While the Oakland City Council took recess over August, my office reflected on what we have accomplished so far and how we’re going to continue moving forward. There has been a lot to reflect on and I’ve decided to share these successes over two articles.

To ensure that my votes are reflecting your voices, we created this survey to ask you about your priorities for the City budget. Please take a few minutes to answer so that you can have an impact on how your tax dollars are spent in Oakland.

Fife’s win signals a shift to a more progressive electorate in Oakland. Her campaign centered on the idea that “housing is a human right” and that public safety should be reimagined — a nod to Oaklander’s shifting priorities amid a growing homelessness crisis and a racial reckoning over police brutality.

On a sunny Saturday morning in DeFremery Park in West Oakland, 50 people have come to knock on doors. There are ironworkers, students, democratic socialists, even Sunrise Movement climate activists — all here to support Carroll Fife, a candidate for Oakland city council in District 3. “Who’s door knocking for the first time ever?” precinct captain Mary Schindler asks the crowd. Several hands go up. Everyone cheers. “Yes! You guys, that’s awesome!”

Fife’s mission will be urgent, and it will be blunt: Extract the system’s resources and redistribute them. She wants to take $150 million from the police budget and spend it on community programs, violence prevention, and land trusts that could provide affordable housing. “I want to create,” she tells me, “a real transparent process where I try to engage democracy.”

“What we have and what we’ve been doing is not working,” said Carroll Fife, a candidate for District Three. “Anyone can see that. People are desperate, and it’s only going to get worse if we don’t do something drastically different. It impacts everybody.” Fife, a community activist, is best known for organizing Moms 4 Housing, a collective that began when homeless mothers took over a speculator-owned house on Magnolia Street.

On Friday, Walker and Moms 4 Housing member Carroll Fife, who is running for the Oakland City Council District 3 seat, signed a symbolic deed on the front step signifying that the house is returning to the community. Since squatting in the Magnolia Street house with her children, Walker has found stable housing in Berkeley through another land trust.

If this county is really serious about ensuring everyone has access to a vote then we need to have the facilities and tools to be able to do that,” said Carol Fife. Fife said she’s troubled that early voting has started but a ballot drop box still hasn’t been installed in their West Oakland neighborhood. “I think it’s voter suppression,” Fife said. “That's what I’m hearing from people in the district. They are concerned about what’s happening.”

Thank you for taking the time to read my platform. My theory of governance is that when we address the experiences of the most marginalized, we can improve conditions for everyone. For example, if we find solutions for Black unhoused people living on the streets of Oakland, we will have addressed 70 percent of our city’s homelessness problem. A primary function of government should be to care for society, particularly in the face of unregulated market forces. Our movement-based campaign and administration will do just that.