149 City of Oakland Bldg Dept - Inspectors issued hand written notices rather than issue official violations

2 Investigates: New complaints, enforcement questions about troubled East Bay hotel
April 2015

http://www.ktvu.com/news/4277269-story

2 Investigates found records where an inspector chose to issue "hand written" notices to the hotel's manager, rather than issue an official violation, but Oakland's Director of Building and Planning, Rachel Flynn, defended her inspector's actions.

OAKLAND, Calif. (KTVU) - People who live at the Empyrean Towers in downtown Oakland say problems threatening their health and safety continue to plague the hotel after a KTVU investigation in February and numerous visits from city code enforcement inspectors since then.

The conditions have some housing advocates calling for Oakland to take legal action against the owners of the property.

In February, attorneys with the non-profit Eviction Defense Center documented a number of problems at the Empyrean Towers with cell phone video of broken doors in the common bathrooms, cracked windows, faulty plumbing and incomplete repair jobs. 

One of the videos revealed the doors to some vacant rooms at the hotel had been nailed shut.

Attorney Amy Sekany, who's representing a number of tenants at the Empyrean Towers, returned to the hotel after 2 Investigates documented unsafe and unsanitary conditions in January.

"To come back and to find out that just walking the building myself, there are all these terrible conditions still in place?  It's just really disturbing," said Sekany.

Some of the problems found by KTVU, including holes in the walls and garbage in the hallways, have been fixed, but tenants say many other issues remain.

Notices of violation

Oakland code enforcement issued 20 notices of violation, or NOV's, to the Empyrean Towers over a couple of days in late February, according to documents obtained by KTVU through the California Public Records Act. 

Inspectors documented damaged smoke detectors, broken faucets, cracked windows and more than 90 other violations.

Those NOV's start a clock, giving a property owner 30 days to make repairs before facing fines. In some cases, code enforcement officials say Empyrean Towers managers fixed the problems, but others issues have yet to be resolved.

2 Investigates found records where an inspector chose to issue "hand written" notices to the hotel's manager, rather than issue an official violation, but Oakland's Director of Building and Planning, Rachel Flynn, defended her inspector's actions.

"They're going in, apartment by apartment, to get everything up to code and it's actually working," said Flynn.  "So, this is one of those success stories where it came to our attention, we have knowledge about how to get a building up to code and maintain it properly and we have a cooperative owner who's allowing us in."

The owner, identified by the city as Alice Tse, refused to speak with KTVU when first contacted her in January. Her attorney has not returned several phone calls and emails requesting comment since then.

Records show the city issued only four violation notices to the hotel in all of 2014.  Complaint logs indicate inspectors sometimes chose not to write up official notices when they found violations.

"If  we send a notice of violation, or NOV, they have 30 days to address it.  So, if we have someone who's cooperative and they're going to address it in a week or two, why send an NOV?" said Flynn.

Tenants frustrated

Maria Anast and her husband, Don, are among the tenants who have been most vocal about ongoing problems at the Empyrean Towers. Despite managers making some repairs to their room, such as fixing a broken window, Anast isn't satisfied with the city's response to her complaints.

"I would like to see one fine for one room?  [The inspector has] been in this room at least ten times.  No fines. Nothing's done," said Anast.

Code enforcement inspectors could not tell KTVU whether any fines have been issued to the owner of the hotel.

Tenants told KTVU some of the repairs that have been made were incomplete or poorly done.

"It's like putting a band aid over a gash," said single mom, Kia'Ora Henson.

Henson and her son, Nehemiah, say they've been living in a small room at the hotel about seven months. They showed 2 Investigates how they have to use a can to prop open a broken window frame.

The seven story hotel's elevator also remains off limits to tenants, causing the most trouble for elderly residents such as 81 year-old Katherine Bergman, who lives on the fourth floor.

"I fell!" said Bergman. "I fell three weeks ago. I was sore for three weeks."

The frustration tenants are feeling is nothing new. In 2011, federal authorities arrested the hotel's former owner, Richard Singer, who later admitted to paying someone to try to burn down the building, which was already the subject of numerous complaints and lawsuits.

Inspections continue

An inspector returned to the Empyrean Towers on March 27. The inspector, Gene Martinelli, declined an interview, but told KTVU's Eric Rasmussen he was following up on complaints and that he had "an entire floor" to inspect.  

Rasmussen asked why no fines had been issued to the hotel owners, despite repeated violations.  "There's reasons for it and they're good reasons," said Martinelli, who did not elaborate.

After the inspection, which lasted more than two hours, Martinelli told KTVU the hotel managers are "moving in the right direction."

Some tenants are not convinced.

"They're just doing enough to get by," said Anast.  "To satisfy [the inspector]."

Sekany wants to see the city take over the building.

"We would like to see is a receivership put in place here, so a third party could step in and help facilitate the repairs, take control of the building," said Sekany.

Code enforcement managers warn, the situation is "complicated."


"Say we condemn the building," said Flynn.  "Where are those families going to go?  Then we hear about that. 'City puts 50 families on the street.'  And we don't want to do that."

148 City of Oakland - Empyrean Towers gets paint and art, while electric problems and holes in walls and ceilings remain.

Oakland: Changes coming to troubled residential hotel
March 2016

http://www.mercurynews.com/2016/03/24/oakland-changes-coming-to-troubled-residential-hotel/

OAKLAND — At long last, change is afoot at one of Oakland’s most troubled residential hotels.

This month, a U.S. Bankruptcy Court judge approved the sale of Empyrean Towers to a local nonprofit planning a costly makeover of the decaying 96-unit building into livable affordable housing.

For the most part, the days when 344 13th St. was crawling with rats and bedbugs and street people slept in hallways and common rooms are gone. Even so, tenants of the downtown building on Wednesday complained about holes in ceilings and floors, electrical problems and the broken elevator in the seven-story building.

“It was hell for a while,” said 35-year-old Brandon Gunn, who lives with his wife and 10-month-old son on the third floor. “Don’t get me wrong; it’s gotten better.”

The Empyrean, formerly known as the Menlo Hotel, is one of several single room occupancy hotels in downtown Oakland that are part of the city’s affordable housing stock. A recent survey showed that there are 1,224 SRO rooms downtown, said city spokeswoman Karen Boyd in an email.

Conditions in the Empyrean’s three towers and its poor management have been the source of complaints for years. In 2011, landlord Richard Singer, of Tiburon, was sentenced to 27 months in prison after admitting to trying to hire an arsonist to torch the building.

Last year, Oakland City Attorney Barbara Parker sued the new owner of Empyrean, Alice Tse, based on code violations and asked for a court order to require Tse to comply with building codes. The city also last year temporarily evacuated the building due to contaminated water supply.

Tse later declared bankruptcy, and Alameda County Superior Court turned the property over to a trustee, which today serves as its manager. Tse’s lawyer, Steve Whitworth, did not return a call seeking comment.

On Wednesday, workers were hanging art in the newly-furnished and painted lobby. More workers were in the stairwell, painting the hallways a light blue color. Outside on 13th Street, three-year tenant Maria Anast said the work amounted to window-dressing. Step inside the units, and you can find holes in ceilings and residents who walk up flights of stairs because the elevator is broken, she said.

“It’s not even a Band-Aid; they are just painting over things,” Anast said, as a homeless man left feces near the building’s entrance. “This is a Third World country, this building. It’s a joke; it’s a sad, sad joke.”

On the third floor, Gunn pointed to his broken bath tub and said his power frequently goes out because he shares a circuit breaker with three other units.

“Every time I want to cook, (with a hot plate or toaster) I have to knock on the neighbor’s door” to make sure they aren’t cooking, Gunn said.

Anne Omura of Oakland’s Eviction Defense Center has represented the tenants and is optimistic things will change once Berkeley-based nonprofit Resources for Community Development takes over.

“We have our fingers crossed,” Omura said. “If it does go through, it’s nothing short of amazing.”

The March 4 ruling by Judge Roger Efremsky allows RCD the option to purchase the building and maintain it as affordable housing for 55 years, keeping low-cost housing in a city that badly needs it.

Carolyn Bookhart, RCD’s director of housing development, said they plan on converting all the units to new studio and one-bedroom apartments with kitchens and bathrooms. Most of the rooms do not have bathrooms and none have kitchens.

It’s a herculean face-lift: the building is in need of a new elevator and repairs to the plumbing, electrical and heating systems, Bookhart said. She estimates the construction cost at $10 million; the building’s price tag is $4.5 million.

The nonprofit is currently raising money to buy the building and finish the project, she said. The purchase agreement is in effect until Oct. 15. At half occupancy, Bookhart believes it can work on the building without displacing current residents, she said. Work will begin in spring 2017; the grand reopening is set for summer 2018.

Parker, the city attorney, called the bankruptcy court ruling a “landmark decision.”

“The court’s order makes it possible to ensure that this property is preserved as part of Oakland’s critical low-income housing stock and that the horrendous conditions at the Empyrean Towers are remedied,” she said in a statement.

David DeBolt covers Oakland. Contact him at 510-208-6453. Follow him at Twitter.com/daviddebolt.

147 City of Oakland - Empyrean Towers Tenants sickened by coliform bacteria contimination

2 Investigates: Displaced tenants of troubled hotel await water test results

http://www.ktvu.com/news/4593168-story

OAKLAND, Calif. (KTVU) - Tenants in a seven-story residential hotel remained out of their homes Friday while city inspectors await the test results of water samples taken from the building.

On Thursday, Oakland code enforcement red tagged the hotel, deeming it unsafe. East Bay Municipal Water District investigators found contamination from coliform bacteria in one of the pipes.

It's the latest problem at the downtown property since 2 Investigates began looking into tenants' complaints in January.

"The plan is to go have a plumber come through the system and see where the contamination is coming from," said City of Oakland inspector Gene Martinelli on Friday morning.

Later in the day, Martinelli told KTVU stagnant water found in the pipes running through a vacant office on the first floor of the building might be a potential cause of the contamination.

Until water samples from the building get a clean bill of health, management of the Empyrean Towers agreed to pay for displaced residents to stay a Motel 6 in Oakland, about seven miles away. Crews flushed the system of pipes on Friday and more test results were expected as soon as Saturday.

"Traumatic, scary, unbearable," is how tenant Lydia Hamilton described the experience of suddenly being forced out of her home. Hamilton is among several residents who said they became sick from drinking the water at the hotel in the last week.

Steve Whitworth, attorney for the Empyrean Towers owner, Alice Tse, e-mailed a statement to KTVU Friday morning:

"The Empyrean Towers Management remains and has been committed to the welfare of all law abiding, lawfully residing tenants at 344 13th Street Oakland California. Working with Oakland and the City Attorney Office we were / are happy to provide temporary shelter at a local Motel, a temporary Per Diem for each tenant, and transportation to all tenants displaced by this unfortunate event. Empyrean Towers looks forward to the tenants returning to their residences as soon as possible."

Other residents, such as Curtis Davis, who depend on the hotel for basic shelter, aren't satisfied.

"This constant battle of people homeless, people sick? It's frustrating and ridiculous," said Davis.

146 City of Oakland - Empyrean Towers Tenants - 2+ years later are still waiting for safe living conditions

Empyrean Towers in Oakland a step closer to rehab: 2 Investigates
March 2017

http://www.ktvu.com/news/234658169-story


OAKLAND (KTVU) -- More than two years after 2 Investigates first exposed unsanitary and unsafe conditions at the trouble Empyrean Towers hotel in Oakland, the property is now one step closer to being rehabilitated.

The City Council on Tuesday night approved a resolution giving the city authorization to negotiate a deal to have the property deemed a historical site, through the California State Historic Preservation Officer (SHPO). That would free up funds as part of the rehabilitation process.

According to the proposal, “the purpose of entering into the Agreement is to minimize, reduce or avoid adverse effects on the historic building” while it is being rehabilitated and eventually sold to a non-profit that plans to turn it into affordable housing.

Last March, a bankruptcy judge approved the potential sale of the property to the Berkeley-based affording housing non-profit group Resources for Community Development (RCD), paving the way for what tenants and their attorneys hope is reform at the hotel.

Part of the court’s decision requires that the building is maintained as affordable housing for at least 55 years.

But the building that some tenants called a “nightmare” is still far from a dream. 2 Investigates visited the Empyrean Towers on Wednesday to find holes in the walls haven’t been fixed, and the elevator is still not functioning.

Resident Katherine Bergman, 83, says she is forced to climb flights of stairs to her home. And due to faulty plumbing, Bergman says she resorted to bathing with baby wipes during cold snaps.

2 Investigates first exposed dangerous and unsanitary conditions at the Empyrean Towers more than two years ago. Uncover camera footage revealed fire damage, broken toilets, missing smoke detectors, and uncollected garbage among the problems on a long list of complaints reported by tenants.

In March, it already appeared that a major facelift was well underway. At that time, the building had new paint, light fixtures, a heating system and hot water heater.

Nearly two years ago, tenants were forced out of the building by a serious health scare when investigators found coliform bacteria in the water in one of the pipes. Some residents told 2 Investigates by the time it was discovered they already drank the water and had gotten sick.

The City of Oakland filed suit against the owners of Empyrean Towers in April 2015, accusing management of illegal evictions, failing to make repairs and for creating a public nuisance. Inspectors documented dozens of problems including broken windows, faulty plumbing, and an elevator that was frequently out of service.

At that time, owner Alice Tse agreed to a deal that would provide $500,000 for a long list of overdue repairs. But shortly after, Tse had filed for bankruptcy and control of the property was handed over to a Chapter 11 trustee.

Lina Torio is an agent for the trustee overseeing the property while it's in transition.  She says the elevator would cost $3 million to repair and her group is not authorized to spend that money during the bankruptcy.

Torio showed 2 Investigates a new water tank installed for the entire building and other upgrades. She said it’s not the trustee’s job to renovate, but rather keep the property safe until the ownership transfer is finalized. That is expected to happen in March 2017.

KTVU's 2 Investigates team was honored to receive a 2016 Edward R. Murrow Award for continuing coverage of the dangerous and unsanitary conditions at an Empyrean Towers.


Landlords show up to support embattled landlord of Oakland's Empyrean Towers: 
2 Investigates
May 2017

http://www.ktvu.com/news/2-investigates/257674523-story

Dozens of volunteers gathered in front of Oakland City Hall on Friday to show support for a local landlord at the center of a legal fight over the unsanitary conditions at a residence hotel she used to own.

The city is suing Alice Tse over the conditions at the Empyrean Towers hotel after a series of 2 Investigates reports uncovered the unsafe conditions inside. Tse’s supporters say the city is treating the property owner unfairly.

“If this thing happened to Alice, it will happen on every property owner in the Bay Area,” said volunteer Alex Ko.

A crowd of about 30 people chanted in English and Chinese outside and carried signs, some saying “Alice is innocent,” before taking their protest inside City Hall.

Tse did not attend the rally herself, but for the first time her mother Jannny Tsui spoke publicly, through a translator, to defend her daughter.

“She says she doesn’t have money for living,” the translator said on behalf of Tsui. “She’s asking the questions ‘Why? What did I do wrong? What did my daughter do wrong?’”

Tsui said the city has seized some of her property as part of the legal claims against her daughter.

In 2015, the City of Oakland sued Tse and Empyrean Towers alleging years of code violations, illegal evictions, and even abuse of tenants. Later that year, a court-ordered receiver stepped in to run the day-to-day operations of the Empyrean Towers after a judge stripped control of the hotel from owners.  

The move was one of the demands in the city’s lawsuit filed by City Attorney Barbara Parker. Parker's office credited 2 Investigates for exposing unsafe and unsanitary conditions at the property.

2 Investigates revealed video and pictures showing brown water in tenants’ sinks, holes in walls, broken doors in the common bathrooms, cracked windows, faulty plumbing, and incomplete repair jobs.

Cell phone video taken by an attorney representing some tenants revealed the doors to some vacant rooms at the hotel had been nailed shut.

When we asked Friday about the living conditions at Empyrean Towers, Tsui said her daughter was in the process of fixing the issues, but the city did not give Tse enough time. Although she could not provide proof, she said in some cases the tenants caused the damages themselves.

“The city already inspected it and the next week, they’d come back and it would be broken again,” Tsui said.

Friday’s protesters, some of who are landlords themselves, said they feared Tse’s case sets a dangerous precedent for all Bay Area landlords.

“We are afraid the government will do this to other owners too, and not giving them their fair chance” said Meina Young, a volunteer at the rally. “The government is trying to take over the property and that is not fair.”

In July 2015, Tse agreed to a deal that would have provided $500,000 to cover a long list of overdue repairs at Empyrean Towers. At the time, Tse also agreed not to oppose the decision to place the property into receivership. The funding and receivership ultimately fell through and Tse filed for bankruptcy that same month.

Last year, a federal bankruptcy judge approved the sale of the Empyrean Towers hotel to a Berkeley-based affordable housing non-profit group called Resources for Community Development (RCD), paving the way for what tenants and their attorneys hope is reform at the hotel.

2 Investigates reached out to Tse but did not receive a response before the time of publication. At a hearing in March, Tse also declined to speak to KTVU producers regarding the ongoing Empyrean Towers lawsuit with the city.

145 City of Oakland - Empyrean Towers Tenants also ignored by Bldg and Fire Inspectors

2 Investigates: Mounting problems, complaints at notorious Bay Area hotel
Feb 2015

OAKLAND, Calif. (KTVU) Fire damage, broken toilets, missing smoke detectors and uncollected garbage are just some of the problems on a long list of complaints reported by tenants of the Empyrean Towers in downtown Oakland, a KTVU investigation revealed.

http://www.ktvu.com/news/4156581-story

Inspection #1
https://s3.amazonaws.com/s3.documentcloud.org/documents/1569250/oct-14-fire-inspection-report.pdf

Inspection #2
https://s3.amazonaws.com/s3.documentcloud.org/documents/1569249/012315-reinspection.pdf


The seven-story building on 13th Street, formerly called The Menlo, has come under scrutiny before. In 2011, then-owner Richard Singer went to prison for paying someone to try to burn down the hotel in order to collect on the insurance.

Four years later, tenants and guests say many of the problems that plagued the hotel remain.

After reading scathing online reviews of the Empyrean Towers on several travel websites, KTVU's Eric Rasmussen booked a room at the hotel in January.

Upon checking in, an employee at the front desk said the elevator was broken.  2 Investigates recorded a number of holes in the walls while going up the stairs.  Rasmussen also found garbage bags in several hallways.

On the seventh floor, a window leading to the fire escape had been nailed shut.  An extension cord in the hallway appeared to be running power to one of the rooms.

After dark, Rasmussen needed a flashlight to navigate one of the stairwells where the lights were out.

A tenant shared cell phone video of a leaking ceiling in the lobby during rainy weather in December.

A last resort

A single mother and her two children say they moved into a room at the Empyrean Towers when they had nowhere else to turn.  The mother, Nicol, says domestic abuse forced them out of their house.

At a rate of $260 a week, the family of three has no stove and must use a shared bathroom and shower in the hallway.

"Came into this room. Came into this hotel... and I cried. I did not know it was as bad as this," said Nicol. "When we first got here, my son took a shower and he said brown stuff was coming out of the water."

The family says heat in their room is intermittent. They say they've witnessed drug use in the hallways and say complaints to management are often ignored.

Nicol's daughter, "Dana," 16, says she's managed to keep straight A's in school, despite the cramped quarters.

"Sometimes when I want privacy, I go in the closet.  I know it's ridiculous, but that's the only place I can go," she said.  "I just hate it.  It's so uncomfortable."

Tenants organizing

The Oakland non-profit Eviction Defense Center helped organize about 50 tenants of the Empyrean Towers to demand changes at the hotel.

At a meeting in January, residents complained about mold, missing smoke detectors and a rat infestation.

"Every floor has absolutely deplorable conditions, from top to bottom," said Eviction Defense attorney Amy Sekany.  "I've heard rats running through the walls in the middle of the day."

Tenants made similar complaints and filed lawsuits in 2010.  Around that time, the owner of the hotel, Richard Singer, hired someone to try to burn down the hotel, but the plan was interrupted by federal authorities and Singer was sentenced to prison for attempted arson.

Questions about ownership

In an email, Singer told KTVU he sold the hotel before going to prison in 2011.  Documents show the property was purchased by a family trust, of which, Alice Tse is a member.

In a recent deposition, Tse denied she was the owner, but said she managed the property.

Tse blamed tenants for some of the damage.  She also said some of the holes in the walls were left behind by firefighters responding to a fire at the hotel in July 2014.

When 2 Investigates tried to speak with Tse and her attorney in January, they declined to answer questions about the conditions at the hotel.

According to a lawsuit filed in 2014, Singer went on the payroll with Tse's realty company soon after he was released from prison.  Singer also declined to speak to KTVU, but in an email, he denied any management or ownership interest in the Empyrean Towers.

Identifying problems

Records show fire inspectors with the City of Oakland have visited the Empyrean Towers at least five times since October 2014.

One inspection report found a long list of problems including those similar to the ones identified by 2 Investigates -- missing smoke detectors, sprinkler heads in need of repair and a blocked fire escape.

A re-inspection in January declared "no violations noted," but advocates for many tenants at the hotel insist more needs to be done.

"They've been crying out for a long time," said Sekany.  "Something absolutely has to get done now."

144 City of Oakland - Mass evictions at Oakland’s Empyrean Towers

Mass evictions at Oakland’s Empyrean Towers
December 2014

http://sfbayview.com/2014/12/mass-evictions-at-oaklands-empyrean-towers/

Oakland – Many of the residents of Empyrean Towers are being bullied and tossed out of their housing with eviction notices served by the management company called Innovistech Realty Co.

The Empyrean Towers, located in downtown Oakland at 344 13th St., used to be known as the Hotel Menlo and was owned by millionaire Tiburon resident Richard Singer. Singer landed in prison a few years ago after getting caught by the FBI in a sting operation for trying to hire an arsonist to burn down the occupied hotel as part of an insurance scam.

In August 2011, Singer was sentenced to 27 months in prison, fined $60,000 and received three years’ probation after his release from prison. It was an employee of Singer named Samuel Manning who worked with the FBI in a sting operation to nail Singer for the arson scam, after Manning faced charges for embezzling the Girl Scouts out of more than $50,000. Manning sought reduced charges against himself in return for helping the feds go after Singer for the arson scam.

Before he went to prison, Singer and the company that used to manage the hotel, known as RMD Services, were also sued by many of the residents because of slum-like conditions at the hotel. Singer has already been released from prison for the arson scam and is back in business buying and selling properties.

Fast forward a few years later, and the Hotel Menlo has allegedly been renovated and renamed the Empyrean Towers, and the owner-managers have been renting out rooms for $79 a night to a variety of people from all walks of life.

Others reside there as permanent month to month residents, and according to tenants facing eviction it is those tenants who are being run out of the building with evictions recently. Twenty or more residents have been facing eviction since a fire occurred in the building last July from a lit cigarette, tenants say.

Many of the residents of Empyrean Towers are being bullied and tossed out of their housing with eviction notices served by the management company called Innovistech Realty Co.

Additionally, according to public records with “corporation wiki,” Richard Singer has partnered with real estate broker Alice Tse to own and manage the building through Empyrean Towers LLC and Innovistech Realty Co.

As a real estate broker, Alice Tse has been buying properties for Singer for a number of years and she called me a few times around the beginning of 2014.

Over the phone Alice Tse stated a few times that she was buying properties for Singer, and that she was very concerned about Singer’s activities. Then on Feb. 21, 2014, I received a strange email from Alice Tse (alicetsesf@gmail.com) that said: “I have a new fraud case committed by Richard Singer who attempted to burn down the Menlo. Please call me at 650-526-2968 – Alice.”

I tried calling a few times but Alice did not respond to my call, and I wondered what happened. Only lately did I learn that she is partners at the Empyrean Towers with Richard Singer.

I received a strange email from Alice Tse (alicetsesf@gmail.com) that said: “I have a new fraud case committed by Richard Singer who attempted to burn down the Menlo. Please call me at 650-526-2968 – Alice.”

Recently evicted tenant Andrea Polega told me that among the problems she faced living there is that the sink in her room did not have a “U pipe,” and she had to keep a bucket under the sink to catch the water every time she used it. She had to pay $210 a week to stay there until management forced her out of her housing.

On Nov. 25, Andrea contacted me and said: “I am a tenant at Empyrean who is being kicked out at this very second after having a money order returned to me that was in their possession for more than 24 hours. They returned it at 11 a.m. telling me to be out by noon.

“This is directly following my physical incapacitation in the form of a ruptured Achilles tendon, which was directly caused by their negligence. I am on crutches in a six-story walkup and cannot go up or down the stairs unassisted, let alone move my belongings this way.

“At 2 p.m. they returned with police. I will be charged with trespassing if I do not leave. I have nowhere to go. I would be more than happy to go on record for any future articles against these bastards or any other media outlets to gain justice.”

On Nov. 26, I was advised by the Eviction Defense Center that they were assisting Andrea, they had extensive interaction with her while she was being evicted, and she is currently safe.

According to tenant Don Fisher: “The male resident manager, named Royce, beat up Andrea’s boyfriend, Donald, because he was sleeping in the lobby waiting for someone to come and get him and his girlfriend. I believe you are aware of the couple that Luis May kicked out, right after refusing to accept their rent payment.”

“Donald went to the hospital and Royce went to jail. If you can assist, I need to know who to contact to get a restraining order or similar relief to get this manager out of the hotel. Many people are now worried about being treated in the same manner.”

“There was blood from the floors to the doors from this, and Royce’s wife or girlfriend made threatening overtures to Maria. Maria asked why Royce simply did not call OPD and I had to intervene,” Don Fisher said.

Management of the Empyrean Towers has declined to reply to my requests for an interview in regards to the violence and evictions involving management at the building.

Additional information reveals how hard it is for the residents of Empyrean Towers. According to Towers website, there is no guarantee that the elevator of the seven-story building is available to the residents. The residents all have to pay in advance online before moving into the building and do not know what they are getting into until they move in.

Management of the Empyrean Towers has declined to reply to my requests for an interview in regards to the violence and evictions involving management at the building.

Tenants Don Fisher and Maria Anast moved into the Empyrean Towers on Dec. 16, 2013, after being hit by hard times in a tough economy. They lost their footing in the world of the middle class in America and moved from San Francisco to Oakland for cheaper housing.

Now they are both on a fixed income, are very poor and receive around $300 a month each from general assistance. They also receive food stamp assistance to help get by. But by the third week of the month, they are both pretty much broke and are getting hungry. “We only get around $4 dollars a day to live on from food stamps and that’s not nearly enough to survive in Oakland,” said Maria.

They live in a small room with a bed, a TV, small refrigerator, microwave and a hot plate. They are lucky to have their own bathroom in comparison to many others who have shared bathrooms in the old seven-story building.

“Life is very hard on us now, and we do not feel safe living in this building. There are drug dealers, crack heads and prostitutes living on the upper floors. The cops are here all the time. The locks are flimsy on our doors, and we keep a baseball bat handy just in case someone breaks our door down to enter our apartment.

“There is no heat. They do not allow the tenants to use the elevator. The building has bed bugs, rats and is loaded with flies and gnats from the garbage piled up at the property. Our toilet does not work, the shower barely drips any water out of it when we try to take a shower, and the building lacks smoke detectors in most of the apartments,” Maria and Don both explained in exasperated tones.

“We have been good tenants since moving in, are quiet, have paid our rent on time, and we were SHOCKED to find an eviction notice posted on our door recently after management refused to accept our rent anymore,” they said.

Don and Maria filed a response as a way to fight against the eviction, and they need to find an attorney. Others facing eviction from the Empyrean Towers have sought assistance at the Eviction Defense Center near 16th and Telegraph Avenue.

Don and Maria said, “Around 20 people or more are facing eviction because management wants to bring in higher income tenants willing to pay $79 a night to stay at this building.”

Don used to be an officer in the Navy and later worked in the tech industry for years. Maria spent many years happily working in the hospitality industry. They are in their 50s, and they raised two kids who became adults, including a son who entered the Navy recently and a daughter who lives in Santa Cruz.

“We don’t know what we will do if we get evicted,” said Maria. “We are thinking about buying a van, but we are too broke to do so. We are also thinking about buying a tent if we lose our housing, but we do not know where people camp out when they are made homeless in Oakland,’’ Maria said.

Don and Maria said, “Around 20 people or more are facing eviction because management wants to bring in higher income tenants willing to pay $79 a night to stay at this building.”

The Eviction Defense Center is representing at least five residents from various units facing eviction at the Empyrean Towers, in addition to Don and Maria. Attorney Andrew Wolff will assist in defending the tenants.

Management at Empyrean Towers did not respond to my request for information about the evictions. The phone number for Innovistech Realty Co. reached the Sweden Hotel in San Francisco, and the staff there claim that Alice Tse sold the property.

Patricia Singer, Richard Singer’s wife, stated that she is divorced from Richard and does not want to comment on his activities regarding Empyrean Towers. She also declined to pass on his phone number.

Eviction attorney Johanna Kwasniewski stated that she had no comment regarding my many questions about 20 tenants or more allegedly facing eviction by Richard Singer and Alice Tse. Then she reconsidered and said that she would contact Empyrean Towers LLC to see if she were allowed to make any comments. I have not heard from her since that discussion days ago.

143 City of Oakland Bldg Inspector: I am surprised you are applying logics [sic] to the City Of Oakland.

Post-Ghost Ship: Despite mayor’s promises, Oakland city inspectors are telling residents to leave unpermitted spaces
June 12, 2017

http://www.mercurynews.com/2017/06/18/in-post-ghost-ship-oakland-city-tells-artists-to-leave-livework-spaces-despite-mayors-promises/


OAKLAND — Just over a month after a horrific fire ripped through an East Oakland warehouse, killing 36 people, Mayor Libby Schaaf made a promise that city staff would work cooperatively with property owners to make their buildings safe without evicting the artists who live there.

The artists received an eviction notice in the immediate aftermath of the deadly Ghost Ship fire on December 2, 2016. Aric Crabb/Bay Area News Group)

Instead, it appears city inspectors are doing just the opposite. In the months since the fire, they have issued inspection reports explicitly stating tenants cannot reside in the buildings, while offering only vague instructions on what violations the owners or tenants need to correct, or throwing up bureaucratic road blocks to getting work done. At the same time, tenants of cultural and entertainment venues have complained about a heavy-handed approach that has made it difficult to stay in business.

On Feb. 21, city staff identified 18 properties in a report to the City Council, saying it had already begun the process of reaching out to property owners to craft compliance plans — a list of work that needs to be done and a timeline in which to do — so the city could bring the spaces up to code. But Darin Ranelletti, the city’s interim director of planning and building, admitted this week that the city had not in fact entered into a compliance plan with the owners of any of those properties.

Schaaf said she was “disappointed” more property owners have decided not to cooperate with the city.

“The city can’t force that choice,” she said. “It can only make it easier.”

At the Castle Von Trapp, a live/work space in West Oakland identified in the February report, a city inspector wrote in an April 20 report: “Discontinue residential occupancy and obtain commercial tenant improvement zoning approval and permits.”

It was a de facto eviction order, although the building was not red-tagged as an immediate risk to the residents. The inspection report was a direct contradiction to Schaaf’s Jan. 11 order, which states city inspectors should “avoid displacement of any individuals residing or working in the property if that can be accomplished without imminent life safety risk.”

“They’ve done everything but make it easy,” said Tom Dolan, the architect who wrote the city’s live/work conversion ordinance in 1999 and who has been volunteering his time with Safer DIY Spaces. The nascent group emerged in the wake of the Dec. 2 fire to help people make immediate safety improvements to unpermitted live/work buildings.

“The city has not actually explicitly red-tagged spaces, they’ve just made it very difficult for them to be lived in,” Dolan said. “There really has been very little cooperation.”

frustrating for Chris Spiteri, one of the tenants in the Castle Von Trapp. Along with her housemates, Spiteri had been working for several months to assuage the fears of their landlords, who were waiting for guidance from the city. A building inspector walked through the space in January but didn’t send an official report back on the violations until April. In March, the tenants said their landlords gave them an ultimatum: Buy the building or leave. One of the landlords, Yeon Lee, did not respond to a request for comment.

“In that time, we very much tried to keep open communication with our landlords to figure out if there was a path for us to move forward that didn’t result in us vacating the building,” she said. “So, it was frustrating, I’m sure on their part as much as ours, to be waiting so long for direction from the city only to find out the result is, because it’s an unpermitted residence, they want us to leave.”

Ranelletti said the onus is on building owners to enter into a compliance plan with the city, and the delays in issuing an inspection report were not an excuse because the property owners were informed of the executive order at the time of the inspection, he said, and can get information on what needs to be done in other ways.

“The information is … often communicated at the site, in the office; they can come in, in person,” he said. “Ultimately, it’s the responsibility of the property owner.”

SiteA (Todd) redacted p2of13Since the council’s report, inspectors have visited other live/work spaces that aren’t on the list of 18. At one live/work space in the city’s Brooklyn Basin neighborhood that is home to about dozen people, an official inspection report read: “Improper occupancy — All residential and non-residential buildings or structure or portion thereof … shall be considered ‘Substandard and a Public Nuisance.'”

The report continues, “Obtain permits, inspections and approvals and restore to original usage.”

The last line is worrisome, said Todd, a tenant whose last name this newspaper is not using because it would identify the building and increase his risk of eviction. Reverting to the original usage would mean people can’t live there. Even if a change of use was granted, the building would have to be upgraded to comply with modern earthquake and building codes, which could cost hundreds of thousands of dollars.

“That’s a real problem,” Todd said. “That’s when things get expensive.”

When she went to the city to see what needed to be done, Sinuba said she felt as though she were talking to a wall.

“For people who are still grieving, just being given this paper that (says) everything is wrong and we won’t tell you what to do … it’s scary,” she said. “We don’t know what this means. We could be kicked out, but there is no where else to live anymore. Everything is too expensive.”

Schaaf admits the city’s work is not done. She meets with staff regularly to discuss ways to make the process better, she said.

“Every two weeks, we work on something new to make the spirit of this order more effective,” she said.

That includes providing inspection reports to tenants, when, in the past, they were only given to landlords. And, staff is working on ways to red tag only part of the building, if that can be done safely, where inspectors would have ordered the entire building shut down before the executive order was issued.

But the Ghost Ship fire’s fallout is affecting permitted spaces, too.  At Qilombo, a legal community space in West Oakland, David Keenan, another member of the Safer DIY Spaces group, said he had to fight an invalid inspector’s report that said the space had people living in it, despite the fact there was no evidence of habitation. The inspector based his report on a complaint and verified it when he couldn’t access one room during an inspection.

After a lengthy email exchange, the inspector, Wing Loo, agreed to change the report, but he still cited them for a missing structural support pole for an interior loft structure, as well as problems with a rear staircase that was built before Qilombo occupied the space. When Keenan tried to pull a building permit to fix the staircase, he couldn’t, because of the existing violation.

“You admit that nobody lives there but verified (the habitability complaint) because of some other structural condition that needed to be repaired and because you did, you actually blocked me from fixing the thing you are citing,” Keenan said of his interaction with Loo. “I don’t know how much more Kafkaesque you can get.”

In an email, Loo wrote to Keenan, “I am surprised you are applying logics [sic] to the City Of Oakland. I will reply within the next day or so. Have a good evening and continue to dream.”

142 City of Oakland ‘Bulldozer’ Hit A Homeless Man While He Was Sleeping In A Tent Subhead”

City of Oakland ‘Bulldozer’ Hit A Homeless Man While He Was Sleeping In A Tent 
June 1, 2017 - East Bay Express 

Debris and garbage is increasingly an issue at homeless encampments. But homeless residents claim that the 'bulldozer' trashed and destroyed their personal belongings and valuables. 'It was horrible, just ridiculous.'

https://www.eastbayexpress.com/oakland/city-of-oakland-bulldozer-hit-a-homeless-man-while-he-was-sleeping-in-a-tent/Content?oid=7139007

A man says he was hit by what was a smaller, "Dingo" tractor-style vehicle during a clean-up at a different encampment in West Oakland on May 5.

Daryll Barker has lived for more than a year under a freeway overpass at 35th and Magnolia streets in West Oakland. Drugs, crime, pollution, extreme weather — it’s a rough life. But while asleep in his tent on the morning of May 5 shortly after 10 a.m., Barker says something happened that left him “scared as hell.”

Suddenly, Barker said he “was being dragged and pulled, the whole tent itself, everything in it. Just snatched and grabbed." The 51-year-old told the Express last week that he was thrown from his tent, after which he rolled across the asphalt for several feet. 

When he looked up, Barker realized that he'd been hit by “a bulldozer.”

In recent weeks, the City of Oakland began using what is called a wheeled loader — a large, heavy-equipment bulldozer-like vehicle typically seen at construction sites — to help remove what officials say is an unprecedented amount of garbage and trash accumulating at several local homeless encampments.

“We want to clean up the garbage,” explained Joe DeVries, an assistant city administrator with the City of Oakland. “There’s so much debris, we want to get the stuff that people care about out of the way, so that we can” pick up the trash.

DeVries said he witnessed the incident on May 5, when he says a "Dingo" tractor ran into Barker's tent. "I don't know how he was in that tent," DeVries said. "I was scared for him."

ut many homeless residents called the bulldozer “overkill,” saying that they were stunned when the “aggressive” and “dangerous” vehicle showed up at the camps.

Before Barker was hit by the bulldozer on May 5, workers with Operation Dignity, a nonprofit that does homeless outreach as part of a contract with the city, allegedly told residents at the 35th and Magnolia site that Barker’s tent and others people’s belongings would be out of harms way, and that the wouldn’t need to move, according to Jeff Wozniak, an attorney representing Barker. “He was told his tent was safe where it was,” he explained.

“Then, he was woken up by a bulldozer literally crashing into his tent.”

Wozniak says his client was lucky. “Had that bulldozer approached his tent from the other side, it would have bulldozed his head. … There’s no question that this bulldozer could have killed him.”

After the incident, Barker says he was bleeding and in severe pain, so he was ambulanced to Highland Hospital, where he says he received X-rays and was treated for nearly 10 hours. Two weeks later, he says he’s still limping and sore.

Now, Barker is living with a neighbor, sharing a tent, near the encampment, which was formerly the site of Councilmember Lynette Gibson McElhaney’s “Compassionate Communities” tent-city pilot program, which housed at least thirty people earlier this year.

Barker said his tent was completely destroyed, and that he lost all of his clothing, his phone — pretty much everything he owns. “I’m just happy to be alive,” he said this past Saturday.

Wozniak hasn’t filed a claim or lawsuit on behalf of Barker yet. However, he is asking that the City of Oakland and Operation Dignity compensate Barker for his pain, suffering, medical expenses, and losses. “Darryl’s tent is not trash. It is personal property. And they should not be using a bulldozer anywhere near these tents, or these homes,” he said.

Representatives with Operation Dignity were not immediately available to discuss the specific incident.

In the past two weeks, other homeless campers have told the Express that, despite the city’s efforts, they too have lost valuables during these city clean-ups, including family photos, laptops, bikes, and DVD players.

On May 25, the city’s “bulldozer” also made an appearance at one of Oakland’s largest homeless encampments, on Northgate Avenue.

Marcus Emery said he has been living at the Northgate site for nine months, after he was displaced from a nearby apartment, where the landlord raised the rent to $2,100 a month. On that Thursday morning, the 53-year-old said he "woke up hearing a bulldozer": Oakland police and public-works department employees had shown up to remove debris and trash.

The city had given notice that they planned to clean the site, posting fliers along Northgate. But some of those fliers were removed, Emery and others claimed. And none of them were expecting the bulldozer.

City workers told Emery to move his tent and belongings from the western sidewalk and to the other side of the road, so that trash could be removed. The city also said it would be cleaning the sidewalk and gutters. But the day after the clean-up, Emery complained that he’d "lost all kinds of stuff," because he couldn't move his tent and valuables out of the way fast enough.

Specifically, he said he lost family photos, a DVD player, old coins, clothes — "stuff that you can't replace.”

After sharing his story, Emery lifted up his shirt to reveal stitches, from a knife wound he’d suffered while sleeping in his tent on the same street earlier in May. “I just got stabbed the other day,” he told the Express. “I can’t be moving this heavy stuff.”

Also at the Northgate encampment, Tonnell Williams says he too was startled by the “big ass tractor thing” when it arrived that Thursday morning. He says he tried to move most of his stuff, but that he lost a tent full of his clothes, plus his girlfriend’s clothes, bike frames, and more, when the bulldozer snagged and dumped it in the trash.

“They let us move some" of his belongings, he said. "But they didn't let us move all of it."

When the Express spoke with DeVries the day of the Northgate clean-up, he insisted that the City of Oakland’s mission was to not harass or hurt homeless people, or displace them from these encampments. “We weren’t bulldozing tents,” he said, referring to a video of a wheeled loader picking up trash at the Northgate site (see video, below).

DeVries also said that, during a recent camp cleanup, the city removed some 160 cubic yards of debris and garbage.  “We don’t want to criminalize the homeless,” he said.

"We've been painstakingly careful to be compassionate."

On Tuesday, Oakland city council voted in favor of spending nearly half-a-million dollars for a “safe haven” transitional camp for homeless residents. The sanctioned camps would offer 40 small sheds for individuals to live in, and also would provide security, water, toilets and more for residents. There is also a motion to provide sanitation to 10 encampments, and also to keep the door open for additional funding for homelessness programs.

A recent "point in time" count of Oakland's homeless residents tallied 2,761 homeless individuals in the city, nearly 70 percent unsheltered — a roughly 26 percent increase over the count from 2015.

The Express reported last week that Oakland spent some $210,638 in 2016 and during the first few weeks of 2017 on cleaning and dismantling homeless encampments. Records indicate that there were 279 cleanings in 2016, and 33 from January 1 to February 14 this year.

As the Express wrote: “The city’s data shows that 1,475 yards of trash — but possibly also tents, clothing, and other possessions — were thrown away during this period.” DeVries says he's seen an unprecedented amount of trash and garbage at homeless camps in the past months.

The abatement of homeless encampments has been controversial. In December of last year, civil-rights activists filed a class-action lawsuit in state court alleging that Caltrans violates the Constitutional rights of homeless people during encampment sweeps in Oakland, Emeryville, and Berkeley, where homeless residents regularly lost valuables and property. That suit is ongoing.

Shawn Moses, who's lived at Northgate camp for three years, conceded that a significant amount of garbage and debris had piled up at the location, he said in part due to a public works strike against cleaning at the sites, which lasted several months, but also because of illegal dumping.

Moses said that he thought most camp residents didn’t lose any belongings on May 25, and he observed city workers "bag and tag" items from one man’s tent and space, because the owner was in jail and unable to move his tent.

But Moses also says that he lost some “junk that he didn’t really want” during the clean-up, and that city workers weren’t terribly careful not to throw away belongings. “We just worked really fast” to get things out of the bulldozer’s way, he explained.

He added that he and his fellow residents had to sweep the sidewalk underneath their tents themselves, and that the city didn’t even wash the concrete.

Moses said the clean-up on May 25 was the first time the city had came to clear the site in a year and a half. And, like others, Moses argued that the use of the bulldozer was harassment and overkill.

“Everybody was shocked by that bulldozer,” he said. “It was horrible, just ridiculous."

141 City of Oakland - A's purchase SRO after low-income tenants evicted

Oakland A's Minority Owners Purchase Downtown SRO After Previous Landlord Evicted Low-Income Tenants 

June 09, 2017

New owners include an investor group known for operating boutique hotels and student dorms in
high-end markets.

https://www.eastbayexpress.com/oakland/oakland-as-minority-owners-purchase-downtown-oakland-sro-after-previous-landlord-evicted-low-income-tenants/Content?oid=7301511


The Sutter Hotel, one of Oakland’s dwindling number of single-room occupancy hotels, was sold today to an investor group that includes two minority owners of the Oakland Athletics. These new investors are known for operating boutique hotels and student dorms in high-end markets — not affordable housing — and it’s unclear what they intend to do with the 102-room low-income housing property.

This morning, a former Sutter resident told the Express that the hotel’s sale was contingent on the eviction of long-term, low-income tenants.

“There was a concerted effort to remove people,” explained Michael Wiehl, who lived in the Sutter from 2013 until last year, when he was evicted.

In early 2016, Wiehl said that one of the hotel’s front-desk managers told him “they’re selling the hotel to somebody,” and that he would have to “accept the deal because that’s the way it’s going to be.”

Wiehl said the hotel’s previous owner, Raj Singh, at first bought-out some of the permanent residents, and even helped others move to the nearby Empyrean Towers SRO. But he also evicted Wiehl and several hold-outs. Former residents told the Express that all of the permanent residents who were protected by Oakland’s rent control and just-cause eviction laws are now gone.

Wiehl left in October 2016. Court records indicate that six other tenants were evicted through court actions last year, and two were evicted through the courts in 2015.

“You’re dealing with a lot of powerful people who are trying to get to that Uber money and the Airbnb billions,” Weihl speculated about the sale.

Laura Lane, an attorney with the East Bay Community Law Center, represented a different Sutter tenant in an eviction case last year. Lane said she noticed the previous owner paying rent-control-protected tenants to move out. “I know at the end of last year that [the landlord] had paid to relocate some people out of the hotel,” she said.

City officials were reportedly in talks with Singh to try to purchase the Sutter, or use it on an interim basis as transitional housing for homeless people. But no deal was ever struck. City officials didn't respond to emails seeking more information about this effort.

Singh didn’t return several messages, which were left with the front-desk staff at the hotel. But a person working the desk confirmed today that the hotel was sold, and that the new owners are immediately taking over.

“We’re doing a big transition,” explained the individual, who did not identify themselves. They declined to name the new owners or elaborate.

But county records indicate that a company called 584 14th Street LLC purchased the building today for approximately $12 million. The LLC was incorporated by Hawkins Way Capital, a Los Angeles real estate investment company run by Ross Walker.

According to its website, Hawkins Way makes “value added and opportunistic investments” in real estate “targeting attractive risk adjusted returns.”

Walker is part of the ownership group of the Oakland A’s baseball club, according to his biography on his company’s website. He also works closely with his former boss Lew Wolff, one of the more prominent minority owners of the A’s.

Last year, Wolff stepped down as the managing partner of the A’s and sold off most of his shares in the team. But he retains a small ownership stake, and the title of chairman emeritus. For years he was the public face of team's ownership group.

Wolff’s company, Wolff Urban Development, shares office space in the same L.A. building as Hawkins Way Capital, and Wolff Urban is an investor in Hawkins Way's real-estate deals.

Today, Walker wrote in an email to the Express that it’s too early to share plans about what his company intends to do with the Sutter.

The Express asked Wolff if he was involved in the purchase of the Sutter Hotel, to which he deferred to Walker. Wolff also wrote in the same email that his involvement in real-estate deals in downtown Oakland is limited to a proposal to build a new Marriott Hotel at 1431 Jefferson Street, which is across the street from the Sutter.

Hawkins Way Capital owns boutique hotels and student-housing properties across the United States. For example, last year, the company bought Hollywood’s Mark Twain SRO hotel and converted it to market-rate housing.

Hawkins Way also set up the Live Learn Properties Fund, which invests in student dormitories. Both Walker and Wolff are managers of the Live Learn fund, according to securities records.

In the past year, the City of Oakland has been trying to preserve its SROs, because they are often the residences of last resort for people who would otherwise become homeless. In January, City Council passed a moratorium to prevent converting SROs into other uses. The moratorium lasts until December 2018.

Oakland has lost almost half of its total stock of SRO housing units in the past twelve years. According to a September 2015 city report, Oakland had 31 SRO hotels with 2,285 rooms in 2004. Since, some were demolished to make way for new developments and others were converted to different uses, leaving only 1,311 SRO units in Oakland today.

Last year, the Hotel Travelers and a smaller SRO building on 8th Street were both purchased by investors who plan to convert the buildings into market-rate properties.

140 City of Oakland violating state and city open meeting laws during real estate giveaway meetings

Oakland’s ‘Backroom Dealing’ to Sell City-Owned Land Is Systemic Problem ‘Vulnerable to Undue Influence’

June 19, 2017 - East Bay Express 

https://www.eastbayexpress.com/SevenDays/archives/2017/06/19/grand-jury-oaklands-backroom-dealing-to-sell-city-owned-land-is-systemic-problem-vulnerable-to-undue-influence

An investigation by the Alameda County Grand Jury alleges that Oakland city officials routinely violate state and city open meetings laws by discussing multimillion-dollar real estate deals in closed session.

According to the Grand Jury, Oakland officials do not properly notify the public through city council agendas when they’re discussing the sale of a city-owned property, keeping the public in the dark about ongoing deliberations.

The Grand Jury concluded that "the city’s misuse of closed sessions in discussing development of city property is a systemic problem."

Furthermore, the councilmembers and city staff don’t report on the substance of their private conversation to the public, which frequently includes matters such as "project vision, project scope, feasibility issues, community benefits, and selection of a developer" — all of which should be discussed in a public meeting, according to the Grand Jury. Furthermore, opportunities for members of the public to provide input on the deals is extremely limited.

The Grand Jury also found that individual councilmembers frequently hold private, one-on-one talks with the same developers the city is negotiating with. The city has no rules prohibiting these discussions, nor any requirement the contacts be disclosed to the public. As a result, the Grand Jury wrote that it is "concerned that private discussions during the pendency of the selection process favor well-connected developers, and make the process vulnerable to undue influence, or at least the perception thereof."

The Grand Jury is recommending that Oakland update its practices to comply with the Brown Act (the state's open meetings law) and the city's Sunshine Ordinance, and also require councilmembers to disclose when they privately meet with developers who are seeking public real estate.

Oakland's City Attorney did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the Grand Jury Report. The city administrator's office replied to an email that the city council will be preparing a response to the Grand Jury report.

"Backroom deals that exclude our communities have resulted in land use decisions that don’t serve existing residents and negatively impact Oakland’s vulnerable residents," said Ernesto Arevalo, an East Oakland resident who is part of a coalition of community groups that have been asking the city to develop a comprehensive public lands policy for several years now.

"We need more community representation in development, not developer lobbyists and or backroom deal making," said Arevalo. "And by stripping the public of its rightful role in this process, the [city] has spawned lopsided deals which only accelerate the mass displacement of marginalized Oaklanders."

The deals investigated by the Grand Jury include city-owned land at 1911 Telegraph Avenue, 2100 Telegraph Avenue, and the E. 12th Street Remainder Parcel. Negotiations for the Telegraph Avenue lands began in 2014, while the E. 12th Remainder Parcel began in 2015.


The city has 90 days to respond to the Grand Jury’s findings and recommendations.

139 City of Oakland - Giving away public land

City of Oakland Poised to Give Public Land to Nonprofit that Improperly Received $710,000 in County Funds

East Bay Express 
June 20, 2017
https://www.eastbayexpress.com/SevenDays/archives/2017/06/20/city-of-oakland-poised-to-give-public-land-to-nonprofit-that-improperly-received-710000-in-county-funds

Elaine Brown is the CEO of Oakland and the World Enterprises, and also a staff member in Supervisor Keith Carson's office.

The Oakland City Council is scheduled to vote tonight on a deal to sell city-owned land near West Oakland's BART station to a nonprofit that improperly obtained hundreds of thousands in county tax dollars, according to the Alameda County Grand Jury. The city would sell the land for a nominal price, even though it's worth $1.4 million, in order to subsidize an affordable housing project on site.

Further complicating the deal is the fact that the nonprofit's leader sued the City of Oakland last year, alleging that councilmember Desley Brooks attacked her at a barbecue restaurant. The lawsuit is ongoing, and Brown is seeking millions in damages from the city.

The nonprofit, Oakland and the World Enterprises, was set up by former Black Panther Elaine Brown to build affordable housing and operate an urban farm in West Oakland. It also plans to build a grocery store, restaurant, fitness center, and technology center at the location.

But according to the Grand Jury, Brown's group was given $710,000 by Alameda County Supervisor Keith Carson at the same time Brown was a paid staff member in Carson's office. "[T]he dual role of the county employee in these transactions constituted both a failure of good governance practices by the county of Alameda and a conflict of interest," concluded the Grand Jury in their investigation, which was published yesterday.

Brown is currently listed as a staff member in charge of job creation and West Oakland constituent services on Carson's supervisor web site.

According to tax records and other documents, Brown incorporated Oakland and the World Enterprises in 2014. The organization's 2015 tax return states that she received no salary or other pay.

In 2015, the organization received $290,000 in government grants. According to the grand jury, this was money allocated to the group by Alameda County's Housing and Community Development program through the proper channels and procedures.

But according to the grand jury, the organization's invoices sent to the county seeking payment of these funds "insufficiently explained" the reasons for certain expenditures.

Then, according to the grand jury, "over the ensuing months, there were multiple communications between HCD (including a contractor retained by HCD) and [Brown] about OAW’s request for funds under the contract," which ultimately resulted in $102,527 paid to Oakland and the World on May 2, 2016.

No other funds under the county's contract with the group were dispersed.

Over the same period of time, Supervisor Carson's office used its own funds that were available under the county's Fiscal Management Reward Program, to pay Oakland and the World a total of $710,000. The largest payments were made in April 2015 (for $290,000) and March 2016 (for $300,000). These payments don't appear in any publicly available tax forms filed by the organizations.

The grand jury found that there are not sufficient oversight rules to limit the ways the supervisors can use their FMRP funds, which add up to millions each year.

There isn't a 2016 tax return available for Oakland and the World Enterprises, according to the grand jury. The Express searched for the group's 2016 tax return through Guidestar.org and the California Attorney General's Office and confirmed that a copy isn't yet available.

Furthermore, the organization's 2015 tax return doesn't explain how it spent the $290,000 grant from the county HCD program. Instead, there is a $181,733 expenditure for "other" types of "fees for services" to non-employees. The attached schedule that is supposed to detail the spending is incomplete.

On March 24, the California Attorney General's office sent Oakland and the World Enterprises a letter warning the group that it's ability to operate as a nonprofit is in jeopardy because it hasn't provided its 2014 and 2015 tax returns along with other disclosure reports.

The Oakland City Council is currently considering whether to sell the West Oakland land, located at the corner of 7th Street and Campbell Street to the nonprofit.

The proposal to sell the land cleared a council subcommittee last week with councilmembers Larry Reid, Noel Gallo, Annie Campbell Washington, and Lynette Gibson McElhaney all voting yes.

According to a city staff report, Oakland and the World Enterprises first approached the city about the land in 2014. Under the proposed deal, the nonprofit would acquire the real estate, which is worth $1.4 million, at virtually no cost. The city would also provide a $2.6 million loan for the affordable housing project.


Brown sued the City of Oakland last year claiming that she was assaulted by Councilmember Desley Brooks in the Everett and Jones restaurant in October 2015. The district attorney never pressed charges, but Brown is seeking $7 million in damages from the city and Brooks.