Oakland Mayoral Hopeful Loren Taylor on Why Local Experience Matters
57:52 Share

In the current climate, too many companies are just waiting to get to the other side. At IDEO, we partner with audacious leaders to build more courageous futures that take organizations from basic growth to real innovation. Discover more at IDEO.com. That's I-D-E-O dot com. Support for MindShift comes from Landmark College, offering a fully online graduate-level certificate in learning differences and neurodiversity programs.

Visit landmark.edu slash certificate to learn more. From KQED. From KQED in San Francisco, I'm Alexis Madrigal. In a special election on April 15th, Oakland voters will choose a candidate to finish the term of recalled Mayor Sheng Tao. In the first of our interviews with the two frontrunners in the race, former Oakland City Councilmember Lauren Taylor joins us to share his vision for the city and to take your questions.

He says he's the only candidate in the race with the local government expertise needed to turn the city's economic and crime problems around. But he's facing a tough matchup against former longtime Congresswoman Barbara Lee. Lauren Taylor's coming up next right after this news. Welcome to Forum. I'm Alexis Madrigal.

This is a fraught moment for Oakland. These next few years are going to require leadership. The city has huge budgetary issues. Our retail, restaurants, and nightlife were staggered by the pandemic. And despite being voted the best food scene in the country, places can barely stay open.

The commercial property market has been in free fall with no AI boom to prop it up like in San Francisco. And yet the cost of living remains remarkably high and crime shot back up during the pandemic and through 2023, only falling significantly last year.

Much has changed in Oakland over the last 15 years, but the sense that the city is in real trouble remains. We are not so back, or maybe in a darker sense we are. So the mayor's race is critical. The last mayor, Sheng Tao, was raided by the FBI, recalled by voters, and then indicted on corruption charges later.

Lauren Taylor was a city council member from District 6 from 2019 to 2023. He narrowly lost the mayoral race to Tao in November 2022, jumped in early on this new race, and in the first of our two interviews with the frontrunners, he joins us here in the studio. Welcome to Forum, Lauren. Thanks for having me. Yeah.

So you've made your experience in local government, Roots in Oakland, kind of the centerpieces of your campaign. Why do you think that background is so important? Look, you can't lead a city and address our issues, getting us out of these challenges if you don't understand and know the city, having worked on the budget, understanding the line items.

On the ground in community, understanding the impact of decisions that are made in City Hall and being able to wrestle through those obstacles that often ensnare us and keep us from getting where we we all want to get. You know, one of our listeners, Erica, wrote in to ask, would you call yourself progressive, moderate or conservative and why?

You know, I don't like labels being a outsider of the political system. I think people have struggled to put me in a box. And that's why that question keeps coming up. If I had to, I would say I'm a pragmatic progressive, someone who agrees with the values of looking out for those who are underserved, those who have been historically marginalized and needing an extra boost from

Help support from city government, but also recognizing that we have to get things done. We can't just rest on principles and laurels because that allows us to spiral downward like we've seen. We've got to focus on results, outcomes, measuring that impact and driving us towards the improving lives of Oaklanders. Yeah.

You say, and I think a lot of people agree with you, that there is a leadership crisis in Oakland. Obviously, when the mayor gets recalled, that tends to make people think that. You were on the city council for four years.

What specific projects or issues do you think you led on during that time? Look, we've got a number of wins on the ground level where the rubber meets the road, like turning vacant lots, blighted parcels into activated spaces, resources for the community, like Liberation Park at the corner of 73rd and Foothill.

corner of Eastmont Mall, taking intersections that were problematic, attractive to sideshows, planning those interventions, working with different stakeholders to put those in and eliminating those sideshows from occurring, addressing the beautification challenges that are there, illegal dumping, other challenges, bringing resources to bring more trees, more landscaping.

Those are things that directly impact. And then broader on the city level, standing firm against the defund movement when folks came and said, we want to take $50 million away from the police department without a plan for how we'd keep people safe. I was able to work with other council members, stand firm against that while also making sure that we...

recommitted to reimagining what public safety is, leading the Reimagining Public Safety Task Force, and guiding us towards better police community interactions and relations. We're going to get into a bunch more of those issues soon. We're talking with Oakland mayoral candidate, former Oakland City Council member, Lauren Taylor, on Monday. We'll talk with the other frontrunner in the race, candidate Barbara Lee. And we want to hear from you. We'd love this to have a bit of a town hall feel. If you're from Oakland, what questions...

do you have for mayoral candidate Lauren Taylor? Is there an issue that you're voting on? What would you like to see the next mayor tackle on day one? You can give us a call. The number is 866-733-6786. That's 866-733-6786. The email is forum at kqed.org. You can find us on all the social media things. We're KQED Forum, or you can join the discussion on the Discord.

Probably day one, biggest thing facing you as the mayor of Oakland would be the budget, right? It's a bit of a moving target, but Oakland's facing roughly $100 million shortfall in this year's budget, hundreds of millions of more dollars projected over the next couple of years. Specifically, what has to happen to fix the city's finances?

Look, it's dollars and cents, right? We have to increase our revenues and decrease costs. We've been spending way more than we bring in, and that's what caused this structural deficit, $130-plus million. We have to focus on increasing efficiencies while also reducing

reducing the unnecessary spend. If we focus on our priorities, make sure that we're protecting those. We focus on revenue generating growth opportunities and, you know, focus on just getting back to the basics of keeping our streets clean, potholes filled, serving our residents, making sure 911 calls are responded to. That's going to leave a number of things that we're not able to fund immediately. And we've got to recognize that.

I mean, when you say increased revenue, that means taxes, right? And when you say decreased costs, that means what? Well, I guess I'll pull us back a little bit. When I say increased revenue, my default is not taxes. As someone who's not a career politician, I don't think about taxes as the only way we increase revenues. We've got to grow. We've got to make Oakland a much more attractive city for businesses, for investment, for entrepreneurship.

The reason that we have businesses leaving our city in droves, residents moving out, is because we are not business friendly. We are not providing that return on investment. If we focus on increasing growth, we don't have to tax as much. And in fact, polling is showing that residents aren't ready to, you know, just sign up for more taxes. We've got to look at internal ways that we increase the efficiencies and the growth as well.

But I'm looking at a bar chart of Oakland's budget. It is almost all taxes. There's a few things, federal and state grants. Not sure we can count on those right now. And so there would either need to be an increase in the tax rates or there would need to be an increase in the value, property taxes and associated things are a huge piece there. What do you think? I mean-

No increase in taxes? Well, I am supportive of Measure A, the sales tax increase. But we have to acknowledge that Oakland has not been delivering on our results, on our promises. We have not been serving Oaklanders the way that we could and should. And so there's a tangible sort of frustration and revolt against Oakland.

paying additional taxes when we're not getting the return on that. It's a pothole problem. You're like, how am I paying all these taxes? Exactly, exactly. So we've got to deliver better. When Oakland better performs, we will give people a reason to invest more, pay more taxes, and for folks to come here and co-invest in public-private partnerships. So the other piece of this is, the other half of the budget is the costs, right?

You know, you look at Oakland's budget and what the city council controls. What are the areas where you can actually bring costs down? Well, let's take a look at, say, overtime expenses. We have seen that overtime has expanded significantly. OPD overtime, for instance, is a direct source on how we can fund full-time officers so that

We don't have to have our officers overworked, overstressed, you know, on the job. That adds to the significant attrition that we see officers leaving. When we look at other costs, we have not been measuring performance and impact of the investments we're making. As mayor, I will ensure we have department-level performance management so that we see the goals that we're attempting to achieve every year, how we're doing at that. And if there are investments and programs that are not delivering performance

on the expected results, those are going to be the first on the chopping block. Do you think there's going to be staff cuts at City Hall? There are going to have to be reductions in the personnel expense line item. At 70% of our budget, we cannot avoid touching the personnel expenses, 70% of the general fund budget.

That is, we can't avoid touching that. Now, what those look like in terms of whether it's workforce reductions, whether it's furloughs, whether it's deferred compensation increases, there are a few levers. And that will be a partnership with our labor leaders and our staff to figure out, well, what temporary incentives,

solutions can we put in place while we get through our difficult period and then bring the revenues back in line where we can restore those benefits, those services that impact. So the hope would be that you don't have to make staff cuts, but you might have to. I think we will. If you look at the numbers, we will have to. The question is,

Where, what's the priority and how quickly we can rebound. And that's what the mayor's job is going to be like paint that vision of not just what cuts, you know, tradeoffs need to be made today, but how quickly we can get through this rebound, grow revenues, increase confidence so that we can restore confidence.

All of the services that are necessary for us to provide. Are you worried that it's going to be difficult to have a hand in this budget process? You know, the deadline for the mayor to present the budget at city council is May 1st. The election is April 15th.

Are you worried about the sort of chaos around this budgetary process? - Look, the chaos is here. We can't ignore the fact that Oakland has been in trouble, in crisis. We have been kicking the can down the road for a long time and now it's time to pay the piper. Yes, it's not clean, it's not easy, and there are gonna be some hard choices to make.

when I am brought in as mayor and I'm speaking that into existence, there will be time to modify the budget that has been prepared. I'm grateful that the interim mayor and the sort of city administration are developing a proposal on how we rectify the situation, but I will have a couple few weeks to make sure that I can put my stamp on that budget amendments happen all the way up until June. So again,

There are definitely opportunities to make sure that the mayor is influencing where we go financially.

We're talking with former Oakland City Council member Lauren Taylor, candidate for mayor in the election coming up April 15th. If you live in Oakland, there is an election going on. It's on April 15th. What questions do you have for candidate Lauren Taylor? Love to get some more of your calls and comments in. The number is 866-733-6786. That's 866-733-6786. Email...

your questions to forum at kqed.org or drop them on Blue Sky or Instagram or KQED forum there. I'm Alexis Madrigal. Stay tuned for more right after the break. In the current climate, too many companies are just waiting to get to the other side. At IDEO, we partner with audacious leaders to build more courageous futures that take organizations from basic growth to real innovation. Discover more at IDEO.com. That's I-D-E-O dot com.

With the Venmo debit card, you can turn the mini golf outing your coworkers paid you back for into a trip to Miami with your best friend, earning you up to 5% cash back. Use Venmo to pay for the things you love to do. Visit venmo.me slash debit to learn more. The Venmo MasterCard is issued by the Bancorp Bank N.A., pursuant to license by MasterCard International Incorporated. Terms apply. Dosh cash back terms apply.

Welcome back to Forum. Alexis Madrigal here. We're talking with former Oakland City Council member Lauren Taylor, running for mayor of Oakland. The election is April 15th. On Monday, we're going to talk with another frontrunner, Barbara Lee. You can get to more of your calls and questions during this segment of the show, 866-733-6786. The email is forum at kqed.org.

you know, talking about the kind of crisis of leadership in Oakland, I do want to know who do you think has been Oakland's best mayor that you have experienced? Look, every mayor has faults and flaws, right? A lot of folks look at Jerry Brown. He's a great,

executive leader, got a lot of things done. Some of the challenges with his leadership was it wasn't as inclusive. You know, 10,000 homes, 10,000 jobs, 10,000 new residents, but it didn't bring others along that were here, right? So that's the critique there, but he was effective at delivering results, improvement, economic improvement. You look at folks like, you know, Elihu Harris, Lionel Rilson, you know,

mayors of the people connected to the community really engage in understanding that we need to lift everybody up. So I would take fragments from different mayors here in Oakland. Lana Wilson, mayor during the big quake and fires. L. Hugh Harris, mayor during the big quake and fires. And Lana Wilson, first black mayor of Oakland back in the 1970s. There for the Prop 13 loss of funds too. Very tough hand to be dealt by Lana Wilson.

Let's talk about violent crime and crime in general. You know, Oakland in 2023 had a really tough year. Other cities saw crime begin to subside. That did not happen in Oakland, led to a lot of outcry by people living in Oakland. Still a top concern.

What's your approach to public safety? And is it just, you know, increasing police force? What are the other things that make a city safer that don't involve policing? Yeah, well, we absolutely need a multi-pronged approach to policing. We have to acknowledge that we are understaffed with respect to officers. So I am proposing that we get to 800 officers on the force. I have a plan to get there three academies per year for three years. I

And part of getting there also means that we have to stop the attrition. Oakland can no longer be the police training academy for every other agency in the East Bay. Our officers are getting poached because we're not holding them, keeping them engaged.

Also, we've got to acknowledge that we have to focus on violence prevention. The best way to keep people safe is to keep violence and crime from occurring in the first place. So we have to continue our focus there, but focus on those proven intervention strategies as opposed to just throwing money after everything that might sound good. What do you think has been proven? What has been proven? Well, definitely the ceasefire program. We have academic studies, research that shows how effective it is for us to prevent

target the small percentage of folks that are most likely to be involved in as either a victim or a perpetrator of violent crime, engaging with them with both carrots and sticks to help change their behavior and use them as leaders in the community.

Proven. That's a that's a proven strategy. Also, when you look at the violence interrupters, those who meet victims of violent crime at the bedside and are able to engage with them help to reduce the likelihood of retaliatory gun violence and other activities. Those are proven. And, you know, there are there are there are others that, you know, we try, we throw we throw money at, but haven't demonstrated their value yet.

You know, in the same basket as crime, talking with people in Oakland, I would put sort of this kind of general sense of disorder. And in particular, I think a lot of people have seen the growth of large encampments in Oakland, you know, over the last 15 years as part of that. And one of the

answers that the city came up with was macro, which was a program with a lot of dedicated public servants going out and ending up talking with unhoused people who were oftentimes experiencing mental health crises or other kinds of things. Do you think macro has been effective? The answer is no.

As I have, as I was on the council, this isn't just theory or research, right? I was on the council. I helped to bring macro forward, voted on the initial investments in it. The goal is that we use these non-sworn officers to come to our response and

when we don't need a sworn officer with a gun and a badge to come. And so we're supposed to be reducing the number of 911 calls. So it's supposed to go 911 call, gets diverted over to macro, and then something happens. Absolutely. That's not happening right now. We are not diverting 911 calls. We've got macro that's showing up. They are offering blankets, water, other sort of services to unhoused neighbors. They are doing other things. But it's not...

serving our initial intent, which was reduce the number of 911 calls that are being responded to by officers so that the officers can focus on the more important higher calls. If macro doesn't deliver on the initial goals of the pilot, then it should be reevaluated whether we even invest in it anymore. That has to occur.

but part of that wasn't really macro's fault, right? Like the, not the, the infrastructure was never really set up to connect it to the nine one one center, which was having its own set of problems too, right? Oh yeah. Uh, well, I think what you're pointing at is that Oakland has struggled when it comes to execution, execution and delivery. So we have a good idea. And, uh,

we unfortunately fumble the ball. Other cities take those ideas and actually deliver good, effective programs. And Oakland is still here struggling to realize the value and the potential benefit. And that's why it's important to have a hands-on mayor, someone who's been here on the ground, working with community, understanding the potential pitfalls so that we can focus on execution and delivering results. Let's bring in Robert in Oakland, who has a question about the actual structure of the mayor.

Go ahead, Robert.

I definitely appreciate your outsider perspective, but I'm just curious. You're going to be landing in the middle of a very strange political situation, and I'm just curious to know how you're going to build your A-team to actually get us back to actually executing and not fumbling all the time. And worth noting, I think seven of the eight council members have endorsed your opponent, so you're coming into kind of a difficult position to the city council as well.

Well, I think one thing to acknowledge relative to endorsements is you have public endorsements and then you have the conversations and support behind the scenes. And so I'm grateful to have a number of those who publicly endorsed my opponent actually reach out to me and say, hey, looking forward to working with you if and when you win. And so that...

I think people do what's needed politically for their sort of advancement and for other reasons. That in no way means an unwillingness and a lack of desire to work, collaborate and deliver results.

I think it's also the question around sort of how I will build the team and what I will do to really navigate these challenges. First of all, communication. You got to be open and engaged with everyone, whether or not you agree ideologically, regardless of where you were on an election. And so that's number one, making sure we have the systems in place, regular engagement with the council members, with obviously the city administrator, who I will be sort of in charge of, and also

Also, we have to align our goals, aligned incentives and goals. I have proposed and will implement department level performance management where the city as a whole and each department has very clear annual goals, metrics on how we will get to those goals, the milestones that we'll hit, and we'll publish transparent dashboards on at least a quarterly basis so that

The city as a whole is aligned on what we're doing. We will be accountable. There will be visibility. And that's what allows us to sort of row in the same direction and make sure that we're delivering. Martina asks, you know, what kinds of businesses do you want to support that will actually bring in money and keep money in the city? How could you help small businesses started by residents and not just corporations and tech startups? What are some original ideas you have about being, quote, business friendly that aren't just about giving property development deals?

Absolutely. So when it comes to being much more business friendly, we have to acknowledge the things that hold businesses back, cause them to either fail or leave our city. So the cost. I'm proposing that we eliminate the business license tax for those businesses that are making less than one and a half million dollars in annual revenue. We have to show that we are co-invested in their success, their future, and setting them up so they could be medium and large size businesses that then contribute even more to our economy.

I'm also proposing that we have a dedicated OPD retail and property crime unit that addresses the public safety concerns that are keeping residents and visitors from coming to our downtown, shopping in our restaurant. You know, it's...

devastating when major corporations send memos out to their staff saying, don't bother coming into work, don't go out to lunch because it's unsafe. That has a direct impact on our small businesses, the foot traffic, the impact. Also creating concierge service for businesses so that they can have help and streamline their ability to navigate the bureaucracy in City Hall. Absolutely critical. And we've got to activate spaces more, the festivals, the

looking at the vacant storefronts, implementing a vacant to vibrant type of a program. Yeah, I mean, some...

When I just think about Oakland as someone walking around the city, the amount of vacant storefronts I think is on its own like a contributor to public safety concerns and all kinds of bad things. Is there a way that the government can get involved in that, given that it was kind of part of the planning process to build huge amounts of ground floor retail and all the towers that went into downtown and other places? Yeah.

And now almost nobody seems to be able to rent those places who actually wants to run a restaurant or business. Right. So-

I guess a couple of things there. I look at the success that San Francisco has had with their vacant to vibrant program where they are working with the property owners to reduce the amount of the cost of the rent and an initial basis to allow a burgeoning entrepreneur interested in establishing brick and mortar to set up shop and to have that

activation. Also looking at ways that we can reduce the red tape and really get these in. That's one of the things I'm looking at when it comes to building planning permits is to establish a shot clock for our building and planning and permitting department so that a small business is wanting to do some tenant improvements in order to make a space something that they can have.

that we give them predictability in their schedule. This amount of time, the city will do its job, its reviews, its inspection, and if we don't complete it by then, then we're going to allow you to move forward, create the value that you're wanting to do. We're not going to stand in the way of value creation in our city anymore. It does feel like there's a bit of a do less agenda on some of those things that might be helpful for some of these places. Let's bring in Mo in Oakland. Welcome, Mo. Hi. Hi.

I'm wondering if you can expand a little bit on your approach to homelessness. I've definitely read your platform, but I also know that Oakland doesn't currently have funds to follow its own encampment management policy, that an existing shelter and a managed encampment is slated to close in the next year. I mean, we also know that just sweeping encampments and not providing services because Oakland doesn't have the capacity to offer those services only displaces people.

outside of your long-term strategies and given Oakland's funding problems, I'm wondering what your plan is to actually support homeless people and move them into permanent housing.

Mo, thanks so much for that question. I mean, I also noticed you were endorsed by Matt Mahan, mayor of San Jose, who did make a call to basically focus on short term solutions, building tiny homes in San Jose and saying, listen, we actually building long term affordable housing takes very long time. Is that an approach you would follow? Absolutely. We need to have more short term immediate solutions that can be propped up and shift people into affordable

that they at least have for a period of time. We also have to acknowledge that, and thank you for bringing this up, Moe,

Putting a roof over someone's head is insufficient. We have to provide the services. Our unhoused residents do not all fit the same mold. Some need deep mental health services. We as a city are not funded to provide that. That's the county. We have to hold the county accountable for the health care services, mental health, others that they are supposed to be providing. While also we recognize, hey, some of our residents, they might just need services.

First month, last month security deposit in order to get back on their feet and be able to sustain themselves. We've got to understand the differences, the nuances, and be able to provide the appropriate level of services for each person. When we have temporary housing and we're not...

singularly focused on the ultimate goal of getting folks through transitional housing into long-term sustainable housing, then we have a bottleneck. And that transitional housing isn't able to support as many folks because we have folks staying there longer than if we were more aggressive on providing the services and supporting them to move forward. I mean, can we point to literally anything in another city that has worked to reduce the absolute levels of homelessness placed in the Bay Area?

A lot of times we focus on some of the other cities. Houston, for example, is one where they have demonstrated an ability to reduce the homelessness in an aggressive and fast clip. There are other cities that have made progress. We have to recognize that those best practices should be looked at, observed, leveraged, while also understanding that we've got some unique challenges here in the Bay Area. Our housing is more expensive.

We also have put a number of obstacles in the way of getting quick, quickly standing up housing. And so we have to address the policy reductions. And, you know, when it comes to longer term housing, it is a regional issue. So you mentioned my endorsement by Mayor Matt Mahan in San Jose and partnering with others in the Bay Area, the nine Bay Area counties like on the Rena mission.

And the proposal around BAFA, the affordable housing fund that we can all collectively contribute to and lead relative to creating more options. A couple of bits of pushback on housing coming in from folks. Larissa writes in on policing, excuse me. Larissa writes in to say,

What does Lauren Taylor say about having negotiated the police union contract years before it was set to expire and locking in the city into much higher costs while knowing the deficit was looming? This decision made it harder on our budget. Other decisions you made also contributed to our current deficit by approving one time money for ongoing costs.

How would you respond to that? The police union contract happened before I came into office. So I think just in terms of timing, I didn't have a chance to weigh in on that. And that was frustrating to me because I would have made sure that we had a more reasonable approach and something that we could check in on more regularly to make sure that it's serving us and as opposed to a longer term contract. In fact, I think the way it was negotiated...

Yeah, I believe it was negotiated in 2018 before I came in in 2019 and then it was a five-year contract so I didn't actually get a chance to sort of It was extended that period the the other question around, you know using one-time funding in order to Keep keep things going. That is something that I did decide to approve. It was you know, wasn't maybe it

It wasn't something that I would do under normal circumstances, but that was, you know, months after the pandemic, we were all shut down. We didn't know what was going to happen, how it was going to move. And so relative to the ARPA funding that we received from the federal government, it made sense at that time for us to say, let's apply a portion of that in a way that we can avoid deep cuts and other things because of the reduced foot traffic, because everybody's sheltered in place and not spending money in our city. And,

But that was intended to only be a temporary piece until things settled and we saw what was going on. And so I stand by that decision, but also stand by my stance that it shouldn't have been going forever. And we saw the writing on the wall much sooner. That it was sort of a state of exception during the pandemic. Exactly. Required. Yeah.

We're going to come back to some of these other issues. We're talking with Oakland mayoral candidate, former Oakland City Council member Lauren Taylor. On Monday, we're talking with the other frontrunner candidate, Barbara Lee. I want to hear from you questions you have for Lauren Taylor, the issues that you're most interested in seeing him address if he's elected mayor.

You can give us a call. Of course, the number is 866-733-6786. That's 866-733-6786. You can email your questions or comments to forum at kqed.org. You can find us on social media, Blue Sky, Instagram, etc. We're KQED Forum. Obviously, there's a discussion going on over on the Discord as well.

One thing to note, listener Aya writes, you know, do these candidates have the motivation and wherewithal to make our city more beautiful? Pick up all the trash alongside the streets and freeway entrances and exits, more pocket parks, more trees. It's more than aesthetics. It's for our mental and physical health. I'm Alexis Madrigal. We'll be back with more from Lauren Taylor right after the break.

You don't wake up dreaming of McDonald's fries.

You wake up dreaming of McDonald's hash browns. McDonald's breakfast comes first. Welcome back to Forum. Alexis Madrigal here with former Oakland City Council member Lauren Taylor, now running for mayor, Oakland residents. The election is April 15th. I can get to more of your comments and questions here.

One of the things that I wanted to ask you about has been the sort of campaign. You know, according to Oakland Side, your supporters published a video ad attacking Barbara Lee, which included a fabricated news story near the – I'm quoting here from Oakland Side –

But the article and the headline are not from Oakenside and no one's published such an article. So do you support the tactic? Like, would you agree that it's misleading? I do agree that it's misleading. And I have been consistent relative to my campaign and those that I am directly engaged with that we will run an honest, fact-based campaign. It's important that we draw the contrast. We identify what the stakes are for Oaklanders, but doing that in a fact-based, data-driven way. And I encourage others to do the same.

But your own campaign also bought Google search advertising, which effectively created a big KQED headline, Lee's Bribery Scandal, Lee's Ties to Corruption, which links to a KQED story, but that doesn't actually have that headline on KQED.

Yeah, so the advertisement is intended to direct people towards the actual source, not replace the headline. And so that's how we have sort of led is we want to direct people towards that versus replacing. And so the actual article that's there is what KQED produced and developed. That's true, but the headline ends up being misleading. Like, you know, when somebody's seeing the way that Google ad is displayed, it has like a headline and then directs to KQED.

So we hear that. We got the response and we corrected. We have no longer put that there, but that was not the intent. Our intent was to direct people towards KQED's article. And that's what the ads now sort of focus on. All right.

Back to the city's big issues. Everybody in Bay Area politics wants to speed up the construction of affordable housing. Right. I mean, everybody everybody says that. Are there things specifically you think that can be done like like a like a one, two, three? This is how we speed up the production of affordable housing. Yes. Number one.

We have to act with the urgency when it comes to bringing the dollars in. It's one thing to say, hey, you know, we identify funding sources, but we just had an article that came out around how we have not gone out to the bond market to bring in money that we've already approved, that voters are already paying for. So a thousand units of affordable housing could potentially not move forward because

We have not acted with the urgency. That's a leadership decision. It's execution and guiding this. Also, when it comes to building affordable housing, we have to get out of the way the bureaucracy. So that's one of the reasons I'm proposing that we put that shot clock in for our building and planning department so that we are not, you know,

doubling, tripling, quadrupling the time that it should normally take for a, uh, developer to bring that housing online and help us to address the critical crisis that we have helped get our unhoused neighbors off of the streets. It's also important that we look at new ways to build housing and make those more accommodating. So when we talk about affordability by design, modular construction, offsite, uh, building that then you bring it on, uh, onsite. I'm sure you've been opposed to a lot of that. Yeah. Uh,

Well, at times. At times. And I think there's a softening and a recognition that we've got to do things differently. There are a number of trades that are supportive of those techniques and those models. And part of it's engaging in a way that acknowledges how we will continue to maintain trade jobs while using innovative solutions. We can't ignore the value and the benefit of innovation that

It reduces, drastically reduces the time to getting people housed while also we can protect working jobs, working families, et cetera. Talking with former Oakland City Councilmember Lauren Taylor, what are the issues that you want to see the next mayor of Oakland tackle? You can give us a call, 866-733-6786, forum at kqed.org. Let's bring in Ryan in Oakland. Welcome, Ryan.

Hey, how's it going? Good, good. I was going to ask about Measure U. It was good to hear that you're supportive of selling those bonds. My question would be, do you support additional congestion, road diets on Grand Lake?

on Grand Avenue. They're redesigning Grand Avenue right now. And if you read the news recently, this Berkeley professor was hit just outside Fairyland. And I think we really need improved infrastructure there and reduced lanes.

I do agree that we need to slow down traffic. We need to, I think, as one person says, make grand grand, which means it's got to be safe for pedestrians, safe for bicyclists, safe for those who are going out to eat and driving. It is tragic to have a loss of life, as many losses of life that we have within our city in high traffic corridors.

We've got to do better. We've got to bring that number down to zero. And so putting in traffic calming road diets, reducing the speeds to make them safer, absolutely important. I think one of the challenges that we've had when we've implemented these, though, is that we have not delivered. We have not taken into account all the impacts. We are impacting businesses in a way that...

reduces the amount of foot traffic, that has people going elsewhere where they can find sort of better access, parking, it's easier. We've got to take into account all of the effects of how we slow down traffic, make things safe, but also support the businesses, the vibrancy that we want and need. It's the Valencia Street problem here in the city. Let's bring in Amy in Oakland. Welcome.

Hi, Lauren. Congratulations on all your hard work and let's see what happens this next election. Thanks.

I am really upset about youth crime in Oakland. I live in a high-traffic area near MacArthur Bart, and every time I see a car being broken into, they are kids under the age of 18. I have seen a car that was stolen, abandoned by a group of four kids that were not even tall enough to barely see over the steering wheel. I mean, I swear to God, these kids were like 14 years old.

And I just don't understand what is happening, who is monitoring. And most of the youth crime is just for fun and folly, where the people that are victims of the crime have to spend thousands of dollars in window replacement or, you know, you can't work because your car is stolen. And there's just this horrible ripple effect.

it is really demoralizing. And I just, nobody's really doing anything for the youth in Oakland. And I think if there was a shift and people were paying attention and giving them programs and outlets and just a little attention, I think that the whole, one of the big problems of crime could be turned around with

Without putting kids in jail or youth detention. Let's take this question over to Lauren. You know, youth who end up being engaged in crime. What do you what's your plan there?

Yeah, what Amy brings up is absolutely true. We have lost a number of the resources that we used to have for our young people here in our city as a kid who was born and raised here. I benefited from so many programs through Parks and Rec, through the youth sports leagues and, you know, Boy Scouts, you name it.

We have lost a lot of that. We don't even have we used to have Malibu Grand Prix. We used to have the lots of movie theaters and other places where youth could go and hang out. And right now we don't have those here in Oakland. And that contributes. So we do need to do more with our youth. The city has to partner with our school district, our parks and rec to create more of these opportunities. We have to better utilize our our park system, our infrastructure and our

We have to create opportunities for young people to create value. I intend to bring back the mayor summer jobs program in a full fledged way where we're not only providing minimum wage jobs that are above minimum wage, but we're also giving the hard skills, the soft skills that set our young people up for success. Uh, as a council member, I helped to start the ESO ventures entrepreneurship accelerator where we brought more than, uh,

eight million dollars from the state to help seed these small businesses that are young people and others were, you know, excited to build and to create value in their own neighborhoods.

Leaning in with those programs, also taking advantage of our OFCY. Oakland has the Oakland Fund for Children and Youth, where 3% of our general fund revenues are allocated towards supporting youth family services. We have to make sure that those dollars are being spent more effectively, more wisely. What are they going to now?

Well, they're going to a number of organizations. Unfortunately, the rigor on evaluation and measurement in terms of what impact is happening, what the strategies are that are addressing those levers, it needs to be improved. We have to hold our service providers that we're funding more accountable for delivering the outcomes and not just volumes, volumes of interactions, the number of days that they show up at a school site versus, you know,

how are the children, the young people actually moving forward to promising careers?

You know, obviously, we're talking a lot about very local Oakland issues. But, you know, there's a national context right now that is very intense. People may have seen graduate student at Tufts, you know, taken by ICE agents, apparently, at Tufts. One listener writes in to say, what will you do to ensure resident safety from ICE and other federal authorities in these violations of law? Oh, yeah.

So I am proud of our status as a sanctuary city in Oakland and the fact that we have done a number of things that help to protect residents already, put those in place, certain data that we are not collecting so that it doesn't fall into the wrong hands, being intentional and also partnering with

organizations on the ground who are engaged with our immigrant communities, understanding what's happening, communicating and developing robust sort of education strategies for them. We've got to use our platform as a city to

hear, listen, understand what's happening to communicate, to demystify. There's a huge trauma that occurs from the false alerts and alarms as to, you know, ICE raids that aren't happening. And it still keeps people home, keeps our young people out of school because of the fear. So being able to harden those safe sanctuary spaces while also encouraging

Using our platform to communicate, educate, prepare folks and also partnering with other agencies like other cities, the county, the state, our attorney general's office to make sure that we are battling legally as well, because there are definitely sort of lawsuits and other tactics that we will have to employ in order to support and protect Oaklanders.

Rebecca writes in, and there's a few different comments coming in of this stripe. Rebecca writes, what will Lauren Taylor do to support LGBTQ people, especially transgender people who are under political attack from the federal government? You may want to address the second part of this separately. This is especially concerning when Lauren Taylor has allied himself with Seneca Scott, openly hostile to LGBTQ people. I know that you would disagree with that characterization. Yeah.

Yeah. So first of all, I am 1000% supportive of our LGBTQ brothers and sisters and supporting their right to and all of our rights to be protected when we look at the impacts of our community.

city on the LGBTQ community, we have to create those open spaces. We're celebrating that incredible part of who we are, the LGBTQ center and district that we now have off of Lakeshore Avenue, off of the lake. Incredible, not just a source of pride for us as a city, but also an incredible source of

economic generation, uh, the, the cultural piece that draws people in. And yes, we have to protect our residents. Uh, it is devastating that so many of our residents are in fear of attack, both from the federal government and locally. And we've got to support everybody. Yeah. And, uh,

Give a chance to address Seneca Scott situation. I mean people but I have denounced Seneca Scott's words what he has said and There's no place for that within the the discourse in the dialogue I I say it now I didn't answer the denounce those now as I did in other forums as well and so I think We've addressed that and been very clear on where I stand. I

Let's make sure that Andres gets a chance to say this, which I know many people in Oakland also feel. Andres, welcome.

Thank you. Quick question. Thanks for taking my question. What is your opinion and plans on the condition of our roads? Specifically, I live near Park Boulevard. It's a major thoroughfare. The street has so many potholes that many cars swivel to avoid them. Some of the cars break down. Tires are broken. I'm from a third world country, and believe me, our streets were better than some of the Oakland streets. What can we do about it?

Thank you, Andres. Yeah, thanks for bringing that up. It is ridiculous that we have to become slalom drivers dodging these potholes around our city. I think everyone knows it. I have had to repair a rim of my tire as a result of a pothole. And unfortunately, that experience is too common in our city. We've got to act with the urgency of getting these filled. And I will, again, focus on Measure U.

It is we have decided in the city not to go after the bond as aggressively, which means that we are delaying and potentially not paving 50 miles of roadway this year. What we were funded for, what taxpayers have been paying into. So the dysfunction, the mismanagement in our city has to be addressed. We also have to look at quality standards, quality control. I am frustrated, as I know many listeners are.

on how we repave a road, and then less than two years later, it starts to crumble. We're not holding our service providers, our contractors, others accountable to the higher standards that we should be getting and should be expecting. Yeah. I mean, there was a major plan to fix the roads over the last few years. Do you think it worked? Why is it so bad? I mean, I think it's something that I've never quite been able to figure out.

While we pave a number of miles of road, we have a big hole that we've got to dig ourselves out of. Delaying the... Just deferred maintenance on the roads. Deferred maintenance, delaying the improvements. That creates even more of a backlog.

We do need to move more aggressively. We need to eliminate the obstacles. We should be able to pave more roads each year than we have been. And I mentioned the quality control piece. We have to make sure that the roads don't crumble and start to fall apart. We also have to coordinate better with other agencies, PG&E, East Bay Mud, others. If we freshly pave a road and then they cut into it because they've got another plan,

that undermines and defeats what we've been attempting to do. And then the other piece is we have to be able to measure, prove, demonstrate that we're making progress. Which roads are in the pipeline, understanding where we should be prioritizing and making sure that we're moving through that list efficiently. Real quick, last thing, where's your favorite place to go in District 6?

Favorite place to go in District 6. So I'm going to focus on Sweet Fingers Restaurant. It's a Jamaican restaurant. Chef Clive is an amazing culinary expert. And yeah, it's a great vibe. You're there. The music, live music, DJ, regular nights. Recommend that folks check out the food, seminary and foothill in East Oakland. Yeah.

We've been talking with Oakland mayoral candidate and former Oakland City Council member Lauren Taylor. Thank you so much for all of the calls and comments. I'm sorry we couldn't get to every single one of them. We have heard, though, there's a lot of trash and the roads are bad. I promise. We heard that. Thank you so much for joining us, Lauren Taylor. Absolutely. Thank you for having me.

That election is April 15th. Everyone in Oakland, special election. Don't forget. On Monday, we're going to talk with the other frontrunner in the race, candidate Barbara Lee. I'm Alexis Madrigal. Stay tuned for another hour of Forum Ahead with Mina Kim.

In the current climate, too many companies are just waiting to get to the other side. At IDEO, we partner with audacious leaders to build more courageous futures that take organizations from basic growth to real innovation. Discover more at IDEO.com. That's I-D-E-O dot com.

Hi, I'm Morgan Sung, host of Close All Tabs from KQED, where every week we reveal how the online world collides with everyday life. You don't know what's true or not because you don't know if AI was involved in it. So my first reaction was, ha ha, this is so funny. And my next reaction was, wait a minute, I'm a journalist. Is this real? And I think we will see a Twitch streamer president, maybe within our lifetimes. You can find Close All Tabs wherever you listen to podcasts.

Hi, I'm Ed Zitron, host of the Better Offline podcast. And we're kicking off our second season digging into tech's elite and how they've turned Silicon Valley into a playground for billionaires. From the chaotic world of generative AI to the destruction of Google search, Better Offline is your unvarnished and at times unhinged look at the underbelly of tech brought to you by an industry veteran with nothing to lose. Listen to Better Offline on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, wherever else you get your podcasts from.