Oak Tree

Many community service and social action groups make their homes in this tiny Oakland neighborhood. For example, a squat, dingy building on the corner of Miller and 15th Houses the Volunteers of America, a nationwide volunteer service that is over a century old. VOA helps with everyone from the aging and homeless community to parolees looking to find employment and re-enter a legit life. (The building is also across from a beautiful example of the Mission Style in homes—a structure that has an adobe tower with attractive tiled roof—very cool!)

Just a few blocks away, Youth Employment Partnership is an organization that seeks to help 15-24 year olds gain work experience and improve grades by helping them find service sector jobs. The organization helps to pay for training and provides support for students to stay in school or complete their GED.

There is also a shelter and housing agency for battered women—the 26th Avenue Housing Association and a couple of other community development offices.

The neighborhood is also home to a pair of churches as well: a Seventh Day Adventist church, the Oakland Spanish SDA Church; and, the New Covenant Church. The New Covenant Church has a pre-school attached—“Little Sprouts Pre-School.” (There is another child care center just around the corner, Centro Infantil.)

When it comes to actually living in the neighborhood, residents have many of the same choices as those in the surrounding neighborhoods—pre-World War II bungalows and some fairly boxy looking apartment buildings.

In terms of food and entertainment, there really isn’t much to speak of, beyond some fast food places at the edges of the neighborhood.

Crime is, of course, a worry here as in the surrounding neighborhoods. Between 2007 and 2009 there were 5 murders in this neighborhood. Given that the population of the neighborhood is only 4500 that means you have roughly a 1 in 2,250 chance of being killed here on any given year—though the reality is that this level of intense violence is mostly limited to the young who look as if they are in gangs—most of the victims being in their teens and early 20s. (A generally sad situation that gives you some sense of why the many community organizations are needed here.)