In the wake of the city’s 127th shooting death this year on Sunday, Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf said Monday she’ll propose training and hiring more police while putting the brakes on next year’s planned hiring freeze.
Joined at a virtual news conference by East Oakland city councilmembers Treva Reid and Loren Taylor, Schaaf said hiring more officers doesn’t mean the city is backing down on its commitment to MACRO, it’s new Mobile Assistance Community Response Program designed to send mental health professionals instead of police to nonviolent 911 calls.
It does mean the city has to address the requirements of Measure Z, the 2014 parcel tax passed by voters to ensure minimum police staffing levels and other services.
Measure Z requires the city to have 678 police officers or revise its hiring plan. As of Monday, it had 677.
Police are still investigating Sunday’s shooting, which occurred just before 3:30 p.m. on the 600 block of Grand Avenue, where a man confronted someone trying to burglarize his car. The passenger of the burglar’s black Toyota Rav 4 allegedly shot and killed him before the pair drove away.
Former police officer Kevin Nishita was killed Nov. 24 while providing security for a TV news crew in an attempted robbery on the 300 block of 14th Street. Nishita died in the hospital Saturday.
Schaaf said the current budget calls for a police hiring freeze July 1, something she’ll ask to be reevaluated. Schaaf said the recent surge in gun violence is a “perfect storm of bad outcomes,” including Oakland’s lowest police staffing in more than a decade, thanks to unexpected attrition and “the pandemic’s interruptions to our criminal justice system.”
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Keep the discussion civilized. Absolutely NO personal attacks or insults directed toward writers, nor others who make comments.
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