Alameda Filings Detail Vella’s EdTech Donors as APD Makes Arrest

Campaign finance filings examined by the Alameda Post show that Alameda mayoral candidate Malia Vella — who has served since October 2023 as Senior Vice President of State Partnerships at San Francisco-based AI education technology company Amira Learning — received her largest individual campaign contribution, the $5,900 Fair Political Practices Commission maximum, on June 24 from Dallas-based Amira Learning board co-chairman Richard "Dick" Collins, alongside donations from out-of-state company employees (Alameda Post). Across the island this week, the Alameda Police Department (APD) arrested a driver within 19 seconds of a be-on-the-lookout alert on Wednesday, Oct. 28, following reports of a motorist approaching school-aged children (Alameda Post), and host Scott Piehler released Episode 226 of the Alameda PostCast weekly news digest (Alameda Post).

Amira Learning Executive Donations and AUSD's K–2 Reading Screener

Built on Carnegie Mellon University's Project Listen research and Anthropic's Claude large language model, Amira Learning's reading screener was 1 of 4 tools approved by the California Department of Education after California became the 41st state (following 13 prior legislative attempts) to mandate kindergarten-through-2nd-grade reading assessments starting in the 2025-2026 school year (Alameda Post). Alameda's Board of Education voted unanimously in June 2025 to adopt Amira's screener for the Alameda Unified School District (AUSD), and in October 2025 Lindsey Jenkins-Stark, AUSD Senior Manager of Research, Assessment, and Data, credited the tool with helping the district respond early to students needing reading support. Backed by investments from Amazon and Google and an October Securities and Exchange Commission filing to sell up to $14 million in securities, Amira Learning updated its privacy policy this summer after parent pushback in Portland, Oregon, and Santa Fe, New Mexico, and was included on a list of AI tools banned from New York City public elementary and middle schools by Mayor Zohran Mamdani in September, while CEO Mark Angel defended the tutor in a June CNN interview.

After Amira Learning merged in 2024 with Istation, former Istation CEO Richard "Dick" Collins (chairman of Richard H. Collins Enterprises in Dallas, Texas, who has donated more than $750,000 to conservative PACs and Republican politicians since 2016 according to OpenSecrets) contributed $5,900 to Vella's campaign on June 24, the same day a donor named Mark Angel in Napa, California (listing his employer as Atlas Peak Ranch) contributed $1,000, alongside 4 other out-of-state donors (2 listing Amira Learning job titles). In emailed statements to reporter Desmond Bracken, Vella emphasized that AUSD and the Mayor's office have completely separate budgets and processes subject to the Brown Act, noted that an individual contribution does not mean she shares every political position of a donor, and pointed to endorsements from the Alameda Renters Coalition, Our Revolution, the Democratic Party, the City of Alameda Democratic Club, East Bay Stonewall Dems, the Alameda Labor Council, and East Bay for Everyone (Alameda Post).

APD Uses ALPR Cameras to Arrest Driver Near Schools as PostCast Airs Episode 226

In public safety news featured on Scott Piehler's Alameda PostCast Episode 226 — which also covered high tides, Planning Board actions on vacant storefronts, a City Council review of the Oakland Roots soccer proposal, public safety funding, real estate sales, a raccoon rescue, and a visiting film crew (Alameda Post) — APD officers investigated reports earlier this month of an individual in a vehicle attempting to speak to several school-aged children walking to or from school (Alameda Post). Using residential camera footage showing unique vehicle characteristics together with Automated License Plate Reader (ALPR) technology, detectives identified the license plate, verified the car had entered Alameda around school dismissal on Wednesday, Oct. 28, and located and arrested the driver near Wilma Chan Way and Marina Village Parkway within 19 seconds of broadcasting a BOLO alert, booking the suspect into Santa Rita Jail and referring the case to the Alameda County District Attorney's Office.