Parking lots remain unchained in N. Oakland

A December phone call from Councilmember Jane Brunner's office alerted PANIL to a proposed ordinance which could have created problems in the PANIL neighborhood while attempting to solve problems in other areas of town. For several years, East Oakland residents have been endangered by groups of teens and young adults who participate in weekly events called "the sideshow." It involves anywhere from several hundred to a thousand young people gathering in large parking lots or in intersections to meet and to watch demonstrations of drag racing and wild driving.

Police have been frustrated by the extreme mobility of the events (moving unpredictably from area to area in response to police enforcement) and by the lack of cooperation from a number of property owners of parking lots where the events are staged. The sideshow has cost over a million dollars per year in police overtime. Working with concerned East Oakland residents, the police had developed a proposed ordinance requiring owners of parking lots with more than 10 spaces to chain their lots within an hour of the businesses' closing time. City-owned lots would also have been chained. In the PANIL neighborhood, this would have included the lots for Chapel of the Chimes, Front Row Video, Piedmont Market, Wells Fargo, and Blockbuster, as well as the city-owned lot behind the 4000 block of Piedmont Avenue. Many of these lots are used after hours by customers of nearby businesses open late, as well as residents whose apartments or houses have no parking. Closing these lots would create a hardship for businesses, customers, and residents.