into the deep, what should the government do to stay afloat? In Oakland, the answer routinely is to collect more taxes.

As more taxes are loaded on to save the sinking ship, the thinner the justifications for new taxes tend to become, and the farther from view the accumulated burdens tend to recede. Discussions about the many varieties of taxes often become problem-solving exercises on how to convince a majority of voters to tax themselves, or to tax somebody else, at the ballot box.

Virtually absent from such explorations, aside from the technicalities required for the tax measure to pass legal muster, are reflections on the long-term impacts and unintended consequences the tax may have. Rarely are questions asked as to how and why the city services came to be in such urgent need of salvation in the first place.

One may wonder, why are there so many different taxes in Oakland? What are all those taxes actually being spent on? And given the regrettable state of some of Oakland’s public services, why even bother paying taxes at all?

Oakland Report is taking a closer look at Oakland’s many taxes and the ballot measures behind them — what the taxes were originally for, how they came to pass, and how they are being used now.

As a first step, we’ll take a closer look below at the upcoming Oakland City Council Finance and Management Committee meeting on Oct. 28.

A menu of tax hikes for city council to peruse

As the agenda materials state, the finance committee will be reviewing an extensive menu of options to “raise an additional ongoing $40 million in general purpose fund revenues.” These options were assembled by the city administration in fulfillment of the budget directive for fiscal years 2025-2027.

As the city administration frames it, the task at hand is “to adopt or increase a tax effective July 1, 2026 to provide ongoing resources for public safety services and to maintain key equipment, IT systems, and 911 investments.” That reads very much like the question one would find on a ballot, which suggests that the city has already identified the essence of its sales pitch: to exploit residents’ concerns about public safety and the severe shortage of police officers.

Never mind that the city could use the new taxes to displace, rather than add to the funds previously committed to public safety. Never mind that the new taxes would not hold the city to any meaningful standard for efficiently and effectively using the funds.

Oakland already has taxes “to provide ongoing resources for public safety.” The most recent such tax, Measure NN, was passed by Oakland voters in November 2024. But as Oakland Report reported earlier this month, the tax was not a two-way deal. While taxpayers have an obligation to pay the tax, the city has a loophole that allows it to suspend its obligation to maintain the minimum 700 police officers promised in return. There are now fewer than 600 officers on duty, yet the city continues to collect and use the tax funds at its total discretion.

In that context, this Oct. 28 agenda item has two staff reports that suggest the committee is searching for just the right recipe to win votes at the ballot box.

The first report, dated Sept. 23 and previously reviewed by the committee on Sept. 30 provides a menu of all the taxes the city conceivably could try to increase. Included are explanations and calculations for each tax and brief analyses of the impacts to various constituencies, the likelihood of voter approval, and in some cases, the potential strength of public opposition.

The second “supplemental” report dated Oct. 16 is perhaps the more interesting of the two. It lists the questions council members had about the menu in the first report, and provides some analysis in response to each question. It provides insight into the council members’ and staff’s deeper thought processes.

A new lease on life — replacing the Pension Override Tax

The first council question in the report relates to the Pension Override Tax, which is set to end in 2026. The old retirement system into which Oaklanders have paid this tax since 1981 will be fully funded this year, leaving the city with an estimated $340 million surplus in its account balance. (The surplus is comprised of the existing $260 million balance plus approximately $80 million of additional taxes to be collected this year from the “City of Oakland 1” tax line.)

The idea is to replace the expiring tax with a new parcel tax that can be applied toward general city operations instead of paying down pension liabilities. Oakland Report made a similar suggestion one year ago.

The nature of the council’s question suggests they want to pitch the idea to voters as a tax reduction for some single-family homeowners, a group that can form an influential voting bloc under the right circumstances, even though the total amount of tax collected would be higher overall. Calculations in the report highlight proposed new $40 million, $50 million, and $60 million “parcel tax targets,” along with the percentages of Oakland’s single-family homeowners who would pay less.

This proposal is likely to get serious consideration by the committee and eventually the full city council for a few reasons.

• First, it has the potential to generate a lot of tax money for the city.

• Second, it has a connection to public safety, albeit a somewhat tenuous one with respect to the narrowly-defined purpose of the old levy which was for a police and firefighter pension fund.

• Third, the ballot measure could be sold to voters as simply replacing an expiring tax.

• Finally, the new tax could be sold as a tax decrease for a critically important bloc of voters, even though the total amount of tax collected would be much higher.

This rings many bells for the city, and it would not be surprising to see this recipe or something very similar to it on the ballot next June.

Squeeze play — increasing real estate transfer taxes

The second council question appears to be about figuring out just how much the city could increase the real estate transfer taxes collected from the more expensive properties without triggering a slowdown in property sales or catalyzing “politically challenging” voter sentiment against the measure.

The city collects a tax every time a property changes hands. The more expensive the property, the higher the tax rate the city collects. For example, the current rate on a $300,000 property sale is 1.00%. According to the Sept. 23 report, that rate is not proposed to increase. The current rate on a $725,000 property sale, the average home price in Oakland, is 1.50%. That rate is proposed to increase to 2.00%, which would result in a $3,625 tax increase on that average home sale to a total $14,500 in transfer tax.

The city estimates having collected $66 million in transfer tax last fiscal year. This appears about typical for recent years, but the amounts can vary wildly from year to year because they depend on the ever-shifting volume of sales in the real estate market. A single high-end property changing hands, for example the iconic Lakeside Drive office tower that Kaiser Permanente sold to PG&E earlier this year for $908 million, can generate a hefty amount of transfer tax. But sales like that don’t happen every year, or even every few years.

The current rate for property transfers valued above $10 million is 2.50%, which in the case of the Lakeside Drive office tower sale pencils out to a whopping $22.7 million in transfer tax. If the rate had been increased to 4.00% as proposed in the staff report, the transfer tax on that sale would have jumped to $36.3 million.

The city was aware of this volatility, thus it included in its Consolidated Fiscal Policy that the real estate transfer tax should be expected to fund no more than 15% of its General Purpose Fund. However, even that view seems now too rosy, with the current $66 million amounting to less than 10% of the General Purpose Fund budget.

Shock value — raising taxes on utilities

The third question is about increasing utility consumption taxes on natural gas while lowering them for electricity. The implication here appears to be that natural gas is bad and electricity is good, so maybe voters will go for raising taxes on the bad thing and lowering taxes on the good thing, if the net result is more tax money for the city.

However, this approach is likely to receive less enthusiasm because it is regressive — utility taxes disproportionately affect low- and middle-income households, and the staff report says that this particular maneuver would actually result in around $50,000 less tax collected overall.

Several other questions seem to center around the notion of taxing people or activities that the city judges to be bad or undesirable in various ways. These ideas include taxing Amazon deliveries, industrial emissions, diesel fuel, “above baseline” consumption of utilities, vapes and tobacco products, alcohol, and “luxury sales.” Apparently even the city’s popular centerpiece park is considered too much of a good thing, with one idea to charge “congestion pricing” around Lake Merritt.

The report provides analyses and data on each of these ideas and outlines various regulatory, political, or practical difficulties they would face. In one case the report-writer explains that the council member’s idea is flat out illegal per the state constitution.

Another idea in this category is to tax multi-dwelling residential properties (i.e. landlords) and commercial properties at higher rates than single-family homes. The implication appears to be that landlords and big businesses are bêtes noires in the eyes of many Oakland voters, which is good when trying to pass a measure that taxes those groups more. However, it doesn’t take a political savant to predict that those groups almost certainly would express strong and vocal public opposition on grounds that further burdening housing providers through higher taxes would work against the city’s housing supply goals and state mandates.

If enacted, this tax increase could collect more than the predetermined $40 million target. But as a special tax, it would need to get approval from two-thirds of Oakland voters, a high bar.

Use it or lose it — increasing vacant property taxes

A couple other ideas appear to possibly have some legs with the committee based on the way they are presented in the report, except for the fact that Oakland already has taxes with very similar mechanisms.

One is about collecting taxes on undeveloped land, and the other is about taxing long-vacant storefronts. The implications in both cases appear to be that the owners of these properties already have more than most people, and could be characterized as hoarding and wasting resources at a time of need for more housing and businesses.

The subtext here is that many voters are likely to be amenable to the notion that wasteful property owners should be taxed more, and the tax itself conveniently would not directly affect most voters. Seemingly absent from consideration is the full breadth of Oakland’s economic distress that contributes to these vacancies, including a city government that some consider neglectful and even punitive to business, in particular with respect to fundamental issues such as public safety and cleanliness.

Furthermore as noted above, Oakland already has a tax on vacant properties, implemented when voters passed Measure W in 2018, and it already includes taxes both on undeveloped land and on vacant storefronts.

On the undeveloped land tax increase idea, the staff report offers a few charts indicating that adding a separate tax targeting undeveloped parcels (instead of undeveloped “land”) could conceivably achieve the predetermined $40 million target. However, “it remains an untested tool within current property tax frameworks,” meaning that this distinction without a difference has never been tried before.

On the vacant storefront tax increase idea, the staff report notes that the current tax collects $3,000 per vacant unit, but curiously offers no total amount that the tax has collected citywide. It instead points to an ABC news story that says a similar tax in San Francisco has yielded only $5 million since 2022.

Death and hot dogs

All the technocratic discussion of tax percentages and regulatory requirements aside, the underlying questions before the finance and management committee on Oct. 28 remain:

• Which recipe has all the right ingredients to hit the spot and make the sale to the voter?

• Which of the potential taxes can achieve the predetermined financial target?

• How can the measure be framed in a way that avoids triggering stiff opposition from influential constituencies and interest groups?

• Who are the people or groups that can be taxed in sufficient measure to achieve the target, yet who most voters won’t overly sympathize with and who some voters perhaps might even relish the prospect of taxing more?

Oakland will sadly soon be losing two of its beloved old-school hot dog joints, Top Dog4 and Kasper’s Hot Dogs5, but one needs not travel further than Oakland City Hall to see the sausage being made. Just try not to look too closely at the ingredients.

Oakland Report is by no means comprehensive in our coverage of public meetings in Oakland. The scope and frequency of public meetings are far more than we can presently cover. You can review the full agendas of all six upcoming council committee meetings on the city council meeting calendar, or by following these links to specific committee meeting agendas:

• Finance and management committee, Oct. 28

• Public works and transportation committee, Oct. 28

• Community and economic development committee, Oct. 28

• Life enrichment committee, Oct. 28

• Public safety committee, Oct. 28

• Rules and legislation committee, Oct. 30

Do you have a tip about an Oakland agenda item that you think should get a closer look? We want to hear about it! Contact us at oaklandreport@citizensoakland.org.

WE ARE 100% SUPPORTED BY YOU

Oakland Report provides accurate, unflinching, data-driven reporting and analysis that you will find nowhere else. If you value our work, please donate. All contributions go directly to sustaining and growing our 501(c)(3) nonprofit work:

Donate to Oakland Report

Learn more

Video clip 1: “Oakland deserves better.” Supervisor Elisa Márquez calls developer Ray Bobbitt’s eleventh-hour proposal to avoid liability for environmental issues “unconscionable” ahead of the board rejecting his proposal. The board approved the term sheet as originally proposed. May 28, 2026. (Source: County of Alameda.)

Oakland Recap provides summaries of public meeting proceedings that catch our attention. In this installment, we review the Alameda County Board of Supervisors’ approval of a term sheet to buy back 50 percent interest in the Oakland Coliseum Complex from the Athletics baseball franchise, then sell it to developer Ray Bobbitt’s company, African-American Sports Entertainment Group.

“Oakland deserves better… People are going to make billions of dollars off this transaction, and… we know that there’s a liability. We’re going to say, that’s okay, you don’t have to even give us a penny for it? It’s unconscionable.”

— Supervisor Elisa Márquez, moving to adopt the term sheet without the developer’s requested carve out to remove environmental liability for an unnamed Oakland Arena buyer.

Developer Ray Bobbitt, in a last-minute change, sought to avoid liability for environmental contamination at the Oakland Arena

Yesterday the Alameda County Board of Supervisors unanimously voted to accept a non-binding term sheet that lays out a deal for the county to buy back a 50 percent interest in the Oakland Coliseum complex from the Athletics (A’s), then sell it to developer Ray Bobbitt’s company, African-American Sports Entertainment Group (AASEG).1

Under the proposed term sheet, the county would pay $115 million in cash to the A’s affiliate that bought the county’s stake in 2019. The county would then be repaid the same $115 million by the developer, AASEG, through its affiliate over five to seven years at 5% compounding interest.2

The developer would then sell the indoor Oakland Arena (not the outdoor Coliseum stadium or the surrounding parking lots) to an unidentified third-party buyer for at least $100 million. Recent news reports say that the buyer is the Oak View Group.3

AASEG is also under a separate contract to buy the City of Oakland’s 50 percent interest in the Coliseum Complex.

AASEG has missed or delayed nearly every major payment owed to the city since the city’s deal was signed in 2024.4

During the staff presentation at the outset of the meeting, supervisors David Haubert and Nate Miley seemed inclined to consider Bobbitt’s proposals to shield the Oakland Arena from liability for potentially expensive environmental cleanup at the site. (Later in the meeting, they appeared to change course.)

Per the county term sheet approved by the board, AASEG is not required to provide collateral or a certificate of credit for the transaction. AASEG would be required to maintain only $30 million in enterprise value during the entire repayment period. The county would convey its interest “as is,” with AASEG waiving the right to sue the county over environmental or other property conditions.

State cleanup records show that soil and groundwater at the Coliseum site are contaminated with industrial solvents at concentrations exceeding human health risk thresholds and requiring hotspot excavation, in-situ groundwater treatment, an asphalt cap, and a recorded land-use covenant.5678

No public dollar estimate for cleaning up the full 112-acre complex has been released, but the liability is consequential enough — potentially tens of millions of dollars or more — that the county’s sale to AASEG would be conditioned on the developer releasing the county from “any costs related to hazardous waste and environmental remediation.”

Video clip 2. Developer Ray Bobbitt defends his proposal to avoid environmental liability by stating, “We have people that I was in middle school with that are living in tents and feces with no running water, with no electricity. We drive through East Oakland and we should all be ashamed of ourselves.” May 28, 2026. (Source: County of Alameda)

Developer Ray Bobbitt evokes ‘people… living in tents and feces’ in a bid to avoid liability for environmental issues for the unnamed Oakland Arena buyer

Supervisor Elisa Márquez objected to Bobbitt’s proposal, calling it “unconscionable” and stating that “People are going to make billions of dollars off this transaction, and we know that there’s a liability. We’re going to say, that’s okay, you don’t have to even give us a penny for it?”

(A video of Márquez’s remarks is at the top of this article.)

Márquez then scolded supervisor Haubert for calling Bobbitt back up to speak for a third time to respond, in excess of the time limits given to other speakers.

“You’re like, showing all our cards and we’re at a huge disadvantage by this process, and you’re making it worse”

– Supervisor Elisa Márquez to supervisor David Haubert, May 28, 2026

In response, Bobbitt noted that the project has broad support from influential members of the community, and also evoked “people… living in tents and feces” in East Oakland.

“I do want to just clarify for the record, this is a community-driven process and at the end of the day, we have people that I was in middle school with that are living in tents and feces with no running water, with no electricity. We drive through East Oakland and we should all be ashamed of ourselves. So there’s nothing more urgent than this process for me personally, as a person who was a visionary, to come through this, and for a person who was born and raised here and wants to see impact.”

— Developer Ray Bobbitt, defending his last-minute proposal to shield the Oakland Arena from liability for environmental cleanup, May 28, 2026

Video clip 3. Supervisor Nate Miley offers a ‘teachable moment,’ stating, “We’ve lost three teams... Why? Failure of leadership and poor decisions. That’s why we’ve lost three teams.” May 28, 2026. (Source: County of Alameda)

Supervisor Nate Miley blames the city of Oakland for ‘failed leadership’ and becomes emotional as he offers a ‘teachable moment’

Supervisor Miley appeared to become frustrated and emotional in his comments, emphasizing his long association with the Coliseum site going back to his days as an Oakland city council member in the 1990s and during his 26-year tenure on the board of supervisors.

Miley blamed an unnamed former Oakland mayor for losing Oakland’s major sports teams and entangling the Coliseum Complex in a complicated ownership structure.

“We’ve lost three teams... Why? Failure of leadership and poor decisions. That’s why we’ve lost three teams. I was on the city council when we brought back the Oakland [Raiders]. Henry Gardner was the city manager when we negotiated that deal…

“We’d still have the Oakland A’s here, but for a former mayor, and I’m not going to use the mayor’s name, fired the Black city manager, Robert Bobb, who wanted to build a downtown stadium for the Oakland A’s. Had that happened, we would have had the Oakland A’s playing downtown right now. Had that happened, the Raiders would still probably be playing at the Coliseum right now.

“This county... I’ve dealt with mayors... this county offered to sell our interest to the city so that it could be under one uniform ownership. No, the city didn’t take our deal. We’ve offered to buy the city’s interest. No, the city didn’t take our deal to put the property under one one ownership. It didn’t happen.”

– Supervisor Nate Miley, May 28, 2026

Miley also noted his long association with Ray Bobbitt and his family over the years.

“We are here now with a developing team, an owner... potential ownership team that’s primarily African-American, that’s got the resources to make this happen. That would be extremely beneficial for East Oakland, the city of Oakland and the entire county and region.

“That’s why I stand behind this term sheet… I’ve often said, let’s not, let’s not let perfect be the enemy of the good. And this is not perfect, but it is good…

“And I know, I know Ray Bobbitt. I’ve worked with Ray and his family over the years. I know many of you. I’ve worked with many of you over the years, so, but I’m not representing [AASEG]. I’m representing the county, and I’m obligated to represent the county.”

– Supervisor Nate Miley, May 28, 2026

Don’t miss a beat. Donate to support our nonprofit work.

Donate to Oakland Report

A who’s-who of public speakers

Board president Haubert allowed three public speakers extra time to address the board, beyond the one-minute time limit established for other speakers:

• Oakland city council member Ken Houston

• Developer Ray Bobbitt

• Former Oakland city manager Henry Gardner.

Other public speakers included trade labor representatives, business operators, and some community groups — all supportive of the proposal, of AASEG and of Ray Bobbitt personally.

During the comments, Bobbitt looked on from the front row, seated next to the speaker’s podium.

A transcript and video of the board discussion is below.

Read this related article:

Transcript

DEVELOPER RAY BOBBITT:

So first of all, I want to apologize to this board.

Tuesday, when we didn’t vote, I was just really frustrated. And I was... because we... it’s so... it’s just... it’s heartfelt that people from this community will react this quickly. Like, in 48 hours, we had almost 100 people here, just in 48 hours.

And then today, the same people take time off work, come and be here, so I didn’t... I just want to tell you, you guys have worked tremendously. This board has worked tremendously. The staff has worked tremendously. We appreciate you.

And so I just wanted to first of all, you know, apologize.

But secondly, thank you for the work and the time that you’ve put in. This is really important to our community.

I’ve said it all before, but we just want to say how grateful we are to be at this position, and we can change history and change... and move into a new chapter of this site. So thank you very much.

SUPERVISOR DAVID HAUBERT:

[Calling Bobbitt back to the public speaker’s podium.] Mr. Bobbitt.

Thank you for your public comments. I have to ask you: there could be competing opportunities. We’ve discussed them.

One, the term sheet that’s on the agenda posted excludes the carve out [to exclude the Arena buyer from environmental liability]. The request that we received from your team last night and reaffirmed even this morning includes the carve out.

If this board takes action on the terms that have been agendized and published, excluding the carve out, and instead, as I think I heard mentioned, discuss the carve out, or discuss the handling of the environmental risks and responsibilities for a later time, puts that off to discussions with the Arena buyer and our staff…

Would you... what does that do to the deal?

RAY BOBBITT:

Well, well, the reason why there’s a carve out is because we understand how critical the Arena is.

It is like if you bought a strip mall. You would have to want an anchor.

And if you go into the strip mall and you have a Safeway there, you’re really in a strong position. You know, you could have Mailbox Etc., Panera Bread, but if you have a Safeway and a Starbucks, you’re in really good position with respect to an anchor.

The Arena represents an anchor of the site. The Arena represents the ability to upgrade and be competitive, and potentially fight off competition from Chase Center, which is brand new.

It’s an opportunity for upgrades. It’s an opportunity to really set the tone with respect to bringing in that situation.

This Arena — there was this SFGate article the other day that said it’s become a pop culture mecca, and it’s excellent. And the opportunity to enhance that and expand that is critical to the overall process.

So obviously, one of the reasons why that was submitted is because we don’t want to be in a position where we lose momentum, to create an anchor, and to make sure our anchor is strengthened.

DAVID HAUBERT:

Is there a risk then to the anchor, if we refuse what you requested, the carve out, and instead approve the terms without the carve out? Is there a risk to the Arena deal?

RAY BOBBITT:

Well, we... we have, as you know, we’re communicating with multiple entities. And, but it does create more complication because, as you know, the environmental impact of the site — if it was a carve out for just the Arena.

I think you said it’s eight acres. The entire site is 112 acres. So the 112 acres, minus eight.

So the under 104 acres would not be subjected to this carve out, would not be subjected. So the other 104 acres would have the same impact and the same process that we’ve sort of surrendered through, where the previous disposition agreement, the county was fully responsible.

DAVID HAUBERT:

So is there risk to the Arena deal or not?

And related to that, is there a time consideration? Is it expected to delay things?

RAY BOBBITT:

I think it’s a time consideration more than anything because we’ve been doing this, as you know, for five years, but because we’re from here, we’re never going to walk away.

I mean, we’re, we are from here. And so this is our soil. And so we’ve used perseverance, patience and persistence to be here.

But it’s been a long time. And as I started with, it was frustrating to know that we weren’t voting Tuesday.

But every second, every day that clicks off, we have some very tight timelines. It would be very helpful if that was to happen today because it, you know, I can’t say with certainty, but I could say it definitely would potentially create timing risks with respect to our project.

DAVID HAUBERT:

That’s what I’m trying to ascertain.

RAY BOBBITT:

Yes.

DAVID HAUBERT:

Thank you. Next speaker.

OAKLAND CITY COUNCIL MEMBER KEN HOUSTON:

Good morning. Supervisor Márquez, Supervisor Haubert, Bas, and my fearless leader, Supervisor Nate Miley.

Ken Houston, son of Oakland. I’m standing here in a real complicated position. Not only that, I am a born and raised third generation — like my brother Jesse and I played in those fields [before the Coliseum was built].

I sit on the JPA [the Coliseum Joint Powers Agreement between the city and county].

I’m a community advocate. I’m a long life resident, third generation, and now I am one of the council members. I represent this district and I represent the Hegenberger corridor, which I want to turn into a world class destination.

I have an electoral obligation, it’s very, very complicated, just like yours is, to represent the best interests… [timer runs out]. And I want to see if I have the privilege here of speaking long to have the privilege, president.

DAVID HAUBERT:

I’m sorry, I can’t. The point is, and our county council has already told us, if I let one go along, I gotta let all go long.

KEN HOUSTON:

Do they do the same thing that I do?

DAVID HAUBERT:

I guess? Yeah. I would ask... [looks over to county counsel Andrea Weddle].

No, no, no we don’t. Yeah, we don’t do that either.

But, but I do want to say, since I’m interested to hear what else you have to say, I would invite you to continue.

I’m not granting you extra time. I’m asking you what else you have to say.

KEN HOUSTON:

Yes, thank you.

This project for East Oakland and for the Hegenberger corridor is unimaginable. My district 7 has been underserved for generations. Right? And this will bring vitality.

However, at the same time, it has to make sense for the city and the county and for the people of Oakland.

And, like I said on the JPA, and I spoke to [former Oakland city manager] Henry Gardner this morning, and I’m the one that put his name on there [the speaker’s list], because he had said something about, that it put the JPA in jeopardy.

I sit on the JPA, I really didn’t understand what he was saying. Right? And he’s one of the people I listen to.

I have an electoral obligation, supervisors, to do the right thing for my constituents, to do right thing for my community and do the right thing for this development. So I want this to move forward.

However, it has to be in the best interests of the city and the county, and this has to be... it’s very complicated. I did not know this was that complicated. Right?

So, they’ve been here for five years working it. It has to make sense and it has to go together. That’s what I’m saying. It has to, because it’s coming to us. Thank you.

DAVID HAUBERT:

Thank you. That’s awesome.

[...]

FORMER OAKLAND CITY MANAGER HENRY GARDNER:

Honorable president and members of the board. I thought I heard a variation of my name called as a speaker.

For the record, I did not sign up to speak.

I had no intentions of speaking. But since my name has been mentioned and my comments mischaracterized, I want the record to show that what I said and what I continue to say is this is an enormously complicated transaction.

I have been around, as some of you know, for more than a few years, and the only thing that comes close in complexity is the sale and leaseback of Oakland City Hall.

I have no comments on the term sheet. I will share those with the staff. I do have some concerns, but since I’ve been asked to make a comment, I do have a recommendation. [Timer runs out.]

DAVID HAUBERT:

Since your time is up, I would respectfully ask for you to make that recommendation.

HENRY GARDNER:

I recommend that the board make a wise decision. Thank you.

DAVID HAUBERT:

Thank you, Mr. Gardner.

RAY BOBBITT:

I just wanted to reinforce that as I was speaking, my phone was going off and the... our board was saying that it would... a delay of the carve out would absolutely impact our situation tremendously.

DAVID HAUBERT:

Thank you. There are no more speakers. No more speakers. Okay, so, bring it back for deliberation and discussion.

SUPERVISOR ELISA MÁRQUEZ:

I’m ready to make a motion.

DAVID HAUBERT:

Yeah. Well, if you make a motion, we can have a substitute motion also. So, um, I... go ahead and make the motion. We’ll discuss it.

ELISA MÁRQUEZ:

So I move that we adopt the non-binding term sheet as is because this continues the conversation.

My goal is to get the best deal possible for our community. Quite frankly, I’m offended that we want to be short sighted on health and safety.

Oakland and the entire region deserves better. We could do better.

People are going to make billions of dollars off this transaction, and the fact that we’re going to... we know that there’s a liability, we’re going to say, that’s okay, you don’t have to even give us a penny for it? It’s unconscionable.

NATE MILEY:

I’d like to second the motion and speak to it when it’s appropriate.

DAVID HAUBERT:

Very good.

The motion is to accept the terms as presented, excluding the carve out and as presented, which excludes the... excludes the requested carve out, noting that it’s a non-binding term sheet and terms can always be discussed going forward.

It’s been pointed out that that could affect the deal timing, which we’ve been at this for nine years. But what’s a little more time? And it has been pointed out that that may risk the deal.

And that said, if there’s nothing else to say, from OAC [Oakland Acquisition Company / Ray Bobbitt], you’ve said what you’ve said.

I just wanted to make clear we’re about to vote on the terms as published without a carve out. I could make another motion to accept a substitute motion or another motion rather to accept the terms that OAC has requested, which includes the carve out. If we vote for that one.

Again, it’s a non-binding term sheet, and terms can continue to be changed since it’s non-binding. But I just don’t know that, that that’s going to get us anywhere. So I think we’re going to end up just voting on the motion that’s been made. But I invite OAC to make more comments on this particular topic, and then supervisor...

[Inaudible comments from Supervisor Márquez]

I believe that if I have questions of a member of the public that’s making comment that I can ask those questions, is that not correct?

INTERIM COUNTY COUNSEL ANDREA WEDDLE:

You may, but you cannot invite them to speak again, because they have already spoken twice.

DAVID HAUBERT:

I’m just going to ask, well, I’ve asked him to come and explain the implications of this vote on their deal.

[Inaudible comments from Supervisor Márquez]

I, I’m not sure what you’re trying to say to me, Supervisor Márquez. It’s my right to ask him again. Maybe he’s got more information…

ELISA MÁRQUEZ:

You’re like, showing all our cards and we’re at a huge disadvantage by this process, and you’re making it worse.

DAVID HAUBERT:

I disagree.

RAY BOBBITT:

I won’t say anything more than was already said.

I do want to just clarify for the record, this is a community driven process and at the end of the day, we have people that I was in middle school with that are living in tents and feces with no running water, with no electricity.

We drive through East Oakland and we should all be ashamed of ourselves. So there’s nothing more urgent than this process for me personally, as a person who was a visionary, to come through this, and for a person who was born and raised here and wants to see impact.

So all I’m saying is, I won’t comment anymore. I just wanted to make sure that the comments that are made with respect to our process are clear, and that’s, I just wanted to say that.

DAVID HAUBERT:

Okay. Thank you. Supervisor Miley, you wanted to make some comments before we vote?

SUPERVISOR NATE MILEY:

Yes, on the motion.

First of all, you know, I’ve been very clear, what the board does has to be legally sound.

It has to pass the smell test. It has to pass all scrutiny, and we have to negotiate as fiduciaries of the county.

I don’t represent OAC. I don’t represent the city. I represent Alameda County. And that’s my obligation.

It has to pass the smell test. And if it doesn’t, then we will be responsible for carrying that burden.

I think the motion is a strong motion because it doesn’t preclude further negotiation. It’s a non-binding... it’s not a binding term sheet. It’s non-binding. It doesn’t preclude negotiation.

We still know there’s issues around the environmental. That’s the big bugaboo based on, I think, the terms. That’s got to be reconciled. The county has had no conversations with the city about this, no conversations with the Arena buyer about this. And the county is still in the position of being part owner of the facility.

So, and, you know, we’ve sold our interest, but it’s subject to all these other terms being met, before we can turn over the deed to CWP [Coliseum Way Partners] or the Oakland A’s.

So I think sticking with the terms that we’ve come up with puts the county in the best prudent position to continue any negotiations with the city, OAC, and the Arena buyer.

Now, let me use this as a teachable moment.

Someone who’s been on the city council, 1990, someone who’s been a board county supervisor, 2000 to present. Let me use this as a teachable moment.

We’ve lost three teams. No one contemplated losing three teams. We’ve lost three teams. Why? Failure of leadership and poor decisions. That’s why we’ve lost three teams.

I was on the city council when we brought back the Oakland A’s [Raiders]. Henry Gardner was the city manager when we negotiated that deal, we would still have, excuse me, the Raiders, we brought the Raiders back.

We’d still have the Oakland A’s here, but for a former mayor, and I’m not going to use the mayor’s name, fire the Black city manager, Robert Bobb, who wanted to build a downtown stadium for the Oakland A’s. Had that happened, we would have had the Oakland A’s playing downtown right now. Had that happened, the Raiders would still probably be playing at the Coliseum right now.

But all that’s water under the bridge.

This county... I’ve dealt with mayors... this county offered to sell our interest to the city so that it could be under one uniform ownership. No, the city didn’t take our deal.

We’ve offered to buy the city’s interest. No, the city didn’t take our deal to put the property under one one ownership. It didn’t happen.

We are here now with a developing team, an owner... potential ownership team that’s primarily African-American, that’s got the resources to make this happen. That would be extremely beneficial for East Oakland, the city of Oakland and the entire county and region. That’s why I stand behind this term sheet.

I tried to point out, when I went through various aspects of the term sheet, why I thought this was a good, nonbinding term sheet for us to have. I’ve often said, let’s not, let’s not let perfect be the enemy of the good. And this is not perfect, but it is good.

It’s good because we get rid of the lawsuit. It’s good because the county, I hope, ultimately ends up with more money. When we do $115 [million] and we get $115 [million] back over the course of time.

It’s good because an African-American team takes ownership of the property and they’ve got a lot of potential in terms of what they want to do with the property in the future. That benefits East Oakland and the city of Oakland and everyone else. It gets the county out of the damn sports business so we can concentrate on safety net services.

Márquez, Supervisor Márquez asked how many hours have gone into this? County Counsel went back to 2017. Trust me, I, um... If you want, I can go back to the time I was on the city council. Talk about hours? Talk about frustration? Oh, don’t get me started. Don’t get me started.

So I’m using this as a teachable moment for all of you. That this is... everyone’s comments mentioned, this has been very complicated and I want to see this happen, but it’s got to happen the right way.

I don’t think OAC can walk away from this if we do a non-binding term sheet today. It still allows us further opportunity to negotiate around the environmental.

So, sorry to get a little emotional about this, but hey, I’ve lived this since 1990, let’s say, but easily since 2000.

And I know, I know Ray Bobbitt. I’ve worked with Ray and his family over the years. I know many of you. I’ve worked with many of you over the years, so, but I’m not representing OAC. I’m representing the county, and I’m obligated to represent the county.

DAVID HAUBERT:

Supervisor, thank you for that.

I’m also supportive of this motion, knowing that indeed continued discussions will have happened.

What I have a problem with is it will simply delay things. I don’t know what will change, if anything, but I am hopeful that a resolution can be made.

I think a few phone calls back and forth might be able to resolve this.

I hope that it’s done expeditiously because, as you’ve said, we have many more steps to go through.

As we’ve heard the community say, we have a ton of... this has taken a long time and people are suffering and need to see this move forward. So let’s get this done.

If we take this action today, there will be still more discussions that have to happen. But we’re making progress.

I would say I agree with you: don’t let good be the enemy of perfect or perfect be the enemy of good. I think that the proposal they made is also good, but maybe it can get better. It’ll just take more time.

So with that said, I’m supportive.

I think Supervisor Bas, you want to make a comment. Supervisor Tam, you can chime in if you want. I know you came late, but you can chime in too. Supervisor Bas.

SUPERVISOR NIKKI FORTUNATO BAS:

Thank you, President Haubert.

I just want to let the community know where I stand. I shared some of this on Tuesday. But I think it’s important to understand who are the community’s best partners, who has our interests at heart.

And I have to say, from my experience here and in the city, you know, it is... it’s it’s, it’s clear who does real community engagement and who builds the relationships and trust.

Back in 2021, the city went through a process while I was there to award the exclusive negotiating agreement for the Coliseum Complex to AASEG [African-American Sports Entertainment Group / Ray Bobbitt] because of its commitment to community engagement.

And I think you all have done incredible community engagement, built relationships, and made some commitments as well. And I, I hope that will continue and that will follow through with...

I completely agree with what people said about the importance of economically revitalizing East Oakland and by extension, Oakland and Alameda County, that the vision that has been put forward creates incredible opportunity and hope.

I think having an active, competitive partner running the Arena could be game changing for us. And we stand to gain in terms of more jobs, more opportunity, more entertainment, and a larger tax base. And all of that will improve community safety. So there’s definitely a lot to be gained.

I do want to, also say, somewhat in line with my colleague’s comments, Supervisor Miley, that we do have to make the best decision possible safeguarding our assets as county supervisors.

We are going to have a budget presentation shortly. And for those of you who don’t know, we are working to close a $91 million deficit.

We are also, myself and Supervisor Miley, we’re meeting very actively with Alameda Health Systems, our public hospital system, to address their projected $100 million deficit.

We are dealing with residents who are losing their health care, residents who are losing their food assistance, people who have severe mental illnesses, who are justice involved, who are running out of resources.

The list really does go on in terms of how we need to ensure that we have the resources and we limit our liability, to protect our resources, to continue to be a strong safety net. If we are not that safety net to our residents, what you see in East Oakland is only going to get worse.

And so for me personally, I am trying to balance the real opportunity that I believe in, with safeguarding our resources and knowing that under this current federal administration, so much is under attack.

And I want to make sure that people don’t lose those basic rights to health care, food, housing, etc. So this is a huge decision. And we’re trying to balance a lot of interests here, and I’m glad that people are coming to understand that. Thank you.

DAVID HAUBERT:

Supervisor Tam. Anything to add?

SUPERVISOR LENA TAM:

I’m going to ditto what Supervisor Miley and Supervisor Fortunato Bas just said.

DAVID HAUBERT:

Okay, very good. With that said, a motion has been made and seconded.

Roll call vote, please.

COUNTY CLERK:

Supervisor Márquez? (Aye.)

Supervisor Tam? (Aye.)

Supervisor Miley? (Aye.)

Supervisor Fortunato Bas? (Aye.)

President Haubert?

DAVID HAUBERT:

I vote yes. With that the motion passes. We’ve, uh, concluded that meeting.

Before we end the meeting, I would just like to say that, we’re left now with our negotiating team, Supervisor Miley and I being an observer to that, working expeditiously with OAC to, um, progress.

Is that correct? Do we have a timeline for that?

ANDREA WEDDLE:

Well, the document that you just approved, projects a closing by June 30th.

DAVID HAUBERT:

Okay, good. Good luck. Good luck, everybody.

With that the meeting is over, and I’ll let that room clear out for five minutes, while we start our next meeting.

[END]

WE ARE 100% SUPPORTED BY YOU

Oakland Report provides accurate, unflinching, data-driven reporting and analysis that you will find nowhere else. If you value our work, please donate. All contributions go directly to sustaining and growing our 501(c)(3) nonprofit work:

Donate to Oakland Report

Learn more

Video clip 1: Supervisor Nate Miley expressing that it is in the county’s best interest to, “get out of the sports business… in a responsible way” on Dec. 23, 2019. (Source: County of Alameda)

Oakland Agenda Watch provides short summaries of key items on upcoming public meeting agendas that catch our attention.

BY SENECA SCOTT

County is back in the sports arena business, apparently to save the faltering Oakland Coliseum deal

Alameda County board of supervisors special meeting, May 28, 2026.1

“None of us were here when the decision was made with the city and the county to jointly have that property and have sports out there. That decision was made more than 50 years ago. Now we’re at this juncture in time, and we think it’s in the best interest of the county to get out of the sports business and get out of it in a responsible way.”

— Supervisor Nate Miley, voting to sell Alameda County’s 50 percent stake in the Oakland Coliseum Complex to the Oakland A’s for $85 million in 2019.2

In December 2019, the Alameda County board of supervisors voted unanimously to sell the county’s 50 percent stake in the Coliseum to the A’s affiliate Coliseum Way Partners for $85 million.

At the time, supervisors framed the deal as a chance to “get out of the sports business” and refocus on core services such as health, housing, and human services.3

On May 28 (today), the board of supervisors will vote on a term sheet that lays out a structure for buying back the county’s 50 percent interest in the Oakland Coliseum complex from the Athletics (A’s) baseball franchise, then selling it to a firm led by developer Ray Bobbitt.4

• Under the proposed structure, the county would pay $115 million in cash to Coliseum Way Partners (CWP) — the A’s affiliate that bought the county’s stake in 2019.

• The county would then be repaid $115 million by the developer, Oakland Acquisition Company (OAC), over five to seven years at 5% compounding interest.

• OAC is the affiliate of the African American Sports and Entertainment Group (AASEG), led by developer Ray Bobbitt.

• Bobbitt’s AASEG is also under contract to buy the City of Oakland’s 50 percent interest in the Oakland Coliseum.

• AASEG has missed or delayed nearly every major payment owed to the city since the city’s deal was signed in 2024.

• The city’s reliance on AASEG payments to plug a budget hole — before the cash was in hand — under former Mayor Sheng Thao forced Oakland into a “contingency budget” with cuts to police, fire, and other services after the developer failed to pay on time.

• Per the new term sheet, Bobbitt’s OAC is required to maintain only $30 million in enterprise value during the entire repayment period. The county would convey its interest “as is,” with OAC waiving the right to sue the county over environmental or other property conditions.

• A sale of the Oakland Arena (the indoor arena next to the outdoor Coliseum) to an unnamed third-party buyer for at least $100 million is a condition of closing.

• According to news reports, that buyer is Oak View Group — see below.

The county has held closed-session discussions on this latest iteration of the Oakland Coliseum deal for more than a year without issuing public statements.

Notably, on May 27, the San Francisco Chronicle reported that Oak View Group — co-founded by concert promoter Irving Azoff and owned by private equity firm Silver Lake — is in talks to buy the Arena.5

The first detailed public account of the new term sheet appeared in news coverage on the eve of the board of supervisors’ vote, one day after a celebratory feature about the Oakland Arena’s concert lineup published in SFGate, a sister publication of the Chronicle.6

Flashback: How the county got out of the Oakland Coliseum deal — and why it’s getting back in

To understand today’s vote, it helps to go back to Dec. 23, 2019, when the Alameda County board of supervisors voted unanimously to sell the county’s 50 percent stake in the Oakland Coliseum Complex to Coliseum Way Partners, an affiliate of the Oakland A’s, for $85 million.

At the time, supervisors cast the sale as a responsible exit from a business the county no longer wanted to be in.

“None of us were here when the decision was made with the city and the county to jointly have that property and have sports out there,” supervisor Nate Miley said.

“That decision was made more than 50 years ago. Now we’re at this juncture in time, and we think it’s in the best interest of the county to get out of the sports business and get out of it in a responsible way.”

Miley argued the deal would let the county retire its bond debt on the property and still have proceeds left over “that can be utilized for other services.”

Don’t miss a beat. Donate to support our nonprofit work.

Donate to Oakland Report

An economic analysis by Economic & Planning Systems put the county’s half of the complex at roughly $82 million, meaning that the $85 million price came in about $3 million above appraised value.

Additionally, the sale was projected to convert tax-exempt public land into taxable private property, thus increasing property tax revenue to the county.

Supervisor Wilma Chan called the sale “a gift to the residents of Alameda County and Oakland,” adding: “We don’t really want to be in the sports business. We have so many other things that we have to cover — housing, homeless, mental health and food.”

Supervisor Scott Haggerty emphasized that the county would save roughly $5 million a year in operating costs it had been absorbing.

Read this related article:

Under the 2019 agreement, CWP (the A’s) was to pay the $85 million to the county in cash installments through January 2026, take over the county’s share of operating costs, and receive the deed once bond conditions were met — a timeline that had the county fully exiting its ownership in 2026.

That deadline is almost exactly when the county now proposes to buy the stake back.

Rather than completing its exit now, the county is proposing to pay the A’s $115 million — $30 million more than it received in 2019 — to reacquire the same interest and then resell it to Ray Bobbitt’s AASEG/OAC.

Background: How the city’s deal with Ray Bobbitt’s AASEG fell apart

To understand why the county is now considering paying $115 million to essentially buy back the property interest it sold in 2019 for $85 million, it helps to understand what happened on the city’s side of the same deal.

In May 2024, Oakland mayor Sheng Thao announced a plan to sell the city’s 50 percent interest in the Oakland Coliseum Complex (which includes the Oakland Arena) to Ray Bobbitt’s AASEG for $105 million.

Thao’s announcement came after city staff had warned that Oakland was facing roughly $360 million in cumulative deficits and was preparing substantial budget cuts — including the closure of four fire stations and shrinking the police force into the low 600s.7

On July 2, 2024, Oakland city council approved Thao’s budget proposal on a 5-3 vote. The budget irresponsibly assumed the city would receive $63 million from the not-yet-signed Coliseum sale.

Council members Janani Ramachandran, Noel Gallo, and Treva Reid voted no. The city’s own financial advisor warned that tying the budget to the sale could have “catastrophic” consequences if it failed.8

The city council formally approved the sale ordinance on June 26, 2024, authorizing the city administrator to negotiate and execute a Purchase and Sale Agreement with AASEG for the city’s 50 percent interest at $105 million, payable in installments.

What followed was a series of missed and renegotiated payments:

September 1, 2024 — A scheduled $15 million payment did not arrive. Bobbitt’s AASEG had paid only the initial $5 million non-refundable deposit at the August 31 signing. Council members Ramachandran, Gallo, and Reid demanded that the city’s “contingency budget” — a backup plan that would cut $48 million across departments — be triggered immediately.

October 7, 2024 — In response to the criticism, Thao announced an amended agreement that raised the total price from $110 million to $125 million but pushed $95 million of the payments out to May 30, 2025. The amendment was billed as a “win-win” by the mayor’s office. Three council members called for greater transparency about the schedule’s impact on the city’s budget.

November 2024 — A post-election payment was missed. The contingency budget went into effect. By December, the city council had approved cuts including reducing police overtime by $25 million, temporarily closing two fire stations, and cutting arts programs and social services.

April 14, 2025 — The city council voted to push closing of the Coliseum sale to align with the county’s process, with the new closing deadline set at June 30, 2026. Then-interim mayor Kevin Jenkins told the council the Coliseum was “absolutely divorced from the budget process.”

December 31, 2025 — More than 16 months after signing the original Purchase and Sale Agreement, Bobbitt’s AASEG/OAC had still paid only the initial $5 million non-refundable deposit, according to The Mercury News.9

The pattern of missed payments under the city’s contract is notable context for the county’s proposed new deal.

Rather than waiting any longer for Bobbitt’s AASEG/OAC to come up with $115 million in cash to buy CWP’s (the A’s) interest, the county is proposing to pay CWP itself — and then accept a five-to-seven-year IOU from AASEG/OAC at 5%, secured only by a $30 million enterprise-value covenant.

A favorable press rollout, on the eve of the county supervisors’ vote

The county itself has produced no press release, briefing, or public statement announcing the term sheet.

This new iteration of the Coliseum deal has appeared on the board of supervisors’ agenda repeatedly over the past 17 months — almost always in closed session, with no details of the deal, listed as a “Conference with Real Property Negotiators.”

Fast-forward to today, and the May 28 special meeting agenda lists three closed-session real-property items (one each on OAC, CWP, and the City of Oakland as negotiating parties) before today’s open-session vote.

Read this related article:

The term sheet’s release comes after two stories in Hearst-owned Bay Area media outlets focused on the Oakland Arena portion of the deal, both published in the same 48-hour window:

• On May 26, SFGate published a culture-section feature headlined “Left for dead, Oakland Arena has become a pop music mecca,” celebrating the arena’s bookings of stars like Ariana Grande and Olivia Rodrigo, and quoting Oakland Arena vice president of booking Gretchen Claffey and Visit Oakland CEO Peter Gamez. The story does not mention the pending sale of the Arena or the county term sheet.

• On May 27, the San Francisco Chronicle published a story identifying Oak View Group as the buyer in talks for the Oakland Arena. The story confirms key financial details that match the term sheet — including the county’s $115 million payment to the A’s CWP and the 5% compounding-interest repayment from Bobbitt’s AASEG — and reports that “two people familiar with the agreement told the Chronicle that Oak View was in discussions to buy the arena.”

Both outlets are owned by Hearst Communications. SFGate’s piece, in particular, contains none of the financial-structure detail in the term sheet — instead positioning the Oakland Arena as a thriving cultural asset on the eve of a public vote that determines who controls it.

Timeline: key milestones in the Oakland Coliseum deal, 2019–2026

Dec. 23, 2019 — The county votes unanimously to exit “the sports business,” selling its 50 percent stake to the A’s affiliate CWP for $85 million ($3 million above appraisal), paid in installments through January 2026.

Oct. 2021 — The City of Oakland signs an exclusive negotiating agreement with Ray Bobbitt’s AASEG for the city’s 50 percent interest, with no competitive bidding.

May 2024 — Mayor Sheng Thao proposes selling the city’s 50 percent share to AASEG for $105 million, tying the proceeds to closing a roughly $177 million city budget deficit.

June 26, 2024 — The city council approves the sale ordinance; the 2024–25 budget passes 5-3, counting $63 million in not-yet-received sale revenue.

Aug. 5, 2024 — CWP and AASEG announce a $125 million sale agreement, subject to board of supervisors approval.

Sept. 1, 2024 — AASEG misses a scheduled $15 million payment to the city, having paid only the initial $5 million deposit.

Oct. 7, 2024 — An amended agreement raises the price to $125 million but pushes payments out; the city’s contingency budget is triggered.

Nov. 2024 — AASEG misses another payment after the election; the contingency budget takes effect, with cuts to police, fire, and services.

Jan. 14, 2025 — The county approves a first non-binding term sheet with a 30-day window to finalize the CWP-to-OAC assignment; the deadline is missed.

Apr. 14, 2025 — The city council pushes the sale to align with the county, targeting a 2026 close; AASEG has still paid only the original $5 million deposit.

July 22, 2025 — The county approves a Conditional Consent to Assignment, reassigning CWP’s purchase rights to OAC and authorizing a Second Amendment.

Jan. 27, 2026 — A joint city-county public meeting is held on the deal’s status; interim mayor Jenkins says a June 30, 2026 closing is still achievable.

Feb. 6, 2026 — The county drafts proposed amendments incorporating the “as is” release language and waiver into the term sheet.

May 26, 2026 — SFGate publishes a feature celebrating the Oakland Arena as a “pop music mecca,” with no mention of the pending sale, two days before the vote.

May 27, 2026 — San Francisco Chronicle names Oak View Group as the buyer “in talks” for the Oakland Arena, the same day the term sheet is released.

May 28, 2026 — A special board of supervisors meeting is set to vote on the new term sheet: the county pays CWP $115 million; OAC repays the county over five to seven years at 5%.

June 2026 (target) — Commercial closing, contingent on the Oakland Arena sale, settlement of litigation (see below), and City of Oakland concurrence.

Four to seven years out — OAC’s installment payments to the county begin, the first due one year after Planned Development Approval or five years after closing, whichever is earlier.

NON-BINDING TERM SHEET: Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum Complex Transaction

179KB ∙ PDF file

Download

This Non-Binding Term Sheet (“Term Sheet”) sets forth the principal terms and conditions of a proposed transaction (the “Transaction”) by and among Oakland Acquisition Company, LLC, a Delaware limited liability company (“OAC”), Coliseum Way Partners, LLC (“CWP”), and the County of Alameda (“County”). The closing of the Transaction shall occur in two phases: (a) the “Commercial Closing” (expected in June 2026), at which the principal Transaction documents will be executed and delivered and the events described in this Term Sheet will simultaneously occur; and (b) the “Financial Closing,” at which the County will be fully paid and will deed its remaining interest in the Complex to OAC. This Term Sheet represents an expression of intent only and does not set forth all matters upon which agreement must be reached in order for the Transaction to be consummated. This Term Sheet does not constitute a legally binding agreement and does not create any legal obligations on the part of, or any rights in favor of, any party.

Download

The term sheet: what’s on the county’s agenda today

The May 28 special meeting agenda lists one open-session item: approval of a non-binding term sheet that would renegotiate the “Conditional Consent to Assignment” the board of supervisors approved on July 22, 2025.10

That July 2025 vote was supposed to clear the way for the developer to take the county’s 50 percent stake from the A’s affiliate. Almost a year later, that deal has not closed.

The new term sheet, attached to the agenda, splits the transaction into two parts. At a “Commercial Closing” expected in June 2026, the county would pay the A’s CWP $115 million in cash. CWP would hand off its rights under the original 2019 Disposition Agreement to Ray Bobbitt’s OAC.

OAC would then owe the county $115 million, payable on a delayed schedule. A “Financial Closing” follows once OAC has paid the county in full.

The document itself says it is “an expression of intent only” and “does not constitute a legally binding agreement.”

A pending lawsuit must be settled before closing

The community group, Communities for a Better Environment has been suing the county since 2024 over whether the original 2019 sale complied with the California Surplus Land Act. Settling that lawsuit — through a “Public Commitments Agreement” — is one of several conditions to closing the new deal.11

The May 28 special meeting is scheduled for 10 a.m. in the Board of Supervisors’ chambers at 1221 Oak Street, fifth floor, Oakland.

WE ARE 100% SUPPORTED BY YOU

Oakland Report provides accurate, unflinching, data-driven reporting and analysis that you will find nowhere else. If you value our work, please donate. All contributions go directly to sustaining and growing our 501(c)(3) nonprofit work:

Donate to Oakland Report

Learn more

BY SANFORD FORTE

Oakland is beautiful – but the city’s dysfunction is holding it back

I love living in Oakland — specifically, West Oakland — since arriving from San Francisco several years ago.

Oakland has a vibrant and diverse culture, a dynamic food scene, stunning natural features, architecturally beautiful neighborhoods, an entrepreneurial spirit, and above all, extraordinary people.

Oakland can and should be a world-class city.

But the city government’s chronic dysfunction and institutionalized inequity — which city leaders continue to perpetuate to this day — are holding it back.

In this commentary, I will use the colloquial term ‘Flats’ to refer to the flatland areas of West Oakland and East Oakland.

The Flats are a defining feature of Oakland, home to some of the most interesting and diverse neighborhoods in the city. The Flats are arguably what most people — especially those who don’t live here — think about when they think about Oakland.

This part of Oakland is wonderful in many ways. But unfortunately the Flats, where the city’s Black and Hispanic residents are concentrated, continue to bear the worst outcomes relative to other areas of the city, across nearly every measure of economic opportunity, public health, public safety, and neighborhood conditions.12

Many of these challenges stem from a long legacy of institutionalized disinvestment, segregation, economic inequality, and racial injustice.

Unfortunately, this legacy of inequity continues to this day — partly due to generational after-effects of the institutionalized discrimination of the past, but also due to being perpetuated in new forms by city leaders in the present.

Read this related article:

As co-chair of West Oakland Neighbors, a 600-plus member association of West Oakland residents and business owners, I spend a lot of time speaking with West Oakland neighbors and business owners — including in more recent years, probably hundreds of unhoused people who have set up camp here.

Through all these interactions, it’s apparent that a big thing holding back the Flats right now is the out-of-control presence of encampments — in recreational vehicles (RVs), tents, and makeshift shelters — and the associated debris, blight, crime and behavioral problems they cause in West Oakland.

Oakland’s ‘sensitivity areas’ place an inequitable burden on the Flats

In response to the spread of Oakland’s homeless camps and RV settlements, Oakland city council recently adopted an Encampment Abatement Policy (EAP) in an attempt to restore order by controlling the behavior and location of homeless camps.3

The Encampment Abatement Policy was framed by its supporters as a way to address health and safety conditions through regulating conduct rather than housing status — establishing rules on where, when, and how unhoused people are permitted to camp, such as campsite size limits, spacing requirements, and bans on hazardous storage and illegal utility hookups.45

But as a practical matter, the EAP formally sacrifices neighborhoods in the Flats to remain ground zero for this problem, while shielding the more affluent, predominantly White neighborhoods in the hills from it.

The EAP approved by city council identifies a ‘Sensitivity Area’ map that designates ‘high sensitivity’ areas as off-limits locations for RVs and encampments, and ‘low sensitivity’ areas where the city essentially allows these encampments to persist.6

According to the Sensitivity Area map, 95% of Oakland is designated ‘high sensitivity’ and therefore off-limits to encampments — including nearly all of the more affluent, majority White areas in the hills. The ‘low sensitivity’ areas where encampments are allowed are almost exclusively located in less affluent, majority Black and Hispanic neighborhoods in West and East Oakland, i.e., the Flats.

This appears to run counter to the city of Oakland’s stated goal to provide services equitably across all its neighborhoods.

Rather than moving to solve the encampment problem for all Oaklanders, city officials are demonstrably making the Flats a sacrifice area where the problem is allowed to continue effectively unabated.

Don’t miss a beat. Donate to support our nonprofit work.

Donate to Oakland Report

The new redlining

The city’s 2026 Anti-Displacement Strategic Action Plan notes that among racial groups, Black residents have the highest relative rate of homelessness.7

Black residents make up approximately 22% of Oakland’s general population, but account for 52.5% of the total unhoused population, 47.9% of the unsheltered population, and 59% of all new entries into homelessness.

The city’s anti-displacement plan cites a legacy of redlining,8 predatory lending practices, and systemic disinvestment in Black communities as primary drivers of the racial disparity.

Yet, some city council members and career officials who connect the dots between race and homelessness appear not to acknowledge that confining the homeless problem primarily to so-called ‘low sensitivity’ areas in the Flats amounts to a new form of institutionalized racial, economic and social injustice.

Homelessness is not a crime — but behaviors in encampments often are

Homelessness is not a crime in and of itself. It’s a tragic condition with many causes: a lack of affordable housing, untreated mental illness and drug addiction, sudden job loss, debilitating illness, family crisis and many other complex and intertwined factors.9

Unfortunately, many of the behaviors exhibited by people in these encampments — including drug dealing and manufacturing, violence, fencing stolen goods and vehicle parts, littering, and blocking public rights-of-way — are, in fact, crimes.

These behaviors are traumatic and harmful to residents and businesses in the Flats. That the city now formally allows the conditions that foster these crimes to continue violates these Oaklanders’ rights to have safety and security in their neighborhoods comparable to that enjoyed by other neighborhoods in the city.

Read this related article:

The West Oakland area around Mandela Parkway has long contained some of the city’s largest, most established, and most impactful encampments.10

Thieves have stripped copper wire from streetlights and water irrigation boxes all along the corridor, rendering the once-beautiful Mandela Parkway median park (formally named the Cypress Freeway Memorial Park) dark and unsafe in the evenings, and its greenery deprived of water. It’s often unclear exactly who the thieves are, but the neighborhood did not experience this problem at such intensity until recent years, after encampments and RVs moved into and were allowed to remain and grow here.

Oakland residents living near long-standing encampments have reported crime, threatening confrontations, and a diminished sense of safety. In one example, residents described a rise in stolen and stripped vehicles they associated with a nearby encampment; elsewhere, a business owner reported being confronted by a man wielding an ax. The City's own records acknowledge that long-standing encampments have posed public health and safety concerns for nearby residents.1112

I’ve personally witnessed senior citizens and people in wheelchairs have to navigate into street traffic because a tent or RV has blocked a sidewalk or a street. My observations may ring true with other observers as well.

Meanwhile, if a homeowner or business blocks the street or sidewalk with their possessions, they are issued a citation.

‘Harm reduction’ strategies do more harm than good

One of the reasons for the unacceptable behavior is that, sadly, over 67 percent of unhoused people are chronically drug-addicted and mentally ill, according to a meta-study in the Journal of the American Medical Association.13

State law is such that it is difficult to compel those people into treatment, even when they are living in unsafe conditions for extended periods of time, and demonstrably pose a health and safety threat to themselves and others.

Prevailing policies of ‘harm reduction’ (famous for allowing encampments to remain in unsafe conditions, and for distributing publicly-funded drugs and drug paraphernalia to addicted people) and ‘housing first’ (which openly allows drug use in publicly-subsidized shelters and housing) perpetuate the suffering for precisely the people who are least equipped to voluntarily navigate their way to sobriety and healing.

Read this related article:

Under current policy, people with substance use disorders or serious mental illness are generally directed to voluntarily seek or remain in treatment — but only when they are 'ready.' Research shows that waiting for a patient to be 'ready' can mean missed treatment windows, that motivation can be built rather than waited for, and that voluntary frameworks under-serve people who have severe, treatment-resistant illnesses.1415

Even supporters of ‘harm reduction’ will assert that this policy, when implemented as a standalone approach without strong, meaningful pathways to treatment and recovery, can leave people stabilized in active addiction rather than moving them toward recovery.16

To be clear, this is not a judgment of people in those unfortunate circumstances. They need help. But their antisocial behaviors too often are enabled and intensified, not reduced by so-called ‘harm reduction.’

Alameda County and the city of Oakland have practiced various ‘housing first’ and ‘harm reduction’ tactics for well over a decade — and these tactics have failed to reduce the problem of encampments and harmful behavior. Indeed, the problem appears to have only escalated in size and severity.

The city plans to spend billions on policies that perpetuate the problem

Oakland has grappled with a difficult and growing problem for the past several years: the more money the city spends to alleviate homelessness, the worse the problem appears to become.

According to the city’s 2026 Anti-Displacement Strategic Action Plan, Oakland estimates that it will need to spend $1.06 billion in new funding to reduce homelessness by 50 percent in five years.

Yet deteriorating, long-persisting encampments, recurring toxic fires, and theft and stripping of vehicles remain common in West Oakland — problems that have persisted for years despite repeated city and state intervention.1718

A person living in an encampment who has a medical emergency from drug use will rightly call an ambulance, go to an emergency room, and often then get released back to the streets where the cycle can repeat indefinitely.

When an RV or tent catches fire while its inhabitant is cooking a meal, cooking methamphetamine or building fires for warmth, people call the fire department, putting firefighters in a dangerous — and preventable — situation.

A 2021 city performance audit found that Oakland fire department responded to 988 fire emergencies at homeless encampments over the two years 2019 and 2020 — an average of more than one encampment fire per day — accounting for roughly 12.5 percent of all Fire Department calls in each of those years.19

The frequency has only increased since then: by 2025 alone, the fire department recorded 818 encampment fires — roughly 66 percent more per year than the 2021 audit's two-year average.20

Notably, closing the infamous Wood Street is credited with reducing fires citywide; residents there pleaded for housing solutions before its closure finally happened. Yet other encampments have cropped up in other nearby locations, and are now officially allowed to exist elsewhere in this same area, perpetuating the cycle.

Research on unsheltered and encampment populations finds that serious mental illness and substance use disorders are far more prevalent than in the general public, and that the instability of street life combined with limited access to treatment makes recovery without sustained intervention extremely difficult.21

We must come to grips with the fact our neighborhoods will continue to be in disarray unless the basic civil standards of behavior we expect from the chronically unhoused — the same expectations that other citizens are held to — are enforced.

Oakland deserves better

The city currently permits thousands of unhoused people in Oakland to live in unsafe, unsanitary, and illegal conditions seemingly indefinitely, with few constraints on their behavior.

Oakland has, over many years, repeatedly formed task forces, cleared camps, funded voluntary outreach, and built transition centers on a ‘housing first’ model that does not condition shelter on sobriety or treatment.

These efforts have produced disappointing results — and the city's own performance data bears out part of that concern. The city auditor's 2022 homelessness report found that of the 669 residents who left community cabin sites over three years, only about 30 percent moved on to permanent housing, well short of the city's 50 percent goal. In the worst year tracked, 58 percent of those who left returned to homelessness.

More recent figures show a similar pattern: at some homeless cabin programs, including 3rd and Peralta, nearly half of those who left in 2024–2025 returned to homelessness or to unknown circumstances; and across two safe-parking RV sites, the combined figure was 63 percent.22

Notably, the same audit found Oakland's family-focused shelter and transitional housing programs performed far better, in one year housing 77 percent of those who left — suggesting the shortfalls have been concentrated in particular program types rather than across the board.

I’m a politically liberal person, but I refuse to performatively claim that I care about the unhoused — which I do, very much — while at the same time promote and defend the ineffective use of scarce city resources on policies and tactics that appear to perpetuate the problem; or, that don’t work at scale for so many of the the unhoused.

I’ve come to the conclusion that some of our elected officials and administrators can’t see literally what’s happening in front of their eyes: the spread of near-dystopian behavior that emanates from homeless encampments and RVs in the Flats.

Notably, some of those officials live in and represent districts that are now officially shielded from this problem — the so-called ‘high sensitivity’ areas in Oakland’s new map.

Meanwhile, there appears to be scant concern offered to those of us in the ‘low sensitivity’ areas who now officially have to endure the burden of this problem for the sake of those who happen to live in the historically privileged ‘high sensitivity’ areas — and a city organization whose chronic dysfunction appears to render it unable, or unwilling, to make the difficult decisions required to solve the problem for everyone.

We invite counterpoint commentaries from other leading voices in Oakland. Do you have something to say on this issue or others? Visit our About page for more information.

Oakland’s Flats represent our city to the outside world. We deserve better, and so do the chronically unhoused who are being essentially abandoned to street encampments and RVs because they are permitted to refuse or leave services that they so clearly need to survive and heal.

The Flats don’t deserve the institutionalized marginalization being visited upon us by the city’s inequitable ‘sensitivity area’ maps. We’re weary of being the sacrifice area for Oakland’s structural problems. We’re tired of taking on the lion’s share of the homeless burden. Oakland citizens in the Flats want and deserve order in their neighborhoods and public commons, like other Oakland neighborhoods take for granted.

We can help the unhoused who want to receive help, but we must not continue to condone more years and years of dysfunctional chaos on our streets and in our public commons — especially when the consequences of decisions made by city officials disproportionately affect West and East Oakland — again.

WE ARE 100% SUPPORTED BY YOU

Oakland Report provides accurate, unflinching, data-driven reporting and analysis that you will find nowhere else. If you value our work, please donate. All contributions go directly to sustaining and growing our 501(c)(3) nonprofit work:

Donate to Oakland Report

Learn more

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Sanford Forte is co-chair of West Oakland Neighbors, comprised of 600+ residents and business owners in West Oakland. He is the founder of the largest open public market on the lower San Francisco Peninsula; a former library commissioner and public activist. In his professional life, Sanford played a key role in the creation of the Open Textbook movement which led to access high-quality educational content for millions of students, worldwide, for free.

Sanford is interested in finding humane, scalable, workable solutions to the disconnect between the insufficient treatment of mental illness and drug addiction among Oakland’s unhoused community. He believes this has led to the tragic spread of homeless camps into the most vulnerable parts of Oakland, further constraining the neighborhoods in those communities to overcome a long history of structural and economic and racial injustice.

The views expressed in our Commentaries do not necessarily reflect the editorial views of Oakland Report or its contributing writers.

Video clip 1. Mayor Barbara Lee stated about the Measure NN promise of 700 police officers, “The promises are being kept… We have a Measure NN committee that is in the process now, of just putting that plan together. And in fact we have in Measure E the continuation of the funding strategy.” Measure NN was approved by Oakland voters in 2024 with a legally binding promise of 700 police officers. The city currently has around 610 officers on payroll. (Video courtesy of NBC Bay Area, May 21, 2026)1

Editor’s note

Oakland Report is examining the misleading political statements made by local leaders and advocates. Today we look at some of the campaign statements supporting Oakland Measure E, the $34-million-per-year parcel tax on the June 2 ballot. Future installments will look at misleading statements made by elected leaders and special interest groups on other issues that affect Oaklanders’ lives.

Campaign statement that Measure E results in “lower tax rates for most homeowners” is a lie, as the term is commonly understood.

The “Yes on E” campaign website homepage claims that Measure E, a new, $34-million-per-year parcel tax would “lower taxes for a majority of homeowners.”

But there is no language in the actual text of Measure E that specifies which tax is “expiring” or being replaced, nor is there any language in the measure’s text that offers any legally binding specifics that the measure would, in fact, “lower tax rates for most homeowners.”2

So far, no one in the campaign or elsewhere has offered proof that this claim is true.

In reality, Measure E’s estimated $34 million per year in new parcel taxes would be in addition to, not replacing Oakland’s existing ‘public safety’ parcel tax, Measure NN, approved by voters in 2024, also on promises that the money would be used to save and enhance ‘public safety.’

By all appearances, the campaign message that Measure E would “lower tax rates for most homeowners” is a lie, as the term is commonly understood.

Read this related article:

The public unions who put the measure on the ballot were careful not to make the “lower taxes” statement legally binding in the text of the measure itself. But it is, in fact, legal to make misleading statements in campaign messaging.

This may explain why the “lower tax rates” promise is primarily being made through the campaign channel instead of in the legally binding language of the measure itself.

The elected Alameda County treasurer Henry Levy endorsed Measure E, including in his statement in the Argument in Favor of the measure that was published in the official Voter Information Guide.

Levy’s endorsement claim of “lowering tax rates” also was included in campaign mailers paid for by the public employee unions and their backers who are supporting the measure.3

Levy later admitted in writing that he did not even know if the so-called “expiring” tax the campaign alludes to, the Police and Fire Retirement System (PFRS) tax, actually is expiring, as he claims in his endorsement.4

Read this related article:

Promises made, promises broken

Additionally, Mayor Barbara Lee recently released her budget proposal and spending plan for Measure E, if voters approve it on June 2.

In her own words, the mayor admits that the city has no plan to keep the promises it made to voters in the last tax, the $47-million-per-year Measure NN (2024), unless voters approve another tax, the $34-million-per-year Measure E.

Measure NN was approved by Oakland voters in 2024 with a legally binding promise of 700 police officers. The city currently has only 678 officers budgeted, and only around 610 officers on payroll.

A few days after she released her Measure E spending plan, mayor Lee offered new promises for Measure E spending that are not listed in the Measure E text at all. (More on that below.)

‘Repeat a lie often enough, and it becomes the truth’

According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, the word “lie,” meaning to make a false or misleading statement, carries three relevant definitions in this context:5

1. “To make an untrue statement with intent to deceive.”

2. “To create a false or misleading impression.”

3. “Something that misleads or deceives.”

These definitions share a common thread — deception — whether through making an outright false statement or by giving a misleading impression through cleverly-worded political rhetoric.

The legal question that follows is whether speech fitting these definitions can be prosecuted when it occurs in a political campaign.

(Spoiler: More often than not, it can’t.)

The difference between the commonly understood definition of a “lie” and the legally enforceable one

The word “lie” in ordinary use is broader than the definition the law can prosecute in the context of political campaigns. The dictionary definition is fairly clear about what constitutes misleading impressions, gaslighting, and false statements — i.e., lies — but the law is far more narrowly defined.

First, only false statements of fact are actionable; opinion, hyperbole, and misleading rhetoric are not. Within defamation law, there is a gray area occupied by misleading political statements that may not meet the threshold of falsehood required for defamation.6

Much of what honest people would call a campaign “lie” — a misleading impression, a selectively framed claim, a rhetorical sleight-of-hand — falls into this gray area.

Second, even a provably false factual statement about a political opponent is rarely enforceable, because political candidates are public figures.

Under the standard set in the 1964 Supreme Court case New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, public figures must prove that the defendant made the defamatory statement with knowledge of its falsity or with reckless disregard for its truth — the “actual malice” standard.7

This is a subjective and demanding test: there must be clear and convincing evidence, and the plaintiff needs to show that the speaker seriously doubted the truth of what they were about to say before they said it — a very high bar, because it is not possible to read people’s minds.8

Third, the practical result is that the standard can make it very difficult to prevail in a defamation case, even when allegations against a public figure are unfair or proven false.9

Legal practitioners observe that courts continue to apply a high bar for proving defamation, especially when challenged statements are part of political ad campaigns.10

In short: the commonly understood “lie” — a statement made with intent to deceive or mislead — is mostly not legally enforceable in a campaign. The legally enforceable category is far narrower: a false assertion of fact, about an identifiable person, made with actual malice, causing reputational harm.

It’s legal to lie in campaigns

With that distinction in mind, the fact that lying in political campaigns is generally legal in the United States rests on well-documented constitutional law.

For example, the Supreme Court’s 2012 decision in United States v. Alvarez establishes the foundational principle: there is no general exception to the First Amendment for false statements, and the Court reasoned that some false statements are inevitable if there is to be an open and vigorous expression of views in public discourse.11

Although that case concerned false claims of military honors, it makes clear that the Court has not endorsed a general rule that false statements receive no First Amendment protection.12

In addition, lower courts have applied this reasoning directly to campaign speech. In the 2016 case Susan B. Anthony List v. Driehaus, the Sixth Circuit affirmed the district court’s judgment finding Ohio’s law concerning political false statements unconstitutional, concluding they were content-based restrictions that fail strict scrutiny review.13

The trial judge reasoned that the answer to false statements in politics is not to force silence, but to encourage truthful speech in response, and to let the voters, not the judiciary, decide what the political truth is.14

Other scholarly legal analysis confirms this trend, noting that the Alvarez ruling suggests false speech is a protected class, and that other courts evaluating similar laws afterward have reached the same conclusion.15

Together, this body of law shows campaign lies are largely shielded from legal sanction — though, as the caveats above make clear, “legal” here means largely immune from judicial penalty, not free of all consequence.

Mayor Barbara Lee is changing the Measure E promises in real time

Measure E — the “Oakland Public Safety, Cleanliness and Community Accountability Act of 2026” — would levy a nine-year special parcel tax raising roughly $34 million annually, promised to fund five priority areas:

1. 911 response and fire services (improving emergency response times and keeping fire stations open)

2. crime prevention

3. homelessness solutions

4. cleanliness (illegal dumping, litter, graffiti)

5. administrative support.

The measure itself does not fund specific line items within those categories. Per the language of the measure, which includes the disclaimer “such as, but not limited to,” the city council may allocate the Measure E money at their discretion through the budget process.

The supporters’ campaign and the official Argument in Favor stress the same broad themes — keeping fire stations open, faster 911 response, cleaner streets, and homelessness response — rather than itemized purchases, while emphasizing oversight and a biennial audit.

Mayor Barbara Lee’s more specific promises came later and separately — and they are materially different from the promises made in the text of Measure E and the associated Yes campaign.

Read this related article:

On May 15, mayor Lee released a Measure E spending plan stating the revenue would support additions like 22 police officers (the number of budgeted officers the city needs to add in order to meet Measure NN’s promised 700-officer minimum in terms of budgeted officers), a police academy, replacements for older city vehicles like fire engines, and new shelter beds.16

Then at a May 21 campaign rally, mayor Lee said, “Under the mayor’s budget plan, where we have our senior centers, for example, open four days. If we pass the [Measure E] parcel tax, they’ll be open five days, you know?”17

However, the text of Measure E does not directly include Lee’s campaign promises. The campaign’s recent fire-truck/equipment promise has a plausible but stretch home in the measure’s first category (911 and fire services), but capital purchases of vehicles are not named in the text. Notably, capital purchases like fire trucks are one-time expenditures, not ongoing ones like “services.” Treating the money as available for fire engines under the banner of “services” is Lee’s political interpretation, made after the measure was finalized.

The senior centers promise is not among the five priority areas listed in Measure E at all. The connection is indirect — the mayor’s intention presumably is that the Measure E revenue would backfill services normally covered by the General Purpose Fund, and that passing the measure would free up other money so senior centers can stay open an extra day. That is a downstream budget effect she attributes to the measure, not a service the measure directly funds or guarantees.

The mayor’s statements, if they are to be taken at face value, confirm that there is no guarantee as to how Measure E funds will be spent. The measure’s “such as, but not limited to” language gives officials broad discretion over spending the funds on essentially anything at all — and to make any promises the campaign feels necessary to convince voters to approve the measure.

Read this related article:

WE ARE 100% SUPPORTED BY YOU

Oakland Report provides accurate, unflinching, data-driven reporting and analysis that you will find nowhere else. If you value our work, please donate. All contributions go directly to sustaining and growing our nonprofit work:

Donate to Oakland Report

Learn more

Video clip 1: Encampment on 26th and Wood Street on May 15, 2026. (Source: Oakland Report)

Oakland Report examines the data behind the headlines. Today we look at the preliminary 2026 ‘point-in-time’ homeless count announced by Alameda County on May 19.

Out of sight, out of mind

County officials announced on Tuesday what they called the largest reduction in homelessness Alameda County has ever recorded. Oakland Mayor Barbara Lee offered remarks at the press conference:

“Today is proof that we’re doing the right thing.”

–Oakland Mayor Barbara Lee, on the 2026 preliminary homeless count results, May 19, 2026

The preliminary report on the biennial county-wide point-in-time homeless count found 8,201 unhoused people countywide in 2026, a reduction of 13% since the last count in 2024.1

Oakland, the epicenter of the regional crisis, showed a reduction of nearly 20%.

It is a striking statistic, worthy of critical evaluation. Oakland Report took a closer look at the data and the context around it, and empirical research on the topic of homelessness.

Our key finding: the headline 20% reduction appears not to have taken several relevant factors into consideration:

• The 2026 count took place after the largest encampment-clearing sweep in the city’s history.

• Oakland’s number of shelter beds did not substantively increase.

• Research has concluded that encampment sweeps without shelter beds leads to dispersal, not rehousing of homeless individuals.

• The city’s own reports state that Oakland’s homeless population has grown by a net 1,000 people per year.

The county’s latest report of a reduction in the number of homeless people counted is undeniably better news than had the count increased. But more likely than not, Oakland’s 20% count reduction, while technically accurate according to the point-in-time count’s methodology, is overstated.

‘Known locations’: The 2026 count took place after the largest sustained encampment-clearing sweep in the city’s history

In the eighteen months before the 2026 point-in-time homeless count took place, Oakland conducted more encampment closures than at any point in its history.

The city completed roughly 140 and 240 closures per year through 2024. Then in 2025, closures surged to 1,212 closures — an increase of more than 600%.2

The point-in-time homeless count takes place every two years. The previous count took place in 2024, before the significant increase in encampment sweeps began. The new count announced on Tuesday was conducted in January 2026, after a sustained, fifteen-month surge in encampment sweeps.

The acceleration in encampment closures was precipitated by the U.S. Supreme Court’s June 2024 decision in Grants Pass v. Johnson, which held that cities may penalize public camping even without offering shelter.

Shortly after the Grants Pass decision, former Mayor Sheng Thao ordered city workers to close all encampments deemed an “emergency,” stating that “in no case will emergency or urgent closures be delayed for shelter unavailability.”

This change is significant because Alameda County’s methodology, adopted in 2024 and reused in 2026, sends volunteers to ‘known locations’ — sites where outreach workers already know unhoused people are living.3

When encampments are repeatedly dispersed, ‘known locations’ are less likely to have encampments when volunteers show up. And new encampments, especially smaller ones, may not be among the ‘known locations’ yet.

Oakland’s number of shelter beds did not substantively increase

If the 2026 decline reflected genuine shelter placements, then it is reasonable to expect that the number of sheltered homeless people would have grown roughly in equal measure to the decline in the number of unsheltered homeless people counted. It did not.

Oakland’s sheltered population nearly doubled between 2017 and 2022, due largely to COVID-era Project Roomkey hotels.4

Since then, the number of shelter beds has not significantly increased.

As of Thao’s September 2024 order to close encampments, the city counted roughly 1,200 emergency shelter and transitional housing beds, 280 safe RV parking spaces, and 600 permanent units developed since 2020.5

Then, in 2025 and 2026, Oakland began closing shelters, including the 3rd & Peralta community cabins, the 71st Avenue RV safe parking site, and Mandela House.6

When the last point-in time count was taken in 2024, Oakland had approximately 1,826 shelter beds. The city has not produced data indicating an increase in shelter beds since then.

The data suggests that the roughly 1,075 people who vanished from Oakland’s count between 2024 and 2026 did not all move into Oakland shelters, because there were not enough for them to move into.

Federal data confirms the same plateau in shelter availability county-wide. Each year the U.S Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) compiles a Housing Inventory Count for every ‘Continuum of Care’ (CoC) — a census of beds dedicated to homeless residents.

For the Oakland/Berkeley/Alameda County CoC, the combined emergency shelter, transitional housing, and ‘safe-haven’ inventory shows a regional pattern that mirrors Oakland’s.

Countywide, shelter capacity nearly doubled from about 2,000 beds in 2020 to nearly 4,000 in 2022, lifted by COVID emergency funding, then fell back and settled around 3,400 to 3,500 beds — essentially flat for the two years through 2024.7

Permanent supportive housing, counted separately, grew over the same period; but emergency and interim shelter — the beds that an unsheltered person displaced by a sweep could actually move into that night — did not.

The available Oakland-specific data — roughly 1,718 people sheltered in 2022 and 1,826 in 2024 — indicate that Oakland accounts for somewhere between 40 and 55 percent of the entire county’s shelter capacity.

These two points are a count of people sheltered on the nights of the point-in-time counts rather than a bed-capacity census, so they are an estimate, not a precise inventory. But the estimate moved by only about 100 people across two years.

Across every available measure, Oakland’s shelter supply was flat or shrinking during the window when its homeless count at ‘known locations’ fell by 20%.

Oakland’s homeless population has grown by 1,000 people per year

Oakland’s 2026 Anti-Displacement Strategic Action Plan found that more than 2,550 people become newly unhoused in the city each year, while the system facilitates only about 1,500 exits — a net increase of over 1,000 people annually.8

The plan conceded even the 2,550 number “is unfortunately an undercount,” excluding people who return to homelessness and those who never enter a shelter program.

It seems unlikely that a system adding a thousand people a year could produce a 1,075-person two-year decline through shelter and housing placement alone.

(According to news reports, the county’s director of Housing and Homelessness Services Jonathan Russell stated that Alameda County saw more people exit homelessness than enter in 2025, however the data provided in the preliminary results does not include that information.)9

Read this related article:

Data suggests that dispersal is a factor

If people were swept out of ‘known locations’ of Oakland encampments without additional shelter beds, it stands to reason that many of them would move to other locations nearby, including, in some cases, other areas of the county.

The county’s own city-by-city point-in-time count data offers additional insight into this question.

The 2026 point-in-time figures show six of fifteen Alameda County jurisdictions saw increases in homeless people counted between 2024 and 2026.

All three of the East County cities increased: Livermore (+24%), Pleasanton (+37%), and Dublin (+60%). The unincorporated county rose 11%. Berkeley rose 4%. Fremont rose 6%. Regionally, the East County climbed 29% — an increase of 107 people.

East County’s gain accounts for only about a tenth of Oakland’s reported loss. But the direction is notable, and it is what dispersal predicts: the city sweeping hardest loses population while its suburban neighbors and unincorporated fringes gain.

The rest are likely dispersed into less-visible corners of Oakland itself — places a ‘known locations’ count are less likely to detect — and some, perhaps, into departures from the county.

Sweeps without shelter tend to disperse people, not reduce actual homelessness: research

A substantial body of peer-reviewed research has examined what happens when cities clear encampments.

A July 2025 report by the National Association of County and City Health Officials found that more than 90% of displaced people remain in public spaces afterward, and nearly two-thirds simply move down the street. According to that report, “Encampment sweeps do not reduce homelessness. Nor do they improve housing access.”10

A landmark 2023 simulation study by the Centers for Disease Control and the National Health Care for the Homeless Council modeled involuntary displacement across 23 American cities. In hundreds of projections, no scenario in any city showed sweeps producing neutral or positive outcomes.11

Additionally, the practice of sweeps was estimated to contribute to 15% to 25% of deaths among the unsheltered population over a decade.

The American Public Health Association, in a January 2024 brief, called forcible displacement “a temporary cosmetic fix” that “does little to effectively connect unhoused people to services and housing.”12

Dr. Aislinn Bird, who directs integrated care for Alameda County Health Care for the Homeless, described these impacts to KQED in October 2025: “Before we would pull up to a large encampment and people would come to us; they knew that we were going to be there and provide care. Now that folks are so dispersed, we often lose track of them.”13

If the county’s clinicians lose track of patients after sweeps, it stands to reason that a count that depends on knowing where people are will lose track of them too.

Why the preliminary ‘point in time’ number will likely stand in the public’s awareness

The headline number of “a 20% reduction in homelessness in Oakland,” absent the additional context outlined in this report, is likely to remain the public story for months, shaping budgets, speeches, and the narrative that current strategy is working.

The county’s recently announced point-in-time results are preliminary. The county says it will release the comprehensive report in the fall.

A more comprehensive, nuanced conclusion of the preliminary data is this: Some real reduction in homelessness has occurred — but likely due in part to reduced visibility of homeless people as a result of Oakland’s unprecedented surge in encampment sweeps.

The 2026 count’s preliminary results are encouraging, but likely are overstated. The data and research suggest that some of that claimed success was not due to reducing homelessness, but by making homelessness harder to see.

WE ARE 100% SUPPORTED BY YOU

Oakland Report provides accurate, unflinching, data-driven reporting and analysis that you will find nowhere else. If you value our work, please donate. All contributions go directly to sustaining and growing our nonprofit work:

Donate to Oakland Report

Learn more

Note: This article has been updated with a parenthetical paragraph on a news report that county director of Housing and Homelessness Services Jonathan Russell stated that Alameda County saw more people exit homelessness than enter in 2025.

Our new Oakland Beat newsletter provides exclusive reports, commentaries, and inside information on issues that matter, grounded in the evidence and facts that you have come to expect from Oakland Report.

Oakland Beat is offered exclusively for Oakland Report supporting members, but this installment is being made available to all readers.

Become a member of Oakland Report today to receive future installments of Oakland Beat, straight to your inbox. (If you have already donated: thank you.)

Donate today to support our nonprofit work

Donate now

Mayor Barbara Lee, council president Kevin Jenkins, and firefighters union boss Seth Olyer held a rally with public employees to gin up support for Measure E.

Oakland Report obtained video of today’s rally at Oakland City Hall in support of Measure E. (See above for the video, and below for a transcript.)

Rally speakers included Mayor Barbara Lee, council president Kevin Jenkins, firefighters union president Seth Olyer, and Chaney Turner of Oakland Rising Action.

Also in attendance were former councilmember-turned-illegal dumping project manager Rebecca Kaplan, Oakland school board president Jennifer Brouhard, and around 50 others holding signs that said “Yes on E - save our essential services” and “Save our fire stations.”

Transcript

[WORKERS DISASSEMBLING POLITICAL SIGNS]

Take them off. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Of course.

No, I’m not. I’m not.

FIREFIGHTERS UNION PRESIDENT SETH OLYER:

All right, good afternoon every… good afternoon? It is afternoon. Welcome, everybody. We’re gonna get started here in one minute.

Okay. Good afternoon. My name is Seth Olyer, president, Oakland Firefighters, Local 55. I want to welcome everybody.

Welcome, all the workers here today showing support for Measure E. Oaklanders coming out to support this incredible, incredibly important measure on the June 2nd ballot.

Again, I’m Seth Olyer. There goes my script. S-E-T-H O-L-Y-E-R, president, Oakland firefighters. And I’d like to pass the mic to Chaney.

ACTIVIST CHANEY TURNER:

Good afternoon everybody. Thanks for joining us this afternoon. My name is Chaney Turner. I’m the director of voter engagement with Oakland Rising Action.

And as Seth said, we are here to show our support for Measure E and also talk to voters about why this is important for all of Oakland.

I want to introduce our honorable Mayor, Barbara Lee, who has a few words to say.

MAYOR BARBARA LEE:

Thank you all very much. And let me just say thank you to Pamela, and thank you to all of our community members, to all of our workers, to all of our organizations for being here today, our pastors.

This is a very important moment in the city’s history, really, in terms of our financial history and where we are today.

And I just wanted to say, my first year as your mayor will be May 20th. Is that tomorrow one year? And this is the first time that I’ve been able to submit my own budget.

Now, let me just be clear. The budget I submitted does not include the parcel tax because it would not be responsible to put forward the budget before any initiative on the ballot had passed.

Read this related article:

But having said that, we have a spending plan… that is a plan… if the parcel tax, Measure E passes, that really supports our city services, it supports our neighborhoods, and I’ll give you an example.

Under the mayor’s budget plan, where we have our senior centers, for example, open four days. If we pass the parcel tax, they’ll be open five days, you know?

So we can’t tolerate just treading water and just barely making it. Oaklanders deserve to move forward. And they deserve not just to survive, but to thrive. And that’s what we do here.

And I just want to say to you. There are... there’s a lot of misinformation out there. Okay? And so we decided — and Miya [Saika Chen] is here. Thank you very much, Miya and to my team, because we have our spending plan laid out in terms of what... and I’ll just show you what Measure E will do.

Don’t believe what people are saying with regard to this is about union raises or COLAs [cost of living increases]. You know, those are just arguments that those who don’t support this are making.

Read this related article:

This is about the services. This is about public safety.

It’s about making sure our illegal dumping strategies work.

It’s about making sure that housing and our unsheltered population have the services and the shelter and the housing that they deserve.

So that’s what Measure E is about. It’s about making good on our promise.

And so believe me, there’s a lot of misinformation out… and Pamela and all of you, I’m glad that you’re here doing this because we need to clarify what the truth is about Measure E.

And so, president Jenkins, why don’t you come up and say a few words? May I yield to the president of the City Council if he, he’ll say, he’s my... our colleague, our friend, our leader of the city council.

And I’m really happy to see you here. And I have to go in just a minute to a rally - another rally.

COUNCIL PRESIDENT KEVIN JENKINS:

Well, Pamela Drake said I wasn’t invited.

But, you know, this is really important for Oakland and the future of Oakland.

And the mayor has come out with a plan that is blessed by council on how we would spend the taxpayers’ money.

If we are so blessed to get Measure E passed, it’s desperately needed to help with our aging infrastructure.

It’s desperately needed to help when it comes to our some of our fire trucks. I think they’re older than me. Some of them, right.

Read this related article:

She said everything’s older than me, but we desperately need this for the city of Oakland.

We are rowing in the right direction and we have to continue that. We have to continue supporting the infrastructure that has been desperately underinvested in.

And so, with the mayor, with city council, we will be accountable to the voters. We’ll be accountable to the taxpayers on how we spend their money in a transparent way. Thank you so much.

WE ARE 100% SUPPORTED BY YOU

Oakland Report accepts no advertising or “sponsored content.” We rely on you, our readers and subscribers, for the financial support we need to produce news stories like this one.

Your donation in any amount helps Oakland Report continue our 501(c)(3) charitable nonprofit work:

Donate now

Learn more

Our new Oakland Beat newsletter provides exclusive reports, commentaries, and inside information on issues that matter, grounded in the evidence and facts that you have come to expect from Oakland Report.

Oakland Beat is offered exclusively for Oakland Report supporting members, but this installment is being made available to all readers.

Become a member of Oakland Report today to receive future installments of Oakland Beat, straight to your inbox. (If you have already donated: thank you.)

Donate today to support our nonprofit work

Donate now

Mayor Barbara Lee, council president Kevin Jenkins, and firefighters union boss Seth Olyer held a rally with public employees to gin up support for Measure E.

Oakland Report obtained video of today’s rally at Oakland City Hall in support of Measure E. (See above for the video, and below for a transcript.)

Rally speakers included Mayor Barbara Lee, council president Kevin Jenkins, firefighters union president Seth Olyer, and Chaney Turner of Oakland Rising Action.

Also in attendance were former councilmember-turned-illegal dumping project manager Rebecca Kaplan, Oakland school board president Jennifer Brouhard, and around 50 others holding signs that said “Yes on E - save our essential services” and “Save our fire stations.”

Transcript

[WORKERS DISASSEMBLING POLITICAL SIGNS]

Take them off. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Of course.

No, I’m not. I’m not.

FIREFIGHTERS UNION PRESIDENT SETH OLYER:

All right, good afternoon every… good afternoon? It is afternoon. Welcome, everybody. We’re gonna get started here in one minute.

Okay. Good afternoon. My name is Seth Olyer, president, Oakland Firefighters, Local 55. I want to welcome everybody.

Welcome, all the workers here today showing support for Measure E. Oaklanders coming out to support this incredible, incredibly important measure on the June 2nd ballot.

Again, I’m Seth Olyer. There goes my script. S-E-T-H O-L-Y-E-R, president, Oakland firefighters. And I’d like to pass the mic to Chaney.

ACTIVIST CHANEY TURNER:

Good afternoon everybody. Thanks for joining us this afternoon. My name is Chaney Turner. I’m the director of voter engagement with Oakland Rising Action.

And as Seth said, we are here to show our support for Measure E and also talk to voters about why this is important for all of Oakland.

I want to introduce our honorable Mayor, Barbara Lee, who has a few words to say.

MAYOR BARBARA LEE:

Thank you all very much. And let me just say thank you to Pamela, and thank you to all of our community members, to all of our workers, to all of our organizations for being here today, our pastors.

This is a very important moment in the city’s history, really, in terms of our financial history and where we are today.

And I just wanted to say, my first year as your mayor will be May 20th. Is that tomorrow one year? And this is the first time that I’ve been able to submit my own budget.

Now, let me just be clear. The budget I submitted does not include the parcel tax because it would not be responsible to put forward the budget before any initiative on the ballot had passed.

Read this related article:

But having said that, we have a spending plan… that is a plan… if the parcel tax, Measure E passes, that really supports our city services, it supports our neighborhoods, and I’ll give you an example.

Under the mayor’s budget plan, where we have our senior centers, for example, open four days. If we pass the parcel tax, they’ll be open five days, you know?

So we can’t tolerate just treading water and just barely making it. Oaklanders deserve to move forward. And they deserve not just to survive, but to thrive. And that’s what we do here.

And I just want to say to you. There are... there’s a lot of misinformation out there. Okay? And so we decided — and Miya [Saika Chen] is here. Thank you very much, Miya and to my team, because we have our spending plan laid out in terms of what... and I’ll just show you what Measure E will do.

Don’t believe what people are saying with regard to this is about union raises or COLAs [cost of living increases]. You know, those are just arguments that those who don’t support this are making.

Read this related article:

This is about the services. This is about public safety.

It’s about making sure our illegal dumping strategies work.

It’s about making sure that housing and our unsheltered population have the services and the shelter and the housing that they deserve.

So that’s what Measure E is about. It’s about making good on our promise.

And so believe me, there’s a lot of misinformation out… and Pamela and all of you, I’m glad that you’re here doing this because we need to clarify what the truth is about Measure E.

And so, president Jenkins, why don’t you come up and say a few words? May I yield to the president of the City Council if he, he’ll say, he’s my... our colleague, our friend, our leader of the city council.

And I’m really happy to see you here. And I have to go in just a minute to a rally - another rally.

COUNCIL PRESIDENT KEVIN JENKINS:

Well, Pamela Drake said I wasn’t invited.

But, you know, this is really important for Oakland and the future of Oakland.

And the mayor has come out with a plan that is blessed by council on how we would spend the taxpayers’ money.

If we are so blessed to get Measure E passed, it’s desperately needed to help with our aging infrastructure.

It’s desperately needed to help when it comes to our some of our fire trucks. I think they’re older than me. Some of them, right.

Read this related article:

She said everything’s older than me, but we desperately need this for the city of Oakland.

We are rowing in the right direction and we have to continue that. We have to continue supporting the infrastructure that has been desperately underinvested in.

And so, with the mayor, with city council, we will be accountable to the voters. We’ll be accountable to the taxpayers on how we spend their money in a transparent way. Thank you so much.

WE ARE 100% SUPPORTED BY YOU

Oakland Report accepts no advertising or “sponsored content.” We rely on you, our readers and subscribers, for the financial support we need to produce news stories like this one.

Your donation in any amount helps Oakland Report continue our 501(c)(3) charitable nonprofit work:

Donate now

Learn more

Editor’s note

Oakland Report is an experiment in a new form of media — focused on evidence, reason, and unflinching analysis of issues that affect our lives, and the city we love.

We present the facts — even the uncomfortable ones — and let our readers decide what to think about them.

Founded in 2023, our nonprofit mission is to provide reasoned, fact-based, well-sourced reporting and analysis on local government issues, led by observable and verifiable evidence free from implicit bias.

Oakland, the soon-to-be greatest city in the world, deserves nothing less.

Don’t miss a beat. Donate to support our nonprofit work.

Donate now

Oakland Report welcomes five new members to the team

As part of our educational nonprofit mission, we’re committed to helping grow the next generation of unbiased, facts-forward media professionals.

In that spirit, Oakland Report has partnered with The Daily Californian newspaper at University of California, Berkeley, to expand our writing and media team over the summer.

Through paid internships, we are bringing on five new team members this summer, including four university students and one high school student.

We’re looking forward to giving you more stories about issues that matter this summer — and more of our unique style of investigative media that you will find nowhere else.

We’re also planning a big move to a new web platform! Stay tuned for more details in the months ahead.

Don’t miss a beat — become a supporting member today

We are 100% supported by you.

Oakland Report accepts no advertising or “sponsored content.” We rely on you, our readers, for the financial support we need to produce deep-dive analysis and unbiased reporting on issues important to you — like our comprehensive parcel tax study, Broken Promises: Oakland’s Measure E.

And we’ve only just begun.

We’re announcing a $50,000 fundraising goal for summer 2026. And we’re thrilled to report that we’re already halfway to our goal. Thanks to two generous individual donors, we’ve raised $25,000 so far. And you can help us get the rest of the way.

Join us as a supporting member today to receive our exclusive new Oakland Beat newsletter, invitations to members-only events, and our everlasting gratitude to our readers who want Oakland to be better — a thriving community of thoughtful, civic-minded readers that you helped us build.

Your one-time or monthly recurring donation in any amount helps Oakland Report continue our 501(c)(3) charitable nonprofit work.

Donate to Oakland Report

Up next: Oakland Beat

Don’t miss a beat. Become a supporting member today and you will receive our new Oakland Beat newsletter — a monthly roundup of exclusive reports, commentaries, deep-dive data and inside information on issues that matter, grounded in the evidence and facts that you have come to expect from Oakland Report.

Here are just a few of the items we have in store for you:

• Look out, Oakland! Public employee unions are coming to your door — and reaching into your wallet (again).

• Oakland is upside-down — and it feels like normal.

• The real reason why CalTrans wants to open Interstate 580 to heavy trucks.

• Data deep-dive: Oakland’s many, many nonprofit contractors — where is all that money going, and what is it doing?

• Why are so many downtown businesses still boarded up, and what can we do about it?

• What is up with paying for sidewalk repairs in front of my property — isn’t that the city’s job?

• Oakland ‘leaders’ scrapbook: portraits of our elected officials and candidates — with no touchups.

• …and much more.

Never fear — we will continue to produce our high-quality flagship Oakland Report as always, with no paywalls and no donation necessary. In fact, we plan to ramp up production of Oakland Report this summer, as noted above.

But in order to achieve our mission and fully restore accountability media in The Town, we need your support. One hundred percent of your donation is applied toward Oakland Report daily operations — including our new student interns.

If you have already donated recently: thank you!

Don’t miss a beat. Become a supporting member today to receive our Oakland Beat newsletter straight to your inbox. Only $8 per month ($96 per year); get additional members-only benefits for greater giving. Your gift is tax-deductible.

Learn more and donate today

Check out a sample of Oakland Beat

About us

Oakland Report is an experiment in a new form of media.

Our mission is to provide reasoned, fact-based, well-sourced reporting and analysis on local government issues in Oakland, California and the surrounding region.

We achieve our mission through producing our nonprofit, independent, citizen-led media outlet, Oakland Report, focused on observable and verifiable evidence free from implicit bias.

We seek integrity, accessibility, and quality in the articles we publish. We seek truth.

Our guiding principles:

• Present the facts and evidence and let the reader judge for themselves.

• Focus on what people and organizations do, not what they say.

• Always remain open to examining and questioning our own biases.

We don’t expect everyone to agree with everything that we publish, but we do expect that the articles are grounded in verifiable evidence and logic so that all observations and conclusions may be rationally challenged.

We started Oakland Report as a volunteer endeavor in 2023 to fill a critical gap in local independent media by producing high-quality, unbiased, unflinching articles by and for the citizens of Oakland and neighboring communities.

A year later, we formed Citizens Oakland, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization to support and continue our work to publish Oakland Report.

Our extended team includes a scientist, a librarian, physicians, journalists, attorneys, technology executives, housing providers and media personalities — all from Oakland, and all deeply committed to helping Oakland achieve its true potential as a world-class city.

We aim to sustain the Oakland Report experiment with no advertisements, “advertorials,” or sponsored content. This is to avoid the conflicts of interest that inevitably arise when needed financial support is tied to such interests.

We strongly believe in and support private enterprise and the essential role it plays in contributing to a thriving community for all. But our work requires independence in order to be successful. We seek to avoid the incentives other media outlets have to publish content that only tells influential people and organizations what they want to hear.

The ghost of civic accountability journalism still haunts the old Oakland Tribune tower — and one day, we aim to move back in and bring it to life once more.

We rely on you, our readers and supporters, to financially support our work. Help us continue and grow Oakland Report by giving a tax-deductible donation today:

Donate to Oakland Report

Thank you.

— The Oakland Report editorial board

Oakland Report managing editor Sean Reinhart talks with local television station KTVU about Oakland’s many taxes on April 17, 2026. Our thanks and appreciation to news anchor Andre Senior and KTVU for having us on their Take 2 in the Morning show. Video courtesy of KTVU.

ABOUT THE EDITOR

Sean S. Reinhart is a former library director, now retired after 26 years in local government. He served as library and community services director for the cities of Hayward and Menlo Park for a combined 16 years, where he helped build Hayward’s new main library and Menlo Park’s new multi-service community center. His post-retirement endeavors include serving as the managing editor of Oakland Report.

Sean and his family have lived in Oakland for 15 years. He grew up in nearby Hayward. Sean enjoys exploring California’s world-renowned coastline, valleys, deserts and mountains. His creative pursuits include writing, printmaking, carpentry, music and visual arts. He enjoys meeting new people, reading, hiking, gardening, and spending time with his family.

Oakland Report continues its coverage of Oakland’s broken promises and deceptive practices with its parcel taxes. Read the full series.

Mayor Barbara Lee asks Oaklanders to pay twice for the city’s broken promises— and the same services

Late Friday afternoon, Mayor Barbara Lee released her ‘mid-cycle’ budget proposal for fiscal year 2026-27, accompanied by a spending plan for Measure E, the $34-million-per-year parcel tax that voters will decide on June 2.1

In a windy press conference held Thursday before her budget proposal was released, the mayor described the plan as “honest” and “fiscally responsible,” stating that the proposed budget is balanced, contains no layoffs, and no longer assumes that the city will have Measure E revenue.2

However, the details of the mayor’s proposed budget and spending plan— which include options if Measure E passes or if voters reject it— show that the city would use Measure E funds to charge Oaklanders twice for obligations the city had promised would be funded by previous tax measures.

Three notable areas of concern are evident in the mayor’s proposal:

1. Mayor Lee’s proposal says that meeting Measure NN’s minimum police staffing requirement now depends on voters approving a second parcel tax: Measure E.

Oakland voters approved Measure NN in 2024, a $47-million-per-year parcel tax for ‘public safety,’ based on its requirement that the city would use the funding to maintain a minimum of 700 sworn police officers. Mayor Lee’s proposal says that the city’s ability to meet Measure NN’s 700-officer requirement now depends on voters approving another $34-million-per-year parcel tax on June 2: Measure E. (Notably, the Measure E parcel tax would be in addition to, not replacing Measure NN.)

2. ‘Saving’ services that supposedly were ‘saved’ by previous tax measures

According to the mayor’s proposed spending plan, Measure E funds would provide no new services. It would only ‘save’ and ‘maintain’ existing services— like 911 response times and emergency responders— which previous tax measures, including Measure NN, the city promised voters would ‘save’ and ‘sustain’ those same services.

3. Diverting Measure NN funds to fire equipment— while failing to keep Measure NN’s core promises for police staffing

In the mayor’s proposed spending plan, Measure NN funds would be diverted to fire equipment that is not specifically authorized in the measure— while simultaneously saying that Measure NN is insufficient to meet its clearly stated and specific requirements around minimum police staffing.

These concerns are not about whether the police department or fire department are more deserving or more in need of additional funding above and beyond the significant amounts Oaklanders already pay for these fundamental services. The concerns center around the city’s apparent inability or unwillingness to meet its own clearly stated obligations and keep the promises it made to voters who were led to believe they had already ‘saved’ these services with previous tax measures.

Mayor Lee says that Measure NN-funded police staffing now depends on voters approving another parcel tax: Measure E

Measure NN, the $47-million-per-year parcel tax approved by Oakland voters in November 2024 on a promise of ‘public safety,’ requires the City to “budget for, hire and maintain a minimum of seven hundred (700) sworn police personnel” by July 1, 2026.3

Under the terms of Measure NN, if the City fails to budget for 700 officers, the city’s collection of the Measure NN parcel tax revenue would be suspended for that fiscal year (and an associated parking tax surcharge for twelve months), unless the city council declares an “extreme fiscal necessity” exception— as it has done repeatedly in past tax measures.4

The City is currently out of compliance with Measure NN’s minimum staffing requirement. The city’s 2025-27 two-year budget— approved by City Council last June, after Measure NN passed— funds only 678 sworn officers.

A report from city administrator Jestin D. Johnson estimated in February that keeping the promise the city made in Measure NN would now cost Oaklanders an additional approximately $18.6 million: $11.6 million for three additional police academies and $6.9 million for the additional officers.5

The mayor’s new ‘mid-cycle’ budget proposal does not propose to solve this problem using the Measure NN funds approved by voters for that purpose, nor by using the city’s General Purpose Fund. Instead, the mayor’s spending plan would fund the 22 additional sworn positions and another police academy from the hoped-for new parcel tax, Measure E.

In other words, the mayor’s proposed path to comply with Measure NN’s central voter-approved requirement— the 700-officer staffing minimum— runs through a different, additional tax.

Notably, if Measure E fails on June 2, the mayor’s proposal offers no plan to meet the 700-officer budget requirement, and the city council would presumably need to invoke Measure NN’s “extreme fiscal necessity” loophole for a third consecutive year.

The “extreme fiscal necessity” exception was meant for severe and unanticipated financial events— for example, the Great Recession of 2008, or the global pandemic and economic crash of 2020. Using it to absorb a foreseeable, structural budget gap— one the city’s own reports have identified for years— appears to stretch the exception well beyond its plain meaning.

The mayor’s transmittal letter acknowledges the bind without naming it directly, conceding that the budget “sustains the police department’s staffing levels”— not increases them— and warning of “longer emergency response times, reduced patrol presence, [and] delayed investigations” as a result.

‘Saving’ services that supposedly were ‘saved’ by previous tax measures

A second concern is evident in the mayor’s new plan for spending Measure E parcel tax funds, if voters approve the measure on June 2.

According to the mayor’s plan, roughly $9.4 million of Measure E’s first-year revenue would be directed to the purchase of fire trucks, fire engines, and ambulances.

At Thursday’s press conference, city administrator Jestin D. Johnson and mayor Lee stood in front of a 29-year-old fire engine that, according to Oakland Fire Department has been in operation roughly twice as long as national replacement standards recommend.6

The mayor’s transmittal letter links these older yet still-in-service vehicles to an implicit threat that the city has used multiple times over the past 20 years as a tactic to spur voters to approve new taxes: “Our fire engines and trucks are well beyond their useful lives and are in danger of failure. If the City does not have operating engines and trucks, we will be forced to close firehouses.”

Read this related article:

Buying replacement equipment is not the same as expanding or even ‘saving’ service. The Measure E spending plan does not add fire companies, does not add or reopen fire stations, and does not add firefighters. The $9.4 million instead would be for capital expenditures to replace equipment that is aging but still in active use.

The premise of the mayor’s proposal appears to be that once delivered, registered, equipped, and put into service— often a multi-year process for fire apparatus— the fire department would then continue operating its existing stations at existing staffing levels. That is a service baseline, not a service increase nor arguably even ‘saving’ fire services, a refrain voters have heard many times in election seasons past.

The Yes on E campaign has consistently described the measure as “designed to maintain fire protection services and emergency response times.”7 The mayor’s proposed spending plan says funds will “protect 911 fire and emergency medical response times by keeping fire stations open, equipped, and fully operational.”

Voters reading those sentences may consider what, precisely, they are getting that they do not already have, or have not already paid for in multiple past tax increases?

The answer, for the largest fire-related line in the spending plan, is this: the equipment replacements the city claims are necessary to keep what exists from collapsing.

That may be a defensible use of city resources— aging fire apparatus is a genuine concern— but it is materially different from improving response times or expanding service.

Diverting Measure NN funds to unauthorized uses

The third and potentially most significant concern with the mayor’s proposal is evident in the overall (non-Measure-E) portion of the proposed ‘mid-cycle’ budget.

According to the mayor’s proposal, the city would use Measure NN funds to purchase additional fire equipment (fire helmets, turnout gear, defibrillators and CPR machines) above and beyond what the city now is saying Measure E will cover.8

This appears to be a violation of the permissible uses of Measure NN revenue.

The text of Measure NN is unambiguous on this point. Section 3 of the measure limits the use of tax proceeds to costs “relating to or arising from efforts to achieve the following desired goals”:

1. Reducing homicides, robberies, car jackings and break-ins, domestic violence, and gun-related violence.

2. Improving emergency 911 response times and quality of response.

3. Reducing the incidence of human trafficking including the sexual exploitation of minors.

4. Administrative expenses associated with furthering (1)-(3) above.

Section 5 then enumerates the specific permissible uses:

• 911 dispatch and emergency responders

• Community ambassadors

• Community policing

• Crime lab operations

• Crime reduction teams

• Domestic violence intervention

• Group violence intervention

• Hospital-based violence intervention

• Mental health services

• Mobile crisis responders

• Violence interruption

• Violent crime investigations

• Similar programs.

Fire equipment is not specified on that list. Nor does it appear to be reasonably inferred from it, except perhaps by stretching the meaning of “emergency responders” to include gear like fire helmets and jackets.

Measure NN already allocates $3 million per year for “the Oakland Fire Department and associated administrative expenses”— an amount that increases according to the Consumer Price Index, a common measurement of inflation. That allocation is explicitly tied to the “emergency responders” objective noted elsewhere in the measure’s text.

Meanwhile, as noted above, the mayor’s proposal states that Measure NN funds are insufficient to fulfill the measure’s very specific promise/requirement of maintaining a minimum 700 sworn police officers.

Why the mayor, city administrator, and finance director did not account for this apparent violation of the Measure NN requirements in their budget proposal and spending plan is unclear.

Read this related article:

Implications for Measure E

If voters approve Measure E on June 2, Oakland homeowners will be charged a third, overlapping, $34-million-per-year parcel tax to ‘save’ public safety services— on top of Measure NN’s $47-million-per-year parcel tax, and Measure MM’s $2.7-million-per-year parcel tax that applies only in certain elevated-wildfire-risk zones.

If voters reject Measure E, the $40 million budget gap that was created when the city council irresponsibly budgeted that revenue without actually having an approved tax measure would, according to the mayor’s alternate spending plan, result in “longer emergency response times, reduced patrol presence, [and] delayed investigations.”

Alternatively, the city could seek to close the gap by reallocating previously committed resources from the city’s General Purpose Fund, or by invoking the “extreme fiscal necessity” loophole for a third consecutive year.

Mayor Lee’s transmittal letter is right that “the City must earn the trust of the Oaklanders we serve.” Trust, in this context, means honoring the conditions voters attached to the last measure before asking them to approve the next one.

The mid-cycle budget asks Oaklanders to approve a new tax to fix the city’s self-inflicted tax compliance problem— and, in the same package, proposes diverting the previous tax to items it does not specifically authorize.

The City Council begins budget deliberations on Monday, June 1— one day before the June 2 election when voters decide Measure E. The deadline for city council to adopt the budget is June 30.

📖

Editors’ note: Oakland has an embarrassment of riches

As we have noted throughout this series, taxes are necessary for a safe, functioning society. That fact is not up for serious debate.

But what happens when the government fails to provide the services it promised in exchange for new taxes— as has happened in Oakland multiple times now?

In Oakland, the city’s answer routinely is to collect even more taxes.

After years of cumulative tax increases, Oakland charges the highest taxes per capita in the state compared to similar cities.9

This past year, Oakland collected a record-high level of total governmental revenue— more than $1.6 billion.10

In recent years, Oakland has dramatically increased its revenue by convincing voters to approve multiple new taxes— many of them on the promise of maintaining and improving police and fire services.

The city’s revenues from voter-approved special taxes have increased by 379% compared to 20 years ago.11 That’s over 6 times higher than the cumulative change in inflation over that same period.12

The city’s financial problems are not unlike those now faced by Oakland Unified School District (OUSD), which is deep in the throes of its own multimillion-dollar budget deficit, and appears to be on the brink of state receivership— again.

Alameda County superintendent of schools Alysse Castro, who oversees the school district’s finances, has issued multiple warning letters to the school board about its chronic fiscal mismanagement. Castro’s most recent letter, issued on April 16 stated her professional perspective in simple and clear terms:13

“This is not a revenue problem— it is a decision-making problem.”

We want to hear from you, our readers, what you think about Oakland’s taxes and the services Oaklanders receive in return. We also want to hear what you think about this series. Write a comment, send us a note, and share this article with others.

Most importantly: subscribe to our mailing list, share our stories, and please consider giving a tax-deductible donation to help us continue our nonprofit work.

WE ARE 100% SUPPORTED BY YOU

Oakland Report accepts no advertising or “sponsored content.” We rely on you, our readers and subscribers, for the financial support we need to produce news stories like this one.

Your donation in any amount helps Oakland Report continue our 501(c)(3) charitable nonprofit work:

Donate now

Learn more

Read our comprehensive report on Oakland’s parcel taxes:

Oakland Report continues its coverage of Oakland’s broken promises and deceptive practices with its parcel taxes. Read the full series.

Alameda County Treasurer Henry Levy concedes his statement that Measure E will ‘lower tax rates for a majority of homeowners’ lacked factual support

In the “Argument in Favor” of Oakland’s Measure E published in the county’s official Voter Information Guide, Alameda County Treasurer Henry “Hank” Levy stated:

“Join me and Oakland Firefighters in supporting YES on E for safer streets, cleaner neighborhoods, and a healthier community while lowering tax rates for a majority of homeowners.”

– Alameda County Treasurer Henry “Hank” Levy, in the official voter guide1

However, subsequent emails Levy exchanged with an Oakland resident — obtained by Oakland Report — raise questions about the factual basis for Levy’s claim.

What expiring assessment?

3.42MB ∙ PDF file

Download

Email exchange between Alameda County Treasurer Henry Levy and an Oakland resident on May 5. In his email, Levy admits that he needs to "better understand how many people would end up paying more under Measure E," despite definitively claiming in the official Voter Guide that the measure would result in "lowering tax rates for most homeowners."

Download

In the email exchange, the resident asked Levy to provide data to prove his campaign statement in the Voter Information Guide about “lowering tax rates for most homeowners.”

In response, Levy conceded — after his endorsement in the Voter Information Guide had already been published and mailed to voters — that he doesn’t know whether the so-called ‘expiring’ tax, the Police and Fire Retirement System (“PFRS”) tax, would actually decrease or expire next year.2

Levy wrote:

“I am in the middle of analyzing all of this.... I am trying to figure out if it [the PFRS tax] will decrease next year.”

– Alameda County Treasurer Henry Levy, in an email to an Oakland resident, May 5.

The resident responded:

“It’s surprising that the campaign for E publishes a firm quote from you while you indicate here that it is still an open question.... You state on campaign literature that Measure E will ‘lower tax rates for a majority of homeowners.’”

– Oakland resident [name redacted for per our confidentiality policy], in an email to Henry Levy, May 5.

Levy replied that supporters of Measure E were “saying” the PFRS tax would retire this year. Notably, he did not state that he knew this to be true, nor did he provide any evidence supporting the claim. Instead, Levy stated that he is “in the middle of… trying to figure out” whether his endorsement claim is actually true.

Levy further admitted:

“This conversation suggests to me that I should ask the Assessor for a breakdown of the frequency of assessed values to better understand how many people would end up paying more under the Measure E flat tax proposal than what they are paying now for the Police and Fire [PFRS] bond, whether it is completely retired or not.”

– Alameda County Treasurer Hank Levy, in an email to an Oakland resident

Levy’s statements suggest that key public claims used to promote Measure E — such as that it will “lower taxes for most homeowners” — were made before the underlying facts had been verified.

Read this related article:

‘No responsive documents’

The concerns deepen in light of a Public Records Act request from another Oakland resident seeking documents supporting Levy’s assertions.

According to Alameda County’s response, no responsive documents existed.

When questioned further, County representatives replied that any related communications would not constitute public records because Levy may have been acting in his “private capacity” — despite invoking his official title in the published endorsement.

Letter to Office of Alameda County Counsel. Re: California Public Records Act Request No. PRR-00273

111KB ∙ PDF file

Download

Apr. 23, 2026. This is a follow-up to Public Records Act request no. PRR-00273, pursuant to Government Code section 7920.000 et seq. The Public Records Act request asked for the following documents, from January 1, 2025 through the present: 1. All documents referring or relating to claims made that passage of Oakland Measure E, coming up on the June 2026 election, will result in lowering taxes for most Oakland homeowners. 2. All documents referring or relating to claims made that an Oakland property assessment is expiring or will be expiring soon. 3. All communications to or from Hank Levy referring or relating to the above categories of documents. 4. All communications to or from Hank Levy regarding proposed support of Oakland Measure E.

Download

Taken together, these events raise additional questions about transparency and accountability from public officials — and whether Oakland voters and taxpayers were misled by public supporters of Measure E with unsupported assumptions rather than verified facts.

WE ARE 100% SUPPORTED BY YOU

Oakland Report accepts no advertising or “sponsored content.” We rely on you, our readers, for the financial support we need to produce news stories like this one.

Your donation in any amount helps Oakland Report continue our 501(c)(3) charitable nonprofit work:

Donate now

Learn more

Oakland Report is an experiment in a new form of media: reasoned, fact-based, well-sourced analysis focused on observable and verifiable evidence. We present the facts and let the reader decide. Learn more at oaklandreport.org.

Oakland Recap provides summaries of public meetings that catch our attention.

‘It’s not about what we say, it’s about what we do’

Council public works and transportation committee, May 12, agenda item #5.

Yesterday the council public works and transportation committee voted to advance a proposed illegal dumping expenditures action (‘IDEA’) plan to the full city council on May 19.1

Two committee members whose neighborhoods are heavily impacted by illegal dumping — Ken Houston (District 7) and Noel Gallo (District 5) — expressed their frustration with the proposal.

Their remarks appeared to be directed at times to city staff, to committee chair Zac Unger seated to their right, and to former councilmember-turned-illegal dumping project manager Rebecca Kaplan, who was seated in the audience.

Houston and Gallo’s remarks focused on what they described as yet another plan — and expense — that was long on policy talk, but short on practical solutions to the city’s chronic illegal dumping challenges.

Committee member Charlene Wang (District 2) and council member Rowena Brown (at-large, not a committee member) focused their remarks on technocratic questions about the plan.

Council member Carroll Fife (District 3) — who does not serve on the committee, but whose district is significantly impacted by illegal dumping — expressed thanks and commended Kaplan for her work.

Committee chair Unger (District 1), who co-sponsored the Apr. 14 legislation with mayor Lee, offered no remarks.

Editor’s note: See above for the video and below for a transcript of Houston’s remarks. See below for the video and a transcript of Gallo’s remarks.

‘Where is that money going?’: 20 years of spending, 20 years of ever-growing trash

On April 23, Oakland City Auditor Michael C. Houston released a 56-page performance audit that found Oakland’s spending on illegal dumping has climbed nearly fivefold over two decades while the volume of dumped material has continued to rise.2 The audit issued 17 recommendations; only four were marked as “Complete.”

As Oakland Report documented in our reporting on former council member Rebecca Kaplan’s long involvement in the city’s illegal dumping activities,3 the city administrator hired Kaplan shortly after she left elected office — without a public recruitment or hiring announcement — as an “illegal dumping project manager” paid $149,410 per year plus benefits.4

Read this related article:

The $1.1 million ‘IDEA’ plan does not address the audit’s primary recommendation: renegotiating Oakland’s $1 billion Waste Management hauling contract, in which Kaplan played a key role negotiating and approving on the council.

Waste Management’s $53.36 minimum residential trash pickup fee for its Oakland customers is 56% higher than the regional average for cities served by the same hauler.

The ‘IDEA’ plan aims to operationalize the Apr. 14 legislative package from mayor Lee and council member Unger, which increased dumping fines to up to $5,000, criminalized using one’s vehicle to dump, and exempted encampment waste from the “illegal dumping” definition.5

Additionally, a proposed State Senate Bill 1218 (Arreguín), sponsored by the city of Oakland, would direct the DMV to block vehicle registration for unpaid dumping citations, if the bill is ultimately approved by the legislature and signed by the governor.

Drones, equipment and no-bid contracts

The auditor’s report highlighted Oakland’s poor track record on illegal dumping enforcement, which the ‘IDEA’ plan aims to improve.

According to the audit, Oakland received over 25,000 calls (to 311) about dumping, and removed at least 15 million pounds of trash, yet issued only 273 citations and collected fines from only 25 of them.

The audit also found that the city’s Environmental Enforcement Unit “lacks internal organization,” with no written policies, conflicting roles, insufficient training, and a five-month period in late 2024 when it patrolled only a 20-block stretch of East Oakland.

In the ‘IDEA’ plan, four of the ten line items — $515,000 total — would be awarded as no-bid contracts, along with waivers of Oakland’s competitive bidding and local/small business contracting rules:

• $190,000 to Big Truck Rental of Tampa, Florida for grapple-truck rentals.

• $150,000 to San Francisco AI-drone startup Aerbits, Inc. for an aerial imagery (drone camera) pilot.

• $100,000 to Verizon via California’s CALNET master agreement.

• $75,000 to Security Lines U.S. for additional cameras. The Security Lines contract expansion would bring cumulative spending with that vendor to roughly $910,000 since 2022.67

The plan’s largest single line item expense is $300,000 in staff overtime. During the May 12 committee meeting, city staff confirmed that the city only has eight positions on its Environmental Enforcement Officers team — five of which are filled, two vacant, and one frozen.

The plan also funds $95,000 in cleanup equipment and $90,000 to revive the “Bulky Block Parties” program the city shuttered in 2024.

Read this related article:

The ‘IDEA’ staff report does not fully address the relationship between dumping hot spots and Oakland’s homeless encampments. Oakland’s unsheltered population grew 10% from 2022 to 2024, even as Alameda County’s declined 3%.8

The auditor reported that the city’s encampment management team removed 5,428 tons of debris from encampments in 2025 — 50% more than the 3,617 tons collected citywide by illegal-dumping cleanup crews — after a ‘garbage-blitz’ effort diverted cleanups to encampment work.

The ‘IDEA’ plan responds to some audit recommendations, such as expanding outreach, new citation software, and camera evaluation. But it bypasses several others: renegotiating the Waste Management contract; implementing low-income renter subsidies; imposing commercial special assessments on the thousands of Oakland businesses without trash service; and working to make the English-only 311 call service multilingual.

Don’t miss a beat. Donate to Oakland Report to support our nonprofit work:

Donate to Oakland Report

Learn more

Video and transcript of council member Noel Gallo’s remarks on the ‘IDEA’ plan

It’s not about what we say, it’s about what we do, and sometimes we — some of us writing policy and recommendations, I never see you on the street picking anything up. I’ve been here for many years, but I never see people out. But they’re going to tell me how to do it, what to do, and when to do it.

So those are realities. You can shake your head and growl, but the reality is, I have seen Oakland in many different ways, and one of the realities that we’re facing: we have a contract with a Waste Management company that can’t deliver the service to allow Noel to go dump at Waste Management, and not create a bulky pick-up where I won’t have all my workers doing overtime work, with dumpsters and trucks where I could go to Waste Management like other cities do.

I go to Tucson, Arizona; I get to go. If I have a bill, I go straight to the dump yard [run by] Waste Management. And they only charge me $30, not $300. So I don’t have to go to the public works yard, and [then] the public works yard has got to go to the Waste Management yard.

So I think that for those that wrote these policies, please come out and help me. We’re out there every day. We’ve been out there every day for ten years picking it up. I’m not sitting here just making more excuses. All right?

So the reality is that we have to deal with Waste Management and what the city’s not doing — city employees are not doing administratively, sitting here at City Hall. Because there are many businesses in Oakland that don’t have a garbage license. So what they do is they come and leave it on the corner down the street so we can pick it up, and we’re not charging any fees.

Certainly at one time, public works used to do that on a daily basis early in the morning: clean the streets up, pick it up and make it clean, not only dealing with graffiti, but dealing with, I mean, garbage, but dealing with the graffiti.

You never saw graffiti throughout the city because we used to have cameras in certain places, and the police department would go with me at nighttime to capture those doing the graffiti and arrest them.

And I still get people from the sheriff’s department that come volunteer with me because they illegally dump or they did graffiti, but they’re coming from the city of Fremont, Castro Valley. I don’t see any people in Oakland getting arrested or cited to come work off their tickets. And they’re coming from other cities in Alameda County.

So what I’m asking the city administration, where is that franchise fee dollar doing that illegal — where like one or two cities in the state that ever did that because they went to court and sued the city because that was illegal, because the voters never paid for that or voted for that, but we’re still collecting $28 million — where is that money going? That’s supposed to be going back, keeping our streets clean.

So if you need to report that not only that fee, but also the cannabis operations, because I still remember when I was here, when we started, that they used to bring their trucks and give us millions of dollars. But now we changed the process of where is that money going to a city administration to keep this city safe and clean?

So for me, it’s, you know, we can do a lot of writing, a lot of talking, but I want to see those who wrote it and put it together, come on the street and help do it. So you know what the hell is going on in the neighborhood. You can see it yourself. Get your hands dirty.

It’s easy for me to sit here all day long writing to do this and do that and over here and feel sorry. But the reality is we need to hire more people within public works.

And if you go to public works today, right now, you’re going to see trucks — 50, 60 trucks that are not working because we don’t have the mechanics. We used to have ten mechanics, but I only have three, and the trucks are sitting because I drive city trucks every weekend and throughout the week. But most of the time they’re not working, and your people are not able to go and collect the trash and do what you’re saying we should be doing.

So for me, Oakland needs to get its act together, and public works transportation. We need to have that cooperation, not just with Waste Management, but California Waste Solutions, because they used to bring the big trucks on Saturdays to volunteer and help me clean up. But now, they don’t do that anymore because, the city — well, somebody, something’s going on with negotiations.

So for me it’s, whether you’re in West Oakland and East Oakland, I think what we need to do is improve the delivery of service. I don’t need more laws and more ordinances, I need to get the job done, as we’ve done in many years in the past.

And so the only other recommendation I have for you: you want to do education? Well, we used to receive that information in our high schools. No, it’s not okay for you to throw your trash out the window as we’re doing today. And it’s not okay for your school to be like it is in the condition today, because the youngsters used to volunteer to keep it clean every day. And that’s my high school years. I used to, once a month, they’d make us all work around the school, inside the school, in the neighborhood, to make sure that neighbors saw us caring for the community.

So I think that there are many ways to get this done, but at the end of the day, Waste Management has a dump yard that we can go and dump our trash like we do when we pick it up during the week, and it’s over: it’s clean. But Waste Management, California Waste Solutions, Civic Corps would be out on the streets daily unloading your trash cans, picking up whatever’s on the sidewalk and on the streets.

And so we need to get back to the work attitude. And that’s one of the things that’s missing in all these policies that I’m creating and doing this and that — but it’s about work.

It’s about cleaning Chinatown. I can write all the laws I want, but unless you get out and go clean it, it’s not going to change.

So what I ask is that, you know, be able to report back in terms of: what is the condition of Oakland, of public works, what is their need to fix those vehicles? How many more employees do they have, because many are not here anymore?

As an example, and I’ll leave you with: go to the public works yard and Coliseum Way. You’ve been there lately? In front of Oakland’s public works yard, it should be the cleanest area around, as a demonstration of cleanliness. It is dumped left and right. You come out with your truck, it’s the whole street. Even though I asked to put no parking at any time [signs], it is filled with garbage and trash and we allowed that in front of our property, and that’s a role model. We need to correct that.

But go take a look, go take a look and then you can decide what to write and what to do. But at the end of the day, I need more individuals working with public works and make sure that their vehicles are repaired and are able to assist the workers that we do have.

So anyway, thank you. I know, I don’t mean to express my frustration, but Oakland’s got to get its act together. And it’s not about how many laws and rules I have. We’ve got to go get it.

Look at Lake Merritt. You used to help me with Lake Merritt. Look where it is today. Not like where it used to be, where you had Olympic trials, people wandering, the high school kids all rowing at Lake Merritt. But nowadays, well, I’m not going to go to Lake Merritt, I’ll go somewhere else.

So anyways, thank you, but, and I do value that, and it’s more about than just $1 million. You got to remember that through Waste Management, they collect $36 million a year in my garbage bill on top of the garbage bill I have to pay on a monthly basis. Thank you.

– Council member Noel Gallo, May 12, 2026.

Transcript of council member Ken Houston’s remarks on the ‘IDEA’ plan

You know how ridiculous this sounds? When we’re talking about illegal dumping —in other cities, when they’re talking about other issues? Why is that? Why is that? It’s because we’re just cleaning up, cleaning up instead of deterrence. Why are we spending all this time and resources, on what? Clean up. It’s called deterrence.

The city of Oakland has the same equipment that Waste Management has. I don’t know other cities that have that. That’s ridiculous. Sitting on this council, I’m the only council member here that’s prosecuted a graffiti vandal and an illegal dumper.

Through Nancy O’Malley with supervisor Nate Miley, we had stopped and slowed it down. Then after Nancy left, the prosecution stopped. Now that we have another district attorney — she’s willing to prosecute. She’s running for office right now.

We have to deter this crime, council member Unger. It’s not called clean up, clean up, clean up, fine, fine, fine.

That’s why I said the information that the EEO’s [Environmental Enforcement Officers] are very, very important to this system, because they’re the ones that are on the ground that need to be protected. They’re the ones that are on the ground that will collect and go through the indicia to find out the individuals that are committing this crime against our community.

So if they have the information and the data that they can turn over in the proper way to the district attorney, we can prosecute these individuals that are committing crimes against our community: illegal dumpers and graffiti vandals, which is a visual cue of deterioration that attracts illegal dumping.

Let me give you a story.

Ten years ago, there was some huge, huge illegal dumping on San Leandro Boulevard. I went out, it was like 12:30, 1:00 at night. I saw this guy dump and I said, hey, you know, I want to, yeah, what makes you feel that you can dump here?

You know what he said to me? He said if they can tag and do graffiti vandalism for 30 minutes, I can dump it in ten. Right?

So my message is this: clean up is fine. We have to clean up and keep it clean. Because Noel’s been out there all the time, cleaning up, cleaning up, and spending his time just cleaning up our city. That’s unacceptable. He could be doing other things, right? We need to deter these individuals that are committing crimes against our community.

I’m gonna say it one more time: in my priorities, it was real simple. There was three: public safety, homeless and housing. I addressed that with the EAP [Encampment Abatement Program] and public safety.

We need to address it in a way that we can spend our time worrying about our seniors, worrying about our children, worrying about our homeless individuals that need housing, instead of talking about dumping — which people should know better to do it anyway, because I’m gonna tell you, much of the dumping in my community is coming from my community, from down the street with bags and stuff. I don’t know if it’s because of the size of the garbage bags, the garbage containers or not; we’re working on that also.

So my main point right now is to get money — that money that was promised for the EEO’s to be safe for themselves, to be safe, and to be able to be trained to identify hazardous and contaminated materials so that information can be documented and turned over to the district attorney, so these individuals that are committing crimes against our community can be prosecuted.

Because it is hurtful that I have to walk through this, my children, my seniors... it is sad.

I yield the floor.

– Council member Ken Houston, May 12, 2026.

Oakland Report provides accurate, unflinching, data-driven reporting and analysis that you will find nowhere else.

If you value our work, please donate. All contributions go directly to sustaining and growing our nonprofit work:

Donate to Oakland Report

Learn more

Note: This article has been updated from its original version to reflect the correct title for Environmental Enforcement Officers, the April 14 legislation sponsors, and the current public works and transportation committee membership.

Oakland Agenda Watch provides summaries of key items on upcoming public meeting agendas that catch our attention.

A total systems failure in tax collection

Council finance and management committee, May 12, 2026, agenda item #3.

The council’s finance and management committee will review a new report from the Oakland City Auditor that examined the city’s business tax collections process.1 The audit found what amounts to a total systems failure: the city failed to collect an estimated $9 million to $12 million in business taxes due to the city.2

The city’s leadership conceded that the audit’s central findings were true, indicating that they “generally agreed with the report’s findings and recommendations.”

The auditor’s report on the city’s organizational dysfunction comes at a time when the city is simultaneously:

• Collecting the highest amount of tax revenue in its history.

• Sitting on 840 vacant staff positions worth an estimated $136 million per year.

• Asking voters to let the city forgive an estimated $2.2 million in revenue through a business tax holiday (Measure C).

• Asking voters to increase taxes on homeowners through a new $34 million annual parcel tax (Measure E) to ‘save’ fire stations and public safety services.

In this context, the audit’s findings raise a question: if the city apparently can’t be bothered to collect the taxes it is already owed; or fill the staff positions it already has on the books; or balance its budget despite record-high revenues — then why should voters trust it with even more taxes?

City failed to collect up to $12 million in business tax revenue due to mismanagement

The audit reviewed business tax collection practices across three fiscal years, and compared Oakland’s performance to ten benchmarked municipalities, including Los Angeles, San Diego, San Francisco, and San Jose.

Auditors found that the city’s Tax Compliance Division — the unit responsible for researching delinquent business tax accounts and handing them off to collections — essentially stopped working in late 2022.

Over the three-year audit period, the Tax Compliance Division sent only two batches of delinquent accounts to collections: 407 accounts totaling $1.5 million in 2022, and 4,187 accounts totaling $14 million in 2024.

Zero delinquent accounts were sent to collections in 2023. Some delinquencies from 2020 remained unprocessed as of June 30, 2024.

The audit estimates that in a normal year the city should refer $9 million to $12 million in delinquent accounts to collections — money the city was simply leaving on the table, uncollected.

Performance audit of the Revenue Management Bureau’s business tax collections process

1.98MB ∙ PDF file

Download

The audit found the Bureau did not collect all revenue that was due to the City, and that, during the period of the review, the Bureau reduced or ceased multiple activities that led to reductions in the revenues that could have been collected.

Download

City failed to research 97% of delinquent business tax liens

According to the audit, zero delinquent business tax lien proposals were brought to the city council for 19 months. During that time, the share of liens involving delinquencies more than two years old nearly doubled from under 12% to over 21%.

In California, business taxes carry a three-year statute of limitations.3 Every month a delinquent account lingers without action moves that revenue closer to becoming permanently noncollectable.

When the 2024 batch of 4,187 accounts finally landed in collections, the audit found that over 97% had not been researched, no contact attempts had been made, no notes were attached, and no supporting documentation accompanied them.

The Collections Division — already responsible for every type of collection in the city — had to do the Tax Compliance Division’s work over again. As of May 2025, Collections had worked through only about 1,000 of them — less than a quarter of the backlog.

City lacks performance management and monitoring systems

“Members of [Revenue] Bureau leadership stated that they did not know what was happening in the Tax Compliance Division. Regular meetings with the Tax Administrator all but ceased.”

— Michael C. Houston, Oakland City Auditor, Apr. 1, 2026

The audit found that the city’s revenue bureau had no meaningful performance management or monitoring systems in place, leading to multiple systems failures including:

• Systemic lack of adequate internal controls or segregation of duties.

• The city stopped using California Franchise Tax Board data and stopped doing field inspections in 2023.

• Nearly 75% of manual adjustments to amounts owed were entered by non-supervisory staff, with no required second-person approvals. $2.7 million in manual adjustments were made under these deficient conditions.

• Business discovery activities — the systematic identification of businesses operating in Oakland that have not registered to pay business taxes — dropped 48% from 2023 to 2024.

Management tracked only total revenue collected, and apparently did not examine the underlying figures. According to the audit, that lead to a failure to detect the collapse in collections because Measure T, the 2022 progressive business tax increase, was driving the topline up even as the collections process broke down.

More money left on the table: the city’s vacant payroll

The city’s systems failures extend beyond revenue collection from tax bills.

As of February 1, the city was sitting on 840 vacant employee positions worth up to $136 million per year — nearly 20% of its budgeted workforce of 4,264 full-time-equivalent (FTE) positions.4

A citywide staffing report in February revealed that the city had 3,255 filled positions, 169 “encumbered” positions (held for overtime, temporary staffing, underfilled positions, or acting assignments), and 840 vacant positions.

This is not a one-time bottleneck. The city’s vacancy rate has, with brief interruptions, remained consistent at roughly 18% to 20% for over four years. These are positions the city has been budgeting payroll for, year after year, while not delivering the services those positions exist to provide — and while artificially driving up the city’s claimed budget deficit and “extreme fiscal necessity.”

The city’s 2025-27 budget eliminated approximately 400 positions to close roughly $65 million in two-year deficit, an average loaded cost of about $162,000 per eliminated position.5

According to the city’s own figures, this means that the city’s 840 vacant, unfrozen positions are worth up to $136 million per year in budget capacity — a range that nearly matches the city’s own projected structural deficit of $115 million to $135 million per year through 2030.

Despite booming tax revenues, the city declared “extreme fiscal necessity” and went back to the voters for more taxes

Over the last 20 years, Oakland’s governmental fund revenue has grown 91%. In 2025 the city collected over $1.6 billion in governmental fund revenue, the highest amount in its history.

Yet while it collects more revenue than ever before, the city has projected ongoing structural deficits of $115 million to $135 million annually through 2030.6 It has declared a state of “extreme fiscal necessity” for nearly two years — a declaration that allows the council to override voter-approved spending mandates on restricted-fund measures like Measure NN.7

The point is not that Oakland’s finances are healthy in every respect; they are not. The point is that voters are being asked to accept the framing that the city has a revenue problem when in fact the ten-year picture shows revenue at record highs and rising at 4.7% annually.

Now this new audit documents that even within that already-growing revenue base, the city was not collecting taxes already due under existing law.

Businesses good, homeowners bad: Oakland City Council

It is in this context that the city is now asking Oakland voters to approve two tax-related measures on the June 2 ballot: one that rewards businesses, and one that penalizes homeowners.

Measure C is being promoted as relief for business owners and a way to stimulate the city’s moribund business economy. It would suspend the gross receipts tax for one year in 2027 (renewable for up to three years by the city council) for existing small businesses earning under $1 million annually and for up to $1 million in receipts for any new business opening in Oakland.

The city’s failure to follow up on delinquent accounts put $9 million to $12 million per year at risk — and now Measure C is asking voters to forgo another $2.2 million in these taxes.8

Measure E is being promoted as necessary to ‘save’ fire stations and public safety services like 911 dispatch. Notably, these services were supposedly ‘saved’ two years ago when voters approved the very similar Measure NN.9

Measure E would charge homeowners approximately $34 million annually for nine years. It would be in addition to, not replacing the Measure NN tax.

As Oakland Report has documented, up to $14.9 million per year of the revenue from Measure E — roughly 44% — will be absorbed by union pay raises in every year going forward.10 The city’s public employee unions are campaigning heavily for the measure, spending nearly half a million dollars on signature-gatherers and advertising.11

Measure E essentially would penalize homeowners for the city’s financial failures — in a city that was recently reported to have the worst housing market in the nation.12

Voters are asked to fix problems the city created for itself – again

Oakland Report has extensively documented Oakland’s habit of using the ballot box as a cash machine to compensate for the city’s fiscal dysfunction, including:

• Approving pay raises that exceed the rate of inflation and cost-of-living.13

• Raiding voter-approved restricted funds.14

• Selling public assets to cover operating costs.15

• Using one-time revenues to “buy time” while ignoring the structural deficit.16

The new audit adds another category to that list — leaving money on the table that the city was already owed under existing law.

The audit lists ten recommendations for the city to improve, including written policies and procedures, standardized status codes, two-person approval for adjustments, reinstated field inspections and data sharing, public-facing certificate lookup tools, and — most fundamentally — actual performance metrics tracked and reported to the Director of Finance or to a council committee on a regular basis.

These are not innovations. They are baseline practices that the cities Oakland was benchmarked against already perform — including its Bay Area neighbors. The audit’s recommendations are, in effect, a list of what the city should have been doing all along.

Oakland voters will be asked on June 2 to accept a smaller tax base (Measure C) and to pay a new parcel tax (Measure E) to close a deficit that the audit shows was deepened, in part, by the city’s own failure to administer the taxes already on its books.

Meanwhile the city carries 840 vacant FTEs whose fully-loaded cost — estimated up to $136 million per year — almost exactly equals the city’s structural budget deficit.

The council finance and management committee will receive the audit report on May 12. What council members do with it beyond “receiving” it as informational — and whether they will take meaningful steps to hold the city administration accountable to fix its own deficiencies before asking taxpayers to bail the city out again — remains to be seen.

Read this related article:

Oakland Report is by no means comprehensive in our coverage of public meetings in Oakland. The scope and frequency of public meetings are far more than we can presently cover. You can see the full list of upcoming meetings agenda and meeting materials at the city’s meeting calendar.

SUPPORT OUR NONPROFIT WORK

If you like our work, please consider donating. We are a volunteer-run, 501(c)(3) charitable nonprofit organization based in beautiful Oakland, California.

Your donation of any amount helps us continue our work to produce articles like the ones our readers wrote about in this column.

Donate to Oakland Report

Thank you.

The views expressed in our Letters column do not necessarily reflect the views of Oakland Report or its contributing authors. Letters may be edited for clarity, length, and conciseness.

Oakland is still #1 – in highest taxes

Re: Only 35% of Oakland’s rental housing is rent-controlled — and parcel taxes raise their rents, too, Feb. 10, 2026

I would love for you guys to compare Oakland’s property taxes to those of nearby cities like Berkeley and Richmond. On the one hand I’m sure the city government is plenty dysfunctional as you endlessly stress but on the other hand I feel like the property taxes we pay on our house (yeah, bought almost 30 years ago) are actually quite reasonable.

Brzuno (via Substack)
Oakland

Thank you for your comment, and for reading Oakland Report. Your suggestion to compare specifically to Berkeley and Richmond is interesting. In fact, we looked into it while researching for our investigative series on Oakland’s taxes. We also looked at Emeryville, Piedmont, San Leandro, Hayward and Fremont.

While these cities have some significant differences from each other, in particular their assessed property values (on which the state’s 1% baseline property taxes are based), the extra parcel taxes each city has layered on, and the estimated current market values, we found that Oakland still has the highest median property tax bill as a percentage of median estimated market value:

If you have read our “Broken Promises” investigative report on Oakland’s taxes, then you may have seen that Oakland’s special taxes have surged 379% over the past 20 years— over 6 times higher than inflation, and the highest in the state among comparable cities.

Meanwhile, service levels have either stagnated or decreased on several metrics – a form of government ‘shrinkflation.’

We also reported how Oakland’s property taxes hit deep East Oakland’s homes up to 48% harder than Rockridge’s, continuing a historic trend of disproportionately burdening East Oakland neighborhoods.

Thank you again for your comment; the discussion is appreciated.

Help us reach our goal of 10,000 subscribers

Subscribe now

The racially-motivated aspects of Oakland’s taxation and service delivery

Re: Oakland taxes hit deep East Oakland’s homes up to 48% harder than Rockridge’s, Apr. 20

I’m sorry but this article seems to be designed to be inflammatory by pulling in a racial element. Why not turn this around and point out that the higher valued areas pay much more in property taxes but that the city, in the name of “equity” intentionally and openly focuses its services on the lower income areas?

One result of this is that there is effectively no police protection east of Highways 24, 13, and even Interstate 580. In addition, there are no polling places, no tree or street maintenance, etc.

So, please, try to be even handed.

Victor Gold
Oakland

Thank you for your message, and for reading Oakland Report. We appreciate your observations, and agree that public services should be delivered in a fair and even manner to every neighborhood in the city.

Unfortunately, the economic and demographic data around Oakland’s parcel taxes is clear: they result in disparate financial impacts that are highly correlated to past and present racial and economic disparities. The correlation, and the financial math, is remarkable.

See this related article:

The language in the Measure E parcel tax, which is the focus of this analysis, includes no provision for offsetting this disparity by delivering different levels of service in different neighborhoods. Nor do other parcel taxes such as Measure NN include any such provisions, as far as we can tell.

That does not necessarily mean that there is no disparity in practice, of course. The city of Oakland is notorious for saying one thing and doing another.

One of the main points of the article which the data leads to is this: despite Oakland’s stated commitment to resolving the government-sanctioned discriminatory practices of the past, the present city leadership appears to be perpetuating a very similar discriminatory practice through regressive taxation. I think we are in agreement on that point, and it appears to be valid from multiple perspectives.

Your observations about disparate services are notable, and perhaps will be subject to examination by Oakland Report in a future analysis, if our capacity allows. As a longtime reader you may know that we are a genuine shoestring operation!

Part 2: Racially motivated taxation and services

Re: Oakland taxes hit deep East Oakland’s homes up to 48% harder than Rockridge’s, Apr. 20

Thanks for taking the time to reply. If you want to pair my letter with your response I won’t be offended :)

On the taxation note, I think that one thing cities like Oakland forget about is that Proposition 13, the infamous proposition that has been blamed for so many things, came about because taxpayers were tired of the irrational, subjective, and arbitrary evaluation system.

That is not the same as saying that Prop 13 hasn’t had a lot of unintended consequences, but at least it is consistent.

One thing that Prop 13 did not address is the antics of cities like Oakland that have subverted the voters’ will time and again with virtually no consequences. I am sure that the latest parcel tax will be more of the same but this time it is just plain barefaced self-interest for us all to see.

Join us as a supporting member

Learn more

Until we get a mayor AND council that are willing to truly clean house and stop playing games there is no alternative but to vote no every time a new parcel tax comes up, regardless of issues like proportionality and whether there is real merit to it.

I think that if the next proposition adopts what you seem to be urging, that being some kind of “equity” proportionality, not a flat tax, there will be an uproar.

Sure, the upper value homes are being proportionally taxed less relative to the home values, but in absolute terms they are contributing way more financially to a city that has essentially told them f*** off if they expect any basic services in return.

Victor Gold
Oakland

Victor, Thank you again for the discussion, and for the inspiration to look at service levels by neighborhoods.

Rebecca Kaplan is not qualified for the job

Re: There’s something about Rebecca, Apr. 27

Kaplan’s “gift” job position is the only way she could ever hope to have such a position. Her public record demonstrates that she is NOT qualified for the job and citizens should be up in arms over this administration’s blatant patronage of entitled public officials.

This is what happens when we elect and re-elect (this year) over-the-hill figureheads to leadership instead of new, energetic, out-of-the box thinkers who would work hard to attract major employers, innovatively solve longstanding crime and illegal dumping issues, and move this city beyond the political doldrums it has been mired in for decades.

Arthur Clark
Oakland

School administrator pay isn’t what’s straining OUSD’s budget

Re: The elephant in the classroom, Apr. 30

There was a Grand Jury report on the OUSD back about 2019 that said that the area-wide average was four teachers to every one administrator, but in Oakland it was one administrator for every 2.5 teachers. This has to be expensive. While I agree with the outsized role of the unions, there are more things to look at.

Mike Henn
Piedmont

Mike, thank you for your comment, which prompted us to check the current data. Using the latest official California Department of Education dataset (2024–25) and the same methodology the Grand Jury used in 2018-19:

• OUSD is now at 1 administrator per 3.9 teachers, consistent with the area-wide average cited in the 2019 Grand Jury report.

Thank you again for your comment; the discussion (and inspiration to check the latest data) is appreciated.

Some of the best reporting in decades

Re: Broken Promises – Oakland’s Measure E, May 7

Good grief, this is some of the best reporting I’ve seen out of Oakland in decades. I suggest one of the primary reasons we are in this downward spiral is because Oaklanders don’t read this. Wear all the booster denial stuff (Oaklandish) you want. As Adlai Stevenson once famously said, “people get the kind of government they deserve.”

Roland De Wolk
Oakland

Roland, thank you for your kind words and for all your support.

Editors’ note

We recognize and love that Oakland is a complex city of nearly half a million people with so many unique lived experiences and perspectives. It’s what makes Oakland so beautiful. In that spirit, we don’t need to agree with every viewpoint we share in Letters. However, we also don’t have the time, space, or inclination to publish letters that are not helpful or that don’t meet our standards.

We appreciate readers’ comments on the topics we cover in Oakland Report, and observations about Oakland politics and governance in general. We welcome letters that are grounded in reason and evidence that can be rationally examined. We may respond to some letters. We may reject some letters. We may fact-check some letters. Other letters we may let speak for themselves. Write to us at letters@citizensoakland.org.

SUPPORT OUR NONPROFIT WORK

If you like our work, please consider donating. We are a volunteer-run, 501(c)(3) charitable nonprofit organization based in beautiful Oakland, California.

Your donation of any amount helps us continue our work to produce articles like the ones our readers wrote about in this column.

Donate to Oakland Report

Thank you.