When the Oakland City Council approved the city’s two-year budget in June, they slashed vacant jobs and tightened spending, but the cuts didn’t completely balance out a $265 million projected shortfall. Now the council is seeking to raise $40 million in additional annual revenue through new taxes. But there aren’t a lot of obvious options.

On Tuesday, Oakland Budget Administrator Bradley Johnson told members of the City Council that the city is in the early stages of seeking a polling company to survey residents about a possible tax measure that could appear on the June 2026 ballot. Johnson also presented the council’s Finance Committee with a list of tax options . But as he noted, “Not many of them are viable.”

The likeliest choice — and the one envisioned by the council earlier thi

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