Oakland’s Housing Crisis—Success and Moving Forward

On September 30, I along with my colleagues on the City Council held a Special Council Meeting on Hous­ing and unanimously passed Oakland’s Housing Equity Roadmap—a comprehensive plan to address Oakland’s dis­placement, affordable hous­ing production, and housing habitability challenges. This means we have taken the first step in taking action to deal with our housing crisis, but more work remains.

The City of Oakland is fac­ing a serious affordable hous­ing crisis, with numerous residents being dis­placed from their homes. The displacement crisis is tearing apart families and communi­ties, and, in many cases, includes people be­ing kicked out of their homes in ways that are illegal. Oakland has laws on the books protect­ing tenants from unjust evictions, but many do not know about the laws, and they are not adequately enforced. In some cases, tenants are being kicked out due to fake “owner move in” evictions, or simply being told they must leave, and the tenants have no resources to fight wrongful evictions.

Meanwhile, when tenants are forced to relo­cate, they are, in some cases, given no reloca­tion assistance funds, and, in other cases, given an amount that is far too small to be able to cover the costs of relocating. The inadequate relocation requirements also encourage more evictions, and more suffering by tenants.

I have been urging action since receiving the Housing Equity Roadmap this past June. That is why prior to the Special Council meeting on Sep­tember 30, I submitted and urged that the follow­ing actionable items be scheduled as an immedi­ate response to Oakland’s housing displacement:

1) Amend our relocation assistance require­ments to cover the real costs that tenants face when forced to move, and adopt an amended ordinance to increase the required relo­cation assistance amount, and apply it more consistently;

2) Fund a community-based outreach strategy to provide public education about laws protecting tenants’ rights; and support enforcement strategies that will provide the enforce­ment of laws protecting tenants’ rights, discourage unjust evic­tions, and reduce violations;

3) Promote rapid rehousing for those in danger of home­lessness by funding a rental assistance program to enable people to pay first month, last month, and security deposit.

I and Councilmember Brooks successfully got a vote scheduled on the proposal to fund im­mediate responses to the housing crisis, includ­ing tenants’ rights education and enforcement, rapid rehousing to address homelessness, and more. It will be heard at the October 20th City Council meeting.

The passage of the Housing Equity Roadmap was a success because of all the support from the people of Oakland— attending and al­lowing for the City Council to hear their tes­timonials. For us to win this next step to fund immediate responses to the housing crisis, we will, again, need all the support from the people of Oakland at the October 20, City Council Meeting on the 3rd floor Chambers at 5:30pm, Oakland City Hall.

Vice Mayor Rebecca Kaplan was elected in 2008 as Oakland’s citywide councilmember. She serves currently as Vice Mayor. Vice Mayor Kaplan graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, obtained a Master’s degree from Tufts University and a Juris Doctor from Stan­ford Law School.