Mayor Quan, Oakland Business, And The Recall

(First posted at http://zenie62blog.com)

Is the Oakland Business Community really behind the planned recall effort of Mayor Jean Quan? As one blogger who’s lived in Oakland since 1974, it’s easy to gain the temperature around town because people either call or talk about the matter every day, including today.

Let’s say this: the issue of the recall of Mayor Jean Quan is not being officially driven by any recognized Oakland large business organization, as of this writing. Indeed everyone who’s talked to this blogger, and in total, that’s adding up to about 50 people so far, has said that, while they don’t want to be quoted for political reasons, they’re “on the fence” about supporting a recall effort against Mayor Quan.

Here’s my video on the Quan recall details:

A large reason for this is that no one know who the next Mayor of Oakland will be if the signature gathering process goes well, and the recall vote works according to the plans of the persons involved.

Everyone this space has communicated with is upset with the way Mayor Quan has handled the Occupy Oakland situation. Not one person has said anything in support of Quan’s actions. But, contrary to what you may read elsewhere, the truth is that about 70 percent of the people ‘surveyed,’ if you will, were already unhappy with Mayor Quan for various reasons – Occupy Oakland was just icing on the cake, and a good set point to former Oakland Mayor Elihu Harris’ statements about Quan in the video below as reflecting their views.

One thing is certain: Former California State Senator and Oakland Mayoral Candidate Don Perata is flat out not running for Mayor again in any recall scenario. It’s fair to say that Mr. Perata’s done with that aspect of his life, at least to the point of seeking the office of Mayor again. Don’t bother trying to “draft” Don Perata to run.

What about the others who ran for Mayor of Oakland? Well, Joe Tuman’s “Joe Tuman For Mayor Of Oakland” Facebook page is still up and active in the timeliness of its postings. Tuman’s not made an official statement regarding the recall effort.

But that written, Tuman does support statements against Mayor Quan, written on his Facebook page, like this long paragraph by Janet Marie Drew that Joe used the Facebook ‘Like’ Button to support:

Janet Marie Drew
The city has forbidden camping in the plaza. Officer Johnna Watson, a police spokeswoman, said the city would continue to monitor the plaza with help from a squad of unarmed private security officers the city recently hired for $540,000 a month.

Oakland is so broke it cannot provide Police support to it’s citizens in the Hills (residents have been told by police dispatch that they do not respond to burglaries) or pay to have more OPD officers; yet Mayor Quan is paying for Private Security with our tax dollars to the tune of more than a 1/2 Million a month!?? Her fiscal nonsense continues wherever she goes; from Bart to School Board, from Councilmember to Mayor.

A “like” of that harsh statement could be interpreted as support for the recall of Mayor Quan by Mr. Tuman.

Former Green Party Candidate Don Macleay has said on video that he’s interested, but as of now, Don’s taking the same ‘wait and see’ position that others in the Oakland Business Community have adopted. This blogger has not personally talked to all of the the other candidates from 2010, but one man, Terence Candell, was out campaigning for the recall of Quan. Moreover, Dr. Candell’s “Candell For Mayor of Oakland” website is still active.

A lot of people want to see just how organized the recall effort turns out to be. Some have issues with Oaklander Gene Hazzard’s style, in that they wonder how well the recall will be executed, given some early paperwork filing mistakes Gene made. Gene might me “methodical, surgical and lethal,” as he says, but he also, at times, (and I say this in a friendly way) can be careless with details.

The new group of people reportedly involved are largely unknown with respect to their track record on getting efforts like this to be successful. What they need is 26,000 signatures to be sure, not 19,000. One feather in Gene’s cap – regardless of how anyone feels about how the last Mayor of Oakland performed – is that Gene can say he drafted Ron Dellums to run for, and become, Mayor of Oakland, including gathering about 6,000 signatures.

So, right at this calm period, the main people involved in Oakland – I hate the term “players” because it ignores the fact that the people who’s names regularly come up really care about Oakland – are taking a wait-and-see position. The unfortunate news here is that no one I’ve talked to has said they don’t support the idea of a recall. They may be too busy to deal with it, or waiting to see what happens, or fearful of upsetting their political relationship with Mayor Quan, but there’s not been one person who came up and said “I don’t back the recall and I support Jean Quan.”

Stay tuned.