1. Fully fund MACRO as a 24/7 pilot in East Oakland so that it can be properly evaluated and used to demonstrate that this community-initiated 911 alternative is more effective & cheaper. Trying to stretch MACRO to cover more of the Town will nullify its success;
2. Move the investigation of complaints of police misconduct from IAD to CPRA;
3. Fund Youth Services and juvenile diversion, including NOAB;
4. Fund any job previously done by OPD at $70,000/year + Benefits.

Hello Councilmembers, I write you today, as a resident of District 6, in full support of Council President Bas's proposed budget amendments. She provides common sense adjustments to the City's budget, that prioritize real community health and safety. Her recommendations go to the core of the issues we face in Oakland, namely public safety and violence prevention, housing and homelessness and creating economic opportunities that begin to address the significant inequalities in our town. I urge you to pass the Council President's budget amendments, and for us to move toward not only a more balanced budget (as OPD's portion of the pie is far too bloated), but also safer streets where community and mental health workers respond to non-violent, non-criminal calls, a Community Police Review Agency oversees OPD officer behavior, and there are crossing guards on our most dangerous streets. Thank you.

I am commenting to support Council President Bas' amendments to the mayor's budget, and to please reject Councilmember Taylor's amendment. It lays the groundwork of beginning to divest from the police department and ultimately begin to reinvest in our communities. You can't police away inequities, and unless we reinvest in our communities with tangible policies, we will never break out of these ruts. That starts with putting our money where our values are. Don't be distracted by "crime waves" happening; this is happening pretty much across the board irrespective if the the locale has reduced, or even increased, their police budget. This tells us that these crimes are crimes of desperation and poverty, potentially more deeply influenced by job insecurity, mental health care, health care, education access, food insecurity, and housing insecurity. If we don't prioritize these issues over a few extra cop academies, we're criminalizing poverty, criminalizing homelessness, criminalizing mental health crises. Please reject Mayor Schaaf's fear-mongering budget and support Council President Bas' budget. Thank you (district 3)

Oakland has been increasing its police budget for the past 25 years. I can't imagine anyone choosing to spend so much money on police relative to other things if they were creating a budget from scratch. We have an opportunity right now to address so many social problems at the source and set a precedent for the rest of the country.

I am commenting to support Council President Bas' amendments to the Mayor's budget. We need to truly invest in alternatives to policing. Programs like MACRO have real potential to decrease the amount of violence that OPD inflicts on marginalized people in Oakland. If we are truly interested in finding ways forward for public safety, we need to give these programs a fair shake, which means more funding.

As an educator in Oakland, I support Council President Bas’ proposed budget amendments. We don't have nearly enough funding for youth services, but we have an excess of funding for police who only serve to criminalize and violate the youth that I work with. To achieve true public safety we need to invest in community services, not police.

We need to re-invest in critical social services to support our youth, families, poor folks, and others who have been hard hit by the pandemic and years of development that hasn't prioritized our community. At the same time, we need to reduce the impact of policing and police violence on the same communities. The way forward is reducing the police budget so that we can fund true safety in the form of healthy, prosperous communities. I support President's proposed budget amendments as important steps towards this vision. Mayor Schaaf's budget only reinforces a harmful status quo.

SUPPORT for the Thao, Reid, Taylor Budget Amendments - As someone who works directly with over 400 small and medium size businesses, helping shape our communities and culture of Oakland from east of the lake, please incorporate ALL of the Thao, Reid, Taylor Budget Amendments as brought to Council.

Please also work to fund sufficient police staffing to help secure Oakland's business and resident communities, and to investigate crimes. Attrition rates are high and academies are often needed just to sustain levels in the future. Now more than ever our business communities cannot suffer through conditions that deter customers and clients from coming out and patronizing their business, or their business being victimized.

Thank you

Regarding cuts to crossing guards as proposed by Mayor Schaaf. If anything we need more crossing guards especially since our roads in Oakland are so unsafe even around schools (ie. Franklin Elementary which has had massive delays in implementing standard safety protocols around the school). We had to fight to get one last year at Melrose Leadership Academy and we have to actually split the road in half to offload kids which then forces a one way in each direction. It's incredibly dangerous and the best solution we could come up with was a crossing guards and that has made a huge difference. Crossing guards are essential in communities of color especially because the traffic infrastructure in these neighborhoods is in disrepair on non-existent at best. Crossing guards are also incredibly helpful in creating community, many people from the same neighborhoods engage with children and parents each day. I'm appalled this is even being considered and cannot thank Council Pres. Bas for reinstating.