& Oakland Tribune WIHRE STILL HERE! Protesters write their defiance on the sidewalk at 14th and Broadway. Photo by José Antonio Galloso. by Jaime Omar Yassin Occupy Oakland has been a different kind of Occ ment from the start camps, with their GA-sanctioned bans on negotiations with the police and the city, created a unique referendum on the nature of dissent. By refusing to accept the limitations of ordinances that allow protest, Occupiers. made 1 two Oscar Grant Plaza into a constant interrogation of the city’s liberal gate-keepers, the electoral process and institutional polities Tensions developed between Occupy Oakland and the city once political actors discovered that the camp would focus on local as well as national issues. First came the joint City Hall/Chamber of Commerce progressive smear campaign, with its claims that the camp was destroying downtown business and_ driving away investment. Local media such as the San Francisco Chronicle regurgitated these eagerly, based almost solely on phone calls to the Director of the Chamber of Commerce, who is little more than a political liaison for the local offices of the country’s largest 1% (continued on page 6) narrativesSaturday | January 28, 2012 Foreclosing on the “American Dream” ‘The housing crisis is not a prob- Jem separate from the system but exists deep within its web, depen- dant on the system’s constructs. A combination of faulty bank practices, unemployment, income inequality and an overall lack of humanity has resulted in an astounding number of foreclosure filings each year since 2007. Prop- erty taxes go unpaid, banks own more homes, families are displaced and people carry around a false that they did something wrong because they were sold the “American Dream” in mortgage legalese. Banks foreclosed on more than 40,000 homes in Oakland in the past few years using various shady practi d bonuses for subprime mortgages ~ it simply did not matter if the prospective buyer fully understood the terms or could handle the increase in payments. Banks exten- sively employed “robo-signing” from 2007 to 2011, falsely claiming to have financial documer sary for foreclosures, until. they eventually stopped. Ultimately, their retreat from this practice for much of 2011 resulted in a decrease societal shame s. Lenders receit in foreclosures down to 1.9 million, the lowest since 2007 Other bank practices ~ including the constant shutlle of mortgages ~ can lead a homeowner to default for simply sending the payment to the wrong lender, though it was a miscommunication on the lender's part. Prime loan holders are also defaulting because of mort- gage verbiage and “underwater,” meaning they owe more on their mortgage than what their house is worth. A deeper look into why the banks chose these practices. and why the government continu: let them slide by without legal consequences is necessary to avoid a repeat of the 3:million-plus fore- closure filings each year. People are making billions off this business plan that dries up property taxes for city budgets. Yet, analysts believe the banks still have at least $750 billion in foreclosure backlog, so the 19% is going to come out smiling in the end. In December, according to the foreclosure RealtyTrac, Oakland had on average | in 254 homes involved in a foreclosure filing. However, | in 115 homes in Fastmont and 1 in 195 hom ‘West Oakland were at some stage of foreclosure. Compare that with 1 in 636 homes in Piedmont and 1 in L195 Rockridge Predominately Brown and Black neighborhoods were quick candi- dates for subprime loans ~ Wells Fargo referred to them as “ghetto loan refinancing Other homeowners are school and wacker homes in ” The racial makeup, income, unemployment rates all play a role in foreclosures. A true solution to the problem must take these issues into account. Federal and bank programs offer litle to no assistance, as the major- ity of mortgage holders do not qualify for their restructuring guide- lines. The Federal Reserve suggests allowing the bulk sale of properties with the intention of turning them into rentals, meaning more bank owned properties. Th don't stop the foreclosure vein from pumping in the short-term or long- education, and term. Schools are closing, parents do not have enough money to buy food, home and the state legislature is wiping out the affordable housing budget Communities must find their own solutions and togeth Groups like Causa Justa/Just Cause are fighting to help people stay in their homes. One Occupy Oakland tactic is to Occupy foreclosures to help prevent e property. It’s time for all these ideas ness is increasing band tions and reclaim and discussions to come to the table. It's clear that more than bank reform is needed. Only by addressing the underly- ing inequalities can we build some: thing stronger and more sustain- able Occupied Oakland Tribune Editorial and Design Sarah Morgan Scott Johnson Celeste Christie Legal Counsel Michael Siegel, Siegel & Yee In Support OF Occupy Oakland Contact: occupiedoaktrib@gmail.com http://occupiedoaktrib.org Special Thanks To: all supporters of Occupy, Oakland, 1984 Printing, Art for a Democratic Society ‘The Occupied Oakland Tribune is not in any way affiliated with the Oakland Tribune or Bay Area News Group, its parent company.Saturday | January 28, 2012 3 Quan’s Co-Dependent Investigation Last month Oakland Mayor Jean Quan announced the creation ‘of an “independent investigation” into the actions taken by police against Occupy Oakland. Costing $100,000—which no doubt will be blamed on Occupiers—the investigators appear to be hardly independent of the Oakland Police Department or police in general. ‘The investigators have asso- ciations with entities such as the FBI, Homeland Security and the Heritage Foundation, none of them defenders of the progressive values Quan claims to champion. These are not institutions of the 999% but of the 196. A further look at two of the four investigators serious concerns: Thomas Frazier: Former Police Commissioner of Baltimore, Maryland and President of Frazier Group LLC, Frazier has been appointed to lead the investigation, He is a past President of the Police Executive Research Forum and worked on the Heritage Founda- tion Homeland Security Task Force immediately following 9/11 headed by future Iraq. colonial governor/overlord L. Paul Bremer. Frazier has been working with the OPD since October, when he was hired as a “special adviser” to help Police Chief Howard Jordan deal with a consent decree resulting from the decade-old Rider's scan- dal that saw Oakland police framing innocent. suspects, among other crimes. Thus, Frazier has been raises more employed by the OPD to help prove that they are not guilty of misconduct and is now supposedly going to expose it Michael Hillman: As a security planner for the LAPD during the 1984 Olympics, he helped identify “potential trouble- makers . . . all over the city and placed them] in check before they could disrupt the event,” according to the Orange County Sheriff's Department (OCSD) blog. He later conducted secretive trainings in “urban warfare” for the Marines, Delta Force and Navy Seals, according to the OCSD blog: “They would conduct exer- cises in the early moming hours,” then LAPD Police Chief Daryl Gates recalled of the military train- ing. “The Mayor would call and say they had so many helicopters over a neighborhood and nobody knew why. Td say ‘Tl check’,” Chief Gates continued. “But I wouldn't get back to him.” If information about Hillmann’s “urban warfare” traine ings could not be entrusted to the Mayor of Los Angeles, how can we expect his investigation into Oakland's actual urban warfare against Occupy Oakland to turn up trustworthy details for the Mayor of Oakland? During the Los Angeles rebellion in 1992, Hillmann was Commander of the LAPD Metro unit which, according to the OCSD blog, “was known as the shock troops of the LAPD.” He disagreed with his own superior officers insisting on an even greater prepara- tion for cracking down on the expected uprising. Scott Campbell, videoed himself being shot by a non-lethal projectile the night of the who. Oakland General Strike, described the investigation as a “The ‘independent’ investigation proposed by the city is just another version of the police investigating the police,” Campbell said. especially true given the q able past conduct of the ‘investiga- tors’ and the links that Frazier has to conservative and pro-police think tanks, as well as the Department of Homeland Security.” There is nothing “indepen- dent” about these investigators and there is little reason to believe they are more loyal to an open demo- cratic process than they are to the use of police force. A truly indepen- dent investigation ought to be just thatindependent of the police force under investigation and with- out the ideological and professional baggage carried by enforcement consultants, We should not settle for this shambolic inquiry but demand that the guilty parties be held accountable, from the cops who assaulted Iraq veteran Scott Olsen to the Mayor and Police Chief who ordered the attack. “whitewash.” ‘This is, estion- these law Thanks to @MaryMad for doing the research for this article Jean Quan speaks to protesters. Photo from Oakland Local.