A lot of Oakland News presented from bed in Georgia, where this blogger's keeping Mom company and working.
First, a big thanks to my long time friend and Oakland's new District Four (Montclair - Oakland Hills) Councilmember Libby Schaaf, who nomninated bloggers Rebecca Saltzman, Jonathan Bair, Aimee Allison, Debbie Richman and Echa Schneider, and me, Zennie Abraham for the "Making Democracy Work" award. It's a high honor to be considered in this way.
I'm particularly happy with the blog and vlog work everyone did during the Oakland Mayors Race last year. The sum total was we got out a lot of information about the candidates, disagreed on some, and contributed to the community in a big way by fostering discussion.
On the day of the award I'm going to be in New York City for the NFL Draft, so I'm going to ask Susan Mernitt of OaklandLocal.com, another great Oakland blog, to attend and represent me. Susan's done a great job in building a local media brand from scratch and creating some work for local bloggers, so I'm going to share my award with her.)
Second, and on the matter of Oakland bloggers, Aimee Allison of OaklandSeen.com and the now-cancelled KPFA Morning Show can say she was responsible for 16,000 monthly listeners to KPFA. Why? Because that's how many listeners the Berkeley-based Pacifica Foundation legend of a dysfunctional media company lost in just one month.
The latest radio ratings delivered thank to Rich Lieberman via email reported a lot, but what jumps out is way down in the chart: KPFA had 120,700 listeners in November, and 106,500 in December, and an even worse 104,000 during the Holidays.
So, for all of the back-and-forth yada-yada about budgets and costs and personalities and politics, the business that is KPFA is suffering. Care to bet on if listenership dips below 100,000 at some point? Maybe KPFA need to have Aimee on interviewing Oakland Police Chief Batts.
Because he's back.
And it's a good thing for Oakland, and reports about rank-and-file officers not supporting him are just a load of horse mess. A plant of news by a person who was out for no good, done where that person believed it would be shared. It's false. Don't believe it. Oakland cops have Batts back, now the Oakland City Council has to show him some skin.
(It's also great to see Oakland Mayor Jean Quan and Chief Batts together, as covered by OaklandLocal.com.)
Third, and on the matter of "skin," if California Governor Jerry Brown gets his way and sacks California Redevelopment Agencies (which I still assert is a really dumb idea), there may not be a new ballpark for Oakland at all because skin will be harder to come by. (And I use the term "dumb" because Jerry's a smart guy; using that term is the only way to get it in his head that he's going in the wrong direction here.)
(Oh. I discount San Jose as a media creation because a number of journalists don't want to get their heads around the complicated legal and business issues standing in that city's way, not to mention the MLB Major League Agreement. So when Columnist Mark Purdy or anyone with the San Jose Mercury News starts yappin about a stadium for San Jose, Laugh. Hard.)
Other Oakland Stuff
On the Libby Schaaf info train, she's having her first office hours at various Oakland District Four cafes, to help them with business. A cool thing. Here's the schedule: Dimond: First Thursday of the month, 9am at Caffe Diem, Laurel: First Saturday of the month, 9am at World Ground Cafe, Redwood Heights: Third Saturday of the month, 10:30am at Cafe Galleria Melrose: Fourth Wednesday of the month, 3:30pm at Melrose Library, Montclair: Fourth Sunday of the month, 9am at the Farmers Market.
And on the matter of lawyers, as Libby is one...
Dan Siegel, a good guy who's currently on the other end of the legal issues around Oakland Gangs and against another good guy, Oakland City Attorney John Russo, is the target of a movement to get him kicked off the KPFA Board for being an advisor to Oakland Mayor Jean Quan. Seriously. The reason, according to Matthew Hallinan, was that it amounted to a "political appointment," and Matt's ready to go to the "matt" of court to protect Dan and maintain SaveKPFA's majority on what's called the "Local Station Board."
And...
Doug Boxer has resigned from the Oakland Planning Commission. Mayor Quan will appoint a replacement.
And...
Mayor Quan needs to stop playing political games with the Oakland City Attorney's budget. Hiring outside counsel is expensive, so stop forcing the office to do it by cutting the budget. Quan needs to walk away from this one.
First, a big thanks to my long time friend and Oakland's new District Four (Montclair - Oakland Hills) Councilmember Libby Schaaf, who nomninated bloggers Rebecca Saltzman, Jonathan Bair, Aimee Allison, Debbie Richman and Echa Schneider, and me, Zennie Abraham for the "Making Democracy Work" award. It's a high honor to be considered in this way.
I'm particularly happy with the blog and vlog work everyone did during the Oakland Mayors Race last year. The sum total was we got out a lot of information about the candidates, disagreed on some, and contributed to the community in a big way by fostering discussion.
On the day of the award I'm going to be in New York City for the NFL Draft, so I'm going to ask Susan Mernitt of OaklandLocal.com, another great Oakland blog, to attend and represent me. Susan's done a great job in building a local media brand from scratch and creating some work for local bloggers, so I'm going to share my award with her.)
Second, and on the matter of Oakland bloggers, Aimee Allison of OaklandSeen.com and the now-cancelled KPFA Morning Show can say she was responsible for 16,000 monthly listeners to KPFA. Why? Because that's how many listeners the Berkeley-based Pacifica Foundation legend of a dysfunctional media company lost in just one month.
The latest radio ratings delivered thank to Rich Lieberman via email reported a lot, but what jumps out is way down in the chart: KPFA had 120,700 listeners in November, and 106,500 in December, and an even worse 104,000 during the Holidays.
So, for all of the back-and-forth yada-yada about budgets and costs and personalities and politics, the business that is KPFA is suffering. Care to bet on if listenership dips below 100,000 at some point? Maybe KPFA need to have Aimee on interviewing Oakland Police Chief Batts.
Because he's back.
And it's a good thing for Oakland, and reports about rank-and-file officers not supporting him are just a load of horse mess. A plant of news by a person who was out for no good, done where that person believed it would be shared. It's false. Don't believe it. Oakland cops have Batts back, now the Oakland City Council has to show him some skin.
(It's also great to see Oakland Mayor Jean Quan and Chief Batts together, as covered by OaklandLocal.com.)
Third, and on the matter of "skin," if California Governor Jerry Brown gets his way and sacks California Redevelopment Agencies (which I still assert is a really dumb idea), there may not be a new ballpark for Oakland at all because skin will be harder to come by. (And I use the term "dumb" because Jerry's a smart guy; using that term is the only way to get it in his head that he's going in the wrong direction here.)
(Oh. I discount San Jose as a media creation because a number of journalists don't want to get their heads around the complicated legal and business issues standing in that city's way, not to mention the MLB Major League Agreement. So when Columnist Mark Purdy or anyone with the San Jose Mercury News starts yappin about a stadium for San Jose, Laugh. Hard.)
Other Oakland Stuff
On the Libby Schaaf info train, she's having her first office hours at various Oakland District Four cafes, to help them with business. A cool thing. Here's the schedule: Dimond: First Thursday of the month, 9am at Caffe Diem, Laurel: First Saturday of the month, 9am at World Ground Cafe, Redwood Heights: Third Saturday of the month, 10:30am at Cafe Galleria Melrose: Fourth Wednesday of the month, 3:30pm at Melrose Library, Montclair: Fourth Sunday of the month, 9am at the Farmers Market.
And on the matter of lawyers, as Libby is one...
Dan Siegel, a good guy who's currently on the other end of the legal issues around Oakland Gangs and against another good guy, Oakland City Attorney John Russo, is the target of a movement to get him kicked off the KPFA Board for being an advisor to Oakland Mayor Jean Quan. Seriously. The reason, according to Matthew Hallinan, was that it amounted to a "political appointment," and Matt's ready to go to the "matt" of court to protect Dan and maintain SaveKPFA's majority on what's called the "Local Station Board."
And...
Doug Boxer has resigned from the Oakland Planning Commission. Mayor Quan will appoint a replacement.
And...
Mayor Quan needs to stop playing political games with the Oakland City Attorney's budget. Hiring outside counsel is expensive, so stop forcing the office to do it by cutting the budget. Quan needs to walk away from this one.