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The Landmarks Preservation Commission was able to get through its entire agenda on Monday night, but it wasn’t pretty. 

A month after the Nov. 6 LPC meeting disintegrated without the commission hearing any of its agenda items, Monday’s meeting was successful despite confusion and frustration caused by a controversial and unresolved opinion by City Attorney Manuela Albuquerque disallowing four commissioners’ participation on certain landmarks applications because they are directors or staff of the Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association. 

Albuquerque’s opinion said their participation would create a conflict of interest on any applications on which BAHA has taken positions. 

The four commissioners, Becky O’Malley, Carrie Olson, Lesley Emmington-Jones and Doug Morse, retained an attorney and said they would ignore Albuquerque’s instructions until there is a definitive decision from the City Council or the courts about the validity of the opinion.  

The City Council adopted a resolution Nov. 21, to retain outside counsel for a second opinion. However, Albuquerque and the commissioners’ attorney, Antonio Rossmann, are still squabbling over who will be retained as outside counsel. 

There were eight commissioners present at Monday’s meeting, including three of the four whose participation was brought into question by Albuquerque. Commissioner Morse was absent. The nine-member commission requires a quorum of five to convene and in order to adopt any motions five commissioners have to approve them. 

At the beginning of the meeting, LPC Chair Burton Edwards instructed the three commissioners he would not recognize them during discussions and city staff would not count their votes on three of the items on the evening’s agenda. 

“I’m placed in an unenviable position, but I feel obliged to follow the city attorney’s advice and not risk tonight’s action,” Burton said. 

An insurgency almost occurred when O’Malley made a motion to overrule Burton’s instructions. Emmington-Jones seconded the motion, but when it became clear there were insufficient votes to adopt the motion she withdrew it before a vote was taken.  

The three issues on Monday night’s agenda that BAHA has taken written positions on were Gorman’s Furniture Building on Telegraph Avenue, The Edwards House on Dwight Way and the controversial Beth El proposal for a synagogue and school at 1301 Oxford St. 

Both O’Malley and Emmington-Jones momentarily stepped out of their LPC roles and addressed the commission from the podium during the public comments portion of the meeting on matters related to the Final Environmental Impact Report on the Beth El project. Later in the evening the commission took no action on the Beth El FEIR. 

O’Malley later addressed the commission, again from the floor, on the Gorman Building, which was awarded landmark status by her colleagues during the meeting.  

The atmosphere was awkward when the five eligible commissioners had an animated discussion about the conditions of the Gorman landmarking, while the three ineligible commissioners sat at the table motionless and silent.  

The ban from discussing the project “was irritating and totally unnecessary and pointless,” O’Malley said Tuesday. “There was no reason why we couldn’t participate in that discussion, there was no conflict. Everybody was in agreement.” 

Edwards said he had mixed feelings about Albuquerque’s opinion, but after the Nov. 6 meeting fell apart he decided to strictly follow her advice until the issue is resolved. He said he could not risk exposing the city to litigation. “My responsibility is to the public, my fellow commissioners and the City of Berkeley,” Edwards said.  

John Coreris, of Coreris Cabinets and Construction, said he is concerned Albuquerque’s opinion banning the four commissioners from discussing his project, is going to affect his right to due process on his application to build an eight-unit development next to the Edwards House at 2526 Dwight Way. 

The four commissioners are ineligible to vote on the application because Coreris went to BAHA seeking their approval for the project, which they gave in a written letter, thereby allegedly causing a conflict of interest. 

Coreris said he’s been working with all nine LPC members since July and is concerned he may not have the support of the five remaining eligible commissioners. 

“The compromises we made with the LPC were before nine commissioners. Without their unanimity now, I have to put this project before only five commissioners and only one has to abstain or vote no,” Coreris said. “And you can’t get five people in Berkeley to agree on anything.”