Government
“Knock! Knock!” Compared to the red door, the woman’s head and shoulders, blurry through the window, look enormous. The weather outside is ominous, dark and cloudy. “Who’s there?” The door opens. The giant (surprise!) is City Council candidate Marilyn Langlois, and this is the inside fold of a slick red and olive political flier. Don’t vote for Langlois, the ad implores the reader—“She wants to raise your family’s taxes!” and, “She even refused to pay her own taxes!” The real…
Governor Jerry Brown signed a bill late last month making it illegal to visibly carry loaded or unloaded shotguns or rifles. In San Francisco the open carry ban has spurred debates and some protests by open carry advocates. But across the Bay in Richmond, the response has been more muted, and some citizens said the ban won’t have a substantial impact on their city. Kevin Muccular, a change agent with the Office of Neighborhood Safety, said that his organization hadn’t…
There’s one outcome for the City Council election that Bea Roberson says she can’t let happen, and it’s the reason the first-time candidate decided to put her name on the ballot to begin with. “We cannot let the [Richmond Progressive Alliance] win again,” Roberson said, standing near the dais in the city chambers after a council meeting. She said if she can make it out of the election with her sanity, she doesn’t plan on running for any other political…
Eduardo Martinez sits at the front desk of the Richmond Progressive Alliance hunched over a pile of donor thank-you letters. It’s midday and the quiet of the office is punctuated by the hum of vehicles that pass by on Macdonald Avenue and the occasional police siren in the distance. As Martinez picks up the letters and shuffles them a bit, several stray postcards—decorated with antique cars and a family of raccoons and littered throughout the pile—pop out. The postcards are…
There wasn’t anything unusual or exciting about the white shirt, gray slacks, black shoes or the red, diamond patterned tie that Jael P. Myrick wore. Even the way he blended in with people didn’t make him seem out of the ordinary. Myrick is to all appearances a regular guy. But in a field of City Council candidates where many of the big names are part of a deep partisan division, the 27-year-old Myrick hopes his youth and regular-guyness brings a…
With exactly three weeks until the upcoming election, Richmond’s key political players were out in full swing and the council’s division on full display at Tuesday night’s meeting. The main source of tension for the evening was a recent fight between Corky Booze and Richmond Progressive Alliance member David Moore. The much-disputed incident between the two men resulted in an exchange of blows outside the Sept. 20 Point Richmond Neighborhood Council’s Candidates Night forum. Councilmember Nat Bates placed an item…
Richmond native Anthony Green spent 13 years in the Air Force – first as an Aerospace Ground Equipment mechanic, then as a loadmaster for the C-5 airplane, which he told me was one of the best jobs he ever had. “I still got to fly around everywhere,” he said. “I just wasn’t flying the plane.” The Air Force took him from battlegrounds in Iraq and Afghanistan to training grounds at Travis Air Force Base, as well as to Washington, Texas,…
Eleanor Thompson is known in the Iron Triangle neighborhood as an advocate for youth and their safety. What’s less known is that she is motivated to work for the young people of Richmond by her own childhood experience. Thompson was born in Arkansas but moved to Arizona when she was six. By the time she was 14, she had lost both her parents and entered a foster home with her two younger sisters, then 13 and 12. Despite being the…
Armed with a Ziploc bag full of bookmarks and a compliment, Mike (Ali) Raccoon Eyes Kinney moves quickly from house to house “slinging paper.” As an experienced precinct walker, he gives himself 15 seconds to assess each porch before he decides whether to deliver the thin strip of paper emblazoned with a “WE LIKE MIKE!” slogan, his picture and the words “Candidate for Richmond City Council 2012.” If the doorstep is too cluttered, he won’t go near. There might be…