A non-exhaustive list of notable legislation coming before committees Tuesday
Finance Committee Tuesday, 9:30am
$1MM State Grant for Uncommon Law for pro bono legal defense for residents navigating the parole process. The money is a state grant intended for the organization which focuses on providing legal services.
Enhanced Infrastructure Financing District/Kosmont Report. Over the past two years, the City has engaged a consultant, Kosmont, to give direction on proposed Enhanced Infrastructure Finance District [EIFD] concepts, including a potential EIFD in East Oakland and West Oakland and a citywide structure. The EIFD is a relatively new financing tool that uses site-specific tax and other revenues that would normally go directly to the general fund for specific infrastructure projects that ostensibly benefit both the public and the developer instead. An EIFD was said to be the methodology for the funding of necessary infrastructure for a proposed Howard Terminal development by John Fisher, but no real analysis was done based on actual costs for the project. The analysis will be fairly technical, but the overall recommendation is to develop a policy to govern EIFD proposals should they come before the City.
Public Works/Transpo
[Canceled]
Community and Economic Development
Second ProHousing Affordable Housing Funding Opportunity
When Oakland received a “Pro-Housing” designation from state Housing and Community Development [HCD] in late 2022, the City became eligible to apply for additional funds reserved only for Prohousing-qualified cities. Oakland won $2.39MM in the first tranche of Prohousing funding in 2023. This year's Notice of Funding Availability [NOFA] is for a smaller amount of 1.39MM—the City's Housing and Community Development [HC] report suggests that the lesser amount reflects State HCD's intention of providing funds for a greater number of eligible cities, which means fewer available funds for each. The legislation before the committee will authorize the City’s HCD to apply for the funds, which the city intends to use as a reserve to support ongoing costs for permanent supportive housing.
Lease Disposition Development Agreement for Low Income Senior Housing at 606 Clara/9418 Edes LDDA. The LDDA for the far East Oakland site comes after DignityMoves and Housing Consortium of the East Bay [HCEB] partnered on a proposal for City of Oakland Homekey funding. Dignity Moves intends to develop 40 units at the site, and HCEB will provide Permanent Supportive Housing [PSH] for the units dedicated to homeless seniors earning no more than 30% of Area Median Income. The project submitted to Cal HCD won $4.1 MM in capital development funds and 2.2 MM in operating funds for the permanent supportive housing portion.
Public Safety Committee
Goat Grazing Contract. As Oakland residents go about their day, goats mitigate hillside grasses that can become overgrown and pose fire risks. But goats don’t work cheap. The City’s two year contract with Ecosystems Concepts, Inc., for goat-grazing services, renewable for another two, is nearly $1 MM [$800K] per year—the city will potentially spend 3.6 MM on goat-borne fire mitigation services over a potential four years if the contract is approved.
Alarm Verified Response. CM Rebecca Kaplan brings legislation that would require companies that install alarms in their businesses to have a form of secondary verification that a break-in is in progress and not simply an outer-entry trigger. The City has an alarm registration process for police response and all businesses with alarms are required to register. The changes would require businesses with alarms at registration to prove that there is a secondary verification, such as a motion-detector or video surveillance system. Kaplan’s legislation would make it unlawful to register such an alarm without a verification system after July 1, 2024, with the intention of diminishing false-alarms that police must respond to. The legal changes would affect both those who manage their own alarm systems and alarm companies that do so.
Also at ALCO Board of Supervisors...
—At the Alameda County Board of Supervisors, Nate Miley will introduce a resolution regarding Gaza and Israel—the resolution’s intent is hard to pin down, and its only resolved clause would seem to recommend only that every nation seek a peaceful resolution to conflict. While most of the clauses in the document are focused on condemning Hamas’ attacks on October 7, notably the resolution characterizes Israel’s attacks against Palestinians in Gaza as “out of proportion” to the October 7th attack—a claim that has raised the ire of the San Francisco Jewish Community Relations Council [SFJCRC]. SFJCRC has attacked almost every local body seeking to comment on the ongoing atrocities by Israel in Gaza, which are now before the International Court of Justice and being adjudicated as war crimes. The org is demanding the BOS remove the language around proportionality, which would leave a resolution condemning only Hamas.
—Also at BOS, Oakland United, a coalition of groups such as Communities for a Better Environment, EBASE, and Youth Spirit Artworks, will protest John Fisher’s continued intransigence on his 50% share of the Coliseum. With the process of purchasing the site from Alameda County nearly complete, the group wants the BOS to cancel its agreement with the A’s for the sale of the Coliseum property. Tuesday, 10am at the County Administration Building.
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