In a meeting this week that dragged on for more than 12 hours, Oakland City Councilmembers decisively turned down a proposal to place a measure on the November ballot to allow voters to weigh in on whether they want over a billion of their tax dollars spent on infrastructure for private luxury development and baseball stadium on public land at the Port of Oakland.
The final vote was 5-2 against the measure, with council member Rebecca Kaplan abstaining.
Voting yes was Councilmember Noel Gallo, the author of the measure. Gallo emphasized that this proposal had not been his idea but was drafted in response a deluge of calls and petitions from local residents, demanding that their voices not be ignored in the city’s rush to give public funds for infrastructure to billionaire developer and A’s team owner John Fisher.
“Your neighbors, my neighbors, are asking us to put this on the ballot,” Gallo said, adding that this is a business deal, and the A’s corporation has been less than transparent about the terms of the deal, whether the A’s will pay any community benefits and how much infrastructure will cost the public.