As the Trump regime become more and more corrupt, the farce is playing out in a smaller way here in Oakland. Never mind that the two sides are seemingly ideologically opposite, red versus blue: they’re engaging in precisely the same sort of lawless, self-serving behavior.
In the Council’s case, as I reported yesterday, now they’re trying to nullify the results of past elections, so they can grab money that previous ballot measures promised us would go to hiring more cops. Instead, they redirected the city to seize the money and give ever-higher salaries and benefits to SEIU bureaucrats. When the voters approved Measure NN in November, 2024, for example, what they thought they were voting for was to increase OPD’s sworn-officer count to 700.
But that’s not what they got. Nowhere close. Instead, under new City Council directives, nearly half of Measure NN’s annual revenues of $47.4 million will be awarded, not to hiring cops, but directly to community-based organizations for youth programs and intervention strategies. And, as we all know, these “strategies” are nothing more than sweetheart insider deals so Council members can pay off their supporters—corruption on a block-by-block basis where deals nobody knew about were going down in back rooms, while union bosses drank champagne and celebrated their clout. It’s a damning illustration of “the swamp” that Trump falsely promised to drain.
But wait, there’s more! Not only are these sleazeballs corruptly nullifying election results, they’re also about to greatly increase their salaries, in a secretive move they don’t want you, the voters, to know about.
You’ve probably heard that there’s something about “charter reform” that’s likely to appear on next November’s ballot. About all we’re being told about it is that it’s a vote on whether to have a “strong mayor” system here in Oakland. I, myself, have not taken a position on this, because the details are unclear. I don’t particularly care if we have a “strong” or a “weak” mayor so much as I want to get woke ideology purged from Oakland, no matter who our electeds are. What’s the point of having a “strong mayor” if that person, like Barbara Lee, is simply a woke stooge? In that sense, this “strong/weak mayor” issue is a distraction, a shiny object meant to take our attention away from what is really needed: a complete overhaul of our politics.
Yet tucked away in the details of the strong/weak mayor measure is something our City Council electeds desperately want concealed: language that will vastly increase their salaries. They’re voting today on whether to put Lee’s charter amendment on the November ballot, and believe me, the outcome of this vote is clear: they will approve it. That means they will be voting themselves a huge raise, up to $318,145 per year in total compensation, an astronomical increase over their current $108,803 annual salary.
Now, I grant that $108,803 is not a lot of money to live on in the Bay Area. Perhaps there’s actually a logical argument that the City Council deserves a raise. But is a midnight deal the right way to do it? If these council members believe they deserve a raise, let them publicly say so. Individually, on the record. Tell us why. We’re all ears.
Look, this charter reform stuff is a big deal. Lee wants it more than anything, which makes it suspicious to me. She needs the City Council’s support. It looks like the deal that went down was this: Lee tells the City Council to support charter amendment. The Council is hesitant to share their power. Lee: “If you support me, I’ll throw in a huge raise.” City Council members: “Hmm, now you’re talking.” And that’s how deals go down.
Steve Heimoff