We put $1.2 million of community money into a building that had sat abandoned on International Blvd. for twenty years. In ten months, we turned it into an accredited career school. Twenty-two students lived on site.

Then our landlords foreclosed on it and sold the building to themselves for $300,000.

We found out afterward that we were not the first.

They are among Oakland's larger landlords, with roughly 130 properties held since 1980. In 2019, the Oakland City Attorney sued them over six other East Oakland properties and called them "textbook predatory landlords who have profited for years from willfully violating the basic legal and human rights of tenants." In 2021, after a 13-day trial, a judge found a "willful, reckless" pattern and practice of violating tenants' rights.

Their names are Baljit Singh Mann and Surinder Mann, operating through Dodg Corp. and SBMANN2.

This page exists to make sure the Career Center is where the pattern stops. That takes lawyers, and it takes you.

Ten months. Two accredited programs. Twenty-two students housed.

The Oakland Career Training Depot ran Barbering & Cosmetology and Nursing Assistance, fully accredited. Twenty-two students lived on site with wraparound support. The encampment outside wasn't swept away. It was invited in.

"This is actually a sanctuary, a hospital for second chances." That's our founder, Rose.

The community put $1.2 million into that building floor by floor, under an agreement to purchase it at year's end. The buildout was 85% complete when operations stopped.

The soil, the appraisal, and the $300,000 sale

The purchase contract stated there was nothing wrong with the soil. During refinancing, we learned the property needs an estimated $600,000 to $800,000 in undisclosed remediation. No bank would refinance without it.

By then, our work and the neighborhood's turnaround had lifted the building's appraised value to $3.2 million.

So run the numbers on what happened next. Instead of remediating, the Manns foreclosed and sold the building to themselves for $300,000. Less than a tenth of what it appraised for. A quarter of what the community had put inside it. Same family on both sides of the sale.

Twenty-two students lost their housing and their programs, months from earning their licenses.

The record, in their own courtrooms

Court records and reporting by The Oaklandside and NBC Bay Area identify the owners as Baljit Singh Mann and Surinder Mann, a married couple operating through companies including Dodg Corp. and SBMANN2.

At the 2021 trial, a city inspector described one of their buildings as "by far the worst that I have seen." Fire sprinklers were connected to no water source. Tenants were offered move-out deals requiring a full release of claims, without being told they had a right to relocation payments. The Anti-Eviction Mapping Project counts at least 98 evictions by their entities between 2011 and 2021. The judge ordered a $3.9 million penalty.

They took the Career Center while under a court injunction

That 2021 judgment barred them from any involvement in leasing at their Oakland properties for five years and required outside management. A court of appeal affirmed the findings in 2024.

That injunction was still in force when the Career Center's doors closed.

The $3.9 million penalty? Vacated on appeal. Not because the facts were wrong, but on a technicality about which city ordinance authorized it. The findings stand. The punishment evaporated. Seven years of litigation and the pattern simply continued, because so far, continuing has been free.

You can make it not free.

What your donation does

Two things, and we publish receipts for both.

Legal defense. Foreclosure challenges run on deadlines, and every filing, hearing, and hour of counsel costs money the Manns are betting we don't have. Your donation funds the case to challenge this foreclosure and pursue the return of the building and the $1.2 million of community investment inside it. $50 covers filing costs. $500 funds hours of counsel. Every dollar is a dollar they didn't count on.

The 22 students. Direct support, housing, essentials, and continuity, so displacement doesn't end their training. These are students months from a license. One of our first put it plainly: "If I wasn't part of the program, I would probably not be a contributing citizen to society." That's what's on the table.

The Oakland Career Training Depot is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit. Your donation is tax-deductible, and your receipt is issued automatically through PayPal Giving Fund. Every filing, every hearing, every dollar gets documented publicly as this moves.

A judge found the pattern. An inspector described it. A City Attorney named it. None of that stopped it. Twenty-two students and one building on International Blvd. is where it can actually stop, and whether it does now depends on people like you.

They don't have seven years. They have right now, and they have you.

Donate above, then help us be loud:

reclaimthecareercenter.org · @reclaimthecareercenter