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Kathryn Kalges/Special to the Daily Planet
          
          Tom Bates declares victory over incumbent Mayor Shirley Dean late Tuesday night.
Kathryn Kalges/Special to the Daily Planet Tom Bates declares victory over incumbent Mayor Shirley Dean late Tuesday night.
 

News

Bates in a landslide

By Matthew Artz Daily Planet Staff
Wednesday November 06, 2002

Progressive Tom Bates who returned to Berkeley politics last May, fresh off a six-year political hiatus, declared victory Tuesday night in his race to unseat Mayor Shirley Dean. 

“The work has just begun,” the former state Assemblyman told more than 200 supporters at his campaign headquarters on Shattuck Avenue. 

With 85 percent of the vote counted, Bates held a commanding 56 to 42 percent lead over the moderate incumbent at press time early Wednesday morning. 

Bates’ triumph ends a race that featured two of the city’s pre-eminent politicians. The pair offered similar visions for the city, but did so in contrasting and sometimes antagonistic styles. 

Bates, positioning himself as a consensus builder, won support of voters tired of a City Council that has been marred by partisan bickering. 

Noting nationwide gains for Republicans Tuesday, Bates insisted late Tuesday that Berkeley now has a mission to keep the progressive spirit alive. 

“We need to provide hope for the nation going in the wrong direction,” he said. 

Dean gave a short speech to supporters early Wednesday, but campaign officials refused to comment on their apparent defeat. 

Berkeley election returns filtered in slowly Tuesday night, with voters packing polling stations up to the 8:00 p.m.. closing time. Many polls remained open until 9:30 p.m. to accommodate crowds, according to City Clerk Sherry Kelly.  

The candidates’ headquarters told the story of the vote. 

While Bates’ headquarters was a raucous party with supporters cheering with each updated vote total, Dean played host to roughly 35 mostly subdued supporters, most of whom filed out by 10:30 p.m.  

The race for mayor pitted two political Goliaths who were close on many policy issues but stood on opposite sides of Berkeley’s moderate versus progressive divide for nearly 30 years. 

Dean, a 15-year member of City Council, was elected mayor in 1994, ending the progressives’ 16-year stranglehold on the office. Bates rode his progressive Berkeley base to 20 years in the state Assembly until term limits forced him to retire in 1996. 

The race, which saw both candidates raising roughly $150,000, was one of the most expensive in Berkeley history and sometimes appeared driven more by personal animosity between the candidates than by substantive policy differences. 

Dean fired the opening salvos, blasting Bates for allegedly blocking the construction of student housing and warning voters that a Bates victory would mean a return to run-down buildings and a derelict downtown. 

Bates eventually fired back, calling Dean a mean-spirited person. He blamed her for the partisan bickering at City Council meetings and noted her ballyhooed trip to Ohio to dig up dirt on arch rival Councilmember Kriss Worthington. 

The campaigns also dueled in the ring of campaign finance. Bates’ treasurer Mal Burnstein found that Dean had misfiled approximately $3,000 in campaign contributions from the 1998 race. Dean was ultimately ordered by a citizen commission to re-allocate the money to her previous campaign and file amended fundraising reports with the city. 

Dean’s campaign responded by plugging two citizen petitions, accusing Bates of illegal fundraising. Both charges against Bates were dismissed by the citizen commission.  

With both candidates calling for a Berkeley with more housing along transit corridors, better public transportation, good relations with the university and support of small businesses, Dean and Bates often ended up debating who was better suited to achieve their similar visions. 

Bates said his political connections throughout the state gave him an edge. Noting his ties to Sacramento politicians, including his wife, former Berkeley Mayor Loni Hancock, who was overwhelmingly elected to fill Bates’ former Assembly seat, Bates said he was better positioned to win state grants and negotiate with the university from a position of strength. 

Dean insisted that she had already made progress on these issues, and that Bates was at the head of a political machine that sought to control city politics.


No media coverage for protesters?

Ann Lehman El Cerrito
Wednesday November 06, 2002

To the Editor: 

 

My nine year old son and I were at the demonstration against the war in Iraq on Saturday in San Francisco. It was astounding, with apathy at appalling rates, to see so many thousands of individuals show up for anything. This was not just students or young people; there were lots and lots of families, young and old, brown, black, white and every color under the rainbow. When I said to a friend, “This is amazing,” she answered, “Yes but will the media cover it?” And I thought, “Of course they will.” 

Generally, I'm am very cynical about things, but I thought (mistakenly) that there was no way the media could ignore these numbers protesting our government’s war policy. I’m astounded I could have been so naive and so wrong. Where was most of the media? The demonstrations involved over 100,000 people in Washington D.C., and 50,000 in San Francisco, and concurrent events throughout Europe in the pouring rain. There was no real main stream reporting and, even when it was mentioned, no analysis. 

It saddens me, almost as much as our government's war policies, to realize that if these demonstrations had not been peaceful and nonviolent, they would have been considered newsworthy. When was the last time that many folks have turned out for any one event? 

 

Ann Lehman 

El Cerrito


Calendar

Wednesday November 06, 2002

Wednesday, Nov. 6 

North Berkeley Senior Center Advisory Council Meeting 

10 a.m. 

North Berkeley Senior Center, 1901 Hearst St. 

981-5190 

Community Members Welcome 

 

Monthly Birthday Party 

1:15 p.m. 

North Berkeley Senior Center, 1901 Hearst St. 

Featuring Jim Steinke, guitar and mandolin wizard 

981-5190 

 

2002 Surjit Singh Lecture 

5:30 p.m. 

Church Divinity School of the Pacific, Common Room, 2451 Ridge Rd. 

649-2440 

 

“The Chinese and Religion in the Context of Globalization” 

Reception 5:30 p.m. / Lecture 7 p.m. 

Bade Museum at Pacific School of Religion, 1798 Scenic Ave. 

A noted scholar and author, Professor Zhuo Xinping speaks 

649-2440 

 

Thursday, Nov. 7 

“Water, the Beverage of Life” 

11:30 a.m. 

North Berkeley Senior Center, 1901 Hearst St. 

Aaron Miller, SF State Intern will discuss 

981-5190 

 

Additional Ferries from East Bay Sites 

noon to 2 p.m. 

Albany Public Library, 1247 Marin Ave. 

Discussion with a representative of the San Francisco Bay Area Water Transit Authority. Sponsored by the League of Women Voters 

843-8824 

Free 

 

Panel Discussion - “Resistance to the Free Trade Agreements in Mexico and Central America” 

7:30 p.m. 

La Pena Cultural Center, 3105 Shattuck Ave. 

Featuring video presentation of “Tierra Si, Aviones No”, and performance by the NoPPP Players 

$5 and $10/ suggested donation 

 

Friday, Nov. 8  

Alexander Cockburn’s Incendiary Rants 

7 p.m. 

AK Press Warehouse, 673-A 23rd St. 

Release party for muckraking maverick Alexander Cockburn’s new spoken word CD “Beating the Devil” 

208-1700 

Free 

 

Berkeley Women in Black Vigil 

Bancroft at Telegraph Ave. 

Weekly protest to “End the Occupation” 

Saturday, Nov. 9 

Book Sale and Auction 

10 a.m. to 4 p.m. 

The Center for AIDS Services, 5720 Shattuck Ave., Oakland 

This big sale will benefit the AIDS center 

655-3435 

 

An Afternoon of Mystery  

2 p.m. 

1901 Russell St. 

Berkeley’s South Branch Library presents mystery writers Jake Fuchs “Death of a Prof”, Owen Hill “The Chandler Apartments”, and Mary Halock “The Dog on the Roof” 

525-3948 

Free 

 

Sunday, Nov. 10 

World Run Day-national charity benefit 

All day 

Various cities across the nation  

(516) 859-3000, www.runday.com 

 

Tuesday, Nov. 12 

Holiday Craft Baazar 

10 a.m. to noon 

St. John’s Presbyterian Curch, 2727 College Ave. 

Handmade items, sweet treats, and knick knacks will be for sale. All are welcome 

845-6830 

 

Wednesday, Nov. 13 

Public Lecture by the Rev. Canon Naim Ateek 

7:30 p.m. 

UCC, on Dana St. between Durant and Channing 

Founder of the Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center and native of East Jerusalem, Rev. Ateek will lead a discussion sponsored by the First Congregational Church of Berkeley (UCC) and the Pacific School of Religion 

848-3696 

$10/ suggested donation 

 

League of Women Voters Meeting 

Noon 

LWVBAE office, 1414 University Ave. 

Discussion will focus on regional issues 

849-2154 

 

Thursday, Nov. 14 

Regret to Inform  

Reception 6:30 p.m. / Program 7 p.m. 

Berkeley High School Auditorium, 2234 Martin Luther King Jr. Way 

A screening and discussion with filmmaker Barbara Sonneborn. 

979-0190, liz_vogel@facing.org 

Free 

 

Berkeley Path Wanderers Meeting 

7 to 9 p.m. 

Hillside Club, 2286 Cedar St. 

Meeting to include a presentation by best- selling author Adah Bakalinsky who will speak about her book, “Stairway Walks of San Francisco” 

Free 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wednesday, Nov. 6 

Zabava! Izorno and Brass Menagerie 

7 p.m. doors open/ 8:30 live performance 

Ashkenaz, 1317 San Pablo Ave. 

Enjoy this celebration with live music from the Balkans, including dance lessons begining at 7:30 

525-5054 

$8 

 

Christopher Hitchens 

7:30 p.m. 

Cody’s Books, 2454 Telegraph Ave. 

Hitchens will discuss “Why Orwell Matters” 

845-7852 

 

Saadet Turkoz with Miya Masaoka and George Cremaschi 

8 p.m. 

Freight & Salvage, 1111 Addison St. 

Mysterious improvisations based on ancient Central Asian music in collaboration with local luminati Masaoka and Cremaschi on contrabass 

548-1761 

$15.50-$16.50 

 

 

Thursday, Nov. 7 

Gary Thorp 

7:30 p.m. 

Cody’s Books, 2454 Telegraph Ave. 

Thorp will read from “Caught in Fading Light” 

845-7852 

 

The Non Prophets  

9:30 p.m. 

The Starry Plough, 3101 Shattuck Ave. 

Performing with special guest Vince Welnick of the Grateful Dead 

21+ 

$10 

 

Bandworks Recital 

7:30 p.m. to midnight 

Ashkenaz, 1317 San Pablo Ave. 

Hear student bands play rock, blues, and pop at this annual recital event 

525-5054 

$11 

 

Friday, Nov. 8 

The Librarians, Bitesize, and Glitter Mini 9:30 p.m. 

The Starry Plough, 3101 Shattuck Ave. 

All age show 

$7 

 

Chaskinakuy 

8 p.m. 

Freight & Salvage, 1111 Addison St. 

Beautiful vocal harmonies in Spanish and Quechua 

548-1761 

$15.50-$16.50 

 

An Evening of Cultural Harmony 

8 p.m. 

St. John’s Presbyterian Church, 2727 College Ave. 

The Barbard Ensemble, the San Francisco Klezmer Experience, and Lichi Fuentes & Jackeline Rago will treat listeners to music from Iran, Eastern Europe, and Latin America. 

704-7480 x755 

$25 general admission 

 

Black Dice, Dearly Departed (ex-Subtonix), and The Mass 

9:30 p.m. 

The Starry Plough, 3101 Shattuck Ave. 

$8 

 

Sunday, Nov. 10 

The Sheldon Brown Group 

4:30 p.m. 

Jazzschool, 2087 Addison St. 

Reservations: 845-5373 

$10-$15 

 

Images of India-2002 

7 p.m. 

International House Auditorium, 2299 Piedmont Ave. 

‘Asha for Education,’ a campus based non-profit organization, holds its 12th annual event  

665-4889, ioi@ashanet.org 

$15-$25 / $10 students 

 

The Starry Irish Music Session with Shay Black 

8 p.m. 

The Starry Plough, 3101 Shattuck Ave. 

Tickets available on a sliding scale 

 

“Shove Off to Birthday Island” 

Through Nov. 30 

Reception Nov. 2 from 5 to 8 p.m. 

Tue. through Sat., 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.  

Ardency Gallery, 709 Broadway, Oakland 

A collaborative exhibition of Tonya Solley Thornton and Frank Haines including video and sculptural installations. 

836-0831 

 

Children of the Gulf War Photo Exhibit 

Through Nov. 30 

Mon. through Thurs., 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. 

Fri. through Sat.., 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. 

Sun., 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. 

Berkeley Public Library, 2090 Kittredge St. 

Featuring works of Takashi Morizumi 

Information: www.savewarchildren.org 

 

Ceramics - Opening Reception 

Through Nov. 17 

3 to 5 p.m. 

A New Leaf Gallery, 1286 Gilman St. 

525-7621 

Free 

 

“Recent Acquisitions” 

Through Dec. 14 

Thurs. through Sat., 1 to 4 p.m. 

Berkeley Historical Society, Veterans Memorial Building, 1931 Center St. 

848-0181 

Free 

 

Threads: Five artists who use stitching to convey ideas 

Through Dec. 15, Wed. through Sun., noon to 5 p.m. 

Berkeley Art Center 

Live Oak Park, 1275 Walnut St. 

Information: www.berkeleyartcenter.org, 644-6893 

Free 

 

Menocchio 

Nov. 6 through Dec. 22 

Berkeley Repertory Theatre, 2025 Addison St. 

Berkeley Repertory Theatre presents the world premiere of Lillian Groag’s charged comedy 

647-2949, www.berkeleyrep.org  

$38 and $54/ sliding scale 

 

Thursday, Nov. 7 

“Desert Hearts” 

1 p.m. 

North Berkeley Senior Center, 1901 Hearst St. 

A 1950s lesbian romance featuring Helen Shaver and Patricia Charbonneau. 

 

Friday, Nov. 8 

“El Che” 

7 p.m. 

Redwood Gardens, 2951 Derby St. 

Film screening followed by salsa dancing to support Berkeley’s Cuban Sister-City Palma Soriano. 

548-6941 

$10 / sliding scale 

 

“Cinemayaat: The Arab Film Festival” 

Through Nov. 12 

Various locations throughout Berkeley, San Francisco, and San Jose. 

For more information contact the Arab Film Festival at info@aff.org, (415) 564- 1100, or www.aff.org 

 

Wednesday, Nov. 6 

Poetry Slam with host Nazelah Jamison and Karen Ladson 

8:30 p.m. 

The Starry Plough, 3101 Shattuck Ave. 

Cash prizes up to $90 

21+ 

$7/ general, $5/ students with ID 

 

Saturday Nov. 9 

Dorothy Allison and Jewelle Gomez appear in support of Boadecia’s Books 

8 p.m. 

Northbrae Community Church, 941 The Alameda at Solano 

559-9184 

$25/ sliding scale 

 

Tuesday, Nov. 12 

Open Mic 

The Starry Plough, 3101 Shattuck Ave. 

7:30 p.m. 

Free 

 

Wednesday, Nov. 13 

Poetry Slam with host Charles Ellik 

8:30 p.m. 

The Starry Plough, 3101 Shattuck Ave. 

Cash prizes up to $90 

21+ 

$7/ general, $5/ students with ID 

 

Saturday Nov. 16 

Alice Walker and Brenda Boykin 

appear in support of Boadecia’s Books 

8 p.m. 

Northbrae Community Church, 941 The Alameda at Solano 

559-9184 

$25/ sliding scale 

 

Monday, Dec. 2 

Adam David Miller and Rita Flores Bogaert 

7 to 9 p.m. 

Pegasus Books Downtown, 2349 Shattuck Ave 

The Last Word announces a poetry reading that will include an open mic and featured readers 

649-1320 

Free


Johnson wins fourth Cy Young

By Ronald Blum The Associated Press
Wednesday November 06, 2002

NEW YORK — Randy Johnson won yet another Cy Young Award and then he teed off. 

No, not on baseball. The Big Unit was getting ready to play Pebble Beach Golfs Links when his latest honor was announced Tuesday, and rather than delay his round, Johnson grabbed a cell phone and talked about his fastballs and sliders while deciding among woods and wedges. 

“I’m trying to make a putt on No. 2 right now,” he said, the California coast off to his side. 

No doubt, his score Tuesday was far lower than his perenially high strikeout total. 

Johnson was a unanimous pick over Arizona teammate Curt Schilling, winning a record-tying fourth straight National League Cy Young and fifth overall — one short of Roger Clemens’ record. 

The Big Unit, who will earn an additional $4 million because of the award, received all 32 first-place votes and 160 points from a panel of the Baseball Writers’ Association of America. 

“The big picture, obviously, is to get to the World Series. If you remain consistent and have a good year, it’s kind of a bonus,” Johnson said, referring to the award. “This has come from maintaining consistency, hard work and dedication, and my teammates being very supportive offensively, defensively and in the bullpen.” 

Schilling was runner-up for the second straight season, getting 29 second-place votes and three thirds for 90 points. Atlanta closer John Smoltz was third with 21 points. 

Johnson matched Greg Maddux (1992-95) as the only pitchers to win four straight Cy Youngs and became the NL’s 11th unanimous winner, the first since Maddux in 1995. Johnson and Schilling became the first pitchers to finish 1-2 in Cy Young voting in consecutive years. 

Johnson, who has won the award in all four seasons since signing with the Diamondbacks as a free agent, earned his first Cy Young with Seattle in 1995. 

“I’ve got them in my office, and they’re displayed nice,” he said. “I’m a very simple person, and I work hard, and I push myself, and this is the reward.” 

The Big Unit went 24-5 with a 2.37 ERA and 334 strikeouts, becoming the first major leaguer since Boston’s Pedro Martinez in 1999 and the first NL player since the Mets’ Dwight Gooden in 1985 to win pitching’s triple crown. 

The 39-year-old Johnson set a career high for wins, led the major leagues in strikeouts for the ninth time and became the first pitcher to reach 300 in five straight seasons. He also led the majors in innings (260) and complete games (eight), and led the NL in opponents’ batting average (.208). 

Schilling went 23-7 with a 3.23 ERA, 316 strikeouts and just 33 walks in 259 1-3 innings. Schilling, who has never won a Cy Young, was 21-5 with a 2.77 ERA though Aug. 31, while Johnson was 19-5 with a 2.63 ERA. 

Johnson sealed the award by going 5-0 with an 0.66 ERA in September as Schilling was 2-2 with a 6.19 ERA. On Sept. 20, Schilling allowed eight earned runs for only the third time and a career-high 14 hits in 9-4 loss to Colorado at Coors Field. 

Arizona, the NL West champion, was 55-15 when Johnson or Schilling started, 43-49 the rest of the time. The defending World Series champions were swept by St. Louis in the first round of the playoffs. 

Last year, Johnson and Schilling were co-MVPs of the seven-game World Series win over the New York Yankees. Johnson called that the “top of the mountain” and recalled the thrill of having his family at the Diamondbacks’ parade. 

Injuries to Luis Gonzalez and others crippled Arizona.


PC coffee, height limits voted down

By Kurtis Alexander Daily Planet Staff
Wednesday November 06, 2002

Berkeley’s two most-watched ballot measures appeared well on their way to defeat late Tuesday night. 

With 68 percent of city precincts reported, residents were appearing jittery about calls for socially-conscience coffee, voting 70 to 30 percent against the initiative that would require retailers to brew and sell only organic, shade-grown or “Fair Trade” cups of coffee. 

Berkeley voters also weighed in on the increasingly contentious issue of urban growth, rejecting an initiative that aimed to steer high-rise housing out of the city. 

With 68 percent of precincts reported, the initiative was losing 79 to 21 percent. 

Both Measure P, the height initiative, and Measure O, the coffee initiative, pushed historic thresholds of citizen-driven initiatives, bringing such issues as international trade and population growth into the realm of local policy-making. 

While disappointed by the loss of the height initiative, supporters remained confident that their attempts to put limits on the heights of new buildings could be established through other means. 

“There are three lawsuits against the city in regard to development and others in the pipeline,” said height initiative author Howie Muir, claiming that the city has illegally approved oversized projects and will likely be admonished by the courts. 

The height initiative had sought to reduce Berkeley’s population density by cutting permissible height limits along several major traffic corridors. On sections of San Pablo Avenue, under the initiative, limits would have dropped from four stories to two and on parts of University, Shattuck and College avenues height limits would have dropped an average of one story. 

“We’re the 20th densist city in the country for cities with more than 100,000 people,” Muir noted. 

While campaign literature conjured images of the Manhatten skyline taking shape in Berkeley, opponents of the height initiative said the rhetoric was overdone. 

Garnering support from the League of Women Voters, the entire City Council and advocates of so-called smart growth, the opposition made the case that much-needed housing opportunities would be lost if the measure passed. 

“We need to be able to continue revitalizing corridors like San Pablo and provide affordable housing along transit corridors. Measure P wouldn’t allow either of these things,” said Stuart Cohen, executive director of the Oakand-based Transportation and Land Use Coalition. 

A sign held by an opponent of the measure read, “Don’t P on Berkeley.” 

Opposition to Berkeley’s high-profile coffee initiative met with similar success. 

Peet’s Coffee & Tea, Starbucks Coffee and the National Coffee Association, each throwing more than $10,000 into the opposition effort, argued that politically correct coffee would hurt both local businesses and consumers because of its higher wholesale cost. 

Supporters of the coffee initiative, though, said untold costs of labor exploitation and environmentally-destructive farming practices would far exceed any local price increases. 

“If this would have passed, my money would have gone to small farmers who are struggling to survive. Now it goes to corporate farms and companies that don’t care about labor practices,” said Rick Young who authored the coffee initiative.


Housing density and transportation

Robert R. Piper Former Director of Transportation Berkeley
Wednesday November 06, 2002

To the Editor: 

 

Interpreting the population density numbers being bandied about is a challenge. Let me address impacts on transit. As most of you know, that has been my field for 30 years. 

Average density for cities or neighborhoods is irrelevant to transit ridership. What counts is how many people and what activity is within walking distance of stops or stations. The rule of thumb is that people walk up to five minutes to a bus stop. On flat land, that is around a quarter mile. Both numbers stem from research on how far passengers actually walk. I have done some of the research. Our results duplicated those of other investigators. Historically, people have tended to walk further to rail transit stations. 

It is important to understand what the quarter mile means. It means that few passengers walk further. Beyond a quarter mile, you are looking at the tail of the distribution. Most passengers come from less than that. Since they come from all directions, imagine concentric circles, the market penetration (riders per unit of area) tails off even more rapidly with distance from the stop. 

Residences and activities have to be clustered really densely around stops if we expect many people to use transit. “Around” means just that. The high-density node should extend a block or two on either side of the arterial as well as along it. 

If we seek to shift future travelers from automobiles to transit, zoning must encourage high density at stops, not inhibit it. 

 

Robert R. Piper 

Former Director of Transportation 

Berkeley 


Fans pay tribute to Jam Master Jay

By Michael Weissenstein The Associated Press
Wednesday November 06, 2002

NEW YORK — Pallbearers wearing white unlaced Adidas carried the body of slain Run-DMC star Jam Master Jay from a funeral service Tuesday at which he was remembered as “the embodiment of hip-hop.” 

A funeral cortege of white stretch limousines and luxury SUVs was lined up outside the Allen A.M.E. Cathedral in the rapper’s native Queens. Inside, bandmates Joseph “Run” Simmons and Darryl “DMC” McDaniel eulogized their friend, whose real name was Jason “Jay” Mizell, as a great man and groundbreaking musical force. 

“Jason helped build hip-hop, and his job is finished,” said Joseph Simmons, now an ordained minister, wearing a broad-brimmed black hat and clerical collar. “He just couldn’t leave without drama.” 

The funeral came six days after Mizell was shot to death in his Queens recording studio by a masked assailant. No one has been charged. 

A who’s who of hip-hop attended the service. LL Cool J, Chuck D of Public Enemy, Queen Latifah and hip-hop mogul Russell Simmons, the brother of Joseph Simmons, were among the mourners. Many in the church and among the crowd outside wore the white Adidas and black leather that Run-DMC turned into a fashion trend in the 1980s. 

As DJ for the pioneering group, Jam Master Jay had worked the turntables as Simmons and McDaniels rapped a string of hits over nearly 20 years. 

McDaniels brought the overflow crowd of 2,300 to its feet with his eulogy, getting in a dig at anyone who would call the slaying just another example of rap violence. 

“Jam Master Jay was not a thug,” McDaniels said. “Jam Master Jay was not a gangster.”


Battle beginning over Angels’ rally monkey

By Gary Gentile The Associated Press
Wednesday November 06, 2002

ANAHEIM — The World Series champion Anaheim Angels aren’t about to let anyone monkey around with their mascot, especially when it comes to a movie. 

Larry Cano, an executive producer of the 1983 film “Silkwood,” views the Rally Monkey as a perfect role model for kids and wants to make a movie featuring the crowd-pleasing primate. 

Cano has filed both a trademark application for the term “Rally Monkey” and a script treatment with the Writer’s Guild of America. 

There’s only one problem. The Angels and major league baseball say they have prior rights to the name, and have already begun to enforce them against others looking to make a buck from the monkey. 

“The mere fact that somebody filed for trademark registration does not give them any special legal status,” said Rick Schlesinger, an attorney for the Angels. “Our position is that ’Rally Monkey’ is a protected trademark of the Angels and has been so since we first used it in the fall of 2000.” 

Not to mention the fact that The Walt Disney Co., which owns the Angels, might want to make its own Rally Monkey movie someday. 

The monkey with seemingly miraculous powers first made his appearance on June 6, 2000, when the Angels, losing to the San Francisco Giants, needed a boost. The operator of the video scoreboard in right-center field played a clip from the movie “Ace Ventura: Pet Detective” that showed a capuchin monkey jumping up and down. 

Fans went wild, the team won and a tradition was born. 

Until this year, the monkey restricted his appearances to inside the stadium. But as the Angels moved closer and closer to the baseball playoffs, the monkey made his way to T-shirts and other items.


Six-period day will stand

By David Scharfenberg Daily Planet Staff
Wednesday November 06, 2002

In a recent union vote, local teachers overwhelmingly approved Berkeley High School’s controversial shift from a seven- to a six-period day, averting the financial cost and logistical nightmare of a mid-year switch back to the seven-period schedule. 

“I can start sleeping nights,” joked Berkeley High Co-principal Laura Leventer. “We’re very happy we don’t have to switch back to the seven-period day.” 

Teachers from all 15 of Berkeley’s public schools voted 297-54 to approve the switch during a two-week voting period, Oct. 14-25. A rejection would have required the high school, which has operated on a six-period schedule since August, to return to a seven-period day at the start of the spring semester. 

Proponents say the move to a six-period day has saved the cash-strapped district money, increased overall classroom time for students and eliminated “gaps,” or periods without class, for most pupils. Erasing gaps, they argue, has cut down on the number of students roaming the hallways and improved safety. 

Opponents complain that the move has cut into the high school’s successful double-period science program and reduced the number of electives available in music and African-American Studies. But district officials note that the overall number of electives has actually increased this year, with new classes in ceramics, photography, acting and other areas. 

Opponents also argue that the shift to a six-period day, which eliminated teacher hall duty, has cut down on the adult presence in the hallways during class and reduced student safety. 

The teachers’ vote ensures that the controversial schedule will remain in place at least through the end of the school year. But, with the current teacher contract set to expire in June, the issue will be on the bargaining table again in a matter of months. 

“Who knows what will come out of the negotiations this spring?,” said Berkeley Federation of Teachers (BFT) President Barry Fike, noting that teachers might re-assess the six-period day after a year of experience with the new schedule.  

The Board of Education approved the shift to a six-period schedule in February and determined that it would go into effect in August, with the start of the 2002-2003 school year. 

But the union argued, at the time, that the board could not unilaterally implement a six-period day. BFT held that the shift would affect the teachers’ contract and therefore had to be negotiated. This summer, an independent arbitrator agreed with the union, throwing the issue into formal negotiations. 

On Oct. 7, after six grueling sessions, the district and union hammered out a deal. The union agreed to accept the six-period day in exchange for several small concessions. But the deal did not go into effect until the rank-and-file membership approved it with the Oct. 14-25 vote. 

Initially, union and district officials had real concerns about teacher approval of the agreement. Shortly after inking the Oct. 7 deal, the union conducted a non-binding, informal poll of high school teachers who only approved of the agreement by a slim 62-46 margin. 

At the time, Fike said opposition was rooted in general disapproval of the six-period day and concerns, among some, about the quality of the concessions the union was able to win from the district. 

In the end, Fike said, fears of disrupting the Berkeley High schedule halfway through the year weighed on some teachers in voting for the deal.


Rethinking hydrogen

Greg Hoff Oakland
Wednesday November 06, 2002

To the Editor: 

 

Jeff Hoffman wrote a misleading and inaccurate letter to the editor (Forum, Nov. 4). Mr. Hoffman thinks that AC Transit should convert to hydrogen power immediately to reduce the use of oil and thereby pollution. While I wholeheartedly agree that we need to reduce our use of oil, Mr. Hoffman evidently doesn't understand that making hydrogen requires energy which is made using oil (hydroelectric power is all spoken for by our houses – additional energy is made from burning oil). Making hydrogen uses lots of energy – more than the hydrogen gives back. In fact, making hydrogen uses 50 percent more oil than the equivalent power obtained from putting the oil directly into a car. And hydrogen is not green. Just because a hydrogen powered bus isn't spewing pollution, doesn’t mean it is non-polluting. It just relocates the pollution to where the power is made, someone else’s neighborhood, and 50 percent more pollution to boot. 

We should support hydrogen power for the right reasons – as part of research into alternative energy systems. Just understand that every hydrogen powered vehicle right now is burning more oil and creating more pollution than if that vehicle were conventionally powered. They say that instead of learning how to make hydrogen powered vehicles, we should be learning how to make hydrogen cost effectively. 

 

Greg Hoff 

Oakland 

 


Progressives win big on council

By David Scharfenberg Daily Planet Staff
Wednesday November 06, 2002

Berkeley’s progressive political faction appeared on course to win at least three of four City Council races and the mayor’s race late Tuesday night, solidifying its control over local politics. 

Incumbent councilmembers Kriss Worthington, Dona Spring and Linda Maio, all progressives, led by significant margins after midnight and former state Assemblyman Tom Bates, also a progressive, had declared victory over moderate Mayor Shirley Dean. 

Moderate Planning Commissioner Gordon Wozniak held a solid lead in a four-way race for the empty 8th District City Council seat. If he wins, Wozniak would succeed retiring moderate Polly Armstrong. 

But, just after midnight, with 80 percent of precincts counted, Wozniak had not reached the 45 percent threshold required to avoid a run-off. Wozniak held a 43 to 35 percent edge over his closest competitor, progressive-backed UC Berkeley student Andy Katz. 

If neither candidate wins 45 percent, the city will mail ballots to 8th District voters for a Wozniak-Katz runoff. The votes would be tallied Dec. 3. 

The Berkeley City Council consists of eight councilmembers and the mayor. Before Tuesday, progressives held a 5-4 edge on the panel. A Bates victory, coupled with the re-election of Worthington, Spring and Maio, would increase the progressive majority to 6-3. A Katz victory would mean a 7-2 edge. 

Four of Berkeley’s eight council members – moderates Betty Olds and Miriam Hawley, and progressives Margaret Breland and Maudelle Shirek – did not face re-election this year. 

A 6-3 or 7-2 re-alignment, progressives said, would lead to greater harmony on a council that has been sharply divided by partisan bickering. 

“We will have a completely different environment and tenor on the council,” said an exuberant Maio, late Tuesday night. “I’m looking forward to it.” 

Worthington was reluctant to declare victory in his own race, despite a late 60 to 38 percent lead over UC Berkeley student Micki Weinberg, but rejoiced in Bates’ apparent win.  

Still, Worthington played down the idea of a new progressive super-majority on the council and said Bates will work with both progressives and moderates. 

The 8th District race for an empty seat was the most competitive City Council contest this year. Moderates lined up behind Wozniak, while progressives backed Katz, who hopes to be the first student elected to City Council since 1984. Human rights consultant Anne Wagley and air conditioning mechanic Carlos Estradaran outside Berkeley’s two dominant political factions.


Don’t attack Iraq

Graduate Theological Union Berkeley
Wednesday November 06, 2002

To the Editor: 

 

We at the Jesuit School of Theology at Berkeley join our colleagues at the Weston Jesuit School of Theology and other voices around the world in urging the U.S. government not to attack Iraq. As Christians, we share a strong moral presumption against war. 

As members of international Jesuit centers for the study of Roman Catholic theology, it is our judgment that unleashing massive violence in a military invasion of Iraq is neither necessary or moral. 

We find the situation in Iraq and throughout the world deeply troubling. We share, with others, overwhelming concern about the stockpiling of biological and chemical weapons in Iraq and elsewhere. 

However, as persons of conscience, we are persuaded that the present circumstances do not warrant the use of force against Iraq. Our “Just War” tradition insists that peaceful and diplomatic alternatives must first be exhausted. It has not been demonstrated to the satisfaction of allies of the U.S. or its public that we have reached the point where war is our last resort. 

For 12 years innocent Iraqi civilians, especially children, the elderly and the infirm have suffered the effects of desperate deprivation brought about by military strikes and economic sanctions against their nation. 

As we read the signs of our times, we cannot remain silent in the face of a haunting moral question: What would become of a divided and chaotic Iraq after an attack? Given the course of U.S. interventions in Haiti, Somalia, Afghanistan and elsewhere, we cannot fail to observe that in the recent past the U.S. has demonstrated little of the patience that is required for the task of reestablishing order after imposing regime changes. Indeed the very phrase “nation-building” has acquired stigma in foreign policy discourse. 

In light of these observations and questions, we urge creative efforts in cooperation with United Nations, allies of the U.S. and the international community to find ways to contain and curtail Saddam Hussein’s threats without resorting to a military attack on Iraq. 

We, as followers of Jesus Christ, appeal to you: Pursue the ways of peace through diplomacy, not war. 

 

Graduate Theological Union 

Berkeley


Issel, Doran and Riddle take school board

By David Scharfenberg Daily Planet Staff
Wednesday November 06, 2002

With 85 percent of city precincts reporting late Tuesday night, it appeared Board of Education members Shirley Issel and Terry Doran would win re-election and parent activist Nancy Riddle would take the third school board seat up for grabs this year. 

A total of six candidates ran for three slots on the five-member panel. The two seats held by board members Joaquin Rivera and John Selawsky were not up for re-election this year. 

After midnight, Riddle had 24 percent of the vote. Doran was second with 21 percent and Issel had 20 percent. The next closest competitor, recent Berkeley High School graduate Sean Dugar, had nearly 13 percent of the vote. 

“I’m feeling pretty good,” said Riddle, who is chief financial officer for Monster Cable of Brisbane, speaking to the Daily Planet late Tuesday night. “I think probably the financial background helped a lot.” 

Issel and Doran won re-election despite persistent fiscal woes plaguing the Berkeley Unified School District, which faces a $3.9 million budget shortfall this year. 

Issel said her re-election marked an endorsement of the steps the board has taken in the past few years to bring solvency to the district. 

“I think the message is really clear – the voters feel we’re on the right track,” said Issel. 

The district’s financial woes were a chief issue in the campaign. Riddle suggested that the board, which slashed millions last year and still faces the $3.9 million budget shortfall, has taken a haphazard approach to cuts. 

She said members must demand detailed budgets and a range of cost-cutting options rather than “highly summarized budgets” and a few recommendations for cuts from Superintendent Michele Lawrence. 

Riddle also said the district needs to engage in long-term financial planning, rather than year-to-year cuts, if it hopes to get out of a cycle of financial crises. 

But Issel and Doran argued that the board has taken important steps on the road to fiscal recovery, replacing most of the district’s upper-level management in the last couple of years and putting a new data processing system in place that will help fix sloppy accounting practices.


Davis edges out Simon for governor

By Alexa H. Bluth The Associated Press
Wednesday November 06, 2002

LOS ANGELES — Once considered a future presidential contender, Gray Davis was content to win re-election Tuesday as governor of the nation’s most populous state. 

Davis’ aspirations were rarely mentioned as he struggled to combat a steep decline in popularity to secure his re-election against a lackluster candidate. 

Despite spending $68 million and facing rookie Republican challenger Bill Simon, Davis barely held onto his lead. 

As he enters a second term, he faces a multibillion dollar budget shortfall and the remnants of a statewide energy crisis that drove down his support. 

Even Davis’ confidantes concede he likely won because of the amount he spent and because of Simon’s low popularity and controversies surrounding his business practices. 

“If you have a sitting governor whose job ratings tanked a year-and-a-half ago and have never recovered, and you have roughly half the people in the state who think the state’s headed down the wrong track, those two things combined are usually a death knell for a sitting governor,” said Davis’ senior campaign adviser Garry South. “We are going to win anyway, in spite of that. That’s what our money got us.” 

Davis blamed his declining popularity on a nationwide recession and a generally negative mood among voters. 

A man who rarely lets down his guard, Davis has marched through 20 years in elected office defined by moderate politics and rare and unbending personal and professional discipline. 

He insists on being kept abreast of state business, is preoccupied with his public image and guarded about personal activities. He often focuses on headline-making issues while brushing off smaller troubles until they swell into crises. 

On the eve of the election, Davis vowed a state takeover of the tiny West Fresno Elementary School District after a fiscal crisis led teachers and staff to walk out. Davis had previously vetoed legislation that would have authorized a takeover and averted the crisis. 

Davis finds supporters in a range of groups — from environmentalists to police unions. He is credited with boosting spending for schools and signing scores of laws from expanding health care for poor children to ensuring overtime pay after an eight-hour workday. 

Personally, Davis, 59, is not known for small talk and is meticulous in his appearance.


Community rallies around plumber

Wednesday November 06, 2002

A Berkeley plumbing contractor who hit hard times recently is now finding himself surrounded by friends. Greg Ticehurst, a Berkeley resident of 14 years, was involved in a motorcycle accident that left him paralyzed in late September.  

Ticehurst had been in the process of remodeling his home when the accident occurred and was unable to complete the project. Now, a group calling themselves “Friends of Greg” is determined to finish the job for him. 

The group, organized by longtime friend Gregory Sieben of Innovation Builders in Emeryville, is composed of friends, acquaintances, and other volunteers. Currently, said Sieben, there are about nine volunteers per weekend working on Ticehurst’s house. Local companies and individuals have donated money and materials for the project, and Sieben expects the remodel to be completed by Dec. 1. 

Many “Friends of Greg” know Ticehurst from the contracting industry. But Sieben said he is struck by the fact that many of the volunteers and donors are total strangers. He attributed the community’s generosity to karma. 

“Greg is a really giving person and has always helped people himself. He’s the type of guy who inspires this kind of giving in others,” said Sieben. 

Ticehurst was not able to comment on the effort, due to medical conditions from the accident. 

 

Donations can be made care of Innovation Builders at 1467 Park Avenue, Emeryville, CA 94608. Checks should be addressed to “Friends of Greg.” 

 

– Melissa McRobbie


Missing girls returned to their father

The Associated Press
Wednesday November 06, 2002

SAN FRANCISCO — Two young sisters who had disappeared during a custody battle were dropped off at the doorstep of a San Francisco Bay area television station. 

Two members of a group that helps parents get custody of children in county protective care delivered Anna Nunez, 6, and her sister Emily, 4, safely to KGO-TV studios in San Francisco Monday. 

The girls had been at the center of a custody dispute after the 1999 divorce of their parents, Danny and Kelli Nunez of Contra Costa County. 

The mother had accused Danny Nunez of child abuse, and the girls disappeared in April after Kelli Nunez picked them up from a day care center. Danny Nunez has never been charged with child abuse. 

Kelli Nunez was arrested shortly after the disappearance, after telling a judge she had given the girls to strangers and had no idea where they were. She has been held on contempt of court charges at Contra Costa County jail.


Oakland police investigate 96th killing of the year; four injured by gunmen

Daily Planet Wire Service
Wednesday November 06, 2002

OAKLAND – The Oakland Police Department says homicide detectives began investigating the city's 96th slaying of the year Tuesday night. 

Police were called to the scene of a multiple shooting in East Oakland, near the intersection of 105th Avenue and Acalanes Drive, at 5:55 p.m. 

A total of four people were injured by gunfire, police said.  

Three of the victims were taken by ambulance to Highland Hospital, where one of them was pronounced dead on arrival, a nursing supervisor said.  

A fourth victim from the same shooting walked in to the hospital. 

The three surviving victims were listed in stable condition Tuesday night.


’Three-strikes’ law heard by Supreme Court

By Gina Holland The Associated Press
Wednesday November 06, 2002

WASHINGTON —The Supreme Court struggled Tuesday over the constitutionality of a California sentencing law that put a man who shoplifted children’s videocassettes in prison until 2046 and gave another man a life sentence for taking three golf clubs. 

Their sentences are due to California’s three-strikes-you’re-out law, which has been challenged as cruel and unusual punishment. The law requires tough sentences for repeat offenders. 

“No other state in the country would impose a punishment like this,” said Erwin Chemerinsky, the attorney for the man who stole $153 worth of videotapes. 

The three-strikes law was passed in 1994 after voters endorsed tougher sentences amid public furor over the kidnapping and murder of 12-year-old Polly Klaas. The law has been credited with lowering crime in California, and state officials said it gets career criminals off the streets. 

“There comes a point when the state has a right to say enough is enough,” Douglas Danzig, a deputy attorney general in California, told justices. 

More than 7,100 inmates are serving third-strikes sentences, including about 350 who received life terms for petty offenses, officials said. Justices are considering if the punishment fits the crime. 

Justice Antonin Scalia said the crimes may be more serious than they appear to be because of the potential for violence. 

But Justice John Paul Stevens questioned if states could also give long prison sentences to people who repeatedly break traffic laws, because of public safety concerns. 

Some court members seemed unsure how to handle the cases. 

“We cannot convert this court into a sentencing commission,” noted Justice Stephen Breyer, who also said the crimes seemed minor. 

Leandro Andrade, a heroin addict had previous burglary convictions when he was caught shoplifting nine videotapes, including “Snow White” and Cinderella,” from Kmart. Under his three-strikes sentence, he’ll be at least 87 when he gets out of prison. 

The California law requires a sentence of 25 years to life in prison for any felony conviction if the criminal was previously convicted of two serious or violent felonies. It is one of the toughest sentencing laws in the nation, although most states also impose longer terms for revolving-door criminals.


FDA approves new birth control device

Daily Planet Wire Service
Wednesday November 06, 2002

SAN CARLOS — The federal Food and Drug Administration has approved a new non-surgical method of female sterilization developed by a San Carlos company.  

The Essure device, manufactured by San Carlos-based Conceptus, Inc., can be implanted in a woman's fallopian tubes under a local anesthetic and without the need for any incisions. 

“Unlike other currently available surgical sterilization procedures for women, placement of the device does not require an incision or general anesthesia,” according to an FDA statement. 

The device is a small spring-like metallic implant that causes scar tissue to form in the fallopian tubes, blocking sperm from fertilizing an egg. 

None of the more than 600 women that have been successfully implanted with Essure devices in both fallopian tubes have become pregnant, according to the FDA. 

An estimated 700,000 women a year undergo sterilization by tubal ligation, a surgical procedure requiring general anesthesia and a hospital stay. Conceptus President Steve Bacich believes that Essure will provide an attractive alternative for women seeking permanent birth control. 

“After researchers have worked for more than three decades to develop an alternative to surgical tubal ligation, Conceptus is extremely proud to have developed Essure and be one step closer to bringing this breakthrough option to women seeking permanent birth control,” Bacich said in July when a FDA committee approved the product. 

The FDA formally approved the device Monday. The company hopes to begin offering the device nationwide by next spring.


Controller may spoil Democratic hopes for statewide sweep

By Seth Hettena The Associated Press
Wednesday November 06, 2002

LOS ANGELES — California Democrats hoping for their first sweep of statewide offices in more than a century found only the Republican nominee for state controller standing in their way Tuesday night. 

With more than two-thirds of precincts reporting, well-funded Democratic incumbents won their races for attorney general, treasurer and lieutenant governor. Democrats also were elected as insurance commissioner, secretary of state and superintendent of public instruction. 

Only state Sen. Tom McClintock, the Republican nominee for state controller, threatened to spoil the Democrats’ party — they haven’t swept all statewide offices since 1882. 

But McClintock, a veteran lawmaker, saw his lead dwindle as the evening wore on. Both he and Democrat Steve Westly, a dot-com millionaire who poured more than $5 million of his own money into his campaign, had 45 percent of the vote. 

Democrat John Garamendi defeated Republican challenger Gary Mendoza, 46 percent to 42 percent, to recapture the office he held as the state’s first insurance commissioner from 1991-1994. 

The state GOP had considered Mendoza a good bet to win and directed more than $1 million to his campaign in the final week. 

The only current Republican statewide officeholder, Secretary of State Bill Jones, has to give up his seat because of term limits. 

After trailing early in the race for secretary of state, Assembly Majority Leader Kevin Shelley, D-San Francisco, beat Republican Keith Olberg, a former Assemblyman, 46 percent to 42 percent. 

Gov. Gray Davis and Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante became the first pair of top office holders from the same party to win re-election in 40 years. 

Bustamante beat Sen. Bruce McPherson, a moderate Republican from Santa Cruz, 49 percent to 42 percent. 

Attorney General Bill Lockyer was already looking beyond his race against Republican state Sen. Dick Ackerman to a potential run for governor in four years. Lockyer won with 51 percent of the vote to Ackerman’s 40 percent. 

Treasurer Phil Angelides beat Greg Conlon, who struggled with a record as a former public utilities commissioner who advocated electricity deregulation, 49 percent to 41 percent. 

In nonpartisan races, three members of the California Supreme Court, justices Marvin Baxter, Carlos Moreno and Kathryn Werdegar were voted to another term. In the contest for superintendent of public instruction, teacher-turned-legislator Sen. Jack O’Connell, D-San Luis Obispo, defeated Katherine Smith, an Anaheim School Board president, 61 percent to 39 percent. 

In 1998, only two Republicans kept statewide office, Jones and Insurance Commissioner Chuck Quackenbush, who was forced to resign in scandal in 2000. 

Republican leaders feared another poor showing could stall efforts to rebuild the party in the nation’s most populous state, leave few viable candidates for future statewide races and hurt their chances to help President Bush in 2004.


Redwood city woman sentenced for threat

Daily Planet Wire Service
Wednesday November 06, 2002

REDWOOD CITY – A 55-year-old Redwood City woman was sentenced Monday to 35 days in the San Mateo County Jail for making bomb threats to her son's former parochial school last year. 

Linda Chulbna was also ordered to pay $360 in probation fees and $200 in restitution fines. She was actually sentenced to 60 days in jail, but has been credited for 25 days already served, according to the San Mateo County District Attorney's Office. 

Chulbna was accused of making a number of threatening phone calls to the Mt. Carmel Catholic School, at least one of which falsely reported a bomb, in April and May 2001. Administrators took the bomb threat very seriously, and on May 1 last year had to evacuate the 200-300 students there so that the campus could be checked for explosives. 

Chulbna was arrested after the calls were traced to her home and to St. Raymond's School, where she worked as a teacher's aide. 

Prosecutors said Chulbna had a grudge against Mt. Carmel school because her son was not allowed to remain going there more than six years before the threats were made. 

Originally charged with three counts of making criminal threats and one count of falsely reporting a bomb, Chulbna waived her right to a jury trial and was convicted of the bomb charge in August. The prosecution dismissed the threats charges before her trial before Judge Phrasel Shelton. 

Chulbna is scheduled to begin serving her jail sentence on Dec. 14, and until then remains free on $50,000 bail


Tablet PC to launch amid some skepticism

By Matthew Fordahl The Associated Press
Wednesday November 06, 2002

SAN JOSE — After years of dreams and hype, Microsoft Corp. founder Bill Gates will launch digital tablets that can handle text like a paper notepad but run all the programs of a notebook PC. 

The “Tablet PC” is nothing but revolutionary, according to Gates, who has predicted the ultralight gadgets will be the most popular personal computer style within five years. 

But analysts who have toyed with the devices are not so impressed, particularly with the limited screen real estate and short battery life. And it’s not clear customers see the need, they say. 

“A lot of system architects are scratching their heads trying to figure out what the big advantage is here,” said Richard Doherty, director of The Envisioneering Group, a research firm. 

On Thursday, Gates will officially launch a version of the Windows XP operating system specifically for the devices. Thirteen hardware vendors from Hewlett-Packard Co. to Fujitsu will unveil models based on Microsoft’s software. 

All the tablets weigh about 3 pounds and are about the size and shape of a standard ultralight notebook. They have swiveling screens that can be written on with a pen-like stylus. 

The tablets are based on one of two designs, with a few mixing elements of both. Some are only tablets, with no input device other than the digital pen. Others are notebook computers in which the keyboard can be folded away and the screen used for entering data. Others still can be docked into a unit that provides network connections or additional drives. 

Microsoft’s operating system includes software that recognizes handwriting scribbled on the screen and converts it into plain text. Jotted notes also can be used in programs as graphics. 

Prices vary. Hewlett-Packard’s entry model costs $1,699 without wireless capability and $1,799 with wireless. Acer’s starts at $2,199 without wireless and $2,395 with the feature. 

Analysts say the devices are especially handy for those who have to enter data into forms while on the go, such as insurance or health care workers. Similar devices, which essentially bolted Windows onto proprietary hardware and software, have been available for 10 years and have sold well in industries where mobile form entry is important.


UPS looks to deliver more services

By Michael Liedtke The Associated Press
Wednesday November 06, 2002

SAN FRANCISCO — With its “What Can Brown Do For You?” ad campaign, United Parcel Service Inc. uses its familiar brown-garbed workers and brown trucks to remind people of the company’s role in their lives and work. 

The ads also show a different UPS — a one-stop problem solver that handles a range of chores for corporate customers. They’re part of CEO Michael Eskew’s drive to develop services to complement the company’s bread-and-butter package delivery business. 

Under Eskew’s plan, more companies would hire UPS to serve as a distribution hub, an inventory warehouse, a high-tech repair shop and even a telephone call center for customer inquiries. 

“He has clearly articulated this vision — no ifs, ands or buts about it,” said industry analyst Stephen Jacobs of U.S. Bancorp Piper Jaffray. “It’s an absolutely pivotal strategy for UPS.” 

To diversify, Atlanta-based UPS has spent $1.3 billion on 27 acquisitions since 1998. The biggest deals came last year, when UPS picked up retail shipping chain Mail Boxes Etc. and freight forwarding service Fritz Cos. 

The shopping spree helped UPS’s non-package business generate revenue of $1.93 billion through the first nine months of this year, a 36 percent increase from the same time last year. UPS operates in 200 countries, generating more than $30 billion in annual revenue while delivering about 3 billion packages each year. 

Although this year’s shipping volume is slightly lower than last year and the company isn’t making as much money as investors hoped, UPS stock has held up well amid Wall Street’s turmoil. The company’s shares are up 13 percent so far this year, compared with a 21 percent decline in the Standard & Poor’s 500 index. 

Eskew, who became CEO 10 months ago, recently talked to The Associated Press about UPS’s performance and his plans for the future.


Calpine’s profit dives 50 percent

The Associated Press
Wednesday November 06, 2002

SAN JOSE — Calpine Corp. on Tuesday said third-quarter net income plunged 50 percent as higher fuel and project development costs and falling prices hammered the company’s bottom line. 

The San Jose energy concern Tuesday said profit fell to $161.3 million, or 36 cents a share. It earned $320.8 million, or 88 cents a share, in the same quarter last year. 

The latest results included a gain of $12.9 million, or 3 cents a share, from the sale of discontinued operations. 

The company also booked charges totaling 5 cents a share, including severance and other costs, deferred project-cost write-offs and a loss on the sale of turbines. 

Excluding items, the company said it earned $170.9 million, or 38 cents a share, below its August earnings estimates of 40 cents to 55 cents a share. The results, however, matched analysts’ expectations, according to Thomson First Call. 

Revenue, meanwhile, slipped 1 percent to $2.5 billion from $2.52 billion. 

Fuel expenses jumped 60 percent to $525.5 million, and project development costs more than quadrupled to $23.9 million.


Election Day Coverage

Wednesday November 06, 2002

Mayor 

*75 precincts reporting 

Tom Bates 56% 

Shirley Dean 43% 

John Patrick Boushell 1% 

 

City Council; District 1 

*8 precincts reporting 

Linda Maio 86% 

Rhiannon 14% 

 

City Council; District 4 

*7 precincts reporting 

Bob Migdal 21% 

Dona Spring 66% 

David A. Freeman 2% 

L.A. Wood 10% 

 

City Council; District 7 

*10 precincts reporting 

Micki Weinberg 39% 

Kriss Worthington 61% 

 

City Council; District 8 

*10 precincts reporting 

Carlos Estrada 3% 

Andy Katz 36% 

Anne Wagley 19% 

Gordon Wozniak 42% 

 

City Auditor 

*75 precincts reporting 

Ann-Marie Hogan 99% 

 

Director, Rent Stabilization Board (5 Elected) 

*75 precincts reporting 

Howard G. Chong Yes 

Chris Kavanagh Yes 

Selma Spector Yes 

Pinkie Payne Yes 

Robert J. Evans Yes 

 

Berkeley Unified School 

District (3 elected) 

*75 precincts reporting 

Lance Montauk 7% 

Cynthia Papermaster 8% 

Shirley Issel 20% 

Derick Miller 6% 

Nancy Riddle 25% 

Terry S. Doran 21% 

Sean P. Dugar 13% 

 

Measure I; New Animal Shelter 

(General Obligation Bond) 

*75 precincts reporting 

Yes (2/3 vote required) 68% 

No 32% 

 

Measure J; Old City Hall Retrofit (General Obligation Bond) 

*75 precincts reporting 

Yes (2/3 vote required) 40% 

No 60% 

 

Measure K; School Board Director Pay Raise (Charter Amendment) 

*75 precincts reporting 

Yes 67% 

No 33% 

 

Measure L; Property Transfer Tax for Pedestrian Safety Improvements 

*75 precincts reporting 

Yes (2/3 vote required) 54% 

No 46% 

 

Measure M; Property Transfer Tax 

*75 precincts reporting 

Yes (2/3 vote required) 51% 

No 49% 

 

Measure N; Waterfront Amendment 

*75 precincts reporting 

Yes 67% 

No 33% 

 

Measure O; Brewed Coffee Sale Restrictions (Citizen Initiative) 

*75 precincts reporting 

Yes 30% 

No 70% 

 

Measure P; Building Height Limits (Citizen Initiative) 

*75 precincts reporting 

Yes 20% 

No 80%


Election Day Coverage

Wednesday November 06, 2002

County Measures 

Measure A; Hotel and Lodging Tax (Majority Approval Required) 

*930 precincts reporting 

Yes 53% 

No 47% 

 

Measure B; Business License Tax (Majority Approval Required) 

*930 precincts reporting 

Yes 64% 

No 36% 

 

Measure C; Probation Officers (Charter Amendment - Majority Approval Required) 

*all precincts reporting 

Yes 59% 

No 41% 

 

Measure AA; Property Tax for Transportation – Alameda-Contra Costa Transit District (2/3 Vote) 

*568 precincts reporting 

Yes 68% 

No 31% 

 

Measure BB; Seismic Safety – San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit District (Bond Issue - 2/3 Vote) 

*930 precincts reporting 

Yes 66% 

No 34% 

 

 

 

 

 

 

State Executive 

Governor 

*19, 314 precincts reporting 

Peter Miguel Camejo, Green 5% 

Gray Davis, Dem. 48% 

Bill Simon, Rep. 42% 

 

Lieutenant Governor 

*18, 516 precincts reporting 

Bruce McPherson, Rep. 42% 

Donna J. Warren, Green 4% 

Cruz M. Bustamante, Dem. 50% 

 

Secretary of State 

*18, 521 precincts reporting 

Kevin Shelley, Dem. ..................46% 

Larry Shoup, Green ......................4% 

Keith Olberg, Rep. .....................42% 

 

State Controller 

*19, 108 precincts reporting 

Tom McClintock, Rep. 45% 

Laura Wells, Green 6% 

Steve Westly, Dem. 45% 

 

State Treasurer 

*17, 503 precincts reporting 

Jeanne-Marie Rosenmeier, Gr. 5% 

Phil Angelides, Dem. 49% 

Greg Conlon, Rep. 41% 

 

Attorney General 

*17, 508 precincts reporting 

Glen Freeman Mowrer, Green 4% 

Bill Lockyer, Dem. 51% 

Dick Ackerman, Rep. 41% 

 

Insurance Commissioner 

*17, 362 precincts reporting 

Gary Mendoza, Rep. 42% 

John Garamendi, Dem. 46% 

David I. Sheidlower, Green 4% 

 

State Superintendent of Public Instruction 

*17, 416 precincts reporting 

Katherine H. Smith 39% 

Jack O’Connell 61% 

 

State Assembly 

Member; District 14 

*103 precincts reporting 

Lori Hancock, Dem. 98% 

 

Board of Equalization 

Member; District 1 

*930 precincts reporting 

Mark S. Bendick, Rep. 27% 

Carole Migden, Dem. 67% 

 

Judicial 

California State Supreme Court 

*930 precincts reporting 

Carlos R. Moreno Yes 

Marvin R. Baxter Yes 

Kathryn M. Werdegar Yes 

 

State Court of Appeal; 

District 1, Division 1 

*930 precincts reporting 

Sandra L. Margulies Yes 

William D. Stein Yes 

James J. Marchiano Yes 

 

State Court of Appeal; 

District 1, Division 2 

*930 precincts reporting 

J. Anthony Kline Yes 

 

State Court of Appeal; 

District 1, Division 3 

*930 precincts reporting 

Stuart R. Pollak Yes 

William R. McGuiness Yes 

Joanne C. Parrilli Yes 

 

 

State Court of Appeal; 

District 1, Division 4 

*930 precincts reporting 

Patricia K. Sepulveda Yes 

Maria P. Rivera Yes 

 

State Court of Appeal; 

District 1, Division 5 

*930 precincts reporting 

Mark Simons Yes 

Barbara Jones Yes 

Linda M. Gemello Yes 

 

Superior Court Judge; County of Alameda; Office 5 

*930 precincts reporting 

Lise Pearlman 32% 

Trina Thompson Stanley 68% 

 

Special Districts 

Director; East Bay Municipal Utility District; Ward 4 

*97 precincts reporting 

Charles L. Whitbeck 14% 

David Richardson 85% 

 

State Propositions 

Proposition 46; Housing and Emergency Shelter Act of 2002 

*930 precincts reporting 

Yes 65% 

No 35% 

 

Proposition 47; Public 

Education Facilities Bond Act 

*930 precincts reporting 

Yes 68% 

No 32% 

 

Proposition 48; Court 

Consolidation 

*930 precincts reporting 

Yes 76% 

No 24% 

Proposition 49; Before and After School Programs 

*930 precincts reporting 

Yes 55% 

No 45% 

 

Proposition 50; Water Quality and Supply 

*930 precincts reporting 

Yes 63% 

No 37% 

 

Proposition 51; Distribution of Existing Motor Vehicle Sales and Use Tax 

*930 precincts reporting 

Yes 44% 

No 56% 

 

Proposition 52; Election Day Voter Registration 

*930 precincts reporting 

Yes 51% 

No 49% 

 

U.S. Congress 

U.S. Representative; District 9 

*431 precincts reporting 

Jerald Udinsky, Rep. 15% 

Barbara Lee, Dem. 81% 


Many voters expected to stay home during election

By Matthew Artz Daily Planet Staff
Tuesday November 05, 2002

Berkeley politicians have done their best to stir up interest in an election that will determine the city’s next mayor and the height of new buildings. But despite a virtual Shirley Dean–Tom Bates road show that has included 27 debates and has both candidates admitting the race is too close to call, Berkeley voter turnout is expected to hit all-time lows. 

“Everything we know says statewide there is going to be very low turnout,” said David Mermin of Lake, Snell, Perry and Associates, a polling firm hired by the Dean campaign. 

The latest Field Poll suggests low turnout as well. According to the non-partisan survey group, only 55 percent of registered California voters are projected to cast ballots today. 

Like most political observers, Councilmember Kriss Worthington fears that voter disenchantment with the major party candidates for governor will keep many Berkeley voters away from polling stations. 

“The turnout will be really low because there is no liberal gubernatorial or presidential candidate to get excited about,” he said. 

Early indications attest to Worthington’s pessimism. Only about 150 voters cast ballots during two weeks of early voting this October, said City Clerk Sherry Kelly. In 2000 she said about 500 residents took advantage of early voting. 

History suggests that Berkeley voters are more likely to turnout for presidential elections than off-year elections. In 2000, 76 percent of registered voters cast ballots compared to 60 percent in 1998, the year of the last Mayoral election. 

But UC Berkeley student leaders say a surge of student registrations could boost turnout and affect two key races. 

Eight thousand students have registered to vote this semester, about 6,000 more than were registered during the 2000 campaign, said Jimmy Bryant Vice President of External Affairs for the Associated Students of the University of California. 

“This is the biggest voter drive we’ve ever done,” he said. Bryant said he hoped that between 40 to 50 percent of the newly registered voters will vote today. 

Students make up about 30 percent of the city’s population, but historically they choose not to vote or opt to vote via absentee ballot in their home towns. 

Bryant believes a large student turnout should help 8th Council District candidate Andy Katz, a UC Berkeley graduate student as well as progressive mayoral candidate Tom Bates. 

“Housing is the biggest issue for most students,” Bryant said. Both Katz and Bates support current rent control laws, while their most prominent opponents Gordon Wozniak and Mayor Shirley Dean both support eliminating rent control for wealthy tenants. 

Dean campaign manager, Bryan Schwartz, however, said he thinks a high student turnout could play into Dean’s hands. 

“We anticipate having a lot of student support,” Schwartz said, noting that the UC Berkeley newspaper the Daily Californian endorsed Dean Monday. 

There is no historical correlation between high voter turnout and success for either of Berkeley’s political factions. 

In 1994, the year Dean was first elected mayor and moderates won a council majority, 61 percent of all eligible voters cast ballots. In 1996, when progressives regained the a council majority, 60 percent of eligible voters turned out. 

Both mayoral candidates will do everything in their power to make sure their supporters get to polling places. The Dean and Bates campaigns will both provide cars for voters who otherwise would not be able to get to a polling station. They have also assigned local campaign captains for nearly every neighborhood to make sure that their supporters cast ballots. 

Voting itself will actually be more inconvenient this year. Berkeley will have only 77 polling stations for this election down from the usual 93. 

Bradley Clark, of the Alameda County Registrar’s Office, said stations were dropped because a new law allows any resident to vote by absentee mail ballot. 

The consolidation of voting stations will most adversely affect residents of the 7th Council District on a 3-block stretch north of campus from Hearst to Le Conte avenues, that is primarily home to students. They will have to go about 10 blocks to the nearest voting booth on Bancroft Way, on the other side of campus. 

 

Contact reporter at  

matt@berkeleydailyplanet.net 


Is Library Gardens smart growth

Marc Mathieu Berkeley
Tuesday November 05, 2002

To the Editor: 

 

Smart growth in city planning is intended to introduce and sustain a number of innovations. One of these is increased and facilitated public transportation, along with walkable destinations. Work and leisure activity would not, in theory, require automobile use or ownership for persons residing in large mixed-use buildings in the Berkeley downtown and on transit corridors. The Daily Planet (Oct. 26-27), has developer John DeClerq saying he would open his Library Gardens parking lot to the public on the assumption that residents would drive to work for the day. This statement contradicts smart growth intentions in regard to automobile use. It seems that ideology and practice in this case of development are not aligned. Opportunity and profit for the developer, usually disguised by claims of smart growth planning, are here revealed as the real motives for building big in Berkeley. 

 

Marc Mathieu 

Berkeley


Calendar

Tuesday November 05, 2002

Tuesday, Nov. 5 

Flu Shots for Everyone 

10 a.m to 12:30 p.m. 

St. John’s Presbyterian Church, 2727 College Ave. 

Sponsored by the Berkeley Public Health Department 

845-6830 

 

Berkeley Intelligent Conversation 

7 to 9 p.m. 

Berkeley-Richmond Jewish Community Center, 1414 Walnut St. 

Join the bimonthly discussion group informally led by fomer UC Berkeley extension lecturer, investment advisor and finncial planner Robert Berend. Open to all. Please bring light snacks or drinks to share. This session’s topic: Work ethic vs. playing and having fun 

527-5332 

Free 

 

Wednesday, Nov. 6 

North Berkeley Senior Center Advisory Council Meeting 

10 a.m. 

North Berkeley Senior Center, 1901 Hearst St. 

981-5190 

Community Members Welcome 

 

Monthly Birthday Party 

1:15 p.m. 

North Berkeley Senior Center, 1901 Hearst St. 

Featuring Jim Steinke, guitar and mandolin wizard 

981-5190 

 

2002 Surjit Singh Lecture 

5:30 p.m. 

Church Divinity School of the Pacific, Common Room, 2451 Ridge Rd. 

649-2440 for more info 

 

“The Chinese and Religion in the Context of Globalization” 

Reception 5:30 p.m. / Lecture 7 p.m. 

Bade Museum at Pacific School of Religion, 1798 Scenic Ave. 

A noted scholar and author, Professor Zhuo Xinping speaks 

649-2440 

 

Thursday, Nov. 7 

“Water, the Beverage of Life” 

11:30 a.m. 

North Berkeley Senior Center, 1901 Hearst St. 

Aaron Miller, SF State Intern will discuss 

981-5190 

 

Additional Ferries from East Bay Sites 

noon to 2 p.m. 

Discussion with a representative of the San Francisco Bay Area Water Transit Authority. Sponsored by the League of Women Voters 

Albany Public Library, 1247 Marin Ave. 

843-8824 

Free 

 

 

Panel Discussion - “Resistance to the Free Trade Agreements in Mexico and Central America” 

7:30 p.m. 

Featuring video presentation of “Tierra Si, Aviones No”, and performance by the NoPPP Players 

La Pena Cultural Center, 3105 Shattuck Ave. 

Requested donations between $5 and $10 

 

Friday, Nov. 8  

Alexander Cockburn’s Incendiary Rants 

7 p.m. 

Release party for muckraking maverick Alexander Cockburn’s new spoken word CD, Beating the Devil at the AK Press Warehouse, 673-A 23rd St.  

208-1700 

Free 

 

Berkeley Women in Black Vigil 

Bancroft at Telegraph Ave. 

Weekly protest to “End the Occupation” 

548-6310 

 

Saturday, Nov. 9 

Book Sale and Auction 

10 a.m. to 4 p.m. 

The Center for AIDS Services, 5720 Shattuck Ave., Oakland 

This big sale will benefit the AIDS center. 

655-3435 

 

An Afternoon of Mystery with Authors 2 p.m. 

1901 Russell St. 

Berkeley’s South Branch Library presents mystery writers Jake Fuchs (Death of a Prof), Owen Hill (The Chandler Apartments), and Mary Halock (The Dog on the Roof) 

Free 

 

Sunday, Nov. 10 

World RunDay - national charity benefit. 

All day 

Various cities across the naton - contact www.runday.com 

(516) 859-3000 for more info 

 

Tuesday, Nov. 12 

Holiday Craft Baazar 

10 a.m. to noon 

St. John’s Presbyterian Curch, 2727 College Ave. 

Handmade items, sweet treats, and knick knacks will be for sale. All are welcome 

845-6830 

 

Wednesday, Nov. 13 

Public Lecture by the Rev. Canon Naim Ateek 

7:30 p.m. 

UCC, on Dana St. between Durant and Channing 

Founder of the Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center and native of East Jerusalem, Rev. Ateek will lead a discussion sponsored by the First Congregational Church of Berkeley (UCC) and the Pacific School of Religion 

848-3696 

$10/ suggested donation.  

 

 

League of Women Voters Meeting 

Noon 

LWVBAE office, 1414 University Ave. 

Discussion will focus on regional issues 

849-2154 

 

Thursday, Nov. 14 

Regret to Inform  

Reception 6:30 p.m. / Program 7 p.m. 

Berkeley High School Auditorium, 2234 Martin Luther King Jr. Way 

A screening and discussion with filmmaker Barbara Sonneborn. 

979-0190, liz_vogel@facing.org 

Free 

 

Berkeley Path Wanderers Meeting 

7 to 9 p.m. 

Hillside, Club, 2286 Cedar St. 

Meeting to include a presentation by best- selling author Adah Bakalinsky who will speak about her book, “Stairway Walks of San Francisco” 

Free 

 

Tuesday, Nov. 5 

Garrison Keillor 

7:30 p.m. 

First Congregational Church of Berkeley, 2345 Channing Way, entrance on Dana between Channing and Durant 

Keillor will be reading from “Good Poems”  

www.codysbooks.com 

$10 / $5 with purchase of “Good Poems” 

 

The Duo-Tones 

8 p.m. 

Freight & Salvage, 1111 Addison St. 

Paul Johnson and Gil Orr play pure, essential surf music like you’ve never heard before. 

548-1761 

$15.50-$16.50 

 

Wednesday, Nov. 6 

Zabava! Izorno and Brass Menagerie 

7 p.m. doors open, 8:30 live performance 

Ashkenaz, 1317 San Pablo Ave. 

Enjoy this celebration with live music from the Balkans, including dance lessons begining at 7:30 

525-5054 

$8 

 

Christopher Hitchens 

7:30 p.m. 

Cody’s Books, 2454 Telegraph Ave. 

Hitchens will discuss “Why Orwell Matters” 

845-7852 

 

Saadet Turkoz with Miya Masaoka and George Cremaschi 

8 p.m. 

Freight & Salvage, 1111 Addison St. 

Mysterious improvisations based on ancient Central Asian music in collaboration. 

548-1761 

$15.50-$16.50 

 

 

Thursday, Nov. 7 

Gary Thorp 

7:30 p.m. 

Cody’s Books, 2454 Telegraph Ave. 

Thorp will read from “Caught in Fading Light” 

 

The Non Prophets  

9:30 p.m. 

The Starry Plough, 3101 Shattuck Ave. 

Preforming with special guest Vince Welnick of the Grateful Dead 

21+ 

$10 

 

Bandworks Recital 

7:30 p.m. to midnight 

Ashkenaz, 1317 San Pablo Ave. 

Hear student bands play rock, blues, and pop at this annual recital event 

525-5054 

$11 

 

Friday, Nov. 8 

The Librarians, Bitesize, and Glitter Mini 9 

9:30 p.m. 

The Starry Plough, 3101 Shattuck Ave. 

All age show 

$7 

 

Chaskinakuy 

8 p.m. 

Freight & Salvage, 1111 Addison St. 

Beautiful vocal harmonies in Spanish and Quechua. 

548-1761 

$15.50-$16.50 

 

Saturday, Nov. 9 

An Afternoon of Mystery 

2 p.m. 

South Branch Berkeley Public Library, 1901 Russell St. at Martin Luther King Jr. Way 

Featuring local Bay Area authors Jake Fuchs, Owen Hill, and Mary Madsen Hallock 

525-3948, Kimmac@pacbell.net 

Free 

 

An Evening of Cultural Harmony 

8 p.m. 

St. John’s Presbyterian Church, 2727 College Ave. 

The Barbard Ensemble, the San Francisco Klezmer Experience and Lichi Fuentes & Jackeline Rago will treat listeners to music from Iran, Eastern Europe, and Latin America. 

704-7480 x755 

$25 general admission 

 

Black Dice, Dearly Departed (ex-Subtonix), and The Mass 

9:30 p.m. 

The Starry Plough, 3101 Shattuck Ave. 

$8 

 

Sunday, Nov. 10 

The Sheldon Brown Group 

4:30 p.m. 

Jazzschool, 2087 Addison St. 

Reservations: 845-5373 

$10-$15 

 

 

Images of India-2002 

7 p.m. 

International House Auditorium, 2299 Piedmont Ave. 

‘Asha for Education,’ a campus based non-profit organization, holds its 12th annual event  

665-4889, ioi@ashanet.org 

$15-$25 / $10 students 

 

The Starry Irish Music Session with Shay Black 

8 p.m. 

The Starry Plough, 3101 Shattuck Ave. 

Tickets available on a sliding scale 

 

“Shove Off to Birthday Island” 

Through Nov. 30 

Reception Nov. 2 from 5 to 8 p.m. 

Normal hours: 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday 

Ardency Gallery, 709 Broadway, Oakland 

A collaborative exhibition of Tonya Solley Thornton and Frank Haines including video and sculptural installations. 

836-0831 

 

Children of the Gulf War Photo Exhibit 

Through Nov. 30 

Mon. through Thurs., 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. 

Fri. through Sat.., 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. 

Sun., 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. 

Berkeley Public Library, 2090 Kittredge St. 

Featuring works of Takashi Morizumi 

Information: www.savewarchildren.org 

 

Ceramics - Opening Reception 

Through Nov. 17 

3 to 5 p.m. 

A New Leaf Gallery, 1286 Gilman St. 

525-7621 

Free 

 

 

Menocchio 

Nov. 6 through Dec. 22 

Berkeley Repertory Theatre, 2025 Addison St. 

Berkeley Repertory Theatre presents the world premiere of Lillian Groag’s charged comedy 

647-2949 or www.berkeleyrep.org for tickets 

Regular tickets between $38 and $54, with group, student, youth, and senior discounts available 

 

Tuesday, Nov. 5 

Open Mic 

The Starry Plough, 3101 Shattuck Ave. 

21+ 

Free 

 

Wednesday, Nov. 6 

Poetry Slam with host Nazelah Jamison and Karen Ladson 

8:30 p.m. 

The Starry Plough, 3101 Shattuck Ave. 

Cash prizes up to $90 

21+ 

$7/ general, $5/ students with ID 

 

Saturday Nov. 9 

Dorothy Allison and Jewelle Gomez appear in support of Boadecia’s Books 

8 p.m. 

Northbrae Community Church  

941 The Alameda at Solano 

559-9184 

$25, sliding scale 

 

Tuesday, Nov. 12 

Open Mic 

The Starry Plough, 3101 Shattuck Ave. 

7:30 p.m. 

Free 


Versatile Murphy is Panthers’ ultimate weapon

By Dean Caparaz Daily Planet Correspondent
Tuesday November 05, 2002

Steve Murphy is a man without a position – because he plays everywhere. 

Well, not quite everywhere, but the St. Mary’s senior football player lines up wherever head coach Jay Lawson and the Panthers need him. 

Nominally the quarterback, Murphy also plays tailback and cornerback – when he isn’t returning kicks and punts, that is. His production in different facets of the game has led the Panthers to a 4-3-1 record so far this year. 

“His season is going very well,” Lawson said. “He came into the season as one of the big leaders on our team, starting on offense and defense for us. He’s very versatile and is a very instrumental part of our team.” 

St. Mary’s takes advantage of Murphy’s athleticism and speed, particularly on offense, as the 5-foot-10, 180-pounder runs a 4.5 40-yard dash. 

“We see Steve as an offensive weapon who can score anytime he touches the ball,” Lawson said. “We use him in different matchups. He can run inside or outside. We can throw to him out of the backfield. He has a quick change of direction and is able to run people over. From last year to this year, he developed his speed and now has that breakaway speed.” 

St. Mary’s has the luxury of moving Murphy around because it occasionally uses Scott Tully at quarterback. The Panthers coaches anticipated playing the sophomore somewhat this season, and they had played him a few plays here and there prior to the Oct. 11 Oakland Tech game. But a deep thigh bruise to Murphy against Tech forced their hand, and Tully started the following two games against Kennedy and Albany. 

Murphy’s thigh healed and allowed him to take back the reigns to the offense in the last week’s game, a 40-35 loss at St. Patrick-St. Vincent. 

Even though Murphy is healthy, Lawson says he will continue to bring in Tully when the situation warrants, which is fine with Murphy. 

“I’m still going to be starting the games, and when it’s time, he’ll bring Scott in,” he said. “I don’t have a problem with that. Me and Scott, we don’t compete against each other at all. Coaches try to pump it up like that in practice, but we don’t take it like that at all.  

“We have our roles. My role is to start and to lead the team. His role is to come in and keep us putting points on the board and do his thing.” 

Tully is more of a drop-back passer than Murphy, whose speed allows him to make plays in and out of the pocket. Bringing in the former allows the Panthers to pair Murphy with leading rusher Fred Hives in the backfield. 

Whatever position he plays, Murphy is the team’s unquestioned leader. 

“Steve’s our starting quarterback,” Lawson said. “The team really follows him. He’s really mobile and allows us to do different things. We like to bring in Scott, which gives us both Steve Murphy and Fred Hives, who emerged last month as an outstanding running back for us. It makes defenses defend us honestly, so they can’t key on one back. With Scott in as QB, we’re actually more dangerous running the ball.” 

With all his success on the offensive side of the ball, Murphy will likely play defense, and just one position, in college. Murphy, who’s being recruited by several schools, with Cal and Oregon as the frontrunners, says he knows he’ll end up as a cornerback, which is his favorite position. 

“I like the contact,” he said. “I like to hit people and like to be able to guard people. It’s a challenge.”


UC clericals reject offer

By David Scharfenberg Daily Planet Staff
Tuesday November 05, 2002

The Coalition of University Employees (CUE), which represents 18,000 secretaries, library assistants and other clerical workers at the University of California, rejected a comprehensive UC contract offer last week. The rejection will probably lead to state intervention in a 1 1/2-year-old contract dispute over wages and workplace safety that has sparked strikes on five of UC’s nine campuses since late August. 

The clericals’ Oct. 31 refusal came just one day after UC lecturers, locked in a 2 1/2-year-old battle with the university over wages and job security, turned down a contract offer of their own. State intervention in that fight also appears likely. 

CUE and the University Council-American Federation of Teachers, which represents the lecturers, will have separate meetings with the university in the next two weeks. But UC officials are not optimistic, in either case, about a break in contract talks. 

If there are no new agreements, university officials suggest that they will declare an “impasse” in both negotiation processes, sparking state intervention. 

“We’ve been negotiating with CUE for a year and a half and it’s time to bring these talks to a close, even if that means impasse proceedings,” said Gayle Cieszkiewicz, executive director of UC labor relations, in a statement issued after the clericals rejected the university offer. 

If the university declares an impasse, in the case of CUE, the state’s Public Employment Relations Board, or PERB, would decide if a true deadlock exists and could then appoint a state mediator. If there is still no resolution after mediation, a PERB panel would make a non-binding “finding of fact” and recommend a contract settlement. If both sides reject the proposal, the university would have the power to impose a final contract. 

The process would be the same for the lecturers, but would skip the mediation phase because a state mediator has already been involved in negotiations. 

CUE’s chief negotiator Margy Wilkinson, criticized the university for moving toward state intervention. 

“We don’t see any need to go impasse when there’s still room for negotiation,” said Wilkinson, arguing that the two sides are close on layoff and workplace safety procedures, among other elements of the contract. 

One issue where the two sides remain far apart is wages. The union is asking for a 15 percent pay hike over two years, while the university is offering 3.5 percent.  

UC officials say they can offer no more because of limits in state funding for salary increases. Union officials say the nine-campus UC system has a $2.3 billion unrestricted reserve that it could tap for salary increases. But UC says the money is labeled “unrestricted” for technical reasons only and is in fact tied up in several obligations. 

Wilkinson said the union, scheduled to meet with the university Nov. 13 and 14 at UC Riverside, is unlikely to change its demand for a 15 percent pay hike in the coming week. The university appears rigid as well. 

“We don’t have any more movement to make on wages,” said university spokesperson Paul Schwartz. 

UC Berkeley clericals and lecturers went on strike in August, claiming that the university has engaged in bad faith bargaining. Lecturers at UC campuses in Santa Cruz, Irvine, Davis, Riverside and Santa Barbara walked off the job in October. Clericals joined in at all the campuses except for Irvine. 

The lecturers’ union has indicated that future strikes are possible. Wilkinson, of the clericals’ union, declined to comment on the possibility of future work stoppages. 

“I just can’t predict the future,” she said. 

The university has argued that the strikes are illegal and counterproductive. 

 

Contact reporter at scharfenberg@berkeleydailyplanet.net


An argument for war

Paul Schafer Concord
Tuesday November 05, 2002

To the Editor: 

 

President Bush should be applauded for taking a courageous stand against Saddam Hussein's outlaw regime and its reckless pursuit of weapons of mass destruction. As the president noted in his recent address to the nation, the riskiest option for dealing with Iraq is to do nothing. Inaction would only give Hussein time to complete his malicious pursuit of nuclear weapons and would embolden tyrants and terrorists everywhere.  

Acting now to disarm Hussein, using military force if necessary, is the only way we will keep America safe from weapons of mass destruction that fall into the hands of freedom's enemies. President Bush is right – our nation cannot let world events be dictated by brutal and lawless dictators.  

 

Paul Schafer 

Concord 

 


Baker’s contract ends Wednesday

By Janie McCauley The Associated Press
Tuesday November 05, 2002

 

SAN FRANCISCO — Manager Dusty Baker’s future should be much more clear within days. 

Baker’s agent, Jeff Moorad, has spoken with San Francisco Giants general manager Brian Sabean to discuss whether Baker will remain with the organization, a team official said Monday, speaking on condition of anonymity. Now the Giants are waiting to hear back from Moorad. 

Baker’s contract expires Wednesday, 10 days after the Giants lost Game 7 of the World Series to the Anaheim Angels. 

Sabean agreed to a new multiyear deal with the Giants last week, and one of his first priorities is hiring a manager. 

Before Game 7 of the World Series, Baker made it sound as if he was on his way out. He said he had not been convinced the Giants wanted him to return. 

When asked what he would need to hear from Giants owner Peter Magowan to stick around, Baker said, “If somebody wanted me back, a lot of times they wouldn’t wait until the last minute to tell them.” 

The 53-year-old Baker, who just completed his 10th year with the Giants, said when the playoffs began that he did not intend to “break the bank” — meaning the $6 million a year Joe Torre got from the Yankees — “but I want to be near the bank.” 

Neither Baker nor Sabean could immediately be reached for comment. 

Baker’s name has been mentioned for the vacant managerial jobs in Seattle and with the Chicago Cubs — two attractive openings that have yet to be filled after many clubs have already made their hires. 

While the Cubs haven’t expressed interest in Baker publicly, their search for a new manager is on hold until he resolves his situation. 

General manager Jim Hendry hasn’t interviewed anyone new, and is in Arizona for the team’s organizational meetings. 

Mariners general manager Pat Gillick has been careful not to call Baker a candidate, saying he didn’t want to comment when Baker was still under contract. But Seattle, which has been openly naming its candidates, has said it has a “mystery candidate” in the mix.


Judge rules against Wheeler Hall protesters, hearings to continue

By David Scharfenberg Daily Planet Staff
Tuesday November 05, 2002

An Alameda County Superior Court judge has rejected a request by 32 pro-Palestinian student activists facing possible expulsion to intervene in UC Berkeley student conduct hearings. 

The protesters, who participated in the April 9 takeover of the university’s Wheeler Hall, asked Judge James Richman, among other things, to block the use of police videos, reports and testimony in the student conduct hearings. The students argued that such testimony was legally banned and would unfairly bias the disciplinary process. 

But Richman, who heard the case Oct. 28 and mailed out his ruling Oct. 30, agreed with university arguments that the courts should not get involved, if at all, until after the hearings are completed. 

“The university is pleased with the result,” said Jeff Blair, who argued the case for UC. 

Richman based his decision on a number of prior court rulings which have established that “as a general rule” the courts will not intervene in quasi-judicial hearings until the “administrative agency,” in this case the university, issues a final ruling. After a ruling, the case law suggests, the accused can go to court if they feel the administrative agency has handled the case improperly. 

“I am disappointed, but I’m not surprised,” said Dan Siegel, lead attorney for the students. “It was a relatively low probability of success, but we thought we had a strong case.” 

The students and their attorneys attempted to put the best spin on the ruling, noting that Richman did not rule on the substance of the case, but rather on the timing of court intervention. 

“All he really said is, I can’t deal with this at this time,” said Roberto Hernandez, 23, one of the students facing conduct charges. 

UC Berkeley began the first conduct hearing Sept. 30, focusing on the Hernandez case in particular, but suspended the proceeding when the students filed suit Oct. 7. Now that Richman has issued a ruling, UC Berkeley officials say they plan to restart hearings “as soon as possible.” 

Siegel said that, if the rest of the hearings mirror the Hernandez proceeding, the students will almost certainly take the university to court when the hearings are complete. But Blair said he is confident that the university would win a court case on the merits. 

The students’ lawyers have complained, among other things, about a university decision to close the Hernandez hearing to the public and about the composition of the committee hearing the Hernandez case. 

But university officials say they have acted within the UC Berkeley student code of conduct. The rules allow the hearing committee chairperson to close the proceedings to preserve order and university officials say there had been talk of activists storming the Hernandez proceeding, a charge that activists deny.  

University lawyers also note that, while the code of conduct dictates that a five-person committee should run a conduct hearing, it allows a quorum of three, as in the Hernandez case, to preside. 

The students sought remedies on the issues of open hearings and committee composition, in addition to a block on police evidence, in their Oct. 7 lawsuit. But Richman declined to intervene in any way. 

A total of 79 protesters, including students and community members, took over Wheeler Hall April 9, demanding that the nine-campus University of California system divest from Israel. 

In June, the Alameda County District Attorney dropped all criminal charges against the activists, including resisting arrest and, in Hernandez’s case, assaulting an officer. The county agreed to a “factual finding of innocence” for all the protesters, including a seal on all the activists’ arrest records. 

But the university decided to proceed, on a separate track, with student conduct charges against the 41 students who took part in the Wheeler Hall takeover. 

Nine of the 41 students agreed to a “stayed suspension,” essentially a one-semester probation, leaving 32 to face formal student conduct hearings. 

Last week the students’ lawyers argued that, under the terms of the deal with the District Attorney, all “records of arrest,” including videos, reports and even officers’ testimony, are under seal and cannot be used in any setting, including student conduct hearings. 

The university argued that the law only requires it to eliminate any direct reference to arrest in the evidence. Last month, UC Berkeley blacked out any mention of the word arrest in the Hernandez police report, but kept the rest of the report in the record. 

Blair said the university will have to decide how to handle the police videos, which depict UC police officers walking or dragging protesters away from the foyer of Wheeler Hall and booking them in a hallway. 

Blair said UC will have to remove images of bookings, which is a clear “record of arrest,” but may be able to show officers walking or pulling activists away from the foyer. 

“Just because you’re removing a student from a room doesn’t mean you’re arresting them,” he argued. 

 

Contact reporter at scharfenberg@berkeleydailyplanet.net


Does war make sense?

Gary Gresher Berkeley
Tuesday November 05, 2002

To the Editor: 

 

President Bush’s threats and blandishments against Iraq make sense only if we plan to bomb Saudi Arabia in the morning, getting our just desserts in the desert, or so to speak. 

Equally nonsensical is Bush’s letting Bin Laden’s boys beat it out the back door in Afghanistan. And does anyone really believe that Bin Laden is on the outs with his family? Trust me, the rich know how to dispossess one of their own. 

The big game is back on, folks. It may be only days until 1914, and oil is king. In a recent book review in the “Scientific American,” it was stated that a significant fraction of the world’s petroleum geologists and engineers believe that Saudi Arabia’s oil reserves will begin to tap out in the next five to 10 years. If true, this might explain much about our leader’s animus against Iraq. But then, I may be wrong. 

 

Gary Gresher 

Berkeley 


Raiders’ kicker pleads innocent to DUI charges

Daily Planet Wire Service
Tuesday November 05, 2002

OAKLAND — Oakland Raiders place-kicker Sebastian Janikowski pleaded innocent in Alameda County Superior Court Monday to two misdemeanor counts of driving under the influence of alcohol. 

Janikowski, 24, who was born in Poland and now resides in Castro Valley, was not in court for Monday's arraignment in misdemeanor court in Oakland. 

A complaint filed Oct. 9 charges the football player with driving under the influence and driving with a blood-alcohol content in excess of 0.08 percent. 

Janikowski's attorney, Cris Arguedas of Emeryville, entered a plea of not guilty on behalf of her client Monday. The lawyer is scheduled to return to court for a pre-trial hearing in the matter on Nov. 19. 

“We entered a plea of not guilty,” Arguedas said outside of court. “Now I'll take a look at the reports and we'll see what we're going to do after we see the evidence.” 

Commissioner Beverly Daniels-Greenberg ordered Monday that while the matter is pending, Janikowski, who remains free on his own recognizance, refrain from driving while there is any “measurable amount” of alcohol in his blood. 

According to a California Highway Patrol report of the arrest, on Oct. 1 at about 11:55 p.m., an officer on patrol in the area of eastbound Interstate Highway 580 near High Street observed a red Mercedes-Benz S-500 allegedly traveling at 86 mph. 

The officer pulled over the vehicle, which bore the license plate “CBASS11,” apparently in reference to Janikowski's nickname, Sea Bass, and his jersey number. 

Janikowski was behind the wheel, and a friend, Mike Qutob, 38, of Castro Valley, was in the passenger seat. Qutob was not charged in the case. 

The officer wrote in a report that Janikowski allegedly had alcohol on his breath, red watery eyes and “slow and slurred speech.” The report also noted that Janikowski was polite.


State races hold little appeal

By Robert Jablon The Associated Press
Tuesday November 05, 2002

Arnold Schwarzenegger may be big at the box office, but pollsters say even he doesn’t have enough star power to attract voters to the polls for an election that includes a lackluster governor’s race, secession in Los Angeles and homelessness in San Francisco. 

Only 58 percent of registered voters are expected to go to the polls today — a fraction of a percent better than 1998’s record low for a gubernatorial race, Secretary of State officials said Monday. 

Analysts say Democrat Gray Davis and GOP challenger Bill Simon have turned off their constituents with repeated allegations of corruption and incompetence. Voter after voter complained they were ignoring issues. 

An estimated 25 percent of California voters didn’t commit to either major candidate. 

Ray Wirta, a 58-year-old lifelong Orange County Republican, said he believes Davis has done little in office but he is only voting for Simon as “the lesser of two evils.” 

Democrats, meanwhile, will try for their first sweep in state history. A new poll shows them with significant leads for five of seven offices, including incumbents in the races for lieutenant governor, attorney general and treasurer. 

Los Angeles residents will be asked whether to split Hollywood and the sprawling San Fernando Valley into separate cities. Supporters say LA’s downtown government has short-shrifted the regions on services while critics say the resulting new cities wouldn’t do any better. 

“Secession is by far the foremost issue,” said Dan Biers, a 45-year-old Valley resident who planned to vote against the measure. “There’s very little way I could affect the national issues. There is no president in this election, no senators.” 

A raft of state initiatives and local measures take aim at untamed growth and the sickly California economy. 

With California facing a $15 billion budget deficit, voters are being asked to put the state further into debt by approving more than $18 billion in bond measures for education, water and housing projects. 

Proposition 49, championed by Schwarzenegger, would allocate as much as $550 million in existing school money to before- and after-school programs. 

A Los Angeles County measure seeks a new tax to save the county trauma system from financial collapse. 

A proposed $3.3 billion bond, the largest local bond in California history, would build 120 new schools and create 115,000 new classroom seats in the Los Angeles Unified School District, the nation’s second-largest.


Rent control difficulties

John Koenigshofer Berkeley
Tuesday November 05, 2002

To the Editor: 

 

Few Berkeley residents understand the injustices brought about by rent control. Consider the following actual case. 

A single mother with two children and editor of a local magazine, needs to buy and move into a house soon. Just divorced, she wants to stabilize a home for her children. She purchases a house in Berkeley occupied by tenants who have resided there for 18 months. The tenant's lease has expired. They have been aware of the sale for months. In theory, single family homes are exempt from rent and eviction controls but not in practice. A lawyer tells the tenants that in Berkeley they can prolong eviction for months. The attorney tells the buyer this and suggests she offer relocation money to secure a vacancy. When it is suggested to the attorney that this is extortion, he responds: “In Berkeley this is how it's done.” Final outcome, single mom pays thousands of dollars to move into her own home.  

I am personally familiar with numerous cases of such extortion facilitated by Berkeley rent laws. Such cases are only the tip of the iceberg. The devil is in the details. The details regarding rent control expose a system that regularly violates common sense and basic rights.  

 

John Koenigshofer  

Berkeley 

 


U.S. kills senior al-Qaida leader in Yemen with missile strike

By John J. Lumpkin The Associated Press
Tuesday November 05, 2002

WASHINGTON — U.S. forces killed a top associate of Osama bin Laden in Yemen in a missile strike, expanding the war on terror with America's first overt attack on suspected al-Qaida operatives outside of Afghanistan, a U.S. official said Monday. 

Qaed Salim Sinan al-Harethi was one of several al-Qaida members traveling by car in northwest Yemen when a Hellfire missile struck it Sunday, killing him and five others. The official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said the attack was believed to have been conducted by a CIA aircraft, possibly a missile-carrying Predator drone. 

The official Yemeni news agency, local tribesmen and the U.S. official confirmed the strike killed al-Harethi. Witnesses said they saw an aircraft, possibly a helicopter, in the area. Hellfires can also be launched by attack helicopters. 

The others killed were believed to be low-level operatives. The attack occurred in the northern province of Marib, about 100 miles east of Yemen's capital of San`a, where al-Qaida is considered active. 

U.S. counterterrorism officials have said al-Harethi, also known as Abu Ali, was al-Qaida's chief operative in Yemen and a top target of U.S. anti-terrorism efforts. An associate of bin Laden since the early 1990s in Sudan, al-Harethi is a suspect in the bombing of the destroyer USS Cole in Aden, Yemen, on Oct. 12, 2000. 

The CIA declined comment. On Monday, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld told a Pentagon press conference, “It would be a very good thing if he were out of business.” 

A Yemeni official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said, “Authorities have been monitoring this particular car for a while and we believe those men belonged to the al-Qaida terror network.” 

Many al-Qaida operatives fleeing the U.S.-led war on Afghanistan have joined comrades in Yemen. After the United States detected growth in al-Qaida presence there this spring, hundreds of U.S. troops deployed to Djibouti, the tiny African nation facing Yemen across the Gulf of Aden, officials said. The Marine amphibious assault ship Nassau recently replaced the USS Belleau Wood in the waters between the two nations. 

Inside Yemen, U.S.-trained Yemeni troops deployed to suspected al-Qaida hotbeds in August. 

Besides al-Harethi, at least one more Yemeni al-Qaida operative linked to the Cole attack, Mohammad Hamdi al-Ahdal, is thought to be in Yemen, U.S. officials say. In the Cole attack, two suicide bombers slammed an explosives-laden boat into the hull of the ship, killing 17 U.S. sailors and disabling the vessel. 

Also believed to be in Yemen are Shaykh Dabwan and Suwaid, described as al-Qaida operatives who plan and provide support to terror operations, and an al-Qaida communications expert known as Miqdad, said a U.S. defense official, speaking on condition of anonymity. 

Many al-Qaida followers in Yemen, bin Laden's ancestral homeland, are led by Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, bin Laden's Persian Gulf operations chief, U.S. counterterrorism officials said. 

U.S. intelligence believes Yemeni-based terrorists linked to al-Qaida carried out the Oct. 6 attack on a French oil tanker, the Limburg. A small boat apparently crashed into the ship and exploded, blowing a hole in its hull and spilling 90,000 barrels of oil into the Gulf of Aden. One crewman was killed. 

Since the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States, the CIA has used remotely operated Predator drone aircraft to make pinpoint strikes on al-Qaida leaders and do reconnaissance. 

Mohammed Atef, bin Laden's military chief and a Sept. 11 organizer, was killed in November near Kabul in a joint airstrike by a Predator and U.S. military aircraft. 

A Predator targeted Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar at the start of the war on Afghanistan.


Suspicious bag forces evacuation

The Associated Press
Tuesday November 05, 2002

SAN JOSE — Three planes were evacuated, at least 56 flights were delayed and hundreds of people were cleared out of Mineta San Jose International Airport after a suspicious bag slipped past screeners last weekend. 

The airport’s most serious security problem since the Sept. 11 terrorist attack began when a piece of luggage tested positive during a routine swabbing for explosives. A second test of the luggage was negative and the passenger left the checkpoint with the bag. 

When a supervisor was told what had happened, the alert began Sunday afternoon. 

When screeners checked the explosives detection machine, they determined that almost 30 minutes had passed since the alarm had been activated. At least one flight had departed before a Transportation Security Administration supervisor was alerted to the security breach, police spokesman Joseph Deras said. 

Once that plane landed in San Diego, all passengers were rescreened, officials said.


Bay Area Briefs

Tuesday November 05, 2002

Less church for Marin residents 

SAN RAFAEL — Marin County residents are below the national average in church attendance, but are far from being spiritually disenfranchised, according to a study by a San Francisco-based religious think tank. 

The study, “Religious and Spiritual Change in America: the Experience of Marin County, California” was done by the Institute for Jewish & Community Research’s Gary Tobin and Patricia Lin. 

“I think it’s a great laboratory at looking at the ways religious identity and belief and practice are changing,” Tobin said. 

Second of two protesters dead 

SAN FRANCISCO — The second of two North Bay protesters died Sunday from massive head trauma received while standing through the skylight of a double-decker bus passing through Broadway Tunnel in San Francisco Saturday Oct. 26. 

According to San Francisco General Hospital nursing supervisor Gloria Rodriguez, Sebastopol resident Diana Canning died at 2 p.m. Sunday in the intensive care unit. Marin resident Tony Hernandez died Oct. 30, he too was housed in the intensive care unit.


Alameda county probation chief to step down Jan. 31

Daily Planet Wire Service
Tuesday November 05, 2002

Days before voters in Alameda County will be asked to give the Board of Supervisors control over the county's next chief probation officer, the current officeholder announced her retirement. 

Sylvia J. Johnson, the current chief probation officer, said Monday she plans to step down on Jan. 31. She said she provided notice of her intentions on Friday. 

“This will be the conclusion of a career spanning 45 years,” Johnson said Monday, reading from her retirement memo. “I have enjoyed and valued every moment.” She thanked members of her staff for their support over the years. 

Asked Monday about the timing of her retirement announcement, she said simply, “You live, you work, you age, and you retire. Forty-five years.” 

Johnson, who said she began as an entry-level probation officer in 1958 and became chief probation officer in Alameda County in October 1993, said she does not plan to seek another job. 

“I will enjoy my grandson,” she said. 

Johnson said it is her belief that she will be remembered for bringing positive change to the Probation Department. 

“What people have told me is that I brought resources and service to people who are at risk, children and families who are involved in the criminal justice system and in need of intervention,” she said. 

Johnson said that she could not offer her successor any advice on negotiating county politics because the situation is “dynamic.” 

The Board of Supervisors currently has no control over Johnson, who is supervised by the presiding judge of the Alameda County Juvenile Court. The supervisors control the probation department's budget, however. 

Measure C, if approved by a majority of those casting ballots, would not apply to Johnson, only to her successor. The ballot measure would amend the county charter so that any county probation officer taking office after Wednesday would be appointed by, and serve at the pleasure of, the five-member Board of Supervisors.


Lawyers argue for return of pot to couple

The Associated Press
Tuesday November 05, 2002

SAN JOSE — The Santa Cruz couple who ran a medical marijuana farm raided by federal agents in September argued Monday that their pot plants, as well as confiscated videos and photo albums, should be returned to them. 

Federal prosecutors said they need the seized items as evidence. 

U.S. District Judge Jeremy Fogel said he would make a ruling in a few weeks. 

Drug Enforcement Administration agents arrested Valerie and Michael Corral and cut down the 130 plants they grew for the Wo/Men’s Alliance for Medical Marijuana. 

Valerie Corral said the alliance continues to grow medical marijuana at a secret location. 

State law and city and county ordinances say marijuana is legal if recommended by a doctor, but under federal law, it is illegal as a medicine or a recreational drug. 

Nearly two weeks after the raid, Michael Corral helped distribute medical marijuana to people gathered outside City Hall. Several city leaders attended to show their support of medical marijuana, and no law enforcement was present.


Jailed JDL leader on life support

By Sandra Marquez The Associated Press
Tuesday November 05, 2002

LOS ANGELES — Jewish Defense League leader Irv Rubin, jailed on charges of plotting to bomb a mosque and the office of an Arab-American congressman, was brain dead Monday after what federal authorities called a suicide attempt. 

“We’re told that he is brain-dead and on life support,” said Rubin attorney Peter Morris. Rubin’s wife and two sons were called to his bedside, he said. 

U.S. marshal’s spokesman Bill Woolsey described Rubin’s condition as critical after more than two hours of surgery at an undisclosed hospital. 

Rubin used a razor to slash his neck and throat and then fell or jumped from a prison balcony as he and other inmates lined up for breakfast before 5:30 a.m., Woolsey said. 

“There is no evidence at this point that it was anything but a suicide,” Woolsey said. 

Rubin fell as far as 18 feet at the federal Metropolitan Detention Center, said Mark Werksman, an attorney representing Rubin’s co-defendant. Rubin was not handcuffed at the time, Woolsey said. 

Initially, hospital personnel told prosecutors and defense attorneys that Rubin had died in surgery, said Bryan Altman, also a Rubin attorney. Lawyers in turn told Rubin’s family that he had died. 

The FBI was investigating what it was calling a “crime in a government property,” said spokeswoman Laura Bosley. She could not confirm that it was a suicide attempt. 

Rubin’s family alleged that Rubin had been attacked by someone. 

“My husband would never kill himself. This was a hit, this was a hit,” said his wife, Shelley Rubin. 

“I saw my husband yesterday. He was just the same as before. He didn’t say goodbye. He said I will see you in court tomorrow. He was fine,” she said. 

Rubin and associate Earl Krugel were arrested Dec. 11 on charges of plotting to bomb the King Fahd mosque in suburban Culver City and an office of Rep. Darrell E. Issa, R-Calif., who is the grandson of Lebanese immigrants. 

Rubin and Krugel were arrested after an FBI informant delivered an explosive powder that authorities believed was the last component in making pipe bombs. The charges carry up to 40 years in prison upon conviction. 

Rubin, who by his own account has been arrested more than 40 times, joined the JDL early in the 1970s and quickly moved up, becoming chairman in 1985. 

In 1989, the leader of the rival Jewish Defense Organization was charged with firing shots at Rubin and wounding three others in New York. Mordechai Levy was convicted of assault. 

According to his biography, Rubin learned to fight anti-Semitism while growing up in Montreal, “where some hotel owners and other business people hung signs reading ’No Dogs or Jews Allowed’ on their doors and where French Canadian schoolchildren taunted him because he was Jewish.”


Venture capitalists still curtailing fund raising

By Michael Liedtke The Associated Press
Tuesday November 05, 2002

SAN FRANCISCO — Taking their cue from the skittish stock market, venture capitalists continue to scale back their fund-raising efforts for future investments, according to industry figures released Monday. 

Venture capitalists raised $1.7 billion in the third quarter, a 76 percent drop from the same time last year when the industry collected $7 billion from investment partners, said Thomson Venture Economics and the National Venture Capital Association. 

The slowdown continued a retrenchment that began after the dot-com investment bubble burst 2 1/2 years ago. 

As the Internet business woes spread throughout the high-tech industry, the stock market turned a cold shoulder toward most of the unprofitable startups financed by venture capitalists. 

The frigid investment conditions have saddled venture capitalists with the worst losses in the industry’s history and made them more reluctant to finance other startups. Venture capitalists invested $16.9 billion during the first nine months of this year, a 50 percent drop from last year, according to Venture Economics. 

“If the market is ugly, why should you raise more money and risk losing even more? It’s better to wait until things get better,” said Wes Raffel, a general partner with Advanced Technology Ventures in Palo Alto. 

Like a lot of venture capital firms, Advanced Technology is still sitting on a pile of money raised during the boom times. An estimated $90 billion in venture capital still needs to be invested, lessening the need to raise more money. 

Most of that money poured into venture capital during the Internet frenzy of 1999 and 2000, when the industry raised $159 billion. 

The industry’s surplus is so large that venture capitalists refunded $2.7 billion during the second quarter. An insignificant number of refunds occurred in the third quarter, said Jess Reyes, a vice president for Venture Economics. 

Based on the patterns of past industry slumps, Reyes expects the venture capital drought to last at least six more months. 

This already shapes up as the industry’s driest year since 1993, when venture capitalists raised $3.7 billion. Venture capitalists this year are on pace to raise $7.3 billion, slightly below the $7.8 billion collected in 1994, according to the National Venture Capital Association. 

Some venture capitalists think the industry should throttle back even more. 

“We are still raking in too much money,” said Mark Saul, general partner with Foundation Capital in Menlo Park. “There are still too many venture capitalists chasing after a limited number of good deals.”


Applied Materials to cut 1,750 jobs

The Associated Press
Tuesday November 05, 2002

SAN JOSE — Semiconductor equipment maker Applied Materials Inc. said Monday it will cut 1,750 jobs, or 11 percent of its work force, as it struggles with the continuing high-tech slump. 

The Santa Clara-based company said about 800 of the jobs will be cut at its Silicon Valley operations and another 200 from its Austin, Texas, facility. The remaining reductions will take place at other locations. Employees will be notified starting Tuesday. 

“This was a painful but necessary decision to make in order to enable the company to align our operations with the current level of business and position for future growth,” said James C. Morgan, Applied Materials’ chief executive. 

The job cuts were necessary despite other cost-cutting measures, Morgan said. 

Applied Materials, the leading supplier of products and services to computer chip makers, said it will post a restructuring charge in its fiscal first-quarter results. It did not specify the amount. 

In September 2001, the company cut 2,000 positions. At the end of the year, it announced it was cutting another 1,700. 

Applied Materials currently has 16,000 employees around the world. 

Before the company announced the cuts, shares of Applied Materials closed up 73 cents to $16.45 on the Nasdaq Stock Market.


Teamsters to shut down concerts

By Kim Curtis The Associated Press
Tuesday November 05, 2002

SAN FRANCISCO — Teamsters pledged Monday to shut down two Rolling Stones concerts this weekend at Pacific Bell Park if the promoter, Clear Channel Communications, does not agree to use union workers. 

“We’ve been having trouble with Clear Channel for years,” said William Cromartie, president of Brotherhood of Teamsters Local 85. “They want to bring in kids to work for $6 or $7 an hour and give them a T-shirt.” 

About 50 Teamsters picketed Monday outside Pac Bell Park, home of the San Francisco Giants, as tractor-trailers began arriving to deliver equipment for the Friday and Saturday shows. At least three trucks turned around without making deliveries after Teamsters talked to the drivers. 

The Teamsters say they should be unloading those trucks and unionized stagehands should be setting up the stage and the lights. Instead, Bill Graham Presents, San Francisco’s largest concert promoter and a subsidiary of Clear Channel, will use its own nonunion workers. 

Cromartie said that means union members will miss out on about 100 jobs during the next eight days. 

Calls placed to San Antonio-based Clear Channel were not immediately returned. 

Bill Graham Presents said it’s never had a relationship with the Teamsters. 

“We have the expertise developed to do those jobs,” said spokeswoman Sherry Wasserman. “They are using this high-profile show to strongarm us.” 

Wasserman said the San Francisco concert promoter does have a relationship with the stagehands’ union. But if they refuse to work, nonunion workers will be hired to replace them. 

“Some of their work starts today,” Wasserman said. “If they decide to honor this strike for union reasons, we will have a crew ready and we will have a show.” 

Giants Enterprises, which organizes non-baseball events at the stadium, uses union workers to sell concessions, to serve food and beverages and to clean the park. 

But when they sign contracts with concert promoters, “we don’t provide the service that they need for their staging equipment,” said spokeswoman Shana Daum. “We don’t dictate who they can and can’t use.” 

Mark Fabris, a trade show foreman picketing on Monday, also spent $608 for two 18th row tickets for Friday’s show. He said Teamster bylaws prohibit him from crossing any picket line. 

“I’m a big fan. I’ve never seen them before,” he said. “But I’ve been a Teamster for almost 20 years and I’m not going to go if this is still going on.”


CHP says crash of almost 200 cars and trucks was preventable

By Tom Harrigan The Associated Press
Tuesday November 05, 2002

LOS ANGELES — The chain-reaction crashes that piled up nearly 200 cars on the Long Beach Freeway likely could have been avoided if drivers had simply slowed down when they hit foggy conditions, California Highway Patrol officials said Monday. 

The crashes, which left a five-mile section of the freeway looking like an auto junkyard, shut down the highway for 11 hours Sunday. Eight people suffered critical or serious injuries in the accidents that took place within minutes along the one-mile stretch of freeway. 

Motorists reported driving into fog so thick that it reminded some of being on an airliner as it travels into the clouds. 

“In that weather condition, we’re sure if drivers had drastically reduced their speeds, this could have been avoided,” said California Highway Patrol Officer Luis Mendoza. 

A total of 198 cars and trucks were involved in the crash 25 miles south of Los Angeles, with a total of 41 people hurt. Nearly 150 vehicles, torn and tangled, ended up in one pile, with nearly 50 others crammed together a half mile away. 

After the injured were treated or taken to five area hospitals, tow trucks began hauling away the remains of crumpled vehicles, including some that ended up on top of others. 

Scores of emergency personnel and stranded motorists were fed by the Red Cross. Portable toilets were brought in as some people waited by their cars. Others sat on the road away from the heavy smell of leaking fuel. 

With visibility reduced to only 50 to 100 feet “the fog moisture caused the roadway to become slippery so that braking vehicles slid into others,” Mendoza said. 

“All of a sudden you see a wall,” William Carter of Long Beach said of the fog resembling a cloud. He told the Long Beach Press-Telegram he skidded to a stop among other cars without a collision, but soon his car was hit from behind. 

“It was crazy unreal,” Joe Bozek of Upland said of watching cars sliding about before his pickup was hit in the rear. 

CHP Capt. Cliff Williams said, “Today’s accident is living testimony of the importance to slow down when there is fog like this.” 

Seven Long Beach fire engines were sent to the scene, along with a rescue truck containing a “Jaws of Life” device firefighters used to cut into crumpled cars and rescue trapped motorists. 

“I’ve never seen anything like it,’ said Jan Andriese, a 13-year firefighting veteran who was on his way to work when he saw cars smashing into each other in front of him. 

“I checked as many cars as I could, to the front and the back,” Andriese said. He found two trucks leaking fuel, and joined with other motorists to channel it into roadside dirt so it could be absorbed. 

Fire Department spokesman Wayne Chaney said Andriese also helped stabilize a driver with broken ribs while other rescuers worked to get the man out of his car. 

“Everyone knew exactly what their role was,” Chaney said of the emergency response worked out in disaster drills. “We were able to give patients the best care, take them to the right hospital and do it in a timely manner.’


Baywatch

By Matthew Artz
Monday November 04, 2002

The Coast Guard radio call came in at about 6 p.m. Saturday. An unidentified boat with its lights off was heading for the Port of Oakland. 

Officer Ed Galvan of the Berkeley Police Department didn’t hesitate. In seconds he had Police-One, a 26-foot rescue and patrol boat, going 45 mph, darting through tame tides underneath the Bay Bridge. 

The Port of Oakland is a prime target for terrorists, explained Sgt. Guy Craig, as he grabbed hold of a post on the open-air boat, the wind whipping against his face. 

Within minutes he spotted the boat – a million-dollar yacht christened Chardonnay – sloppily traversing a narrow corridor between a barge and a freighter.  

Galvan flashed the blue police light, then a spotlight. 

Finally after several minutes, out stepped the captain. Bearing a striking resemblance to Governor Gray Davis, he asked if there was problem. 

“You need to turn your lights on,” scolded Galvan. 

The lights went on, but the police were not amused. “That guy didn’t have a clue,” Galvan said. “He could have really messed up his boat.” 

Messed up boats are something Craig and Galvan know all too much about. If a vessel is in distress anywhere in the bay Wednesday through Saturday from 4 p.m. to 2 a.m., the BPD – not the Coast Guard – will likely handle the call. 

The BPD maritime program started in 1997 after the Coast Guard alerted local cities that budget cuts meant they would have to police their own waters. To start the program, the BPD was given one boat by the Coast Guard and bought a second one via a state grant.  

The BPD cooperates with other Bay Area cities, including Oakland, San Francisco, Richmond and Redwood City, with each city taking a shift to make sure the bay is constantly patrolled. 

Most of the maritime officers’ work is similar to that performed by regular traffic police. They make sure that boaters keep their lights on in the dark, look out for drunk captains, and enforce the rules of the sea. But about four times per month they are called upon to perform rescue missions. 

The most harrowing rescue came last year, when the Coast Guard asked them to come to the aid of 42-foot boat that was taking on water underneath the Bay Bridge. Within 30 seconds after they got the sailors onto the rescue boat, the distressed boat sunk. 

“They were going to die,” Craig said. 

Their most recent rescue was just as timely but far more strange. 

Last month, a woman, in an apparently drug-induced furor, jumped out of her boyfriend’s car on West Frontage Road, threw off her clothes and started swimming in the bay. At temperatures that average about 53 degrees and can result in death within a couple of hours, the woman had been in the bay for about 30 minutes and would likely have swum to her death if not for Craig and Galvan. 

“We drove up next to her, and I reached down got a big clump of hair and lifted her into the boat,” Craig recalled. The woman was treated at a local hospital. 

If a rescue is their most rewarding task, recovering dead bodies is their most sobering. At one point Saturday, Galvan flashed the spotlight into the water thinking he had seen human remains. A man thrown overboard from a party boat last Saturday night in the waters off Hunter’s Point is still missing, and his body could now be anywhere in the bay floating close to the surface. 

The spotlight did not reveal a body on this occasion, but Craig estimated that they recover about two bodies a year. 

The officers also patrol the bay for fish poachers and serve as the region’s first line of defense against suspicious boats that terrorists might use to target either the Oakland port or the Richmond oil refinery. 

Galvan also serves as patrol officer for the Berkeley Marina, keeping watch over the restaurants and the residents of floating homes. He said marina residents tend to more friendly and more willing to compromise with neighbors than resitents of typical Berkeley beats. “A lot of [police officers] think we have it easy and we have the best job on the force,” he said. 

“Well they’re wrong on the first part – it’s hard work, but it is definetely the best job on the force.” 

 

Contact reporter at matt@berkeleydailyplanet.net


A nice police presence

Gregory S. Murphy
Monday November 04, 2002

To the Editor: 

 

I would like to take the opportunity to commend Berkeley Police Department officer J.S. Hall for her outstanding service Halloween night. My son and his friend, both 13 years old, were trick-or-treating on College Avenue near Derby Street when they were mugged by a group of about 10 older teenage boys and had their candy bags torn out of their arms. No one was injured and the crime was minor in comparison to the increasing concerns of the neighborhood, but the violation done to those boys was as painful as any bruise. 

I reported the incident to the police and officer Hall responded promptly. She took the matter seriously and immediately gave the boys the feeling that this was not insignificant or a waste of her time, but that it was a real crime. More importantly, she allowed them to feel that they were having a positive impact in dealing with this by taking their statements and even asking them to help identify a group of teens held under similar charges (they weren’ t the same teens, unfortunately). 

Officer Hall’ s rapport with these boys helped salve the hurt and anger they experienced as crime victims. Her easy yet professional manner turned a nasty Halloween “trick” into a real treat. My son and his friend discovered that they were important in the eyes of the community, and that they handled the situation with maturity, calmness, and wisdom - all through the positive interaction with officer Hall. 

 

Gregory S. Murphy 

Berkeley


Calendar

Monday November 04, 2002

Monday, Nov. 4 

Berkeley Gray Panthers Home Owners Support Group 

3 p.m. 

Berkeley Gray Panthers Office, 1403 Addison St. 

Resources for low and middle-income home owners, and home maintenance 

548-9696 

 

Albany talk on Marin Salmon 

7 p.m. 

1249 Marin St., Albany 

Watershed biologist Reuven Walder will speak at the monthly meeting of Friends of Five Creeks 

848-9358, f5creeks@aol.com 

Free 

 

“Pathways to Collaboration” 

7:30 to 9:30 p.m. 

Kroeber Hall, Rm. 160, UC Berkeley 

A lecture by Dana Plautz, director of research communications for Intel Corporation, followed by live music 

Free 

 

 

Tuesday, Nov. 5 

Flu Shots for Everyone 

10 a.m to 12:30 p.m. 

St. John’s Presbyterian Church, 2727 College Ave. 

Sponsored by the Berkeley Public Health Department 

845-6830 

 

Berkeley Intelligent Conversation 

7 to 9 p.m. 

Berkeley-Richmond Jewish Community Center, 1414 Walnut St. 

Join the bimonthly discussion group informally led by fomer UC Berkeley extension lecturer, investment advisor and finncial planner Robert Berend. Open to all. Please bring light snacks or drinks to share. This session’s topic: Work ethic vs. playing and having fun 

527-5332 

Free 

 

Wednesday, Nov. 6 

North Berkeley Senior Center Advisory Council Meeting 

10 a.m. 

North Berkeley Senior Center, 1901 Hearst St. 

981-5190 

Community Members Welcome 

 

Monthly Birthday Party 

1:15 p.m. 

North Berkeley Senior Center, 1901 Hearst St. 

Featuring Jim Steinke, guitar and mandolin wizard 

981-5190 

 

2002 Surjit Singh Lecture 

5:30 p.m. 

Church Divinity School of the Pacific, Common Room, 2451 Ridge Rd. 

649-2440 for more info 

 

“The Chinese and Religion in the Context of Globalization” 

Reception 5:30 p.m. / Lecture 7 p.m. 

Bade Museum at Pacific School of Religion, 1798 Scenic Ave. 

A noted scholar and author, Professor Zhuo Xinping speaks 

649-2440 

 

Thursday, Nov. 7 

“Water, the Beverage of Life” 

11:30 a.m. 

North Berkeley Senior Center, 1901 Hearst St. 

Aaron Miller, SF State Intern will discuss 

981-5190 

 

 

 

Additional Ferries from East Bay Sites 

noon to 2 p.m. 

Discussion with a representative of the San Francisco Bay Area Water Transit Authority. Sponsored by the League of Women Voters 

Albany Public Library, 1247 Marin Ave. 

843-8824 

Free 

 

Panel Discussion - “Resistance to the Free Trade Agreements in Mexico and Central America” 

7:30 p.m. 

Featuring video presentation of “Tierra Si, Aviones No”, and performance by the NoPPP Players 

La Pena Cultural Center, 3105 Shattuck Ave. 

Requested donations between $5 and $10 

 

Friday, Nov. 8  

Alexander Cockburn’s Incendiary Rants 

7 p.m. 

Release party for muckraking maverick Alexander Cockburn’s new spoken word CD, Beating the Devil at the AK Press Warehouse, 673-A 23rd St.  

208-1700 

Free 

 

Berkeley Women in Black Vigil 

Bancroft at Telegraph Ave. 

Weekly protest to “End the Occupation” 

548-6310 

 

Saturday, Nov. 9 

Book Sale and Auction 

10 a.m. to 4 p.m. 

The Center for AIDS Services, 5720 Shattuck Ave., Oakland 

This big sale will benefit the AIDS center. 

655-3435 

 

An Afternoon of Mystery with Authors 2 p.m. 

1901 Russell St. 

Berkeley’s South Branch Library presents mystery writers Jake Fuchs (Death of a Prof), Owen Hill (The Chandler Apartments), and Mary Halock (The Dog on the Roof) 

Free 

 

Sunday, Nov. 10 

World RunDay - national charity benefit. 

All day 

Various cities across the naton - contact www.runday.com 

(516) 859-3000 for more info 

 

 

 

Monday, Nov. 4 

Mike Davis 

7:30 p.m. 

First Congregational Church of Berkeley, 2345 Channing Way, entrance on Dana between Channing and Durant 

Mike Davis will discuss “Dead Cities: A Natural History” in collaboration with Working Assets president Michael Kieschnick 

www.codysbooks.com 

$10 / $5 with purchase of “Dead Cities” 

 

Tuesday, Nov. 5 

Garrison Keillor 

7:30 p.m. 

First Congregational Church of Berkeley, 2345 Channing Way, entrance on Dana between Channing and Durant 

Keillor will be reading from “Good Poems”  

www.codysbooks.com 

$10 / $5 with purchase of “Good Poems” 

 

The Duo-Tones 

8 p.m. 

Freight & Salvage, 1111 Addison St. 

Paul Johnson and Gil Orr play pure, essential surf music like you’ve never heard before. 

548-1761 

$15.50-$16.50 

 

Wednesday, Nov. 6 

Zabava! Izorno and Brass Menagerie 

7 p.m. doors open, 8:30 live performance 

Ashkenaz, 1317 San Pablo Ave. 

Enjoy this celebration with live music from the Balkans, including dance lessons begining at 7:30 

525-5054 

$8 

 

Christopher Hitchens 

7:30 p.m. 

Cody’s Books, 2454 Telegraph Ave. 

Hitchens will discuss “Why Orwell Matters” 

845-7852 

 

Saadet Turkoz with Miya Masaoka and George Cremaschi 

8 p.m. 

Freight & Salvage, 1111 Addison St. 

Mysterious improvisations based on ancient Central Asian music in collaboration. 

548-1761 

$15.50-$16.50 

 

 

Thursday, Nov. 7 

Gary Thorp 

7:30 p.m. 

Cody’s Books, 2454 Telegraph Ave. 

Thorp will read from “Caught in Fading Light” 

 

The Non Prophets  

9:30 p.m. 

The Starry Plough, 3101 Shattuck Ave. 

Preforming with special guest Vince Welnick of the Grateful Dead 

21+ 

$10 

 

Bandworks Recital 

7:30 p.m. to midnight 

Ashkenaz, 1317 San Pablo Ave. 

Hear student bands play rock, blues, and pop at this annual recital event 

525-5054 

$11 

 

Friday, Nov. 8 

The Librarians, Bitesize, and Glitter Mini 9 

9:30 p.m. 

The Starry Plough, 3101 Shattuck Ave. 

All age show 

$7 

 

Chaskinakuy 

8 p.m. 

Freight & Salvage, 1111 Addison St. 

Beautiful vocal harmonies in Spanish and Quechua. 

548-1761 

$15.50-$16.50 

 

Saturday, Nov. 9 

An Afternoon of Mystery 

2 p.m. 

South Branch Berkeley Public Library, 1901 Russell St. at Martin Luther King Jr. Way 

Featuring local Bay Area authors Jake Fuchs, Owen Hill, and Mary Madsen Hallock 

525-3948, Kimmac@pacbell.net 

Free 

 

An Evening of Cultural Harmony 

8 p.m. 

St. John’s Presbyterian Church, 2727 College Ave. 

The Barbard Ensemble, the San Francisco Klezmer Experience and Lichi Fuentes & Jackeline Rago will treat listeners to music from Iran, Eastern Europe, and Latin America. 

704-7480 x755 

$25 general admission 

 

Black Dice, Dearly Departed (ex-Subtonix), and The Mass 

9:30 p.m. 

The Starry Plough, 3101 Shattuck Ave. 

$8 

 

Sunday, Nov. 10 

The Sheldon Brown Group 

4:30 p.m. 

Jazzschool, 2087 Addison St. 

Reservations: 845-5373 

$10-$15 

 

Images of India-2002 

7 p.m. 

International House Auditorium, 2299 Piedmont Ave. 

‘Asha for Education,’ a campus based non-profit organization, holds its 12th annual event  

665-4889, ioi@ashanet.org 

$15-$25 / $10 students 

 

The Starry Irish Music Session with Shay Black 

8 p.m. 

The Starry Plough, 3101 Shattuck Ave. 

Tickets available on a sliding scale 

 

 

 

“Shove Off to Birthday Island” 

Through Nov. 30 

Reception Nov. 2 from 5 to 8 p.m. 

Normal hours: 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday 

Ardency Gallery, 709 Broadway, Oakland 

A collaborative exhibition of Tonya Solley Thornton and Frank Haines including video and sculptural installations. 

836-0831 

 

Children of the Gulf War Photo Exhibit 

Through Nov. 30 

Mon. through Thurs., 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. 

Fri. through Sat.., 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. 

Sun., 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. 

Berkeley Public Library, 2090 Kittredge St. 

Featuring works of Takashi Morizumi 

Information: www.savewarchildren.org 

 

Ceramics - Opening Reception 

Through Nov. 17 

3 to 5 p.m. 

A New Leaf Gallery, 1286 Gilman St. 

525-7621 

Free 

“Recent Acquisitions” 

Through Dec. 14 

Thurs. through Sat.., 1 to 4 p.m. 

Berkeley Historical Society, Veterans Memorial Building, 1931 Center St. 

848-0181 

Free 

 

Timoteo Ikoshy Montoya 

Through Nov. 1  

Gathering Tribes Gallery  

1573 Solano Ave.  

Acrylic/air brush paintings  

by this Native American artist.  

528-9038 

 

Threads: Five artists who  

use stitching to convey ideas 

Through Dec. 15, Wed. through Sun., noon to 5 p.m. 

Berkeley Art Center 

Live Oak Park, 1275 Walnut St. 

Information: www.berkeleyartcenter.org, 644-6893 

Free 

 

 

 

Alarms and Excursions 

Nov. 15 through Dec. 22 

Aurora Theatre Company, 2081 Addison St. 

Michael Frayn's comedy about  

the irony of modern technology. 

843-4822, www.auroratheater.org for reservations 

$26 to $35. 

 

Menocchio 

Nov. 6 through Dec. 22 

Berkeley Repertory Theatre, 2025 Addison St. 

Berkeley Repertory Theatre presents the world premiere of Lillian Groag’s charged comedy 

647-2949 or www.berkeleyrep.org for tickets 

Regular tickets between $38 and $54, with group, student, youth, and senior discounts available 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tuesday, Nov. 5 

Open Mic 

The Starry Plough, 3101 Shattuck Ave. 

21+ 

Free 

 

Wednesday, Nov. 6 

Poetry Slam with host Nazelah Jamison and Karen Ladson 

8:30 p.m. 

The Starry Plough, 3101 Shattuck Ave. 

Cash prizes up to $90 

21+ 

$7/ general, $5/ students with ID 

 

Saturday Nov. 9 

Dorothy Allison and Jewelle Gomez appear in support of Boadecia’s Books 

8 p.m. 

Northbrae Community Church  

941 The Alameda at Solano 

559-9184 

$25, sliding scale 

 

 

 

Thursday, Nov. 7 

“Desert Hearts” 

1 p.m. 

North Berkeley Senior Center, 1901 Hearst St. 

A 1950’s lesbian romance featuring Helen Shaver and Patricia Charbonneau. 

 

Friday, Nov. 8 

“El Che” 

7 p.m. 

Redwood Gardens, 2951 Derby St. 

Film screening followed by salsa dancing to support Berkeley’s Cuban Sister-City Palma Soriano. 

548-6941 

$10 / Sliding scale$15 


Bears’ slide continues against Stanford

By Dean Caparaz
Monday November 04, 2002

The Cal women’s soccer team faces two must-win situations after losing, 2-1, to top-ranked Stanford on Saturday at Edwards Stadium. 

After a promising start to the season that included wins over defending NCAA champion Santa Clara and national power Texas A&M, the Golden Bears have struggled since hitting the Pac-10 part of the schedule. Head coach Kevin Boyd’s team raced out to a 7-2-1 start but has since posted a 2-5-0 record in one of the strongest conferences in the country. 

All-American forward Laura Schott scored early against Stanford to put the Golden Bears up 1-0 and move her within three goals of tying Joy Fawcett’s all-time Cal record of 55. But the Cardinal got two first-half goals from their own All-American forward, Marcia Wallis, to complete the comeback. 

Cal’s overall record fell to 9-7-1. Stanford, which has now beaten Cal two consecutive years after the Golden Bears had won the previous three in a row, improved to 16-1 (7-0 Pac-10). 

The Bears will likely need to beat Arizona this Friday and Arizona State on Sunday to advance to the NCAA tournament. 

“We played well,” Cal coach Kevin Boyd said. “It was a dead even game with the No. 1 team in the country.” 

Stanford outshot Cal, 12-9, and forced Bears goalkeeper Sani Post to make four saves. Cardinal keeper Nicole Barnhart stopped three shots. 

Cal’s Brittany Kirk set up Schott’s second-minute strike, passing the ball to a streaking Schott in the Stanford penalty area. The Cal forward got her right leg on the ball before Barnhart lunged out to grab it. Barnhart got a hand on the shot but couldn’t keep it from falling into her net. 

 

 

 

“It was kind of a thigh ball,” Schott said. “I’ve played with Nicole for a long time, and I knew if I took two touches she’d smother me. I just had to get whatever on it that I could.” 

Kirk’s assist gave the senior midfielder sole possession of third place on the all-time Cal assist list, with 19. Fawcett also holds that record with 23 assists. 

Cal controlled much of the early going, but the dangerous Cardinal eventually woke up. A corner kick produced its first shot and first goal. In the 22nd minute, Marcie Ward took a short corner and passed to Kelsey Carlson, who quickly passed to Natalie Spilger. The defender sent a short ball into the Cal penalty area to Wallis, who turned and fired the ball past Post. 

In the 33rd minute, Stanford forward Jennifer Farenbaugh dropped a long ball into the Cal area to Wallis, who had two shots saved by Post before sending her third effort into the net. 

Despite the loss, Boyd was encouraged by the effort of his Bears, who lost last weekend to Washington and Washington State. 

“We came off a weekend last weekend where the whole team was in the dumpers,” Boyd said. “We had to do a real character check and a team check this whole week to try to make things right. I thought we did that. It’s tough to come out, do that and then lose and feel like you didn’t accomplish it. But in fact we did.” 

If Cal hopes to make the postseason tournament, the Bears need to sweep the Arizona schools in the final weekend of the regular season. 

“If we split, I think we go into the selection show with a rabbit’s foot and hoping we get a little luck,” Boyd said. “I think if we win both, we’re in, and if we lose both, we’re out.”


Balance of power hangs on election

By David Scharfenberg
Monday November 04, 2002

Tomorrow, months of mudslinging and campaign promises will come to a head, with Berkeley voters deciding a tight mayoral race and four City Council contests. But what does it all mean? 

With City Council currently split 5-4 between Berkeley’s “progressive” and “moderate” factions, including Mayor Shirley Dean on the moderate side, activists on both sides say that the stakes are high, with issues like affordable housing, rent control, and the environment hanging in the balance. 

While the candidates have had difficulty distinguishing themselves on most issues with all favoring more affordable housing and better environmental protection, rent control, by contrast, has provided a real dividing line. 

Moderates like Dean and 8th District City Council candidate Gordon Wozniak are calling for curbs on the rent control program, much to the dismay of progressives. But any significant change in rent control policy would require a ballot measure, and citizen support for the program remains strong, making a shift unlikely. 

Everyone agrees that the election could have a significant impact on the tenor and quality of Berkeley’s notoriously divisive political debate. 

Moderates have focused on the 7th District race, where they are backing UC Berkeley student Micki Weinberg in his attempt to unseat progressive City Councilmember Kriss Worthington. Moderates say Worthington is one of the chief instigators of the moderate-progressive brawl and argue that City Council would be more productive without him. 

 

Worthington, expected to win re-election, says the City Council factionalism is regrettable, but argues that it is rooted in real policy differences on affordable housing and the environment that are worth debating.  

Worthington lays the blame for any personal bickering on Dean. The mayor’s chief opponent, former state Assemblyman Tom Bates, also faults Dean for failing to “reach across the aisle.” 

“I think it’s been demonstrated that the mayor cannot work across lines,” said Bates, arguing that he could bring peace to the council. 

But Dean, who says that she has been able to make real progress in her eight years in office despite the factionalism, argued that a Bates victory and progressive triumphs in the City Council races would have a negative impact on local debates over key issues. 

“It’s 5-4 now. If it went 6-3 or 7-2, that would really mean that the wonderful exchange of ideas that makes Berkeley such a wonderful place would all go down the tubes,” Dean said. “It would be a real tyranny of the majority.” 

Progressives, expected to win at least three of the four council seats up for grabs, play down the idea of a leftist super-majority on the council, arguing that the current slate of progressive councilmembers is splintered on many issues. 

“I don’t think it’s going to be a monolithic majority,” said Worthington. 

In addition to Worthington, progressive incumbents Linda Maio in the 1st District and Dona Spring in the 4th District face re-election and are expected to win. The 8th District seat is open after the retirement of moderate Councilmember Polly Armstrong. Moderate Planning Commissioner Gordon Wozniak is considered the favorite by many, but centrist human rights consultant Anne Wagley and progressive-backed UC Berkeley graduate student Andy Katz are strong candidates. 

Voters could shake up the moderate-progressive balance if they elect one of the “independent” candidates in the race. All the challengers, from the moderate Wozniak to the more progressive Katz, say they will provide an independent voice on the council. But a few candidates, like Wagley in District 8 and LA Wood in District 4, make a more plausible claim to falling outside the city’s two “machines.” Both say they will work with both sides if elected. 

 

Contact reporter at scharfenberg@berkeleydailyplanet.net 

 


Hooray for hydrogen

Jeff Hoffman
Monday November 04, 2002

To the Editor: 

 

While it is very good news that AC Transit is thinking about replacing oil-consuming, polluting, diesel buses with hydrogen-powered ones, AC Transit should not have to demonstrate that “fuel cell buses are more reliable, easier, and cheaper to maintain than” diesel buses in order to change to hydrogen. The fact that hydrogen buses do not consume oil (one of the most environmentally destructive activities an individual can engage in) and do not emit any pollutants should be enough reason to change. Reliability and other factors are minor details compared to the environmental destruction that will be eliminated by ending the use of diesel. 

 

Jeff Hoffman 

San Francisco


Niners win battle of bay on second chance

By Greg Beacham
Monday November 04, 2002

OAKLAND – Jose Cortez seized his second chance to win the Battle of the Bay – and Jerry Rice didn’t get much of a chance at all. 

After missing a short field goal as regulation ended, Cortez made a 23-yard field goal seven minutes into overtime as the San Francisco 49ers beat the Oakland Raiders 23-20 Sunday. 

Rice, who set every significant NFL receiving record during 16 seasons with the 49ers, had six catches for 74 yards for the Raiders. But when the game was on the line, he paced on the sideline as San Francisco controlled the ball for more than 15 straight minutes to end the game. 

Cortez made the final kick, but the victory really belonged to Jeff Garcia and the San Francisco offense, which held the ball for the last 6 1/2 minutes of regulation and all of overtime. 

Garcia was 25-of-36 for 282 yards, completing 17 of his 19 passes after halftime to keep the 49ers moving relentlessly downfield. Terrell Owens caught 12 passes for 191 yards, including several key third-down grabs. 

But Cortez sent the Coliseum crowd into delirium and added another remarkable chapter to this entertaining rivalry when he shanked a 27-yard field-goal attempt on the last play of the fourth quarter, leaving the game tied at 20. 

But the 49ers (6-2) won the coin toss and simply never stopped moving, with Garcia completing more than a dozen consecutive passes. That set up Cortez for another kick, and this time he made no mistake. 

The Raiders have lost four straight following a 4-0 start. 

Rich Gannon was 18-of-28 for 164 yards, ending his NFL-record streak of six straight 300-yard games. 

Garcia hit Tai Streets with a 2-yard TD pass in the middle of the end zone with 12:57 left in regulation, giving San Francisco a 20-13 lead. But Gannon completed a fourth-down pass to Porter to extend the next drive, which ended with a 10-yard TD run by Charlie Garner with 6:28 left. 

On the final drive of regulation, the 49ers moved from midfield to the Oakland 9 with deliberate precision that exhausted the Raiders’ timeouts and silenced the Coliseum. But Cortez, who had made 12 straight field goals entering the game, pushed the easy kick wide left. 

In the first regular-season meeting of teacher and student, Owens outshone Rice – but only because the 49ers simply wouldn’t allow Rice, Gannon and company on the field. 

Excelling against the Raiders’ spotty bump-and-run coverage, Owens got open repeatedly in the middle of Oakland’s secondary. Even the return of Pro Bowl cornerback Charles Woodson, who’d missed the last seven weeks with a broken shoulder, didn’t slow down Owens in his biggest game of the season. 

The players claimed they don’t have any special enmity for one another, but the rivalry brought the first sellout crowd of the season to the Coliseum. 

Thousands of Raiders fans in full regalia booed the Niners at every turn, but fans of both teams sat peacefully together in every section.


County ready to vote

Daily Planet Wire Service
Monday November 04, 2002

Voters in cities across Alameda County will elect a county supervisor on Election Day, as well as a Bay Area Rapid Transit District director, mayors, and city council members. 

Oakland voters will elect a 4th District council member to replace Dick Spees, who decided not to seek re-election this year following a 24-year run on the City Council. Jean Quan, a member of the Oakland Unified School District Board of Education, Is running against attorney David A. Stein for the seat. 

City of Alameda voters will elect a new mayor among councilmembers Barbara A. Kerr and Beverly Johnson, retired Navy Capt. Bill Withrow, and school supervisor Denise Timney Ranish. Voters in the island city will also elect two members of the City Council. 

Voters in the cities of San Leandro, Dublin, and Pleasanton will all elect mayors and members of the city council on Nov. 5. Voters in Fremont and Albany will choose two members of the city council. 

The voters of Castro Valley, who will also vote on whether to become an incorporated city, will elect five members for the possible city council for the proposed municipality. 

In the Board of Supervisors race, 3rd District incumbent Alice Lai-Bitker is running against the late Ralph Appezzato, former mayor of Alameda who took his own life in mid-September, but whose name remains on the ballot. 

If Appezzato is elected, the Board of Supervisors will then have 60 days to make an appointment to the vacant seat. In the event that the board does not make an appointment, it would be up to the governor to fill the seat. 

Thomas M. Blalock and Nancy Jewell Cross are vying for the 6th District seat of San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit.


Strong words against a war with Iraq

First Congregational Church of Berkeley, Peace and Justice Ministry Team
Monday November 04, 2002

Strong words against a war with Iraq 

To the Editor: 

 

We firmly oppose the call to a new war with Iraq made by the Bush administration and recently approved by the U.S. Congress. 

We call on our leaders to step back from the brink of war. We call on the American people to seek solutions to the forces of division and violence in our midst. 

The case for a pre-emptive attack on Iraq fails to persuade us or the world community. In particular, there is no evidence that Iraq is an imminent threat. A pre-emptive attack by the United States to deal with weapons proliferation would establish a dangerous precedent 

Unilateral military action against Iraq is detrimental to U.S. interests. The U.S. must cooperate with international efforts to constrain militarization in the region. 

The human cost of the new war would be enormous. The ordinary people of Iraq should not bear the burden of deprivation and death such a war would surely exact on them. 

We expect our government to reflect the values we hold dear – pursuing peace not war; self-defense with courage; working with the community of nations; respecting international law and treaties while holding in high regard all human life. 

 

First Congregational Church of Berkeley, Peace and Justice Ministry Team 

Berkeley


Scoreboard

Monday November 04, 2002

Scoreboard 

Football - St. Patrick 40, St. Mary’s 35 

The Panthers (4-3-1, 2-1) suffered their first BSAL loss as St. Patrick’s (4-4, 2-1) Pat O’Donnell ran for the winning touchdown with 37 seconds left, then intercepted a pass to end the game. O’Donnell rushed for 316 yards and four touchdowns, outmatching St. Mary’s Fred Hives’ 229 yards and three scores. 

 

Men’s Water Polo - Cal 11, UC Davis 5 

The third-ranked Bears followed up their upset of No. 1 Stanford by beating the Aggies. Attila Banhidy racked up a hat trick for Cal (15-4, 4-2), while Tom Jay did the same for UC Davis (14-11). 

 

Women’s Volleyball - UCLA 3, Cal 0 

The Bruins (13-10, 6-7) prevailed 30-23, 32-30, 30-24 as Cal star Mia Jerkov watched from the sideline with a sprained ankle. Freshman Jenna Brown led the Bears (15-8, 5-8) with 14 kills. 

 

Field Hockey - Cal 2, Stanford 1 (OT) 

Cal All-American Nora Feddersen scored the game-winner in the 81st minute to clinch a perfect NorPac Conference season for the Bears (11-6, 6-0). Amanda Billmyer tied the game for Stanford (8-10, 4-2) with seven minutes remaining in regulation.


Victims of August blaze return home

By Sophia Tareen
Monday November 04, 2002

After nine weeks of living in local hotels, the 69 residents of fire-damaged UA Homes finally moved home last week. 

A two-alarm fire burned the 75-unit, low-income residential hotel at 1040 University Ave. in the early morning hours of Aug. 26. The building passed final safety inspections last Wednesday, and all but eight units have been restored. Those most heavily damaged units will be ready in January, said Mikal Pruitt the administrator of UA Homes.  

Resources for Community Development, which owns UA Homes, has been eager for the residents, who are primarily seniors, disabled, and recipients of federal subsidies, to return.  

“It’s finally here and we’re breathing a big sigh of relief,” said Linda Webster director of operations at RCD. “It was a strain on the tenants. They have really prevailed and done well.”  

Rose Patterson, a tenant of UA Homes since 1993, was among those who spent the past nine weeks at the Flamingo Hotel in Berkeley while her apartment was refitted.  

“We function on what we can,” said Patterson wearily as she waited to see her apartment for the first time since the fire. “We survive.”  

The August fire spread through the center of the building through the light well, an open shaft used for ventilation. The recent renovations include constructing a new ventilation system and installing carpeting.  

Pruitt estimated that by January, the cost of renovating the building and relocating the tenants will total nearly half a million dollars. Most of the tab was picked up by RCD and its insurers.


Just say no to hunting

D. Perry
Monday November 04, 2002

To the Editor: 

 

While the homicide rate in Oakland is already nearing one hundred this year, the country is being pushed into a war and a sniper has just held the nation hostage. Do you really think it is a good idea to have an article about deer hunting in Mendicino county (Daily Planet, Oct. 30.) Please take your staff to see Michael Moore’s new movie “Bowling For Columbine.” After watching it, my guess is that you will reevaluate what you print that glorifies gun use. 

 

D. Perry  

Berkeley 


Pac-10 Football Roundup

Staff
Monday November 04, 2002

No. 8 Washington State 44,  

No. 16 Arizona State 22 

PULLMAN, Wash. – Jason Gesser threw three touchdown passes as No. 8 Washington State took over sole possession of first place in the Pac-10 Conference with a 44-22 win over 16th-ranked Arizona State on Saturday. 

Jermaine Green scored on runs of 13 and 10 yards as Washington State became the front-runner for the Rose Bowl. 

The Cougars kept star Sun Devils defensive end Terrell Suggs away from Gesser, who broke Jack Thompson’s school record for career yards passing. Jerome Riley caught two TD passes. 

Gesser was 18-of-32 for 250 yards and was intercepted twice. 

Walter completed 31 of 51 passes for 328 yards, finding Mike Pinkard for scoring passes of 35 and 23 yards, but the Cougars stopped the Sun Devils twice on downs inside the 3-yard line. 

Arizona State was held to 37 yards rushing, while the Cougars ran for 135 yards. 

No. 19 Oregon 41, Stanford 14 

EUGENE, Ore. – Jason Fife threw three touchdown passes and ran for another score Saturday as No. 19 Oregon bounced back from two straight defeats with a 41-14 win over Stanford. 

The Ducks, coming off home losses to Arizona State and Southern California, beat Stanford for just the second time in six tries at Autzen Stadium. 

The Cardinal handed Oregon its only loss last season en route to its second consecutive Pac-10 title and a No. 2 national ranking. 

With the exception of Jason Siegel’s field goal with 1:20 left, the Ducks did all their scoring in the first half — building a 38-7 lead by halftime. 

 

UCLA 34, Washington 24 

SEATTLE – Tyler Ebell ran for 102 yards and three touchdowns, and freshman quarterback Drew Olson was steady if not spectacular in his first start to lead UCLA past Washington 34-24 Saturday night. 

Ebell’s fifth straight 100-yard game helped the Bruins improve to 4-1 on the road this season. UCLA also handed the struggling Huskies their third straight loss. 

Linebacker Spencer Havner sealed the win with 1:17 to play by intercepting a pass from Washington’s Cody Pickett and returning it 41 yards for a TD. 

 

Oregon State 38, Arizona 3 

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Steven Jackson ran for 134 yards and two touchdowns Saturday as Oregon State beat Arizona 38-3 – the exact score they beat the Wildcats by last season. 

It was the fifth straight loss for the Wildcats, who are the Pac-10’s lone winless team. 

Arizona had minus-23 yards rushing and 93 yards overall. It was the second fewest rushing yards allowed by Oregon State in school history. OSU held Oregon to minus-24 yards in 1966. 

Derek Anderson passed for 239 yards and a score for the Beavers, who won their second straight after losing three in a row.


Saddam: public opinion makes attack too unpopular for U.S. to go ahead

By Maamoun Youssef
Monday November 04, 2002

CAIRO, Egypt – Iraqi President Saddam Hussein said in a rare interview that he believed the American and British determination to make war on Iraq could collapse under the weight of anti-war sentiment in the two countries. 

“Time is in our favor, and we have to buy more time hoping that the U.S.-British alliance might disintegrate because of ... the pressure of public opinion on American and British streets,” Saddam told the Egyptian weekly Al-Osboa in the interview published Sunday. 

“The demonstrations in the Arab and Western world include hundreds of thousands of peace-loving people who are protesting the war and aggression on Iraq,” he said, apparently referring to protests in the United States and around the world last month. 

Pointing to Arab public opinion as a force in Iraq’s favor, Saddam also appealed to Arab leaders to defend Iraq. Arguing that Washington’s goal was to control Mideast oil, he said that after attacking Iraq, U.S. forces could strike at other Arab countries and non-Arab Iran. 

Most of Saddam’s statements were standard Iraqi rhetoric – he blamed “Zionist schemes” for Iraq’s troubles and said invading Iraq would not be “a picnic” for American and British forces. 

But his references to anti-war demonstrations in the West were the first signal he believed protests could undermine President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair, the chief advocates of attacking Iraq. 

Al-Osboa published two pictures of its reporter Sayed Nassar with Saddam — one of the interview and the other of the two shaking hands. 

The newspaper said the interview took just over two hours and was conducted at one of Saddam’s presidential palaces on the outskirts of Baghdad, with Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz present. 

Nassar made the trip from his hotel in Baghdad to the interview in three different government-owned luxury cars, each with curtains over the side windows. 

While the United States has said it wants to oust Saddam to eliminate Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction, the Iraqi president maintained in the interview that America’s real design is to take control of Middle East oil to serve the interests of its ally, Israel. 

“The Arab oil will be under the U.S. control and the region, especially where oil flows, will be under full American hegemony. All this serves Israel’s interest with the aim of turning it to a vast empire in the region,” Saddam said. 

U.S. officials have consistently argued their goal is not to control Iraq’s oil.


Sports This Week

Monday November 04, 2002

 

Tuesday 

Girls Volleyball - St. Mary’s vs. St. Elizabeth, 5:15 p.m. at St. Mary’s High 

Girls Volleyball - Berkeley vs. Hercules, 7 p.m. at Berkeley High 

 

Wednesday 

Cross Country - ACCAL Championship, 2 p.m. at Tilden Regional Park, Berkeley 

 

Thursday 

Cross Country - BSAL Championship, TBA at Joaquin Miller Park, Oakland 

Girls Volleyball - St. Mary’s vs. Piedmont, 5:15 p.m. at St. Mary’s High 

Girls Volleyball - Berkeley vs. El Cerrito, 7 p.m. at Berkeley High 

 

Friday 

Women’s Soccer - Cal vs. Arizona, 11:30 p.m. at Edwards Stadium 

Men’s Soccer - Cal vs. UCLA, 2:30 p.m. at Edwards Stadium 

Football - Berkeley vs. Alameda, 7 p.m. at Alameda High 

Football - St. Mary’s vs. John Swett, 7:30 p.m. at John Swett High, Crockett


San Francisco considers growing and distributing marijuana

By Martha Mendoza
Monday November 04, 2002

SAN FRANCISCO – Public pot gardens in San Francisco may be more than just California dreaming. 

Voters here will decide Tuesday whether they want the city to consider growing and distributing marijuana for medical use. 

Passage of the citywide initiative, the first of its kind in the country, would not see green thumbs out Wednesday morning planting public pot patches. Instead, the proposal is a “sense of the voters” measure that would make it city policy to explore establishing a marijuana growth-and-distribution program. 

The proposal comes in response to a series of raids by the Drug Enforcement Agency on marijuana distribution centers that give or sell pot to people with a doctor’s recommendation. 

“Of course we’re pushing the point here, but we’re forced to do this because the federal government has continued to proactively interfere with our most ill and vulnerable citizen’s access their medicine,” said San Francisco Supervisor Mark Leno, the initiative’s author. 

DEA Administrator Asa Hutchinson said it’s not good public policy. 

Providing marijuana to sick people is not only against the law, he said, but could be harmful because “the scientific and medical communities have concluded that there is no future in smoked marijuana as medicine.” 

“When it comes to deciding what is safe and effective medicine, I think it would be wise to follow the guidance of science,” Hutchinson said. 

The American Medical Association and the San Francisco Republican Party are also opposed, but the initiative is widely supported by state and local leaders and most San Francisco political organizations. 

Tuesday’s vote is the latest salvo in a community fight to legalize marijuana for medical use. 

Marijuana is illegal under federal law, but legal under California law and San Francisco ordinance if it’s part of a medical treatment. 

The result? 

“It’s pretty much OK to smoke pot here,” said Clark Sullivan, who lit up openly with dozens of other marijuana law reform advocates at a fund-raiser last weekend. 

Snacking on hors d’oeurves and smoking marijuana, Sullivan pointed to the city’s police headquarters just a block away. 

“If a cop rolls by and sees you smoking a joint, you’re OK,” said Sullivan. “That’s one of the reasons I live here.” 

A few feet away, District Attorney Terrence Hallinan, the prosecutor who routinely refuses to prosecute medical marijuana cases, said the initiative sends an important message but could be difficult to carry out. 

“The idea that the city would actually grow marijuana is to my mind a little dangerous in that it could provoke a direct confrontation with the federal government,” he said. 

DEA agents have already raided several of San Francisco’s medical marijuana providers, as well as providers in other California communities during the past year. For the most part, those raids took place without support from local law enforcement. 

“This has been a political hot potato for the Bush administration” said Tim Lynch, director of the conservative Cato Institute’s project on criminal justice. “The president talks about federalism, and yet the stance of the administration in these drug cases undermines what he says.” 

In 1996, California became the first state to approve the use of marijuana for medical ailments. Since then, eight other states have passed medicinal marijuana laws. 

San Francisco’s health department issues medical marijuana use cards to patients who have a doctor’s recommendation. Police have refused to participate in raids and last year city leaders declared San Francisco a sanctuary for medical cannabis use. 

“We’re not expecting our mayor or our board of supervisors to become part-time agriculturists growing this herb,” said Wayne Justmann, who’s been HIV positive for more than 15 years, carries the first city-issued ID card and operates one of San Francisco’s 11 remaining pot clubs. 

Justmann said there are other people in San Francisco – patients and caregivers – who are experienced at growing pot and could help the city’s government. 

“San Francisco is on the front line on the war against drugs,” said Keith Stroup, a Washington, D.C. public interest attorney who founded the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws in 1970 and currently heads the organization. 

Marijuana law reform initiatives are also on the ballots in Arizona, South Dakota and Nevada and several legal cases challenging federal authority are working their way through state courts.


Police Briefs

Matthew Artz
Monday November 04, 2002

 

n Suspicious package 

Berkeley police responded to a bomb scare Wednesday at Mechanics Bank on the 1800 block of Solano Avenue. According to police at about 8:30 a.m. an assistant bank manager noticed a box with the word “BOMB” scrawled on it in ball point pen. Police diverted traffic from the block and evacuated employees of nearby businesses. Bomb Squad officers x-rayed the box and determined that it was empty. The box was taken to be examined for evidence. 

 

n Bike safety 

Police drug task force officers stopped a man for riding his bicycle on the sidewalk at Heinz and 8th streets at 12:23 p.m. Monday. The man turned out to be on probation for dug offenses and was in possession of approximately two grams of suspected methamphetamine, syringes and over $400 in cash. Jody Allen Curtis, 42, was arrested for possession of methamphetamine, drug paraphernalia and probation violation. 

 


Bay Area Briefs

Monday November 04, 2002

S.F. Opera fined for accident 

SAN FRANCISCO – The state is leveling a $70,000 fine on the San Francisco Opera after a stagehand fell 22 feet from a hydraulic lift. 

Francis Kenny, 43, suffered a broken leg and head trauma in the June 27 fall. 

Now, the California Occupational Safety and Health Administration is fining the opera for allegedly knowing the lift was dangerously unstable. Cal-OSHA says the opera committed a “willful serious violation” by removing two of the lift’s legs to fit it into a tight space. 

“It says right on the equipment not to operate without all four outriggers deployed,” OSHA spokesman Dean Fryer told the San Francisco Chronicle. 

Cal-OSHA has issued 16,915 citations in the last year and only 37 have been designated as “willful.” 

Opera officials said they will probably appeal the citation. That means an administrative law judge would hear the case. 

The opera is “as safe as other theaters,” said Patrick Markle, its technical director. “And we are taking proactive steps to create an even safer environment for our workers.” 

Clerk faces charges for flashing gun 

PALO ALTO – A 74-year-old liquor store clerk is facing misdemeanor charges after flashing his revolver to scare a teenager who was allegedly trying to steal sweets. 

Claude Ferris Baker Jr. faces charges of brandishing a weapon. If convicted, he could face up to a year in jail. 

Baker says he never threatened to shoot the boy.


State Briefs

Monday November 04, 2002

L.A. wants $1.4 billion from feds for health care 

LOS ANGELES – Federal health officials have proposed giving Los Angeles County $150 million to bolster its ailing health care system. But the offer falls far short of the $1.4 billion county officials say is needed to avert massive cuts. 

Federal authorities stressed Friday that negotiations are not over and the offer is not final. 

County residents will vote Tuesday on a ballot initiative that would raise property taxes to pump $168 million into the county’s emergency and trauma care network. If Measure B is approved, an owner of a 1,400-square-foot home would pay about $42 more annually. 

County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky said the $150 million offered by the federal government is nowhere near enough. 

 

Missing meerkats found 

SANTA BARBARA – Five meerkats that were loaned, lost and finally found in Texas will be returned Sunday to their rightful home at the Santa Barbara Zoo, 

The turnout for the homecoming is expected to be large, said zoo director Rich Block. 

Meerkats are slim-tailed members of the mongoose family, native to Southern Africa’s Kalahari Desert. 

The case of the missing meerkats has drawn attention from animal lovers across the state who feared the furry critters had become supper for the coyotes, bobcats, cougars and buzzards that roam the rural Texas hills outside San Antonio. 

The saga began two years ago, after a meerkat population boom hit the zoo. Most of those babies were loaned to well-known, accredited zoos. 

But five males went to the unaccredited New Braunfels Zoo in Texas. It closed a short time later and the meerkats disappeared. 

Block estimates that the rescue effort will wind up costing between $15,000 and $20,000. 

“We have the most expensive meerkats in history, I think,” he said. 

 

Cops visit adult Web sites at work 

CORONA – Local police dispatchers visited adult, gambling, job-hunting and other inappropriate Web sites while using police computers on the job, according to records obtained by The Press-Enterprise in Riverside. 

The records also show several dispatchers have been disciplined. 

Corona police officials refused to discuss measures taken against the workers or discuss what types of Web sites were visited.


Davis, Simon hit the road in races’ final hours

By Alexa H. Bluth
Monday November 04, 2002

LOS ANGELES – With less than 48 hours until election day, Gov. Gray Davis and challenger Bill Simon raced to seal key votes Sunday and urged residents to get to the polls. 

Davis set out on a two-day sweep through the state, jetting from port cities to the farm-rich inland valley. He was with fellow candidates on a slate that hopes to win the first Democratic sweep of statewide offices in California history. 

Davis began the day at the West Angeles Church of God in Christ, telling a predominantly black congregation that he has worked to improve access to health care and education for all. 

He urged them to vote for Democrats. 

“This election is not about me,” he said. “It’s about you and your future. It’s about your children and their future. With your help and God’s blessing, we’ll continue to make progress for all Californians.” 

Davis then took a charter jet to San Diego for a get-out-the-vote rally with union workers. 

Meanwhile, Simon and his Republican ticketmates were joined by Arizona Sen. John McCain at a rally in San Diego’s Balboa Park. About 200 people were at the outdoor stop. 

McCain, co-author of the bill that overhauled federal campaign finance rules, delivered a stinging attack against the governor’s fund-raising practices. 

Davis “has put a for-sale sign on the governor’s office of the state of California, in violation of everything I’ve ever stood for and believed in,” McCain said. 

There have been a series of controversies surrounding the governor’s collection of some $68 million in contributions, including some from donors with personal stakes in state business. 

In his speech, Simon repeated his attacks on the governor’s fund-raising tactics and handling of the state’s recent energy crisis. 

“He’s broken his word on so many occasions, and that’s why when Gray Davis asks for four more years, I respond, how about three more days?” Simon said.


Many voters putting off decision

By Jim Wasserman
Monday November 04, 2002

SACRAMENTO – They’re the indecisive and waiters, middle of the roaders, inattentive, the late deciders. Just hours shy of polls opening, they’re still holding their noses and up for grabs — the greatest bumper crop of disaffected voters in California memory. 

At Baron’s Books in Anaheim, employee Myra Vevenecia, a 39-year-old Orange County Republican, says, “I haven’t made up my mind on which one, only because they both seem pretty rotten. It’s not going to be Simon or Davis. I’m thinking, actually, the Green Party guy, I don’t know his name. That will be a first.” 

Pollsters say they’ve never seen anything like it. An estimated 25 percent of California voters aren’t committing to either major candidate. A political analyst says the race for insurance commissioner may draw more votes. 

“That is, to my mind, a shocking statistic,” says Stanford University political science professor Shanto Iyengar. “I think that’s extraordinarily high. It’s emblematic of the mud. A plague on both houses.” 

“I am disgusted with both candidates,” explains Monika Weiler, 50, who works at a downtown San Francisco law office. “I was very unhappy with the way Davis handled the power crisis and Simon is too conservative. It truly is choosing the lesser of two evils.” 

Weiler usually votes for Democrats and supported Davis in 1998. Now, in a mind that California needs change, she may try Simon. 

Such sentiment swells Republican hopes for an upset. But Iyengar says, “Going out on a limb, I’d be shocked if Simon won. People are risk averse. Often, I think they prefer the devil they know to what they don’t.” 

The newest Field Poll reveals that most Protestants favor Simon while a majority of Roman Catholics likes Davis. It holds that women, union members, African-Americans and Hispanics prefer Davis, while whites in general prefer Simon. 

But beyond such certainties lies mainly mystery about Tuesday. What will the 25 percent – the independents, nonpartisans, the less informed and less interested, the disaffecteds – really do in the booth? Will the 8 percent who favor third parties remember Ralph Nader’s effect on the 2000 presidential race and lose their nerve? Will three percent who say they’ll leave the ballots blank really do it? 

Among the undecideds, Jonathon Condit, a 33-year-old San Francisco waiter, still doesn’t know. Reflecting sentiment reported by pollsters, he says, “The whole campaign has turned me off to the election. I couldn’t get to the issues. You come away with a feeling not of the issues, but of who can sling the most mud.” 

Political pros acknowledge it’s been that kind of campaign. 

“When a candidate is calling the other a criminal and the other is calling his opponent an incompetent, there’s not a lot left for most voters,” says Dan Schnur, a Republican consultant and former aide to Gov. Pete Wilson.


Microsoft competitors mostly mum as users complain

By Bob Porterfield
Monday November 04, 2002

SAN JOSE – Microsoft Corp.’s rivals vowed to continue to push for a stronger antidote to the software giant’s domination of the software market after a court ruling largely upheld the federal government’s remedies. 

Sun Microsystems Inc., long one of Microsoft’s harshest critics, urged the nine states that objected to the federal government’s antitrust settlement to appeal the decision made Friday by U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly. 

“Choice, innovation and competition form the foundation of the technology industry,” said Sun Microsystems attorney Michael Morris. “(Friday’s) ruling does little to advance these principles or to protect the millions of developers and businesses that want an open marketplace.” 

AOL Time Warner Inc.’s Web browser subsidiary, Netscape, will continue to battle Microsoft in a pending lawsuit “designed to promote competition and deter further anticompetitive behavior,” said Paul T. Cappuccio, the company’s general counsel. 

Microsoft nearly drove Netscape out of business in the late 1990s when it melded its own Explorer Web browser into the Windows operating system that controls more than 90 percent of all personal computers. 

AOL wound up buying Netscape after it relinquished its leadership in the Web browser market to Microsoft. 

“The effort to constrain Microsoft’s monopoly has neither ended, nor been without result,” Cappuccio said. 

Jon von Tetzchner, CEO of another Web browser maker Opera Software in Oslo, Norway, also expressed disappointment with Kollar-Kotelly’s decision. 

“It isn’t very much of a settlement at all,” he said. “Microsoft was found guilty. There were no real remedies, no actual punishment.” 

Morris said Palo Alto-based Sun will continue to pursue its own civil lawsuit against Microsoft so the company “does not continue to use its monopoly position to become the gatekeeper of the Internet.” 

University of Baltimore law professor Bob Lande characterized the decision as “either a total victory for Microsoft or close to it. 

“They ought to be celebrating in Redmond tonight. The states just didn’t convince the judge of the bulk of their issues,” Lande said. “The judge didn’t buy their story ... it’s going to be really hard for the states to appeal this successfully.” 

Nine states, including California, had argued that the settlement didn’t go far enough in protecting consumers and giving competitors a fair chance to compete with Windows products. 

California Attorney General Bill Lockyer said an appeal of Friday’s decision is possible, but indicated he is inclined to enforce the provisions of the federal government’s settlement. 

“I would regard the outcome as neither total victory nor total defeat.” Lockyer said. 

Consumers shopping at popular computer store in the heart of Silicon Valley Friday had a mixed reaction to the ruling. 

“I like Microsoft products, and I don’t have a vendetta against (chairman) Bill Gates, but they really needed to be slapped down,” said Mark Banks, 41, of Morgan Hill, Calif. “Only time will tell if (these sanctions) are enough, but it sounds like a good start.” 

As he carried a computer with the Windows XP system, Kevin Wallace of Fremont said the decision virtually assures nothing will change in the high-tech industry. “There is just too much Microsoft and not enough of the little guy.” 

Preserving the status quo sounded fine to Ernest Yu of Hayward. 

“I have tried a lot of different things out there and I haven’t seen anything that can run the number of applications that Windows does. I haven’t seen anything that is perfect. I like Windows.”


Song-swapping’s growing popularity is cutting into online music sales

By Ron Harris
Monday November 04, 2002

SAN FRANCISCO – The growing popularity of CD burning and illegal song-swapping over the Internet has caused online music sales to tumble this year, according to a survey to be released Monday. 

Online sales of prerecorded music lagged behind last year’s totals through the third quarter by $185 million in sales, or 25 percent, according to the study conducted by research firm comScore Networks. 

Music sales via the Internet this year have reached $545 million through the third quarter, well behind last year’s total of $730 for the same time period. 

The study showed former Napster users flocked to alternative file-sharing networks such as Kazaa and Morpheus. After Napster went offline for good in the summer of 2001, Morpheus’ user base grew from less than one million in June 2001 to 7.2 million in March 2002, comScore found. 

Phil Leigh, an analyst for Raymond James & Associates, said consumers increasingly are seeking the instant gratification from free downloads with which online CD orders can’t compare. And the ability to burn those downloads to blank CDs offers computer users even more personalization and choice that CDs don’t offer, Leigh said. 

“The primary message of the CD burner is the consumer doesn’t want to be straightjacketed into buying a prepackaged CD,” Leigh said. “I think what we’re seeing is not only the death of the physical form factor, but the death of the prepackaged concept.” 

There also are legitimate ways to buy downloads online, such as Listen.com’s Rhapsody service as well as MusicNet and pressplay, two joint ventures launched by the major recording companies to counter illegal song-sharing. 

But those services have yet to release any figures on how many people have actually signed up and it is hard to gauge their popularity in the face of free downloads from Morpheus and Gnutella network programs. 

Leigh said free downloads and CD burning have liberated the consumer “so that she can have what she wants on a disc, and not three (songs) she wants and five she doesn’t.”


Survey: Caltech has fewest black freshmen of top universities

The Associated Press
Monday November 04, 2002

PASADENA – The California Institute of Technology has the lowest percentage of black freshmen among the nation’s top 25 universities, according to a survey by the Journal of Blacks in Higher Education. 

The journal tracked the number of black students accepted at universities ranked the best by U.S. News & World Report this year. It found that only three of the 13 black students accepted by Caltech actually enrolled, which is slightly more than one percent of the freshman class. 

In contrast, 63 black students enrolled at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology this year. The university also had 443 black applicants compared to only 44 at Caltech. However, both schools reported a similar acceptance rate for black applicants, close to 29 percent. 

The leading schools in the survey were Duke University, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Stanford University. The 2002 freshman class at these three schools was more than 10 percent black. 

The survey also found black enrollments declined this year by 6.6 percent at the University of California, Berkeley. There are 142 black freshmen, making up 3.9 percent of the first-year class. 

The survey said the university is still trying to recover from Proposition 209, which banned affirmative action at California state universities. As a result, black enrollments dropped from 273 in 1997 to 113 in 1998. 

Over the years, Caltech officials said they have made an effort to boost minority enrollment. In 1997, the university established presidential scholarships that considered diversity and merit. That year, Caltech had the largest number of black freshman, with eight students. 

“Change doesn’t happen overnight,” said Miriam Feldblum, a special assistant to Caltech President David Baltimore. “But we are very optimistic about all the different initiatives we’ve put in place.” 

Caltech has created new staff positions to focus on minority affairs, encouraged administrators to create scholarships and initiatives for underrepresented students and urged faculty members to expand outreach efforts. 

“If a prospective African-American student comes and sees very few (peers), that makes it more difficult. We initially had a very similar problem with women,” said Gary Lorden, a Caltech mathematics professor and former vice president of student affairs. 

John Dabiri, a black graduate student from Toledo, Ohio, said Caltech needs stronger recruitment efforts. 

“Some people worry about stigma of affirmative action, but I think there are so many well-qualified women and minorities in science and engineering now it really becomes a moot point,” he said.


Arrest made in fatal wreck

Daily Planet Wire Service
Monday November 04, 2002

PLEASANTON – The California Highway Patrol arrested a person on suspicion of drunken driving Sunday morning after a car collided with a truck on Interstate Highway 680 and killed one person. 

Preliminary reports indicate that a medium-sized, delivery truck was parked on the shoulder of the highway when it was struck by a Honda compact, apparently traveling at high speed, at 1 a.m. on southbound I-680 near Sunol Boulevard. 

“They got the car that was crunched into a tight ball onto a flat bed,” reported on eyewitness, who also said that a body was lying behind the truck on the ground. 

The California Highway Patrol had been working to extricate the driver of the Honda before making an arrest for suspicion of drunken driving at 3:25 a.m.


Day of the Dead reaches beyond

By Brian Kluepfel
Saturday November 02, 2002

Rather than fearing death, Day of the Dead (Dia de los Muertos) winks at it, seeing it simply as part of the natural cycle of life. Throughout Latin America and other places where the tradition is honored, the first two days of November are a time to remember deceased friends and relatives with altars, visits to their graves and offerings of music and food. 

Berkeley sculptor Carol Stewart first discovered Day of the Dead in her travels through Latin America. Soon afterward she was incorporating them into her art work. “When people in my family died, we didn’t know how to deal with it,” she said. “We could never express our grief. In Latin America, they thumb their nose at death, and see it as the other side of the coin. I think that’s really healthy.”  

In recent years, awareness of the Day of the Dead has grown outside its traditional boundaries. Several Berkeley artists, including Stewart, were chosen this year to make contributions to San Francisco gallery SomArts’ Day of the Dead exhibit, and in doing so, have shown how the non-Latino community has embraced the day of remembrance. 

Stewart’s contribution to the exhibit “Under the Skin” is a collection of figurines draped with fabric, encircled with wire and illuminated from behind.  

She said the piece represents her father’s death this year from melanoma, with the figures symbolizing the body and the wire symbolizing the cancer. “There’s a thin veil between life and death,” she said. “I saw that with my father.”  

Printmaker and Berkeley resident Elizabeth Addison’s altar, “She Could Have Danced All Night,” pays tribute to her friend Nancy Wilcox who also died of cancer this year. Wilcox loved dancing and parties, said Addison, and her exhibit includes prints of couples dancing and embracing. 

“It really took on a life of its own,” said Addison. Her tribute reveals traditional and modern influence. It includes a collage that Wilcox made entitled “Mexican Dresses” and computer-generated music by Wilcox’ son. A slide projection of William Shakespeare’s 30th Sonnet, which Addison read at her friend’s memorial service this spring, enfolds and completes the altar.  

Addison spoke highly of show curator Rene Yañez, who has been organizing Day of the Dead events in the Bay Area for three decades. “Rene really tries to make it cross-cultural, and we all bring our own sensibilities to it. It’s not something that’s strictly Hispanic,” she said. 

Berkeley artist Jos Sances agreed. “I’ve been working with Rene for over 20 years, and he was always a guy who was into sharing culture, not keeping it separate,” said Sances, whose own tribute to the late Fetterly Gallery director Dan Robeski is included in the SomArts show. “The cross-hybridization adds 

vitality to the show,” he said.  

For Sances, who grew up in New England, Day of the Dead evokes “the bittersweet melancholy of autumn. There’s an understanding that the light is diminishing and the cold of winter is in front of you,” he said. “It’s a very profound time for me and as close to spiritual as I get.”  

Sances says that the Halloween he grew up with does not come close to its Latin American counterpart. “It never had the resonance of Day of the Dead,” he said. “This really ties it all together for me.”  

Curator Yañez has personally experienced how the Day of the Dead has changed. “At first, Day of the Dead was celebrated solely within the Mexican-American community,” said Yanez. “Now, it’s been adopted by people of many cultures and religions. The Bay Area can take credit for celebrating the Day of the Dead and influencing mainstream U.S. culture.”


Mass mailing misleading?

Eric Gilmore
Saturday November 02, 2002

To the Editor: 

 

I was dismayed, although not surprised considering the source, to see such misleading information in the recent mass mailer against Measure O, the initiative demanding organic, fair-trade, or shade-grown coffee. Why does the mass mailer mislead voters by implying that a violation automatically brings a six-month jail term? The truth is that the penalty is up to a $100 fine or up to six months in jail, or both; a range of penalties are provided and left to a judge's discretion. A possible jail component is standard for a misdemeanor, which in Berkeley includes such things as an unauthorized barbeque on public property or riding a bicycle on the sidewalk. Ever hear of anyone going to jail for doing those things? Here’s another idea for coffee vendors: comply with the law and don’t worry about the penalty. 

The opposition, who call themselves - believe it or not - Friends of All Small Farmers, is funded almost entirely by political action committees and big corporate coffee interests, such as Peet's and Starbucks. Do Berkeley voters really think that these corporations truly have the interests of small farmers in mind? Can they be trusted to protect the environment? Why do you think these “Friends” refused every opportunity to debate the proponents of the initiative? Coffee corporations would rather be unregulated and unaccountable, allowing them to reap record profits while the environment suffers and workers struggle to survive.  

 

 

Eric Gilmore 

Berkeley


Rows of early 20th century homes line early streetcar lines

By Susan Cerny
Saturday November 02, 2002

After the electric streetcar was introduced in 1891, and then consolidated and expanded in 1903, the streets along the routes, and within walking distance of a streetcar stop, were subdivided for homes. Martin Luther King, Jr. Way (formerly Grove Street) was the location of the earliest electric street car, and today is lined with 2 to 3 story houses called “Classic Boxes.”  

The Classic Box was so popular after the Chicago World's Fair of 1893, that streetcar suburbs across the United States and Canada were soon filled with them. They are quintessentially North American and were built with little regard for climate or location from Key West to Vancouver, British Cloumbia.  

With established electric streetcar lines, Berkeley became an increasingly popular residential community especially after the 1906 earthquake and fire which resulted in a sudden increase in Berkeley's population. Many who had lost their homes in San Francisco considered Berkeley a safer alternative and the city's population grew from 13,000 in 1900 to 42,000 in 1910.  

It was during this building boom that the Classic Box was so popular. There are many variations of this square or rectangular boxy style, but they usually are 2 to 3 stories high and have hipped roofs with central dormers. Some were designed by architects, some are wide and large, and some narrow and small. Some have elaborate classic details and others are plain and covered with brown shingles in the “Craftsman Style.” Some were designed to look like single family dwellings but were actually built with two to four units. They have a good flexible floor plan, and are easy to convert to multiple units or for making additions to the rear without changing the facade. In Berkeley they date from about 1895 to 1915, so they are rather old.  

Because these houses were built along major public transportation corridors, and in the now older sections of town closest to downtown, they are being lost at an alarming rate everywhere. Berkeley, over the years, has lost entire blocks of these large, handsome houses, particularly in central Berkeley.  

Buildings such as these Classic Boxes, and later the California bungalows, give Berkeley a special character not found in the newer communities of California where the majority of the population lives. They provide housing options that are more varied than the corporate alternative.  

Berkeley is a very nice and rather interesting older American city with layers of history in a real setting. It can never be a European city. Preserving Berkeley's homes and its neighborhoods protects those aspects of Berkeley, which make it unique, worth living in and exploring. 

 

Susan Cerny is the author of the book “Berkeley Landmarks” and writes this column in conjunction with the Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association.


Run-DMC’s acclaimed DJ an unlikely target

By Larry McShane
Saturday November 02, 2002

NEW YORK — As one of the forefathers of rap, with a history of social activism, Run-DMC’s Jam Master Jay was an unlikely target for the kind of violence that killed rappers Tupac Shakur or the Notorious B.I.G. 

He was married with three kids, and a fixture in the Queens neighborhood where he grew up. Yet authorities were searching Thursday for the gunman who killed the 37-year-old disc jockey with a gunshot to the head inside his recording studio. 

“Jam Master Jay was a longtime family man and one of the founders of the group that knocked down all the doors for hip-hop, and a dear friend of mine,” said Russell Simmons, the hip-hop impresario whose brother Joe was Jay’s bandmate. 

“I loved him,” said a devastated Simmons. “I will miss him. He is irreplaceable.” 

Chuck D, frontman for rappers Public Enemy, agreed with that sentiment. 

“You draw the comparison to when John Lennon was shot,” he said. “It’s an enormous loss to the genre.” 

The DJ — whose real name was Jason Mizell — was the man behind the music, working the turntables as Joe “Run” Simmons and Darryl “DMC” McDaniels rapped over his hard rock beats on hits like “Rock Box,” “King of Rock” and their Top 40 cover of Aerosmith’s “Walk This Way.” 

“He was family to me,” McDaniels said. “He stuck to the true essence of what a DJ in a hip-hop performance should be. The whole music industry has lost a great talent.” 

He spun and scratched records on twin turntables simultaneously, creating a new style and sound that was copied by endless disc jockeys. “If Grandmaster Flash was the first famous DJ, Jay had to be the second,” said Andre Harrell, a Mizell contemporary who now heads Nu America Music. 

While breaking new ground, Run-DMC made hip-hop commercially viable, becoming a platinum-selling act that earned a 1987 Grammy nomination. 

In a 2001 interview with The Associated Press, Mizell talked about how some initially said rap was a passing fad. 

“I hated that, because even before we were making records, I knew it couldn’t be a fad because it was the biggest thing in the world to me,” he said. 

Run-DMC created opportunities for untold rappers to follow, expanding their work into movies and a line of clothing. 

“It’s a terrible loss,” Adam Horovitz of the Beastie Boys, who joined Run-DMC on a national tour in the mid-1980s. “If Jam Master Jay and Run-DMC hadn’t looked out for us way back when, I don’t know where we’d be now.” 

Run-DMC, three friends who hailed from the Hollis section of Queens, was always above the thuggishness that later came to dominate hip-hop. “It’s not like we just have scrambled brains and gold chains,” McDaniels once told the AP. 

Last year, Simmons said: “We never talked about nothing that was ungodly too much anyways. Run-DMC was no thugged-out gangsta killers, cursing all over their records.”


Berkeley defense dominates showdown with Spartans

By Jared Green
Saturday November 02, 2002

The Berkeley Yellowjackets had a 7-0 record heading into Friday night’s showdown with Pinole Valley High, built mostly on overwhelming wins over underwhelming opponents. Berkeley had surrendered just 55 points all season and had the second-rated defense in the Bay Area. The question was, were the Jackets ready to take down a quality opponent and beat the Spartans for the first time in seven years? 

The Berkeley defense answered that question with a resounding yes. It held the Spartans scoreless while the Jacket offense got three scores off of Pinole Valley turnovers, and Berkeley (8-0 overall, 5-0 ACCAL) prevailed, 17-0, to take command of the Alameda-Contra Costa Athletic League race. 

“I knew we were good enough to shut them out, but once the game starts, mistakes get made,” Berkeley defensive coordinator Ronald Moore said. “But the defense played pretty much a perfect game tonight.” 

The Yellowjackets intercepted three Anthony Lopez passes, including Patrick Henderson’s pick that the sophomore returned 78 yards to the Pinole Valley 10 with four minutes left in the game. Fellow sophomore Antoine Cokes scored on a sweep on the next play to give the Jackets an insurmountable 17-0 lead. 

Pinole Valley (6-2, 4-1) managed just 142 yards in the game, including a meager 33 in the first half. Berkeley’s offense wasn’t much better, gaining just 181 yards, but the Yellowjackets didn’t commit a turnover and took advantage of some great field position in the second half. 

“The idea was not to be too aggressive and not make mistakes,” Berkeley offensive coordinator Clarence Johnson said. “We wanted to use the field position that our defense gave us.” 

The Jackets were almost too patient, failing to score touchdowns on two drives inside the Pinole Valley 10-yard line in the first half. But the Jackets did put the winning points on the scoreboard when kicker Terrell Elliot made a 27-yard field goal as time expired in the first half. 

Berkeley caught the break it needed right away in the second half, as Pinole Valley’s Damarea Johnson fumbled the opening kickoff right into the waiting hands of Berkeley’s Finus Cokes on the 14-yard line. Quarterback Dessalines Gant used a nice second effort to score from the 1 for a 10-0 Berkeley lead. 

The Berkeley defense stood strong against the vaunted Pinole Valley running game, allowing the Spartans less than three yards per carry. Anchored by tackles Jamal Lucas-Johnson and Myron Seals and with Robert Hunter-Ford, Rodney Jones and Julian James attacking from the edges, the Yellowjackets swarmed the Pinole Valley running backs every time they touched the ball.  

The Jackets also had three sacks of Lopez, all in the second half, and Jones caused one of the interceptions by dragging Lopez down as the quarterback threw the ball into cornerback Robert Young’s arms in the third quarter. Hunter-Ford came up with Berkeley’s first interception, reading a screen pass and stepping into the passing lane just before halftime to set up Elliot’s field goal. 

While the victory was certainly enjoyed by all of the Berkeley players, Johnson-Lucas was more grateful than most. The 300-pound senior missed last season’s ACCAL-title-deciding game against the Spartans due to academics, and he took out two years’ worth of frustration on Friday night. Johnson-Lucas was a monster in the middle, pile-driving any Spartan running back who dared run up the gut. 

“I had a whole lot to prove tonight,” Johnson-Lucas said. “I just wanted to go out with a bang. I guess we did that, didn’t we?” 

With games against Alameda and El Cerrito left in the regular season, the Jackets figure to finish undefeated and with an automatic berth to the North Coast Section playoffs. It would be the first postseason appearance for every Yellowjacket player and coach, a nice reward for the most talented Berkeley team in recent memory. 

“This is such a great feeling,” middle linebacker Owen Goldstrom said. “Now we just have to make sure we win the rest of our games and make the playoffs. Once we’re there, that’s when we can do some real damage.”


Candidates spend half a million in Berkeley races

By David Scharfenberg
Saturday November 02, 2002

Berkeley candidates for public office will raise and borrow nearly $500,000 this year, according to campaign finance records. 

Mayor Shirley Dean and challenger Tom Bates have raised roughly $300,000, making their quests for Berkeley’s highest office the most expensive race this year. 

As of the last official filing deadline on Oct. 19, Dean held a roughly $9,000 fundraising edge, $142,293 to $133,963. Both candidates have taken in thousands of dollars in additional contributions since then. 

The totals put this year’s race on par with the last two mayoral contests. In 1994, according to the city clerk’s office, Dean and opponent Donald Jelinek raised about $390,000, including funds for a runoff. In 1998, Dean and Jelinek faced off again, raising roughly $320,000. 

Fundraising has been the source of heavy sniping between the mayoral camps, with both sides filing charges of campaign finance improprieties against the other. The city’s Fair Campaign Practices Commission has absolved Bates of all charges but found that Dean’s 1998 campaign made a $3,000 accounting error. Dean has since corrected the error. 

The two sides have also raised questions about their opponents’ donors. Rent Board Commissioner Paul Hogarth, who supports Bates, has attacked Dean for taking some $20,000 from landlords and real estate interests. The Dean campaign, in turn, has criticized Bates for taking money from politicians outside Berkeley. 

Of this year’s City Council races, the contest for the 8th District’s open seat, vacated by retiring Councilmember Polly Armstrong, has been the most costly. As of Oct. 19, the four candidates had raised a cumulative $80,000, including more than $14,000 of their own money.  

Planning Commissioner Gordon Wozniak led the pack in the 8th District at $40,562, none of it personal funds. UC Berkeley graduate student Andy Katz followed with $25,225, including $8,250 of his own money, and human rights consultant Anne Wagley had $14,915, including $6,000 in personal funds. Air conditioning mechanic Carlos Estrada had not raised any money as of his last filing. 

Fundraising has taken its place alongside issues like rent control, traffic and safety in the 8th District race as a hot topic of debate. Wozniak said his significant fundraising edge shows the depth of his support in the district, which stretches south of the UC Berkeley campus. 

He said the heavy personal loans that Katz and Wagley made to their own campaigns and the significant number of contributions his rivals secured from outside the district indicate a lack of grassroots support. 

But Wagley, who has tried to position herself outside the traditional “moderate” and “progressive” camps in Berkeley politics, charged that Wozniak had an edge because he inherited the moderate fundraising “machine” from the retiring Armstrong. 

“That’s just not true,” Wozniak replied. “I’ve lived in the district for 30-some years. I have a lot of friends and neighbors.” 

In the 4th District, progressive incumbent Dona Spring led in fundraising as of the Oct. 19 filing, with $17,138, none of it personal money. Moderate-backed challenger Bob Migdal was second with $13,277, including $2,768 in personal funds. Candidate LA Wood had $12,990, nearly all of it – $11,900 – his own money. 

In the 7th District, progressive incumbent Kriss Worthington had out-raised challenger Micki Weinberg, a UC Berkeley student, $20,559 to $7,656 as of the last filing deadline. 

In the 1st District, progressive Councilmember Linda Maio had raised $850 as of Oct. 19. Her one-named challenger, Rhiannon, had raised nothing. 

In the six-candidate Board of Education race, school board President Shirley Issel led the way with $24,289 as of the Oct. 19 filing deadline, including $8,909 in personal funds. 

Candidate Sean Dugar, 18, who graduated from Berkeley High School last summer, had raised $8,105 by Oct. 19, including $6,500 in personal funds. He said Friday that he was going to add $7,000 more of his own money to help pay for mailers. 

Dugar said he inherited the money. 

 

Contact reporter at scharfenberg@ 

berkeleydailyplanet.net


Negative campaign bad for election

Carole Bennett-Simmons
Saturday November 02, 2002

To the Editor: 

 

I have lived and voted in Berkeley for 32 years and taught in the Berkeley public schools for 31 years. In that time, I have never received the kind of negative campaign literature for a Berkeley election than I have received for the Dean campaign this year. My family, neighbors and the people I have spoken with around Berkeley are disgusted and turned off by the personal attacks on, and the spreading of false information about, Tom Bates.  

One piece of literature sent out by Mayor Dean's campaign shows pictures of lots of lips and a picture of Tom Bates. The headlines say: “Talk is cheap” and “Tom Bates is all talk.” I think this tactic is a cheap shot and a look at Tom's record shows nothing could be further from the truth.  

Mayor Dean's literature belittles Tom Bates' call for an education summit. But I believe such a summit would be very useful. Many of the problems we face in Berkeley's schools are due to demands placed on the schools for programs that are mandated by state and federal laws, but which receive no funding for implementation. These are issues we cannot solve without developing a partnership with other levels of government and without help from a wide range of sources. Tom Bates has the ability and positive personal qualities to draw people together and build coalitions that can solve our city's problems in education and all the other areas of concern to us as Berkeley citizens. 

 

Carole Bennett-Simmons 

Berkeley 


Exhibit draws eerie parallels

By Chaka Ferguson
Saturday November 02, 2002

NEW YORK — In this shooting gallery within an art gallery, a pellet gun and a bull’s-eye over a human target evoke images of the recent sniper shootings. 

“Shoot Me,” by Miyoung Song at the Puffin Room in Manhattan’s SoHo district, is a video installation about the darker side of human nature. 

Despite its similarities, “Shoot Me” is not based on the Washington-area sniper shootings. “It’s a metaphor,” the artist said. The exhibit opened on Sept. 21 — more than a week before the first shooting — and a similar show by Song was first exhibited last year. 

Song’s work is part of a larger exhibit on Korean American art that runs through Nov. 10. 

The show is intended to explore violence in the United States, especially toward women, and the country’s obsession with guns. “The human subconsciousness is the most violent terror,” Song said. 

The installation, in the gallery’s dimly lighted basement, has a target superimposed over video images of women and children. A faux handgun loaded with plastic pellets and headphones playing techno music give it the feel of an arcade.


Sports Shorts

Saturday November 02, 2002

Berkeley loses playoff berth 

The Berkeley High girls tennis team was denied an automatic berth into the North Coast Section team playoffs when Alameda High’s Erika Fong won the final set of her match with Berkeley’s Gail Nipitnorasete on Friday at Old Grove Park in Berkeley. 

The match was postponed due to darkness Thursday evening with the team match tied 3-3. The two teams finished the ACCAL season 9-1 and split their matches, resulting in co-champion status. The playoff, which started at El Cerrito High, was played to determine which team would get the league’s automatic bid to the playoffs.  

Each player had won a set on Thursday night, and a protracted battle over when and where to play the final set added drama to the event. 

Nipitnorasete came out strong on Friday morning, taking a 5-4 game lead and serving for three set points. But Fong managed to fight off the points and forced a tiebreaker, which the Alameda freshman won 8-6. 

Berkeley head coach Alex Kopel said he intends to apply for an at-large berth into the NCS playoffs, but isn’t holding out much hope. 

“From what I’ve heard, I don’t think we have a very good chance,” Kopel said. 

The NCS individual playoffs start on Monday at El Cerrito High. Berkeley’s Megan Sweeney, who was undefeated this season, is the top seed and has a first-round bye. Berkeley’s other entry, Clara Mattei, is the No. 4 seed and will play her first-round match at 12:15 p.m. 

 

Bears win exhibition opener 

Newcomer Timea Ivanyi scored a game-high 15 points as the Cal women’s basketball team defeated Team Concept, 69-57, Friday night at Haas Pavilion in its first exhibition of the 2002-03 season.  

The Bears were in control most of the game and led by as many as 21 points in the fourth quarter before a late surge by Team Concept cut the margin to 12.  

“I thought they played very well,” said Cal acting head coach Barb Smith. “We didn’t have every play in place for the year. We didn’t have every out of bounds play [in place]. We didn’t have every defensive thing that we’re going to do this year in place, but they played together, and they played hard. That made a difference.”  

Smith, a first-year assistant coach at Cal, coached the Bears in place of Caren Horstmeyer, who gave birth to Kylie Joy on Monday, Oct. 28. Horstmeyer will rejoin the team next week.  

Ivanyi, a junior center who transferred to Cal from Jefferson College, scored on a variety of nice moves in the paint. Cal’s sophomore point guard Kristin Iwanaga pitched in 13 points, six assists and four steals. Teammates Kiki Williams and Leigh Gregory each had 12 points. Gregory also led the Bears with nine rebounds.


Neighbors try to wipe out blight

By Matthew Artz
Saturday November 02, 2002

A group of south Berkeley neighbors wants to meet the first African American to officiate a professional football game. But they’re not asking for his autograph. They want to tell him to fix up his run-down property on the corner of Sacramento and Julia streets. 

Blighted property is a citywide phenomenon, said Michael Caplan, a city neighborhood services liaison and a member of the city manager’s problem property team. Team members track derelict properties and work with neighbors who have become increasingly willing to take action against troublesome tenants and owners. 

Burl Toler, a San Francisco resident, a retired National Football League official and current board member of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, has owned the south Berkeley lot where the defunct King Liquors store sits since 1994. 

The shop closed down in the mid–80s’, and since then, neighbors say the lot has been used as a dumping ground. 

“A lot of homeless people come here to go through the trash. It makes the place look ghetto,” said Runni Vermel who lives directly behind the lot. 

Last December, fed-up neighbors sent Toler a letter imploring him to either renovate the property or sell it to somebody who would. 

Toler never responded. Now the neighbors, represented by the Russell, Oregon and California Street Neighborhood Organization, are considering legal recourse. 

Mark Goldowitz, an attorney who lives and works near the lot has offered his assistance in organizing a small claims suit against Toler. Neighbors who live in the lot’s immediate vicinity could sue Toler for $5,000 because of the negative effects his derelict property has had on adjacent homes, Goldowitz said. 

Stephanie Roesner, a neighbor, said that the tactic worked 13 years ago on Russell Street when more than 20 neighbors filed individual suits against the owners of the crime–ridden Rosewood Apartments on the 1600 block of Russell Street. The owners lost in court and ultimately sold the building to the city. 

However, Toler’s son, Gregory, said legal action will not be necessary in this case. 

“We’re going to work with the city of Berkeley as best we can to make sure the property is maintained until it is developed in the near future,” he said, adding that last week he had trash removed from the lot. 

Taj Johns, a city neighborhood services liaison, met with Toler and his father on Tuesday and said they made progress on addressing the neighbors’ concerns. 

In the short term, the Tolers agreed to do weekly maintenance and install lights on the property, Johns said. If the Tolers fail to keep the lot free of trash, the city has the authority to put a lien on the property. 

The ultimate future of the plot, though, remains unclear.  

Gregory Toler said his family would like to build a small development with a ground floor shop and fewer than 20 units of housing above. 

But he acknowledged that developers have not shown interest. He and his father are working on financing the project themselves. They have not hired a designer and have no timetable on when their plans will be finalized. 

Neighbors cringed when told of the Tolers plans. “He’s got to be kidding,” said Roesner, noting that at 3,100 square feet, the lot is less then a tenth of an acre and smaller than the nearby lots with single family homes. “Certainly a retail space is needed with maybe one or two apartments above, but anything else is totally out of scale,” she said. 

Neighborhood cleanup efforts continue today in south Berkeley with a city sponsored cleanup of Sacramento Street from Dwight Way to the Oakland border. 

 

Contact reporter at matt@berkeleydailyplanet.net


To the undecided

Eric Goedken Eric Goedken Eric Goedken
Saturday November 02, 2002

To the Editor: 

 

I address this to those that are still undecided in the Berkeley mayoral race. 

I find that an interesting comparison can be made in the headquarters of the two mayoral campaigns. That of Mayor Shirley Dean is located in a bright, resurgent downtown surrounded by a bevy of new business and shops. The headquarters for Tom Bates' campaign are in a dingy south Berkeley, graffiti-laden building near closed stores and a massage parlor. This is likely the future for Berkeley if the idealistic but impractical ideas of the progressives are given the power of the mayor's office. 

Berkeley is better off after Mayor Dean's efforts in office.  

 

Eric Goedken 

Berkeley


Feel-good tales from the American Midwest

By Jane Yin
Saturday November 02, 2002

The famed radio host, author, and critic Garrison Keillor, known for his feel-good anecdotes and humorous food-for-thought, has recently delivered “Good Poems” to bookstands. The collection is just that – an all-embracing compilation of straightforward, graceful poems, some of which he will be reading next Tuesday at the First Congregational Church in Berkeley.  

“Good Poems” is a collection of the poetry he reads on morning National Public Radio show “The Writer’s Almanac” providing listeners more than sugar with their coffee. The markedly honest poems discuss topics like lovers, failure, music and beasts. The story lines range from the feeling you get after watching a movie to, just pages later, “Master Works of Ming” which describes a woman who fills bowls with rice. Keillor has selected and arranged the poems to provide solace, invoke laughter and force the reader to pause for reflection. 

Being a native of Minnesota, Keillor began careers in his home state both in radio and writing. He has always written short stories, many of which he began sending to “The New Yorker” in the 1960s and anxiously waited for editors to accept or decline them. In 1969 Keillor began to work for Minnesota Public Radio. In 1974, he began his own live variety radio show “Prairie Home Companion.” By 1980, the show had gained national success but was brought to an end seven years later when it became too tiring for Keillor to continue. The popular radio show host soon regretted this decision and resumed the show in 1989. Again, it was broadcast from its original location, the World Theater in St. Paul, Minn.  

Keillor is an author of more then 10 books, including “Lake Wobegon Summer 1956” and “Wobegon Boy.” Many of his works focus on childhood and the culture of the American Midwest. He has also authored several children’s books.  

“I look on writing as simply something I do every day,” explained Keillor, “as some people attend Mass and others tend gardens, so I sit down and write. I’d like to be a man of letters, capable of fiction, poetry, drama and criticism, and I have a long way to go.” 

Not only can humor be found in his fictional anecdotes, but he reveals it within his own life. He speaks of his job hunt right out of college when he lived in a boarding house that he later discovered was a halfway house. 

“The residents sat in the dayroom, stunned by Thorazine, and jabbered,” reminisced Keillor, “I sat and recorded some of their thoughts, imagining that I’d write a story about this. One man claimed to have known Dorothy Parker. I listened to him talk about Dotty for hours, trying to decide if he was telling the truth or not, and finally decided I didn’t care.” 

Now, years later, his work as a radio host and writer are so well-known and enjoyed that he and his show have become a fixture in many people’s lives. 

“Every Arbor Day I get together with some of my fellow archetypes – Donald Trump and Sally Ride and Willard Scoot and Martha Stewart – and we talk about what it’s like. Frankly, it’s OK. It’s not a dignified life, but we seem to serve a useful function as landmarks, like the Chrysler Building or the pier at Santa Monica.


Mayoral candidates not far apart

By Judith Scherr
Saturday November 02, 2002

Tuesday voters will choose between two seasoned politicians vying for mayor. Both incumbent Mayor Shirley Dean and former state Assemblymember Tom Bates are Democrats and claim many of the same goals: the creation of housing for all income levels built along transit corridors; standing up to UC Berkeley to make it pay costs the city incurs on the university’s behalf; creating a sustainable city, including support for solar power and reduction of the use of fossil fuels. Both candidates want to address the gap in health and education between flatlanders and hills residents.  

The candidates, however, differ in their strategies and alliances. Bates supports rent control; Dean supports rent control but wants it tied to need. Dean demands more parking downtown; Bates says the city must ascertain whether it’s needed before building it. 

Bates wants to create a Rules Committee to streamline council meetings; Dean calls the proposal undemocratic. 

Each tout local, state and national allies, ties which they say gives them clout to get their programs implemented. Dean’s nationwide ties include people from the Conference of Mayors where she chairs a committee on cities and universities; and she has developed a close working relationship with state Sen. Don Perata, D-Oakland. Her supporters include the three council moderates, the Berkeley Democratic Club, the police and firefighter unions, and the dog aficionados’ organization, Bark. 

Bates touts ties from his 20 years in the Assembly, including Attorney General Bill Lockyer and, of course, his spouse, former mayor Loni Hancock who is assemblymember elect from Berkeley. He also has a close working relationship with Rep. Barbara Lee, D-Oakland. Bates is supported by four of the five progressive councilmembers and backed by Berkeley Citizens Action, the Green Party, and the Alameda Central Labor Council. 

The Daily Planet was unable to reach a third candidate, John Patrick Bouchell, who, on the statement filed with the city clerk, says he’s 47 and a graduate of Princeton University. He writes: "In my lifetime I have been primarily a student, a teacher, and an absolutely astounded witness to the human drama and, at times, comedy."  

On this page, the Daily Planet looks at ways in which Dean and Bates differ.


Politically correct free speech?

Justin Azadivar
Saturday November 02, 2002

To the Editor: 

 

Aftim Saba’s letter (Forum, Nov. 1) suggests that he is somewhat confused. The bulk of the letter is a long and involved discussion about how council candidate Micki Weinberg would be a bad Israeli politician. As a brief correction or clarification, allow me to point out that Weinberg is running for Berkeley City Council, which is not part of the Israeli government, thereby making his views on Israeli politics irrelevant. 

Saba then goes on to say that Weinberg is “rabidly anti-free speech” for his view that students who disrupt classes should face consequences. If a group of students was to burst into Saba's home and scream about a cause, and if Saba was to call the police and press charges, I wonder if it would be appropriate to label Saba as “rabidly anti-free speech.” The university is an educational institution. Disruption of education on a university is not free speech. Amazingly enough, while Saba objects heartily to the university trying to allow its students to get an education “uninterrupted by anyone,” Saba goes on to claim that he is proud that Berkeley is “politically-correct.” Political correctness and free speech are at dramatic odds with one another. Perhaps Saba is the type who thinks that a group such as the KKK is not entitled to free speech, because they are politically incorrect. 

 

Justin Azadivar 

Berkeley 


Vietnamese outraged by actor’s punishment

By Ian Stewart
Saturday November 02, 2002

SAN FRANCISCO — Celebrated Vietnamese actor Don Duong has played an army commander, a refugee and a pedicab driver from post-war Saigon. Now he’s been cast as an outlaw by the nation’s communist leaders, forbidden to leave Vietnam and banned from acting for five years. 

Branding Duong a “national traitor,” Vietnam’s Ministry of Culture and Information recommended that the actor be punished for his portrayal of a North Vietnamese commander in the Paramount film “We Were Soldiers.” 

The treatment of Duong, one of Vietnam’s most popular actors, has outraged people in the large Vietnamese communities in California. 

“This incident just shows that Vietnam’s communists have no freedom of speech,” said Ky Ngo, the advisor to the President of the Vietnamese-American Community of Northern California. 

“I’m happy this has happened. This shows the American people that Vietnam has no freedoms,” he said. 

Officials at Paramount said Thursday that they were monitoring the situation and did not have an immediate comment. 

An official in Ho City Minh City, formerly Saigon, said Duong had not been detained or arrested. His final fate has yet to be determined. 

But Culture Ministry spokeswoman Pham Thuy Thanh said “We Were Soldiers” did not portray North Vietnam’s war aganst the United States in an accurate light. 

Duong also was criticized for playing a refugee in “Green Dragon” — a role the Vietnamese government labelled a distortion of the country’s past. 

“I haven’t seen these two movies myself, but authoritative personnel who have seen the movies “We Were Soldiers” did not correctly reflect the true history of the legitimate struggle of the Vietnamese people,” she said at a news conference. 

Vietnam’s communist government has led a strident campaign against “We Were Soldiers” in the country’s state-controlled media, accusing it of distorting history and harming the image of Vietnamese soldiers.


Sharon meets former prime minister Netanyahu for talks on possible alliance

By Steve Weizman
Saturday November 02, 2002

JERUSALEM — Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon met Friday with former premier Benjamin Netanyahu, a sometimes ally and sometimes rival, and offered him the job of foreign minister in the fragile minority government. 

The talks at Sharon’s sheep farm in the Negev desert ended with neither man speaking to the reporters. A senior Israeli diplomatic official, speaking on condition of anonymity, confirmed that Sharon was offering Netanyahu the foreign minister’s post. 

The official said the two agreed to meet again Sunday — an indication that Netanyahu had not turned down the offer. “The door hasn’t been closed,” the official said. 

The moderate Labor Party, the largest faction in Sharon’s coalition, quit the Cabinet this week over a budget dispute, leaving the government without a majority. 

The walkout made vacant the foreign affairs portfolio, formerly held by Labor’s Shimon Peres. 

Peres was a welcome visitor in foreign capitals and a skilled advocate of Israeli policies at a time when they face fierce criticism abroad. 

Netanyahu is widely expected to challenge Sharon for the leadership of the Likud party before the next election. The American-educated Netanyahu is skilled in using the media and experienced in diplomacy. 

When Netanyahu was prime minister from 1996-99, he brought Sharon in as foreign minister for part of his tenure. 

It appeared Sharon would prefer to bring Netanyahu into the government, where he would be subject to Cabinet discipline, than allow him to offer up criticism from the outside. 

Sharon has offered Labor leader Binyamin Ben-Eliezer’s post as defense minister to former army chief of staff Shaul Mofaz. 

Mofaz has a reputation as a hard-liner and oversaw the army’s crackdown against the Palestinian uprising for most of the past two years. Mofaz also has advocated exiling Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. 

Sharon is looking to small, far-right parties in an attempt to maintain a viable coalition, but he said he would not change his positions to accommodate them. 

“I am on the way to forming a government with a different makeup,” he told the Maariv newspaper. “Policy lines will remain exactly the same policy lines and its goals won’t change: war on terror, renewing political negotiations and reaching an agreement.” 

Sharon’s coalition now has only 55 seats in the 120-seat parliament. 

One candidate for inclusion is the far-right National Union-Israel Beiteinu party, which has seven seats, enough to restore the government’s majority. 

The party was originally part of Sharon’s coalition when it was formed last year, but later left amid policy disputes. 

National Union legislators have said they want Sharon to distance himself from some of the policies they believe were put in place to appease the Labor Party. 

The National Union opposes negotiations with the Palestinians and favors annexing the West Bank and Gaza Strip, lands the Palestinians want for a future state. Some party members support expelling the Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza Strip. 

Israeli newspapers reported that Sharon talked to U.S. administration officials on Thursday, and gave them assurances he would not make major policy changes. 

Meanwhile, in a move that signals the declining relations between Israelis and Palestinians, Israel has decided to put the military and civilian offices responsible for contacts with the Palestinians under one umbrella. 

Israeli officials say the move is meant to make things more efficient for Palestinian security officials who coordinate with the army, and for Palestinian civilians who use the offices to obtain work permits, entry permits to Israel and other documents.


Election Day Preview: Tom Bates

Compiled by Judith Scherr
Saturday November 02, 2002

Tom Bates 

Age: 64 

Born: San Diego 

Education: B.A. in speech, UC Berkeley 

Occupation: Worked in real estate and as a developer before elected to state Assembly; recently did non-profit work 

Offices held: state assemblymember (Berkeley), 1976 - 1996; Alameda County supervisor, 1972-1976 

Endorsements: Rep. Barbara Lee, D-Oakland, councilmembers Linda Maio, Margaret Breland, Dona Spring, Kriss Worthington 

Campaign Spending: raised $134,000 as of Oct. 19 

 

Rent control 

Supported rent control while in the state Legislature; continues to support it. Would make sure landlords who make repairs can pass costs on to tenants.  

 

Housing Trust Fund: Wants fund used for nonprofits to build affordable and low-income housing, not loaned to for-profit developers. 

 

Second Units: Wants to build second units behind homes to increase housing supply. To encourage that, change parking regulations to allow “tandem parking” where one car is parked directly in front of another. 

 

Divisiveness vs. cooperation : 

In Assembly, worked well with opposition and got 220 bills signed, mostly by Republican governors. He and wife, former mayor Loni Hancock blocked bulldozers about to demolish a UC Berkeley building, demonstrating their activism. (University tried to demolish the building at 6 a.m. without alerting community, Bates says.) Built amicable relations with Ira Michael Heyman, then UC Berkeley chancellor; Heyman supports Bates for mayor. Says Dean is divisive, citing her trip to Councilmember Kriss Worthington’s school in Ohio where she tried to get “dirt” on him. Dean’s negative campaign pieces indicate negative leadership style.  

 

Streamlining council meetings: To streamline council work, wants to establish Rules Committee: one progressive council member, one moderate and the mayor, staffed by the city manager; meetings open to the public. Wants the committee to establish the agenda, determine whether an item is placed on the council agenda, referred to the city manager for fiscal/program analysis, or sent to a board or commission for consideration and recommendation. Council meetings will end by 11 p.m. 

 

Streamlining city government: Wants to reduce number of boards and commissions by consolidation; allow some commissions to take their own minutes, freeing up staff; create department of the environment to consolidate functions in various departments addressing the environment. 

 

Addressing budget deficit: Says one reason for deficit is that city allowed police and fire to adopt rules that allows personnel to retire at age 50, with a sizable retirement; Suggests hiring freeze, getting citizen input on where cuts can be made, attracting new businesses and make university pay fees when it takes property off the tax roles. 

 

Economic development: Wants to attract businesses to bring sales taxes, rezone parts of Gilman Street and Ashby Avenue to allow neighborhood-serving retail below housing. Says there is a need for retail space for west Berkeley artisans; wants to market San Pablo and University avenues area as “International Market;” advocates streamlined permitting process. 

 

Parking: Not sure more parking needed; need to do study before building more parking.


State Briefs

Saturday November 02, 2002

Judge blocks ordinances 

LOS ANGELES — Citing free speech guarantees, a federal judge has blocked two ordinances enacted this year that would allow the city of Los Angeles to collect more than $3 million in annual fees from owners of outdoor billboards. 

U.S. District Judge Stephen V. Wilson issued the 17-page ruling Thursday. 

At issue was a $314-per-sign fee imposed for annual inspections of about 10,000 billboards that are supposed to protect the city’s aesthetics and ensure public safety. 

“The only hardship the city will suffer is lost revenue, which can be recouped if the ordinances are ultimately found to be constitutional,” Wilson wrote. 

Three media conglomerates, Clear Channel Outdoor Inc., Viacom Outdoor Inc. and National Advertising Co., had sought the preliminary injunction against the ordinances, which were set to take effect Thursday. 

Richard Kendall, who represented the billboard companies, said his clients were gratified by the judge’s ruling, while a spokesman for the city attorney’s office said he was disappointed. 

 

Women testify against officer 

SAN BERNARDINO — Three women who testified at a pretrial hearing for a former police officer alleged he used his late-night patrols to hunt for potential sexual-assault victims. 

Ronald VanRossum, who has been fired from the department, faces 43 felony counts of rape and other charges involving 13 women, including several who have filed claims against the city seeking damages. 

The three women who testified at Thursday’s hearing — all referred to as “Jane Doe” — are all convicted felons. They told Superior Court Judge Kurt J. Lewin that VanRossum intimidated them with threats of arrest and violence. 

Jane Doe No. 3 said she was on methamphetamine when she met VanRossum in late 2001. She said he handcuffed her, drove her around the city for about 30 minutes, then took her to an abandoned building, where he allegedly raped her. 

In the following weeks, VanRossum allegedly drove near her home and stared at her, she said. 

“That man stalked me,” she said. 

But defense attorney Bill Hadden accused her of fabricating the story in order to sue his client and the city for $5 million. She denied the allegation. 

Jane Doe No. 2 said she was outside a liquor store in August 2000 when VanRossum approached. She said she was driven to a parking lot near an abandoned building and raped behind the officer’s car, then warned not to report the incident. 

 

Teacher pleads guilty 

VENTURA — A former elementary school teacher has pleaded guilty to child pornography charges, a prosecutor said. 

James Robertson, 57, of Thousand Oaks pleaded Thursday to one count of sexual exploitation of a child and one count of possessing child pornography, Deputy District Attorney Howard Wise said. He faces up to nine months in jail when he is sentenced Dec. 9. 

Robertson taught at White Oak Elementary in Westlake Village and was an educator for nearly 30 years in the Las Virgenes Unified School District. 

He was arrested Aug. 5 after police received a tip and found a cache of child pornography at his home, most of which had been downloaded from the Internet, Wise said.


Teen delays plea in Oakland shooting

Daily Planet Wire Service
Saturday November 02, 2002

OAKLAND — A 17-year-old boy charged with shooting an Oakland police officer in the head last month delayed entering a plea Friday in Alameda County Superior Court. 

A complaint filed Oct. 16 charges Terrance Laverne Hunter of Oakland in adult court with attempted murder of a police officer, assault with a firearm upon an officer, and unlawful possession of a firearm. 

Hunter, who is being held without bail, appeared in court in Oakland Friday morning wearing eyeglasses, a navy blue sweatshirt and tan pants. 

His court-appointed attorney, Gary L. Sherrer of Oakland, requested that the entry of plea be delayed until Nov. 8. The attorney said he has received 10 audiotapes from the prosecution in connection with the case but is still waiting for investigators' logs to be provided to him. 

Judge Allan D. Hymer agreed to put the matter over for one week. 

Sherrer declined to comment on the case outside of court. 

The charges stem from Sept. 27, when Officer Ilario Juarez, 30, stopped in front of the Mosswood Motel at 683 W. MacArthur Blvd. at about 2:45 a.m. 

As Juarez, who was patrolling alone, approached a group of individuals lingering in the motel's driveway, one person immediately separated himself from the others and fired on the officer, police said. Three bullets grazed Juarez's head, according to court documents. 

Hunter was stopped by police on the day of the shooting and later arrested when a check revealed that he was wanted on a probation violation, police said. He was arrested in connection with the shooting on Oct. 14. 

Court documents state that Juarez picked Hunter out of a photo lineup as the alleged shooter.


East Bay park district to dedicate bird preserve

Daily Planet Wire Service
Saturday November 02, 2002

The East Bay Regional Park District will hold a dedication ceremony for the Waterbird Regional Preserve near Martinez on Saturday. 

The heart of the 198-acre preserve is the Al McNabney Marsh, situated on land owned by the park district and the Mountain View Sanitary District. 

The marshland is part of the Pacific flyway for migratory birds and home to many species of native waterfowl. The completion of the preserve is the result of restoration and rehabilitation of a habitat damaged by an environmental spill in 1988. 

The marsh is part of a larger wetlands area connected by Peyton Slough, which empties into Suisun Bay. 

Speakers at Saturday's ceremony are scheduled to include U.S. Rep. George Miller, D-Martinez, state Assemblyman Joe Canciamilla, D-Pittsburg, Contra Costa County Supervisor Gayle Uilkema, and Will Travis, executive director of the Bay Conservation and Development Commission.


Police want help with investigation

Daily Planet Wire Service
Saturday November 02, 2002

RICHMOND — The Richmond police are requesting the public's assistance with their investigation of an attempted double homicide that occurred Thursday. 

Police say that at 1:30 p.m. they received a report of gunshots being fired in the area of the 1600 block of Portrero Avenue. Officers located evidence of a shooting there, but could not locate a victim. 

Six minutes after this first call, police were notified that two gunshot victims had arrived at Kaiser Hospital. 

The two victims, Marcio Williams, 28, of San Pablo and James Robert Lewis, 19, of Richmond were able to drive themselves to the hospital after being shot by an unknown assailant.  

According to reports, the victims were seated inside a white Mitsubishi sedan when the shooter approached on foot and open fired. 

Williams is currently listed as being in critical condition, while Lewis is described as stable. 

Police say that there is no known motive for this shooting, and anyone with information is asked to call Detective Joe Valle at (510) 620-6628, or Detective Terry Ellis at (510) 620-6625.


Body of Phoenix stuntman found

The Associated Press
Saturday November 02, 2002

OCEANO — The body of a stuntman who had been missing since parachuting into the Pacific Ocean during filming of a Bruce Willis movie was recovered Friday, officials said. 

The body of Michael Kent Barber, 39, was found shortly after 7 a.m. on Oceano Dunes State Beach, said Lt. L.R. Davis of the San Luis Obispo County Sheriff’s Department. 

Barber, a Phoenix resident, disappeared Tuesday afternoon after jumping among nine skydivers from an airplane 14,000 feet above the ocean. 

All were supposed to land on a beach about 180 miles north of Los Angeles.


Tentative deal in port labor talks

By Justin Pritchard
Saturday November 02, 2002

SAN FRANCISCO — West Coast longshoremen and shipping companies reach an important — albeit tentative — agreement Friday on the use of technology, the major sticking point in their bitter contract talks. 

Both sides hailed the deal on how to introduce new cargo tracking systems to the waterfront as the first tangible progress since negotiations resumed after last month’s lockout of dockworkers closed down shuttered major Pacific ports for 10 days. 

The dockworker’s union and the association representing shipping lines were compelled to restart talks after a federal judge granted President Bush’s request for an 80-day “cooling-off” period that reopened the ports. 

“The parties have worked long and hard,” federal mediator Peter Hurtgen said in a written statement Friday. 

The deal concerned “the key issues of new technology and retention of union’s jurisdiction for marine clerk work,” the statement said. 

Hurtgen would not disclose details of the agreement, which he said was reached at 4 a.m. PST Friday after all-night talks. 

Still, it was clear that the deal entailed compromise on both sides. 

The 10,500-member International Longshore and Warehouse Union had said it would agree to cuts in the number of marine clerks, whose jobs will be obsolete with a freer flow of electronic information, only if the Pacific Maritime Association agreed that new jobs created by the technology be under the union’s jurisdiction. 

“We had our bottom line on jurisdiction on what we could do, what we could accept, and they met our bottom line,” union spokesman Steve Stallone said. “So we consider this a real victory and the first real progress we’ve had in these negotiations.” 

Like Hurtgen, Stallone emphasized that the deal on technology isn’t the only issue separating the two sides — and if talks break up over issues such as pensions and arbitration of disputes, the technology deal could be moot. 

Shipping lines and terminal operators will save hundreds of millions of dollars through the technology, “and we want a piece of that action,” primarily in the form of increased pensions, Stallone said. 

A Pacific Maritime Association spokesman also said the deal could prove to be an important breakthrough, but had no further comment, citing Hurtgen’s request for a media blackout on the negotiations. 

The tentative agreement comes as the two sides have been sparring over who’s to blame for slow progress in clearing a massive backlog of cargo off the docks since the lockout ended Oct. 9. 

The association complained to the Justice Department that dockworkers have intentionally slowed work, cutting productivity by 30 percent in some cases. The union countered that mismanagement by shipping lines and terminal operators has led to dangerous congestion and disarray. 

The nation’s 29 West Coast ports handle more than $300 billion in trade each year. Some economists estimated that the U.S. economy lost $1 billion each day as cargo piled up at the docks and ships waited at anchor offshore. Some factories had to shut down for lack of supplies.


Stocks end fourth straight winning week

By Amy Baldwin
Saturday November 02, 2002

NEW YORK — Wall Street shook off a trio of disappointing economic reports and forged ahead with its fall rally Friday, posting a fourth consecutive weekly win for the first time in more than two months. 

Analysts attributed the recovery and subsequent rally to buying momentum that built up throughout October. 

“Investor psychology has changed. The market has become very resilient to bad news. Today is a good example of that,” said Michael Murphy, head trader at Wachovia Securities in Baltimore. “Nobody wants to be left behind.” 

Stocks overcame news that consumer spending and manufacturing activity declined and that the unemployment rate increased. 

The Dow Jones industrial average closed up 120.61, or 1.4 percent, at 8,517.64, after falling as much as 87 in early trading. The advance came after the Dow had its second-best October with a gain of 10.6 percent, just short of the 10.7 percent advance in October 1982. It also was the Dow’s best month since January 1987 when the blue chips rose 13.8 percent. 

The broader market also recovered, moving into positive territory. The Nasdaq composite index rose 30.95, or 2.3 percent, to 1,360.70, having advanced 13.5 percent in October. The Standard & Poor’s 500 index rose 15.20, or 1.7 percent, to 900.96, following its monthly advance of 8.7 percent. 

The indexes scored a four-week winning stretch for the first time since the four weeks that ended Aug. 23. For the week, the Dow rose 0.9 percent.


Edison International swings towards profit

By Gary Gentile
Saturday November 02, 2002

LOS ANGELES — Edison International, parent of utility Southern California Edison, swung to a profit in the third quarter on higher revenues, the company said Friday. 

The quarter also benefited from major write-offs last year from power plants sold in the United Kingdom. 

Edison said it was well along in collecting the cost of buying power during California’s power crisis, when a rate freeze was in effect, and raised its full-year earnings expectations. 

Edison reported net income of $352 million, or $1.08 per share, in the quarter ended Sept. 30. That compares with a loss of $413 million in the same quarter last year. 

On an operating basis, which excludes the $1.2 billion Edison wrote off last year for the sale of its power plants in England and a one-time adjustment at SoCal Edison, the company had a net income of $351 million compared to $283 million in the same quarter last year. 

The results easily beat the expectation of analysts surveyed by Thomson First Call, who had expected earnings of 82 cents per share. 

Higher operating and maintenance costs at SoCal Edison were offset during the quarter by the effects of decisions made.


From school vouchers to seat belts, races could alter state agendas

By Sharon Cohen
Saturday November 02, 2002

Vermont’s law granting marriage benefits to gay couples and Wisconsin’s ban on concealed weapons are just two of the volatile issues whose fate could be determined by the outcome of close races for control of many of the nation’s legislatures. 

Democrats and Republicans hold majorities in both legislative chambers in almost the same number of states — 18 versus 17 — but redistricting, term limits and retirements likely will change that Tuesday. 

A transfer of just four seats or less in 25 states could shift the power from one party to another in one or both legislative chambers. And that, in turn, has the potential to reshape the outcome of tax, school and health-care bills — all at a time when money is tight everywhere. 

“A whole new set of people will be leading and setting the agenda. That makes a huge difference,” says Tim Storey, an elections analyst with the National Conference of State Legislatures in Denver. 

Even before Election Day, 22 percent of 6,214 state lawmakers chosen will change because of term limits, retirements or primary losses, Storey notes. He predicts an additional 5 percent turnover after the votes are counted. 

These changes could have a dramatic impact. For example: 

— In Michigan, one of many states facing budget problems, lawmakers will take their cue from a new governor. If Republicans maintain control of both chambers, they may reconsider a bill to increase the number of charter schools. If Democrats take over, they may try to ban Canadian trash from disposal in Michigan and raise the minimum wage. 

— In Kentucky, if Democrats take the Senate — the GOP has a 20-18 edge — that will improve prospects for a mandatory state seat belt law and continued partial public financing of gubernatorial campaigns. 

— In Wisconsin, if Republicans control both chambers — they have a majority in the House, though Democrats hold a three-vote advantage in the Senate — there could be a push to expand the Milwaukee schools voucher program in the state and end a 150-year ban on concealed weapons. 

— In Vermont, a switch to Republican control in the Senate — Democrats hold a two-seat edge — could lead to a move to repeal the civil union law passed two years ago that grants marriage benefits to gay couples and possibly replace it with a broader reciprocal benefits law. 

No matter who is in charge, both Democrats and Republicans will share one problem: money. 

“Next year it’s going to be budget, budget, budget. Everything else is going to be relegated to fifth of sixth place,” says Constance Campanella, president of Stateside Associates, a consulting firm that tracks legislation.


Walkout cancels classes in West Fresno schools

By Brian Melley
Saturday November 02, 2002

FRESNO – The board of the insolvent West Fresno School District could secure a county loan to pay teachers and staff their back pay, but only if the board puts the county school superintendent in control of the district temporarily. 

The board and the superintendent have been in a standoff over control of the district that resulted in canceled classes Friday as most teachers skipped school and most pupils stayed home. 

The walkout was the climax of a two-year feud over finances between the district’s governing board and the Fresno County Office of Education. 

James Tucker, president of the five-member district school board, said county schools Superintendent Pete Mehas is withholding the money the district needs to pay salaries and expenses. 

But Mehas claims he doesn’t have the money because the district, which has an annual budget of $8.3 million, spent it. He estimates the school is at least $220,000 in debt and perhaps as much as $2 million. 

The money issue is just one of the district’s well-publicized problems. It has hired convicted felons, been sued by more than 20 former employees and has had six superintendents in the last year and a half. 

Mehas, who approves budgets for 34 school districts, has offered to loan about $1 million from his office to the district, but he wants authority over personnel and expenses. Tucker said he won’t surrender control to Mehas. 

Among other things, Tucker claims Mehas is crazy. Mehas says the “rogue board” is inept and corrupt. 

In all the controversy, classes have never been canceled. The state Department of Education said the crisis was a first for the state. 

“There have been situations where a school district needed financial assistance, but that has been welcomed by all parties,” said Nicole Winger, state education spokeswoman. “There are certainly political elements to this situation.” 

The tiny two-school district was a chaotic landscape as teachers and staff called in sick in epidemic numbers the day after they didn’t get their monthly paychecks. 

“It was pitiful, absolutely tragic,” said Terry Flanagan, a union representative for nonteachers. “Young children were in tears because their teachers weren’t there. They were afraid to go with any other teacher. They were clinging to their parents.” 

In some cases, parents dropping off their children were angry and frustrated because they had to choose between going to work or leaving their kids with strangers. With little instruction planned, some parents took their children home. 

On Thursday, the board delayed a decision until Saturday on the compromise proposal that would make the county loan available and put Mehas in control until the county and district agree on a temporary administrator. If they can’t agree, the state will appoint one.The board’s decision Thursday might have kept the elementary and middle schools running smoothly Friday. 

Instead, only six of the 59 teachers and about 120 of the 1,000 students came to school Friday. About half of the 65 support staff reported to work. 

The handful of adults had to police a rowdy cafeteria of students at the middle school. Student were seen bolting across a field and hopping a fence. 

For students who stuck around, there were peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and even some impromptu entertainment. 

Mayor Alan Autry intervened in the crisis, bringing Dexter the Magician to amuse the kids. 

But Dexter didn’t perform any trick that made the teachers come back.


Handgun found near site of Alabama shooting linked to sniper case

By Bob Johnson
Saturday November 02, 2002

MONTGOMERY, Ala. — A stolen handgun has been found near the scene of the Sept. 21 shooting that helped police zero in on sniper suspects John Allen Muhammad and John Lee Malvo. 

Police Chief John Wilson said the gun fits the make and model of a weapon believed used in the shooting outside a Montgomery liquor store that left one employee dead and another wounded. 

Someone found the weapon Wednesday along the route where a police officer said he chased a gunman after the shooting, Wilson said. The gun was underneath leaves in an area of abandoned apartments, he said. 

Wilson said the gun, stolen July 20 at an El Paso, Texas, gun show, will be tested to determine if it is connected to the Alabama shooting. 

Investigators also believe a rifle was used in the Montgomery shooting. Police have said ballistics tests showed that the rifle was also used in the sniper attacks. 

Muhammad and Malvo face state and federal charges in the sniper spree that left 10 people dead and three wounded in Maryland, Virginia and Washington, D.C. They also have been charged in the Alabama shooting and a Sept. 23 slaying in Louisiana, and are suspects in a February killing in Washington state. 

Authorities closed in on the suspects after a man — apparently the sniper — called and suggested that they check out the Alabama shooting. 

Wilson said witnesses reported seeing the flash of a handgun during the shooting that killed store employee Claudine Parker and wounded co-worker Kellie Adams. There was no witness account of a rifle being fired, he said, but he expressed confidence that the crime would be solved.


Publishers will give award to Winfrey

The Associated Press
Saturday November 02, 2002

NEW YORK — Her book club is on hold, but the publishing industry has not forgotten Oprah Winfrey. The talk show host is receiving an honorary award from the Association of American Publishers. 

“She’s brought unparalleled excitement and attention to books. All of America should be grateful to her,” Jane Friedman, president and CEO of HarperCollins and vice chair of the publishers association, said in a statement Tuesday. 

The award will be presented next February at the AAP’s annual meeting, in Washington, D.C. Previous winners include Dolly Parton, “for her efforts to improve the lives of children through books,” and to National Public Radio, “for ongoing and outstanding book coverage.” 

Winfrey, who helped make best sellers out of Anita Shreve, Joyce Carol Oates and many other writers, received an honorary National Book Award in 1999. She announced last April she was cutting back on her book club picks, saying she was having a hard time finding worthy selections. 

The Association of American Publishers is the national trade association of the U.S. book publishing industry and has approximately 300 members.


Davis, Simon make final weekend pushes for votes

By Erica Werner
Saturday November 02, 2002

ROCKLIN — Bill Simon swept through Northern California Friday, rallying support in GOP strongholds and invoking memories of California’s favorite Republican at a factory for Jelly Bellys, Ronald Reagan’s favorite sweet. 

With three days left to catch up to Democratic Gov. Gray Davis and a new poll showing him seven points behind, Simon urged voters in Rocklin, Redding and Fairfield to the polls while he stepped up criticism of Davis’ fund-raising practices. 

“Four more days and we will be done with the reign of Gray Davis!” he said at the Jelly Belly Candy Co. in Fairfield, midway between San Francisco and Sacramento. “My administration will be built upon sound public policy, not campaign contributions,” Simon said. 

Behind him hung a Jelly Belly mosaic of Reagan. One of Simon’s ads uses Reagan’s famous line, “Are you better off now than you were four years ago?” 

Davis, who starts his own barnstorming tour Sunday, was in Los Angeles picking up the endorsement of Mayor James Hahn, a notable holdout when the governor announced a round of endorsements from the state’s mayors in August. Davis endorsed Hahn’s opponent in the mayoral election this year. 

“Unlike previous governors, you have not balanced the state’s budget on the back of local governments. We appreciate that,” Hahn said in announcing his support with other city officials outside Los Angeles City Hall. 

Davis lashed out at Simon and predicted victory, despite voter apathy about a campaign that has centered on mudslinging by two candidates who are both viewed unfavorably. A Friday Field Poll showed 25 percent of voters either remain undecided or plan to vote for minor party candidates or leave the ballot for governor blank. 

“I really believe we’ve made progress in the face of a national recession and a terrible energy crisis. I believe we will see a substantial number of people coming out to the polls to vote for me because of the four good years we’ve had,” Davis said. 

“I believe in paying your dues. My opponent wants to parachute right in,” he said. 

Simon, his wife Cindy, campaign aides and reporters traveled in a Gulfstream 3 jet provided by GOP donor and real estate developer William Lyons. Simon mingled with voters at Marie Callendar’s in reliably Republican Redding and pumped up a lunchtime crowd gathered to see local conservative talk show host Eric Hogue in Rocklin, a Sacramento suburb. 

Simon unleashed a new attack against Davis’ fund-raising practices, bringing up 14-year-old allegations of campaign improprieties that a former state official made against Davis when he was the state’s controller. 

Former deputy attorney general Vincent Reagor wrote a 1988 memo urging prosecution of Davis for allegedly using state employees, time, facilities and equipment during his campaign to be controller. Reagor’s superiors did not prosecute for lack of evidence. 

The allegations were reported then and two years later Reagor’s memo was reported. 

The Republican Party has been trying for weeks to get reporters to write about the allegations. The party finally arranged a meeting between Reagor and a KCBS-TV Los Angeles reporter. 

KCBS aired the story Thursday and Simon used that Friday, even as he sought to distance himself from the allegations and demurred when asked whether he believed Davis committed a crime. 

“I’m not making any suggestions, no accusations, let me be very clear about that. The question is this. Mr. Davis, you owe the people of California an explanation, you owe the people of California an explanation for your pay-to-play practices,” he told reporters. 

In Los Angeles, Davis said: “He’s got a lot of problems of his own. He is using this to deflect from his own lack of vision and the hot water that he is in.” 

It’s the third time that Simon, a former federal prosecutor, has sought to link Davis to criminal behavior as he struggles to overcome the governor’s lead in fund-raising and polls. 

Earlier this month Simon accused Davis of illegally accepting a campaign check in the state Capitol, but had to retract the claim when it was shown the photo Simon used as evidence was taken in Santa Monica. 

Then Simon called on Davis to answer questions about decade-old allegations of impropriety made by a convicted felon, which were unsealed Monday by a federal judge. Prosecutors decided at the time, as in the Reagor case, not to pursue the allegations. 

Simon repeatedly pushed reporters this week to focus on the allegations, but said he was not making accusations. 

“There’s a distinction in my own mind between accusations and questions that get raised by other people,” he said.


News of the Weird

Saturday November 02, 2002

Tabby owner tracked down 

ELKHART, Ind. — A tiger-striped tabby is home after 10 months thanks to factory workers who took in the wayward feline and tracked down its owner. 

The gray-and-silver cat, named Mercedes, disappeared after running out the door of Beverly VanZandt’s mobile home in Osceola on an unseasonably warm January day. When a snowstorm three days later lowered temperatures to almost zero, VanZandt figured she had seen the last of her cat. 

But on Wednesday, VanZandt got a phone call from an employee at Monaco Coach Corp. in Elkhart. 

Mercedes somehow wandered to the recreational vehicle factory 10 miles east of Osceola, and had been staying there for the past month. The cat was wary of humans for weeks, but finally let a worker get close enough to read its tag so its veterinarian and then VanZandt could be traced. 

VanZandt and Mercedes were reunited Thursday at Monaco Coach. 

“It’s like she died, and now she’s alive again,” VanZandt said. 

 

Candy thief finally caught 

DETROIT — A retiree paid $100 as reimbursement for stealing candy from a school pantry 55 years ago. 

The 1947 Detroit Southeastern High School graduate anonymously mailed a letter and a $100 bill to the school district a few weeks ago. 

The donor admitted raiding the pantry while doing chores in the lunch room a couple times a week. 

“I am a retired professional who has been highly respected all my life,” the letter read. “I have certainly been guilty of much greater offenses over the years, but that basic breach of trust has remained in the back of my mind.” 

The thief admitted taking Hershey bars and a few handfuls of almonds. 

The donor noted that the value of the food “might not have been as much as a dollar at that time.” 

Detroit Public Schools Chief Executive Kenneth Burnley plans to take the money to Southeastern on Friday to teach students that’s its never too late to right a wrong. 

 

Mistake makes glass collectible 

LOUISVILLE, Ky. — A mistake on the first run of the 2003 Kentucky Derby glass has apparently created a collectible. 

The glass mistakenly lists 1932 Derby winner Burgoo King as a Triple Crown winner and neglects to note that 1937 Derby winner War Admiral did win the Triple Crown. 

Churchill Downs officials said Tuesday that 100,440 glasses, about 20 percent of the glasses that will be produced for next year’s race, contain the error. 

The bad glasses, which retail for between $2 and $3, were expected to be more valuable than the corrected glasses. 

“It’s Christmas morning for those who collect them,” said Churchill Downs spokesman John Asher. “It adds to the fun. We’re unhappy they’re out there — we want everything we market to be perfect — but it’s exciting for the collectible community.”


Marijuana measure gets $1.2 million in donations

The Associated Press
Saturday November 02, 2002

 

CARSON CITY, Nev. — A Washington, D.C.-based organization has poured $1.28 million into a campaign to legalize possession of up to 3 ounces of marijuana in Nevada, far outspending opponents of the ballot question. 

Three major Nevada casino-hotel corporations provided most of the funding for opponents of Question 9, on Tuesday’s ballot as a proposed constitutional amendment. 

The latest report from Nevadans for Responsible Law Enforcement, pushing Question 9, showed virtually all its funding came from the Marijuana Policy Project in Washington, D.C. 

Nevadans for Responsible Law Enforcement also reported spending $1.1 million. 

The Committee to Keep Nevada Respectable, which is trying to defeat the marijuana petition, reported getting $143,800 in contributions in the August-October quarter — half of that from the Venetian megaresort on the Las Vegas Strip. 

Other big contributors included casino-owning Park Place Entertainment and Boyd Gaming, for $25,000 apiece; and Sunbelt Communications, which contributed $10,000. 

The Committee to Keep Nevada Respectable spent $128,265. Of the expenses, $107,000 went to FFG Advertising and $20,000 went to Rogich Communications for consulting. 

A group called Nevadans Against Legalized Marijuana collected $6,325 and spent $6,225. The major contributor to this group was Stop DUI, which gave more than $5,000. 

The Coalition for the Protection of Marriage, which is supporting a ban on gay marriages in Nevada, reported it collected $351,468 since the primary election in September. At that point it had a balance of $523,231. In its latest report, the coalition said it spent $730,231 since the primary. 

The figures were in campaign finance reports filed this week with the Nevada Secretary of State’s office.


Sen. Feinstein blames Sierra Club for blocking wildfire bill

By Scott Sonner
Saturday November 02, 2002

SOUTH LAKE TAHOE — Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., blames environmental ally the Sierra Club for Congress’ failure to pass legislation last month to thin national forests to reduce wildfire threats in the West. 

Sierra Club President Carl Pope said Republican leaders are responsible, and a timber industry leader points the finger at Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, D-S.D., who he accused of “election year politics.” 

All sides agree it’s unlikely that Congress will move in its lame duck session after Tuesday’s general elections to seek consensus to reduce the threat of fires that have consumed an estimated 6.5 million acres across the nation this year. 

“You have a very polarized community when it comes to fire and how they view fire,” Feinstein said. 

“The Sierra Club roasted me,” she said. 

The former mayor of San Francisco has averaged a 91 percent scorecard rating from the League of Conservation Voters the past six years, but confounds environmentalists by insisting that logging be used to help ease wildfire threats. 

She said she will press the Senate to hold hearings early next year and that she will attempt to build support among conservationists and others for an emergency program she hopes to develop with Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and Republicans on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee. 

Feinstein said she was close to securing a bipartisan agreement with Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, that would have sacrificed some trees to reduce fuel loads and make 7 million acres of forests near urban areas safer from fires. 

“I think the Sierra Club did it in to be honest with you. There was just real opposition,” Feinstein told reporters after a speech to an environmental conference last week at Lake Tahoe. 

Feinstein said the Sierra Club made it impossible for her to gather the support she needed among Democrats to cut off debate and force a vote. 

“So the effort kind of collapsed,” she said. 

Chris West, vice president of the timber industry’s American Forest Resource Council based in Portland, Ore., said Feinstein is partially right. But he puts the blame more squarely on Democratic leaders. 

“From our perspective, the reason nothing moved in the Senate that was workable was because of Daschle. It was all election-year politics,” West said. 

Craig, chairman of the Senate subcommittee on forests and public lands, offers a similar account of the Senate’s refusal to consider his amendment to a spending bill for the Interior Department that still needs congressional approval. 

“The Dianne Feinsteins of this world have every reason to be frustrated and angry. I think she felt herself a friend of that organization only to have them bite her as hard as they did,” Craig said. 

“She kept going to her leadership and got nothing. In the end, Tom (Daschle) did not want to put his people at risk taking a tough vote — which was the right vote — on something the environmental people have so effectively polarized,” he told The Associated Press this week. 

Pope said there was agreement on a plan to do emergency thinning in as much as 23 million acres the Forest Service identified as overstocked forests near homes, known as “urban interface” areas. 

But he said GOP leaders refused to provide funding unless normal environmental reviews for projects outside those areas were suspended, too. 

“Basically, they blackmailed the Senate. And we said, ‘No, that blackmail is not acceptable.’ So in that sense, yes Sen. Feinstein is correct” about the group’s role in blocking legislation, he said. 

Aides to Daschle said he was willing to expedite thinning, even in some areas outside “urban interface zones,” but not with the prohibitions on legal challenges GOP leaders demanded. 

“We agreed that some streamlining of the process makes sense, particularly if you focus most of the resources on thinning in the urban interface zone. But the notion of depriving folks of opportunities they have now for judicial review was going too far and something we were not prepared to support,” said Eric Washburn, a senior legislative to Daschle. 

The conflict centers on disagreement over the amount of logging that should be allowed to remove unnaturally high levels of brush and small trees that have resulted from decades of suppressing fires. In the past, fires periodically cleared forests of such undergrowth. 

Critics say the thinning programs are abused to remove larger, commercial-sized timber and, in some cases, increase fire risks. 

Pope said he doubts any new policy will be adopted during the “lame duck” session of Congress. 

“I would think that what was driving people on both sides (last month) is they wanted to take something home to run on,” he said. 

Feinstein said she understands environmentalists are distrustful of proposals to use logging to reduce fire threats. 

“What we really need to do is build confidence and work with environmentalists to try to come together, just as they have here,” she said at Lake Tahoe where competing interests have united to work to restore the lake’s clarity. 

“This used to be very fractionated community. It is not so any more,” she said. 

Feinstein also criticized the Bush administration for failing to provide necessary funding. 

“Grooming the forests has to become a major priority for this administration. To this date ... it isn’t.”


LA police probe past tips on faith healers

By Laura Wides
Saturday November 02, 2002

LOS ANGELES — Police Chief William Bratton said Friday he has opened an internal investigation into the possible mishandling of tips about dangerous practices by faith healers. 

The investigation comes four days after a man died when an unlicensed faith healer allegedly injected him with an unknown substance. 

Bratton said he recently learned that the Police Department’s narcotics division had received tips about the illegal injections as far back as May 2001 but had failed to investigate. The tips continued over the past 18 months, he said. 

“I’m concerned, very concerned, about how the tip was handled, and I have many questions,” said Bratton, who was publicly sworn in on Monday. “We are going to try to convince the public of our sincere interest in determining what went wrong so that those mistakes are not made again.”


Jackets want payback on Spartans

By Jared Green Daily Planet Staff
Friday November 01, 2002

 

When the Berkeley Yellowjackets and the Pinole Valley Spartans face off tonight, there will be plenty on the line. A huge step toward the league championship and an automatic bid to the North Coast Section playoffs, a seven-game Pinole Valley winning streak and bragging rights for the next year are among the spoils the winner will take home. 

With both teams sitting at 4-0 in Alameda-Contra Costa Athletic League play, the only teams without a loss thus far, tonight’s game at Pinole Valley is a de facto championship. It’s the second straight season the game will decide the league title, with the Spartans winning last year’s finale 35-14 for a second straight undefeated ACCAL record. 

“I’ve been waiting the whole year for this game,” Berkeley linebacker Owen Goldstrom said Wednesday. “Beating Pinole Valley has been our goal since we moved into this league.” 

But while Pinole Valley (6-1 overall) was the favorite last year behind star running back DeAndre MacFarland, the Yellowjackets are favored in tonight’s game. There’s little question Berkeley (7-0 overall) is the more talented team, with tremendous speed at every skill position and a defense that has been strong all season. But Berkeley head coach Matt Bissell still thinks of his squad as the underdog. 

“I don’t think we can be favored until we beat [Pinole Valley],” Bissell said. “Someone has to knock them off the top before becoming the favorite.” 

Bissell will have all his weapons at his disposal tonight, unlike last year when 10 Berkeley players were ruled ineligible due to academics in the week leading up to their showdown with the Spartans. While some Yellowjackets are still having grade issues, they lucked out with this year’s game coming earlier in the season; the first official grades don’t come out until next week. 

Defensive tackle Jamal Johnson-Lucas was one of the Berkeley players who watched from the sideline as their teammates fell to Pinole Valley last season.  

“I can’t tell you how painful it was to have to watch that happen,” Johnson-Lucas said. “It’s not a feeling you want, knowing you let down your teammates and coaches like that.” 

Berkeley defensive coordinator Ronald Moore said the suspensions cost his team the game and league title last season. 

“The game before I had a Magnum, and then we had to play Pinole with a .22 [caliber],” Moore said. “You can’t go to war with a .22.” 

Johnson-Lucas and his linemates bear most of the pressure on the Berkeley defense, as they will have to stop the Spartan running game that features a three-headed monster at tailback. Ronnie Jones, Damarea Johnson and Fontino Hardy are all solid backs who can break big gains. While not as explosive without MacFarland, who ran for 166 yards and three touchdowns in last season’s game, the Spartans can wear an opponent down with their stable of running backs behind a huge offensive line. 

Adding to the offense is the development of wide receiver Thomas Decoud, a 6-foot-4 basketball star who specializes in coming down with jump balls. Although the Spartan passing game has been spotty this season, Decoud is always a threat to make a big play and draws double-team coverage much of the time. 

Moore plans to put his best cornerback, senior Robert Young, on Decoud and let the rest of his defense concentrate on stopping the run for the most part. 

“You have to know where Decoud is at all times. He’s their big playmaker,” Moore said. “I’m not going to let him beat us. If we need to give Rob help, we’ll give him help.” 

On the other side of the ball, the Yellowjackets will need to establish the run early to keep the pressure off of quarterback Dessalines Gant, who will be starting just his fifth game. In Berkeley’s only close game of the year, a 34-28 overtime win over Hercules, Gant threw five interceptions as the opposing safeties sat back and defended the deep pass.  

The Jackets have been working on the short passing game for the last two weeks, but if they can’t run the Spartans will drop back and wait for Gant to make a mistake. Fullback Aaron Boatwright will likely see a lot of carries, and his success will determine how aggressive Pinole Valley can be on defense. If Boatwright can force the Spartans to put more people near the line of scrimmage, Gant will have more room to find speedy wideouts Sean Young and Roberto McBean for big plays, as well as tight ends Robert Hunter-Ford and Rodney Jones in the middle on play-action.


The blame game

Joseph Matossian Berkeley
Friday November 01, 2002

To the Editor: 

 

Two letters written by two well-meaning Berkeley residents (Forum, Oct.18) caught my attention. Incidentally, myself and probably many others, share most of the points made by the respective writers. 

Mr. Frank Gebauer blames “landlords and those lucky enough to already own a home” for the congestion and pollution on College Avenue. I suggest that he not blame landlords, but instead that he direct his frustration toward tenants and homeowners who live in those areas. Berkeley landlords are already blamed for everything. 

Ms. Judith Segard Hunt blames Proposition 13 for causing “damage to vital social services.” I suggest that, rather than merely blame Proposition 13 and suggest its repeal, she should mobilize her peers around legislation to fund social services from income taxes, rather than from the limited incomes of the retired. This would enable social services to be more adequately financed and property owners would not be disproportionately burdened. 

 

Joseph Matossian 

Berkeley


The butterfly ballot on the big screen

By Peter Crimmins Special to the Daily Planet
Friday November 01, 2002

If voters gearing up for the election Tuesday have forgotten problematic butterfly ballots and dimpled chads, then a new documentary screening Saturday, at the Berkeley Video and Film Festival, will bring it all back. 

Exhaustively investigated, “Unprecedented: the 2000 Presidential Election” is chock full of information about how the electoral process broke down in Florida two years ago when President Bush’s victory hinged on a few hundred hand-counted ballots. But, for better or worse, filmmakers Richard Ray Perez and Joan Sekler are clearly biased against Republicans, and their film stumbles over itself in laying out the gory details of underhanded election poll tactics. 

The film comes in the second half of the marathon festival produced by the East Bay Media Center, which assembled 45 videos and films (all screened via video projector) to be presented back-to-back for 12 hours at the Fine Arts Cinema beginning noon Saturday. Tickets allow in and out privileges, and the full half-day of movies includes narratives and documentaries as long as 94 minutes, and experimental works and shorts as brief as one minute. 

“Unprecedented” spends most of its 80 minutes scrutinizing Florida’s polling system with a magnifying glass. The contest it uncovers is not between Bush and then-candidate Al Gore, or even Republicans and Democrats. The 2000 election in Florida was a debate over the rules of election process versus the spirit of voter intention. 

The film begins well before the ballots were cast. The voter eligibility roles in Florida were purged of thousands of names via a little-known Florida law revoking the right of ex-cons to vote. As evidenced in the film, the private database company hired by the state of Florida to create the voter roles was instructed to match the names of voters with the names of felons using very general parameters.  

When the company protested that the database parameters would create “false positives,” meaning people would be improperly purged from the voter list, state election officials, overseen by Secretary of State Katherine Harris, instructed them to continue purging voters. When county officials in Tallahassee checked the 690 names purged from their voter lists, only 33 were confirmed ex-cons. 

After the ballots were cast and the recount began, the film passes indictments on Harris, who had earlier campaigned for President Bush in New Hampshire. During the recount, Harris established non-negotiable deadlines for the counties to present their results while Democrat and Republican observers lobbied for favors in determining the intention of each chad – the little square of punched paper on a voting card that determines a selection.  

The film dives headfirst into the battle of the wonks with accounts of very dense political and legal spinning. The final decision of the Supreme Court to favor the technical rules of polling over the intention of the voter is moved by quickly and is poorly described at the end of the film. However, it ends on a high note: the American people now have a deeper understanding of how our democracy is run, even if they might need to carefully watch this film two or three times in order to understand it fully. 

“Unprecedented” screens in the later half of the festival’s schedule, at 8 p.m., when the longer and better-produced films are clumped. The stylistic range of filmmaking is as broad as the difference of running times. Longtime festival entrant Hoku Uchiyama, former Albany High School student now attending film school in Los Angeles, created a handful of short, roughly produced videos of awkwardness and sadism, one featuring a homicidal teenage Santa Claus impersonator. 

At 9:30, during festival primetime, “Crazy Jones” will be played; a quirky, feature-length drama about a 40-year-old recluse with Tourette’s syndrome who tries to break out of his suicidal shell with the help of a perky 12-year-old girl. First time director Joe Aaron wore several hats – lead actor, writer, producer and director – and used the latest cinema technology to make this film.  

“Crazy Jones” is one of the first films to be shot on high-definition video; its 24P HD video system is the same technology George Lucas is using to shoot his Star Wars films, and with 1080 pixels per square inch it has a resolution comparable to celluloid. “Crazy Jones” is able to get a subtle lighting and visual depth that most video works can’t approach. 

Another visually arresting film in the festival is the documentary “Mighty Times; the Life of Rosa Parks” which tells the historical story of the infamous Alabama bus boycott that launched the Civil Rights Movement. Filmmakers Robert Hudson and Bobby Huston matched 1955 archives of police actions and demonstrations with dramatic re-enactments.  

Unlike Aaron’s crisp, high-tech HD video images in “Crazy Jones,” Hudson and Huston sought to make their film look 50 years old. Using vintage cameras and old film stock, they recreated the afternoon Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a city bus with amazing fidelity to old cinema technology. The archival footage and the re-enactments are woven together seamlessly.


Calendar

Friday November 01, 2002

Friday, Nov. 1 

Census 2000: Growing Together or Apart? 

8:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. 

Wurster Hall Auditorium (Rm. 112), UC Berkeley 

During this one-day conference, scholars will analyze the geographic impact of changes to the population. 

For more info: 

http://urbanpolicy.berkeley.edu/census2000.htm 

 

Featured Speaker Jonathan Kozol 

3 p.m. 

Sponsored by the university’s Center for the Development of Peace and Well-being, Kozol will speak about world issues through the innocent eyes of children, focusing on his most recent book, “Ordinary Rsurrections”. 

International House, 2299 Piedmont Ave. 

Reservations required at 643-7491 or lshiota@socrates.berkeley.edu 

Free 

 

Berkeley Women in Black Vigil 

Weekly protest to “End the Occupation” 

Bancroft at Telegraph Ave. 

548-6310 

 

Saturday, Nov. 2 

Inbound Tourism 

8:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. 

Speakers and workshops focusing on development and tourism on local, state, and national levels. Featuring Ms. Barbara Hillman, Director of the Berkeley Convention & Visitors Bureu 

Vista Community College, Room 303 

2020 Milvia St. 

981-2931 

$5.50/ California residents 

 

Spanish Table’s First Anniversary  

10 a.m. to 6 p.m. 

Various activities, including tapas, music, demos, and book signng by author Janet Mendel to celebrate the store’s first year. 

The Spanish Table, 1814 San Pablo Ave. 

548-1383 

 

Sacramento Street Clean-Up Day 

8 a.m. to noon 

Fun chance to clean up the neighborhood and meet your neighbors. Free T-shirts and refreshments. Wear work clothes and gloves (if you have them), tools provided. 

Meet at the northwest corner of 66th and Sacramento in the parking lot of El Nopal. 

981-CITY (2489) 

 

Sick Plant Clinic 

9 a.m. to noon 

UC Botanical Garden, 200 Centennial Dr. UC plant pathology and entomology experts will diagnose what ails your plant. 

643-2755 

Free 

 

Sunday, Nov. 3 

“Sacred Breath” 

6 p.m. 

Tibetan Nyingma Institute, 1815 Highland Place 

Robin Caton gives this talk on Tibetan Buddhism, and the classic Buddhist practice known as Tong-len. 

843-6812 

Free 

 

Public Speaking Seminar 

10 to 11 a.m. 

First in a four part series. Contact Steve, 595-0878 for more information. 

Free 

 

Beach Clean-Up 

2 to 3 p.m. 

Sponsored by the Friends of Albany Beach, this one hour clean-up will meet at the Albany Waterfront Trail parking lot at the western terminus of Buchanan Street. Bring gloves and trash bags. 

525-3125 

 

Focus On Iraq: What can we do? 

7 p.m. 

Recently returned from Iraq, Barbara Lubin will share first hand observations and assist us in finding ways to respond to the war. Dinner and program included. 

Epworth United Methodist Church, 1935 Hopkis St. 

548-4141 

$15 and up suggested donation, no one turned away for lack of funds. 

 

Monday, Nov. 4 

Berkeley Gray Panthers Home Owners Support Group 

3 p.m. 

Berkeley Gray Panthers Office, 1403 Addison St. 

Resources for low and middle-income home owners, and home maintenance. 

548-9696 

 

“Pathways to Collaboration” 

7:30 to 9:30 p.m. 

Kroeber Hall, Rm. 160, UC Berkeley 

A lecture by Dana Plautz, director of research communications for Intel Corporation, followed by live music. 

Free 

 

 

Tuesday, Nov. 5 

Flu Shots for Everyone 

10 a.m to 12:30 p.m. 

Sponsored by the Berkeley Public Health Department 

St. John’s Presbyterian Church 

2727 College Ave. 

845-6830 

 

Berkeley Intelligent Conversation 

7 to 9 p.m. 

Join the bimonthly discussion group informally led by fomer UC Berkeley extension lecturer, investment advisor and finncial planner Robert Berend. Open to all. Please bring light snacks/ drinks to share. This session’s topic: Work ethic vs. playing and having fun. 

Berkeley-Richmond Jewish Community Center, 1414 Walnut St. 

527-5332 

Free 

 

Wednesday, Nov. 6 

2002 Surjit Singh Lecture 

5:30 p.m. 

Church Divinity School of the Pacific, Common Room, 2451 Ridge Rd. 

649-2440 for more info. 

 

“The Chinese and Religion in the Context of Globalization” 

Reception 5:30 p.m. / Lecture 7 p.m. 

Bade Museum at Pacific School of Religion, 1798 Scenic Ave. 

A noted scholar and author, Professor Zhuo Xinping speaks. 

649-2440 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Friday, Nov. 1 

Festa Da Bunda 

8:30 p.m. 

Ashkenaz, 1317 San Pablo Ave. at Gilman 

This Brazilian “love fest and Penta party” features a Batucada jam with Gary Muzynski of One World Music and others. The night includes a Brazilian soccer team look-alike contest. 

525-5054 

$12 

 

Bristol Sessions Anniversary 

8 p.m. 

Freight & Salvage, 1111 Addison St. 

A tribute to the Carter family and Jimmie Rogers. 

548-1761 

$16.50-$17.50 

 

Saturday, Nov. 2 

The Librarians with The Skyflakes and Plain White Ts 

9 p.m. 

Bear’s Lair 

2475 Bancroft Way 

$5 / 21 and over 

 

Wake the Dead 

8 p.m. 

Freight & Salvage, 1111 Addison St. 

All-star Celtic musicians pay tribute to the Grateful Dead. 

548-1761 

$16.50-$17.50 

 

Vince Black with Root Awakening 

9:30 p.m. 

Ashkenaz, 1317 San Pablo Ave. at Gilman 

Socially conscious reggae classics and original songs. 

525-5054 

$11 

 

Sunday, Nov. 3 

Workshop and Performance by Akira Tana 

1 to 3 p.m. workshop 

4:30 p.m. concert 

Jazzschool, 2087 Addison St. 

Drummer Akira Tana teaches and performs. 

Reservations: 845-5373 

$30-$35 workshop 

$10-$15 performance 

 

CalArts Night of Jazz 

8 p.m. 

Jazzschool, 2087 Addison St. 

The first of many collaborations between Jazzschool and CalArts. 

Reservations: 845-5373 

$10-$15 

 

Tish Hinojosa 

8 p.m. 

Freight & Salvage, 1111 Addison St. 

548-1761 

$17.50-$18.50 

 

Flamenco Open Stage 

7:30 p.m. 

Ashkenaz, 1317 San Pablo Ave. at Gilman 

Dancers, guitarists and singers, with a costume exhibit and a sale of flamenco items. 

525-5054 

$8 

 

Miriam Abramowitsch and George Barth 

4 p.m. 

Crowden Music Center, 1475 Rose St. 

The renowned singer and pianist will perform classical vocal favorites featuring the music of Brahams, Dvorak and Bartok. 

559-6910 

$10 / 18 and under free 

 

 

“Shove Off to Birthday Island” 

Nov. 1 through Nov. 30 

Reception Nov. 2 from 5 to 8 p.m. 

Normal hours: 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday 

Ardency Gallery, 709 Broadway, Oakland 

A collaborative exhibition of Tonya Solley Thornton and Frank Haines including video and sculptural installations. 

836-0831 

 

Ceramics - Opening Reception 

Through Nov. 17 

3 to 5 p.m. 

A New Leaf Gallery, 1286 Gilman St. 

525-7621 

Free 

 

“A Lashing of Malice, a Slice of Humor” 

Oct. 31 through Nov. 2 

Julia Morgan Center for the Arts, 2640 College Ave, near Derby 

Roald Dahl’s adult stories come to life onstage. 

Tickets available at the door and at: 

925-798-1300 

$25 opening night Gala 

$10-$15 otherwise 

 

Saturday, Nov. 2 

Jan Tissot, 3 to 5 p.m. 

Pegasus Downtown, 2349 Shattuck Ave. 

Jan Tissot, longtime West Coast political activist and criminal defense investigator will be signing his new novel, “Keiki”. 

 

Sunday, Nov. 3 

Avery E.D. Burns and Aidan Thompson 

7:30 p.m. 

Cody’s Books, 2454 Telegraph Ave. 

Authors will read from their poetry. 

525-5476, $2 donation 

 

 

Sunday, Nov. 3 

“Focus” 

2 to 4:30 p.m. 

Berkeley Richmond Jewish Community Center, 1414 Walnut St.  

William H. Macy stars in this early 1940’s period piece. 

848-0237, $2 donation 

 

To publicize an event, please submit information two weeks in advance. Fax to 841-5694, 

e-mail to calendar@berkeleydailyplanet.net or mail to 2076 University Ave., 94704. Include a daytime telephone number. Sending notice does not guarantee publication.


Day of the Dead reaches beyond

By Brian Kluepfel
Friday November 01, 2002

Rather than fearing death, Day of the Dead (Dia de los Muertos) winks at it, seeing it simply as part of the natural cycle of life. Throughout Latin America and other places where the tradition is honored, the first two days of November are a time to remember deceased friends and relatives with altars, visits to their graves and offerings of music and food. 

Berkeley sculptor Carol Stewart first discovered Day of the Dead in her travels through Latin America. Soon afterward she was incorporating them into her art work. “When people in my family died, we didn’t know how to deal with it,” she said. “We could never express our grief. In Latin America, they thumb their nose at death, and see it as the other side of the coin. I think that’s really healthy.”  

In recent years, awareness of the Day of the Dead has grown outside its traditional boundaries. Several Berkeley artists, including Stewart, were chosen this year to make contributions to San Francisco gallery SomArts’ Day of the Dead exhibit, and in doing so, have shown how the non-Latino community has embraced the day of remembrance. 

Stewart’s contribution to the exhibit “Under the Skin” is a collection of figurines draped with fabric, encircled with wire and illuminated from behind.  

She said the piece represents her father’s death this year from melanoma, with the figures symbolizing the body and the wire symbolizing the cancer. “There’s a thin veil between life and death,” she said. “I saw that with my father.”  

Printmaker and Berkeley resident Elizabeth Addison’s altar, “She Could Have Danced All Night,” pays tribute to her friend Nancy Wilcox who also died of cancer this year. Wilcox loved dancing and parties, said Addison, and her exhibit includes prints of couples dancing and embracing. 

“It really took on a life of its own,” said Addison. Her tribute reveals traditional and modern influence. It includes a collage that Wilcox made entitled “Mexican Dresses” and computer-generated music by Wilcox’ son. A slide projection of William Shakespeare’s 30th Sonnet, which Addison read at her friend’s memorial service this spring, enfolds and completes the altar.  

Addison spoke highly of show curator Rene Yañez, who has been organizing Day of the Dead events in the Bay Area for three decades. “Rene really tries to make it cross-cultural, and we all bring our own sensibilities to it. It’s not something that’s strictly Hispanic,” she said. 

Berkeley artist Jos Sances agreed. “I’ve been working with Rene for over 20 years, and he was always a guy who was into sharing culture, not keeping it separate,” said Sances, whose own tribute to the late Fetterly Gallery director Dan Robeski is included in the SomArts show. “The cross-hybridization adds 

vitality to the show,” he said.  

For Sances, who grew up in New England, Day of the Dead evokes “the bittersweet melancholy of autumn. There’s an understanding that the light is diminishing and the cold of winter is in front of you,” he said. “It’s a very profound time for me and as close to spiritual as I get.”  

Sances says that the Halloween he grew up with does not come close to its Latin American counterpart. “It never had the resonance of Day of the Dead,” he said. “This really ties it all together for me.”  

Curator Yañez has personally experienced how the Day of the Dead has changed. “At first, Day of the Dead was celebrated solely within the Mexican-American community,” said Yanez. “Now, it’s been adopted by people of many cultures and religions. The Bay Area can take credit for celebrating the Day of the Dead and influencing mainstream U.S. culture.”


Eastshore Park plan finalized

By Matthew Artz Daily Planet Staff
Friday November 01, 2002

Off-leash dog walkers and artists are howling mad over the final plan for the bayside Eastshore State Park. The plan set to be released this week forbids both groups from using a favorite stretch of Albany coastline. 

“The only thing I feel is disgust. All this proves is that it doesn’t matter... what the users of the park want,” said Jill Posener of Albany Let It Be. The group had called for a roughly 40–acre parcel, called the Albany Bulb, to remain open to off-leash dog walkers and a group of artists that paint on washed-up driftwood. 

The plan finalized last week includes long-debated changes that have received the support of environmentalists and playing field advocates, but make dog walkers and artists feel further alienated. The proposed park plan, which embraces 8.1 miles of coast stretching from Emeryville to Richmond, still needs to be approved by the State Parks Commission this December. 

While dog walkers vented, environmentalists cheered after winning several late concessions from park planners.  

“I’m extremely optimistic that the plan will contain language we can agree on,” said Robert Cheasty, president of Citizens for an Eastshore State Park (CESP).  

Athletic fields currently slated for the Albany Plateau, just east of the bulb, will be moved, if a new site becomes available. 

Members of the Sierra Club and CESP have been lobbying to switch the fields from the wild habitat in Albany to a paved lot in west Berkeley owned by Magna Entertainment Corporation. The company is currently negotiating with the East Bay Regional Park District over the sale of the property. 

Planners have also agreed to make the construction of a boat launch planned for the north Berkeley coast contingent on the results of a study reviewing the effects of kayaks and boats on migrating sea birds. 

The year-long park planning process has been marred by animosity between environmentalists and recreation advocates. 

Dog walkers now insist that their interests have been put below those of environmentalists and playing field advocates which they say had better access to state planners. 

“We didn’t even need a public process,” Posener said. “Ultimately they went into the back room and did the deal they wanted to do.” 

Neuwirth, though, insisted that off-leash dog walkers made out well under the final plan. “Twenty percent of the park is for off-leash dogs more than any other in California,” he said adding that planners determined that off-leash dogs intimidate people and would chase away sea birds around the bulb. 

Posener contended that off-leash dogs have been a fixture at the bulb for years, during which time birds started flocking to the area in greater numbers. 

Regarding the artists, Neuwirth said he was open to letting them stay if they agreed to tone down their often sexually explicit work. 

Posener, however, said the artists were never given a chance to bargain. “We went to a meeting with Neuwirth. He told us that you cannot have that kind of art in a family park. How do you negotiate with that?” she said. 

Members of the State Park Commission, including Commissioner Clint Eastwood, are tentatively scheduled to convene Dec. 6 in Berkeley to rule on the plan. Construction of park facilities would get underway next year and could continue for more than a decade. 

 

Contact reporter at matt@berkeleydailyplanet.net 


Playoff postponed after tension, tears

By Jared Green Daily Planet Staff
Friday November 01, 2002

 

The Berkeley-Alameda girls tennis playoff ended in tears and consternation on Thursday, and the match wasn’t even decided. 

The deciding match between Berkeley’s Gail Nipitnorasete and Alameda’s Erika Fong was suspended after two sets, tied 1-1, due to darkness, and the players were to meet this morning to play the final set at a neutral court in Berkeley. But reaching that decision was a long and painful process, with opposing coaches butting heads over whether to continue or postpone the match. 

After Nipitnorasete came back from a 3-0 game deficit to win the second set 7-6 in a tiebreaker, both coaches agreed that it was too dark to start the third set. Berkeley coach Alex Kopel suggested moving to a lighted court nearby to finish the match, but Alameda’s coaches urged Fong to hold out for a postponement. The strain proved too much for the Alameda freshman, who burst into tears under the pressure. 

“There’s no reason for high school tennis to make a girl a wreck,” Kopel said. 

With a neutral site coordinator contributing and Fong’s father removing her from the situation things calmed down a bit, but the resolution still took more than 30 minutes to sort out. Nipitnorasete is taking the SAT on Saturday and didn’t want to play Friday after school, while the Alameda coaches didn’t want to wait until next week to finish the match. Instead, each player will miss their morning classes to meet this morning at 9:30 a.m. 

Several Berkeley players expressed outrage at the apparent gamesmanship by the Alameda coaches with the momentum of the match clearly in Nipitnorasete’s favor. 

The stakes are very high, as the winner will earn her team an automatic bid to the North Coast Section team playoffs, while the losing team will be forced to apply for an unlikely at-large berth despite co-champion status. Both teams finished the ACCAL season at 9-1 and split their regular-season matches. 

The Nipitnorasete-Fong match was expected to decide the issue, as Berkeley swept the other three singles and lost all three doubles matches according to form. All of the other six matches were finished when Nipitnorasete began her comeback, with the teams cheering from opposite sides of the court.


Election inexperience?

Betty Olds 6th District City Council member
Friday November 01, 2002

 

To the Editor: 

 

Rob Wrenn (Forum, Oct. 29) seems to have forgotten that when Kriss Worthington first ran for City Council, he had no experience and a rather sketchy past. In fact, he didn’t have a single name endorsing him in the 1996 voter handbook. Micki Weinberg is a strong candidate who will bring to the council a sincere desire to solve problems, rather than create them. He is a consensus builder who focuses on solutions. Berkeley has plenty of nasty, narrow-minded ideologues. What the City Council needs now is new and positive approaches to our problems. Micki Weinberg will be a welcome breath of fresh air on the City Council 

 

Betty Olds 

6th District City Council member 

 


Comically unhip ’King of the Hill’ reclaims old time slot

By Anthony Breznican The Associated Press
Friday November 01, 2002

LOS ANGELES — After years of moving around the Fox prime-time schedule, the working-class comedy “King of the Hill” is back where it started. 

The Fox cartoon series about a small-town Texas family — stoic patriarch Hank Hill, his Boggle champion wife, Peggy, and their vaudeville-loving son, Bobby — is moving to 8:30 p.m. EST on Sundays — the slot after “The Simpsons” that it first occupied when it strongly debuted in 1997. (Most recently the show has aired at 7:30 p.m. on Sundays.) 

“I’m on it and I could never find it,” said Kathy Najimy, who provides the voice of Peggy, an award-winning substitute teacher and pseudo-intellectual with a penchant for “Fat Albert” impressions. 

“I’d tell people I was Bobby on ’King of the Hill’ ... and they’d say to me, ‘I saw that show years ago,” said Pamela S. Adlon, who won an Emmy this year for supplying the scratchy voice of the 13-year-old character. “And I would say, ’Yesss ... we’re still on.”’ 

Just as Hank Hill suppresses all emotion except his passion for selling propane and propane accessories, the makers of “King of the Hill” are tight-lipped about the show’s nomadic past. 

“Fewer people out in the world would come up to you and talk about it,” shrugged Greg Daniels, “King of the Hill” co-creator. “This (new time slot) feels like a little bit of an acknowledgment that we did a good job last season.” 

“It’s good to be back there. It’s good for the morale of people who work on the show,” said Mike Judge, the voice of Hank and the show’s other co-creator, who was previously known for creating MTV’s “Beavis & Butt-head.” 

“King of the Hill” has thrived in syndication, and Judge said the multiple showings each week may have helped rejuvenate its fan base. 

“It’s funnier when you get to know the characters and notice the subtle things,” he said, comparing the show to the low-key comedy of Bob Newhart. 

While Homer Simpson is known for outrageous oafishness, Hank Hill is the soft-spoken opposite — funny because of his blandness. 

Hank is a frustrated man’s man. He loves football, beer, barbecue and trucks, but his feet are too chubby for cowboy boots, the whole neighborhood knows about his bowel problems and other health woes — and he regards pop culture with a restrained disdain. 

“The show is definitely about masculinity,” Daniels said. “Hank’s trying to take his son, who’s sort of a couch potato, and turn him into a man.” 

Hank has a lot of love for the boy, but expressing it isn’t easy. In a moment of overwhelming fatherly pride, he once said: “Bobby, if you weren’t my son, I’d hug you.” 

Although the show pokes fun at Hank and Peggy’s lack of sophistication, it generally favors their orthodoxy. In Sunday’s season premiere, the couple faces down the overly permissive parents of Bobby’s new girlfriend and rescue the boy from an embarrassing situation at the girl’s coed sleepover. 

“It’s not a political show, but it has a lot of sympathy for unhip regular people,” Judge said. 

The family is surrounded by oddball neighbors like bug exterminator and conspiracy-theorist Dale Gribble (voice of Johnny Hardwick); Bill Dauterive (Stephen Root), an Army barber and sloppy bachelor, and mushmouthed stud Boomhauer (Judge). 

“King of the Hill” also isn’t afraid to show its characters’ ugly sides. 

Hank often displays bullheaded chauvinism, second-guessing his wife even when he suspects she’s right and giving the cold shoulder to live-in niece Luanne (Brittany Murphy). 

Meanwhile, Bobby seems determined to take sloth to new levels. In one episode, he develops gout from inactivity and poor eating habits and is delighted to travel around on a Rascal, the kind of slow-moving scooter used by the elderly and infirm. 

“I was trying to capture the kind of kid who is capable of sitting on the couch expressionless for hours and hours,” Judge said. 

Peggy can be obsessive and selfish, undercutting Hank when he taught a shop class so she could win a substitute teaching prize and spending hundreds of dollars on ice cream so she can correctly guess the weight of a sundae at a local store — and therefore get it for free. 

“What I like about her is she’s not the typical boring housewife,” Najimy said. “She’s just this silly ego-inflated person.” 

“Peggy’s wrong a lot of the time,” Judge laughed. “She has a lot of problems.” 

As Hank might put it: Yup.


Oscar de la Renta is guiding brides down the aisle

Friday November 01, 2002

NEW YORK — Choosing a wedding dress is quite possibly the most important fashion decision in a woman’s life. 

With that kind of pressure, it makes sense to turn to an expert, and designer Oscar de la Renta is offering his services. 

De la Renta, well regarded for his ready-to-wear and couture clothing, recently unveiled a collection of bridal gowns that included an elegant-yet-striking strapless gown with bias hem ruffle and matching sheer cathedral cape, and a strapless, fitted lace gown with a flared circle ruffle hemline. 

The gowns might sound as if they have a lot of detail — and they do, which is the norm in bridal designs — but the overall look seems almost restrained for de la Renta whose current fall ready-to-wear collection features elaborately embroidered coats. 

“I don’t really like some overly ornate bridal gowns. I think a bridal gown is something extremely special, the gown has to be really romantic and soft,” de la Renta explains. 

This sensibility dates back to de la Renta’s childhood in the Dominican Republic. He was born on the island in 1932, arriving in New York, after detours through France and Spain, in 1963. 

“Being from a strict Catholic country, there is an essence of dignity and romance that a bride represents,” he says. 

De la Renta says he senses modern brides are once again interested in traditional weddings and traditional wedding gowns — which is part of the reason he decided the time was right to do a collection. 

He also hints at his desire to offer a fashion democracy. “People like Vera (Wang), I like Vera, but it’s nice to have a choice,” he says. 

Deborah Moses, editor-in-chief of Elegant Bride magazine, is pleased to see so many well-known designers, including de la Renta and John Galliano for Christian Dior, doing gowns. “It’s very exciting for the bridal industry and, more to the point, it’s exciting for brides.” 

And the designs seem to come naturally to de la Renta, she adds. “Oscar has stayed modern over the years and he has such an incredible feminine hand. ... He captures the spirit of well-bred America.” 

De la Renta says his bridal gowns feature fabrics of high quality because the dresses are standing on their own without any camouflage for any fabric flaws. 

Silk satin organza, duchess satin and French alencon lace don’t come cheap, but de la Renta says he learned from a previous experience in the bridal business that the quality and integrity of the dress are more important than price. 

“I used to do a bridal collection years ago but we ended the relationship over price. They wanted to me to do less expensive gowns and then I didn’t want my name on them,” he explains. “But I continued to do (wedding dresses) for people who came to me for special gowns.” 

De la Renta adds: “I haven’t lost my hand.” 

In fact, he says, the gowns in his bridal line really are a “recollection” of what all the brides-to-be have told him over the years. De la Renta’s contribution is adding stylish elements from the life that these young women want to lead: The designer is a happily married, successful world traveler who has a craving for experiencing new things while maintaining traditions. 

“Ninety percent of the time girls know exactly how they want to look on their wedding day,” he says. 

“They’ve been dreaming about it for so long.” 

Their dream dress, however, isn’t always what their mother or fiance had in mind. 

“When I’ve done gowns for private customers, the girl usually comes with her mother to the fitting. I ask the mother to leave because mothers have their own vision of what their daughters should look like, and the girls want to please their mothers,” de la Renta says. 

As for the soon-to-be husbands, de la Renta encourages the brides to be considerate and thoughtful of the men’s tastes but not to make a huge sacrifice either. “Every girl has the thought ‘On the day I get married, this is how I want to look.’ And that thought comes long before the boyfriend. ... If he doesn’t like anything tight, and she wears everything tight, the marriage is in bigger trouble than a fight over the dress.”


Weinberg and Israel

Aftim Saba Berkeley
Friday November 01, 2002

 

To the Editor: 

 

When I first saw Micky Weinberg’s name as a candidate for City Council, I thought this was either a joke or some pathological hubris. I have debated Mr. Weinberg on Larry Benski’s Sunday Salon on KPFA, observed him speak at some events and therefore I know where he stands on important contemporary moral and human issues. He is a student who dreams to be an Israeli soldier who fully supports the settlers and the expansion of Jewish settlements in the occupied territories. Micky Weinberg does not consider the West Bank and Gaza as occupied territories. As a soldier, he will do many things Israeli soldiers routinely do during their occupation, including: he will enforce perpetual curfews on millions of Palestinians, shoot at children whether they are throwing stones or watching the streets from a window during a curfew, bulldoze homes of families and protect the settlers during their bloody rampages against Palestinian farmers harvesting their olive crops. This will mean we have a settler soldier ideological candidate for Berkeley City Council – a real first in Berkeley. Mr. Weinberg is opposed to a two state solution, one Palestine, in the West Bank and Gaza and the other, Israel living in peace side by side.  

Mr. Weinberg’s political views are so far to the right of the political spectrum. His views do not even come close to the majority of the Israeli public. A poll by the Israeli newspaper, Yedihot Ahronot, in Oct. 2002 revealed that 78 percent of the Israeli public say that Israel should accept the dismantling of settlements in the West Bank and Gaza against 20 percent who opposed. 

Moreover, as a student, I would have thought that Mr. Weinberg should support free speech, even if he disagrees. However, he has consistently attacked the pro-Palestinian students on campus and called for their punishment and their expulsion from the university, which puts him squarely in the rabidly anti-free speech camp. 

Berkeley is known all over the nation and the world for its humanitarian, ecofriendly, politically-correct and free speech environment. Weinberg certainly does not respect Berkeley’s values, principles or its history. Who is behind this extreme right winger? Why is Mayor Dean pushing for the candidacy of an immature individual (She also appointed him to the Peace and Justice commission)? Who is she pandering to? Why is Mayor Dean intending further to damage Berkeley’s reputation as a beacon for free speech and tolerance? 

 

Aftim Saba  

Berkeley


Neighbors try to wipe out blight

By Matthew Artz
Friday November 01, 2002

A group of south Berkeley neighbors wants to meet the first African American to officiate a professional football game. But they’re not asking for his autograph. They want to tell him to fix up his run-down property on the corner of Sacramento and Julia streets. 

Blighted property is a citywide phenomenon, said Michael Caplan, a city neighborhood services liaison and a member of the city manager’s problem property team. Team members track derelict properties and work with neighbors who have become increasingly willing to take action against troublesome tenants and owners. 

Burl Toler, a San Francisco resident, a retired National Football League official and current board member of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, has owned the south Berkeley lot where the defunct King Liquors store sits since 1994. 

The shop closed down in the mid–80s’, and since then, neighbors say the lot has been used as a dumping ground. 

“A lot of homeless people come here to go through the trash. It makes the place look ghetto,” said Runni Vermel who lives directly behind the lot. 

Last December, fed-up neighbors sent Toler a letter imploring him to either renovate the property or sell it to somebody who would. 

Toler never responded. Now the neighbors, represented by the Russell, Oregon and California Street Neighborhood Organization, are considering legal recourse. 

Mark Goldowitz, an attorney who lives and works near the lot has offered his assistance in organizing a small claims suit against Toler. Neighbors who live in the lot’s immediate vicinity could sue Toler for $5,000 because of the negative effects his derelict property has had on adjacent homes, Goldowitz said. 

Stephanie Roesner, a neighbor, said that the tactic worked 13 years ago on Russell Street when more than 20 neighbors filed individual suits against the owners of the crime–ridden Rosewood Apartments on the 1600 block of Russell Street. The owners lost in court and ultimately sold the building to the city. 

However, Toler’s son, Gregory, said legal action will not be necessary in this case. 

“We’re going to work with the city of Berkeley as best we can to make sure the property is maintained until it is developed in the near future,” he said, adding that last week he had trash removed from the lot. 

Taj Johns, a city neighborhood services liaison, met with Toler and his father on Tuesday and said they made progress on addressing the neighbors’ concerns. 

In the short term, the Tolers agreed to do weekly maintenance and install lights on the property, Johns said. If the Tolers fail to keep the lot free of trash, the city has the authority to put a lien on the property. 

The ultimate future of the plot, though, remains unclear.  

Gregory Toler said his family would like to build a small development with a ground floor shop and fewer than 20 units of housing above. 

But he acknowledged that developers have not shown interest. He and his father are working on financing the project themselves. They have not hired a designer and have no timetable on when their plans will be finalized. 

Neighbors cringed when told of the Tolers plans. “He’s got to be kidding,” said Roesner, noting that at 3,100 square feet, the lot is less then a tenth of an acre and smaller than the nearby lots with single family homes. “Certainly a retail space is needed with maybe one or two apartments above, but anything else is totally out of scale,” she said. 

Neighborhood cleanup efforts continue today in south Berkeley with a city sponsored cleanup of Sacramento Street from Dwight Way to the Oakland border. 

 

Contact reporter at matt@berkeleydailyplanet.net


Bates absolved of charges

By Matthew Artz Daily Planet Staff
Friday November 01, 2002

Mayoral candidate Tom Bates was cleared Wednesday of accepting illegal corporate campaign donations.  

The Fair Campaign Practices Commission voted unanimously that Bates did not violate Berkeley campaign law when he accepted money from fundraising committees of state politicians which were funded in part by questionable corporate donations.  

Berkeley campaign law prohibits candidates from taking corporate money. 

Berkeley resident Sam Herbert had alleged that the donations were illegal because there was no way Bates could verify that the money did not come from an outlawed corporate source. 

But according to City Attorney Manuela Albuquerque, Herbert had misinterpreted the law. She said candidates may receive donations from the campaign funds of political allies, as long as they receive assurances that the money donated was not from a corporate source. 

Bates’ campaign treasurer Mal Burnstein insisted that he had received the proper assurances


Down with height limits

Ed Gulick Program Manager, Green Resource Center Berkele
Friday November 01, 2002

To the Editor: 

 

The Green Resource Center is committed to supporting the widespread adoption of sustainable building practices in the San Francisco Bay Area. In addition to advocating resource-efficient and healthy building materials, we encourage building and community designs that support alternatives to automobile use and reduce development of greenfield sites. 

Because Measure P, The height initiative, severely limits the development of housing at the densities necessary to support mass transit and neighborhood services, we believe Measure P is inconsistent with the goals of sustainable development. We therefore oppose Measure P and encourage all citizens to vote against it. 

 

Ed Gulick 

Program Manager, 

Green Resource Center 

Berkeley 


Mall Santa Claus in Pleasanton fired for wearing fake beard

Friday November 01, 2002

 

PLEASANTON — Santa’s out of a job this year. No, it’s not the economic downturn, it’s his lack of facial hair. 

Tom Galletti, who’s played Santa Claus at Stoneridge mall for the past 16 years, will be replaced by someone with a real beard. 

“This is a national trend,” said Robert Wolfe, chief executive of New Jersey-based Cherry Hill Photo Enterprises, which hires and fires mall Santas. “Stoneridge is just one of hundreds of malls that want their Santa Claus to have a real beard. People are demanding it.” 

Wolfe said most of the 350-plus malls the company supplies with Santas insist on ones with real beards. 

Galletti, who wears a trimmed beard, said he cannot grow a full Santa Claus-like beard because he doesn’t feel it’s appropriate for his day job as an investigator for a local utility. 

“I could grow one, but I don’t see what’s wrong with a fake beard,” Galletti said. “Natural beards aren’t usually white and shiny like fake ones anyhow. Real ones don’t look like a Santa Claus beard.” 

“We have a brand-new holiday set this year and our Santa Claus will be out in the open,” said Diana Jan Coelho, the mall’s marketing director. “Many of our customers had asked for a Santa Claus with a real beard, so we thought this was the perfect opportunity with the new holiday decor.” 

Galletti said Santas with a natural beard can make up to twice as much as ones with a fake one.


Demand for speedy U.N. action on Iraq runs into opposition

By Edith M. Lederer The Associated Press
Friday November 01, 2002

 

UNITED NATIONS — The U.S. demand for speedy U.N. action on Iraq has run into strong opposition from Russia, France and China, who want Washington to change a draft resolution and eliminate any license for the United States to attack Baghdad on its own. 

The three powerful Security Council members want to ensure that Iraq is given a chance to cooperate with U.N. weapons inspectors before any military action is authorized — and they are now waiting to see what the United States and Britain are going to do to address their concerns. 

“It’s time for some careful thinking about what next,” Britain’s U.N. Ambassador Jeremy Greenstock said Thursday. “I think the United States and the United Kingdom need to absorb the results of the last three council meetings.” 

After Wednesday’s third council session on the U.S. proposal, Russia’s deputy U.N. ambassador Gennady Gatilov said Moscow still has “quite a number of problems” with the U.S. draft, centered on the automatic authorization to use force. 

The U.S. and British consultations on possible changes to the U.S. draft, coupled with Friday’s handover of the Security Council presidency from Cameroon to China and next Tuesday’s U.S. election, have pushed back the Bush administration’s timetable for a U.N. vote. 

British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said in London he hopes the Security Council can reach agreement this week or next but it may take longer. 

“I can’t be certain that we will reach a resolution on these issues in the next couple of weeks,” he said. 

The Security Council only got the U.S. draft on Oct. 23 and the three sessions since then gave all 15 members the opportunity to go over it line by line and suggest changes. 

Greenstock said contacts between key capitals are continuing but no council meeting has been scheduled on Iraq, and the issue will likely be taken up again next week. 

Whether the U.S.-British response will meet Russian, French and Chinese demands remains to be seen. 

Greenstock said the United States and Britain haven’t decided yet whether to revise their draft resolution. 

“All I can say is it’s unlikely that we’ll put exactly the same draft back down again. We are taking account of what we’ve heard,” he said. 

China’s Ambassador Wang Yingfan expected the United States and Britain to come back with revisions. 

“I don’t know what kind of progress in the end we’ll have,” he said. 

France’s U.N. Ambassador Jean-David Levitte said everyone knows Paris’ position, but “frankly we don’t know where the U.S. is” now on the issue of authorizing force. 

In Washington, Secretary of State Colin Powell said debate would likely be concluded toward the end of next week, but he stressed that U.S. action in Iraq will not be decided by the United Nations. 

“There is nothing that we would propose in this resolution or we would find acceptable in a resolution that would handcuff the president of the United States in doing what he feels he must do,” Powell said, reiterating the administration’s view that the U.S. Congress has already given its authorization for U.S. military action against Iraq. 

But the administration also wants the United Nations to support a resolution that strengthens inspections, warns Iraq of “serious consequences” if it fails to cooperate, and declares that Iraq is still in “material breach” of its obligations to get rid of its nuclear, chemical and biological weapons programs. 

In an effort to win support, Washington signaled a readiness this week to make some minor concessions involving a new weapons inspection regime. These were welcomed, but the United States has yet to find a solution to the critical issue of the automatic use of force. 

Russia’s U.N. Ambassador Sergey Lavrov said Tuesday it isn’t the words “material breach” or “serious consequences” that are at issue but their context and the meaning it implies. 

In the case of the U.S. draft, Gatilov said Wednesday that Russia still has concerns that references to “material breach” could trigger an attack on Iraq. 

He stressed that any assurances from the United States and Britain that this is not the case must be in the draft resolution. Diplomats, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Washington could be willing to offer such assurances privately. 

At Wednesday’s council meeting, diplomats said many nations also objected to an introductory paragraph recalling U.N. resolutions adopted after Iraq’s 1990 invasion of Kuwait which authorized member states “to use all necessary means” to oust Iraqi troops and restore Kuwait’s freedom. There were concerns this could trigger new military action if Iraq failed to cooperate 

On Wednesday, President Bush hosted chief weapons inspectors Hans Blix of the United Nations, and Mohamed ElBaradei of the International Atomic Energy Agency, at the White House.


Heights and sprawl

Barbara Sargent Berkeley
Friday November 01, 2002

To the Editor: 

 

What will Berkeley look like if Measure P, the height initiative passes? I have read many letters for and against it. All the writers are certain about the effects on Berkeley should P pass. As for my own vote I'm still undecided. 

A few things are clear to me. In NYC, where I come from, there is density, liveliness, a world class, inexpensive transportation system and horrendous traffic. It can take 10 to 20 minutes to drive just five to ten city blocks in any direction; one needs a touch of insanity to drive in city traffic. There is also a spread of density into suburbs which had been semi-rural areas not very long ago. Density did not prevent buildup around the city nor dense traffic within it despite the excellent public transit; and the cost of housing there is not low. 

Does anyone really know what Measure P or a vote against it would bring us? 

I still don't know what my vote will be. 

 

Barbara Sargent 

Berkeley


Hey, where you from? Town ponders life as Got Milk? California

By Jim Wasserman The Associated Press
Friday November 01, 2002

 

BIGGS — In a nation where Minute Maid spends $100 million to name a Houston ballpark, NASCAR hosts a Pop Secret Microwave Popcorn 400 and people seeking $1 million willingly expose their inner flaws on TV’s “Survivor,” what’s so wrong about becoming Got Milk? Calif.? 

That’s the question bedeviling 24 tiny California towns swept up in the milk industry’s newest promotional stunt. 

All are being offered cash, fame and possible hordes of tourists — to change names like Sand City, Dorris, Etna or Biggs to Got Milk? Calif. 

Credit the California Milk Processor Board. As it struggles to stabilize declining and flat milk sales in the nation’s leading dairy state, it hopes one brave town will dare to be different: for a possible Got Milk? museum, free school computers, a library expansion or new playground. Name a price. 

In turn, the board promises Got Milk? Calif., will become the centerpiece for a national publicity campaign celebrating 10 years of “Got Milk?” advertising. The campaign, which opened in 1993 and went national in 1995, features TV commercials of comical human dilemmas without milk, and milk mustaches on celebrities from President Clinton to Spike Lee. The aim is to counter a national 21 percent decline in per capita milk drinking since the 1970s, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, as teenagers, especially, turn to soft drinks. 

“What I want,” says the milk board’s Berkeley-based director and ad man Jeff Manning, “is to be so happy to pick up a newly printed California map and run my finger down a road and see Got Milk? California.” 

In Biggs, a Central Valley hamlet of 1,793 best known for the state’s biggest rice miller and last year’s Wolverines high school football division championship, merely considering becoming Got Milk? has turned the town into a carnival of visiting reporters and a sense of what it’s like to be Michael Jackson or Cher. 

“We’ve been unplugging my phone,” says an exasperated Mayor Sharleta B. Callaway, recounting media calls from London, Dallas, Los Angeles, New York City, Albuquerque, Seattle, Washington, D.C., Idaho and Wisconsin. 

“NOTmilk.com has my e-mail address,” she says. 

Initially humored by a local newspaper to pose in a “Got Milk?” T-shirt, the 37-year-old mother of four, who runs a day care center and serves as town commissioner of police, fire, water and sewers, now calls the idea preposterous. 

“I don’t think it’s going to happen. They’re using our name to go national in exchange for nothing,” Callaway says, “and I don’t think it’s fair to the community.” 

The City Council scheduled Nov. 18 to present the idea to townspeople. 

Many in Biggs, situated near Highway 99 an hour’s drive north of Sacramento — and near a road sign that asks, “Got Tractors?” — believe becoming Got Milk? will make them a laughingstock. 

“We’ll get made fun of all the time,” says Biggs High School student Laura Rodriguez. “Where you from? We’re from Got Milk? They’ll say, ’Here come the cows.”’ 

“It’s bad enough our Wolverine looks like a beaver,” chimes in fellow student Amanda Vargas. 

Manning concedes the idea may not be right for Biggs, named for a prominent 1870s’ citizen, Major Marion Biggs, who eventually moved to nearby Gridley. Attempts later to rename Biggs to Pittsville (in honor of another prominent citizen) failed. 

Biggs’ instant fame, Manning says, has attracted calls from two other California towns — neither invited to become Got Milk? — asking, “What about us?” He declines to name them. 

“I said, “This isn’t a bidding war here.”’ 

But Manning may want to keep the numbers. City officials in Maricopa, San Juan Bautista and Sand City — all invited to become Got Milk? — can’t imagine any town changing a name for less than millions of dollars. 

“We’re on the Monterey Peninsula and it would surely cause us to come in for some ridicule,” says Sand City Administrator Kelly Morgan. 

“It’s not worth it. We already have what we need to bring in the tourists,” echoes G. Dan Reed, city council member in San Juan Bautista, home of a 1797-built California mission. 

Despite such huffing, every town does has a price. In 1999, Mayor John Dindak of West Homestead, Pa., offered naming rights to his for $1 million — and still waits. But in 2000, Halfway, Ore., renamed itself for one year to Half.com to promote an e-commerce Internet startup later absorbed into ebay.com. Halfway, population 360, got $73,000 and several computers, and another $20,000 in 2001, says Steve Backstrom, publisher of the weekly Hells Canyon Journal. 

“There’s a couple of signs that say, ’Welcome to Half.com., America’s first Internet city,”’ he says. “Other than a couple of film crews and journalists that came in, I wouldn’t say we saw a boost in tourism from that.” 

Now it’s up to towns like Colma, Colfax and Fort Jones to bite.


Judge blocks Navy sonar deployment

By David Kravets Associated Press Writer
Friday November 01, 2002

SAN FRANCISCO — Amid concerns about marine life, a federal judge temporarily has blocked the U.S. Navy from deploying a new high-frequency sonar system used to detect enemy submarines. 

Magistrate Judge Elizabeth D. Laporte, however, said Thursday that the Navy may use the sonar during wartime and must be allowed to train with it beforehand. Given that, the magistrate ordered both sides back to court Nov. 7 to begin formulating a plan balancing environmental and military concerns. 

The case stems from a lawsuit by the Natural Resources Defense Council and other environmental organizations that sought to stop the Navy from training in most of the world’s waters with a powerful sonar system the groups maintain can strand, harass or kill marine mammals. 

“It is undisputed that marine mammals, many of whom depend on sensitive hearing for essential activities like finding food and mates and avoiding predators, and some of whom are endangered species, will at a minimum be harassed by the extremely loud and far-traveling ... sonar,” Laporte wrote in her lengthy ruling. 

On the other hand, she added, the Navy demonstrated that the new technology “is likely to significantly increase our ability to timely detect very quiet submarines.” 

Pauline Storum, a Navy spokeswoman, said the government was “reviewing the decision” and declined further comment. 

The Navy was planning to immediately begin testing the system throughout the world and had previously agreed to exclude polar waters and areas within 12 miles of any coast. 

“We want the tests carried out far away from coastlines, those are among the richest and most diverse areas,” said Joel Reynolds, an NRDC attorney. “Areas we would certainly favor is where there’s very small numbers of marine mammals, and ones where it is unlikely to do serious harm, such as away from feeding, migrating and breeding areas.”


VH1 halts filming of Liza Minnelli reality show

By David Bauder The Associated Press
Friday November 01, 2002

NEW YORK — Liza Minnelli won’t become another Ozzy Osbourne. 

VH1 has pulled the plug on the singer’s planned reality TV show, complaining that her husband, David Gest, was impossible to work with. 

“We weren’t given the kind of access and cooperation we needed to make the show work,” VH1 spokeswoman Laura Nelson said Wednesday. 

It was a blow to the struggling cable network, which watched corporate partner MTV hit the jackpot with “The Osbournes” and had high hopes for the Minnelli show. But VH1 apparently didn’t need the aggravation. 

Gest would repeatedly cancel production meetings and shooting schedules, and restricted VH1’s access to his wife, according to an official at VH1 who spoke on condition of anonymity. 

He was also a “neat freak” who ordered a VH1 staff member to stand duty with a portable vacuum cleaner while a hole was drilled in a wall, the source said. The New York Post said Gest required VH1 crew members to wear surgical booties while in their apartment. 

When plans were announced this summer, the show was supposed to start in October. But it got pushed back to December and then January. 

Finally, with only one episode filmed, VH1 backed away entirely.


Davis hits campaign trail

By Alexa H. Bluth The Associated Press
Friday November 01, 2002

 

COMPTON — Gov. Gray Davis rallied enthusiastic supporters in this working-class, heavily minority town south of Los Angeles Thursday as part of a final re-election campaign push to shore up his Democratic base. 

“I come to Compton, as I have many times before, to thank you for supporting us through thick and thin,” Davis told about 80 volunteers who gathered with cheers and signs in a parking lot outside a strip mall that houses a Democratic Party field office. 

Davis told the crowd that during his four years in office he has aimed to make life better for them, and he warned that Republican Bill Simon would undo that progress. 

“It’s down to this — I want to continue to move this state forward for all people. He wants to move it back and to the right,” Davis said. 

“Let’s keep working for five more days and we’ll have four more years of progress,” he said. 

Inside the headquarters a handful of volunteers dialed up Democrats to get them to the polls, a key aim for both parties in an election where turnout is expected to be low. 

Davis appeared with local officials including former Congressman Mervyn Dymally, now a state Assembly candidate, and U.S. Rep. Juanita Millender-McDonald, D-Carson. 

“Simple Simon will return to where he came from,” Millender-McDonald told the crowd. 

Blacks are traditionally one of the Democratic Party’s most reliable constituencies. Davis pulled in 76 percent of the black vote in 1998 and he got one of his warmest receptions of the campaign trail Thursday as his listeners mobbed him for autographs and snapshots and chanted “Four more years!” 

“There are clear choices in the governor’s race. This is not a gray election. This is a black or white election,” Davis said, citing his support for abortion and gun laws, areas where Simon’s views are notably more conservative. 

Davis later rallied about 100 Democratic volunteers in Long Beach. 

“These are real choices before the electorate and we are just trying to galvanize the people who in turn galvanize the troops,” Davis said. 

The governor then called a handful of voters on the volunteers’ lists and spoke to a husband and wife named Dottie and Chuck, explaining his handling of the energy crisis. 

He told reporters he had just learned that the couple’s “lights never went out.” 

Simon, meanwhile, was joined on the campaign trail in Santa Monica by Jack Kemp, the former congressman and U.S. housing secretary. He campaigned on a business theme, meeting with about 30 small-business executives. 

The round-table was closed to reporters at the last minute, which Simon campaign traveling press secretary Craig Turk blamed on miscommunication. That left the candidate shut inside an office building away from a bank of TV cameras that could provide badly needed publicity in the campaign’s final days. 

Simon told reporters going in that job creation and business-friendly policies would be central to his administration.


CSU enrollment breaks record, chancellor wants more funding

By Chelsea J. Carter The Associated Press
Friday November 01, 2002

LONG BEACH — Enrollment at California State University has reached a record 406,896 students, due in part to a shaky state economy and the growing number of children of baby boomers headed to college, the chancellor said Thursday. 

The record enrollment reflects an increase of 18,291 students, or 5 percent over last year. It was the eighth consecutive year of growth at the nation’s largest public university system. 

With the children of baby boomers reaching college age and the growing demand by high school students for a college education, the postsecondary education commission estimated an additional 120,000 students would enter the university system by the 2010. 

But with the state’s slowing economy sending people back to college, Chancellor Charles B. Reed said the enrollment increase has put increased pressure on the university’s campuses. 

“Our only worry is that the state budget problems may mean tighter enrollments next year if we are not fully funded for all enrolled students,” Reed said. 

The CSU was funded for an additional 15,000 students this fiscal year, bringing its budget to more than $3 billion. Reed has said the CSU will need an additional $400 million to handle next year’s expected enrollment increase. 

The news of the enrollment boom came as Reed met with trustees to discuss funding for next year. 

Reed urged trustees, faculty and staff members to find ways to ease enrollment pressures. He advocated the use of online classes and an integrated use of computer and classroom teaching techniques that require students to meet in class just once a week. 

“We really can’t keep taking the students without being funded for it,” said Richard West, CSU’s executive vice chancellor and chief financial officer. “ 

“If we don’t get the funding, we will have to tighten enrollment requirements.” 

The chancellor also has given permission to some campuses to close open registration periods. 

Enrollment at the Long Beach and San Diego campuses must be made in November for the following school year, West said. 

CSU Sacramento cut off registration in May and June, instead of enrolling students right up to the start of fall classes after Labor Day. 

“They’re trying to put the best face possible on it, but already they’re saying they’re going to have to limit enrollment again this spring,” said Jon Ortiz, a 40-year-old returning student from Sacramento. “Even with the cutoff, we’ve had a thousand more students enrolled. A lot of students are having to beg to add” classes. 

CSU has already tightened its enrollment requirements for high school students and aligned its entrance requirements with the University of California. It also expanded its summer school and online classes. 

Among the options the CSU may also consider is requiring community college students to complete their two-year lower division course work before transferring to CSU.


ChevronTexaco suffers third quarter loss of $904 million

By Michael Liedtke The Associated Press
Friday November 01, 2002

SAN FRANCISCO — ChevronTexaco Corp. wrote off most of its investment in fallen energy merchant Dynegy Inc. on Thursday, resulting in a third-quarter loss of $904 million. 

The San Francisco-based company absorbed $1.55 billion in charges to account for its soured investment in Houston-based Dynegy, punctuating a disappointing quarter for the oil giant. 

If not for the Dynegy setback and other one-time charges totaling $485 million, ChevronTexaco said it would have recorded a profit of $1.24 billion, or $1.17 per share. 

That fell well below the consensus earnings estimate of $1.30 per share among analysts polled by Thomson First Call. 

ChevronTexaco’s third-quarter loss of 85 cents per share contrasted with a profit of $1.27 billion, or $1.19 per share, last year. Third-quarter revenue totaled $25.35 billion, a 2 percent decrease from last year. 

The company’s shares fell $3.77, or 5 percent, to close at $67.63 Thursday on the New York Stock Exchange. 

“It’s hard to call this anything but a weak quarter,” said Banc of America Securities analyst Tyler Dann. 

ChevronTexaco said oil production problems and lackluster demand for its refined products diminished its third-quarter performance. 

In one of its bright spots, the company said the savings from Chevron’s $39 billion takeover of Texaco are piling up faster than anticipated. ChevronTexaco reduced the combined company’s overhead by $1.8 billion about six months ahead of schedule. The company expects to realize an additional $400 million in savings by April. 

The cost-cutting so far has included the elimination of about 5,500 jobs — about 1,000 more than management projected shortly after the merger. ChevronTexaco attributed the increase to government requirements that forced the company to put about 1,000 international contractors on its payroll. 

This marks the second consecutive quarter that ChevronTexaco has been tainted by its 26.5 percent stake in Houston-based Dynegy, which emerged as a rising corporate star when power prices soared in 2000 and the first half of 2001. 

Dynegy is now struggling to survive amid dramatically lower power prices and the financial fallout from the accounting scam uncovered a year ago at Enron Corp., once the nation’s largest energy trader. 

Dynegy’s downfall has saddled ChevronTexaco with more than $2 billion in losses so far this year, a jarring about-face from 18 months ago. 

When Dynegy’s stock peaked at $57.95 during the spring of 2001, ChevronTexaco’s stake was worth about $5 billion. Dynegy’s success also boosted ChevronTexaco’s earnings by $188 million between January 2000 and June 2001. 

Even after the Enron scandal broke a year ago, ChevronTexaco demonstrated its support of Dynegy by investing an additional $1.5 billion as part of a bid to buy Enron. That deal eventually was called off, but ChevronTexaco’s investments in Dynegy continue to haunt the company. 

“This has been an expensive lesson and a real headache for ChevronTexaco,” said industry analyst Fadel Gheit of Fahnestock & Co.


Paint maker settles sealant suit for $107.5 million

Friday November 01, 2002

STOCKTON — A Southern California paint company has agreed to pay $107.5 million to settle a class-action suit over faulty wood sealants that left mildew damage on fences, decks and houses. 

San Joaquin County Superior Court Judge Carter Holly gave preliminary approval to a settlement with the maker of Behr Paints on Tuesday. 

Consumers who purchased Super Liquid Rawhide or Natural Seal Plus wood sealants after Jan. 1, 1991, may be qualified to share in the settlement if they suffered mildew damage. Those who applied the sealants but did not have damage may be eligible for discounts on other Behr products. 

Consumers have until Feb. 7 to accept, object or opt out of the settlement. A March 6 hearing is scheduled to determine lawyers’ fees and give final approval to the settlement. 

Masco Corp., the parent company of Santa Ana-based Behr Process Corp., made no admission of liability or wrongdoing in the proposed settlement. 

“Unfortunately, litigation is just part of doing business these days,” said Samuel Cypert, vice president of Masco, which is based in Taylor, Mich. 

Stockton lawyer James B. Brown represented Stockton homeowner Judy Herum, the wife of his legal partner, in a lawsuit filed in July 2000. 

Brown was later named liaison counsel in a nationwide class-action suit joining at least a dozen California lawsuits and others from around the country. 

Behr has stopped making the two sealants targeted in the suit.


Vignette buys S.F. company

Friday November 01, 2002

 

AUSTIN, Texas — After months of painful cost cutting, Vignette Corp. has splurged. 

The software company is dipping into its $335 million cash reserves to buy a company, something it hasn’t done since the tech bubble burst in early 2000. 

Vignette is paying $32 million, mostly in cash, to buy San Francisco-based software maker Epicentric Inc. 

Epicentric is the first, but probably not the last, acquisition arranged by new Vignette chief executive Tom Hogan, who has been interested in putting Vignette’s cash to work. 

“Cash is king in this environment,” Hogan told analysts earlier this month. 

It’s a good time to go shopping. Tech companies struggling with low sales are easy prey for those that have cash to spare. 

Analysts say Epicentric is a good technology fit. But in a research note, Salomon Smith Barney analyst Heather Bellini, who is keeping her “underperform” rating for Vignette, said the move would not help the company reach its goal of breaking even any faster. 

Epicentric, which makes business portal software, raised more than $85 million in venture capital and now has about 265 employees, down from more than 330 in 2001. Earlier this year, Epicentric considered going public but decided against it. 

The acquisition, expected to close in December, involves $26 million in cash up front from Vignette and another $6 million coming if Epicentric employees stay with the company.


Police sniffing for possible sniper ties around country

By Jeff Donn The Associated Press
Friday November 01, 2002

 

Police are checking unsolved murders around the nation for ties to the Washington, D.C.-area sniper attacks — a task that took on renewed urgency Thursday as the extraordinary crime spree’s latest leg extended to Louisiana. 

Law enforcement officials said they had linked the rifle used in the sniper case to a Sept. 23 killing in Baton Rouge. Authorities already have laid charges in Alabama and connected two shooting cases in Washington state, all with ballistics evidence. 

Police have identified at least two other cases — a killing in Michigan and a separate string of slayings in Louisiana — they believe could be linked, but with little real evidence so far. 

The task of determining the spree’s full scope is daunting. 

The two men accused in the capital-area sniper shootings, John Muhammad and John Lee Malvo, have lived in or drifted through many states and spent time in the Caribbean. 

Beyond the D.C.-area, Alabama and Louisiana cases, police have linked Muhammad to other seemingly disparate crimes — a possible rage killing at a home and an attack on a synagogue, both in Washington state. The capital-area sniper demanded $10 million — a twist that further expands the range of possible criminal methods and motives. 

“It’s difficult because he could reasonably be a suspect in just about anything,” said Stanton Samenow, a psychologist who evaluates violent criminals for the courts and wrote “Inside the Criminal Mind.” 

Attorney General John Ashcroft said Thursday that investigators were also still exploring if other people took part in the crime spree. 

Spurred by a national advisory from the Maryland-based sniper task force, police in many states have reopened old files to check for elements common with the sniper case. That three-week killing field left 10 dead and three wounded and brought charges from Virginia, Maryland and federal prosecutors. 

State and local police have reported checks for any related cases in at least Washington state, Oregon, California, Arizona, Louisiana, Alabama, Tennessee and Michigan. 

— In the Louisiana case, beauty supply worker Hong Im Ballenger was killed during a Baton Rouge robbery. There is suspicion the rifle used to shoot her in the head also might have been involved in another shooting in the city that did not kill anybody. Muhammad grew up in Baton Rouge and also visited relatives with Malvo there in the weeks before the sniper attacks. 

Baton Rouge police also are seeking DNA samples from each man to check for links to the other case — the serial murders of three women between fall 2001 and last summer. One woman was strangled, one stabbed and one had a slit throat. 

Authorities, however, say they are still leaning toward a white man, as predicted in an FBI profile, as a more likely kind of suspect in those murders. Muhammad and Malvo are black. 

— In Michigan, Lansing police were following up with the sniper task force to check on any connection to the shooting death of Bernita White at a zoo entrance in June 2001. She was shot by someone hiding behind a fence about 200 yards away. The capital-area sniper also fired at long range. 

“It’s something we’re looking into, but it’s nothing formal,” said police Lt. John Parks in Lansing. “You can’t ignore it.” 

There is no known evidence that Muhammad and Malvo were in Michigan. However, a friend of Muhammad’s, who helped buy the car allegedly used in the sniper case, was arrested in Michigan as a material witness. 

In Montgomery, Ala., the Sept. 21 robbery attempt left one woman dead and another wounded outside a liquor store. Police also have linked Muhammad and Malvo to the February murder of a woman shot in the face at her door in Tacoma, Wash., possibly out of fury toward her aunt for taking sides with Muhammad’s ex-wife in a custody scrap. Police suspect the pair, too, in connection with shots fired at a Tacoma synagogue in May, an incident in which no one was hurt. 

At the sniper command center in Montgomery County, Md., detectives asked police agencies around the country to scan for similar cases soon after the sniper arrests. 

But what is similar? Should they look at all long-range sniper shootings, crimes with the same caliber rifle, fatal shootings, all homicides or even severe assaults? Departments are taking varying approaches. 

“You just kind of look at everything to check if it really fits,” said Brooks Wilkins, who oversees criminal intelligence for the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation. 

Knowing Muhammad lived in Monterey, Calif., for about a year while in the military, the county sheriff’s department scanned for any likely matches with all unsolved murders during that time. It came up empty, Deputy Bill Cassara said. 

In Oregon, where Muhammad once served in the national guard, state police glanced back at several dozen sniping cases over the last decade or so, without finding any matches, spokesman Andy Olsen said. 

N.G. Berrill, who teaches about criminal behavior at John Jay College in New York City, said investigators should try to reconstruct every place the men went — especially Muhammad. 

“There’s every opportunity and every possibility that if he ran out of money, there would have been a robbery. If he had become angry or disconsolate or highly agitated, he might have shot someone,” Berrill said. 

“You would look at unsolved crimes that you had an itch to solve. I wouldn’t confine it to a certain type of crime,” added Jeffrey Smalldon, a forensic psychologist in Columbus, Ohio, who worked on the serial sniper case of Thomas Lee Dillon. Dillon pleaded guilty in 1993 to killing five strangers. 

However, Clint Van Zandt, a former FBI agent who examined patterns of criminal behavior, suggested police could focus their search. “I think part of what they need to look for is unsolved assaults or homicides where it appears the victim was again chosen at random,” he said. 

Northeastern University criminologist Jack Levin, in Boston, who writes on serial murders, cautioned against scanning too aggressively for connections, because police could waste time and resources and finger the wrong suspect. 

“When you’ve got guys like Muhammad and Malvo who are charged with crimes in a number of jurisdictions, there’s a tendency for police departments around the country to want to clear their cases. Sometimes they go overboard,” he said.


Sniper suspects linked to slayings in Louisiana, Alabama

By Melinda Deslatte The Associated Press
Friday November 01, 2002

BATON ROUGE, La. — Authorities charged the Washington-area sniper suspects with murder Thursday in a Louisiana attack and said they had definitively linked the two men to an Alabama slaying just two days earlier. 

John Allen Muhammad, 41, and John Lee Malvo, 17, are now charged with a month-long series of killings stretching from the Gulf Coast to the suburbs of the nation’s capital. Police nationwide are said to be looking for links to the men with help from federal authorities. 

The two suspects face multiple state and federal counts in the Alabama and Louisiana cases and the sniper spree that left 10 people dead and three others wounded in Maryland, Virginia and Washington, D.C. They are also suspects in a February killing in Washington state. 

Baton Rouge Police Chief Pat Englade issued first-degree murder warrants for Muhammad and Malvo after ballistics tests matched the rifle used in the sniper shootings to the Sept. 23 slaying and robbery of a beauty shop worker in the Louisiana capital. 

Hong Im Ballenger, 45, died from a single shot to the head as she left work. Witnesses said the gunman was a young black man who fled into a nearby park and evaded bloodhounds called in to track him down. 

According to the arrest warrant, police believe Muhammad shot the woman and Malvo stole her purse and fled. 

Earlier in the day, Alabama authorities said the same rifle, a .223-caliber Bushmaster, had been linked to the shooting death of a liquor store worker in Montgomery on Sept. 21, two days before the Louisiana slaying and 315 miles away. 

In that case, the suspect — allegedly Malvo — was seen rifling through one of the victim’s purses before he was chased off by a police officer. 

The sniper suspects have been in custody in Maryland since they were captured at a highway rest stop Oct. 24. Authorities found the rifle in their car, which they say was modified so someone could fire unseen through a hole in the trunk. 

In Washington, Attorney General John Ashcroft said the investigation was continuing into the possibility other people may be involved or that the suspects have committed more crimes. 

“We will proceed deliberatively, cautiously and not jump to any conclusions,” Ashcroft said. “The facts ... will determine the final outcome and we intend to follow the facts wherever they may lead.” 

A senior Justice Department official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said there was no specific evidence that others were involved but authorities would not rule out the possibility. 

Police nationwide are checking unsolved crimes for links to the sniper suspects, the official said, with a particular focus on the Gulf Coast and East Coast. 

In Alabama, officials said new ballistics evidence had linked the rifle to Claudine Parker, 52, who was shot to death during an attack that also wounded her liquor store co-worker, Kellie Adams, 24. 

State forensics director Taylor Noggle said the slug taken from Parker’s body matched bullets test fired from the Bushmaster. Muhammad and Malvo have already been charged with capital murder in the crime. 

First-degree murder carries a possible death penalty in Louisiana. Doug Moreau, the Baton Rouge district attorney, said he did not know when he would get the case and did not know whether he would push for the death penalty. 

Englade said the unusual type of bullet used to kill Ballenger led police to investigate a possible connection. Police also said dated receipts from two Baton Rouge stores were found in the suspects’ car. 

Muhammad grew up in Baton Rouge and still has relatives and friends there, including one of his ex-wives. He visited the area this summer, friends said. 

A task force working on the serial killings of three Baton Rouge women in the past year is working to obtain DNA evidence from Muhammad and Malvo. However, the two have not been linked to those killings, Englade said. 

Also Thursday, officials in Prince Georges County, Md., where a 13-year-old boy was wounded outside his school, charged Muhammad and Malvo with attempted murder and conspiracy to commit murder, both of which carry life sentences. 

Ashcroft is considering whether the federal government will take the lead in prosecuting the two men or have the first trials in Maryland, Virginia or elsewhere. 

 

Associated Press writer Curt Anderson  

contributed to this report. 


9th Circuit bars Exxon Valdez from operating

By David Kravets The Associated Press
Friday November 01, 2002

 

SAN FRANCISCO — The Exxon Valdez oil tanker cannot return to the Alaskan sound it fouled 13 years ago with nearly 11 million gallons of crude, a federal appeals court ruled Thursday. 

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the Oil Pollution Act, which among other things prohibits any ship from operating in Prince William Sound if it has spilled more than 1 million gallons of oil anywhere. The 1990 act has prohibited 18 vessels from sailing into the sound, Justice Department spokesman Charles Miller said. 

Congress adopted the rule on grounds that the sound was an “environmentally sensitive area” and that it would encourage vessel owners to take steps to avoid spills. The act also provided for a navigational light on Bligh Reef, where the Valdez ran aground, and demanded new equipment and standards for oil spill cleanups. 

The Valdez spill was March 23, 1989. Congress made the act retroactively enforceable to cover that accident. 

A spokesman for SeaRiver Maritime International Inc., a Houston-based shipping concern that owns the ship, said the Exxon Mobile Corp. subsidiary may appeal the decision. 

“We’re disappointed with the outcome,” spokesman Ray Botto said. “We’re currently evaluating it and have not determined what a go-forward plan would look like.” 

He said the ship, which cost $125 million to build, has been shipping internationally under the U.S. flag since the company spent about $30 million fixing its damaged hull. 

The company argued to the appeals court that the Valdez, since renamed the S/R Mediterranean, was being wrongly singled out and punished. The company said there was no basis for believing that a vessel that spilled oil in the past would spill in the future. 

The three-judge panel disagreed unanimously. 

“The concern that the Exxon Valdez presents an unreasonable risk to Prince William Sound is sufficient to justify the restriction on SeaRiver’s use of the vessel in that area,” Judge Richard Paez wrote.


Former UC Berkeley chancellor dies

By David Scharfenberg
Thursday October 31, 2002

Former UC Berkeley Chancellor Chang-Lin Tien, the first Asian-American to head a major U.S. university, died Tuesday night at the age of 67. 

Tien, who served as chancellor from 1990 to 1997, died at Kaiser Permanente Hospital in Redwood City, two years after suffering a brain tumor and debilitating stroke, according to a UC Berkeley statement. 

Tien made his reputation as an award-winning scientist who worked on insulation tiles for the space shuttle, a prodigious fundraiser who guided UC Berkeley through tough economic times and a tireless fighter for affirmative action, even in the face of opposition from the UC Board of Regents. 

Locals remember a warm leader who made a strong effort to reach out to the city. 

“He was a wonderful, personal friend,” said Mayor Shirley Dean, on the verge of tears, describing a great intellect who still took time to lecture before students at Berkeley High School. 

“He would take his personal time and actually be there,” she said. “It wasn’t just lip service.” 

Tien was born on July 24, 1935 in Wuhan, China. In 1949, his family fled China’s communist regime for Taiwan. After completing his undergraduate education at National Taiwan University, Tien emigrated to the United States in 1956 to study at the University of Louisville and later Princeton University, receiving two masters degrees and a PhD in mechanical engineering. 

During his time in the South, Tien learned about racism firsthand. A Louisville professor repeatedly referred to him as a “Chinaman,” Tien recalled, and the black-white divide was plainly evident. 

“One day I got on a bus and saw that all the black people were in back, the white people in front. I didn’t know where I belonged, so for a long time I stood near the driver,” Tien once said. “Finally, he told me to sit down in front, and I did. I didn’t take another bus ride for a whole year. I would walk an hour to avoid that.” 

In 1959, Tien joined the UC Berkeley faculty as an assistant professor of mechanical engineering and in 1962, at the age of 26, he became the youngest professor to win UC Berkeley’s Distinguished Teaching Award. 

An expert in thermal science and engineering, Tien helped the governments of Hong Kong and the United States work through several problems, including the nuclear reactor meltdown at Three Mile Island. 

“He was a visionary,” said Richard O. Buckius, a former Tien student who heads the department of mechanical and industrial engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. “He marked out new high-impact areas, and then he lead everybody to the next area.” 

In 1988, Tien briefly left UC Berkeley to serve as executive vice chancellor at UC Irvine. But in 1990, he returned to take the reins as UC Berkeley chancellor. 

Tien faced a series of crises shortly after taking office – a fraternity house fire that killed three students, a hostage-taking at a hotel bar near campus in which a gunman killed a student before being shot dead by police, and an assassination attempt by a machete-wielding local activist with a history of mental illness. 

“People say that I must have been really shaken over the fact that someone tried to assassinate me,” Tien told Asian Week newspaper in 1997. “But I don’t feel that way.” 

Tien said the hostage situation and fire were more difficult. 

“When I first heard about the fraternity fire that killed two students, I was not really prepared to handle that,” he told Asian Week. “I have children. I went to see the parents at midnight and talked to them – that was hard, the human suffering.” 

Tien also faced a fiscal crisis when he took office. With the California economy lagging, state funding for UC Berkeley dropped by $70 million or 18 percent within four years, according to a university statement. 

In response, Tien launched an ambitious fund-raising drive in 1996 that collected $1.44 billion by the time it was complete. At an April 2001 gala to celebrate the end of the campaign, current UC Berkeley Chancellor Robert Berdahl announced the creation of the Chang-Lin Tien Center for East Asian Studies. 

Tien also gained notoriety for his outspoken support of affirmative action, which the UC Board of Regents banned in 1995. In 1996, Tien took his case to the editorial page of the New York Times. 

“It would be a tragedy if our nation’s colleges and universities slipped backward now, denying access to talented but disadvantaged youth and eroding the diversity that helps to prepare leaders,” he wrote. 

The UC Berkeley campus mourned its own leader, forged in the fires of American diversity, Wednesday. 

“Chang-Lin was an exceptional leader during one of UC Berkeley’s most challenging periods,” said Chancellor Berdahl, in a statement. “His energy and optimism, his willingness to fight for the principles he cherished, and his loyalty and love for this campus made it stronger and better.” 

Tien is survived by his wife Di-Hwa, of Berkeley; a son, Norman, a professor of electrical and computer engineering at UC Davis; and daughters Phyllis, a physician at UC San Francisco, and Christine, the deputy city manager of Stockton. Tien also leaves four grandchildren. 

A campus memorial service will be held Nov. 14 from 3 to 4 p.m. at UC Berkeley’s Zellerbach Hall. 

 

Contact reporter at  

scharfenberg@berkeleydailyplanet.net


Battle of the brochures

James Day
Thursday October 31, 2002

To the Editor: 

 

We are blessed to live on an obscure, quiet little block that is not a battleground in the 2002 mayoral campaign. We watch baseball and eat dinner, uninterrupted by politicians or their earnest canvassers. Since we screen our calls, they're not going to get us that way, either.  

So to us, the mayoral campaign has been a battle of the brochure. Judging it on that basis, it's not been a very inspiring campaign, but it has run true to the personalities of the two candidates and to that dreary battle between liberal and left. 

Tom Bates sent us a big brochure of happy yellows and blues that included a list of all the problems he would solve and then added a card we could mail in, in case he had forgotten to mention anything. It was a very progressive “process,” catchall approach that rendered the thing almost meaningless. Recently we received an equally unforgettable flyer from him about, we think, education.  

He comes across as a moderate lefty, experienced and goodhearted. But it's all a little rote, and you wonder if maybe he lacks a real fire in the belly for this particular race and perhaps for the job itself.  

A recent mailing from incumbent Shirley Dean goes for the throat and doesn't let go. There are a couple of nice pictures of nice people who are supporting her. But they're lost in the spooky, blood-red lettering, the grey-patina pictures of dilapidated housing, and the dire warnings that Bates will return the city to the clutches of wild-eyed radicals, some of whose more flamboyant moments are mentioned – no matter how ancient or of dubious relevance.  

It's fear-mongering, something Dean has never been able to resist. And, once again, it overshadows her good works and her commendable urge to, at some point, just get things done. It also foolishly cedes the high ground to her opposition, some of whom can be just as nasty. 

 

James Day 

Berkeley


Bridging the past and present

By Jane Yin
Thursday October 31, 2002

 

Alfonso Maya is living proof that music is a universal language. This new singing talent from Mexico City is receiving high praise and respect for his native contemporary music during his first U.S. tour, which commenced early September. From Chicago to Milwaukee to California, he has touched the hearts of many who might not understand his words but are drawn to the passion of his performances. 

“[My audience] understands the emotion. They get in contact with the emotion. Even when I sing sad songs, at the end of the concert, people always thank me. It’s like an event of nourishing the soul,” Maya said. 

The Trova musician, whose hits include “Tu Fantasma,” “Giros Y Giros,” and “La Niña de Las Flores,” will be performing at La Peña Cultural Center this Sunday with a multicultural group of musicians and performers. Joining him are Arubah, a world fusion band, and Caminante, featuring Francisco Herrera, a Bay Area activist who is a vocal advocate of human rights. Silvia Parra will also be performing spoken word in English and Spanish.  

“[Alfonso] will be performing a piece with Francisco Herrera, in which they sing ‘who says that everything is lost, I come here to give you my heart.’ It is very poetic,” described Parra. 

Maya’s music is an assortment of bittersweet love ballads and satirical observations of social norms that can be heard on his debut album “Giros y Giros,” which came out last year. He casually, yet dexterously, strums his guitar through songs that speak of the farewell of romance. The delicate, longing tunes are juxtaposed with other humorous melodies, one in which he cleverly sings, “Mindless tunes, get airtime, don’t say anything, nasty little tune gets in your system.” 

La Niña de Las Flores, track five on his album, has made the largest impact on U.S, audiences. He speaks of a real-life girl who has resorted to a life of labor at a young age. 

“He sings so tenderly to this little girl [who is ] selling flowers in the middle of the night. It reminds me that a child is doing this work. And there are a lot of children in Mexico doing this kind of labor,” said Parra.  

In the last piece, a humorous commentary, Maya croons, “People are so addicted to the night of drinking.” And Maya would know about these people, having performed in bars all over the world. He has also graced international audiences in a wide array of venues, from universities to churches and performance halls.  

Maya fondly remembered an experience after his friends’ wedding in France, “I found very interesting that the French people were so moved by my song, that they would stand up in ovation at a wedding ceremony. Later at the party, some of the people told me, through translators, that they could not understand a word that I was saying, but they could feel a lot of emotion in their heart, and they were very touched.” 

The Trova music that Maya performs is an old style of music that has transformed into what is known as contemporary music in Mexico. It is a Spanish ballad style of music that is more than a century old and has evolved over the years. During the 60s’, it developed quite a bit, generating astonishing songs from brilliant artists.  

Art and performance was always a part of Maya’s family, some being circus performers and musicians. In fact Maya’s homeland Cuernavaca, meaning “Place of Eternal Spring,” is known as the capital of language studies and arts, housing many foreign exchange students who want to take a breath of Mexico’s arts and literature.  

Maya began singing at the age of 14 when he was drawn to the music coming from his Uncle’s guitar playing. In high school he took guitar and music lessons and continued his musical studies through college. In college he also received a chemistry and theater degree. 

“I took on theater because I like to be on stage and to personalize somebody at some point,” said the adored Mexican Troubadour. “When I am up on stage, I am recreating myself. And that’s the way I relive the song again.”


Calendar

Thursday October 31, 2002

Thursday, Oct. 31 

“Once in a Boo Moon” 

6 to 9 p.m. 

Chabot Museum, 10000 Skyline Blvd. 

This Halloween party includes a haunted house, hair raising science experiments, creepy creatures, and tricky treats. Costumes encouraged, children must be accompanied by an adult  

Tickets available at www.ticketweb.com or 336-7373 

$10/ $8 for Chabot members 

 

Halloween Carnival 

4 to 9 p.m. 

1730 Oregon St. 

Sponsored by the City of Berkeley Young Adult Project, this “Dead of the Dead” celebration includes a haunted house, carnival, parade, costume contest, food, and games. Contact Phil Harper-Cotton of the Young Adult Project with questions  

981-6670 

 

“Trick-Or-Treat For Unicef” 

Eat out at Chez-Panisse and other local restaurants and help Gourmet Magazine raise funds for children’s programs overseas. For a complete listing of participating restaurants and program details call (800) 252-KIDS or visit www.unicefusa.org 

 

Friday, Nov. 1 

Census 2000: Growing Together or Apart? 

8:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. 

Wurster Hall Auditorium (Rm. 112), UC Berkeley 

During this one-day conference, scholars will analyze the geographic impact of changes to the population 

For more info: 

http://urbanpolicy.berkeley.edu/census2000.htm 

 

Saturday, Nov. 2 

Sick Plant Clinic 

9 a.m. to noon 

UC Botanical Garden, 200 Centennial Dr. UC plant pathology and entomology experts will diagnose what ails your plant  

643-2755 

Free 

 

Sunday, Nov. 3 

“Sacred Breath” 

6 p.m. 

Tibetan Nyingma Institute, 1815 Highland Pl. 

Robin Caton gives this talk on Tibetan Buddhism, and the classic Buddhist practice known as Tong-len. 

843-6812  

Free 

 

Monday, Nov. 4 

Berkeley Gray Panthers Home Owners Support Group 

3 p.m. 

Berkeley Gray Panthers Office, 1403 Addison St. 

Resources for low and middle-income home owners, and home maintenance 

548-9696 

 

“Pathways to Collaboration” 

7:30 to 9:30 p.m. 

Kroeber Hall, Rm. 160, UC Berkeley 

A lecture by Dana Plautz, director of research communications for Intel Corporation, followed by live music 

Free 

 

Wednesday, Nov. 6 

“The Chinese and Religion in the Context of Globalization” 

Reception 5:30 p.m. / Lecture 7 p.m. 

Bade Museum at Pacific School of Religion, 1798 Scenic Ave. 

A noted scholar and author, Professor Zhuo Xinping speaks 

649-2440 

 

Saturday, Nov. 9 

Book Sale and Auction 

10 a.m. to 4 p.m. 

The Center for AIDS Services, 5720 Shattuck Ave., Oakland 

This “big” sale will benefit the AIDS center 

655-3435 

 

Sunday, Nov. 10 

World RunDay - national charity benefit 

All day 

Various cities across the nation - contact www.runday.com 

(516) 859-3000 for more info 

 

Tuesday, Nov. 12 

Holiday Craft Baazar 

10 a.m. to noon 

Handmade items, sweet treats, and knick knacks will be for sale. Everyone is invited 

St. John’s Presbyterian Curch, 2727 College Ave. 

845-6830 

 

Wednesday, Nov. 13 

Public Lecture by the Rev. Canon Naim Ateek 

7:30 p.m. 

Founder of the Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theology Center and native of East Jerusalem, Rev. Ateek will lead a discussion sponsored by the First Congregational Church of Berkeley (UCC) and the Pacific School of Religion 

UCC, on Dana St. between Durant St. and Channing 

848-3696 

$10/ suggested donation  

 

League of Women Voters Meeting 

Noon 

LWVBAE office, 1414 University Ave. 

Discussion will focus on regional issues 

849-2154 

 

 

Thursday, Oct. 31 

Halloween Party with the Venusians 

8 p.m. 

Ashkenaz, 1317 San Pablo Ave. 

The Venusians are a shamanic trance-dance septet known for their costume-laden, colorful performances 

525-5054 

$10 

 

Friday, Nov. 1 

Festa Da Bunda 

8:30 p.m. 

Ashkenaz, 1317 San Pablo Ave. 

This Brazilian “love fest and Penta party” features a Batucada jam with Gary Muzynski of One World Music and others. The night includes a Brazilian soccer team look-alike contest 

525-5054 

$12 

 

Saturday, Nov. 2 

The Librarians with The Skyflakes and Plain White Ts 

9 p.m. 

Bear’s Lair 

2475 Bancroft Way 

$5 / 21 and over 

 

Vince Black with Root Awakening 

9:30 p.m. 

Ashkenaz, 1317 San Pablo Ave. at Gilman 

Socially conscious reggae classics and original songs 

525-5054 

$11 

 

Sunday, Nov. 3 

Workshop and Performance by Akira Tana 

1 to 3 p.m. workshop 

4:30 p.m. concert 

Jazzschool, 2087 Addison St. 

Drummer Akira Tana teaches and performs 

Reservations: 845-5373 

$30-$35 workshop 

$10-$15 performance 

CalArts Night of Jazz 

8 p.m. 

Jazzschool, 2087 Addison St. 

The first of many collaborations between Jazzschool and CalArts 

Reservations: 845-5373 

$10-$15 

 

Flamenco Open Stage 

7:30 p.m. 

Ashkenaz, 1317 San Pablo Ave. at Gilman 

Dancers, guitarists and singers, with a costume exhibit and a sale of flamenco items 

525-5054 

$8 

 

Miriam Abramowitsch and George Barth 

4 p.m. 

Crowden Music Center, 1475 Rose St. 

The renowned singer and pianist will perform classical vocal favorites featuring the music of Brahams, Dvorak and Bartok 

559-6910 

$10 / 18 and under free 

 

Saturday, Nov. 9 

An Evening of Cultural Harmony 

8 p.m. 

St. John’s Presbyterian Church, 2727 College Ave. 

The Barbard Ensemble, the San Francisco Klezmer Experience and Lichi Fuentes & Jackeline Rago will treat listeners to music from Iran, Eastern Europe, and Latin America 

704-7480 x755 

$25 general admission 

 

Sunday, Nov. 10 

The Sheldon Brown Group 

4:30 p.m. 

Jazzschool, 2087 Addison St. 

Reservations: 845-5373 

$10-$15 

 

 

 

Timoteo Ikoshy Montoya 

Through Nov. 1  

Gathering Tribes Gallery  

1573 Solano Ave.  

Acrylic/air brush paintings  

by this Native American artist 

528-9038 

 

“Recent Acquisitions” 

Through Dec. 14 

Thurs., Fri., and Sat., 1 to 4 p.m. 

Berkeley Historical Society, Veterans Memorial Building, 1931 Center St. 

848-0181 

Threads: Five artists who  

use stitching to convey ideas 

Through Dec. 15, Wed.-Sun., noon to 5 p.m. 

Berkeley Art Center 

Live Oak Park, 1275 Walnut St. 

Information: www.berkeleyartcenter.org, 644-6893 

Free 

 

“A Lashing of Malice, a Slice of Humor” 

Oct. 31 through Nov. 2 

Julia Morgan Center for the Arts, 2640 College Ave, near Derby 

Roald Dahl’s adult stories come to life onstage 

Tickets available at the door and at: 

925-798-1300 

$25 opening night Gala 

$10-$15 otherwise 

 

Alarms and Excursions 

Nov. 15 through Dec. 22 

Aurora Theatre Company,  

2081 Addison St. 

Michael Frayn's comedy about  

the irony of modern technology 

843-4822, www.auroratheater.org for reservations 

$26 to $35. 

 

Saturday, Nov. 2 

Jan Tissot 

3 to 5 p.m. 

Pegasus Downtown, 2349 Shattuck Ave. 

Jan Tissot will be signing his new novel, “Keiki” 

 

Saturday Nov. 9 

Dorothy Allison and Jewelle Gomez appear in support of Boadecia’s Books 

8 p.m. 

Northbrae Community Church  

941 The Alameda at Solano Ave. 

559-9184 

$25, sliding scale 

 

Saturday Nov. 16 

Alice Walker and Brenda Boykin 

8 p.m. 

Northbrae Community Church  

941 The Alameda at Solano 

559-9184 

 

Sunday, Nov. 3 

“Focus” 

2 to 4:30 p.m. 

Berkeley Richmond Jewish Community Center, 1414 Walnut St.  

William H. Macy stars in this early 1940’s period piece 

848-0237 

$2 donation 

 

Thursday, Nov. 7 

“Desert Hearts” 

1 p.m. 

North Berkeley Senior Center, 1901 Hearst St. 

A 1950’s lesbian romance featuring Helen Shaver and Patricia Charbonneau 

 

Friday, Nov. 8 

“El Che” 

7 p.m. 

Redwood Gardens, 2951 Derby St. 

Film screening followed by salsa dancing to support Berkeley’s Cuban Sister-City Palma Soriano 

548-6941 

$10 / Sliding scale 

 

“Power and Terror: Noam Chomsky in Our Times” 

7:30 p.m. 

First Congregational Church, 2345 Channing Way 

The Middle East Children’s Alliance will premiere a new film by Academy award-nominated documentary filmmaker John Junkerman 

548-0542 

$15


Cal Football Notebook

Jared Green
Thursday October 31, 2002

He’s a fan: Cal head coach Jeff Tedford will spend his Saturday just like millions of others across the country: watching college football on television. 

Tedford will be paying special attention to the Arizona State-Washington State game on Saturday, as the Sun Devils are slated as the Golden Bears’ next opponent. With the luxury of a bye week, Tedford will watch his first football game of the season that isn’t on tape. 

“I’m really going to enjoy sitting back and watching someone else sweat it out for once,” Tedford said Tuesday. “I’ll be scouting, but I’ll be a fan too.” 

 

Injury report: Tedford’s team’s health should benefit from the weekend off. All three starting wide receivers are nursing injuries, as well as three offensive line starters, three defensive line starters and tight end Tom Swoboda. The injury report Tedford received on Monday was two pages long for the first time this season. Tedford said his backups will see extensive practice time this week, and the team will be in full pads only one day. Here’s a list of injuries to Cal starters: WR Jonathon Makonnen (shoulder), WR LaShaun Ward (shoulder, thumb), WR Geoff McArthur (hamstring), OT Chris Murphy (ankle), C Ryan Jones (wrist), G Jon Geisel (knee), FB Pana Faumuina (shoulder), TE Tom Swoboda (shoulder, ankle), DT Josh Beckham (ankle), DE Jamaal Cherry (foot), DE Tom Canada (thigh). 

 

Running woes: Tedford said the next two weeks will be largely dedicated to the running game, which is averaging just 94 yards per game, including games of 40 and 16 yards against UCLA and Oregon State, respectively. Tedford emphasizes balance on offense, and he hasn’t been getting enough production from the run game, which ranks eighth in the Pac-10. 

“Our running game has been non-existent lately,” Tedford said. “It’s something we’re going to have to address right now.” 

Tedford pointed to several factors that may have contributed to the weak efforts lately, including injuries on the offensive line, tough opponents and poor communication. 

“It might be my fault by having too many plays to remember,” he said. “The players might not be comfortable with having so many plays to remember. We have to get back to basics and be able to play at full speed.” 

 

Echemaandu update: Junior tailback Adimchinobe Echemaandu is likely to play at some point this season, perhaps as soon as the Bears’ penultimate game against Arizona. Echemaandu (formerly Joe Echema) tore the ACL and lateral miniscus in his right knee during spring drills. He started running a few weeks ago and has been practicing lightly for two weeks, running without a brace on the injured knee during sprints on Monday. 

“[Echemaandu] will get quite a bit of action this week,” Tedford said. “We’ll have him hitting a little bit and see how he responds.” 

Echemaandu came out of spring drills as the Bears’ top tailback but hurt his knee on April 24. He set a goal to play in the UCLA game but didn’t make it back in time. Tedford said he wants Echemaandu to play this season as the player used his redshirt a year ago due to academic issues. 


Merchants vent after lootings on Telegraph

By Matthew Artz
Thursday October 31, 2002

Telegraph Avenue merchants demanded justice Wednesday, one day after about 30 teenagers looted more than $2,000 in merchandise from a sporting good store. 

But police said arrests in the case were unlikely. “We are taking the matter very seriously,” said Officer Mary Kusmiss. But Kusmiss noted that without good descriptions of the kids, the looters would probably not be found. 

According to police, a group of teenagers left an AC Transit bus slightly before 11:30 a.m. at Durant and Telegraph avenues. Several of the kids ran into the Gap on the 2300 block of Telegraph, where they reportedly threw clothes on the floor and tried to steal merchandise. After being stopped by Gap security, they barged into the Foot Locker across the street and ran off with jerseys and other clothing. It is not known which high school the teenagers attend. 

Merchants connected the looting to a nearby protest held by the pro-affirmative action group Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action and Integration and Fight for Equality By Any Means Necessary (BAMN). They noted that BAMN held a similar rally March 8, 2001 in which an estimated 75 high school students scheduled to attend the protest instead stole about $12,000 in footwear from The Athlete’s Foot on the same block of Telegraph as the Foot Locker. No arrests were made in that case. 

“The big question is who is By Any Means Necessary and what is the message being delivered to the schools,” said Kathy Berger, president of the Telegraph Area Association. 

Police, however, say that unlike last year there is no evidence tying Tuesday’s looting to the rally. According to police, the protesters were attending a pre-rally event at the First Congregational Church at 2345 Channing Way when the looting was taking place. 

BAMN organizer Yvette Felarca said Wednesday that she was not aware of any violence and refused to discuss which high schools participated in the rally and what level of supervision was provided by the schools. 

Local high school officials were also hesitant to address the subject. 

An assistant principal at Oakland Technical School, the only school confirmed to have sent students to Wednesday’s rally, insisted that they were chaperoned by school staff. The assistant principal declined to give his name. 

 

Berkeley High School security officer Craig White said students in Berkeley were not authorized to attend the rally and that he did not see any large exodus of students heading by bus to Telegraph Avenue. 

No other officials from local high schools returned telephone calls. 

According to UC Berkeley spokesperson Janet Gilmore, BAMN failed to alert university officials that they planned to bus in high school kids for the rally. Nevertheless, she said, in light of last year’s violence, UC Berkeley staff telephoned local schools to anticipate attendance. 

Merchants vented most of their anger at the police department. 

“What’s disturbing here is that the police knew this was taking place and they knew what happened last year, but they didn’t inform the merchants and they didn’t put police on Telegraph,” said Ed Munger who owns the property leased to Foot Locker. 

Kusmiss said that UC Berkeley police advised Berkeley officers that the rally was expected to be peaceful. Acting on that information, Berkeley police dispatched six bicycle officers to the church rally, about two blocks from the site of the looting. 

According to Kusmiss, at 11:27 a.m. while the protesters were still at the church, police received a non-emergency call from the Gap about teenagers ransacking the store. The bike officers were sent from the church to the Gap, but when they arrived at 11:31 a.m., the kids had left the store. Then at 11:33 a.m. police received a 911 call from Foot Locker, directly across the street from the Gap. Berkeley police dispatched 25 officers to the scene, but none of the officers, including the officers at the Gap, were able to catch the kids. 

Munger insisted that the response was inadequate and indicative of the city’s lack of will to protect Telegraph merchants. “We’re trying to make this an attractive place, but those stumblebums in City Hall don’t seem to really care,” he said. 

 

Contact reporter at matt@ 

berkeleydailyplanet.net


Limiting heights

Russ Tilleman
Thursday October 31, 2002

To the Editor: 

 

My house is zoned R-3 and I am applying for permits to increase the standing room in my attic. With the existing height limit of 35 feet I can make this change. Under Measure P, the height initiative, I could not continue this project. R-3 would be the only residential district absolutely and unconditionally limited to 28 feet. This is much more brutal treatment than proposed for any other residential zoning district. The lower density residential districts R-1, R-1A, R-2 and R-2A would be limited to 35 feet with Zoning Adjustments Board approval. The higher density R-4 and R-5 would be limited to 35 feet and 40 feet. 

Measure P prohibits variances, which preserve the rights of people who live near business districts, on corner lots or steep hills, and those with large trees in their yards. I cannot fit 3 floors into 28 feet without tearing down my 1906 brown shingle and building a flat-roofed box. 

My next door neighbor's house is essentially identical to mine but is zoned R-2. Even though he is in a lower density zoning, he could ask for zoning board approval to improve his attic but I could not. This unequal treatment seems ludicrous and badly unfair to me. 

Measure P does not just affect transit corridors. Walk by my house at 2670 Parker Street and compare it with the house next door and the other buildings on my block before you make up your mind on this issue. We will live with Measure P for 10 years and it will single out some homeowners for disproportionately bad treatment with no appeal process. 

 

Russ Tilleman 

Berkeley 

 


Jackets split at ACCAL tourney

Staff Report
Thursday October 31, 2002

Staff Report 

 

The Berkeley High water polo teams split their games at the Alameda-Contra Costa Athletic League championship tournament on Wednesday, with the girls advancing into the championship bracket and the boys dropping into the consolation bracket. 

The Lady Jackets, the third seed in the tournament, beat St. Vincent High, 12-3, and will play Bishop O’Dowd High today at 2:30 p.m., with the winner moving on to the championship game on Saturday. All games are being played at Contra Costa College. 

The sixth-seeded boys fell to St. Patrick, 12-8, and face Encinal at 4:30 p.m. today. The winner will play in the fifth-place game on Friday.


District 1 candidates take the high road

By Matthew Artz
Thursday October 31, 2002

The most gentlemanly campaign In Berkeley this election season is being run by the two women vying for Berkeley’s 1st District City Council seat. 

“I think we are setting a record for the most polite campaign ever run,” said Rhiannon, who uses only one name and is mounting a longshot effort to unseat 10-year incumbent Linda Maio. 

Maio, for her part is used to mellow campaigns. Since winning her council seat, which serves northwest Berkeley, in a 1992 run-off election, she has coasted through four easy re-elections. 

Maio, who is a member of the council’s progressive majority, is viewed as one of council’s strongest advocates on education and small business development. Her accomplishments include school programs on conservation and a ban on fast food restaurants along San Pablo Avenue. 

Rhiannon is not expected to upset Maio’s five-term winning streak. A full-time student, who lives in city-subsidized housing with her daughter, she has been active in district politics for many years, serving as secretary of the Oceanview Neighborhood Association and as a member of the West Berkeley Project Area Committee. 

She is rallying her campaign around a proposal to give residents advance notification of council items, by publishing agendas two weeks before meetings, instead of the current five-day warning. Rhiannon argues that extra time will give residents a chance to fully grasp the issues. Maio calls the suggestion unrealistic, noting that often items are too urgent to wait several weeks before debate. 

Despite a background that suggests progressive leanings, Rhiannon is playing the moderate in this race. Although she has not sought, nor received, the backing of moderates on City Council, Rhiannon is opposing Maio and her progressive council faction on several ballot initiatives. 

Maio, who is considered one of council’s strongest advocates for affordable housing and was a founder of non-profit homebuilder Resources for Community Development, supports a ballot measure to increase the tax on home sales from 1.5 to 2 percent. 

She argues that the tax hike on people who sell their homes for more than $350,000 can effectively build more affordable housing and reduce homelessness.  

Rhiannon sees the issue differently. She contends that the extra $5,000 added to the cost of an average home purchase would eliminate potential home owners from the Berkeley market. Although the measure would leave it up to the buyer and seller to determine which party pays the tax, she assumes the buyer will be made to cover the cost. “It seems like the tax is taking from the little guy and giving to the big non-profit developers,” she said. 

The candidates also differ on the most controversial ballot measure – a limit on the heights of new Berkeley developments. Rhiannon supports the initiative, arguing that it is needed to reign in developers who have exploited the city’s loose zoning regulations and unfairly built high-rise buildings near residential neighborhoods.  

“People should be able to be in a neighborhood and not warehoused in tall buildings,” she said. 

Maio, however, counters that the ballot measure would actually force more incursion into neighborhoods. Whereas current Berkeley zoning law calls for spaces between a new development and a neighboring property, Maio said the height initiative would force the developer to put the building right up against the edge of the property line in order to qualify for an extra floor of housing units. 

Traffic circles divide the candidates as well. Maio, who called commuter traffic racing through streets the district’s number one problem, supports a measure that will generate $10 million from property tax hikes to fund traffic calming measures such as traffic circles and pedestrian-activated traffic lights. Parents are scared to have their kids play outside because commuters are rushing through streets on their way to downtown, Maio said.  

Rhiannon, though, said the measure sounded like just another general tax. “Property owners are taxed enough and as a renter I know that gets passed on to tenants,” she said. As an alternative, she proposes that the city better time traffic lights to keep cars from building speed through district streets. 

Rhiannon has been most forceful criticizing Maio’s record on local environmental concerns. The district is home to the Berkeley Transfer Center as well as sections of Interstate 80 and the railroad, all of which add to local pollution. Rhiannon claims that Maio has blocked attempts to get air quality studies done and that she has ignored air pollution stemming from passing trains that kick up dust. 

Maio, however said she initiated the first west Berkeley air study in 2000. Additionally she said she has supported switching the city’s sanitation fleet from diesel to environmentally-friendly fuels and has passed measures providing environmental education in public schools. 

 

Contact reporter at matt@ 

berkeleydailyplanet.net


Who deserves credit?

Dona Spring
Thursday October 31, 2002

To the Editor: 

 

Mayor Dean recently sent out a campaign flier alleging that if Tom Bates were elected mayor, we would return to trash and graffiti in downtown Berkeley. This is pure political garbage. The Clean City Program was initiated by Tom Bate's wife, former Mayor Loni Hancock, and cosponsored by Councilmember Maio and myself. We also advocated to have homeless people given jobs to do these tasks.  

There was a time before the mayoral election in 1994, when the funding for the program ran low and cleanup slowed, with obvious results. After her election as mayor, Dean joined me in urging the public works director to find some additional funding for the program. Additional funding was taken from the refuse fund, which is comprised of fees that residents pay for garbage pickup. 

In 1998, when Mayor Dean was again running for mayor, the staff told the council that there was not enough money to continue the additional service of trash and graffiti cleanup on the commercial corridors without a fee increase. Mayor Dean voted against the fee increase. It was the progressive majority who saved the day by having the political courage to raise the fees (even though it was close to the election) so that the Clean City Program could continue to be adequately funded. We also added San Pablo Avenue to the commercial streets getting the program.  

It is irksome to have Ms. Dean continually trying to take credit exclusively when it was under the progressive majority leadership that the cleanup and blossoming of the downtown happened. Without the progressive majority votes, there wouldn’t have been funding for the Clean City Program or for subsidizing the arts district. Without progressive council members voting, there would not have been a $4 million subsidy to the Berkeley Repertory and financial assistance to the Aurora Theater and Freight and Salvage folk music club.  

 

Dona Spring  

8th District City Councilmember 


Scoreboard

Thursday October 31, 2002

Girls Volleyball - Berkeley 3, Encinal 0 

The Yellowjackets clinch their third straight Alameda-Contra Costa Athletic League championship with a win over the Jets (13-6 overall, 8-2 ACCAL), 15-7, 15-2, 15-8. Vanessa Williams leads the way with 14 kills and 17 digs, while fellow senior Amalia Jarvis has 12 kills. Berkeley (15-8, 10-0) is headed for a third straight undefeated ACCAL season with just three games left. 

 

Girls Tennis - Berkeley 4, El Cerrito 3 

Berkeley wins all four singles matches against the Gauchos to tie Alameda High for the ACCAL championship. Megan Sweeney, Gail Nipnorasete, Clara Mattei and Alison Headley win their individual matches for the Yellowjackets. Berkeley and Alameda will face off in a playoff match for the league’s automatic berth to the North Coast Section playoffs. 

 

Girls Volleyball - St. Mary’s 3, St. Joseph 0 

The Panthers beat St. Joseph (16-15 overall, 6-5 BSAL) to solidify a spot in the Bay Shore Athletic League playoffs. Jazmin Pratt has 11 kills and 11 aces for the Panthers (9-3, 7-3) in the win. Martha Ryan pitches in with eight kills, while Brittany Murphy has four kills and four aces for St. Mary’s.


UC lecturers reject offer, state intervention likely

By David Scharfenberg
Thursday October 31, 2002

University of California lecturers announced Wednesday that they have rejected UC’s latest contract offer, which is likely to trigger state intervention in the 2 1/2-year-old labor dispute rooted in salary, job security and contract arbitration issues. 

“We’re not going to accept their offer,” said Fred Glass, spokesperson for the University Council-American Federation of Teachers, which represents 4,000 lecturers across the nine-campus UC system, according to a union count, and 2,500 according to UC. 

University spokesperson Paul Schwartz said Wednesday that the university had not yet reviewed a formal union response to UC’s latest contract offer, which was issued Oct. 23. As a result, Schwartz said, he could not definitively reply to the union’s apparent rejection of the contract. 

But Schwartz indicated that, if the union is unwilling to compromise, the university may tell the state that an “impasse” exists in negotiations. If the state confirms that there is a deadlock, it would begin an official “fact-finding” process and propose contract terms of its own. If the university and union turn down the state’s proposal, the university would have the power to impose a final contract. 

“If we continue to be far apart on the issues, we could be headed toward fact-finding,” Schwartz said. 

By all indications the lecturers, who took part in a UC Berkeley strike in August and walked off the job at five other UC campuses earlier this month, are unwilling to cave in on several key contract matters. 

In its Oct. 23 proposal, the university offered to raise the minimum annual salary for lecturers, which currently stands at $28,968, to $35,868 for those with less than six years experience and $40,200 for those with more than six years. 

The lecturers, who teach 25 to 30 percent of UC classes, have maintained that the raise is insufficient and will only affect a relatively small number of instructors who currently make less than the proposed $35,868 minimum. University officials have countered that the $7,000 increase is a significant one. 

Glass said Wednesday that the union still considers the salary offer inadequate. He added that job security language and professional development money included in the latest UC offer is insufficient. Glass also clung to long-standing union insistence on independent arbitration of contract disputes. The university currently serves as the final authority in any dispute. 

“We’re absolutely committed to neutral dispute resolution,” Glass said, arguing that the rest of the contract won’t mean a “darn thing” without it. 

Glass said a move toward “impasse” and state mediation would be a university decision, not a union move. 

“That’s not what we’re going for,” he said. “We believe there’s more room for negotiation.” 

Union officials said last week that the university sprung a comprehensive, take-it-or-leave-it contract proposal on them Oct. 23 in the midst of contract negotiations, and criticized the university for cutting off talks.  

University officials countered that 2 1/2 years of negotiations was “more than sufficient time to discuss the issues” and said the union must be willing to compromise to get a final contract. 

The university hires lecturers to focus on teaching courses, while tenure-track professors are expected to conduct research as well. Lecturers work on one-year contracts until they have six years of experience, at which point they receive three-year deals, contingent on solid job performance reviews. 

 

Contact reporter at scharfenberg@ 

berkeleydailyplanet.net


Support for education

Cynthia Hecker
Thursday October 31, 2002

To the Editor: 

 

For the past six years, I’ve been going to school with struggling kids at King Middle School and Berkeley High School, tutoring them and otherwise helping them out whenever they needed it. I’ve seen creative, motivated people develop projects which start out with lots of enthusiasm, but wither for lack of support or funding or who knows what. Berkeley has no shortage of good ideas and willingness to experiment on our school kids. We could use more discipline in sticking with projects and ironing out their wrinkles, instead of abandoning them in favor of jumping on the next bright idea. 

Tom Bates’s proposal of an “educational summit” sounds like an election campaign invitation for more experimentation. Tom Bates may want a conference to catch himself up on what’s going on in education today, but if he had been involved in Berkeley’s public schools in the six years since he retired from the Assembly, he wouldn’t need an educational summit. There is so much going on that could have used his and other citizens’ support. For example, Check and Connect, a project that proved effective in other cities, monitored attendance of high school students and connected floundering youth with mentors. It floundered itself for lack of mentors. If Tom Bates’ call for an emergency reunion of his friends in Sacramento and Washington, D.C. is a sincere effort to help Berkeley’s public schools, why didn’t he offer this help during the past six years? 

 

Cynthia Hecker 


Sharon’s coalition falls apart over dispute about settlements

By Dan Perry
Thursday October 31, 2002

JERUSALEM — Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s broad-based coalition collapsed Wednesday when Cabinet ministers from the moderate Labor Party resigned in a dispute over funding for Jewish settlements, threatening to push Israel into a bitter election. 

The crisis ended an uneasy 20-month “unity government” formed as a common front against the Palestinian uprising, and could sabotage U.S. efforts to win support for a peace plan. 

Sharon told parliament he would continue to lead the country, suggesting he would try to govern with a narrow coalition of far-right and religious parties rather than call early elections. 

The crisis was precipitated by Sharon’s rejection of Labor Party leader Binyamin Ben-Eliezer’s demands to cut $145 million in funds for Jewish settlements in the $57 billion 2003 state budget. Compromise proposals failed and Ben-Eliezer resigned from his post as defense minister, followed by the rest of Labor’s Cabinet ministers. 

Under Israeli law, the six resignations only take effect within 48 hours, leaving room for last-ditch maneuvers — but politicians from both sides predicted Sharon’s broad-based coalition was at an end. 

“We must fight terror, but this is the day when we have to present a diplomatic horizon,” Ben-Eliezer said, referring to peace talks with the Palestinians. “The prime minister is unable to present a diplomatic horizon.” 

Critics accused Ben-Eliezer of partisan politics, noting that in polls ahead of Labor’s Nov. 19 leadership primary he trails two more dovish challengers, and leaving the government over a settlement dispute could boost his standing. 

“It’s the height of irresponsibility,” said Education Minister Limor Livnat of Sharon’s Likud Party. 

The budget was put to parliament after the Labor ministers resigned, and it passed with the support of parties outside the coalition — as expected — by a 67-45 vote; it must pass two more readings in coming weeks before it is final. 

Several officials involved in the last-minute talks said Foreign Minister Shimon Peres, who led Labor for much of the past two decades and has been a key supporter of the unity government, tried to persuade Ben-Eliezer to back down. Peres then resigned along with Ben-Eliezer and four other Labor Party ministers.


Election Day Preview

David Scharfenberg, Matthew Artz, Erik Totten, Kathryn Klages and Kurtis Alexander.
Thursday October 31, 2002

Editor’s Note: Today is the first of a three-part series outlining the Berkeley ballot and provides a capsule of the ballot measures. Friday’s paper will profile candidates running for City Council and the Berkeley Unified School District board. Saturday’s paper will profile the mayoral candidates and their positions on various issues. 

 

Measure I; Animal Shelter - New Facility,  

General Obligation Bond 

Measure I authorizes the city to issue a $7.2 million bond to build a new animal shelter. A property tax increase would fund construction and would cost the average homeowner about $12 a year for the next 30 years. Proponents say that the current animal shelter, built in the 1940s, is too small and structurally unsound to provide humane treatment to animals. Opponents say the measure is an unnecessary new tax. A two-thirds majority is needed to pass. 

Supporters include Mayor Shirley Dean; former state Assemblyman Tom Bates; councilmembers Betty Olds and Dona Spring. 

No official opposition. 

 

Measure J; Old City Hall - Retrofit for Seismic Safety and Accessibility, General Obligation Bond  

Measure J authorizes the city to issue a $21.5 million bond to renovate and seismically retrofit Old City Hall, which currently houses the Berkeley Unified School District headquarters and the City Council chambers. A property tax increase would fund the project, with the average homeowner paying about $20 per year for 30 years. Proponents argue that a retrofit is necessary to ensure the safety of the historic building’s occupants. Opponents say the bond is too expensive in the midst of an economic downturn and argue that the renovation plan includes an inadequate City Council chambers. A two-thirds vote is required to pass. 

Supporters include Mayor Shirley Dean; City councilmembers Linda Maio, Miriam Hawley, and Margaret Breland; member and past Chair of Landmarks Preservation Commission and Design Review Committee Burton Peek Edwards; Commission on Disability member Norman Rabkin. 

Opponents include councilmembers Dona Spring and Kriss Worthington; Disability Commisioner Karen Rose; Disabled Healthcare Advocate Jonathan Gold. 

 

Measure K; School Board Directors Compensation,  

Charter Amendment 

Measure K would raise school board members’ salaries from $875 to $1,500 per month. Proponents say the raise is long overdue and argue that it could be diverted to pay for staff, which board members currently do not have. Opponents say a raise is inappropriate when the school district faces a multi-million dollar budget shortfall. A majority vote is required to pass. 

Supporters include Berkeley Board of Education member John Selawsky. 

Opponents include Board of Education candidate Lance Montauk. 

 

Measure L; Pedestrian Safety Improvement Tax 

Measure L would raise roughly $10 million for pedestrian safety improvements like traffic circles and lighted crosswalks. The average homeowner would pay $24.70 more in property taxes each year for 10 years to fund the initiative. Proponents say the measure would boost a meager city budget for safety improvements and save lives. Opponents say pedestrian injuries in Berkeley are declining and call the measure unnecessary and expensive. A two-thirds vote is required for approval. 

Supporters include Mayor Shirley Dean; former state Assemblyman Tom Bates. 

Opponents include former chair of Citizens Budget Commission Art Goldberg. 

 

Measure M; Affordable Housing, Real Property Transfer Tax  

Measure M adds an additional 0.5 percent to the tax on the sale of property. The increase would add an average of $5,000 to new home sales, but would not apply to sales of less than $350,000 or on homes sold for a loss. Money raised from the tax would fund affordable housing, seismic retrofitting of at risk apartments and homelessness prevention. Proponents argue that the tax will only affect residents who are selling their home for a large profit and will increase the city’s affordable housing stock. Opponents say that the tax unfairly puts the entire onus of funding new affordable housing on people who sell their homes. A two-thirds majority is needed to pass. 

Supporters include Supervisor Keith Carson; State Assemblymember Dion Aroner; Center for Independent Living Executive Director Jacqueline Garrett; League of Women Voters of Berkeley Nancy Bickel. 

Opponents include Berkeley Association of Realtors President Miriam Ng. 

 

Measure N; Waterfront Development - Change the Amount and Type of Development on Private Property 

Measure N would empower City Council to revise development guidelines for a 45-acre parcel of waterfront property west of Gilman Street. The property’s owner, Magna Entertainment Corp., has planned to put two hotels and retail space on the property. Proponents of the measure say that council should be able to rezone the property because Magna’s plans would not compliment the proposed Eastshore State Park that will be adjacent to the development. Magna opposes the measure, but has not released a statement explaining their stance. A majority is needed to pass. 

Supporters include Mayor Shirley Dean; former state Assemblyman Tom Bates; Sierra Club representative Helen Burke. 

No official opposition. 

 

Measure O; Coffee - Restrict Sale of Brewed Coffee to Organic, Fair-Trade or Shade-Grown Certified, 

Citizen Initiative 

Measure O would restrict the sale of brewed coffee to only those that are organic, shade grown or fair-trade certified. Proponents say that corporate coffee growers have unfairly denied a fair price to local growers and have undermined their way of life. They say the approved coffees would allow coffee growers to make a fair living and would not lead to higher prices or less selection for Berkeley consumers. Opponents say that such strict restrictions will actually hurt local growers who do not have the money to become certified and will lead to more expensive coffee and less selection for Berkeley consumers. A majority is needed to pass. 

Supporters include former Berkeley Mayor Gus Newport; Organic Consumers Association representative Simon Harris; Global Exchange Founding Director Medea Benjamin. 

Opponents include Berkeley Chamber of Commerce; Councilmember Polly Armstrong; Jeremiah’s Pick Coffee owner Jeremiah Pick. 

 

Measure P; Height of Buildings - Amend Zoning Ordinance to Regulate Heights, Citizen Initiative 

Measure P would lower existing height limits for new Berkeley developments. Not all neighborhoods would be affected, but the measure reduces building heights by two stories on San Pablo Avenue and one story on parts of University and College avenues. Proponents say that new high rise developments have jeopardized the health of Berkeley neighborhoods and that current zoning regulations are so vague that developers are allowed to build projects taller than what should be permitted. Opponents counter that the measure would make new developments unfeasible for developers, reducing the city’s affordable housing stock and making it more difficult for middle class people to live in Berkeley. A majority vote is needed for the measure to pass. 

Supporters include Neighborhood Preservation Ordinance co-author Martha Nicoloff; Council of Neighborhood Associations President Marie Bowman. 

Opponents include Mayor Shirley Dean; County Supervisor Keith Carson; State Assemblymember Dion Aroner.


Simon, Davis, prepare for marathon tours in race

By Alexa H. Bluth
Thursday October 31, 2002

SACRAMENTO — Republican candidate for governor Bill Simon repeated his frequent attacks Wednesday on Democratic Gov. Gray Davis’ handling of the state’s finances, saying Davis “spent California into a budget crisis.” 

Throughout the campaign for governor, which entered its final week Wednesday, Simon has said he expects Davis to raise taxes to address an anticipated multibillion-dollar shortfall next year. In recent days he’s predicted the tax increase will be $10 billion or more. 

But Simon, who appeared with Republican legislators at his Sacramento campaign headquarters, gave no details of where he would cut the budget to avoid raising taxes, which he has pledged not to increase if elected. 

Simon’s stepped up attacks on Davis’ handling of the budget, energy crisis and California’s schools come as part of a last-minute effort to win support in the final five days before Election Day. 

Davis dismissed Simon’s tax claims as “more fantasy and fiction from my opponent” and criticized Simon for not proposing his own plan to close the state’s $23.6 billion shortfall this year. 

“I stepped up to the plate, proposed a responsible budget and signed a responsible budget without any taxes,” Davis said. “Obviously our goal is to do the same in the future.” 

Davis spoke after appearing Wednesday at the groundbreaking of a renovation of the historic Griffith Observatory near downtown Los Angeles, where he announced the allocation of $6 million from voter-approved Proposition 40 for the project. 

Although it was an official state event, the ceremony had the air of a campaign stop as Davis collected praise from Los Angeles Mayor James Hahn and the city councilman for the area. 

Davis also criticized new attack ads launched by Simon. 

“It’s really pathetic in the closing days of the campaign that Mr. Simon has no vision, no plans for the state, all he wants to do is attack me,” said Davis, whose campaign has spent tens of millions of dollars running aggressive television advertisements criticizing either Simon or former Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan, one of Simon’s opponents in the March Republican primary. 

Simon, meanwhile, said his campaign had no role in airing a 60-second Spanish-language radio ad paid for by the Glenn County Republican Party that accuses Democrats of promoting gay behavior and urges a vote for Simon. 

“Democrats are supporting abortion and they are teaching our children in the schools that the homosexual practice is OK,” says the ad, airing on a local station in the far Northern California county. 

The ad also says Democrats don’t want to give drivers’ licenses to “our countrymen” — a reference to a bill Davis vetoed that would have allowed some illegal immigrants to obtain licenses. The ad does not mention that Simon has also said he would have vetoed the bill.


Four men arrested after robbery

Daily Planet Wire Service
Thursday October 31, 2002

OAKLAND — A spokesman for the Oakland Police Department says four men are in custody this Wednesday afternoon after leading officers on a brief vehicle chase from the scene of a bank robbery they allegedly committed. 

The spokesman said a Bank of America located at 1959 Mountain Blvd. was robbed at 9:45 a.m. 

Responding officers gave chase and arrested the foursome in the 7600 block of Bancroft Avenue. 

The names of the suspects have not been released.


Bay Area Briefs

Thursday October 31, 2002

Cancer awareness ads criticism 

SAN RAFAEL — Two new cancer awareness television ads showing people ignoring a dead body on a hiking trail and reaching over a corpse in a grocery store were criticized by Marin County officials. 

The creators said Tuesday they designed the ads to raise awareness about the high incidence of breast and prostate cancer in the county. 

“It’s not about (public officials) not doing their jobs,” said Judi Shils of Ross, director of the Marin Cancer Project, who commissioned the ads for a Nov. 9 canvassing effort. “It’s about the community not doing its job, collectively — all of us need to wake up.” 

The 30-second spots started airing this week. At least one major television station refused to air them, according to Jeff Goodby of Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, the San Francisco ad agency that created the ads. 

 

Pacifica woman held for alleged bridge bomb threats 

 

REDWOOD CITY — A Pacifica woman accused of calling in phony bomb threats to the Golden Gate Bridge and the San Francisco federal building has been held to answer following a preliminary hearing in a San Mateo County courtroom. 

Authorities say Anita Hanson, 44, was “very drunk” when she called 911 late at night Oct. 10 and in the early morning Oct. 11 claiming that bombs had been placed at the two locations. 

In Hanson's hearing Tuesday, defense motions to gain her release and reduce her bail, which is set at $50,000, were both denied. She was held to answer on two counts of falsely reporting a bomb and three counts of making terrorist threats. 

After Hanson allegedly made the bogus 911 calls, several law enforcement agencies responded to both locations to investigate and discovered the threats were unfounded. The California Highway Patrol said  

officers traced the calls to Hanson's cell phone and sent Pacifica police to arrest her. 

Hanson has pleaded innocent to all charges against her. 

She will be arraigned in San Mateo County Superior Court Nov. 14. 

 

Activists dies from bus accident 

 

SAN FRANCISCO — A Marin County man died in San Francisco General Hospital Wednesday morning from head injuries he received while standing through the skylight of a double-decker bus passing through a tunnel en route to a peace rally in the city Saturday. 

Hospital spokeswoman Gloria Rodriguez said Tony Hernandez died at 11:43 a.m. in the intensive care unit of the hospital where he was on life support. 

Dianne Canning, of Sebastopol, also was injured when she, like Hernandez, was struck on the head by a building overhang at the end of the Broadway Tunnel in San Francisco. She remains in critical condition in the intensive care unit.  

Hernandez and Canning were among about 25 people riding in a school bus.


State Briefs

Thursday October 31, 2002

Animal lovers try to halt poison drop 

SANTA BARBARA — Animal protectionists asked for emergency federal action to halt the second phase of a poison drop designed to kill off the destructive black rats on Anacapa Island. 

Tuesday’s request seeks protections for the native deer mice that will also die in the eradication program. The Fund for Animals and the Channel Islands Animal Protection Association demanded that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service list the Anacapa deer mouse for protection under the Endangered Species Act. 

Fund for Animals spokesman Michael Makarian said the rat eradication plan would be an ecological disaster for the island. The mice inhabit only the three Anacapa islets.


Levi seeks to boost sales with discount

By Michael Liedtke
Thursday October 31, 2002

SAN FRANCISCO — Seeking to win back bargain-minded shoppers, slumping jeans maker Levi Strauss & Co. on Wednesday unveiled a discount clothing line that will be sold by Wal-Mart Stores next year. 

Levi’s new Signature brand represents the San Francisco-based company’s long-awaited attempt to appeal to a fast-growing consumer segment with frugal fashion tastes. 

Shoppers buy nearly one-third of their clothes at Wal-Mart, Target and other discounters, a trend that forced Levi’s to expand beyond the department store business that has generated most of its sales. Levi’s hopes to sell the Signature clothes in other discounters besides Wal-Mart. 

“We want to sell our clothes in places where people want to shop,” said Phil Marineau, Levi’s chief executive officer. 

Levi’s previous refusal to sell its jeans in discount chains contributed to the company’s steadily declining sales since 1996. Levi’s sales this year will total about $4 billion, down from a peak of $7.1 billion six years ago. 

“If they didn’t make this move, Levi’s would be dead in three years,” said Kurt Barnard, president of Barnard’s Retail Trend Report in Upper Montclair, N.J. “This could be their salvation.” 

The new Signature jeans, which will be available in Wal-Mart in July 2003, probably will sell for $23 to $26, Marineau said Wednesday. 

That’s about 15 percent to 35 percent less than the typical $30 to $35 price for Levi’s most popular basic jeans. 

For Bentonville, Ark.-based Wal-Mart, Levi’s Signature line will be a premium brand. Most Wal-Mart jeans sell for under $20, with some prices falling below $10, said San Francisco fashion industry consultant Harry Bernard. 

Levi’s also plans to sell discount corduroy pants, shirts and jackets under the Signature brand — the company’s first new clothing line since the 1996 launch of Slates slacks. Slates has since been folded into the company’s Dockers brand. 

Counting on Wal-Mart to handle all the promotion, Levi’s isn’t budgeting money to advertise the Signature brand. 

While Levi’s says the new brand will be as durable as its other clothes, Signature jeans will have a bare-bones look. For instance, there won’t be any stitching on the back pocket and the label will be distinguished by a black Levi Strauss signature instead of the traditional red label. 

Fashion consultant Bernard questioned whether Levi’s will be able to deliver the high volumes of low-cost clothes needed to stock Wal-Mart’s 3,000 stores. During its slump, Levi’s has been plagued by high manufacturing costs and delivery problems. 

“The cards are stacked against them,” Bernard said. “They are taking their weaknesses into an arena where they need them to be strengths.”


Man leaves tree-home

The Associated Press
Thursday October 31, 2002

BRISBANE — The tree home on San Bruno Mountain that attracted national attention when two squatters refused to leave a pair of meager huts after 12 years there, is now just a tree again. 

Besh Serdahely, 58, cleared out of the tree house Tuesday and park officials dismantled the dwelling, two months after San Mateo County officials stapled a notice to the 300-year-old oak in August saying Serdahely and his wife, Thelma Caballero, no longer were welcome. 

“I spoke to him Sunday, and he was acknowledging that this chapter was ending,” said Bill Johnston, a lawyer and family friend who has been counseling Serdahely since the ordeal began. 

Caballero left the tree earlier this month and is now living at a board and care facility.


Opinion

Editorials

GOP captures control of Senate

By Alan Fram The Associated Press
Wednesday November 06, 2002

WASHINGTON — Republicans narrowly seized control of the Senate on Wednesday, ousting Democrats in Georgia and Missouri and giving President Bush’s legislative agenda a major boost in the next Congress. 

By winning their 50th seat in Missouri, the GOP was ensured control of the chamber next year because Vice President Dick Cheney will cast tie-breaking votes. 

Democrats took just one seat from Republicans when Arkansas Attorney General Mark Pryor, the son of former Sen. David Pryor, defeated incumbent Sen. Tim Hutchinson. 

In Georgia, Republican Rep. Saxby Chambliss defeated moderate first-term Democratic Sen. Max Cleland, a triple amputee from the Vietnam War, after chiding him for opposing President Bush’s plan for creating a new Department of Homeland Security. 

The GOP also could take control of the lame-duck session of the current Congress, which convenes next week to tackle unfinished budget business and perhaps other legislation because of Rep. Jim Talent’s victory in Missouri. 

Talent could be quickly sworn into office after defeating Democratic Sen. Jean Carnahan. She was appointed to the seat after her husband, Mel Carnahan, was elected in 2000, three weeks after he was killed in a plane crash. That would give the GOP at least 50 seats in Senate returning next week — enough for control because of Cheney. 

Rep. John Sununu was victorious for the GOP in New Hampshire, retaining a Republican-held seat that Democrats had high hopes of winning. He defeated Democratic Gov. Jeanne Shaheen, despite a lack of help from many conservatives bitter over his primary defeat of Republican Sen. Bob Smith. 

In Colorado, incumbent Republican Sen. Wayne Allard held off lobbyist and former U.S. Attorney Tom Stickland in a rematch of their race six years ago. 

The triumph came on a night that began with Democrats clinging to a one-seat margin, and it meant they will have to relinquish the majority they have held since Vermont Sen. James Jeffords abandoned the GOP in June 2001. 

With at least 47 senators, Democrats will still be able to use filibusters — procedural delays — to kill Republican initiatives because such roadblocks need only 41 votes to succeed. 

Even so, the GOP’s capture of the Senate denied Democrats their major remaining source of power. Republicans already control the White House and they recaptured their House majority Wednesday.


Nurses strike in San Pablo

Daily Planet Wire Service
Tuesday November 05, 2002

SAN PABLO — More than 400 nurses turned out Monday to strike at Doctors Medical Centers in San Pablo and Pinole, leaving patients under the care of temporary healthcare workers. 

The company that owns the two hospitals, the Santa Barbara-based Tenet Healthcare Corporation, has signed a 30-day contract to bring in nurses from out of state in order to operate the hospital during the strike. 

Officials from the California Nurses Association and Tenet have been negotiating without much progress since July and nurses have been working without a contract since August. 

Nurses want a defined benefit plan for retirement that that goes beyond the 401K plan that Tenet presently offers, including pension payments and health coverage. 

While nurses have walked out, a Tenet spokesman says patient care has not changed. 

“There has been no effect on quality of care, we still have elected procedures and the emergency room is open as normal,” said David Langness, a spokesman for Tenet Healthcare Corporation. “Patient care is not in jeopardy.” 

Nurses on strike disagree however, saying that the strike compromised hospital services. “Emergency room nurses have told us that the hospital is overcrowded,” said Tami Roncskevitz, a spokeswoman for the California Nurses Association. “Tenet is doing a disservice to the community.”  

A spokesman for the Doctors Medical Centers in San Pablo and Pinole, Michel Burleson, said earlier Monday that some nurses may cross the picket line. 

But Liz Jacobs, a registered nurse at Doctors Medical Center, said that only a handful of striking nurses returned to work Monday. 

“Nurses are digging their heels in,” said Jacobs.


Olympic Committee chooses N.Y. bid over Bay Area

By Angela Watercutter
Monday November 04, 2002

SAN FRANCISCO – San Francisco lost its bid Saturday to host the 2012 Summer Olympics. Instead, New York City, the emotional favorite, will be the American candidate to sponsor the games. 

On a weighted scale of voting by the 123 members of the U.S. Olympic Committee board of directors, New York received 132 points out of possible total of 223. 

At San Francisco’s city hall, members of the Bay Area Sports Organizing Committee, which organized the quest for the games, were joined by former Olympians and politicians to await the announcement. 

Moans and sighs filled the ornate rotunda the moment the bad news came. Many felt New York was selected to help ease the lingering pain of the Sept. 11 terror attacks. 

“Sympathy is a strong human emotion,” said committee member George Broder. “It clearly impacted the voters. How could it not?” 

New York will now compete internationally for the right to host the games — Toronto, Rome, Paris, Moscow and Rio de Janeiro could be among the competitors. The International Olympic Committee will choose the host city in 2005. 

USOC president Marty Mankamyer said the compact nature of New York’s bid was a prevailing factor in her decision. 

“Something that is still fresh in my mind from Sydney was trying to get to the venues with all the traffic,” she said. “So one of the biggest issues was the compactness of the bid.” 

“The wonderful thing about this region is that it transcends particular venues or particular events,” said city Supervisor Gavin Newsom. “You don’t need a Superbowl. You don’t need a World Series. We have so much going for us.” 

The Bay Area committee had driven San Francisco’s bid. It was created in the 1980s to bring events to the area and was later used to bid on the 1996 Summer Olympics. Although that bid was awarded to Atlanta, Bay Area officials worked over the next few years to land the World Figure Skating Championships and the World Cup. 

Broder said national committee members have suggested New York may automatically get the bid for the 2016 Summer Olympics if it’s not chosen to host the 2012 games. 

“It’s great to be one of the two finalist cities, but we obviously would have liked to be the candidate,” Anne Cribbs, BASOC president, said from Colorado Springs, Colo. “When you lose, and that’s what this is even though I said I didn’t come here to lose, you want to go back and reassess. I don’t know whether we’ll do that. What we’ll do is just say ’Hey, we put together a great team and we’re proud of the results,’ and move on.” 

Committee members put a lot of planning into the 2012 Summer Olympic games campaign. The vision included Olympic mountain biking in Napa vineyards, sailing events on San Francisco Bay and other sports held within a “Ring of Gold” connecting four sites — San Francisco, Oakland/Berkeley, Stanford and San Jose/Santa Clara. 

Bay Area backers noted that 80 percent of the sports facilities targeted for the 2012 Olympics, including 85,000-seat Stanford Stadium, already exist. That would have kept costs down, and bid officials proposed capital investment of just $211 million — extremely low by Olympic standards. 

The games would have had a projected $7.2 billion statewide fiscal impact. 

The bidders also promised a $409 million surplus for the USOC that would be used for the future development of Olympic sports in the United States. And, they argued, the low capital investment and the support of Silicon Valley corporations meant San Francisco could have avoided the crass commercialism that tainted the 1996 Atlanta Games. 

“I’m heartbroken,” said Jerome Reitenbach, a former Olympic tae kwon do official. “I can’t believe they made the decision to give it to New York because we just have everything here in our city. I think the Olympic Committee made a big mistake.” 

San Francisco would have become the third California site in Olympic history. Los Angeles has hosted the Summer Games twice and Squaw Valley has hosted the Winter Games.


Election Day Preview: Shirley Dean

Compiled by Judith Scherr
Saturday November 02, 2002

Shirley Dean 

Age: 67 

Born: Eaton, Colo.  

Education: Graduated Berkeley High School; B.A. in Social Welfare. UC Berkeley  

Occupation: Mayor; Retired in 2000 from the Office of Undergraduate Admission and Relations with Schools at UC Berkeley 

Offices held: Mayor of Berkeley,1994 to present; Berkeley council member, 1975-1982, 1986-1994 

Endorsements: State Sen. Don Perata, D-Oakland, former Sen. Nicholas Petris, D-Oakland, councilmembers Betty Olds, Polly C. Armstrong and Miriam Hawley 

Campaign Spending: raised $142,000 as of Oct. 19 

 

Rent control: Supports rent control, but advocates changes. Wants it tied to renter’s need. During current recession, says landlords hold units vacant because market rents are low; if they rent and market rents go up, they continue to receive below-market rent-controlled rate. Says rents would decrease faster and more units would be available without rent control. 

 

Housing Trust Fund: OK to lend Housing Trust Funds to for-profit developers when they use it to build affordable/low income units. Says for-profit builders repay loan funds, while non-profit developers generally don’t. 

 

Second Units: Says parking limitations should remain as they are; tandem parking unworkable for people in separate households. Don’t increase density in sensitive areas, such as areas prone to landslides. 

 

Divisiveness vs. cooperation: Works to build good relations with the UC Berkeley. Says her work is made difficult by public officials’ inappropriate behavior, for example when Bates was legislator and wife, Loni Hancock was mayor, they used a car to block a university demolition project. 

Good relations with university; co-chairs Berkeley Alliance – an organization that brings schools, city and university together – with Chancellor Robert Berdahl. Went to Ohio, not to dig up dirt on Councilmember Kriss Worthington, as claimed, but was there on business and used the opportunity to find out about him in order to improve working relations. Dean’s home phone number is listed in the phone book; available to talk to the public “24/7.” 

 

Streamlining council meetings: Says Bates’ Rules Committee proposal is undemocratic, “limits speech”: Would prevent boards/commissions from giving direction to council and councilmembers from proposing ideas, and says council meeting would be taken up with appeals of rules committee decisions. Better to work cooperatively with a council that coalesces around ideas, not factions. Way council meetings are currently run works, especially the ability to move items listed for discussion to “consent” agenda, where items are approved as a group without discussion. 

 

Streamlining city government: Wants to reduce number of boards and commissions by consolidating some; boards and commissions need to be staffed so they benefit from staff work and vice versa. 

 

Addressing budget deficit: Wants to attract businesses, a selective hiring freeze, no new programs unless funds are identified, performance audits to see if spending funds the best way, attract businesses; as new chair of the U.S. Conference of Mayor’s task force on cities and universities, will have help getting university to pay in lieu taxes in addition to fees already pays. 

 

Economic development: Wants to attract smaller, more unique, “Berkeley-like,” businesses; “No big box” such as Home Depot or Target. Succeeded in getting Eddie Bauer and Pyramid Brewery to come to Berkeley. Supported ordinance allowing west Berkeley businesses to sell art from their studios. 

 

Parking: Need additional parking to attract businesses; re-examine policy that says no public money should be spent on parking


Earth First! bombing case returns

Melissa McRobbie
Friday November 01, 2002

OAKLAND – U.S. District Court Judge Claudia Wilken is scheduled today to hear challenges to a court decision that awarded two Earth First! activists $4.4 million for First and Fourth Amendment violations by the FBI and Oakland Police Department. 

In August, Wilken upheld a jury decision finding that members of the Oakland PD and the FBI wrongly treated Darryn Cherney and Judi Bari as suspects when a bomb went off in their car in 1990, injuring the pair. 

The Oakland PD and the FBI seek to overturn guilty verdicts against them and to reduce the payments ordered. Lawyers for Cherney and the estate of the late Bari are requesting another trial that would include charges against six additional FBI agents who were dismissed from the case before the initial trial began. 

Bari died of cancer in 1997. 

The hearing is scheduled at 10 a.m. in the Federal Courthouse at 1301 Clay Street in Oakland.  


Camping at Cachuma Lake in a Yurt can be relaxing affair

By Marla Jo Fisher The Associated Press
Friday November 01, 2002

CACHUMA LAKE — Friday, 7 p.m. I feel darn smug, sitting here around the campfire. 

Unlike us, everyone else here in this campground is hurriedly setting up their Friday night campsites. 

Not me. 

It’s only been 15 minutes since we arrived at Cachuma Lake, in the Santa Ynez Valley east of Santa Barbara, but we are already sitting around our campfire, drinking our first glass of Chilean merlot. 

The reason I’m feeling so pleased with myself is that I had the foresight to book us into a pair of yurts. That meant that all we did was drive into this scenic park, deliciously whizzing past the long lines of campers waiting to register, get our sleeping bags out of the car and toss them onto the bunk beds, and, presto, our work was done. 

Well, actually that’s an exaggeration. 

We had to open the wine — and light the fire, too. 

Now you’re probably going to ask me what a yurt is. 

I first learned about yurts while reading a fishing magazine in my mechanic’s waiting room. 

I already knew about Cachuma Lake, the picturesque cobalt-blue reservoir on scenic Highway 154 in the Los Padres National Forest that provides water to Santa Barbara County. 

I’d always been interested in camping there, even though most of the people attracted to the campground are anglers, and I don’t fish. 

So, when I read in the fishing guide that you could rent something strange called a yurt, I immediately wanted to do it, just because the word appealed to my writer’s imagination. 

A yurt is a round canvas tent, designed from the homes used by nomadic tribes in Mongolia. 

The yurts at Cachuma Lake are made from a waterproof canvas skin hung over wooden scaffolding, with a wooden floor and surrounded by a wooden deck that seems to hang over the water. 

They have windows with canvas flaps that can be rolled up, electricity and a fluorescent light, and are furnished with wooden bunk beds with waterproof foam mattresses, and resin tables and chairs. 

You even get an electric heater to ward off any evening chill. 

Outside the yurts, each campsite has a barbecue and a fire ring, and is pleasantly shaded by huge, old, friendly looking oak trees. 

While the accommodations are rustic, the view is strictly five-star. But there is a definite shortage of peace and quiet in this huge campground, which holds some 550 campsites that are fully occupied on summer weekends. 

People seeking solitude would be better served by venturing a bit farther east to one of the U.S. Forest Service campgrounds a few miles from here. 

But the lake is the big attraction here, and it is just gorgeous, one of the most beautiful lakes in California. 

No swimming is allowed because the lake is a drinking water reservoir. But there’s a swimming pool and there are other family attractions, including a miniature golf course and a marina with boats available for rent. 

My friends also approve. We finish off the merlot, talking in the dark around the campfire, until it’s time for bed. We sleep comfortably, listening to the gentle lapping of the lake on the shore. 

On Saturday morning, songbirds awaken us, and we rise feeling rested and relaxed. 

Then, the crisis occurs. 

The propane for our camp stove has been left behind, meaning there’s no way to make coffee or breakfast. This could get ugly. 

However, that’s not a problem here, because we can just stroll down to the marina grill. 

After breakfast, we pack a lunch and drive south a few miles to Paradise Road, turning onto a pleasant country lane that includes several national forest campgrounds. A few miles of driving lead us to a series of swimming holes along the Santa Ynez River that are fun to explore. 

After a hike, we drive north again and visit the Firestone Vineyard. 

In recent years, wineries have begun charging their customers for the privilege of tasting, so we each ante up $7.50 for the right to sample several reserve wines and also taste at the smaller Curtis Winery next door. 

We bring back a few bottles to enjoy around the fire. We also stop in the tiny hamlet of Los Olivos to buy cheese, crackers and dessert, proving yet again that we are having an un-wilderness experience. 

We stay up late talking, and enjoy the moment when we hit the sack. 

Sunday. Another blissful morning, with the lake shrouded in mist that burns off as the day wears on. We are so lazy that we almost miss the wildlife tour of the lake on a pontoon boat that leaves from the marina. 

Afterward, it’s time regretfully to pack up and head home. But, again, it’s a simple matter of rolling up our sleeping bags and stowing the cooler and stove in the car. If we’d been willing to eat all our meals at the grill, we could even have dispensed with cooking altogether. 

 

If You Go... 

 

GETTING THERE: From the south, take Highway 101 to the San Marcos Pass exit, Highway 154. The park entrance is about 20 miles from this point. From the north, take Highway 101 to Highway 154. Cachuma Lake is about 20 miles east. 

 

GENERAL INFORMATION: Yurt reservations are taken up to one year in advance. Fees range from $45 to $55 per night depending on yurt size and the season. There is a two-night minimum stay for weekends, and a three-night minimum stay for all major holidays. 

For information/reservations, (805) 686-5054 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday.


Initiatives beckon voters across the county

Compiled from staff
Thursday October 31, 2002

Voters in Alameda County will cast votes on an array of ballot measures Tuesday, with voters in Castro Valley poised to decide whether to become an incorporated city and Fremont and Berkeley voters considering raises for local officeholders. 

Measure Q would create the new city of Castro Valley. If approved by voters, the city would exist as of July 1 and be governed by a five-member city council. Proponents say that incorporation would make Castro Valley more responsive to residents, while critics worry that the city would not be able to support itself financially. State law requires that that voters of a proposed city approve an incorporation by a simple majority vote. 

In Berkeley, Measure K proposes a boost in salaries of school board members, from $875 a month to $1,500 a month. Meanwhile, Fremont City Council members and the mayor would see their salaries increased if voters there pass Measure S. Under the measure, the monthly salary of each member of the City Council would increase to $2,083 from $1,407 and the salary of the mayor would increase to $2,916 from $2,211 per month. 

Measure W, if approved, would allow the Tracy Joint Unified High School District to issue $103 million in bonds to fund school construction and improvements. As a school bond issue, the measure requires 55 percent approval for passage. 

Voters in the city of Fremont will vote on Measure R, a $51 million bond measure that would replace three small fire stations and seismically upgrade seven others. A two-thirds vote is required for passage. 

Measure A would allow the Alameda County to adopt a hotel and lodging tax of 10 percent of the rental charge that would apply to unincorporated areas of the county. With the exception of Piedmont, all cities in the county currently impose a hotel and lodging tax of 8 to 12 percent. 

Measure B would enable the county to continue imposing a business license tax in unincorporated areas. 

If passed, Measure AA would permit the Alameda-Contra Costa Transit District to levy a $24 annual parcel tax over the next five years, to protect bus services for children and seniors, help ensure passenger security and help reduce traffic congestion and air pollution. 

Measure BB would allow BART to issue up to $1.05 billion in bonds to perform seismic upgrades on  

BART facilities in Alameda, Contra Costa and San Francisco counties. 

Measures AA and BB require a two-thirds majority for passage.