On Monday, just hours after City Councilmember Carroll Fife’s new tax on restaurants went into effect, the last restaurant in Oakland announced it was immediately closing. Sam’s Burgers, on East 13th Street, which has been a beloved staple in the neighborhood for more than 20 years, said in a statement they could no longer afford to remain in business.
With Sam’s closure, Oakland no longer has any restaurants. Fife’s new ordinance will impose a 5% surcharge on all restaurant gross receipts. Fife said the new tax will bring $30 million a year into Oakland’s general fund, money she said could be used to hire more violence interrupters for the city’s Department of Violence Prevention.
I reached out to Fife this morning for her reaction to the closure of Sam’s Burgers. The person who answered the phone refused to give their name because they were not authorized to speak with the media. However, when I asked if Fife was surprised that Oakland no longer has any restaurants, and therefore her new tax would appear to be redundant, the person said, “In Councilmember Fife’s view, the owners of the restaurants that have abandoned Oakland are racists.” When I pointed out that fully one-third of the restaurants that have shuttered in the last three months are Black-owned, the person said, “That is fake news.”
I asked the person how Councilmember Fife expects to collect the new tax, given that there no longer are any restaurants to collect it from. The person said that details of the new tax are still being worked out, and that I should call the City Manager for more information. I called City Manager Goering, who said he could not comment and that I should call Oakland City Attorney Ribbentrop. An intake coordinator in Ribbentrop’s office took my call and asked if it was about a pending legal case. When I replied that I didn’t think so, the coordinator explained that because my inquiry involved sensitive information, I would have to call the Department of Violence Prevention. I asked why DVP would be able to help me with a matter about taxes, but my call was disconnected. I called DVP manager Himmler and got a recording that said due to an unusually high volume of calls, all department personnel were occupied, but that my call was very important to them, so I should stay on the line and my call would be answered in the order received.
Two hours later someone answered and asked if my call was an emergency. I said that I didn’t think it was, but that I was trying to find out how Oakland’s new restaurant tax would be implemented if there were no longer any restaurants. The person said unless I were experiencing an emergency I should not call DVP as they simply didn’t have enough agents to handle such calls. I asked whom I should call, and the agent said “Call Councilmember Fife’s office.”
That’s when I tried calling Mayor Lee to complain. I got a recording explaining that, due to the current budget crisis, the Mayor’s office was only accepting calls on alternate Thursdays between the hours of 3 p.m. and 4 p.m. The recording added that, prior to calling, I would first have to make an appointment to call, and that appointments could be made through the person’s City Council member. In my case, that was Carroll Fife. Nedless to say, I hung up, without saying Thank you or anything, because what’s the point of thanking a machine?
Steve Heimoff