Contact: Oakland Police Officers' Association

Phone: (510) 834-9670 

Email: policeofficers@opoa.org

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 

  

OAKLAND, CA – This Summer we learned that the City of Oakland spectacularly missed a grant deadline for a state retail theft prevention grant, missing out on Oakland’s share of the $267 million available to combat crime. Ultimately, Mayor Sheng Thao took responsibility, until now. This week the mayor engaged in revisionist history, by driving an anti-police media campaign pointing the finger of blame at hardworking Oakland Police Officers for her administration’s failure.    

The truth is, the Oakland Police Department successfully applies every year for scores of grants and other law enforcement funding via various federal, state, and local opportunities. In this case, the grant application deadline was missed because of the incompetence of the City’s Economic and Workforce Development Department. The police department put together the grant application, and Thao’s staff at the Economic and Workforce Development Department derailed the application by simply missing the deadline to turn it in. Now, they point the finger at police officers for their own failure.     

Oakland Police Officers’ Association President Barry Donelan responded to Mayor Thao’s revisionist history media attacks by stating; “The failure to apply for this grant was brought to you by the Thao Administration. The same folks that brought us Oakland’s ransomware attack debacle, a year without a permanent police chief, and the elimination of 91 police officer positions in a city with skyrocketing crime. There is no ambiguity where the blame for this epic failure lies, its lies with Mayor Sheng Thao.”