City of Oakland Response – Part 2 (Attachment B)*

Potholes and degradation are an ongoing challenge other street pavement failures faced by all large urban jurisdictions, the have been a prevalent problem City continues to apply industry best in the City of Oakland for many practices in maintenance prioritization years. and public safety risk mitigation. While potholes and pavement

The City of Agree with the finding degradation are an ongoing challenge Oakland needed to repair over faced by all large urban jurisdictions, the 53,000 potholes or similar City continues to apply industry best pavement failures in the most practices in maintenance prioritization recent 2023-2024 Fiscal Year. and public safety risk mitigation. While potholes and pavement

Historically, Agree with the finding degradation are an ongoing challenge liability claims and lawsuits faced by all large urban jurisdictions, the from potholes and pavement City continues to apply industry best failure have cost the City of practices in maintenance prioritization Oakland millions of dollars. and public safety risk mitigation. This figure is a rounded estimate that is Disagree partially with the finding

Complete helpful for the general public to repaying of streets costs the understand the relative cost of City of Oakland approximately pavement rehabilitation. The true cost $1 million per mile. per mile would depend on the number of travel lanes on a roadway, the type of pavement treatment, and other work that may be required, such as improvements to existing non-compliant curb ramps. As of summer 2025, local streets pavement rehabilitation projects (two travel lanes, mill and overlay treatment, and significant curb ramp improvements) are costing approximately $1.3M per mile. The City continues to advance the goals Disagree partially with the finding

The City of of the Five-Year Paving Plan (5YP) Oakland has not met its goals consistent with available funding and for significant repaying under operational capacity. Fluctuations in its 2022 Five-Year Paving Plan bond market timing and project delivery (5YP), with no foreseeable date resources have affected the phasing for completion. schedule, but the City remains committed to plan completion. The City is currently preparing to issue Agree with the finding

Without money the next tranche of Measure U bonds in from the sale of authorized November or December 2025. The City Measure U bonds, the City of continues to explore all eligible funding Oakland will not be able to sources, including state and federal undertake significant additional transportation programs, to supplement street repaying. bond proceeds. The City Administrator's Office is Agree with the finding

High employee committed to working with the Human vacancy rates and the delays in Resources Management Department approval of hiring slowed the and Oakland Department of City of Oakland's in-house Transportation to prioritize hiring critical street repaying and repairs. positions, including Maintenance Workers and related classifications, which perform in-house street repaving and repairs. The City acknowledges staffing challenges affecting multiple municipal functions, including public works and transportation. The City acknowledges its Local and Partially agree with the finding

The City of Small Local Business Enterprise Oakland's Local Business programs influence bid participation, Enterprise and Small Local however, these programs are legally Business Enterprise programs mandated equity tools designed to limit the competition for expand contracting opportunities for Oakland's Department of Oakland-based firms. The City Transportation contracts for continually reviews program design to paving and street work, causing balance inclusion and competition. Oakland to not receive multiple bids, which could result in lower costs. The City maintains and enforces detailed

The City of Disagree with the finding change order procedures that include Oakland's Department of multi-level fiscal and managerial review Transportation lacks adequate consistent with the City Charter and control over change orders on industry standards. All funding sources paving and street projects, are confirmed prior to authorization. including failure to first identify approved funding. The City's annual financial audits Disagree with the finding

The City of conducted by external auditors have Oakland has not conducted any included all Measure KK and Measure U audits under Measure KK or funds as part of the City's Measure U, as required by the Comprehensive Annual Financial Report. measures. In addition, the City is initiating a stand- alone, measure-specific audit to enhance transparency. The Committee met on April 25, 2025. Disagree with the finding

The City of Neither the measure language nor Oakland's I-Bond Oversight implementing ordinance prescribes a Committee has not met fixed meeting frequency, but staff will regularly since at least continue to encourage regular December 2022, as required. convening. Since taking office in May 2025, the

The City of Partially disagree with the finding Mayor has been working to fill all board Oakland (Mayor) has failed to and commission vacancies inherited fill the current vacancies on the from the previous administration, I-Bond Oversight Committee. including the I-Bond Oversight Committee.

The I-Bond The Finance Department will coordinate Agree with the finding Oversight Committee has not with the departments that oversee the provided regular or annual operations under the Bond, to ensure a report is produced and presented to the reports on Measure KK to the Oakland City Council since Committee as soon as practicable. September 2022, nor on Measure U since its approval in November 2022.

The website for Agree with the finding In addition to filling current vacancies, the City of Oakland's I-Bond the Mayor and City Administration are Oversight Committee lacks reviewing the staffing for the I-Bond complete information including Oversight Committee to ensure it has most committee reports, and adequate administrative support. not all agendas, minutes, or recordings.

The City of Agree with the finding City staff are developing a structured Oakland's I-Bond Oversight meeting calendar and reporting Committee failed to conduct a framework, including self-evaluations, to facilitate the Committee's effective self-evaluation, as required by operation in compliance with its bylaws. its bylaws.

The City of Agree with the finding As noted above, City staff are developing a structured meeting Oakland has failed to ensure calendar and reporting framework, that the I-Bond Oversight Committee has been fulfilling including self-evaluations, to facilitate its duties, including meeting the Committee's effective operation in compliance with its bylaws. regularly, reporting as needed, and conducting self-evaluations as required. TABLE 2: GRAND JURY RECOMMENATIONS Action Plan and Responsible Timeline/ Target Date Grand Jury Recommendation City's Response Parties/Depts Oakland faces high priority

The Oakland Disagree with the finding Measure Q ballot measure was discussed by the City City Council added the Council at open public meeting prior to placement on the "extreme fiscal necessity" ballot. clause to Measure Q without open discussion and public debate.

The Measure Q Agree with the finding ballot language passed by voters in March 2020 did not define what constitutes an extreme fiscal necessity. Agree with the finding

The declaration As approved by the voters, Measure Q provides that the of extreme fiscal necessity City Council may suspend the maintenance of effort allowed the Oakland City provisions within the measure by resolution in order to Council to divert funds meet urgent and changing needs in the event of extreme intended for additional park fiscal necessity. services The declaration of an event of extreme fiscal necessity is adopted by resolution at an open and noticed meeting of the City Council. The extreme fiscal necessity declaration specifically allows Oakland City Council to use funds intended for additional park services to instead fund existing park services.

In its last Agree with the finding disclosure of the maintenance of effort calculations, the City of Oakland reported a decrease in Measure Q funding for new park services from 45% to 32%. In July 2024, the Oakland City Council adopted Resolution

To date, Agree with the finding No. 90327 CMS which, among other things, sought to community park stakeholders clarify the definition of extreme fiscal necessity. The City and Oakland city staff still do . has met and will continue to meet with stakeholders on not agree on a definition of this issue. "extreme fiscal necessity." See the City Auditor's

Measure Q Response to the Grand Jury requires biennial reports, and the Oakland City Auditor did Report (Attachment C) not conduct the second biennial audit covering FY 2022-2023 and FY 2023-2024. See the City Auditor's

Measure Q was not included in the Oakland Response to the Grand Jury City Auditor's FY 2024-2025 Report (Attachment C) workplan. Section 5.C of the Act states that "An independent audit

As Partially Disagree with the may be performed annually..." (underlining added). Prior recommended and funded in finding to FY 2025 the City elected not to conduct an independent Measure Q, no independent audit of Measure Q as (1) the City Auditor's mandated financial audit has been biennial audit was anticipated to provide more meaningful conducted. input for policymakers and (2) Measure Q expenditures are audited as part of the annual citywide audit. More recently the City agreed to conduct a financial audit of Measure Q and has included funds for this purpose in the recently approved external audit contract.

Oakland's Parks Agree with the finding and Recreation Advisory Commission complies with the reporting requirements in Ordinance No. 13622 (an ordinance updating the duties of the commission). Measure Q provides: "The City Council shall assign to one Agree with the finding

Oakland's Commission on Homelessness or more existing Boards or Commissions, the responsibility has not met its oversight for citizen oversight of the measure. The Board or Commission or Boards and Commissions shall review mandate of Measure Q reports related to the expenditure of revenue collected by including the preparation of the City from the special tax imposed by this Ordinance annual reports as required by and provide reports to the City Council when requested,..." Ordinance No. 13584 (an [emphasis added]. The only mandatory annual report that ordinance updating the duties applies to the Commission without a specific request is the of the commission). requirement that the Commission publish an annual report regarding how and to what extent the City Council and Mayor have implemented the Chapter (Vacant Property Tax Chapter 4.56) The City's Quarterly Revenue and Expenditure reports and

The City of Agree with the finding other financial documents include details on the status of Oakland has not prepared revenues, expenditures and projects funded by Measure Q. annual reports documenting In addition, the Finance Department will provide a revenues, expenditures and standalone report regarding the expenditures from the status of projects funded Measure Q and other local measures in order to by Measure Q as required by communicate compliance with CA Government Code California Government Code 50075.3. 50075.3. The first report will be published in February or March 2026. Partially agree with the

It is difficult to Parks and Recreation Advisory Commission (PRAC) observe Oakland's Parks and finding meetings are held at the Lakeside Park Garden Center at Recreation Advisory 666 Bellevue Avenue in Oakland and may be attended by Commission meetings the public in-person or online via Zoom webinar. The recorded on Zoom due to poor recordings of each meeting, as well as meeting minutes, broadcast capabilities. (The are subsequently uploaded to the PRAC's website. Staff Commission on Homelessness acknowledge that factors such as the meeting room's meetings recorded on KTOP acoustics and recording equipment used can impact the are broadcast with better quality of the meeting recording's sound and the City will video and audio than PRAC explore options to address these factors and improve the meetings.) quality of recordings. TABLE 4: Grand Jury Recommendations Grand Jury Recommendation City's Response Action Plan and Responsible Timeline/ Target Date Parties/Depts

City of Oakland Agree with the finding parking control technicians have the technology on their existing handheld devices that enables them to search some vehicle databases.

The City of Partially agrees with the finding As noted in response to Finding 25-32 Oakland will save staff time below, almost all citations issued by and taxpayer dollars by OakDOT are to vehicles that are not avoiding issuing and stolen. According to staff's assessment, ultimately dismissing tickets the cost to procure and implement a on illegally parked stolen new system as well as execute a vehicles. memorandum of understanding with the California Department of Justice as required by law, outweigh the benefits of pursuing a solution to an issue that occurs in less than 1% of cases.

When a ticket Agree with the finding The City will review its citation is issued to a parked stolen appeals/dismissal process to identify vehicle, victims of crime suffer and implement changes which help to additional hardship by simplify the process and make it as needing to take affirmative accessible as possible. steps to dismiss a parking ticket.

DMV provides Partially disagree with the finding 99.8% of the time, OakDOT is issuing information on stolen vehicles citations to vehicles that are not stolen. to OakDOT and any OakDOT This is already taking place and is one of staff can be trained to access the reasons why there are so few citations issued to stolen vehicles. It is this information without impractical for OakDOT Parking involving OPD or DOJ. technicians to crosscheck every single license plate with the DMV database before issuing a citation. TABLE 6: Grand Jury Recommendations Action Plan and Responsible Timeline/ Target Date Grand Jury Recommendation City's Response Parties/Depts

The Oakland Agree with the finding In the Very High Fire Hazard Severity zone of Fire Department has met its the Oakland Hills, Fire Prevention Bureau (FPB) goal of conducting annual Fire Code Inspectors carry out Vegetation wildfire inspections of Management inspections, while engine virtually all private company personnel inspect residential properties in the Oakland lots. Annually, staff conduct approx. 25,000 Hills area designated as the inspections. The City's recent adoption of the Very High Fire Hazard Vegetation Management Plan will assist in Severity Zone. inspections and management of public property as well, while also making the City eligible for additional funding for these services through both Measure MM and outside grants, which will contribute to vegetation management on and near private properties as well.

The Oakland Agree with the finding The robust inspection program coupled with Fire Department's annual effective community outreach efforts results in wildfire prevention compliance rates that exceed 90%. Currently inspections of private (2025), FPB's compliance rate is 93%. properties in the Oakland Hills finds a high level of compliance on the part of property owners.

For city- Agree with the finding In May 2024, the Oakland City Council formally owned properties, the adopted a 10-year Vegetation Management Oakland City Council does Plan (VMP). In November 2024, residents in the not presently allocate Oakland Hills voted overwhelmingly in favor of sufficient resources for passing a special wildfire prevention tax vegetation management to (Measure MM) to generate nearly $3 million remove or mitigate fire annually to fund critical annual work included risks. in the VMP for the next 20 years. This work includes managing fuel loads and vegetation on City-owned properties and along roadways and medians. As such, the City has recently added these successful efforts to access funding that will significantly increase City resources to address additional vegetation management and mitigate fire risks.

At the time Disagree with the finding Measure MM provides that the Ordinance shall of this report, the Oakland go into effect ten (10) days after the vote is City Council has not yet declared by the City Council. The City Council developed an adopted the resolution declaring the results of implementation plan for the November 4, 2024 election, including the Measure MM, although the vote on Measure MM, on December 17, 2024 measure becomes effective and Measure MM became effective ten (10) on July 1, 2025. days thereafter. The Wildfire Prevention Commission was established by the Oakland City Council on June 3rd, 2025, to provide for the required public oversight and meet the statutory requirements of Measure MM. Measure MM provides that the special tax will be levied beginning in fiscal year (FY) 2025- 2026, which commenced on July 1, 2025. Implementation funding for expected revenues from Measure MM are included in the Oakland FY 2025-2027 Budget, adopted by Council on June 11, 2025, and which is now currently in effect. Commission members for the Wildfire Prevention Commission were appointed by Mayor Barbara Lee and confirmed by the City Council on July 15, 2025.

Oakland's Disagree with the finding The Oakland Department of Transportation Department of (OakDOT) Parking Enforcement (PE) unit has Transportation lacks the resources to patrol beats throughout the adequate enforcement of city, including in the Oakland Hills parking restrictions in the neighborhoods. Parking Control Technicians Oakland Hills which hinders (PCT) conduct spot checks and respond to the ability of emergency requests for enforcement from the community. services to navigate narrow On red flag days, special patrols are sent to streets to ensure a timely enforce any violations found on the network of response to emergencies. narrow streets in the hills that have been improved with "no parking anytime" regulations. As part of the City's FY 2025-2027 Budget, additional PE staff will be added to the swing and graveyard shifts in the first quarter (Q1) of calendar year 2026, giving OakDOT the capacity to patrol the Oakland Hills regularly night and day as needed to promote compliance.

The Oakland Partially disagree with the finding, The City disagrees that the Oakland City Council City Council has not done an given the City Council and City has not done an adequate job of educating the adequate job of educating staff consistently educate the Oakland Hills residents about emergency Oakland Hills residents public on this topic, although evacuation routes. The City Council and staff about emergency there is always opportunities to have thoroughly discussed the topic of evacuation routes. enhance this education. The City evacuation routes at several hearings involving (i.e. the City Administrator and/or the Oakland Hills and approval of the following any City Department or City legislation, including the adoption of: (1) subdivision under their purview) the Vegetation Management Plan, (2) the City's may coordinate with the Council S-9 Combining Zone (an area where access is Offices to share educational restricted by narrow roadways and lack of resources and training multiple ingress and egress points), and (3) the opportunities with residents, but Accessory Dwelling Unit (ADU) legislation, educating Oakland Hills residents which restricts certain ADUs on properties about emergency evacuation within the City's S-9 Combining Zone. While routes is primarily the more work is needed to consistently and responsibility of the City and effectively educate residents in the Very High Oakland Fire Department. That Fire Hazard Severity Zone (VHFHSZ) about stated, the City Council still emergency evacuation routes, the topic of routinely discusses the issue when evacuation routes in the Oakland Hills is the Oakland Hills area is discussed routinely a consideration when the City Council at Council meetings. considers the approval of legislation impacting the Oakland Hills. In addition, the Oakland Fire Department (OFD) and Emergency Management Services Division (EMSD) have initiated outreach efforts in FYs 2024 and 2025 to date including: community meetings, 21 Personal Emergency Preparedness (PEP) Trainings, and 10 outreach events. Finally, the City has developed a public-facing webpage on evacuation routes and preparedness, entitled "Evacuations and Knowing Where to Go," which informs the public of the most feasible evacuation routes through "Know Your Zone" (a mapping software) and other publicly available information. Please refer to the following link: https://www.oaklandca.gov/Public-Safety- Streets/Ready-Oakland/Stay- Informed/Evacuations-and-Knowing-Where-to- Go. While the City Council and City staff are always looking for new ways to educate the public and develop creative ways to address fire danger and education of evacuation routes, both the Council and staff ensure that it remains a consistent topic of discussion when engaging the public on issues impacting the Oakland Hills area.

Public Agree with the finding The City agrees that public education paired education about evacuation with strong, layered notifications such as AC routes, and availability of Alert, Wireless Emergency Alerts (WEA), and emergency warning systems other systems is critical to public safety. Since (such as AC Alert), are 2020, EMSD has conducted an aggressive public critical to improving public education campaign for AC Alert and other safety in Oakland, especially notification systems. To date, Opt-In sign-ups in areas with high wildfire have increased by 45%. In addition, as risk. mentioned, the City maintains a webpage that educates the public as to the zone where their residence or place of business is located, along with the most appropriate evacuation route. Please refer to the following link: https://www.oaklandca.gov/Public-Safety- Streets/Ready-Oakland/Stay- Informed/Evacuations-and-Knowing-Where-to- Go. TABLE 8: GRAND JURY RECOMMENDATIONS Grand Jury Recommendation City's Response Action Plan and Responsible Timeline/ Target Date Parties/Depts