Mayor Sheng Thao ordered the Oakland Public Works Department to acquire a Ford SUV for official travel when her term began in January of 2023, and she has been using it since April 2023.
Except, there's a catch. The City of Oakland has yet to make a single payment on the vehicle in the 16 months since acquiring it, according to reporting published earlier this week from The Oaklandside.
“To date, the City of Oakland has not paid for the loaner vehicle provided nor purchased a vehicle for the Mayor’s office use,” the city's Public Works Department said in a statement to The Oaklandside earlier this month.
Thao initially asked her subordinates to buy her a Ford Explorer, which could only be found at local dealership Uptown Ford, and the city ordered the car in March 2023.
But as repairs related to a mandatory recall stalled the delivery of the car for months on end, the dealership offered her a Ford Expedition as a temporary substitute until the Explorer could be sufficiently repaired, a proposition soon accepted by Mayor Thao.
Yet, when the Explorer was finally ready to go in October 2023, the mayor said she changed her mind, and wanted to keep the Expedition. This led to the city cancelling the order for the Explorer soon after, beginning a months-long ordeal in which Uptown Ford was left in the dark as to how they would be compensated for the SUV still in use by Mayor Thao.
“I am not sure what happened on the city’s end, but we have had a vehicle out with no payment for over a year. It sounds like you haven’t come up with a solution?" said Chris Kwei, the owner of Uptown Ford, in an email dated June 12th of this year.
City officials told The Oaklandside that the delay was, at least in part, due to the tense work of solving the city's then-ongoing $177 million budget shortfall occupying the staff that would usually address the delinquent car payments. Despite this setback, they assured the news site that negotiations are underway to compensate the dealership fairly for the vehicle's rental, and to acquire the SUV at a "discounted rate."
A sales contract acquired by The Oaklandside states that the city plans to pay $56,000 to own the car and around $18,000 after rental fees. This amounts to a total of roughly $74,000, costing about $10,000 more than a fully featured, highest trim 2024 model of the Ford Explorer, according to the manufacturer's website.
Update: Uptown Ford of Oakland clarified to SFist that the car was not sold at a discount, but at the correct Kelley Blue Book value for the used SUV with the current mileage it has on it. "This XLT is one of the lowest trim Expeditions sold by Ford. The top level Platinum trim starts at $80,800 according to Ford’s website," the dealership notes, disputing the $10,000 more" description given above.
The Chronicle spoke with a former Libby Schaaf administration official who criticized Thao for not choosing a more economical vehicle. And, the paper notes, SF Mayor London Breed doesn't have a city-owned car, but is typically driven around by police.
Photo via Wikimedia
