These are year-to-date crime statistics for the week of Sept. 13-19, 2021 in Oakland Police Area 3, which largely overlaps City Council District 2—Nikki Bas’s district. I’m including the corresponding numbers for 2020, so you can see how rapidly these crimes have increased over the past year:
Homicide:
2020: 17
2021: 23 (35% increase)
Aggravated Assault:
2020: 428
2021: 467 (9% increase)
Assault with a firearm:
2020: 66
2021: 94 (42% increase)
Shooting in an occupied home or vehicle:
2020: 42
2021: 62 (48% increase)
Robbery:
2020: 426
2021: 573 (35% increase)
Carjacking:
2020: 59
2021: 117 (98% increase)
Keeping these shocking figures in mind, recall that Bas voted last June to strip the Oakland Police Department of $18 million, which resulted in the cancellation of planned Police Academies, where OPD hires new cops. Then, as if that weren’t bad enough, two weeks ago, Bas voted against restoring one of those cancelled police academies. (Fortunately, she lost that one.)
Nikki Bas has thus turned into the most virulently anti-police member of the City Council, along with her mentor, Carroll Fife.
Now, if you’re Nikki Bas and you’re out there in District 2, kissing babies and greeting voters in supermarket parking lots, what do you tell them when they express fear of crime, and ask you why you’re so determined to weaken OPD?
You really have no good answer, do you? More platitudes are the best you can come up with. Bas ran her campaign in 2018 on platitudes. (“Housing is a human right,” “We must ensure that funds that we as voters approved are spent responsibly.” “Our city must provide equitable services that create healthy, clean, safe environments.”) These remarks are standard-issue bullcrap, totally meaningless, the rhetorical equivalent of white-bread mush. It must be embarrassing for Bas to have to utter them.
Oddly, Bas had virtually nothing to say about cops or public safety when she ran for office, so it’s been surprising—and, say her constituents, troubling—to see how much she’s turned against the Oakland Police Department since. People are trying to figure out why. Was it some nefarious influence Fife has had on her? Was it a political calculation? If she’s running for Mayor next year—which is the rumor--she might figure she has to appeal to the woke, lefty crowd. Or is she genuinely ignorant of the role that cops play in keeping communities safe?
I think it’s clear that Bas is feeling the heat these days. Her constituents may not be aware of the crime statistics I cited above, but they know the feeling of walking down a dark street and worrying about getting mugged or shot. They know the feeling of returning to a parked car and finding the windows smashed. They’re afraid to let their kids play outside. They’ve heard the gunshots at night, the stories from neighbors attacked in their own homes. They’ve seen the videos of criminals ransacking CVS or Target. And then they hear Nikki Bas, so poised and articulate, telling them that “social justice” should be their main concern.
No, Ms. Bas. Safety is our main concern—and it should be your main concern, because we pay your salary with our tax dollars. Instead, you and your doppelganger, Fife, are doubling down on crippling OPD. And we, your constituents, are getting weary, oh Lord, weary.
Steve Heimoff