Oh, Oakland....

Pitt students are a crazy bunch. As a Pitt alum, I really do love Oakland and have fond memories of exciting events during my college years.  But Pitt students are getting a bad reputation for their love of rioting and causing mass destruction.  There is some weird group-think mentally that permeates the students there whenever something exciting happens.  I was part of that too, back in the day, but I feel like we were never destructive then - instead, it was more about just being out in the excitement and being a small part of something much bigger. 

I woke up this morning (at 4:50 a.m. nonetheless) and turned on the 5 o'clock news to see that there had been a lot of activity in Oakland overnight.  My drive in this morning confirmed that - boarded up windows in multiple businesses and trash everywhere.  It was a very similar scene to that of the post-Super Bowl celebrations and riots that occurred in Oakland last year, only there were significantly more police present this year, and probably a lot more non-student protesters as well.

I'm patrolling Forbes Avenue this morning, until noon.  They are expecting significantly increased amounts of pedestrian traffic due to the scheduled protest at Fifth and Craft at noon today.  Hopefully all will be quiet.