Oakland Puts Foreclosure Transfer Tax on November Ballot, Targeting Up to $13MM a Year From Downtown Distress

Oakland has advanced a November ballot measure that would strip a long-standing exemption from its real estate transfer tax and turn the city's wave of commercial foreclosures into a new source of general-fund revenue. Facing a hollowed-out downtown and a widening budget hole, Oakland is moving to profit from the very distress hammering its property […]