OAKLAND

OPD so corrupt and fucked up, the feds threaten to take over

Police Chief resigns...

His announcement comes a week after U.S. District Court Judge Thelton Henderson warned Oakland officials that the city has failed to meet the terms of a consent decree to reform the department in the wake the "Riders" scandal, in which several officers were charged with beating or framing drug suspects in West Oakland in 2000. As a result, the judge said the city faces court intervention that could amount to a finding of contempt or a takeover by federal receivership.

"Although the Court hopes that Defendants are able to turn this tide in the next several months without further judicial intervention, it remains prepared to take appropriate further corrective action if necessary," Henderson said in the proceeding last week.

actually Batts was pretty competent. A lot of that court-mandated stuff is bureaucratic, and has hamstrung OPD by requiring a larger number of officers to work desk jobs.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bytMNoKNeRA

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/wed-october-26-2011/parks-and-demonstration---oakland-riot

Andrew commented | 52 minutes ago

**** you, Stewart! - A's fans

http://sfist.com/2012/01/31/aquapy_lake_merritt_returns_with_ti.php

i am very possibly moving to oakland for a few months. would def appreciate any decent quotes on rent prices. i'm looking for a shared house on the cheap in a neighborhood that's at least like a 2.5/10 on the safety scale, and i'm trying to avoid any gentrificationy situations. i am pretty broke all the time. friend of a friend who lives there says he works one day a week as a waiter and has no trouble paying for rent/groceries but we don't believe him.

Check out Crimespotting for a general idea of what you're getting yourself into:

http://oakland.crimespotting.org

I think the only way you can move to a poor part of oakland without being a gentrifier is if you make sure to commit crimes once in a while

uh yeah spring for an extra $100 and move somewhere you're less likely to to be mugged. stay away from fruitvale area; I have gentrification-averse friends there too and they are leaving after people got murdered outside their house.

but even moving to fruitvale isn't being gentrification-averse, it's just being a first-wave gentrifier

just stay out of these areas:

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/object/article?f=/c/a/2012/02/20/MNKS1N848N.DTL&object=%2Fc%2Fpictures%2F2012%2F02%2F19%2Fba-100blocks20_g_SFCG1329516950.jpg

there are plenty of nice educated white people who live in fruitvale - you'd hardly be first-wave.

At this point, East Oakland (the general area) has the cheapest rents. Like in SF, you could luck into a shared house/apartment in a pricier area due to rent control.

I actually find the whole proposal slightly offensive. If you're going to move into any area, you will still be you regardless. You can't control peoples' perceptions of you and your intentions for living in that place. When my wife and I left our Adams Pt apartment to own in North Oakland, a white neighbor came by not long after moving in and in the course of our conversation called us "pioneers". I took offense, thinking that made our neighbors (many of whom have roots in this neighborhood going back at least a couple of generations) something else. Saying you don't want to gentrify a place just by you being there seems like the same type of thinking, coming from the opposite side. Live where you want to live, live where you can afford to live, live where you feel safe living, but accept your own presence in your community.

Sorry if this isn't clear, and if I've got the whole notion wrong, maybe we can hash that out too.

i mean, when i said that i really just meant that i don't wanna move to a neighborhood that is clearly in the middle of it. i'm still just going to take what i can get.

def look at the crimespotting map, and the map on akm's link. Fruitvale by and large will be fine, even much of west oakland will probably suit your needs. The deep east has alot of problems, crimewise, mostly due to gang turf wars.

Fruitvale by and large will be fine, even much of west oakland will probably suit your needs.

Probably transportation (what form you will have and what form you will need) should be a major factor in deciding where to live. Also, having your bike stolen or car stolen/broken into is a rite of passage as far as Oakland residency goes.

true

i'm planning on busing there and then buying cheap bikes as often as i need to

zachlyon, i don't know where you're coming from... but if you can afford anything up to $600/month, you'll be fine. i've never paid more than 430$ in oakland. i currently pay $330, i'm very close to BART, and my neighborhood is safe enough. (i also most work odd-jobs and shit, haven't had a 'real' job in more than a year, partly by choice and partly because the economy blows).

$330 sounds great. i'm paying $467 right now and would probably require something lower. what kind of living situation is it (house, apartment, etc)?

no offense, T, but didn't some dude get gunned down right around the corner from your place, like, a couple months ago? And the little kid that got shot in the parking lot, that was right by where you live too, right?

he did say safe enough.

safe enough if you don't mind seeing dead bodies around the corner from your home!

yeah, but in his defense (or in oakland's defense?) most people would consider where i used to live (around the corner from the parkway) "safe enough," and a dude got gunned down in the grocery store parking lot a block or so away, police once cordoned off an entire street because a gunman had taken hostages in a nearby apartment building, my apartment got broken into and robbed, and the video store on the corner got held up multiple times.

have paid in the $550 - $1000/mo. range for any number of neighborhoods ranging from 'desirable' to 'risky' and have seen/heard people shot and killed in all of them, on the street, on the doorstep, next door, around the corner, etc. so I don't really know how this is measured?
South Berkeley/Oakland border was the only one where this didn't happen actually.

a dude got gunned down in south berkeley in broad daylight like a month ago!

If you have an appreciation for spectacle as entertainment, and an iron butt, you should go to this exclusive event, damn you ppl:

http://sfsilentfilmfestival.blogspot.com/2012/02/napoleon-faq.html

what up Oakland

https://p.twimg.com/AvWllypCEAAUeBK.jpg

What up is that I may be stuck in the East Bay

Take the ferry!

what is that

i'm moving to oakland in august, what up oakland

West Oakland BART station on fire

in other Oakland news today - FBI violent crime stats indicate Oakland is the 4th most dangerous city in America and the most dangerous city in California.

Move to North Oakland, "the hottest zip code in the country" (94608)

i am flying into oakland tonight

94608 is also the zip code for Emeryville - possibly the most square footage of big box chain retail per capita.

Awesome = ilx Oakland visitors/new people!

Emeryville is so weird

a "city" where nobody lives, but everybody shops!

Yeah alot of my mail is addressed to E'ville. (xp)

took me two hours to get from my place near the lake to downtown sf this morning. thanks bart fire.

fate was kind and my weekly SF work night was yesterday and not today.

FBI violent crime stats indicate Oakland is the 4th most dangerous city in America and the most dangerous city in California.

since when is this news?!?

Emeryville is like the Delaware of the Bay area.

oakland's not quite EPA but the one time i visited someone at the acorn projects i heard gunshots three times in two hours

emeryville is the most depressing place in east bay imo

At least Cafe Biere is there. Try spending a day in Rodeo.

xp - we were at 6th most dangerous for several years. we're moving on up!

ok, good point. for some reason in my mind the east bay is bounded by richmond and hayward on the N/S and the hayward fault / berkeley hills / contra costa range on the east

rodeo and all those random places like dublin and pleasanton and antioch fall into the same category in my mind as tracy and gilroy

antioch and gilroy are very similar. n.b. gilroy is where i spent the first 17 years of my life.