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Letters to the Editor

Saturday December 30, 2000

Kids should eat lunch on campus 

Editor: 

Why doesn’t Berkeley High have food vendors or a cafeteria on campus?  If it’s because downtown business needs the sales, let them sell their food on campus. Berkeley High saw fit to spend millions on a new sports track but nothing on the basic necessity for a lunch program or cafeteria. Why must the Berkeley High School students be turned loose at lunchtime onto the streets of downtown Berkeley to disrupt and intimidate other citizens?  

The Berkeley High students roam downtown in large groups and will not yield to other pedestrians. They behave in a very aggressive manner: shouting, swearing, and spitting. I have been shoved off the sidewalk many times and seen it happen to many other pedestrians, especially the elderly. I have seen a half a dozen fist fights among the students downtown in the last year.  

Where is the supervision? For that matter I see large numbers of Berkeley High kids downtown all day long. I know of no other city that allows such behavior to be subjected upon it’s shopping district on a daily basis.  

I will not go to downtown Berkeley anymore on weekdays, it’s too threatening to be confronted by swarms of uncontrolled groups of rude hostile teenagers.  

Jay Wagner  

Berkeley