www.perata4mayor.com Blog

A message from Don Perata: Yesterday’s Oakland Mayor Forum

2010-09-03T16:48:39Z

I regret that I was unable to attend last night’s mayoral forum. I hoped to return from the capitol in time to attend, where I had been working with state legislators to help Oakland manage yet another decision from Governor Schwarzenegger’s office that will have an immediate and long term consequence for our city – summary parole.

Summary Parole is to prisons what Reagan's "community-based treatment" was to mental healthcare. Basically, 44,000 "low risk" felons will be released before completing their sentences.

None will have any supervision once released. The state will not provide funding or transitional services, leaving California’s cities to manage this population, unassisted.

To confront this "inmate dumping" in Oakland, I have convened a working group of law enforcement, community, faith and non-profit agencies to go after the Republican Administration to provide what’s needed to prevent Summary Parole from becoming yet another assault on Oakland’s urban life.

California’s recidivism rate is already 70%, and that’s with a parole system. Citizens returning to their communities without any support network under Summary Parole are at an even higher risk of re-offending.

Governor Schwarzenegger’s administration is setting up both newly released citizens and our communities for failure. It is a failure that Oakland cannot afford.

Don Perata to host volunteer BBQ and Lawn Sign Delivery

2010-08-26T19:02:28Z

There is much to tell our supporters this week!

#1 THE CLEAN UPS

Every Saturday this summer, Perata for Mayor volunteers have been cleaning up Oakland. We have been in your neighborhoods doing the things

that the City of Oakland should be doing but hasn't done.

Feedback from our phone bank conversations tell us that you believe the mayor should be in the community getting the little things done. Doing the little things well means you’ll do big things well. City Hall right now does neither. And while my opponents are still talking, we have been getting the job done and getting results. Just as we said we would do.

#2 THANK YOU BAR–B-QUE

The final clean-up of the summer campaign takes place this Saturday, August 28^th, 10am at Allen Temple Baptist, 8501 International Blvd. I hope you can join us again or for the first time.

The clean up will finish with a BBQ, to thank those volunteers who have worked hard this summer, displaying their belief in Oakland.

#3 GREAT POLL RESULTS

CBS/KPIX reported that the Perata for Mayor campaign leads a crowded field with a resounding 41% of first-choice votes, and that we’re ahead among EVERY demographic polled.

Poll results are great but we still have a long way to go and the only real poll that counts is Election Day. We are working hard everyday to make Election Day a success but we need your help!

#4 LAST BUT NOT LEAST: LAWN SIGNS!

Labor Day weekend, on Saturday and Sunday from 9:00am to noon, a team of volunteers will invade Oakland with thousands of bright, shiny signs that you can help deliver or put in your front yard to show that you Believe in Oakland. We also have window signs.

If your browser doesn't support the video you can watch it, and others, at

http://www.youtube.com/user/Perata4Mayor

Please call Tiffany at HQ, 510-922-8397 or email her at tiffany@perata4mayor.com today for your lawn sign or window sign. And you can always show your support by clicking on the “volunteer” or “donate” buttons on the side bar.

Thank you for your continued support

Guest Blog: "Why I Support Don Perata (Part II)"

2010-08-20T01:09:02Z

Long time Oakland resident and doctoral candidate in political science at UC Berkeley, George Willcoxon, in his own words on why he supports Don Perata for Mayor of Oakland

Part 2:

One of the big problems with the Dellums administration is that, from the start, Mayor Dellums has delegated governing the city to the city administrator and the city council. The city council, of course, is the city’s legislative body, and is not supposed to be “governing” the city in a strict, political science sense.

(In political science we define “the government” to be the elected executives and the heads of departments and agencies, who are temporarily in charge of directing the apparatus of the state. So, for instance the British cabinet is the UK’s government, and President Obama and his cabinet make up the current US government. The legislature is something different.)

And while the city charter does task the city administrator with executive authority because he or she directs the department heads, the charter also established a strong-mayor system in which the city administrator serves at the pleasure of the mayor. Having both a strong mayor and a city administrator doesn’t really make sense to me, since it allows the mayor to be as much or as little engaged as the mayor wants. The mayor can tell the administrator what to do, or withdraw and put all governing responsibility on the administrator, in a way that the mayor could not do to a chief of staff or deputy mayor.

In strong mayor systems without a city administrator, like San Francisco, New York, or Los Angeles, the mayor’s role is perfectly clear: she is unambiguously the chief executive, and doesn’t have a co-executive with charter responsibilities. When something gets fucked up in these cities’ governments, then the mayor gets blamed and can’t blame anyone else.

Not so in Oakland, where just recently Ron Dellums defined his position thusly:

Tuesday marked Dellums’ first public statements on the budget, even though the council has been trying to figure out for months how to eliminate what is now a $30.5 million deficit. He insisted, however, that he had not been “missing in action.”

Dellums said that he had been deeply involved in budget discussions with City Administrator Dan Lindheim, who has been talking with council members, union leaders and community members.

Dellums said that it was not his responsibility to negotiate details with council members or unions.

“I’m the master strategist,” Dellums said. “My job is to establish strategy, to establish the policy framework within which those negotiations would take place. And I have assiduously and diligently and coherently done just that.”

Dellums added, “I have been briefed to the max. It would seem to me that to the most casual observer, that I’m totally in command of what it is we’re trying to do. My job is to direct.”

And showing up at City Hall is not a requirement, said Dellums, who is frequently absent from the mayor’s office.

“In the world of computers and the world of telephones and the world of faxes, you can do this job anywhere,” he said.

Anyway, this quirk in our charter allowed Ron Dellums, over the past four years, to delegate his duties to and deflect blame onto the city administrator.

While this situation suggests the need for charter reform, it certainly demands that our next mayor be a strong, hands-on executive who will not delegate, or will not be forced to delegate.

Reason Number Two: Real Executive Leadership

The second reason I support Don Perata for mayor is that he will not delegate his duties as mayor. He is a hands-on leader. He is a public executive. His managerial experience means that he will not be forced to delegate his duties, as Jean Quan and Rebecca Kaplan inevitably would, following in the footsteps of Ron Dellums’ failed administration.

Don Perata’s Executive Leadership Experience

Don Perata has held a variety of executive leadership positions both inside and outside of government. Most obviously he served as Senate Majority Leader and then Senate President in the California legislature. In these roles, he had both constitutional leadership duties and party leadership duties. He was forced to make tough, often zero-sum decisions about funding, programs, short- and long-term goals, that ultimately reconciled the wishes of his caucus and plotted a path forward for the state.

Senator Perata has also served on and chaired the board of successful non-profits, like OPLP, and run his own political consulting firm. In less formal leadership roles, he has championed many legislative struggles, and directed several successful local and statewide initiative campaigns. While he has worked as a legislator most of his career, he served as the executive leader in these legislative bodies and also outside them.

The Other Candidates

Jean Quan has served as chairwoman of the budget committee of the city council. She has also served on the board of at least one non-profit. I can’t find any record of her chairing any committees while on the school board. On her website, she claims to have “led state and national organizations advocating for urban and immigrant students,” but doesn’t name the state and national organizations that she led. I would like to hear more!

I can find no evidence that Rebecca Kaplan has served in an executive leadership position in any prior position. I believe she served as a transit advocate prior to being a marijuana legalization advocate. I think she also worked on the political campaign for the inclusive housing ordinance, but did not lead that effort. As far as I can tell, she was not the chairwoman of any committee on the AC transit board [correction: in comments, V-Smoothe tells us that Kaplan was Board Vice-President, as well as Chair of the External Affairs, Operations, Paratransit Service Policy, and Finance Committees.], and isn’t currently the chairwoman of any committee on the city council. Of course, she had only been on the city council for a year when she decided to run for mayor.

Kaplan’s official bio essentially confirms this: she “helped to bring”, “worked to improve”, has “a strong commitment to”, etc. As far as my research shows, whatever leadership she displayed or accomplishments she claims to have achieved were essentially in an informal capacity. In other words, as an advocate not as an executive.

(Incidentally, I encourage supporters of these other candidates to send me examples of executive leadership that I can post in this entry.)

Executive vs. Advocate

As I conceive it, the main difference between a policy advocate and a public executive is that executives have to make tough decisions regarding personnel, budgets, and policy that advocates mainly don’t. Many of these decisions are zero-sum—that is, they create losers as well as winners. That’s why they’re tough decisions. Every dollar you spend on X, means that you can’t spend that dollar on Y.

Advocates, on the other hand, rarely advocate cutting Y—they just want more of X. That’s fine. And advocates are an important part of our system. But the leadership skills that come from being an advocate are not the same as the leadership skills that are needed to be an effective public executive.

During the most recent budget scuffle, I think Jean Quan has at least showed a bit of leadership by being willing to cut police services. Although I don’t agree with her position, Quan has nonetheless been involved in the negotiations with Councilors De La Fuente and Jane Brunner, and the city administrator, and the police union.

Rebecca Kaplan has not been involved, voted against the cuts, but hasn’t offered any immediate alternatives. If she is mayor, will Kaplan just delegate her duties similar to Ron Dellums? Who will negotiate with the unions? Will she rely on the city council to negotiate, like Dellums did? What programs will she cut? What hard decisions is she prepared to make? We just don’t know, given her lack of previous executive experience. As voters, we have no clues as to how she would govern in difficult times.

Perhaps Jean Quan and Rebecca Kaplan will be outstanding executives, but certainly we can’t rely on their background to give us any indication. Which to me, given the budget problems that Oakland faces and the difficult choices we have to make over the next few years, is an unacceptable risk.

Don Perata rallies for Oakland Care-Givers

2010-08-16T16:05:42Z

Oakland caregivers rally in support of laid-off workers

Don joined care-givers and their supporters in a rally on Thursday to protest the firing of 37 workers by the Piedmont Gardens senior home, following a working-conditions strike. None have been rehired by Piedmont Gardens, owned by Pleasanton-based American Baptist Homes of the West.

In a statement released Wednesday, Don said “Organized unions built America’s middle class: working women and men with dignified wages and working conditions. As we struggle through the biggest economic crisis for generations, we must stand by those principles or return to the harsh livelihoods that those before us fought so hard to improve.”

You can watch Don’s address to the rally in the video below.

If your browser doesn't support the video you can watch it, and others, at

http://www.youtube.com/user/Perata4Mayor

Over 14,000 gallons of trash removed from the streets of Oakland…

and we’re not finished yet!

We’re back on the streets of Oakland this weekend, emphasizing the City Council's failure to deliver clean streets. Your response has been phenomenal. In West Oakland last Saturday, more volunteers turned out for Oakland than we had available tools!

Tools have been re-stocked! With two clean-ups left this summer, we invite you to join us again, building upon the momentum you’ve created and the actual and real difference you’re making in Oakland’s most neglected neighborhoods.

Tomorrow morning, Saturday August 14^th, we’re meeting at Mount Carmel MBC for 10am, at 1343 81^st Avenue (map below). All that’s needed is your belief in Oakland.

Tiffany, Morgan, and Rhys

Perata for Mayor Campaign HQ

Guest Blog: "Why I support Don Perata for Mayor, Part I"

2010-08-11T18:50:31Z

Long time Oakland resident and doctoral candidate in political science at UC Berkeley, George Willcoxon, in his own words on why he supports Don Perata for Mayor of Oakland.

As long-time Oakland residents know, Don Perata has been a force in local politics for many years.

His list of progressive accomplishments is long and unimpeachable. As state assemblyman, senator, and senate leader, Don Perata carried landmark legislation in Sacramento on literally dozens of public policy issues that the Democratic coalition holds dear. Climate change legislation. Gun control. Health care reform. Social welfare coverage. Labor laws that make it easier to organize unions. Minimum wage increases. Environmental protection. Public transportation funding. His record is really a case of, “you name it, Senator Perata did it.” He is a modest man, and doesn’t trumpet these accomplishments in his public appearances. He likes to work behind the scenes, as a workhorse rather than a show horse. That’s fine, because Sacramento and Oakland are full of show horses. Nonetheless, the entire state of California, and Oakland in particular, owes Senator Perata an immeasurable debt of gratitude for holding firm on the front lines and advancing the progressive agenda, when Republicans held the governorship and controlled Washington, DC.

I personally find it hard to believe that any self-respecting progressives and Democrats in Oakland would consider supporting another candidate, given Senator Perata’s caliber and his record of accomplishments for our state and our city. To me, it would be like voting against Willie Brown or Ted Kennedy—legislators with lifetimes of accomplishments. But politics being what it is, the best progressive candidate doesn’t always win, and the campaign this fall will be difficult. Robert Gammon, formerly of the Tribune and currently of the local weekly, has made it his life’s goal to destroy Senator Perata. Anyone with an internet connection can call up 15 years or so of poorly researched hit pieces by the obsessed Mr. Gammon, the monomaniac Captain Ahab of local ‘journalism’. The vibrant and wonderful blogging community in Oakland generally supports half-term city councilor and marijuana-legalization activist Rebecca Kaplan. Jean Quan, a two-term city councilor, has strong support in her district. These are hard obstacles for even a seasoned campaigner like Don Perata to overcome.

Over the next few months or so, I am going to offer some short essays explaining why I support Don Perata for mayor, what I view as the core issues of the campaign, and how Oakland can emerge from the crisis in which it finds itself. I begin below with my first reason for supporting Senator Perata for mayor:

Reason Number One: A Willingness to use ‘Tough’ Leadership

One (Partial) Diagnosis for Oakland’s Ills

Why is the willingness to use ‘tough’ leadership so important for Oakland? I plan to write more systematically on this later in the summer, but a thumbnail sketch of what’s wrong in the city is that theinstitutions are broken. In political science-speak, institutions are “rules of the game,” human-devised constraints on human behavior. In my discipline, we essentially define institutions as anything that shapes how humans interact with each other. They can be formal, like the US Constitution, which aims to regulate how various branches of government interact with each other, with the citizens, and with the several states. And institutions can also be informal, like the norm that undergraduates should call their professors by their title and last name, but their teaching assistants by their first name. An organization (say, the United Nations, the Internal Revenue Service, or the Boy Scouts) is also an institution—in so far as it is a bundle of rules that guide the behavior of humans both within and outside that organization. But not all institutions are organizations: the Geneva Conventions are treaties that guide how states are supposed to behave during wartime, but there is no formal bureaucratic enforcement mechanism, save for the limited involvement of the Red Cross.

There are many institutions in Oakland that are broken. The mayoralty itself is only limping along under Ron Dellums. But I want to talk about two other prominent ones. First is the City Charter. The Charter states that when the legislative branch of the city interacts with the executive branch of the city, it should interact with only the very top officials. In other words, the City Council should interact with the Mayor and perhaps the City Administrator. Councilors should not be contacting and exerting pressure on individual departments, department heads, or line-worker bureaucrats, say, in the Parks Department or the Public Works Department. This rule, which obviously constrains how the city councilors behave, was presumably put in place to prevent councilors from extracting patronage or favoritism out of the city bureaucracy, i.e. extracting “special consideration” from the bureaucracy.

During the parking-ticket fiasco in the spring, various media reports suggested that members of the city council were flagrantly violating the city charter, and exerting pressure on the parking department to let certain parking violations slide in certain city council districts. Above and beyond the obvious inequity of this policy, this episode illustrates how council members can try to grab executive power—the power to direct the administration of the city—from the mayor, rather than limiting themselves to legislating the laws to be implemented. Even City Attorney John Russo suggested (carefully) that the charter was being violated:

City Attorney John Russo said any council member directing staff – instead of working through the city administrator – violated the city charter.

“The idea is to protect the city from this kind of scenario, where council members are able to cut different deals for their district,” he said. The public, too, holds responsibility for expecting council members to intervene for them, Russo said. “Everyone is complicit here.”

If the city councilors have problems with the city’s administration, or their constituents’ needs aren’t being met adequately, then the councilors are supposed to take it up with the mayor or the city administrator. It takes a forceful mayor to push back against council interference.

The second important institution that is broken in Oakland is the bureaucracy itself. The bureaucracy is not performing adequately. Technology is not being adopted, performance metrics are not even reported in many cases, and standard HR procedures are not being followed. The citizens are not receiving the “bang for the buck” that they deserve or expect out of the relatively expensive city bureaucracy.

Institutions are by their nature entrenched and difficult to change. After all, they are intended to restrain individuals, not enable them. Unusual amounts of political pressure are often necessary simply to nudgeinstitutions in the right direction, let alone transform them. I think Don Perata is the only mayoral candidate with the chops to push that hard and that vigorously against the broken institutions in Oakland, to get them finally back on track. The city council cannot be allowed to run roughshod over the Charter, and the bureaucracy has to be allowed to do its job. And the bureaucracy has to be convinced, coerced, or cajoled into higher-quality performance. Getting these institutions back on track (among all the other issues facing the city) will not be easy or conflict-free. But I think Don Perata certainly has the best shot of doing so.

Why Senator Perata?

Like the best progressive elected officials, Senator Perata uses the full range of political tactics available to him. Over his distinguished career he has demonstrated his facility with most forms of political leadership: building coalitions, working the ‘inside game’, leveraging his network of supporters, working the media, making tactical concessions to win passage of a bill, and holding firm when necessary to win concessions. (These skills may sound trite, but they are not skills that every politician shares.) One of his most obvious skills is political fundraising for Democratic candidates and causes; I don’t think I exaggerate in saying that he has raised tens of millions of dollars for Democrats, the Democratic Party, and progressive causes. Another skill is his recruitment of, support for, and partnerships with up-and-coming community leaders in Oakland and around the state. These two skills in particular give Senator Perata a large measure of his political power—power he uses for progressive ends to “get things done.” A consummate dealmaker, Senator Perata got things done even in a severely broken Sacramento.

In addition to these skills at persuasion and coalition building, Senator Perata is not afraid to play hardball when it’s appropriate. Two examples spring to my mind. First, when three fellow senate Democrats broke a caucus rule (and crossed him), Perata locked them out of their offices using his official power as president pro-tempore. That may seem petty, but, well, disciplining caucus members is that sort of game:

“Whether it’s locking somebody out of an office or repainting it or suddenly having the special parking space vanish, legislative leaders back to Jesse Unruh have taken some kind of action to maintain discipline in the caucus,” said Bruce Bronzan, an Assembly member from 1982 to 1993.

As a political scientist and political junkie, I eat this stuff up.

Second, Senator Perata played hardball with a Republican legislator who broke an agreement to vote in favor of the state budget in 2007. (Can we finally call a constitutional convention, most importantly to kill the two-thirds budget rule?) From Wikipedia:

In response to Denham’s refusal to vote for the budget on the grounds that it wasn’t balanced, Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata demoted Denham from his position as Vice Chairman of the Senate Governmental Organization Committee. At the same time, Perata started working with local Democratic parties in the Central Valley to create a petition to start a recall election against Denham.

The recall made in onto the ballot but lost; Perata’s actions are still a good example of hardball tactics. There are many other examples. (But not overly many!)

Why a Willingness to Play ‘Hardball” is a Necessary Condition for Progressive Change

I argue that hardball tactics are an essential tool in the progressive toolkit. (I argue this most persuasively after a glass or two of red wine.) Of course they are not the only tactic… But progressives need to understand how important ‘tough’ leadership is to our success. Why is it so often necessary for progressives to be tough? Tougher than conservatives? Because American constitutional and political-institutional arrangements favor the status quo. Our political system has an amazing number of veto points relative to other advanced democracies, which tend to have parliamentary systems with disciplined party government. Federalism, separation of powers, bicameralism, presidentialism, the committee system, judicial review, weak parties, decentralized government within the states, overlapping and redundant local jurisdictions, the privileged position of business in polyarchy, and a truly ridiculous number of lower-level elected officials all combine to slow reform to a glacial pace. As a result, progressive reformists in the United States have an exceedingly difficult time advancing their agenda; successful progressive leaders have typically needed to use—vigorously—the broadest range of tactics available to them, including hardball.

(Hardball is also the favorite leadership strategy of political scientists because that is where we get all of our colorful political anecdotes.)

In fact, the two great eras of major progressive reform—the New Deal, and the Great Society/Civil Rights era—were orchestrated in part by presidents unafraid of using hardball tactics. To be sure, Franklin Roosevelt and Lyndon Johnson were also masters of co-option—granting recalcitrant congressmen pork barrel projects for their districts, using the bully pulpit to rally the American public, or offering legislative concessions or executive branch jobs to senators. However, these ‘velvet’ tactics were reinforced by—and were not substitutes for—hardball.

We mostly remember Roosevelt’s political tactics as, perhaps, grandfatherly. He gave speeches full of soaring rhetoric and held Fireside Chats on the radio. But that sepia-toned memory is only part of the story. Roosevelt enjoyed enormous congressional majorities, and the significant threats to Roosevelt’s New Deal reforms came not from legislative obstruction, but from the Supreme Court. The Court at the time held dearly to its 19^th century doctrines of economic substantive due process, and of very narrowly interpreting the Commerce Clause of the US Constitution; together, these doctrines essentially prohibited economic regulation at both the state and federal level. Still following these doctrines, the Supreme Court struck down many of the core laws of the New Deal in the mid-1930s.

So FDR played hardball. In a March 1937 Fireside Chat, he proposed expanding the Supreme Court from nine justices up to 15. (The size of the Supreme Court is set by statute, not by the Constitution.) Roosevelt, of course, would nominate those six extra justices, and they would be readily confirmed by a Senate supportive of a more liberal court. In the end, one justice began switching his votes from the conservative bloc to the liberal bloc, thus preserving the New Deal reforms and the nine-member Supreme Court. This apparent surrender to Roosevelt’s “court packing scheme” is the so-called “switch in time to save nine”: FDR took direct aim at one of the most august American institutions and made it bend to his will, an unusual and even breathtaking action commensurate with the scale of the political and economic crisis of the 1930s. (If only President Obama were as willing to thrash the institutional barrier to his agenda during the current crisis, the archaic Senate filibuster rule!)

Most political scientists and historians see this episode as a blunder for FDR; I think keeping the New Deal intact was worth scuffing up the Supreme Court a bit. In FDR’s time, it wasn’t clear that the New Deal would take hold and endure; only to later observers does the court packing scheme seem clumsy. In any event, my point here is not to argue on behalf of FDR’s tactics in this given instance, but only to argue against the idea that this liberal icon was some sort of cuddly grandfather, or simply a rhetorician or only an ‘ideas guy’. The idea that progress flows peacefully and naturally along with time– so-called ‘Whiggish’ history– is a dangerous one for progressives to adopt. Progressive change comes often only with tough tactics, is historically contingent, and is not inevitable.

Lyndon Johnson also used the full range of political tools available to him. As ‘Master of the Senate’ and later president, Johnson was famous for bargaining, cajoling, persuading, arm-twisting—you name it. These well-known photographs by New York Times photographer George Tames captured what everybody called the “Johnson treatment,” the forceful personal suasion for which the Texan was famous.

Johnson, of course, was a self-made, scrappy farmer from Texas, who enacted Medicare, Medicaid, the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and the Voting Rights Act of 1965, using the full range of political tactics.

Politics is rough sport; real progressive change does not come from having ‘better ideas’ than your opponents, or from being on ‘the right side of history’. Real progressive change comes from having better ideas than your opponents and from being on the right side of history and also from tough-as-nails leadership that is willing to play hardball when appropriate. In mathematical terms, I guess my overall point is:

(The Right Policies) x (Tough Leadership) = Progressive Change

A president can have great ideas about providing universal health care, or stopping global warming, or reforming Wall Street, but if you can’t make that 60th senator vote with you, or you can’t force needed reform of the filibuster rule, then all the good ideas in the world will get you nowhere. Closer to home, a mayor or a city councilmember may have a nice plan to make Oakland a model city, or to radically increase public transportation in Oakland, or to bring green jobs to West Oakland, but if you cannot get the people and the institutions to move forward together—to work for rather than against change—then the ideas don’t matter. Good policies without leadership mean nothing, or equals zero in the above equation. Don Perata may not be FDR or LBJ, but he understands how to lead progressive reform.

So the first reason that I support Don Perata is that he knows how to lead. Oakland has suffered through four years of good ideas and good rhetoric coupled with bad leadership. On the other hand, on issue after issue, and in negotiation after negotiation, whether against Republican legislators, Governor Schwarzenegger, and even the Bush Administration, Don Perata has delivered progressive results. Most importantly for Oakland, he will know how to apply sustained political pressure until we get the progress the City deserves. And we get the institutional change we need.

Don Perata - Campaign update

2010-08-03T21:56:21Z

Dear Friends,

Come celebrate Don's official mayoral filing on August 6th with the campaign team at Oakland’s Art Murmur, from 6- 9pm in Uptown Body & Fender where Giovanna Tanzillo transforms her shop into an art gallery. Tanzillo, recipient of this year's "Neighborhood Dynamo" award for community involvement, is thrilled to contribute her energies to Don Perata's Believe in Oakland campaign. Details: August 6th, 6-9pm, Uptown Body & Fender, 401 26th Street, Oakland.

After 9pm, the evening continues at Era Art Bar. Join Don and team with award-winning local musicians, Carne Cruda, for their "Oakland's Tight" CD Release Party. Details: August 6th, 9pm onwards, Era Art Bar, at 19 Grand Ave

There’s a lot to celebrate. “Believe in Oakland" is more than just Don’s campaign theme; it’s a reflection of the grassroots efforts going on right now to make Don Perata the next mayor of Oakland.

If your browser doesn't support the video you can watch it, and others, at

http://www.youtube.com/user/Perata4Mayor

We have been overwhelmed by the community's support and engagement with this campaign on every level. Our accomplishments to date include:

9 Community Conversations held with Oakland residents from every council district throughout the city, listening to over 1,000 people who Believe in Oakland.

80,000 Oakland residents received invites to participate in DonÊ¼s community conversations, where everyone could share why they Believe in Oakland and express ideas for improving Oakland.

6,000 to 8,000 calls are made every week by volunteers to Oakland residents, to share why they support Don Perata.

Over 20,000 Oakland residents have been reached by our volunteers, who every week are going door-to-door talking to voters about the issues they care about and sharing why Don Perata is the Mayor that Oakland needs.

110,000 invites went out announcing our "8 Community Cleanups", for July and August. With 4 down and 4 to go we've already removed an incredible 9,500 gallons of trash from the streets of Oakland's most neglected neighborhoods.
Over 2,000 individual donors have shown their belief in Oakland by contributing to Don's campaign.

We are far from finished; there are three more months, and four years, of this energy still to come!

Perata for Mayor Campaign HQ

Don Perata for Mayor of Oakland lawn signs are here!

2010-08-20T00:26:21Z

Oakland is about to be invaded – ...invaded by thousands of bright, shiny ways to show that you Believe in Oakland. Lawn signs are here! Watch the video:

If your browser doesn't support the video you can watch it, and others, at

http://www.youtube.com/user/Perata4Mayor

Oakland has seen too many grey clouds of late and they’re blowing in straight from City Hall. The time is ripe to brighten your neighborhood with a statement that change is ahead. Under Senator Perata's leadership, Oakland can become "The Town" we believe in.

Please call or email today for your BELIEVE in OAKLAND | DON PERATA for MAYOR lawn sign, in time for delivery on the Labor Day weekend.

To reserve your lawn sign and/or other volunteer opportunities, call Tiffany on 510-922-8397 or email tiffany@perata4mayor.com

Don Perata leads clean-up of Oakland’s forgotten neighborhood, Sobrante Park

2010-07-29T23:52:56Z

Last Saturday morning, community volunteers removed 65 bags of trash, 20 hypodermic-needles, and 9 knives from the streets of West Oakland.

While the rest are giving 90-second sound bites at public forums, we are out there in Oakland’s neighborhoods doing the things that the City Council hasn’t done.

This weekend’s community clean-up presents a greater challenge; We’re taking our Believe in Oakland message to Oakland’s forgotten neighborhood, Sobrante Park.

I need you, and your belief in Oakland to join me this Saturday in cleaning up East Oakland. In the aftermath of 80 police lay-offs, a “sell this, sell that” budget, and another weekend of gun-violence, I want to show people that this stuff matters.

http://www.youtube.com/user/Perata4Mayor

The City Council doesn’t believe that keeping the streets clean and giving people a sense of well-being in their community matters. If you don’t have clean streets then you can’t get anyone to believe that you can do anything else.

So please join me in Sobrante Park on Saturday, 24 July 2010, at 10am. We’re meeting at the School of Urban Missions, 735 105th Avenue, Oakland, CA. It will be the campaign’s third of eight clean-ups, taking place every Saturday this summer.

Thank you for believing in Oakland.

Don Perata

WHAT: The Sobrante Park Clean Up

WHERE: School of Urban Missions, 735 105th Avenue, Oakland, CA

WHEN: Saturday, 24 July 2010, at 10:00 a.m.

HOW: Call Tiffany at (510) 922-8397 or email rsvp@perata4mayor.com

Click on the map for directions

The full schedule of summer clean-ups can be found at:

www.perata4mayor.com/events

Don Perata - "Thank you Oakland"

2010-07-16T20:07:16Z

Dear Friends,

Last Saturday 60 volunteers joined me on the streets of East Oakland for the campaign’s first Community Clean-Up.

I took time out from sweeping to thank everyone who showed up, and to invite you, your family, and your friends, to join me any Saturday this summer as we continue to clean up Oakland.

If your browser doesn't support the video you can watch it, and others, at

http://www.youtube.com/Perata4Mayor

Together, we removed 1,485 gallons of trash from the streets of one of Oakland’s most neglected neighborhoods. It was obvious that it had been some time since City Hall management last dispatched teams to take care of these streets.

It’s a small step but a significant one. If City Hall can’t even do the little things, it’ll never get the big things right. I’m running my campaign the same way I’ll lead as Oakland’s mayor: I’ll be in your neighborhood to make sure we’re getting the job done.

So please join me again on Saturday July 17, from 10am – 12:30pm, in West Oakland. We’re meeting at True Vine Ministries, 896 Isabella St, Oakland, CA.

Click on the map for directions

RSVP: On Facebook, by email: rsvp@perata4mayor.com, or call Campaign HQ at 510-922-8397.

If you can’t join us this Saturday, or would like to support the Believe in Oakland campaign in other ways, please click on the volunteer icon below.

In particular, the campaign is looking for volunteers to join our call teams to share our Believe in Oakland message with other members of your community. If you're available any Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday evenings this summer please call Campaign HQ (510) 922-8397 and ask for my volunteer co-ordinator, Tiffany. Together, we can make Oakland the city we believe in.

Thank you again for your belief in Oakland. I hope to see you Saturday.

LEADING THE OAKLAND CLEAN-UP

2010-07-11T00:53:30Z

Thank you for following my campaign and Believing in Oakland.

This summer, every Saturday, we’re going to be cleaning up Oakland.

We’re going to go into your neighborhood and other neighborhoods to do the things that the City of Oakland hasn’t done, to underscore and to highlight what a mayor should do.

The Mayor should be out in the community. He should be getting the little things done. If you do the little things well, you’ll do the big things well. City Hall right now does neither.

I invite you to join us. Please visit the events section of this website for more details and I hope to see some Saturday, this summer.

Straight out of Oakland...

2010-06-11T21:56:55Z

I recently stopped at a coffee house in the Glenview. While sitting in the patio, a girl and boy in their early teens took an adjacent table. Soon after, they were joined by a man in his late twenties.

What followed was a deeply moving pageant.

The young man was having a snack with his two companions, who were both autistic. They were sitting quietly discussing an assignment.

The affection, gentleness and emotional bond between the mentor and his audience was obvious. At one point, he leaned toward the girl saying "do you know how proud I am you're my student"?

As they left, I asked if he was a teacher. He answered smiling and beaming with pride that yes, he was. The children were his students from the inclusion program at Edna Brewer School.

They were on a social outing in the neighborhood as a practical way to participate in community life and reinforce valuable life skills.

Pure Oakland!

I was a classroom teacher for 16 years. These young people are why I am committed public service. Nothing is more important to Oakland’s future than giving our kids the education they need to succeed.

My optimism comes from the thousands of people I’ve met here who, like the young teacher at Edna Brewer School, “Believe in Oakland”. They deserve a government that justifies their belief.

Sweating the Small Stuff

2010-04-29T16:45:36Z

Oakland’s pothole blitz kicked-off this Monday, as City Hall dispatched eight crews with work orders for more than a thousand potholes. This annual spring event blooms with what the French call “deja vu”, what my kids call “a glitch in the matrix”, and what I call “we’ve been here before”.

Something is not right about the way Oakland City Hall protects it property. Some of the damage to our roads is caused by heavy traffic but you only have to look around Oakland to see that City Hall treats all illnesses with a quick fix band-aid.

Fixing holes

There’s an enormous pothole at the intersection of Santa Clara and Oakland Avenues, underneath I-580. I know it pretty well: it swallowed my car, blowing a tire and damaging a wheel rim.

At least six times this year, I’ve seen the hole disintegrate and then repaired by City Workers. One worker estimated the cost of filling the pothole was at least $400 a shot; another told me that this particular pothole had been there for 12 years.

You don’t have to be a civil engineer to figure that the ubiquitous lake of water filling the hole isn’t coming from traffic. I’ve figured it out, the City Workers I’ve spoken with have figured it out, but City Managers continue to re-write the same work order over and over again.

So, this month I got on the phone to both the management at East Bay Municipal Utility District (EBMUD) and City Hall’s Public Works Department, and asked them to meet me on site for a long term solution. Some impressive diagrams were exchanged with finger-pointing. EBMUD is confident that the source of the problem isn’t theirs; City Hall said the same.

On Monday morning, City Hall returned with three heavy-duty trucks brimming with gadgets and the block has been a hive of activity ever since. Twelve years of papering the cracks and wasted money is being resolved by a couple of phone calls from a former State Senate President pro Tem. That’s an unacceptable response from City Hall. I’m not the only taxpayer in Oakland.

The root cause

There is clear contrast in the way those two public agencies protect their property: Six years ago, EBMUD noticed the pothole and became concerned that its property – the water pipes – was defective and costing the district major dollars. EBMUD sent out a team with monitoring equipment. It found no damage to its property but detected traces of ammonia, and informed its neighbor – the City of Oakland – that there could be a sewage leak. Rather than investigate the source of damage to its property, management at City Hall continued its band-aid approach and papered over the cracks.

Most homeowners know that if there’s damage being inflicted repeatedly on their property, they need to tackle the root cause before it brings the building down. City Hall doesn’t take that view and it has little regard for the efficiency of the public dollars it spends. If the rate of cost and repair were consistent over the 12 years of the pothole’s existence, we’re looking at over $84,000 of our tax dollars spent to treat a square meter in a city that is over 78 square miles.

And as public infrastructure crumbles, so do the taxes that the City collects. These blighted conditions tell investors, businesses, and families that Oakland has an unresponsive city bureaucracy that can’t even manage the small things, let alone the big issues. Opportunity goes elsewhere; the cycle continues.

Sweat the small stuff

Good mayors manage by getting outside and walking the city. They see things, write it down, and call department heads. The next morning, the mayor goes back out to see if the managers did their jobs and holds them accountable. That’s how I will work as Oakland’s mayor.

Ambitious ideas often sound impressive but as one Oaklander commented on a local blog, we shouldn’t plan to build spaceships before we’ve figured out the paper airplane. Oakland City Council has no shortage of ambitious rhetoric but not much of a record for delivering the goods on issues that matter.

A Mayor has to sweat the small stuff before the voters will follow on the big issues. A Mayor has to restore confidence in city government, starting with fixing the things you expect – the standard things, the little things. We need to get back to basics. Once City Hall learns to walk again, we can start running and make Oakland the truly wonderful city we believe in.

Oakland Voters Asked Again to Subsidize City Hall’s Inefficiency

2010-04-05T19:58:17Z

The City of Oakland Government released a city budget proposal last week that will put two tax measures to voters in November. The idea behind it is to cut nearly half the $42.6M budget deficit that the City faces next year. Mayor Dellums’ office threatened that this was the only way to avoid cutbacks to police and fire-services.

The only way? This response is typical of Oakland’s stagnant city government. It’s a ballot cop-out to subsidize city inefficiency. There are always other ways.

To start, the City Council could have put a measure on the June ballot asking Oakland voters to retain the half-cent tax we already pay but one that the state will rescind in July.

The City missed the boat on that one but that’s not unusual from the City’s Finance Committee, some of whom don’t get the main idea of budgeting - planning ahead. They only realized in March that this year's budget gap was actually $10.4M, more than twice the $4.8M originally projected. They blew the city’s rainy day funds before the economic downturn even started.

It’s no surprise then that my office isn’t getting a straight answer from City Hall on how much the city’s 33 boards and commissions are costing Oakland’s taxpayers. The City Clerk’s office claims that the Mayor’s office is responsible. The Mayor’s office has no idea how much is being spent and is not sure that records even exist.

Every dollar should be accounted for before raising taxes. Oakland’s voters are among the most generous in the state. Their pockets have been tapped again and again, and they’ve been failed again and again by the city government. City Hall should be making serious political cuts before cutting city services.

The city also needs to re-look at how it’s using public money. That doesn’t mean axing public employees left, right and center is the answer. City government is too quick to fire front line staff when management is the problem. It takes a leader to hold department managers accountable. It’s a leadership vacuum that’s causing this waste, inefficiency, and inequality. The City Council has not stepped into the leadership void but instead, dragged its feet and ducked its responsibilities.

I want to get Oakland back on track to reach its full potential. With its tremendous resources and its wonderful, generous people, our city is big enough to get your arms around but small enough to make a difference. I still believe in Oakland.

Summary Parole

2010-04-05T20:11:56Z

Among the many recent bad decisions by the governor's office during this recession, one in particular will have immediate and long term consequences in Oakland.

The Department of Corrections "summary parole" policy is to prisons what Ronald Reagan's "community based treatment" was to mental health care. In each instance, the state off loads its responsibilities onto local government and walks away.

California has never recovered from Reagan's abandonment of mental health care responsibility. Homelessness, increased jail incarceration of the mentally ill and runaway ER costs document his failed policies.

Summary parole has the potential to be even more destructive. Basically, 44,000 "low risk" felons will be released before completing their sentences. None will have any supervision once released. The state will not provide funding or transitional services, leaving California’s cities and counties to manage this population without assistance.

I have convened a working group of law enforcement, community, faith and non-profit agencies to confront this "inmate dumping" in Oakland.

We will pursue the Department of Corrections to provide exactly what’s needed to prevent Summary Parole from becoming yet another assault on Oakland’s urban life. We will demand a percentage of the $50,000 (the annual cost to imprison an inmate) to fund a prototype network of local reentry programs and services.

With unemployment at 16% in Oakland - and three times higher for the chronically unemployed - summary parole will simply be another abandoned state responsibility, just like mental health 40 years ago.

California’s recidivism rate is already 70%, and that’s with a parole system. Citizens returning to their communities without any support network under Summary Parole are at an even higher risk of re-offending. The State is setting up both newly released offenders and our communities for failure. It is a failure that Oakland cannot afford.

The City Should Treat Its Residents Equally

2010-04-05T20:02:25Z

On Thursday, the Chronicle reported that a secret memo from City Hall instructed parking enforcement to treat some Oakland residents better than others. Parking enforcement officers were told to give "courtesy notices" in some wealthier neighborhoods, while ticketing and fining everybody else.

At first the City denied there was a problem, and it took a rally outside City Hall to force them to change the policy and treat our neighborhoods equally. Today I’ve called upon the Mayor and City Council members to give up their personal “free parking – all access” passes.

This parking issue is a metaphor for what’s going on in Oakland right now.

The insiders at city hall are playing favorites, then trying to hide the truth when they’re caught. The city is not providing city services fairly and equally, and its parking policies are hurting local business. This lack of leadership in City Hall is feeding miscommunication and dividing Oaklanders where there is no need for division.

The law and common sense—not geographic location—should determine when tickets are issued when cars are parked in the wrong direction. Sometimes leniency is appropriate—but we can still apply the same rules and the same leniency to all City residents.

This type of flatfooted response is typical of Oakland’s absent City government. The problem is that City Hall did not listen to our citizens until after the storm, and after the damage was done. A truly functioning City government should be able to anticipate problems and avoid them. A truly functioning City government should know not to treat some neighborhoods differently than others.

The vacuum in our city’s leadership is taking us backwards, not forward. Oakland needs leadership if we’re to become the City we believe it can be. What’s clear from the parking ticket controversy is that without leadership we can’t even fix the small problems, let alone the big ones.

People live in Oakland because they love the City. They believe in Oakland. They deserve a government that justifies their belief.

Meaningful Reform

2010-02-26T19:10:47Z

Last year, in an act to reduce spending, the legislature approved a law to cut the state prison population by 44,000 in three years.

SB18 allows the department of corrections to release "low risk” felons before their terms are complete and without any supervision. Most of these inmates will have little if any education or life-skills preparation to function in the community.

CA already has the highest recidivism rate in the nation. It seems logical to expect that number will now increase with this poorly designed early release.

In Oakland, I recently convened non-profit, community, clergy, law enforcement and correctional officials to develop a prototype reentry plan.

The goal is to intercede with these returning inmates and families, offering structure, housing, life skills, education, mental health, drug and alcohol and employment assistance.

We will seek legislation mandating a set percentage of the $50,000 per inmate spent on incarceration be allocated to fund our local prototype.

Oakland will be seriously affected by these ex-offenders who will return home with little hope and less opportunity to live within the law.

We plan to press the state to revisit its early release policy, improving its evaluation methods for releasing inmates and investing in established "best practices" community programs designed to cut recidivism.

Unfortunately, the governor's office shows little interest in rescinding or amending early release. To the contrary, it's advocating a $250M cut to literacy, education and vocational programs, further weakening rehabilitation services for inmates.

Please consult this website for status reports on these efforts.

For more information, please contact me at don@perata4mayor.com

From the Campaign Trail

2010-02-10T04:16:59Z

The campaign just posted our first contribution report. At $115,000, we've doubled the nearest competitor. And we did it with a self-imposed $100 limit, with more than 1,300 individuals contributing.

Thanks to our supporters, we have completely built the campaign infrastructure. We’ve installed our communications systems, hosted numerous campaign walks and increased the number of volunteers each day. Combined this allows us to to wage an effective, efficient citywide campaign. Every voter contact and ID can be tallied for Get Out the Vote (GOTV).

As the city council turns the election over to the county to implement the new instant runoff election in November, we’ll need to spend considerably just to ensure voters understand the new system.

Some notable minority organizations have taken issue with the city's decision to contract out voter education for this new system to the League of Women Voters. They argue that longstanding, known and trusted organizations like the NAACP and Chinese American Association are better suited to educate the diverse voters in Oakland.

Despite assurances these concerns would be accommodated, the League retains sole responsibility for explaining to voters how "ranked choice voting" works. We have all witnessed Election Day meltdowns in our country – such controversy bodes ill for an electorate as pluralistic as ours.

Finally, precisely because the new voting process will be used this November, I decided to return the contribution limits to $600/person, as set by city charter. These funds are necessary to provide a clean election in which people cast their votes and all votes are tallied.

One sad note, Bill Cavala died in late December. He was a legend in local and statewide Democratic politics for more than 40 years. Many of us locally - Jerry Brown, Bill Locker, Willie Brown, Johan Klehs, Tom Bates, Loni Hancock, Lionel Wilson, Elihu Harris, Mary Moore and others - had our political careers influenced by Bill.

Unique rarely applies as often used. Bill Cavala was.

As I walk in Oakland

2009-12-31T00:09:27Z

As I walk in Oakland's diverse neighborhoods, I see many signs - literally - expressing opposition to America's war policies in Iraq and Afghanistan.

"No Oil, No War", US Out Now", "Afghanistan: Vietnam Redux" are clear reminders of Oakland's long opposition to foreign adventures or "nation building", the latest term of art.

Our anti-war philosophy began with Vietnam and continued through Nicaragua - and became manifestly outrageous when Bush attacked Iraq seeking to destroy Weapons of Mass Destruction that never existed.

We empowered our Congressmen Ron Dellums and Barbara Lee to vocally lead peace efforts.

I'm proud of that history. In fact, it is that local history that led me to sponsor in 2004 a statewide referendum on the Iraq war. It would have expressed California's opposition to further military engagement in Iraq (and by reference, Afghanistan).

While I couldn't get any Republicans to get the 2/3 majority needed, there was an outpouring of support. Some not surprisingly, from the Bay Area. But also among heavily minority communities in LA, Sacramento and coastal southern California.

Alas, it is again time for us to speak out. It is not possible to reconcile spending American lives and one million dollars a month per soldier in Afghanistan while trying to fund universal health care and cut double digit unemployment at home.

This is NOT President Obama's war; but he can end it. He can reverse the hollowing out of America's middle class designed by the foreign and economic policies of Cheney-Bush.

We must thoughtfully express our opinions - not to the president - by to those Congressional leaders whose support he needs.

Nancy Pelosi, George Miller, Pete Stark are powerful members of the Democratic majority. They must be visible in the pursuit of peace. Only Barbara Lee has done so to date.

Only hubris can expect America to prevail where Western military exploits over centuries have failed.

The great anti-war traditions of Oakland once led the nation to ending the Vietnam War.

Make a call or send a letter or email today to Pelosi, Miller and Stark. Ask them to get us out.

We did it once. Those peace signs in the windows and cars of Oakland voters can again be prophetic.