How is Mayor Barbara Lee handling homelessness, crime, housing, and other issues? Can private funds make up for the city’s budget shortfall? How are local leaders preparing to respond if there’s another federal immigration surge in the East Bay? And who’s going to run for mayor this year?

City Hall reporter Eli Wolfe and news editor Darwin BondGraham on recent City Hall and politics reporting.

Plus: Oakland Pride has a new home and new date, filtering the air in West Oakland with walls of vegetation, a look at one year of lobbying shaping city policies, an end to the Kaiser nurses strike, and a potential Oakland teachers strike.

Stories we cover in this episode:

City Hall

• Barbara Lee is relying on big companies and foundations to raise millions for the city — Lee hasn’t proven quite as prolific a fundraiser as former Mayor Libby Schaaf. But she is leveraging the city’s corporate citizens and philanthropists.
• Oakland’s most influential lobbyists — 70% of lobbying in the city last year was done by just 10 people. Here’s what they did.
• Barbara Lee has yet to confirm she’s running for mayor — but she’s raised $31,000 — Plus: two councilmembers running unopposed have raked in tens of thousands, and Pamela Price is gearing up for another shot at DA.
• Oakland should become a ‘strong mayor’ city, says Mayor Lee’s task force — A new report on charter reform describes a more powerful executive and City Council. Voters could decide on the changes. 
• Who stole Barbara Lee’s car? — A city-owned vehicle used by the mayor of Oakland was stolen over the holiday weekend after a break-in at her City Hall office.
• ICE agents can’t use city property, decrees Oakland Mayor Barbara Lee — The executive orders mirror Alameda County’s “ICE-free zones” and response plans.

Community

• Oakland Pride, long on shaky ground, gets a new home and a new date — The nonprofit that organized Oakland Pride is dissolving — but the festival has found a new home within the Oakland LGBTQ Community Center and the festival will now be in August.

Health and environment

• Dense tree barriers to cut air pollution are coming to West Oakland — A pilot project that breaks ground in March will feature dense rows of trees and shrubs along Frontage Road in West Oakland. The vegetation is designed to clean the air, hopefully reducing health risks.
• Kaiser strike to end after 4 weeks without a deal — The large, open-ended strike had led to frustrations by some patients over delayed care as well as difficulties for workers who went weeks without a paycheck.

Education

• Oakland teachers vote to authorize strike — If teachers walk out, it would be the third open-ended strike since 2019. The decision to go out would require 48 hours notice. 

Find all these stories and more at oaklandside.org.