Every second and fourth Tuesday, the city's public agencies participate in a bi-weekly marathon of discussion in the first floor of City Hall. The schedule:

Public Works Committee - 10:30 a.m.

In one block sits a house that has become an eyesore – blighted by a mattress, two big easy chairs spilling cotton into a  yard gone to weeds and other trash. 

Across the street is a store that has been boarded up and abandoned so long the security bars on the doors are corroded with rust.

Rain isn’t the only thing that's happened to Oakland this past week. OL’s fabulous team of journalists gave you some top-notch coverage of news ranging from local government, to arts and culture, to courtroom drama.

Which neighborhoods are hardest hit by foreclosures? How many foreclosed homes have become a vacant public nuisance?

Bank-owned blighted foreclosures will be on display Thursday during a two-hour public tour aimed at increasing blight enforcement and big bank accountability.

City Councilwomen Desley Brooks and Jane Brunner will join, ACCE - Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment -  and local residents to view three currently undisclosed locations where blight plagues city blocks.