Small business and restaurant owners in Oakland have had enough. Tuesday, September 26, dozens gathered together in a rally downtown, with several owners going on strike to demand public safety reforms.
Concerns about rising crime reverberate far beyond Oakland: In a February survey by the Public Policy Institute of California, 76% of respondents said violence and street crime is a growing problem. And for good reason: violent crime increased by 13.5% from 2019 to 2022 statewide.
In Oakland, violent crimes jumped by 18% from 2019 to 2022, according to police department figures provided to the state. The department reports that robbery is up 33% this year compared to last year, and commercial burglary is up 9%.
Durell Coleman, co-owner of Sobre Mesa restaurant told CalMatters that there have been numerous attempted break-ins during the three years it’s been in business. It closed Tuesday in solidarity with the protest. “A lot of us who are born and raised here, betting on our communities…. And now that we’ve done that, we’re dealing with this issue of public safety,” said Coleman, “But for whatever reasons we’re not protected…by police, by city government right now and that’s unfortunate.”
Holding the rally in front of the well-known restaurant Le Cheval was a conscious decision. Established in 1985, the family-owned Vietnamese eatery recently announced it will close its doors for good on Saturday. Its owners told CBS News that “the lack of office workers” caused by the pandemic “did not kill us,” but rather “the crime, the criminals killed us.”
It’s not just mom-and-pop businesses: retail giant Target announced Tuesday that it will close an Oakland store and two others in the Bay Area due to organized retail theft.
Governor Gavin Newsom’s office announced earlier this month that the state will send more than $267 million to 55 cities and counties to fight retail theft rings. But in what The Mercury News calls “a stunning oversight,” Oakland won’t get any of that money because it missed a deadline to apply. Mayor Sheng Thao, who asked for six more Highway Patrol officers and plans to install 300 security cameras, said the mistake stemmed from “a personnel issue.”
For some at the rally, that missed opportunity was just the latest failure by city officials.
Squeezed onto a narrow sidewalk in the late morning heat, business owners and others held signs that read, “Safe streets, happy eats,” and “Robbed 3 times in 5 months,” as they heard speeches from a handful of restaurant owners and local business leaders.
During the hour-long event, those in the crowd often shouted their frustrations about the lack of support from local politicians and what they called a shortage of police.
“The truth is, our homes are not okay,” said Jennifer Tran, president of the Oakland Vietnamese Chamber of Commerce who is also running for Congress next year.
Tran spoke at the rally and talked about how her 80-year-old uncle was recently burglarized in his Oakland home. She told me that while Oakland and East Bay have a diverse and inclusive culture, it “will continue to disintegrate” as long as the community’s basic needs are not met — “which is public safety, which is small business, which is our parks, which is our schools.”
Note: What most people fail to remember is that in 2021, the City Council of Oakland voted to defund the police by $17 million. By a vote of 7-2, the Oakland City Council approved a plan to redirect the funds from the police department to the Department of Violence Prevention with the intention of improving public safety. Apparently this is not working.
Presented by Dairy Cares, Climate-Smart Agricultural Partnership, Southern California Gas Company and Earthjustice
