Despite recent high-profile cases of violence on our streets, including the murder of four Oakland police officers in March, major crime in Oakland is down significantly this year.
 
Homicide is down about 20 percent, according to daily statistics from the Oakland Police Department. Assaults with firearms – down almost one third. Overall, Part 1 crimes – everything from assault to residential burglary – are down about 15 percent this year.

“He’ll tax the pennies on your eyes” cantaban los Beatles sobre el intrusivo cobrador de impuestos. Ahora el alcalde de San Francisco desea gravar sus colillas.

El mes próximo, el alcalde Gavin Newsom planea solicitar a la Junta de Supervisores de San Francisco que imponga un impuesto de 33 centavos sobre cada atado de cigarrillos que se venda localmente, justificándolo como una forma de obligar a los fumadores a pagar por la limpieza de las calles de la

 
Crime is a major issue that must be solved in the city of Oakland, yet the city cannot provide the leadership for an effective police department.  The latest political kickball involving the police is in the budget crisis. 

Oakland is facing a huge budget deficit, nearly $100 million, that must be closed by June 30, 2009.  The Mayor and his City Administrator Dan Lindhiem

Across the country, politicians are responding to the inability of a population devastated by government-induced recession to support governments’ spending at levels they have grown accustomed to by threatening the closure of schools, firehouses, and other high-profile, highly-valued government “services.” I have opined elsewhere on the reasons that such high-profile programs—rather than the thousands of highly-paid bureaucrats whose