Homeless Live at Union Point Park

Homeless Live at Union Point Park

While once true it was a favorite family destination, now it is a homeless encampment.

Union Point Park

In describing Oakland’s Union Point Park as “a favored destination for family gatherings on warm spring and summer days [“Journey Through Jingletown,” June], you have done your readers a disservice, a very dangerous one. While once true, Union Point Park has been ceded by the city of Oakland to well over a hundred itinerate campers … Rather than a “popular stop for casual bicycling buddies,” it has devolved into a no-go zone for both the police and public alike to be avoided at all costs. The Bay Area citizens have lost another public space jewel to governmental indifference.

 Dan Westerlin 

A Tradition Continues

Thank you for Angela Hill’s great article, “Calling the Next Generation of Park Rangers,” in April. It is wonderful to see the five-decade tradition of interdisciplinary environmental field programs at Merritt College continuing in such a thoughtful way. For an old timer, it is especially exciting that the environmental justice course begun in 1992 is expanding and also that marine biology is coming back. I believe that Merritt sold its small marine education vessel in the late 1970s when Charles Ford was the marine biologist.

Robin Freeman, Chair Emeritus, Environmental Management and Technology, Merritt College