Oakland City Council Elects New President As New Members Take Office
OAKLAND (CBS SF) -- There was a changing of the guard at the Oakland City Council Monday with three new members being sworn in and Councilwoman Pat Kernighan being elected as the council's new president.
Kernighan, who was first elected in 2005 and represents District 2, which includes the Grand Lake and Chinatown districts, succeeds Larry Reid, who represents District 7 in East Oakland.
Reid, who was first elected in 1996 and was recently re-elected to a fifth term, was elected Vice Mayor at Monday's meeting. He had been the council's president for the past four years.
At-Large Councilwoman Rebecca Kaplan, who is beginning her second term, was elected to be the council's president pro tem.
Sworn in Monday were Dan Kalb, who succeeds Jane Brunner in representing District 1 in North Oakland, Noel Gallo, who replaces Ignacio De La Fuente in District 5, which largely consists of the Fruitvale district, and Lynette Gibson McElhaney, who succeeds Nancy Nadel in representing District 3 in West Oakland.
Nadel, De La Fuente and Brunner choose not to seek re-election to the seats that they had each represented for many years.
However, De La Fuente challenged Kaplan for the at-large seat and Brunner challenged Barbara Parker for the city attorney's job but both lost by wide margins.
Parker, who succeeded John Russo in June 2011 when he left Oakland to become Alameda's city manager, was sworn in today for a four-year term.
Oakland school board members Jody London, Jumoke Hinton Hodge, Roseann Torres and James Harris were also sworn in at the ceremony at Oakland City Hall Monday.
London represents District 1, Hodge represents District 3, Torres serves District 5 and Harris represents District 7.
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