Whoever is Holding Up the Howard Terminal Ballpark Doesn't Love Oakland, Not Protecting Black People

Lemme start by saying, I stayed a night once in the Emeryville Holiday Inn and THE FUCKING WATER HEATER RAN OUT folks, at a hotel! So when I learn that NINETY-FIVE PERCENT of the Howard Terminal waterfront development proposal will be paid for by private investment funds and the only thing the City of Oakland has to do is approve it, inspect it and, oh yeah, REDO THE FUCKING PLUMBING!!!, at a cost of less than a billion dollars, I take the information in that context.

And I know, there are very stupid, perfectly well-meaning people out there who honestly believe that all economic development is evil and that somehow gentrification is actually really a terrible, terrible thing. I know that, because of the economics, politics and infrastructure of California and the Bay Area, a disproportionate number of those people live east of the San Francisco Bay and west of the Diablo Mountains.

They are wrong. There are certainly some disadvantages to gentrification, particularly for those irrationally wedded to rented residences. And then there are the people who lived in a gentrifying neighborhood twenty years ago and will still live in the same neighborhood twenty years from today. There are plenty. Those who did live there 20 years and are selling, by the way, are selling because its worth it, finally. For those who stay, prices will rise. They were going to rise anyways.

Jobs, however, will come much closer, as will grocery stores, clothing stores, coffee shops and restaurants serving healthier foods. All of these things are net cost savings, and all are absolutely inherent to meaning of gentrification. So let's not pretend that the Howard Terminal waterfront development is somehow going to ruin people's lives, let's not pretend we're defending the lifestyles of disadvantaged people, people of color or people living in one special neighborhood.

My grandparents were born, raised, met and married in that neighborhood. I've been to my Auntie's funeral in that neighborhood. They would not have, nor will their surviving siblings, miss it.

You know what they would miss? 3,000 units of 'affordable housing,' even airquoted as they had no more difficulty than anyone in hearing. They would have missed seeing $13 billion dollars come to the construction industry in Oakland. They'd have missed the trillions of dollars in economic activity that will take place in the neighborhood over decades if the terminal is built. They'd have missed the thousands of jobs that will be created, durable, good jobs, many of them. That's the Oakland they loved, that's the Oakland they wanted to see, a bustling, vibrant, energized city, a city with purpose, a city with a direction.

And you know what they'd have missed most of all? The Oakland A's.