A 12-year-old Alameda boy, Joe Carter, found a diamond ring in a little black box Sunday when he was boating with his father off Crissy Field. He then set off on a quest to find the owner. First posting on craigslist, and then catching the attention of Alamedan and Chronicle reporter Steve Rubenstein, who penned this article. If it is your ring—it’s a one-quarter carat diamond ring with a price tag indicating it was on sale for $499—or you know whose it is, you can reach the Carters through their craigslist posting.

This Saturday will be the first of the “Alameda Walks!” a series of hour-long, morning strolls around different neighborhoods in our fine town.

Hosted by the Alameda Collaborative for Children, Youth & Families in partnership with the city’s Park and Recreation Department and Pedestrian-Friendly Alameda, the community walk program is now in its fourth year.

The Collaborative’s co-chairs Mayor Beverly Johnson, School District Trustee Janet Gibson, and Alameda County Supervisor Alice Lai-Bitker often join the group, which is out and about the first three weekends of each month, May through October. “We just walk. It’s not a history walk. It’s not a power walk,” says Audrey Lord-Hausman of the Youth Collaborative. “It’s a chance to meet some neighbors, and explore the nooks and crannies of Alameda.”

All walks start at 9 a.m. and are routed through different neighborhoods. “People get a chance to know each other and explore new places,” says Lord-Hausman. “I’ve heard people say, ‘My gosh I was born and raised here and never knew this was here.’”

The first stroll of the season will be this Saturday, May 3. Participants will meet at the Lincoln Park High Street entrance (between Central and Santa Clara), for a meander that includes Alameda’s often-unexplored East Shore neighborhood. On the May 10, walkers will meet at Central and Gibbons to explore the a Sather Mound area and on May 17 the meeting spot is at Encinal High. The complete schedule is here.

This Friday, May 2, at 7 p.m. in Kofman Auditorium (in Alameda High) there will be a benefit concert to try to keep music in grades one, two and three in our district’s schools. The concert is brought to you by Bay Farm parent Lorri Garrett and a host of other hardworking volunteers in the Save our Music crew. You can buy tickets to the hip-happening event online here and also learn more about the class acts, including on- and off-island talent as well as many of our district’s bright-eyed third graders. If you can’t make the show, there’s also an online auction, with items including tickets to the San Francisco Opera, a $100 gift certificate to Scott’s Shoes and a drum head signed by Metallica.

Measure H
As always, Read the rest of this entry »

New at 11:10 p.m: Below is Oakland Tribune video of today’s protest and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. If you watch until the end—it’s only two and a half minutes so probably you can hang in there—you get to see the governor say one of the most amusing/perplexing things that’s been coming out of his office lately. He talks about how education in California is currently ‘overfunded.’

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Thanks to school board member Mike McMahon for the link to this KPIX story on today’s protests. Enjoy the video of parents and students talking about why public schools matter. Hopefully more links to come.

New at 4:46 p.m: Here’s the KCBS story.

New at 4:48 p.m: Here’s an ABC 7 story from today on the long-term impact of cuts to education in our state: Higher Education cuts could be devastating to California.

New at 9:45: The Oakland Tribune’s Josh Richman also filed a story on Schwarzenegger’s visit. He writes about the governor’s softening rhetoric on taxes and the state’s decaying infrastructure.

Peter Hegarty’s story about the school walk outs and parent and teacher protests that greeted Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger when he visited the USS Hornet in Alameda today is here.

Every protest needs friendly, happy kids, no? Below is video of two startlingly cute first graders standing in a trash can during the Alameda Education Foundation’s Step Up and Donate/Public Education is too Valuable to Throw Away awareness campaign last month.

As you may or may not have heard—it’s hard to know, isn’t it? Just who’s heard what?—Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger will be Read the rest of this entry »

There’s only a few more days to catch Alameda photographer Jan Watten’s work, which is up now through April 25 at the Pro Arts Gallery at 550 2nd Street in Oakland. The 10-person show, called Jingletown Junction, is a celebration of the art and artists who’ve made their home in the area of East Oakland between the High Street and Fruitvale bridges.

Watten, who also participated in the recent Alameda on Camera project now up at the Frank Bette Center, says her work for the Jingletown show includes portraits of neighborhood artists, many of whom she’s worked around for years. “I lived in Jingletown from 1984 to 1997,” says Watten. “Then then I got married and moved to Alameda—but I kept my studio because I loved it so much.”

Watten has two pieces in the show:

One piece is called An Aspect of my Jingletown [pictured left]. In the late ’80s, I started photographing people with objects—with something they felt revealed something about their identity. I’m going back to those people and photographing them again. The work is a grid of faces.

I also have some photographs I took with a plastic camera, a Holga. I photograph the neighborhood. I’m in love with my Holga—it’s freeing. You go out and you never know what you’re going to get. It’s sort of like zen photography.

The East Bay Express has a nice little write up of the show and more on the history of the Jingletown neighborhood.

Our very own California governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, will be in town Wednesday April 16, visiting the USS Hornet where he’ll participate in an ‘open conversation’ (as opposed, I guess, to a closed one) as part of the Bay Area Council’s annual conference.

Those who pay attention to these things have lately been noticing a shift in Schwarzenegger’s language: from a staunch anti-tax stance, to a more open rhetoric, one which includes the possibility of raising taxes to fund vital state services like, say, education and parks.

For any of you who may have somehow missed it, Read the rest of this entry »

US. Representative Pete Stark, who has served in congress since 1973, will hold a town meeting in Alameda, from noon to 1 p.m. on Saturday, April 12, in council chambers at City Hall. Stark, who holds an MBA from the Haas School of Business and made his fortune in banking before turning to public service, regularly tours through the towns in his district to hear from voters like us.

Stark was an early opponent of the Iraq War, speaking on the House floor against the resolution authorizing military force in Iraq on October 10, 2002. He said, in part (my source here is Wikipedia):

Well then, who will pay? School kids will pay. There’ll Read the rest of this entry »

[Ed. note: speakers at the rally include State Assembly Member Sandre Swanson and former 16th district State Assembly Member Wilma Chan.]

This coming Thursday at 3:30 p.m. there will be a rally on the steps of the Alameda Unified School District offices to keep the momentum going in support of public education. My understanding is that speeches/remarks will begin at 4 p.m. and speakers include the always-inspiring Brooke Briggance as well as reps from teacher and staff unions. District offices are at 2200 Central Avenue.

Come on out and be energized to, among other things, pass Measure H, the supplemental/emergency parcel tax that, as I hope you’ve heard already, will be on the June 3rd ballot.

Also, for your edification/amusement here’s a link to an Onion story about the cutting of the entire past tense from schools across the country.