Mayor Jerry Browns 10 K Plan Under Fire

Mayor Browns 10 K Plan Under Fire
By Lynda Carson 05/11/03

Oakland CA--In a show of force to challenge Forest City Enterprises and the proposed Uptown Project of Mayor Jerry Brown, nearly 47 people filled out speaker cards for the May 6, 2003 Oakland City Council Meeting to line up in support of the Coalition for Work Force Housing plans to build affordable housing. No Representatives of Forest City Enterprises were on hand to answer any questions posed by the speakers or Council Members as the evening wore on.

As a result of the evenings speakers efforts to sway the council vote, the City of Oakland will continue in it's efforts to negotiate with Forest City Enterprises over the proposed Uptown Project and the council will focus on aspects of the affordable housing proposals by the Coalition for Work Force Housing, a proposed condo lot, and the proposed housing for UC Berkeley students.

Starting out with Lynette Lee of the East Bay Asian Local Development Corporation, speaker after speaker imploringly sought the councils support as they expressed their passion over this issue. In an attempt to convince the council members to get a grip on this Uptown Project, each speaker supported efforts to stretch what may be a $60 million subsidy to the developer as far as possible by including the plan of the Coalition for Work Force Housing into passage of the final deal.

Homeless people showed up to speak out, as well as Michael Diehl of B.O.S.S., who was wearing a lovely black Top Hat sporting a white feather neatly tucked into it's band, along with Alex Salazar of Pyatok Associates, Adam Gold of Just Cause Oakland, Sean Herron of the East Bay Housing Organizations, and many others.

Their message was on target, very focused and most speakers Tuesday night did not specificaly support or reject the Uptown Project as is, but remained focused in getting out their message of support for the Coalition for Work Force Housing plans to be incorporated into the final passage of the Uptown Project master plan.

Supporters of low-income renters and the Colition of Work Force Housing believe that the Uptown Project should have at least 25% of the units available to low-income households and even lower rents for very low-income renters. The Coalition created and presented a new far reaching plan to get the most out of the $60 million subsidy which would meet many of their goals for cheaper rents and more bedrooms per unit, which Forest City Enterprises has over looked or never considered as part of their plan.

The 770-unit Uptown Project will cost nearly $204 million before completion with the city willing to subsidize around $60 million of the project, with 20% of the rental units to be affordable to households earning less than 50 percent of the area median income, while 5%, or 38 apartments, may have up to three bedrooms per unit. Studios going for around $700 per month plus security deposits just to get into the door are well above the range of most low-income renters, and may cost even more by the time the project is finished.

Sanjee Honda was the only speaker who expressed his view that hidden costs may not be reflected in the present plans cost structure, and he pointed out that costs for infrastructure of the Uptown Project may not be included in the $60 million subsidy, inferring that there may be a much higher hidden cost to the city not yet realized.

Passions about this project are very high all the way around, as everyone tries to weigh in on the issues and voices are heard from the homeless, to the housing advocates, the Councilmembers and the Mayor himself.

As the issues heat up over the mass evictions going on in the Uptown Project area, the Mayors 10 K Plan appears to promote further mass evictions happening at the Pacific Renaissance Plaza, and Alice Arts Center. A message I received dated May 6, 2003 from Mayor Jerry Brown expresses his views and concerns over the controversy of the Forest City Enterprises deal, and the mass evictions going on.

Lets keep it honest, says Brown. The Forest City development is the most viable project for Uptown in more than a quarter of a century, he says.

Ask yourself: why has this area been virtually dead for so long? If it could have been developed in the manner you propose, the city council would have done it by now.

Construction costs/capital costs are such that the falling rents in the city make it even harder today to finance this Uptown project--which, in fact, includes a substantial number of affordable units. If the opponents win and kill this project because they can't get the one they want--which is totally impractical--that would be tragic.

The billionaire line is great rhetoric but for what purpose? Do you want only small corporations to invest in Oakland? If you do, you wish to wipe out tens of thousands of jobs and force thousands of layoffs from the City of Oakland.

I really find it counter-productive to throw out imaginary plans in order to kill real ones that could revitalize downtown.

Finally, the evictions you mention in the email below have no relationship to Forest City. Let's keep different problems distinct so that people of good will can work on solutions.

Jerry Brown

Mayor Jerry Browns attempts to silence his critics are steeped in stealthy political shenanigans meant to obfuscate the hidden costs of the 10 K Plan and conceal the tragic consequences of creating homelessness out of low-income renters facing eviction who never recover after being tossed out onto the streets of Oakland by those profiting upon their misery.

Mayor Jerry Brown does not want citizens to hear about or focus upon the $60 million subsidy that may go to the 3 families of billionaires who own Forest City Enterprises, started long ago by some timber barons earlier during last century.

Presently, back room deals are being considered to sell 4 of Oaklands top ranking revenue producing parking garages to Inter Park of Chicago in an effort to come up with $16 million needed for the proposed Uptown Project-Forest City deal. One of those garages is located at the Pacific Renaissance Plaza, which also has a disaster happening for 50 units of low-income housing facing eviction in July, 2003. City staff report that they do not know how Oakland would replace the revenues generated from the parking garages used to pay city employees if the garages were sacrificed for the Uptown Project. These are no win situations for the City of Oakland or the low-income renters during the latest budget crisis, and job cuts going on.

Mayor Jerry Browns 10 K Plan is a call for 10,000 wealthy settlers to move into downtown Oakland, and if they happen to displace thousands of low-income renters in the process such as the 50 units of low-income housing at the Pacific Renaissance Plaza, 34 units at the Westerner Hotel, or an additional 74 units at the Alice Art Center, it is merely considered as collateral damage to the power brokers in the housing-developer industry who thrive on gentrification projects and a Mayor who could care less about losing the low-income renters to the cold mean streets of ghetto life in Oakland.

Mayor Brown wants to delude himself and others into believing that non of the above are connected, only mere abstracts in a complicated world of high finance and dirty deals that could not possibly be linked to one another as tragic circumstances for the less fortunate being over looked in these forced relocations of the poor.

How could the loss of 50 units of low-income housing downtown Oakland at the Pacific Renaissance Plaza ever be linked with the plans to bring in 10,000 new wealthy settlers into downtown Oakland as part of Mayor Browns 10 K Plan, or the planned sale of the garage in the very same Pacific Renaissance Plaza to finance the Uptown Project. How indeed...

Ten years ago, the 1.2 million sq. ft. mixed use retail/residential/commercial Pacific Renaissance Plaza in Oaklands Chinatown was developed by the City of Oakland in partnership with a wealthy developer named Lawrence Chan who is the founder and C.E.O. of Park Lane Hotels International. As part of the deal for financing the project, a local non-profit housing organization stepped in and helped arrange a 10 year deal for 50 of the rental units to be set-aside for low-income renters, which has expired and the renters now face eviction as soon as July 2003. A very short sighted deal that now outs many at risk of becoming homeless.

Local housing activists trying to save the renters from homelessness cannot count on Oaklands Mayor to step up to the plate to protect or support low-income renters from mass evictions during a period when he is pushing for 10,000 new wealthy settlers to replace the low-income renters in the down-town area.

During the May 6, Council Meeting, Councilwoman Nancy Nadel asked city staff how many years the affordable housing set-aside units were to last in the Uptown Project, was informed that it was 55 years and then asked why the Pacific Renaissance Plaza deal was not required to last for more than 10 years. Nadel asked further, if it was possible for Section 8 Vouchers to replace the 34 units of low-income housing that will be lost at the Westerner Hotel as a result of the Uptown Project if it goes through.

In addition to the imminent loss of the low-income rental units at the Westerner Hotel and Pacific Renaissance Plaza, the A.R.T.S. Coalition at the downtown Alice Arts Center which has 74 units of low-income housing are asking for public support to fend off evictions that may occur as a result of the plans Mayor Jerry Brown has to expand his School for the Arts, which he is the Chairman of.

Based upon their latest flier, local artists and low-income renters are asking for public support. The A.R.T.S. Coalition Needs Your help, it says. After several meetings with Mayor Brown, the A.R.T.S. Coalition has no assurance that the Alice Arts Center would be kept intact or offered any concrete offer for relocation, and that this is targeting the African American community and low-income renters. Anti-eviction activists claim that out of 74 rental units, only 50 units are presently occupied at the Arts Center because the Mayor wants to keep new rental contracts from being made until he completely takes over the Alice Arts Center for his own School of the Arts project.

The Westerner Hotel and Alice Arts Center are 2 locations out of 24 locations on the list of downtown Single Room Occupancy Hotels being targeted as part of a report Mayor Jerry Brown had city staff put together to figure out the costs of relocating the low-income renters out of downtown Oakland a number of years ago. The same report states that the elimination of these units, which provide shelter, and, in some cases, social service resources would create an increase in homelessness. The state requires relocation costs for many of those being displaced from the SRO's.

For More Information about evictions at the Alice Arts Center contact; ArtsCoalition1428 [at] hotmail.com