Sanjiv Handa - Oakland

Sanjiv Handa ¹

Sanjiv Handa (1956 - 2011) was for many years a constant fixture at meetings of various Oakland government bodies, including the City Council, various Council committees and subcommittees, the Planning Commission, the Public Ethics Commission and the Landmarks Preservation Advisory Board. He was best known for haranguing city officials about transparency in government, or to be more accurate, their lack of it.

Sanjiv always seemed to stay within the rules, or at least to manipulate them in his favor. When the Council changed procedures in an attempt to limit each speaker's time (informally referred to as the "Sanjiv rule"), he collected speaker cards from others to maximize his speaking time, and he always used the full time allotted to him. And even though everyone on the Council or other body where he appeared certainly knew who he was, per the rules he always began by stating what many people jokingly referred to as his full name: "For the record, Sanjiv Handa, East Bay News Service."

Here's a bit of classic bit of Sanjiv captured on video on February 16, 2010.

Here's Mr. Handa telling Oakland Vlogger Zennie Abraham that there were thousands of condoms stored in Oakland City Hall during Occupy Oakland: Video.

An example of Sanjiv at work: "Demand for Correct and Cure" from 2007.