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Rent board critic stands by herself

By Judith Scherr Daily Planet Staff
Thursday August 17, 2000

If Peggy Schioler wins a slot on the Rent Stabilization Board, she will be a lone voice weighing in on the side of property owners. 

But that’s OK, says the energetic septuagenarian, a Berkeley Property Owners Association board member, who spent two years on the Rent Board during 1983-84. Being in the minority and fighting back against rent control is better than sitting at home and being mad, she said. 

If she gets elected to the board Schioler will have a platform from which to speak. “Nobody ever pays attention” to those not on the board, she said. 

All nine members of the current rent board are part of a pro-rent-control block. Three members whose seats are up for re-election are not running again: they are Board President Randy Silverman, and members Mary Kim Kruckel and Mona Patel.  

Kruckel and Patel opted not to run for second terms. Silverman, who has served two terms, is barred by a two-term limit imposed on rent board members. Incumbent Max Anderson is running for a second term.  

The progressive Rent Board slate includes Max Anderson, Matthew Siegel, Judy Ann Alberti and Paul Hogarth. Four seats are open. 

Serving alone doesn’t frighten Schioler. “What the heck,” she says, underscoring that she’s not planning to use the rent board as a step to higher office. “I don’t have to kow tow,” she said. 

Other candidates who may well have represented a point of view different from the current rent board failed to file candidate papers by 5 p.m. Wednesday, the filing deadline. 

Lori Gitter, who had taken out papers for herself, Barbara Reynolds and Kathleen Crandall, invoked “personal reasons” for not running. She said, had she decided to run and was elected, she would have “represented all people” – property owners and tenants – on the board. Neither Reynolds nor Crandall filed papers they had taken out. 

Green-party member Chris Kavanagh, who ran for the progressive slate at last month’s nominating meeting and lost, had also taken out papers. Kavanagh, who ran two unsuccessful council races in opposition to Councilmember Polly Armstrong, did not turn in the papers  

In unrelated election news, the candidacy of Jon Crowder, who is running for the District 2 Council seat, was confirmed by the Alameda County registrar of voters. It was initially thought that a few of the signatures Crowder collected may not have been those of currently registered voters, but the registrar approved the candidacy.