Oakland faces major challenges amid City Hall disarray

Oakland Mayor Jean Quan attends the police department's awards and promotion ceremony in Oakland, Calif. on Thursday, May 22, 2014. Oakland Mayor Jean Quan attends the police department's awards and promotion ceremony in Oakland, Calif. on Thursday, May 22, 2014. Photo: Paul Chinn, The Chronicle Buy photo Photo: Paul Chinn, The Chronicle Image 1 of / 4 Caption Close Oakland faces major challenges amid City Hall disarray 1 / 4 Back to Gallery

The term, among Oakland City Hall staffers, is Quan-fusion.

The definition? That feeling that - under Mayor Jean Quan's leadership - the city is directionless, that City Hall churns staff and resources while moving from crisis to crisis, never solving the fundamental problems that undermine progress: crime, poverty, joblessness and blight.

Since Quan took office in 2011, key city officials have come and gone: city administrators, police chiefs and mayor's staffers. The turnover, some City Hall insiders say, has created a sense that the city leadership can't get it together.

"There is more than just a passing perception that there is a significant amount of instability in the city administration," said one City Hall staff member who asked not to be identified. "The mayor seems to be skidding around on loose gravel. That isn't a problem for the mayor as much as it is for the average person in the city."

Indeed, the city is facing major challenges. Its Police Department is under federal court oversight; its animal services division has no working director and is in disarray, volunteers there say; it has no permanent public works director; its newest city administrator, Fred Blackwell, is leaving for another job in mid-June - a startling announcement he made only a month after Quan named him to replace Deanna Santana; and the city has not filled key positions for evidence technicians and 911 dispatchers, among other jobs.

Police, parks disorder

The city's management problems are palpable and have drawn criticism. In April, Robert Warshaw, the court-appointed overseer of the Police Department, criticized the city's "fragmentary" 10-month search for a new police chief, saying it took three recruiters and did "little to nurture public confidence." The city eventually gave the job to Sean Whent, who had served as interim chief for a year.

In May, the city's parks department lost a $150,000 grant from the Oakland Athletics for failing to close a deal to remodel a North Oakland Little League field.

Also this month, a dead dog was left on an East Oakland sidewalk outside a post office for almost a week despite calls to the city animal control. Infuriated residents said they felt like they were in a Third World country.

But even some of Quan's harshest critics say the mayor isn't totally to blame for the city's shortcomings.

The problem, they say, is deep-rooted and precedes Quan: The city has long been short on resources and long on turmoil. Pointing the city in the right direction is extraordinarily difficult.

Additionally, according to the City Charter, the mayor in Oakland has very little formal power. She can hire and fire the city administrator and present the City Council a budget.

'Informal powers'

The real power, experts say, is in the informal power of political influence: the ability to bring parties together to negotiate, guide the city administrator to accomplish tasks and persuade the City Council and state leaders to pass laws to improve Oakland.

"Informal powers are very significant in Oakland as compared to the formal ones," said Corey Cook, a professor of politics at the University of San Francisco who studies Oakland.

Former Oakland Mayor Jerry Brown, who headed the city from 1999 to 2007, brought the strong mayor form of government to Oakland and thrived in that position, experts said, because he was a skilled politician with decades of service who had already been California's governor and secretary of state.

A ranked-choice voting election handed Quan, a longtime Oakland councilwoman and former school board member, the mayor's job after the front-runner was eliminated. Now, she's seeking re-election.

Quan sees progress

In an interview, Quan acknowledged that staff in City Hall had left during her time as mayor but noted that every person she hired had brought some strength to Oakland.

"I think the quality of the people I have had at each step have been great," Quan said.

Quan rejected the notion of instability at City Hall and said work is getting done.

Violent crime has dropped dramatically this year, and investment is pouring into the city, she said. The Police Department is growing, and she is working to provide almost 2,000 summer jobs to Oakland youth.

Quan also suggested she is the first mayor since Brown to fully use all the mayor's powers.

"I am probably inventing the full-time strong mayor, and fortunately Jerry was very focused on downtown ... and you might say that Ron Dellums didn't put the same energy into the job that I did," Quan said. "You might say that I am the first person to do this full time."

Quan said she has lured investors to projects at the old Oakland Army Base and the Brooklyn Basin housing development, both of which broke ground in the past year.

The major added that she could put effort now into hiring permanent people for the open jobs at City Hall but said such a move might not be sensible in an election year.

"We will have to make decisions about whether or not we should spend the time now because, quite frankly, I will get better people after the election," Quan said.