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Transparency crucial
for OPD investigation
On June 30, a Black man was discovered hanging from a tree in Oakland’s Dimond Canyon. Police rapidly advised suicide, but no identify, reason behind dying or investigative particulars have been launched.
As a Black father elevating two sons right here, I can’t separate this picture from America’s historical past of lynching or Oakland’s personal document of state violence — from Oscar Grant to the Black Panther patrols that arose to guard our communities. In 2020, effigies hung in my neighborhood. Skepticism will not be paranoia — it’s survival.
Silence breeds mistrust. We’d like transparency: the person’s id (with household consent), the investigative timeline and proof supporting any conclusion. With out this, concern will fester and belief in our establishments will erode additional.
Justice is rarely given — it’s demanded. Oakland should demand solutions now.
Saleem Gilmore
Oakland
Democracy nonetheless
animates nation’s spirit
Democracy is almost all, the plenty, the person, the larger tent, the marginalized, DEI, a seat on the desk, city/suburban/rural, the correct to meals, the correct to shelter, the correct to really feel secure, the correct to disagree, the Structure, awake, radical, fact, an aspiration, an experiment, the previous, current and future, the humanities, the sciences, storytelling, household, hope, optimism, respect, company, a birthright, our shared humanity, a perfect that lives in all of us.
Democracy will not be a political occasion. Democracy is a lifestyle. Democracy issues. Democracy is America.
Ward Kanowsky
Pleasanton
Doulas will help
with assist in dying
Re: “State’s Medical Help in Dying regulation erects obstacles” (Web page A6, Aug. 6).
My coronary heart ached when Randall Spangler described his disappointing expertise with medical-aid-in-dying.
Being with a cherished one as they strategy dying is advanced sufficient with out encountering further stresses. However as end-of-life doulas, we have now seen this example go one other manner. We’ve seen compassionate, devoted medical professionals work as a concerted workforce to verify telehealth visits and home calls happen based on the 48-hour ready interval between a affected person’s first and second authorized request. We’ve additionally seen pharmacies make deliveries inside 24 hours of receiving the prescription order. We now have seen how necessary it’s for sufferers to grasp easy methods to time requests in addition to when to take aid-in-dying drugs.
When coping with a life-threatening or terminal sickness, a skilled end-of-life doula can stroll alongside the household, offering compassionate help in addition to data that honors the cherished one’s needs.
Pastor Kim Risedorph
Danville
Keep in mind those that
wouldn’t dissuade Trump
Re: “The America we knew is quickly vanishing” (Web page A7, Aug. 7).
Sadly, nobody within the Trump administration is courageous sufficient to face as much as him.
In Donald Trump’s newest firing of the commissioner of the Bureau of Labor and Statistics as a result of he didn’t need her to report the reality concerning the economic system, all I can say is disgrace on all these GOP politicians who we anticipated would all the time be the gatekeepers in upholding the integrity of our democracy for his or her blatant and head-snapping dereliction of responsibility.
I hope each citizen will keep in mind every one in all them by identify when it’s time to vote to make sure we by no means have a repeat of such spineless disregard for fact, transparency and easy ethical decency.
Sharon Dixon
San Leandro
