Berkeley—which really did not need any more bad news on the budget front this fiscal year—got it anyway with the surprise, sudden, and stunning announcement this week that the almost universally respected Paul Navazio was resigning as Budget Manager at the end of January to become the Finance Director for the city of Davis. 

City Manager Phil Kamlarz said Tracy Vesley, a Senior Management Analyst for the Department of Parks, Recreation and Waterfront, will serve as interim manager until a replacement is picked. 

Navazio said his decision to leave Berkeley city government after six years had nothing to do with dissatisfaction with the job. “If it wasn’t for a family decision to move to Davis, I wouldn’t necessarily be jumping at [the Davis] position,” he said. 

“It just so happened that this job became available at the same time my wife and I were looking at possibly moving to Davis perhaps in two or three years or so. The Davis job just looked like it’s a good fit, at a good time. At least, a good time for me and my family.” 

Navazio’s departure comes at a particularly precarious time in the fiscal life of Berkeley, which is caught in an escalating budget crisis as it faces a projected $8 million to $10 million shortfall for the next fiscal year. 

On Jan. 27, Navazio’s next-to-the-last day on his Berkeley job, he and Kamlarz are scheduled to present City Council with detailed proposals for budget cuts and fiscal recovery.  

Navazio typically has done both the complicated budget predictions and number-crunching as well as explained the numbers to Councilmembers, city employees, labor representatives, and the public. 

“Paul has a tremendous amount of credibility within the organization, and within the community as well,” said Kamlarz, who recruited Navazio to Berkeley in 1998 from Navazio’s position as Oakland Budget Director. “He’s both a straight shooter, and very patient with people.” 

Asked his first reaction to Navazio’s announcement, Kamlarz said something which he then admitted was “probably unprintable,” then added that he wished he hadn’t come in to the office to catch up on some e-mails and paperwork during the holiday break. 

“I asked Paul what was going on and he gave me a report, and then he added, ‘Oh, by the way...’ It’s not something I wanted to hear. This is a big personal loss to me, not just professionally or just within the organization. I’ve grown to respect his work and [appreciate] my real close relationship with him.” 

Navazio’s move will mean a slight bump in salary for him, up to almost $111,000 a year from his present $108,000, and will put him in a higher tier of city positions. More important, he says, is that it will allow his family to move into a one-story, multi-bedroom home for the benefit of his disabled, six-year-old daughter, one of a set of triplets (the Navazio’s also have a 10-year-old son). “My daughter’s in a wheelchair,” Navazio explained. 

“We have a beautiful house in the hills in Kensington, but it’s two stories, and where do we get a four or five bedroom house on one story where folks could ride bikes or power wheelchairs around town and schools? But the real key is that Davis has a full-inclusion special ed program, so that my daughter, who requires special ed, will be able to be in the same classroom as her sisters. In West Contra Costa School District, where they attend now, she has to be in different schools than her sisters.” 

Another factor in favor of the Davis move was that his wife, an employment law attorney, will be able to rejoin her old law firm, which relocated there. 

“It was all pretty coincidental,” Navazio said. “I was contacted by city officials in Davis, who told me that their Finance Director would be coming vacant (Nov. 14), and asked me if I knew the names of any persons I might forward to them so that they could have a good crop of applicants. And I said, ‘Hey, it just so happens that I’ve been talking about Davis.’ So I spoke with them, and things happened real quickly, quicker than I bargained for.” 

Melissa Chaney, Davis Human Resources Director, was clearly ecstatic for what seemed to be a steal for a city with one-third the budget of Berkeley. “We’re very excited to get him,” Chaney said. “We spent quite a while talking to him during the interview process, and we just knew that he’d be a perfect fit here.” 

Asked what won the job for Navazio over 14 other applicants, Chaney said it was “many things, but two in particular. We wanted somebody could come in and lead the department that had an understanding of what the real function of a finance department was and could offer some in depth budget and financial planning forecasting. [Paul] had those two main qualities.” 

Other city officials reacted to the announcement with a mixture of good wishes for Navazio and expressions of sadness for Berkeley’s loss. 

“It’s going to be a big hole to fill,” said Mayor Tom Bates. “He’s really an outstanding finance director. I guess we all should have been nervous, I suppose, having somebody who loves the Grateful Dead handling all of our money. But as everybody knows, Paul was excellent at his job. He’s definitely going to be missed. But Paul’s a nice guy, and he deserves this break. I wish him the best. ” 

That sentiment was echoed by Bates’ aide, Cisco De Vries. “I don’t think there’s any question that it’s a substantial loss from the budget team,” De Vries said. “Luckily we’ve got a lot of talented people over there [in the city finance department], but Paul was a go-to guy. We’ll figure it out, but it’s certainly bad news. It’s a bummer.” 

City Councilmembers agreed. “There’s a lot of city employees we could function without, but [Navazio’s] not one of them,” Councilmember Betty Olds said. “He’s been an outstanding person. I just really feel bad about it, but it’s from a selfish standpoint. It’s a step up for him.” 

And from Councilmember Linda Maio: “The thing about Paul is his demeanor. He is Mr. Patient. Mr. Good Humor. Mr. Stay Til It Gets Done No Matter How Long. He’s a low-key guy, so you don’t get any rah-rah stuff. But you just feel good about working with somebody like that. I’m sorry that he’s going, and I hope he comes back someday. I really saw him on the ladder for executive level position with the city, someone who would fill [Acting City Manager Phil Kamlarz’] shoes whenever Phil left. I thought it was a wise choice Phil made to hire Paul, and to give him so much responsibility. We’re losing a very talented guy.” 

Navazio’s interim replacement, Tracy Vesley, is scheduled to transfer to the city manager’s office from Parks, Recreation and Waterfront on Jan. 12 to train under Navazio for the last two weeks of his tenure. Vesley has worked for five years in her Senior Management Analyst position. She previously worked as a program manager for the State Judiciary, and as senior budget analyst in the Kern County Administrative office.

FRIDAY, JAN. 9 

Celebrate the Dream commemorating the 75th Birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., with Martin Luther King, III, son of the legendary civil rights leader, Allen Temple Men’s Choir, the Greater St. Paul Missionary Baptist Church’s mass choir, and Dorothy Morrison signing “Oh Happy Day,” from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. in Frank Ogawa Plaza in front of Oakland City Hall. www.oaklandnet.com/celebrations 

Shorinji Kempo Martial Arts Demonstration at 8 p.m. at Emeryville Taiko Dojo, 1601-A 63rd. St., Emeryville. 815-0607. www.emeryvilleshorinji.org 

City Commons Club Noon Luncheon with Peter Dumont, co-founder, Star Alliance, on “Comprehensive Approach to Peace.” Luncheon at 11:45 a.m. for $11.50 - $12.50, speech at 12:30 p.m., at the Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant St. For information and reservations call 526-2925 or 665-9020. 

Literary Friends meets at the North Berkeley Senior Center at 1:15 p.m. to discuss Vermeer’s art and times, and review “Girl in Hyacinth Blue” and “Girl with a Pearl Earring.” 232-1351. 

Women in Black Vigil, from noon to 1 p.m. at UC Berkeley, Bancroft at Telegraph. wibberkeley@yahoo.com, 548-6310, 845-1143. 

Meditation, Peace Vigil and Dialogue, gather at noon on the grass close to the West Entrance to UC Berkeley, on Oxford St. near University Ave. People of all traditions are welcome to join us. Sponsored by the Buddhist Peace Fellowship 655-6169. www.bpf.org 

Overeaters Anonymous meets every Friday at 1:30 p.m. at the Northbrae Church at Solano and The Alameda. Parking is free and is handicapped accessible. For information call Katherine, 525-5231. 

Berkeley Critical Mass Bike Ride meets at the Berkeley BART the second Friday of every month at 5:30 p.m. 

Berkeley Chess Club meets Fridays at 7:15 p.m. at the Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant Ave. Players at all levels are welcome. 652-5324. 

SATURDAY, JAN. 10 

Free Emergency Preparedness Class on Shelter Operations for anyone who lives or works in Berkeley, from 9 a.m. to noon at the Fire Department Training Center, 997 Cedar St. Register on-line at www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/fire/oes or by calling 981-5506. 

“T’ween and Teen Adolescent Girls: Where Do They They Fit In?” Workshop sponsored by Bay Area Children First, from 1 to 3 p.m. at 1400 Shattuck Ave., Suite 7. Fee is $25. For information call 883-9312. 

Cerrito Creek Work Party Help remove blackberries and plant trees on Cerrito Creek north of Albany Hill. Meet at 10 a.m. at the Pacific East Mall, 3288 Pierce St., El Cerrito. For more information, email f5creeks@aol.com 

Broom or Brush? Help us remove invasive species to encourage native plants to flourish. Learn to identify common plants in our study area. Parents of Garden Club kids particularly invited to participate. Call to reserve tools and gloves. From 2 to 4 p.m. in Tilden Nature Area, in Tilden Park. For information call 525-2233. tnarea@ebparks.org  

Kids Garden Club: Plant Protection It’s getting cold out there and the plants need our help. We'll learn about plant defenses, and revitalize our scarecrow. Registration required. From 2 to 4 p.m. in Tilden Nature Area, in Tilden Park. Cost is $3. For information call 525-2233. tnarea@ebparks.org 

Winter Pruning and Maintenance A class on the critical January tasks of tree and shrub pruning. At 10 a.m. at Magic Gardens, 729 Heinz Ave. 644-2351. 

Overeaters Anonymous will host a Newcomers Information Day from 1 to 3 p.m. at St. John’s Presbyterian Church, 2727 College Ave. For more information call 923-9491. 

Shamanic Journeying Meditation using earth’s power centers, plant and mineral energies, Native American medicines, and concepts and principles from different meditation traditions around the globe, at 9 a.m. Free. For information and directions call 525-1272. 

Yoga for Seniors at the Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant St., on Saturdays from 10 to 11 a.m. The class is taught by Rosie Linsky, who at age 72, has practiced yoga for over 40 years. Open to non-members of the club for $8 per class. For further information and to register, call Karen Ray at 848-7800. 

Pet Adoptions, sponsored by Home at Last, from noon to 5 p.m., Hearst and 4th St. 548-9223. 

Car Wash Benefit for Options Recovery Services of Berkeley, held every Sat. from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Lutheran Church, 1744 University Ave. 666-9552. 

SUNDAY, JAN. 11 

Instant Run-Off Voting Instant Runoff Voting will be on the March 2004 primary election ballot in Berkeley. Come and learn more about what IRV is and the history of the struggle to modernize our elections. From 5 to 6:30 p.m. at Niebyl-Proctor Library, 6501 Telegraph Ave. at 65th in North Oakland. 841-8678.  

Tibetan Buddhism, Bob Byrne on “The Final Words of Longchenpa” at 6 p.m. at the Tibetan Nyingma Institute, 1815 Highland Pl. 843-6812. www.nyingmainstitute.com 

MONDAY, JAN. 12 

“Neighborhood Issues? Don’t Get Mad, Get Help!” with Taj Johns, Neighborhood Liason, City of Berkeley at 3 p.m. at the Berkeley Gray Panthers, 1403 Addison St. 548-9696. 

Berkeley CopWatch organizational meeting at 8 p.m. at 2022 Blake St. Join us to work on current issues around police misconduct. Volunteers needed. For information call 548-0425. 

Women’s Cancer Resource Center, volunteer training, every second Monday of the month, from 6 to 8 p.m. at 5741 Telegraph Ave. To sign up call Emily at 601-4040, ext. 109. emily@wcrc.org 

TUESDAY, JAN. 13 

Death Penalty Vigil, from 4:30 to 6 p.m. at the North Berkeley BART station. Sponsored by Berkeley Friends Meeting. 528-7784. 

East Bay Improv Comedy classes begin at the Albany Community Center, 1249 Marin Ave. For information call 964-0571. 

Writers’ Workshop Jack Foley, author, poet, and KPFA radio host will discuss oral presentation of your written work, at 7:30 p.m. at Barnes and Noble, 2352 Shattuck Ave. 644-3635. 

St. John’s Prime Timers meets at 9:30 a.m. at St. John’s Presbyterian Church, 2727 College Ave. Blood pressure checks at 10:30 a.m., and lecture on plants with Dr. Robert Raabi, botanist, at 11 a.m. We offer ongoing classes in exercise and creative arts, and always welcome new members over 50. 845-6830. 

Tuesday Tilden Walkers We are a few slowpoke seniors who walk between a mile or two each Tuesday, meeting at 9:30 a.m. in the Little Farm parking lot. To join us, call 215-7672 for information or check our web page, http://home.comcast.net/~teachme99/tildenwalkers 

Berkeley Camera Club meets at 7:30 p.m., at the Northbrae Community Church, 941 The Alameda. Share your slides and prints and learn what other photographers are doing. Monthly field trips. 234-4783. www.berkeleycameraclub.org 

WEDNESDAY, JAN. 14 

Community Forum on Police Canine Unit at 7 p.m. at the South Berkeley Senior Center. The Berkeley Police Review Commission is planning a series of Community Meetings to provide information and a forum to discuss the proposed Berkeley Police Department (BPD) canine program. Additional forums will be held Jan. 28 at 7 p.m. at the North Berkeley Senior Center and Feb. 11 at the West Berkeley Senior Center. 

“Yesterday, Today & Tomorrow- The Evolution of the Jewish Community” with Ted Feldman, Executive Director, JFCs. Bring your own lunch; coffee and tea provided. From noon to 2 p.m. at the Berkeley Richmond Jewish Community Center, 1414 Walnut St. Cost is $5. 848-0237, ext. 112. 

Writers’ Room Coach Training is offered from 7 to 9:30 p.m. for volunteers who would like to help students improve their writing and critical thinking skills. To attend please call Terry Bloomburgh at 849-4134 or email Bloomburgh@sbcglobal.net 

Fun with Acting class meets at 11 a.m. at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Free, all are welcome. 985-0373. 

Berkeley Peace Walk and Vigil at the Berkeley BART Sta- 

tion, corner of Shattuck and Center. Vigil at 6:30 p.m. followed by Peace Walk at 7 p.m. www.geocities.com/vigil4peace/vigil 

Free Marketing Workshops, sponsored by Sisters Headquarters, for women entrepreneurs, every Wed. from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. at 643 17th St. Oakland. For information call 238-1100. 

Prose Writers Workshop We're a serious but lively bunch whose focus is on issues of craft. Novices welcome. Experienced facilitator. Community sponsored, no fee. Meets 7 to 9 p.m. at the Jewish Community Center, 1414 Walnut, at Rose. For information call 524-3034. 

Berkeley CopWatch open office hours 7 to 9 p.m. Drop in to file complaints, assistance available. For information call 548-0425. 

Community Dances, traditional English and American dances, 8 p.m. every Wednesday, $9. 7 p.m. first Sunday, $10. Grace North Church, 2138 Cedar St. 233-5065. www.bacds.org 

Free Feldenkrais ATM Classes for adults 55 and older at 10:30 and 11:45 a.m. at the Jewish Community Center, 1414 Walnut at Rose. For information call 848-0237.  

THURSDAY, JAN. 15 

“So How’d You Become an Activist?” with Daniel Ellsberg and Sherry Glasser at 7 p.m. at Berkeley Fellowship of Unitarian Universalists, 1924 Cedar St., at Bonita. Suggested donation $5. For more information call 528-5403. 

LeConte Neighborhood Association meeting at 7:30 p.m. at LeConte School, 2241 Russell. Agenda includes the city budget, traffic circles, and new mixed use developments. For more information call 843-2602. 

East Bay Jewish Folk Chorus, led by Achi ben Shalom, meets on Thursdays from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Berkeley Richmond Jewish Community Center, 1414 Walnut St. Audition required. Cost is $120. For more information or to arrange an audition, email shalom@adamamusic.net or call 528-8872. 

Desert Hiking in All Seasons at 7 p.m. at REI, 1338 San Pablo Ave. 527-4140. 

Berkeley Liberation Radio 104.1 FM holds public meetings for all interested people first and third Thursdays, 7 p.m. at the Long Haul Info Shop, 3124 Shattuck Ave. 595-0190.  

ONGOING 

Freedom From Tobacco A free quit-smoking class offered by the City of Berkeley Tobacco Prevention Program on six Thursday evenings from 6 to 8 p.m., Jan. 22 to Feb. 26, at the Central Berkeley Public Library, 2090 Kittredge St. To enroll please call 981-5330 or e-mail at quitnow@ci.berkeley.ca.us.  You will receive a confirmation of your registration.   

Albany Berkeley Girls Softball League offers an exciting opportunity for East Bay girls in grades 1-8 to learn softball, make friends and have fun! Registration starts in January; the season runs March 6 through June 5. For information call 869-4277. www.abgsl.org 

Vista Community College Classes in Computer Software begins Jan. 15. Enrollment is open through Jan. 24. Register on-line at www.peralta.cc.ca.us or at 2020 Milvia St., or call 981-2863. 

Creating Economic Opportunities for Women offers training programs for immigrant and refugee women. Orientations held during January, at 655 International Blvd., 2nd flr. Call 879-2949. 

Acting and Storytelling Classes for Seniors, offered by Stagebridge. Wednesdays and Fridays, at 10 a.m. and 1 p.m. at Arts First Oakland, 2501 Harrison St., close to BART and AC Transit. 444-4755. www.stagebridge.org 

Tae-Bo, a cardiovascular workout composed of kick punches and stretches will be offered at Frances Albrier Recreation Center, 2800 Park St., on Tuesdays & Thursdays, 6:30-7:30 p.m. , beginning Jan. 13.  Cost is $20 per month or $4 drop-in. Call 981-6640 for information. 

Free Smoke Detectors for City residents and UC Berkeley students who live off-campus. Applications are available from the Environment, Health & Safety office of UC Berkeley, at any Berkeley Fire Station, or at the Fire Admin. Office located at 2100 MLK, Jr. Way. 981-5585.  

Free Energy Bill Payment Assistance The City of Berkeley has money to help low-income households pay their gas and electric bills. For applications contact the Energy Office at 644-8544. TDD: 981-6903. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/energy 

CITY MEETINGS 

Landmarks Preservation Commission Special Meeting Fri. Jan. 9, 8:30 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Gisele Sorensen, 981-7419. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/landmarks 

Council Agenda Committee meets Mon., Jan. 12, at 2:30 p.m., at 2180 Milvia St., Sherry M. Kelly, city clerk, 981-6900. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/citycouncil/agenda-committee 

Landmarks Preservation Commission meets Mon. Jan. 12, 7:30 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Gisele Sorensen, 981-7419. www.ci.berkeley.ca. 

us/commissions/landmarks 

Peace and Justice Commission meets Mon., Jan. 12, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Manuel Hector, 981-5510. www.ci.berkeley.ca. 

us/commissions/peaceandjustice 

City Council meets Tues., Jan. 13, at 7 p.m., in City Council Chambers, Sherry M. Kelly, city clerk, 981-6900. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/citycouncil 

Commission on Disability meets Wed., Jan. 14, at 6:30 p.m. at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Paul Church, 981-6342. www.ci.berkeley. 

ca.us/commissions/disability 

Homeless Commission meets Wed., Jan. 14, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Jane Micallef, 981-5426. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/homeless 

Library Board of Trustees meets Wed., Jan. 14, at 7 p.m. at 2090 Kittredge. Jackie Y. Griffin, 981-6195. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/library 

Planning Commission meets Wed., Jan. 14, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Ruth Grimes, 981-7481. www.ci.berkeley. ca.us/commissions/planning 

Waterfront Commission meets Wed., Jan. 14, at 7 p.m., at 201 University Ave. Cliff Marchetti, 644-6376 ext. 224. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/waterfront 

Berkeley Rent Stabilization Board meets Thurs. Jan. 15,  

at 7 p.m., in City Council Chambers, Pam Wyche, 644-6128 ext. 113. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/rent 

Design Review Committee meets Thurs. Jan. 15, at 7:30 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Anne Burns, 981-7415. www.ci.berkeley. 

ca.us/commissions/designreview  

Fair Campaign Practices Commission meets Thurs., Jan. 15, at 7:30 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Prasanna Rasaih, 981-6950. www.ci. 

berkeley.ca.us/commissions/faircampaign 

Housing Advisory Commission meets Thurs., Jan. 15 at 7:30 p.m., at the South Berkeley Senior Center. Oscar Sung, 981-5400. www.ci.berkeley.ca. 

us/commissions/housing 

Transportation Commission meets Thurs., Jan. 15, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Peter Hillier, 981-7000. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/transportation 

Two-by-Two Meeting of elected City and School officials to dicuss common concerns, Thurs., Jan. 15, at 8:30 a.m., in the Redwood Room, 6th floor, 2180 Milvia St. 644-6147, 981-7000.

City Councilmember Gordon Wozniak’s op-ed piece “Rush to IRV Ballot Raises Troubling Questions” (Daily Planet, Dec. 26-29) is full of factual errors and misleading statements. It also ignores one of the strongest arguments for Instant Runoff Voting: IRV offers voters a stronger voice. Under our current system, many people are afraid to vote for their first choice in candidates when that candidate is not one of the frontrunners. They are afraid their vote will be “thrown away,” or that their alternative candidate will be a “spoiler.” So, voters hold their noses and vote for the lesser of two evils. When that candidate wins, s/he claims “I must implement the platform I ran on.” But, with traditional single vote elections, it is unclear how many voters actually agree with the platform. 

Under IRV, voters can express their desires by voting for their first choice. No fear of throwing away one’s vote. If no candidate receives a majority after the first round of counting, the bottom candidate’s votes are transferred over to the second choice of those voters. In the end, we might end up with the same winner as if the voters held their noses without IRV, but each voter’s voice is heard by all candidates. 

We might also find that a minor candidate ends up winning because, given the opportunity to express their true desires without fear of being a spoiler, a majority of voters vote third party. Neither the Democratic nor Republican Parties support IRV. It weakens both parties’ strength by allowing people to vote for third parties without fear of throwing away their vote. If, for example, 30 percent of the Republicans cast their first preference for a Libertarian, and 30 percent of the Democrats for a Green, that will send a clear message to each party that “their” voters are not satisfied with their candidates and platforms. This strengthens the voters’ voices. 

Mr. Wozniak gives an example that people would have had to rank 130 candidates during the recent governor’s recall election. Under most IRV procedures, this is not true. Anyone who voted for one of the eventual top two candidates (Schwarzenegger and Bustamante) would have had their vote counted no matter what. The public knew who these front runners were, and most voters might have only picked a couple of minor candidates before they would end up ranking one of the major candidates. Most voters know who they truly like, and who they will hold their nose and vote for. With IRV they get to express both. 

The commentary by Wozniak expressed concern about the “complexity” of IRV. We live in a world of “top tens.” From movie reviews to sports to David Letterman, we are surrounded by ranking of preferences. To state that the “complexity” of IRV will make people loose their vote is to accuse the public of ignorance. People know how to rank their preferences. In the case Mr. Wozniak cites of the London election where only 78 percent of the ballots were counted in the second round, perhaps 22 percent of the voters didn’t want to vote for either of the top two candidates. That, just like staying home and not voting, is their right. Every election there are people who do not vote the entire ballot, but instead vote for the races/ initiatives they think are important and skip others. 

Mr. Wozniak tries to scare us with fear of additional cost of an IRV election. But the “Financial Implications” statement prepared by the city attorney predicts a savings of up to $300,000. The wording of the Charter Amendment clearly states that IRV will only be initiated if a) “the voting equipment and procedures are technically ready to handle [IRV],” b) “[IRV] will not preclude the city from consolidating its municipal elections with the county” and c) “[IRV] will not result in additional city election costs.” 

The article states that there are currently no voting machines that can handle IRV. This is not true. The machines Alameda County uses can handle IRV. Yes, software would have to be installed to handle it, but such software has been written and could be certified by the registrar of voters and the secretary of state. There would be no need to purchase new machines. 

Mr. Wozniak is concerned that the Charter Amendment does not set in stone what type of IRV will be used, but leaves that up to City Council to enact. But this is how Charter Amendments, Constitutional Amendments, and other “enabling legislation” is historically worded. City charters set the framework for decision makers to carry out the will of the people. If a Charter Amendment is too explicit, it cannot be changed (without another vote of the people) when unforeseen consequences require a change. With changing voting machines and “working out the bugs” of any new system, it is important to have some flexibility in the system of vote transfers. 

It is clear that this Charter Amendment is designed to be a first step towards Instant Runoff Voting in Berkeley. After it passes, there will likely be a period of time to convince the state and county that election code and voting machines need to include IRV. But IRV gives voters a better chance to express their desires than plurality or majority elections with runoffs, and can save the city money in the process. Berkeley will be proud to join cities like San Francisco that have passed IRV. As more cities pass IRV, the state and county will be forced to adapt election machines and regulations to include IRV.  

Lee Trampleasure Amosslee, is a Green Party county councilor, Berkeley High teacher, and has worked in the polls in Alameda County for 15 years.

When early music scholar and performer Eileen Hadidian was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1994, the longtime East Bay resident used the music she loved most to help herself through difficult times.  

“When I (was scheduled to go) into surgery, I had a very, very cool surgeon,” Hadidian recalled. “I asked him if I could bring music into the operating room. He asked, ‘Do you want to bring a Walkman or do you want me to bring a boombox?’ I said, ‘Bring a boombox and then the whole operating room crew will get the benefit!’  

“I brought in medieval chants. It was the last thing I heard as I was going under and the first thing I heard when I was coming out. And we know from studies that people who are unconscious hear everything that goes on around them.  

“My doctor was so blown away by this (music) that when he came out to talk to my husband he said, ‘Wow, that music was great … and oh, by the way, she’s doing OK.’  

“That was my first encounter with using music in a healing capacity.” 

Two years later, her own cancer in remission, Hadidian provided musical relief for a close friend who was dying from breast cancer. Every Sunday afternoon she would relieve the home hospice workers for two hours and without words, play for her good friend as she lay dying.  

“I watched (my friend) go from a place of agitation and discomfort to a place of calm. Her breathing stabilized. She closed her eyes and went into a very deep rest. After the two hours were over I thought, ‘This is powerful.’ 

“What’s so wonderful about it is that it’s not about the performance. I was just a vessel for the music to come through and it felt so right to be an instrument and not an ego driven musician up on a pedestal. It’s such a different way of playing music.  

“I continued to play for her until she passed away and every time, even after she went into a coma, she would respond the same way,” said Hadidian. 

That experience lead her to create a program that gave the gift of music to other cancer patients. Playing in local hospitals and working with Kaiser’s hospice department, Hadidian continued to perform solo until her own cancer returned in 1997.  

“When I had breast cancer the first time, it was a stage-one cancer,” Hadidian said. “I was in the ninetieth percentile chance of living my life disease-free. When it came back three years later and it had jumped from a stage-one to a stage-four, there was this real questioning of why. What I realized after a number of months of really having descended into the underworld, (was) I had to let go of the illusion of control and trust the universe. I also felt very strongly that having reasons for living, having passions for life were a very big part of the mind-body connection.  

“When the cancer metastasized and I didn’t know whether I was going to live or die, I couldn’t do the hospice work anymore, I needed to reinforce my own life force. So when things turned around and I got better again I began to explore ways that I could bring music to a larger constituency. That’s when I teamed up with Celtic harpist Natalie Cox, who herself is a long-term cancer survivor and was interested in doing this work. We developed a repertoire that we (brought) to Kaiser-Oakland. That was in 2000. In 2002 we became incorporated as a non-profit corporation (Healing Muses).” 

Healing Muses derives a modest income to support its hospital and hospice programs from seasonal concerts at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church in Albany, through sales of Healing Muses CDs, and small payments from the hospitals.  

Currently they offer weekly performances at Kaiser Permanente in Oakland and UCSF/Mount Zion Comprehensive Cancer Center in San Francisco, with occasional appearances at Alta Bates, Summit Medical Center in the East Bay and Laguna Honda Hospital in San Francisco. 

The next Healing Muses performances are entitled “Mirth and Good Cheer—Medieval, Renaissance and Celtic Music for Midwinter and the Changing of the Seasons,” features Susan Rode Morris, soprano; Eileen Hadidian, recorder, flutes; Shira Kammen, violin, vielle; Maureen Brennan, Celtic harp; and Julie Jeffrey, viola da gamba. They will take place at 8 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 10 and at 4 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 11 at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church, 1501 Washington Ave., Albany. Tickets are $15-$18 and all proceeds benefit the hospital music program. Advance reservations are recommended. St. Alban’s is wheelchair accessible. Call 524-5661for reservations or visit www.healingmuses.org.

FRIDAY, JAN. 9  

CHILDREN 

Caldicott Stories at 10:30 a.m. at Barnes and Noble. 644-3635. 

EXHIBITION OPENINGS 

“Go Figure,” figurative art by Deann Acton, James Gayles, Jean Graham, Heather Robinson, and Elizabeth Romero. Reception with the artists from 6 to 8 p.m. at the Women’s Cancer Resource Center Gallery, 5471 Telegraph Ave. 601-4040, ext. 111. www.wcrc.org 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Youth Speaks “Flip Fridays” Under 21 open mic hosted by Youth Radio at 7 p.m. at Youth Radio Cafe, 1801 University Ave. erin@youthradio.org 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Berkeley High’s Dance Production at 8 p.m. at the Florence Schwimley Little Theater, Allston and MLK. Tickets are $5 for students, $10 for adults, available at the door. Come early, shows sell out! 644-6120. 

Slammin, an all-body band, at 8 p.m., at La Peña Cultural Center. Cost is $13 in advance, $15 at the door. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

Triple Play, jaz trio, at 7:30 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

Yennayer Berber New Year Celebration with Les Numides at 8 p.m. at The Jazz House. Sliding scale donation $10-$15. 649-8744. www.thejazzhouse.com 

The Vowel Movement, a beatbox showcase hosted by Andrew Chaikin and Tim Barsky, at 8:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $10 in advance, $12 at the door. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Real Sippin’ Whiskeys, Todd Novak of the Cowlicks at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $5. 841-2082. www.starryploughpub.com 

Brian Melvin at 8:30 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810. 

CartoonJazz, Jeff Sanford’s 13-piece band plays the music of Raymond Scott, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $15.50 in advance, $16.50 at the door. 548-1761. www.freight- 

andsalvage.org 

Mood Food at 9 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Sterling Dervish performs acoustic rock & roll at 9:30 p.m. at Beckett’s Irish Pub, 2271 Shattuck Ave. 647-1790. www.beckettsirishpub.com 

SATURDAY, JAN. 10 

CHILDREN  

Los Amiguitos de La Peña Music Together at 10:30 a.m. at La Peña. Cost is $4 for adults, $3 for children. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

FILM 

“Delicatessen,” a film about futuristic France, at 8 p.m. at the Long Haul, 3124 Shattuck Ave. Donation of $3-$5 reques- 

ted, no one turned away. Wheelchair accessible. 540-0751. www.thelonghaul.org 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Juried Annual 2003-04 Artists’ Talks at Pro Arts Hear the artists speak about their work, view slides and participate in open discussion at 1 p.m. at 461 Ninth St. Oakland. 763-4361.  

www.proartsgallery.org 

Great Night of Soul Poetry, Dale and Dan Zola’s celebration of the spoken word, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $16.50 in advance, $17.50 at the door. 548-1761.  

www.freightandsalvage.org 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Berkeley High’s Dance Production at 8 p.m. at the Florence Schwimley Little Theater, Allston and MLK. Tickets are $5 for students, $10 for adults, availabel at the door. Come early, shows sell out! 644-6120. 

“Music for the Epiphany: Seeking Light in a Time of Darkness” Renaissance, Baroque and later music to celebrate the feasts from Advent through Candelaria performed by Coro Hispano de San Francisco and Conjunto Nuevo Mundo at 8 p.m. at St. Joseph the Worker Church, 1640 Addison St. Tickets are $15-$20 available from 415-431-4234. www.corohispano.org 

Healing Muses presents ”Mirth and Good Cheer - Medieval, Renaissance and Celtic Music for Midwinter and the Changing of the Seasons,” at 8 p.m. at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church, 1501 Washington Ave., Albany. Cost is $15-$18. All proceeds benefit the hospital music program. Advance reservations recommended. Wheelchair accessible. 524-5661. www.healingmuses.org 

Trinity Chamber Concerts presents “Fiddlers Three,” a program of 17th music for three violins and continuo at 8 p.m. at Trinity Chapel, 2320 Dana, at Durant. Suggested donation $20. 

Ladytown with Val Esway at the 1923 Teahouse at 8 p.m. Suggested donation of $7-$15. 644-2204. www.epicarts.org 

Peter Zak, pianist, at 8 p.m. at the Jazzschool. Cost is $10-$12. 845-5373. www.jazzschool.com  

The Aux Cajunals at 9:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cajun dance lesson with Patti Whitehurst at 8:30 p.m. Cost is $13. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Triple Play, jazz trio, at 7:30 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

Montuno Groove at 9:30 p.m. at La Peña. Cost is $10. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

Nino Moschella and Linn Brown at 8 p.m. at The Jazz House. Sliding scale donation $8-$15. 649-8744.  

www.thejazzhouse.com 

Mushroom, Jan Norberg at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $5. 841-2082. www.starryploughpub.com 

The Pit of Fashion Orchestra, conducted by Peter Barshay, at 8:30 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810. 

Sharp Knife, Chased and Smashed, This is My Fist!, Holy Ghost Revival at 8 p.m. at 924 Gilman St., an all-ages, member-run, no alcohol, no drugs, no violence club. Cost is $5. 525-9926. 

Matt Berkeley Group performs jazz and funk at 9 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Nicole McRory at 9:30 p.m. at Beckett’s Irish Pub, 2271 Shattuck Ave. 647-1790. www.beckettsirishpub.com 

SUNDAY, JAN. 11 

EXIBITION OPENINGS 

Berkeley Art Center Annual Member’s Showcase, reception at 2 p.m. Exhibition runs to Feb. 14, Wed.-Sun., noon to 5 p.m. 644-6893. 

FILM 

“La Passante” at 2 p.m. at the Berkeley Richmond Jewish Community Center, 1414 Walnut St. Donation $2. 848-0237.  

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Poetry Flash with Kay Ryan and Elena Karina Byrne at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. Donation $2. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com 

Max Byrd reads from his new novel “Shooting the Sun” at 7:30 p.m. at Black Oak Books. 486-0698. www.blackoakbooks.com 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Organ Recital by Paul M. Ellison, performing works of Tomkins, Zipoli, Pärt, Brahms, and Bach, at 6:10 p.m. at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church, 2300 Bancroft Way at Ellsworth. Donation. 845-0888. 

Chamber Music Sundaes San Francisco Symphony musicians and friends perform Mozart, Grieg and Andriasov at 3:15 p.m. at St John’s Presbyterian Church, 2727 College Ave. Tickets are $7-$18, available at the door. 415-584-5946. 

Healing Muses presents ”Mirth and Good Cheer - Medieval, Renaissance and Celtic Music for Midwinter and the Changing of the Seasons,” at 4 p.m. at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church, 1501 Washington Ave., Albany. Cost is $15-$18. All proceeds benefit the hospital music program. Advance reservations recommended. Wheelchair accessible. 524-5661. www.healingmuses.org 

Here and Now, Contemporary Music for the Harpsichord at 5 p.m. at Music Sources, 1000 The Alameda. Tickets are $15-$18. 528-1685. www.sfems.org/musicsources  

Ta Ke Ti Na Workshop with Zorina Wolf from 3 to 6 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $35. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Biodiesel and Bluegrass A Musical Benefit for Grassroots Sustainable Energy, at 1 p.m. at Humanist Hall, 390 27th St., between Broadway and Telegraph, Oakland. Donation of $5-$15, children under 10 free. Childcare provided. Sponsored by Berkeley Biodiesel Collective. 658-2899. www.berkeleybiodiesel.org 

Marcos Silva Quartet, Brazilian music at 4:30 p.m. at the Jazzschool. Cost is $12-$18. 845-5373. www.jazzschool.com  

John McCutcheon, Appalachian folk roots, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $19.50 in advance, $20.50 at the door. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Deaf Electric Series continues at 7 p.m. at The Jazz House. Sliding scale donation $8-$15. 649-8744. www.thejazzhouse.com 

MONDAY, JAN. 12 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Jane Anne Staw discusses “Unstuck: A Supportive and Practical Guide to Working Through Writer’s Block” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com 

Poetry Express, featuring Jan Steckel, from 7 to 9:30 p.m., at Priya Restaurant, 2072 San Pablo Ave. berkeleypoetryexpress@yahoo.com 

Mikel Dunham, photographer and thankgha painter, will show slides from his new book “Samye: A Pilgrimage to the Birthplace of Tibetan Buddhism” at 7:30 p.m. at Black Oak Books. 486-0698. www.blackoakbooks.com 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Earplay Reveals the Unheard, with three classical works based on poetry at 8 p.m. at Yerba Buena Center, 701 Mission St., SF. Tickets are $12-$18 and are available from 415-978-2787. 

TUESDAY, JAN. 13 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Anthony Swofford conveys the horrors of war in “Jarhead: A Marine’s Chronicle of the Gulf War and Other Battles” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com 

Donna Rosenthal will discuss “The Israelis: Ordinary People in an Extraordinary Land” at 7:30 p.m. at Easy Going Bookstore, 1385 Shattuck Ave. 843-3533. 

Peter Hart exposes “The Oh Really? Factor: Unspinning Fox News Channel’s Bill O’Reilly,” co-written with Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting, at 7:30 p.m. at Black Oak Books. 486-0698. www.blackoakbooks.com 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Kairos Youth Choir Open House at 4:30 p.m., 2401 LeConte at Scenic. The choir is enrolling boys and girls ages 7-15 for the spring musical “The Impossible Dream.” Auditions held throughout January. 849-8271 or info@kairoschoir.org 

Mimi Fox, solo guitar, at 8 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810. 

Edessa and The Toids at 9 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Balkan dance lesson with Nancy Klein at 8:00 p.m. Cost is $9. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Dayna Stephens House Jam at 8 p.m. at The Jazz House. Donation $5. 649-8744.  

www.thejazzhouse.com 

Jazzschool Tuesdays, a showcase of ensembles at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

WEDNESDAY, JAN. 14 

CHILDREN 

Preschool Storytime, a program introducing books and music to promote early literacy skills, at 7 p.m. at Berkeley Public Library West Branch, 1125 University Ave. 981-6270. 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

John Dyckman and Joseph Cutler discuss “Scapegoats at Work: Taking the Bull’s-Eye Off Your Back” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com 

David L. Kirp, professor of Public Policy at UC Berkeley introduces “Shakespeare, Einstein, and the Bottom Line: The Marketing of Higher Education” at 7:30 p.m. at Black Oak Books. 486-0698. www.blackoakbooks.com 

The Whole Note Poetry Series, with Albert Wolmer and Sparrow 13, and open mic, at 7 p.m. at The Beanery, 2925 College Ave., near Ashby. 549-9093. 

Berkeley Poetry Slam with host Charles Ellik at 8:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $7, $5 with student i.d. 841-2082. www.starryploughpub.com 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Orchestre Révoluntionnaire et Romantique & The Monteverdi Choir, conducted by John Elliot Gardiner, at 8 p.m., Zellerbach Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $36-$72, available from 642-9988. www.calperfs.berkeley.edu 

Billy Dunn and Bluesway at 9 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Swing dance lesson with Nick and Shanna at 8:00 p.m. Cost is $9. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Phillips, Grier & Flinner, bluegrass, new grass, jazzgrass, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $15.50 in advance, $16.50 at the door. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Ragas and Talas, classical Indian music open jam at 8 p.m. at The Jazz House. $5 donation. 649-8744. www.thejazzhouse.com 

Nicole and The Soul Sisters at 9:30 p.m. at Beckett’s Irish Pub, 2271 Shattuck Ave. 647-1790. www.beckettsirishpub.com 

The Shots play acoustic old time, bluegrass and cajun at 9 p.m. at at Albatross, 1822 San Pablo Ave. 843-2473. www.albatrosspub.com 

Jules Broussard, Bing Nathan and Ned Boynton at 8 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810. 

Taarka, an instrumental acoustic group, at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

THURSDAY, JAN. 15 

THEATER 

Shotgun Players, “The Death of Meyerhold,” through Jan. 23 at the Julia Morgan Center for the Arts. Thurs.-Sat. performances at 8 p.m. and Sun. at 7 p.m. Tickets are $12-$18, available from 925-798-1300. 704-8210.  

www.shotgunplayers.org 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Robert Scheer, Christopher Scheer and Lakshmi Chaudhry expose “The Five Biggest Lies Bush Told Us About Iraq,” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. www.codysbooks.com 

Dia North introduces “The Smart Spot” on the creative power of intuition at 7:30 p.m. at Barnes and Noble. 644-3635. 

Kevin Danaher, co-founder of Global Exchange, and Jason Mark discuss their new book, ”Insurrection: Citizen Challenges to Corporate Power” at 7:30 p.m. at Black Oak Books. 486-0698. www.blackoakbooks.com 

Word Beat Reading Series at 7 p.m. with Maggie Morley and LisaAnnLoBasso, followed by an open mic, at Mediterraneum Caffe, 2475 Telegraph Ave., near Dwight Way. 526-5985, 205-1749.  

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Benefit for Berkeley High Jazz Ensemble at 7:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $5-$15. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Robert W. Getz, improvisational piano, at 8 p.m. at The Jazz House. Cost is $8-$15 sliding scale. 649-8744.  

www.thejazzhouse.com 

Mark Growden at the 1923 Teahouse at 8 p.m. Suggested donation of $7-$15, no one turned away for lack of funds. 644-2204. www.epicarts.org 

Ian Moore at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $10. 841-2082. www.starryploughpub.com 

Rachel Garlin and friends perform contemporary folk at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $15.50 in advance, $16.50 at the door. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Estero at 9:30 p.m. at Beckett’s Irish Pub, 2271 Shattuck Ave. 647-1790. www.beckettsirishpub.com 

Mas Cabeza, salsa, funk, jazz at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Keni El Lebrijano, flamenco guitar, at 8 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810. 

It’s wet out there. It’s mud time, mushroom time, the Season of the Newt. 

In Tilden Regional Park (where the annual road closure is in effect), in Briones, in a hundred secret places across the spongy landscape, the brown-and-orange amphibians have gathered to mate. They may trek for considerable distances, from the standpoint of a six-inch salamander, to get to their traditional meeting sites. 

California newts appear to smell their way to their destination, following pheromone trails. They may also rely on some kind of poorly understood kinesthetic sense; laboratory subjects have been found to become disoriented after being whirled around in containers. 

Once they’ve reached their goal, male newts wait at the shoreline for females. A male that has found a partner may be joined by other hopefuls, forming what is known as a newt knot. Newts are not at all shy about the process; mating can take place in broad daylight, in front of God and everybody. 

You would think the preoccupied amphibians would be vulnerable to predators during this amatory frenzy. But they’re not, and they seem somehow to know that. They’re also not particularly secretive as they migrate. 

Our local California newts, and their close relatives the red-bellied and rough-skinned newts, are loaded with a potent poison called tarichotoxin, essentially the same as the tetrodotoxin—TTX for short—that makes puffer fish a lethal meal. Think of newts as ambulatory fugu. The substance is also similar to saxitoxin, present in the microorganisms that cause “red tides.” 

Whatever you call it, the newt’s secret weapon is the most poisonous nonprotein known to science. It’s a neurotoxin that kills by blocking sodium channels through which nerves activate muscles. With the chest muscles paralyzed, death by asphyxiation follows. Bits of newt skin have proven fatal to fish, frogs, reptiles, birds, and mammals. And we know that a single newt contains enough TTX to kill an adult male human. 

That fatality took place in 1979, when a 29-year-old college student in Coos Bay, Oregon got newt-swallowing drunk and ingested a rough-skinned newt on a dare. (I have spent time in Coos Bay, a dismal little lumber town, and can understand how the place might be conducive to extreme behavior). Within 10 minutes the victim’s lips began to tingle; numbness and weakness followed, then cardiopulmonary arrest. In another incident, a scientist who got newt toxin into a puncture wound on his index finger survived, but the affected arm went numb up to the shoulder for half an hour. 

Like many toxic creatures—insects, sea slugs, other amphibians like the tropical arrow-poison frogs, even one bird, the pitohui of New Guinea—western newts advertise their inedibility with bright colors. A perceived threat triggers what herpetologists call the “unken reflex”: The newt arches its body downward, throws its head back, and extends its tail over its back, showing off its orange or red undersurface. This seems to give would-be predators pause. 

Newts are also similar to other distasteful animals—the monarch butterfly, for instance—in serving as models for edible (if you don’t object on principle to eating salamanders) mimics. There’s another California salamander called the ensatina, which, depending on location, can be blotched or mottled with black and yellow or black and orange. Where its range overlaps with the California newt, though, the ensatina matches its brown back and orange belly, and even its yellow eye color. 

Monarch butterflies, of course, are protected by chemicals from the milkweed plants they fed on as caterpillars. Where does the newt’s defense come from? Good question. 

Other toxic amphibians do acquire their protection from their food. Along with wallabies, chameleons, and other exotics, arrow poison frogs native to Panama and Costa Rica have gone feral in Hawaii. The Central American populations contain a formidable brew of alkaloids; their descendants on Oahu, though, lacked most of those compounds, while some contained chemicals not found in the ancestral group. With insufficient time for radical evolutionary changes, the different diet of the Hawaiian frogs seems the most likely explanation. Recent research demonstrates that the frogs do acquire a toxic alkaloid from their insect prey, then modify it to make it 5 times more potent. 

So newts may also be appropriating the chemical defenses of the insects they eat. But other lines of research implicate bacteria in the toxicity of the fugu fish, whose poison, TTX, is similar to the newt’s. TTX-producing bacteria have been found in algae, which are eaten by fish, crabs, and other sea creatures; some, including the notorious blue-ringed octopus of Australia, concentrate enough of the substance to inflict lethal bites. Something similar may be going on in the freshwater food chains that culminate in the newts, although the specifics are unclear. 

No defense is perfect, though. A newt may be a fatal mouthful for most predators, but the common garter snake has evolved immunity to its toxin. (Some common garter snakes are more common than others: The endangered San Francisco garter snake, arguably North America’s most beautiful serpent, is a form of this species). Garter snakes and newts appear to be locked in a chemical arms race, ratcheting up to higher and higher levels of toxicity and resistance. 

Newts aren’t out to get people; they have entirely different things on their minds. They’re harmless enough if not taken internally. So admire them from a distance, and contemplate their role in the work of the late Frank Zappa (remember the recurring newt motif in 400 Motels?) And if you do happen to pick one up, wash your hands!

With the announcement Monday that Avenue Books would soon close its doors forever, a visitor to Elmwood’s only bookstore discovers an atmosphere that feels like a wake. 

On Wednesday afternoon, former employees and longtime customers shuffled to the back office to pay their respects to owner Brian Rood, while Bob Dylan’s “Percy’s Song” wailed on the stereo. 

“It’s like being at your own funeral,” Rood said.  

After 12 years of “just squeaking by,” the last two marked by sagging sales and mounting debts, Rood decided to call it quits this week, just three months after the store celebrated its twentieth anniversary and two months after another Berkeley independent book store, Shambhala, went out of business. 

But the last chapter of Avenue’s saga might not yet be written. Elmwood neighbors, famous for their efforts to preserve troubled independent shops, are considering ways to save the bookstore. 

To succeed, they will have to find a way to buck trends in the local book market where small independent sellers are being squeezed out of business by corporate giants like Amazon.com and the big chains. 

“The book business in the Bay Area has been terrible for the past two years,” said Andy Ross, owner of Cody’s Books. “There are just too many people selling too few books. We’re big enough that we can return our books instead of paying bills, but the smaller stores like Avenue don’t have much to fall back on.” 

The statistics aren’t pretty for Berkeley book merchants. Twelve-month figures ending in August show Berkeley sales of miscellaneous retail, mainly books, down 5.6 percent. 

Hut Landon of the Northern California Independent Booksellers Association said that nationally the market share for independent sellers plummeted from 33 percent in 1990 to 16 percent in 2002, though locally, independents have fared better.  

Northern California independent book sellers tallied 21 percent of the market in 2002, he said, and the number of local shops have held reasonably steady over the past decade. 

Still, in the past year, Barnes and Noble has installed megastores in Emeryville and El Cerrito, tightening its grip on Berkeley independent sellers already struggling with a slumping economy. 

“After 9/11 we had a month with no sales,” Rood said. “Then for a while we’d see people come in to buy the New York Times and wouldn’t see any of them again for the rest of the day.” 

Rood said booksellers used to think of themselves as “depression-proof,” but rapidly increasing book costs—caused in part by soaring paper prices—have pushed new hardcovers above $25 and paperbacks above $15, beyond the reach of many consumers’ budgets. 

None of this deters Elmwood residents Jerry Karabel and his wife Kristin Luker, who hope to keep the store afloat. 

The two UC Berkeley professors have discussed a bailout in which neighbors would pledge to buy books to help Rood escape his debts while a UC Berkeley Haas Business School professor would draft a new business plan to help the store turn a profit. 

Rood didn’t rule out neighborhood intervention, but remained skeptical that it could work.  

“If there was some kind of groundswell of economic support, it would be hard to turn it down. I don’t want to take someone else’s money unless I can assure future success,” he said. “And right now the future of independent booksellers is really bleak.” 

Elmwood neighbors and merchants have banded together in the past to save local shops. In 2001 when Ozzie’s Soda Fountain was set to close, Burl Willis helped find a new owner for the famous stand. Several years earlier, Willis and others organized merchants to purchase and restore the burnt out Elmwood Theater. 

Willis is out of town, but Karabel is hoping he will return to lead a campaign to save the shop before Rood closes his doors in two to three weeks. 

But John Moriarty, owner of Fourteen Karats, and head of the Elmwood Merchants Association, thought any effort to salvage the store was misguided. “What is the point of infusing money into a store if it can’t meet its bottom line?” he said. “If people want to rally together, they’d buy a fucking book.” 

Some people wonder if a book store that catered to a niche clientele might be more successful in Elmwood. Landon said specialties stores comprised the majority of new book shops in the Bay Area and Alexandra Pitcher of Black Oak Books said her shop would be in trouble without it niche markets. 

Rood’s landlord, Zoning Adjustment Board Chairman Laurie Capitelli—whose wife opened the store 20 years ago—said he was “very sorry” to hear of the store’s demise and would be open to any plans to keep Rood at the site. 

Rood, for now, is contemplating returning to his previous line of work—construction. The former carpenter and contractor entered the book business after his girlfriend grew tired of him complaining about the building trades. 

“I started working here Saturday evenings to see if I liked it,” he said. “It’s a shame. The book business suits me a lot better.”

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I would like to respond to concerns recently expressed in the Daily Planet regarding the city’s installation of curb ramps in city sidewalks. The City of Berkeley was the first community in the nation to install curb ramps to improve mobility for community members and visitors alike—a point of pride for elected officials, city staff, and community activists. 

A significant amount of General Fund revenue—$750,000—has been allocated every year to pay for improvements in city buildings, parks, and curb ramp projects. This dedication of funding is in excess of what is currently budgeted to maintain all 300 miles of sidewalks and pathways in the city. Over 83 percent of the areas identified for curb ramps have been completed since the program began.  

A typical accessible curb ramp currently costs $1,200 each—not the $11,533 figure quoted in several letters to the editor. A typical ramp installation involves removal and replacement of at least 84 square feet of concrete and a significant amount of handwork required to ensure the slope and grooves comply with Americans with Disabilities Act requirements. This includes the replacement of the concrete gutter and adjoining street asphalt and other features. When other storm drain and/or utility construction or relocation is required, the costs can be significantly higher. 

The City of Berkeley works diligently to improve access to all, maintain safety, and to provide services as efficiently as possible. Berkeley’s pioneering efforts continue to yield benefits but also serve as a benchmark for future improvements. Despite economic challenges ahead, the city will continue to improve accessibility while responsibly managing scarce resources. 

Rene Cardinaux, AIA 

Director of Public Works 

City of Berkeley 

While Berkeley public access television is now available to a world-wide audience, that doesn’t mean it’s ready for prime time. 

Starting Jan. 1, Channel 28 became one of the first community stations to stream its shows online—zapping Berkeley legends like Frank Moore and Stoney Blake into homes from Albania to Zaire. 

But all is not well for Berkeley Community Media.  

First, the station barely has enough bandwidth to satisfy a Berkeley frat house. 

“If more than say 25-30 people try to watch over the Internet at the same time, it won’t work,” said station Executive Director Brian Scott. 

The Internet conundrum is emblematic of problems that have plagued BCM since its inception in 1992, Scott said. 

Lofty goals have been squashed by tight wallets.  

Like most public access stations, BCM gets most of its $300,000 budget—about 85 percent—from money local cable monopoly Comcast pays to the city. But unlike most other cities, Berkeley shunts more than half of its Comcast money—four percent of all subscription revenues—into its general fund. 

BCM gets the remaining 40 percent, leaving the five-employee station understaffed and poorly equipped to get Berkeley constituencies on the air, Scott said. 

Even the station’s staunchest supporters acknowledge the station has failed to win the hearts of Berkeley residents. 

“It’s a chicken or the egg type problem,” said Berkeley-based performance artist George Coates, who had to buy the station a TelePrompTer to produce a new show for the station. 

“If they had money and could serve Berkeley communities properly, then people would fight for it,” he said. “People don’t watch Channel 28 because the station doesn’t have the funds to create a loyal fan base.” 

Streaming the shows online costs almost nothing, but purchasing more bandwidth so lots of people can watch programs would run into the tens of thousands. 

Scott said he went online so he could improve access and drum up more funding, but unfortunately for the star-crossed outlet, the video streaming launch came amidst a city budget crunch that threatens to eliminate community television altogether. 

Rumors have circulated that the city has considered pulling the plug on Channel 28, leaving Berkeley viewers with government Channel 33—home to City Council, Rent Board and Zoning Adjustment Board simulcasts—as the city’s sole public access station.  

Like other city-funded entities, BCM has been asked to come up with a 20 percent budget reduction as the city tries to dig itself out of a roughly $10 million hole. 

If implemented, the cuts would gut training programs for production novices and pare operating time from six to four days a week, Scott said. 

Lack of staffing has already turned off constituencies that could have used the station to promote their agendas, Coates said. “We don’t really have public access TV in Berkeley,” he said. “It’s a lie. We have the capacity in terms of hardware and connections, but there’s no production staff.  

“If people wanted to do a show for the disabled community there wouldn’t be anyone to work the camera, or operate the sound board or edit the tape,” he said. 

Berkeley Community Media’s best opportunity for some financial breathing room could come in 2007, when Berkeley’s contract with Comcast expires. The city has quarreled with the company over the years, most recently over a scheduled $200,000 payment due to BCM. 

After the city was late in billing Comcast for the fee mandated in their contract, Comcast insisted it didn’t have to make the payment until Berkeley threatened a lawsuit. Scott said he is still waiting for the money, which goes to the station’s capital account. 

He hopes a new deal could generate more money for the city and the station and also launch the station’s programing onto Comcast’s bandwidth, which could truly give the station a global reach. 

That would be pivotal for Coates’ new show, “Better Bad News,” a collaboration with the Berkeley Adult School in which students play news anchors or expert panelists reading off a TelePrompTer whatever viewers ask them to say.  

Coates says the show mocks broadcast news by allowing regular people to fill the mouths of talking heads instead of entrenched political interests. 

The TV news “puppet show satire” allows residents to e-mail statements the announcers will deliver on television. If the show can go live online with enough staff support, viewers can write their text and watch the announcers say it in real time. 

“You’d gain a thrill that doesn’t happen when it’s tape delayed,” he said.  

“If you’re writing at your laptop and see a talking head reading every word you just submitted, that would be a thrill.”

A 44-year old Berkeley peace activist detained and jailed in the Occupied West Bank for participating in a New Year Eve’s protest over the construction of Israel’s new “security fence” was freed on bail Thursday morning after nine days in a Ministry of the Interior detention center in Khadera, north of Tel Aviv. 

Kate Raphael, a member of the International Women’s Peace Service (IWPS), a group formed to monitor Human Rights abuses in the area, was arrested as she filmed a protest in the West Bank town of Budrus, an event attended by an estimated 400-500 Israeli, Palestinian and International peace activists. 

After paying the 7,000 shekel bail fine (about $1,700) and spending at least one more night in jail than originally expected, Raphael now faces a pending deportation order which would force her to leave the country by Jan. 17. 

Fellow activists in the region along with Raphael’s lawyer, Gaby Lasky, say Raphael will fight the deportation and hopes to stay until Feb. 8, her originally planned departure date. If she beats the deportation order, she said she also plans to travel to Iraq for several weeks. 

If deported, she’ll be barred from re-entering Israel for 10 years, and while on bail she can’t return to the West Bank. 

“I’m really gratified to not be in prison, but I’m still really concerned about what is going on in Budrus,” said Raphael over the phone from a cafe in Tel-Aviv on the night of her release. 

Raphael was arrested at one of a string of protests in Budrus, which lies along the 400 mile-long “fence” dubbed “the apartheid wall” by activists outraged that the barrier effectively annexes large chunks of Palestinian land. 

Erected from what Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon called security concerns, the wall juts far off the course of Palestine’s 1967 border, or Green Line, encompassing enclaves of Jewish West Bank settlements while leaving towns such as Budrus that lie near the settlements largely cut off from basic services and denied access to much of their farmland. 

Angie Zeltzer, a British IWPS member, said one of the organization’s key functions is to protect local Palestinians from violence by the surrounding Jewish settlers—whose population she says now equals that of the Palestinians. 

Raphael was arrested on the day Israeli police fired on protestors with rubber bullets and tear gas as the protestors tried to stop bulldozers from tearing out Palestinian olive groves along the proposed route of the wall. 

Arrested along with her were four Israelis and three other internationals, including Swedish parliamentarian Gustav Fridolin, who agreed to leave the country. According to Zeltzer, eight to 10 Palestinians were also injured by Israeli police. 

The Israeli activists have now been released and the other internationals have said they intend to fight deportation. 

Another American peace activist in the West Bank with IWPS is Dunya, who wouldn’t give her last name because she said she fears reprisal from the Israeli government. Dunya said Raphael’s hadn’t been able to communicate with her lawyer as often as she needed during her incarceration. IWPS members approached shared their concerns with the American Consulate, but Dunya said that although Counsular officials did visit Raphael, they often “only paid lip service” to her concerns. 

Dunya said the State Attorney’s office in Israel and the Ministry of the Interior have been purposely vague and uncooperative throughout. 

Raphael said she also saw gross human rights violations while in jail. She said when Israeli officials routinely mistreated other women prisoners, mostly immigrants from Eastern Europe found without passports who were domestic and sex workers trying to work off the cost of their ticket to Israel.  

A spokesperson for the Israeli Consulate in San Francisco refused to comment either on the detention or on the protest that took place outside their office Tuesday, attended by around 100 of Raphael’s supporters, including Women in Black and Queers Undermining Israeli Terrorism (QUIT). 

Critics of the detention and deportation of international peace observers say Israel’s actions constitute obvious signs of weakness within their position. 

“It’s of great concern that Israel doesn’t allow observers into Palestinian territory,” said Dunya. “I would hope that one would ask what they have to hide.” 

Barbara Lubin, long-time activist, director of the Middle Eastern Children’s Alliance here in Berkeley and a friend of Raphael’s agrees. “It’s really disgusting that Kate or anyone is thrown out because they trying to support the Palestinians who are suffering under this occupation,” she said. “I find it outrageous. But it’s still not as disgusting as their behavior towards the Palestinians.”

BERKELEY HIGH LIBRARY 

Editors, Daily Planet:  

Thank you for running the article highlighting our beautiful new Berkeley High School Library in the Berkeley Daily Planet (“Berkeley High Library Will Reopen in January,” Daily Planet, Dec. 26-29), and thank you Matthew Artz for writing it. After nearly 10 years of planning, building and equipping, our school is eager to make use of the new facility. We’d love to have Matt return to visit us once we are open and settled in with everything in place—perhaps later in January. There will be a public celebration of the library and the whole facility on March 13 to which you are also invited. 

A quick clarification for your records: Though we were very short on space in the interim library, all of our new books were housed there, only the older B Building books were stored in the portables offsite. 

Staff, parents and community members have put in a lot of their own time getting everything ready. Parents have spent long hours this first week helping to organize books in the library, unpacking stacks of boxes in the beautiful new College Counseling Center (located directly across from the library), while staff spent long hours here during the holiday break, and the enthusiasm has been electric. And we can’t forget the contractors and the workers who have also worked very hard to make this happen. Their pride in this beautiful building is evident. 

Our high school community is grateful to everyone for the commitment to make this new library possible and to you for your interest in notifying the public  

about our success. 

Susie Goodin 

BHS Library Move Coordinator 

• 

DEBUNKING MAIN STREET 

Editors, Daily Planet:  

Once again, community activists have been proven to be correct in their judgment of and opposition to the downtown boondoggle known as “Main Street USA.” Eddie Bauer’s pending closure underscores the volatile combination of corporate chains and overvalued commercial real estate. The value, in no small part, pumped up by the inflow of public funds to benefit a handful of downtown interests. 

When Berkeley’s other commercial corridors (San Pablo Avenue, University Avenue and Upper Solano Avenue) are examined, two common features emerge—the majority of businesses are, for the most part, locally owned enterprises and very few vacancies. University Avenue, given the number of Southeast Asian stores and restaurants (60 plus) is a regional shopping draw. San Pablo is where you go for a wide variety of goods and services. Upper Solano speaks for itself. It is likely that any one of the first two corridors contribute more to the city coffers than the downtown district yet they receive less than their share of funding in proportion. Perhaps benign neglect is the best policy when we see the results of the “house beautiful” attitude of the City Planning Department combined with the greed of local developers. 

Rather than propping up a moribund downtown plan that has a dismal record and brought with it harassment and criminalization of street musicians, vendors, and the homeless, the City of Berkeley should put its efforts into encouraging and assisting the development of locally owned endeavors. And, as far as the “Arts District” is concerned, two points need to be made. Who can afford the price of admission and why is Berkeley’s original “arts district”—West Berkeley—given such short shrift when millions in public funds have been used to create an artificial play district for a minority of well off folks? 

Stephen Dunifer 

• 

TREE HAZARD 

Editors, Daily Planet:  

The Berkeley Daily Planet recently ran my opinion piece in which I decried the inability of the City of Berkeley to remove an obvious tree hazard (“Berkeley Officialdom Ignores an Impending Danger,” Daily Planet, Jan. 2-5). On Jan. 6, Gerta Farber wrote a letter to the editor in which she was very generous with my money, suggesting that I should not have spent the $1,800 to repair the damage to my car and, instead, have redirected it to hiring a company to remove the tree. Thanks Gerta. Then, I not only would have a car that didn’t run, I would have an issue with the city about destroying one of their trees without permission. I hope you don’t go around removing trees that belong to someone else--you could get in big trouble. Actually, though, most of the money was paid by my insurance company, and I doubt Allstate was up to (or legally allowed to) spend the money on tree removal. And where did you, Gerta, get the idea that the city was “compassionate”? I guess you never had to fill out forms for three hours in the Planning Department to register a simple address change from one law office to another. And pay a bunch of money beside for the privilege of wasting those hours. 

The point is that we pay taxes, probably close to the highest taxes in the western world, for the city to provide services. The city acts with alacrity when something might fall down on the heads of the city bureacracy—witness the earthquake-proofing of government buildings. But they do nothing about hazards to residents and visitors. I would think that these taxes could pay for someone to make safe a city-owned tree, or sweep glass off of city-owned downtown sidewalks (instead of spending lots of money soul-searching about why Eddie Bauer and Huston’s went out of business). Yes I guess we all could do these things ourselves, but, then, why are we paying the city to do it? 

By the way, after the article ran, red cones have gone up on the block and it looks the city may now have been embarrassed enough to do something about the tree. The glass, meanwhile, still glitters on the sidewalk, and, on a sunny day, one might squint and pretend we have winter ice, just like cities in other parts of the country. 

Jeez. I’m beginning to sound like a Republican or something. 

Paul Glusman 

EDITOR’S NOTE: Since this letter was written, the tree has been removed. 

• 

XXXXXXXXXX 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Sharon Hudson may have been uncharacteristically unfair in her op-ed piece to blame Polly Armstrong for “watering down” the concern that the Zoning Department staff is seen by some to be overly favorable to building-permit applicants ( “City Report Fails to Cite Pro-Developer Staff,” Daily Planet, Dec. 19-22). Ms. Hudson complains that the final text, (“There is concern that the staff members appear to act as advocates for or against an application”) is just “spineless drivel.” 

As a member of the task force, I remember pointing out that in the almost 200 applicant-neighbor situations that I have mediated (as a volunteer with the Berkeley Dispute Resolution Service), a surprising number of applicants say that they are dismayed that the zoning staff has allowed the neighbors too much control over their desire to add on to their house. Of course the staff is not responsible; the right of neighbors to protest new construction is well-embedded in Berkeley’s Zoning Ordinance. 

Single-family residences, which are the main users of mediation, were discussed at a separate time from large-scale development. In retrospect we might have tried to cram too much into that one sentence. Maybe two separate sentences would have better clarified the two different attitudes. Public concern about large projects is much more intense than that about adding a bedroom to someone’s house. 

Ms. Hudson knows that the task force was careful to conclude and include only those items that were generally agreed on. There were no 7-to-6 vote decisions between good guys and bad guys. Ms. Armstrong, nor anyone else, could not have watered down anything without generalized support. 

Ms. Hudson knows this because she, along with other concerned citizens, were at all the meetings, and were de-facto “members” of the task force. Their spoken commentary was valuable and listened to. Her on-going written commentary was well thought out, and her two recent articles in the Daily Planet, pace the Armstrong comment, were a judicious reflection of the work of the task force.  

Victor Herbert  

• 

XXXXXXXXXX 

Editors, Daily Planet:  

If you don’t like America then move to Iraq. We will all be happy to see you idiots leave. 

Jim Hamel 

“I get ideas, I start things, but then I don’t know what to do with them. I’m not a good administrator. It’s a serious fault,” said Zoia Horn, looking down apologetically. 

I suggested that simply provoking action was useful, and that maybe I ought to title this sketch of her “A Provoking Woman.” 

She raised her eyes, and her face lit up. “Oh, yes, I like that!” 

Zoia is best known for provoking a lot of people in 1972, when she, a proper lady-librarian then in her fifties, refused to testify in the conspiracy trial of the Harrisburg Seven—Phillip Berrigan and other anti-Vietnam War priests and nuns. She spent 20 days in jail, at which point the jury deadlocked, the judge declared a mistrial, and the charges (one of which was plotting to kidnap Henry Kissinger!?) fell apart. But that was only her most dramatic act at the mid-point of a long life of provocation. 

Zoia was born in 1918 to a secular family of shopkeepers and small businessmen in Odessa, Ukraine. “I didn’t know I was a Jew until I was six, and a schoolmate told me I had ‘killed Christ.’” In 1926 her family emigrated to Canada, then to New York City. She was a good student, both in academic subjects and in music. After high school she attended Brooklyn College, and later the Pratt Institute Library School. 

While in high school and in college she was already developing her talent for provocation: boycotting silk stockings when Japan invaded China; marching with labor unions in May Day parades; protesting Franco’s takeover of Spain. 

In the 1940s and 1950s came her first library jobs, her marriage, her two daughters, and a spell of rural living.  

But in the 1960s her life, like the lives of so many people, changed radically. One catalyst for change was her winning a 1964, one-month Humanities Fellowship to the University of Oregon. That was the start of her growing activism in librarians’ organizations and conferences, where she met people who shared her passion for the educational mission of libraries—including the tall, soft-spoken Dean Galloway, Director of library services at Stanislaus State College in Turlock, California.  

In 1965 Zoia drove west, ended her marriage, and got a job at the UCLA library, where every day at noon she joined a silent vigil against the Vietnam War, “always wearing good shoes and gloves, the proper lady-librarian. I think that’s important, for people to see that protestors are ordinary folks very much like themselves.” 

In 1968 she headed east again, hired as Head of the Reference Department at Bucknell University in Lewisburg, PA. There she also worked with other peace activists. Three years later, she was back in California, where she and Dean were married, and Zoia began working at the Modesto Public Library.  

In 1972 she was summoned back to Lewisburg to testify in the “conspiracy” trial. When she asked herself whether she should protest by refusing to testify (both the defense and the judge had said her testimony would not affect the outcome), Dean assured her that he would support her decision, whatever it was. The American Library Association was more ambivalent than Dean. At first, they issued a statement of non-support for any refusal to cooperate with the government; later they issued a commendation for Zoia’s refusal. (Her lifelong participation in the ALA continued to be—we might say—provoking.) 

After the trial, she returned to the Modesto Library, where she started something she is still proud of. “I saw that we had many Spanish speaking patrons, so I polled the librarians, then got someone to come in at 8 a.m. and teach us Spanish. Before you knew it, I was getting calls from other city agencies, asking if they could send some of their people over to learn too!”  

But Zoia felt uncomfortable as an administrator in Modesto. “I don’t know if it was the trial publicity or just the times, when younger librarians were questioning all authority. Anyway, I quit.”  

Zoia would never land a job as a full-time librarian again. “There was the two-year, six-county Interlibrary Co-op Project funded by a Federal grant (1974-76), and much later a part-time job in the library at DVC (1977-92). But when we moved to the East Bay in 1977, I applied all over, had good interviews, everyone commending me for my ‘courageous’ stand at the trial. But I would never get the job.” 

The reasons are probably broader and more complicated than anything having to do with the 1972 trial. 

“What I’ve always tried to do is to redefine the definition of censorship, broaden it, because censorship means barriers that restrict access to knowledge. It includes pervasive prejudices like sexism and racism that distort judgment or simply screen out realities. It includes monopoly media cut out many facts and opinions. Censorship takes so many forms.”  

Zoia held to this conviction when she was elected to the ALA Council (1974), and appointed to the ALA Intellectual Freedom Committee (1977). There, and on various other committees, she found herself engaged in complicated bureaucratic conflicts, as when she protested 1977 changes that she felt weakened the wording of the (1939) ALA Library Bill of Rights. That same year she joined African-Americans in protesting an ALA-sponsored film made ostensibly to promote protection of free speech. This messy conflict nearly tore the ALA apart for a while. (You’ll find fascinating details on this and other struggles, in ZOIA! Memoirs of Zoia Horn, Battler for the People’s Right to Know, published by Mc Farland & Co., 1994). 

Also found in this memoir are references to Zoia’s 15-year labor of love, starting in 1977, when she volunteered at the Data Center in Oakland. “It’s a super-reference library, gathering data on vital issues. People come from all over to get information they can’t find anywhere else.”  

Zoia laughed. “The Federal Government even came to us once because they didn’t have a complete list of industries that had moved offshore. We had it!” 

At the Data Center she began the Right to Know Project, for which she edited four volumes of resources on specific issues. This led to her working with distinguished journalists at the Center for Investigative Reporting in San Francisco. From her list of organizations participating in the Right to Know Project she helped establish the American Library Association’s Coalition on Government Information, which has worked with many organizations to provide access to essential information. 

“All this was possible because of Dean’s support, which went beyond earning our living,” she said. “He’s a great advisor and editor.” 

Official awards and honors come in regularly now; the latest is the California Library Association’s newly established annual Zioa Horn Intellectual Freedom Award. “I have especially warm feelings toward this honor because the CLA has been very supportive of my efforts.” 

But at 85, Zoia refuses to become a quiet icon. She is still provoking people, protesting attempts to charge fees for library reference services, defending a gay librarian in Oakland attacked for creating a display of gay library materials, speaking at community meetings urging the Oakland Public Library and the Oakland City Council to adopt resolutions against the Patriot Act (they did). 

And you can be sure that she appears to make her protest with every hair in place, wearing a stylish but conservative outfit--every inch the lady-librarian.

A world-renowned Berkeley landscape architect has paired with a relatively unknown City of New York employee to win the competition to design the memorial for victims of the Sept. 11, 2001 attack on the World Trade Center. 

According to the New York Daily News, Peter Walker met Thursday in Berkeley with his collaborator Peter Arad and Ground Zero master planner Daniel Liebeskind to discuss changes to the winning Walker/Arad submission. 

As the principal of Peter Walker and Partners, Landscape Architecture, Inc., 739 Allston Way in West Berkeley, Walker has achieved worldwide fame for his designs, including the development of Millennium Park for the 2000 Olympics in Sydney, Australia. Walker headed the Department of Landscape Architecture at UC Berkeley from 1997 to 1999. 

His partner in the World Trade Center memorial is an assistant architect for New York City’s Housing Authority. 

According to published accounts, their design has triggered some controversy, resulting in Thursday’s meeting in Berkeley.

Heavy rains over the holiday break left a number of teachers and students at Malcolm X Arts and Academic magnet school without classrooms after water from the surrounding area came spilling into the annex building, forcing a major cleanup and renovation that will keep ground-floor rooms closed until the Tuesday after Martin Luther King Day.  

Rhonda Bacot, Director of Maintenance for the Berkeley Unified School District, said the water piled up after heavy rains hit the area Dec. 29. Neither Bacot nor the Berkeley Public Works department know the exact cause of the backup, but they’re guessing it came from neighborhood storm drains overwhelmed by the storm.  

Brush and leaves also gathered over the school’s drains, leaving the water no place to go but into the building. 

A security guard discovered the problem the middle of last week, and by Saturday the school had mobilized a cleanup that drew parent volunteers and administrators.  

A contractor is now stripping carpeting and wallboard from the damaged areas and an environmental consultant has also been called in to ensure air and structural safety. 

Bacot said there was no danger of contamination from sewage because the sewer and storm drains each have separate systems. A small amount of hydraulic fuel leaked from the school elevator but that was isolated and cleaned up immediately, he said. 

Thus far, the cleanup has cost $49,000. Once it’s finished, another contractor will replace and repair the damaged areas. 

Meantime, students and administrators have had to come up with creative space solutions to accommodate those displaced. 

“The teachers, parents and kids have been so good,” said Principal Cheryl Chinn. 

Dyanthe McDougal, a first grade teacher with 19 students in her class, has had to relocate to a smaller classroom, but she says everyone involved has been extremely helpful. 

“Everyone helped me move things from the old room and it was a really quick response,” she said. 

Rene Cardinaux from the Berkeley Public Works department said the office did not receive a service call about the flood until recently and therefore have not looked into it yet. 

The school’s north border runs along Ashby Avenue, where neighbors have repeatedly complained to the Daily Planet about poor drainage resulting in flooded basements. Cardinaux said reports have come in about poor drainage in the area but said it’s not considered one of the city’s problem spots. 

“I don’t think there is a design problem. Ashby, like University Avenue, runs downhill the whole way so it’s like a canal. If there is any obstruction [in the drains] there is overflow and flooding,” he said. 

This is not the first time the school has been flooded, according to Chinn, but it was the most severe. 

At least one parent, who declined to give her name, complained that her son was affected by the flood, saying that the smell left over from the water made her son nauseous and wheezy. She is also concerned with the school’s decision to reopen the cafeteria which was affected during the flood. 

“I like the school, but they cannot in good conscience let kids have lunch in a place that smells so bad,” she said. “I think it’s unsanitary and unsafe.”. 

Chinn and Bacot dispute her claim and say the area was only opened after a thorough cleaning and an inspection by the Berkeley Health Department.  

“If it was a health and safety problem, we would have never used [the cafeteria],” said Chinn.  

Bacot said the cafeteria, unlike the rest of the ground floor on the annex, reopened quickly because the floor and lowest portions of the walls are concrete and weren’t affected by the water. Unlike the annex, where wallboard is being removed to prevent mold, the cafeteria only needed to be emptied of water and cleaned. 

Bacot said the smell has also been mostly removed by using large fans that circulate air, helping to dry affected areas and prevent molding.

Immigrant communities and their news media were quick to respond to the implementation this week of a program that fingerprints and photographs most foreign visitors upon entry to the United States. 

Reaction came from both established U.S. communities as well as their home countries and ranged from cautious optimism to swift retaliation.  

The Department of Homeland Security unveiled the US-VISIT program at 115 airports and 14 seaports on Monday as part of the ongoing anti-terror campaign. Visitors from all but 28 mostly European countries, those that normally do not require tourist visas for a stay of more than 90 days, are subject to checks—totaling some 24 million travelers a year.  

Visitors from all countries traveling on work or student visas or for more than 90 days must abide by the new rules.  

The Washington-based National Council of Pakistani Americans (NCPA) cautiously welcomed the US-VISIT program saying it was a much better alternative than a predecessor program which required men from mostly Muslim nations to register with immigration officials and resulted in more than 13,000 slated for deportation, 2,800 detainees and 143 arrests. 

“The new fingerprint program is less discriminatory and does not just target Muslim visitors. It is clearly not anti-immigrant,” said NCPA president Faiz Rehman. He said with only $380 million allocated to the program this year, his group was more concerned about long delays at ports of entry.  

In a Jan. 5 editorial headlined “Security: At What Price?", Pilar Marrero, political editor with Spanish-language daily La Opinion, wrote that the new security measures may turn out to be a good idea and perhaps helpful in terms of preventing a new terrorist attack, but also comes with a heavy price. The fingerprinting measures are also in effect along the U.S.-Mexico border. 

She writes, “Yes, it is clear things are not the way they used to be and with time there will be more and more control over society. Good or bad, the issue is that this does not resolve the deeper problems and the real reasons for the conflict.” 

The new U.S. regulations drew a sharp outcry from overseas, however. 

Last week a federal judge in Brazil described the U.S. actions as xenophobic and ruled that Brazil would begin fingerprinting and photographing U.S. visitors, who are now experiencing delays at Brazilian airports as they are registered, according to Brazilian daily newspaper websites on Jan. 5.  

Brazil’s government is considering an appeal to overturn the ruling, citing fears that tourism revenue will be hurt—but that may prove hard to do. A legislator from the governing Workers’ Party told the Jornal do Brasil daily in Rio de Janeiro that the retaliatory measures should be upheld and also should be expanded to other nations in the South American economic bloc known as Mercosur, which is led by Brazil, and includes Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay.  

“If Brazilians are being registered in the United States, then Americans should receive the same treatment here,” Rep. Doutor Rosinha, who sits on a committee that oversees Mercosur relations, was quoted as saying. “All of Mercosur could adopt the same procedure, basing its decision on international law.” 

None of the Mercosur countries, or associate members Chile and Bolivia, are exempt from the U.S. fingerprinting program. 

The U.S. embassy in Seoul, Korea was forced to defend the program criticized heavily by Korean civic groups, according to the bilingual Korea Times.  

Korean activists were concerned over a possible violation of human rights as well as misuse of the biometric information collected and stored by U.S. federal officials. 

The U.S. Embassy official said in a statement that a country has a right to protects its citizens and preserve its sovereignty.  

Seoul’s Foreign Affairs-Trade Ministry officials said the country has no immediate plans for quid pro quo and subject U.S. citizens to a similar registration process as Brazil has done. 

“It’s difficult to apply outright reciprocity on U.S. citizens, in consideration of bilateral trade and tourism agreements as well as overall relations with the U.S. We’ll have to see how other countries deal with the matter,’’ a senior ministry official said. 

At San Francisco International airport, many Indian nationals who were subject to the regulations for the first time seemed not to be bothered by them at all. “Most said it added only an extra 15 to 20 seconds to the process,” said San Leandro-based India-West writer Rupal Shah. 

Kishore Kumar, a visitor who flew into San Francisco from Delhi told India-West upon his arrival, “It will help U.S. officials keep better track of possible terrorist threats and there isn’t much extra time needed at customs.” 

Ravi Tumber, a U.S. citizen who was receiving friends from Delhi was more skeptical about the program. “I think it’s a worthwhile program, but I don’t know how accurate it will be,” he said. “If someone really wants to harm this country and it’s citizens, they will find a way, no matter what country. If they can do it from one country, they can do it from any country.”  

Marcelo Ballve and Sandip Roy contributed to this report.

Among European foreign correspondents based in the United States there is an uproar. Returning from their homelands after their end-of-the-year vacations, for the first time in history many had the unsavory experience of being asked at the border to provide their fingerprints and their pictures.  

Most European countries are among the 28 nations whose citizens are theoretically exempted by the Homeland Security Department from having to comply with U.S.-VISIT, the just-introduced program of finger-scanning and photographing foreign nationals coming to the United States.  

When going through customs at John F. Kennedy airport in New York, Enrico Pedemonte, U.S. correspondent for L’Espresso, Italy’s leading newsweekly, was curtly asked to put his index finger onto an electronic scanner. Pedemonte then had to turn his head toward a hidden camera to have his mug shot taken.  

“I don’t have anything to hide and I don’t fear any particular retribution from this request. It was, however, very unsettling to have to be fingerprinted like a criminal after life-long honesty and compliance with the laws both in my home country and here in the U.S.,” Pedemonte says, when reached at his office in New York. “In addition, wasn’t this supposed to be the land of the free speech?”  

Pedemonte says he finds it “discriminatory” for the rest of the world that 28 countries are being excluded from the provision. And, he adds, finger-scanning journalists, even if only foreign correspondents, “may be the first step of an initiative directed at muting the freedom of press.”  

Pedemonte’s reaction isn’t unique or peculiar. Phones have been ringing off the hook at foreign media offices in the U.S. In the countries in which journalists are represented by trade associations, like in Italy, trade representatives are being asked to put pressure on the State Department to see that the fingerprinting program for foreign journalists is put to an end.  

However, the problem isn’t only with journalists coming from those 28 countries. Inquiries directed to the Department of Homeland Security and the State Department by some Italian correspondents in the U.S. revealed that other categories of citizens from other countries coming on a visa to the U.S. will be fingerprinted and photographed regardless of their country of origin. This means that scientific researchers, students, businesspeople, as well as journalists—basically anyone who has a visa—coming from those exempted countries will be asked to comply with the new tracking program.  

The visa-waiver program only applies to nationals from those countries who come to the United States for less than 90 days on work or as tourists.  

“This will affect the ability of the U.S. to keep its leading position in science, business and technology if foreign professionals coming to or dealing with the U.S. have to fear for their welfare,” says another European foreign correspondent living in the United States who did not wish to be identified.  

Many media professionals, some foreign journalists note, were fingerprinted in Italy and France during the fascist era. That practice led many to self-censor for fear of retaliation if they wrote anything critical of the regime. Some ended up in jail. Others, in a bid to save themselves, turned into the regime’s rubber-stampers, or worse, into spies for the fascists. Today, some journalists fear that the new finger-scanning and photographing could have a similar chilling effect.  

PNS correspondent Paolo Pontoniere is the U.S. correspondent for Focus, Italy’s leading monthly magazine.  

Planners Discuss UC Hotel 

The proposed downtown UC Berkeley hotel and convention center complex may give the city the opportunity to close the first block of Center Street to vehicle traffic and open a similar section of Strawberry Creek to the air.  

Both proposals were tossed out at a meeting this week by members of the Berkeley Planning Commission’s subcommittee on the project, who stressed that the city’s Center Street development proposals are proposals only, and still need several months of study before the subcommittee is ready to make recommendations. 

UC plans to buy the Bank of America branch at Shattuck Avenue and Center Street and replace it with a conference center, 200-room hotel, and bank. 

Kevin Hufferd, UC’s manager for the proposed project, announced at Tuesday afternoon’s meeting that the university is currently interviewing four development/architectural teams to manage the project, down from the original eight. Hufferd said that one of the teams will be selected by the end of January. 

At the same time, Mayor Tom Bates said he was continuing negotiations with UC Berkeley officials over whether or not the proposed complex is subject to the city zoning regulations. UC officials say it isn’t, while Berkeley officials insist that it is—with a major issue being how high the building will be able to rise. 

“Both sides want this project to succeed,” Bates said. “The city has the option of settling this in court, but that’s obviously not the way we want to proceed. We’re hoping we’ll be able to work something out.” 

Councilmember Dona Spring suggested that one compromise might be for the city to trade off a higher height limit for environmental concessions from the university, “including financial support for the opening of the creek.” 

—J. Douglas Allen-Taylor 

Gun Death Suit Delayed 

OAKLAND—A resolution to the long-running legal battle over responsibility for a shooting accident in which a 15-year-old Berkeley boy was killed will have to wait at least a few more months. 

Alameda County Superior Court Judge Henry Needham this week granted a continuance to Beretta USA, the maker of a 9mm semiautomatic handgun that Michael Soe, who was 14 at the time, used when he shot and killed Kenzo Dix on May 29, 1994. The two boys were good friends and neighbors on Tenth Street in Berkeley. 

When the case returns to court, it will be the third trial in the incident. The first resulted in a subsequently overturned verdict for the gun manufacturer and the second ended in December with a hung jury. 

—Bay City News 

Music Fundraiser Results 

Advocates for music instruction in the Berkeley schools will have to find a new way to get instruments back into the hands of fourth graders after their latest fundraiser fell far short of expectations. 

A holiday promotion with Rasputin Music netted roughly $2,750, a far cry from the $100,000 organizers hoped to raise to restore district funding cuts to the music program. 

“It’s disappointing,” said Bob Kridle of the district’s Music Committee. “I had totally miscalculated the possibilities.” 

During the holiday season, Rasputin bought all used merchandise collected by the schools and donated the buy-back price plus an extra 10 percent to the music program. 

In all, the store purchased roughly 6,000 CDs, tapes, records and DVDs at an average price just under 50 cents. 

The Rasputin promotion was the second major fundraiser for the music committee—a collaborative of parents and district employees—to plug a $100,000 funding gap from district budget cuts that ended instrument instruction for fourth graders and cut back music instruction for middle school students. A benefit concert held last May raised about $5,000, Kridle said. 

—Matthew Artz 

Toxic Fears Close Skatepark 

For the second consecutive winter, the city has closed its West Berkeley skatepark due to presumed contamination by the toxin made famous in the movie Erin Brockovich. 

City officials shut down the park indefinitely last month, Acting Director of Parks and Recreation Marc Seleznow said, after an inspection showed groundwater seeping through joints and cracks into the park’s concrete bowls.  

The park at Fifth and Harrison Streets was constructed above a plume of Chromium 6, a carcinogen traced to a color engraving company formerly located near the site. 

Previous instances of contaminated ground water infiltrations delayed construction of the park and doubled its price tag. 

Last winter, after heavy December rains, city toxic officials once again found Chromium 6 in the bowls of the park, forcing them to close it until June. 

Seleznow said the city so far hasn’t bothered to test the groundwater that seeped in this year, but is assuming it’s contaminated. 

He said this year the city has a treatment solution—a mix of Vitamin C and water—to decontaminate the bowls, but won’t bother applying it until winter rains subside for at least several days. 

—Matthew Artz 

New Chancellor Search 

The search to find a new Chancellor for UC Berkeley begins in earnest later this month. 

UC President Robert Dynes named a 17-member committee of regents, faculty, staff, students and alumni Monday to advise him on choosing a successor to outgoing Chancellor Robert Berdahl, who in September announced his intention to step down as chancellor this summer.  

The committee will be involved in recruiting, screening and interviewing potential candidates. They will meet in closed session Jan. 28. 

Dynes hopes to recommend a candidate to board of Regents by April. 

Memorial Stadium Upgrade 

UC Berkeley Chancellor Robert Berdahl gave his blessing Wednesday to a plan to retrofit Memorial Stadium and transform it into a “unique academic-athletic partnership.” 

The $140 million plan—to be funded entirely with private donations—would retrofit the 81-year-old stadium built above the Hayward Fault and provide new workout space, locker rooms, and sports medicine services for football and other UC Berkeley sports teams. New classrooms, laboratories and office spaces could also be added to the stadium. 

Work can’t begin until the university receives pledges to cover 40 percent of the costs, roughly $60 million. UC Berkeley Athletic Department spokesperson Bob Rose said a pledge drive was already underway. 

The project is on the high end of past proposals to renovate the stadium and reflects the improving fortunes of the university’s football team—which under second-year coach Jeff Tedford won its first bowl game in 10 years last season. 

Rumors have linked Tedford to several high-profile coaching jobs and a stadium upgrade is seen as vital to keep the highly sought-after coach at Cal. 

In making his announcement, Berdahl acknowledged his promise to the coach about improving the university’s facilities. He said, “With a football program that clearly has momentum, a stadium that sorely needs a facelift and demand for more academic space, there is no better time than now to move forward on this worthwhile project.” He added that in the coming months he plans to meet with potential donors about the project.

Meat Cleaver Attack 

A Berkeley man awoke early Wednesday morning to find his neighbor attacking him with a meat cleaver. 

The unprovoked assault began at 1:33 a.m. as the victim slept at his house on the 2700 block of Matthews Street, said police spokesperson Kevin Schofield. 

The alleged attacker, Aaron Jordan, 23, of Berkeley broke the victim’s window, climbed inside and began hacking away with the cleaver. The victim “fought (back) violently,” Schofield said, among other things inflicting a bit on his assailant’s arm. 

The fight moved to the victim’s porch, where the victim managed to wrest the cleaver from Jordan’s grip just as the first officer arrived in response to several 911 calls from neighbors. Jordan then began fighting the officer, resisting until the arrival of backup ended the fracas. 

Both Jordan and the victim were taken to Highland Hospital. The victim was treated for wounds to the head and released. 

Schofield didn’t have a medical update on Jordan, who was arrested for attempted murder and burglary. 

Jordan’s family said he had a history of mental illness, Schofield said. 

Botched Burglary 

A couple called police when they heard a crash in their living room Monday evening, and when officers arrived about a minute later, they nabbed a man trying to escape. After a brief scuffle, police arrested Daniel Keihn, 20, for burglary, resisting arrest, possession of methamphetamines and possession of a deadly weapon. 

Police to Distribute Free Gun Locks 

Berkeley Police will provide 1100 free safety kits to Berkeley residents through a partnership with Project ChildSafe, a national firearm safety education program. The kits include a gun lock that fit on most types of handguns, rifles and shotguns, along with a safety booklet. They’re available—with no questions asked—as long as supplies last at the Public Safety Building, 2100 Martin Luther King Jr. Way.

Bay Area hospitals have issued an urgent call for blood donors after regional supplies fell so low that a San Francisco hospital was forced to delay open heart surgery Tuesday. 

Though an emergency drive brought levels up to a half-day’s reserve, area hospitals are still faced with a critical shortage, according to Oakland Red Cross representative Sara O’Brien, who said a two-day reserve is considered a minimum in the event of a natural or manmade disaster. 

Especially needed are donations of types O positive, O negative, B positive, and A negative.  

Donors may contact Blood Centers of the Pacific (888-393-GIVE, www.bloodcenters.org) or the American Red Cross (800-GIVE-LIFE, www.beadonor.com).

Randolph Ward came to the Greater Mandana Action Coalition meeting the other night and patted his own back as the guy who’s had the courage and the cojones to make the “tough choices” to reform the Oakland Unified School District, adding more than a minor implication that Oakland school stewards in the recent past have not displayed such leadership. Wrong on both counts, Mr. Ward. But we’ll get back to that point in a bit. 

Watching him work the GMAC crowd, one can easily see why Dr. Ward was picked by State Superintendent Jack O’Connell to be the overseer of the Oakland schools. He’s had a lot of practice at it, after all, this job of running schools without having to answer to local control, and after some seven years of it down in Compton, he knows pretty much what to say, and what to leave out. Dr. Ward approaches his public performances as part Tony Robbins-type motivational faith healer (“We can do it!”) and part stump politician (“I can do it!”), and the performance is so mesmerizing that one is almost tempted to refrain from spoiling the overall effect by digging into the details of exactly what “it” it is to which the good doctor refers. Still, having paid for our tickets and been promised a magic show in which a woman is sawed in half, it does not seem out of the way to politely request if there is still any intent to put her back together again. 

As always, a history lesson is in order, even if it is only recent history. 

The State of California seized control of the Oakland public schools last year, we are told, after the state floated us a $100 million line of credit because we were running out of money. Why we were running out of money, how much money we were running out of, and whether or not we actually needed a $100 million line of credit from the state are still open questions, and subject to debate. Embedded in the law authorizing the school takeover, however, the state legislature did make two things pretty clear: 1) “While in need of a loan from the State of California, there have not been any accusations of intentional mismanagement or fraud in the Oakland Unified School District.” 2) “Despite its financial condition, the Oakland Unified School District has made demonstrable academic improvements over the last few years, witnessed by test score improvements, more fully credentialed teachers in Oakland classrooms, and increased parental and community involvement.” 

And, so, since we were told, many times, that the takeover had nothing to do with academic achievement or school conditions, but only came about because of the loan, Oaklanders had every right to believe that we would regain control of our schools somewhere around the time the money was paid back, or well on its way thereto. 

Last June, when he introduced us to the man who would be running our schools, State Superintendent O’Connell announced that “I’ve asked him [Ward] to put himself out of business as quickly as possible.” On that same day, Dr. Ward indicated that he was in complete agreement. “The idea here is to work myself out of a job,” he told a reporter from the San Francisco Chronicle. “It’s to put in the checks and balances, both fiscally and academically, but we’re not interested in keeping control. We understand there are very capable and caring people who can do that, and the idea is to give the district back to them as soon as possible.” Fair enough. 

So one would think, in his presentation to the folks at GMAC, Dr. Ward might talk about how soon that soon might be, and what plans he had to bring it about. If he did, I missed that part. In fact, Dr. Ward doesn’t seem all that interested in balancing Oakland’s school budget. As soon as he took office, Dr. Ward rejected a plan put together by former Superintendent Dennis Chaconas and the School Board to balance the school district’s budget. (For those who don’t follow economics that much, if you have to take a loan because you’re spending more than you’re taking in, and if you continue to spend more than you’re taking in, then eventually going to run through the loan money, too, and you’re going to be worse off, than ever before.) We now learn through the Tribune that Dr. Ward is purposely going to operate the Oakland Unified School District at least $20 million in the red this year, which is an interesting action by someone who was hired to correct inadvertent overspending. Asked by the Oakland Tribune why he did not think following Chaconas’ and the school board’s plan for a balanced budget was all that important, Dr. Ward said “They cut too far.” 

That opinion (not balancing the school budget) was shared by a representative of the Fiscal Crisis Management Assistance Team (FCMAT), who said, well, “Last year, the focus in this district was ‘Let’s not get a state loan.’” As if that were a bad thing, both avoiding a state loan, and balancing a budget. 

FCMAT, one might remember, was brought into Oakland because our budget was out of balance. So why was overspending so godawful when Oakland was running its own schools, but not nearly so important now that the state has seized control? 

Anyhow, back to the tough choices thing. Dennis Chaconas and the members of the Oakland School Board recognized their mistake (an unbalanced budget) and corrected it (offering a balanced budget), with the state on its back, with no support from Mayor Brown, facing a hostile teachers union, and having to answer (by law) to the citizens of Oakland. Randolph Ward, with only the state superintendent to report to, overspends without demonstrable consequences.  

So who did the tougher job? You be the judge.

Though a week has passed since corporate executives announced the upcoming closing of the downtown Berkeley Eddie Bauer store, the reasons for the move still aren’t clear—at least to the public. 

One thing is certain: The high-end clothing retailer’s corporate parent is mired in financial difficulties. 

And whatever the reasons, the Shattuck and Allston Way storefront will soon be vacant, joining the ranks of other empty storefronts along one of Berkeley’s main commercial arteries. 

While a downtown merchant representative is confident that will be filled, the city economic development head says there’s no guarantee of with what, and a local real estate broker is equally unsure as to when. 

Shortly following the end of the holiday buying season, the national office of Eddie Bauer retail clothiers announced the closing of 29 stores as part its reorganization effort following the filing of Chapter 11 bankruptcy by its parent company, Chicago-based Spiegel Group. All of the targeted stores, including the Berkeley location, are not expected to remain open past mid-March. 

Bauer has only been in operation for five years at its downtown location, which was owned for many years by the Havens Trust. The store’s opening caused considerable controversy at that time, particularly from groups and agencies such as the Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association and the city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission, because it was preceded by the near-demolition of the 1890-era building, which for many years housed the popular Edy’s Restaurant. 

Lisa Erickson, a national spokesperson for Eddie Bauer Stores, said the closure is “part of the company strategy to reshape our portfolio and to place stores in the right locations.” 

Although she said that the majority of Bauer stores were located in malls and that the average square footage of the targeted stores were somewhat larger than the average Bauer store (at approximately 7,000 square feet, the Berkeley store is slightly larger than average), Erickson refused to speculate as to whether these factors contributed to the decisions to close the particular stores. “As far as why that store was closed and not another, I don’t have that information,” she said. 

While Executive Director Deborah Badhia of the Downtown Business Association (DBA) said that her organization was “very sorry to lose Eddie Bauer as a retailer,” she doesn’t foresee a lot of trouble finding a suitable replacement. 

Shattuck and Allston Way is “a prime retail corner,” she explained. “The City of Berkeley has between 10,000 and 15,000 people in the downtown area each day, and UC Berkeley has a daytime population of 45,000 in close proximity to the area. The Berkeley BART station [a block away] releases 10,000 people a day. It’s the second busiest in the East Bay. And the bus drops off 7,000 people a day within a block of that corner. I can’t imagine there won’t be somebody locating there.” 

Thomas Meyers, Berkeley’s Acting Manager of Economic Development, said that while both his office and the merchants association would be working with the property owner to find a “suitable replacement,” it would be entirely up to the owners as to what they might find suitable.  

“From what I’m hearing from both the community and from the business association, Berkeley is in need of more clothing store outlets, and we would like to see if we could work with the property owner to try and get another clothing store in there,” Myers said. 

“But that part of downtown Berkeley is zoned for general retail, and so the owners not limited in that respect. The property owners are going to evaluate the best option for them, which in all cases is not necessarily the best option for the city or for the commercial district. We think it will be easier to do a transition from Eddie Bauer to some other clothing store because of the improvements already made in the building [when the Bauer store was originally opened]. But the property owner has a mortgage payment to make. They’ve got to make enough money. So it’s a tricky balance.” 

John Gordon, owner and broker of Berkeley’s Gordon Commercial Real Estate Services which represented the property owners when the Bauer store came in five years ago, called downtown Berkeley “a strong market,” but that may not translate into a quick turnaround for a new tenant. 

“I think the revitalization of downtown Berkeley is what attracted Eddie Bauer to downtown in the first place,” Gordon said. “And if you look at where downtown is now versus where it was seven years ago when we started on that transaction, its so much better off.” He added however, that he didn’t “know how long it will take. You just have to find the right tenant and the right mix for this location. There are potential tenants looking at downtown. But these things take time.”  

Gordon says that while he has had conversations with the property owner, he does not yet know if he will have a hand in bringing in the new tenant. 

Gordon did have good news for another empty downtown retail location, saying that a new retail outlet will soon be announced for the recently-vacated Huston’s Shoe Store on Shattuck Avenue and Kittredge Street. Gordon said that a lease has already been signed for the property.

TUESDAY, JAN. 6 

American Red Cross Blood Services volunteer orientation from 9:30 to 11 a.m. at 6230 Claremeont Ave., Oakland. Volunteers are needed to support the more than 40 blood drives held each month. Advance sign-up required, 594-5165. 

Dick Penniman’s Avalanche Safety Lecture from 6 to 9 p.m. at REI, 1338 San Pablo Ave. Fee is $20. 527-4140. For information on additional avalanche safety courses see snowbridge.org 

St. John’s Prime Timers meets at 9:30 a.m. at St. John’s Presbyterian Church, 2727 College Ave. We offer ongoing classes in exercise and creative arts, and always welcome new members over 50. 845-6830. 

WEDNESDAY, JAN. 7 

Junior Skywatchers Club We’ll take a closer look at the earth’s moon through binoculars, and make moon calendars for the New Year. From 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. at Tilden Nature Area, in Tilden Park. 525-2233. tnarea@ebparks.org  

Meetup for Howard Dean at 7 p.m. at three Berkeley locations: Au Coquelet, 2000 University Avenue; Raleigh's (Generation Dean youth meeting), 2438 Telegraph Avenue; Sweet Basil Thai Restaurant, 1736 Solano Avenue. Free. Wheelchair accessible. 843-8724. 

Bicycle Friendly Berkeley Coalition Volunteer Night Come help fold newsletters, enter prospective members names into our database, from 6 to 8 p.m. at 1336C Channing. 549-7433. vc@bfbc2.org 

Walk with the Berkeley Path Wanderers Meet at Live Oak Park, Walnut and Berryman, at 10 a.m. 981-5367. 

Prose Writers Workshop We're a serious but lively bunch whose focus is on issues of craft. Meets 7 to 9 p.m. at the Jewish Community Center, 1414 Walnut, at Rose. For information call 524-3034. 

Berkeley Peace Walk and Vigil at the Berkeley BART Sta- 

tion, corner of Shattuck and Center. Vigil at 6:30 p.m. followed by Peace Walk at 7 p.m. www.geocities.com/vigil4peace/vigil 

Amnesty International Berkeley Community Group meets the first and third Wednesdays of the month at 7 p.m. at the Berkeley Unitarian Universalist Fellowship, 1606 Bonita Ave., at Cedar St. Join fellow human rights activists to help promote social justice one individual at a time. 872-0768. 

Berkeley CopWatch open office hours 7 to 9 p.m. Drop in to file complaints, assistance available. For information call 548-0425. 

Berkeley Communicators Toastmasters meets the first and third Wednesdays of the month at 7:15 a.m. at Hide-A-Way Café, 6430 Telegraph Ave. For information call Fred Garvey, 925-682-1111, ext. 164. 

Free Feldenkrais ATM Classes for adults 55 and older at 10:30 and 11:45 a.m. at the Jewish Community Center, 1414 Walnut at Rose. For information call 848-0237. 

THURSDAY, JAN. 8 

The Ecocity Sessions with Richard Register A six- week course meets Tues. evenings introducing ecocity theory. Cost is $150. For information call Kirsten Miller at 419-0850. kleighmi@flash.net 

“Senior Services and the Philosophy of Geriatrics” with Ellen Bloomfield, Emeryville Senior Center, Aisha Boykin, Albany Center, and Lisa Ploss, City of Berkeley, from noon to 2 p.m. at the Albany Public Library, Edith Stone Room,1247 Marin Ave. Sponsored by the League of Women Voters. 843-8824. 

Snowshoeing Workshop for Women at 7 p.m. at REI, 1338 San Pablo Ave. 527-4140. 

East Bay Mac User Group meets on the second Thursday of the month from 6 to 9 p.m. in the 3rd floor Community Room, Berkeley Central Library, 2090 Kittredge St. http://ebmug.org 

FRIDAY, JAN. 9 

Celebrate the Dream commemorating the 75th Birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., with Martin Luther King III, son of the legendary civil rights leader, Allen Temple Men’s Choir, the Greater St. Paul Missionary Baptist Church’s mass choir, and Dorothy Morrison signing “Oh Happy Day,” from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. in Frank Ogawa Plaza in front of Oakland City Hall. www.oaklandnet.com/celebrations 

Shorinji Kempo Martial Arts Demonstration at 8 p.m. at Emeryville Taiko Dojo, 1601-A 63rd. St., Emeryville. 815-0607. www.emeryvilleshorinji.org 

City Commons Club Noon Luncheon with Peter Dumont, co-founder, Star Alliance, on “Comprehensive Approach to Peace.” Luncheon at 11:45 a.m. for $11.50 - $12.50, speech at 12:30 p.m., at the Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant St. For information and reservations call 526-2925 or 665-9020. 

Literary Friends meets at the North Berkeley Senior Center at 1:15 p.m. to discuss Vermeer’s art and tmes, and review “girl in Hyacinth Blue” and Girl with a Pearl Earring.” 232-1351. 

Women in Black Vigil, from noon to 1 p.m. at UC Berkeley, Bancroft at Telegraph. wibberkeley@yahoo.com, 548-6310, 845-1143. 

Meditation, Peace Vigil and Dialogue, gather at noon on the grass close to the West Entrance to UC Berkeley, on Oxford St. near University Ave. People of all traditions are welcome to join us. Sponsored by the Buddhist Peace Fellowship 655-6169. www.bpf.org 

Overeaters Anonymous meets every Friday at 1:30 p.m. at the Northbrae Church at Solano and The Alameda. Parking is free and is handicapped accessible. For information call Katherine, 525-5231. 

Berkeley Critical Mass Bike Ride meets at the Berkeley BART the second Friday of every month at 5:30 p.m. 

Berkeley Chess Club meets Fridays at 7:15 p.m. at the Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant Ave. Players at all levels are welcome. 652-5324. 

SATURDAY, JAN. 10 

“T’ween and Teen Adolescent Girls: Where Do They They Fit In?” Workshop sponsored by Bay Area Children First, from 1 to 3 p.m. at 1400 Shattuck Ave., Suite 7. Fee is $25. For information call 883-9312. 

Cerrito Creek Work Party Help remove blackberries and plant trees on Cerrito Creek north of Albany Hill. Meet at 10 a.m. at the Pacific East Mall, 3288 Pierce St., El Cerrito. For more information, email f5creeks@aol.com 

Broom or Brush? Help us remove invasive species to encourage native plants to flourish. Learn to identify common plants in our study area. Parents of Garden Club kids particularly invited to participate. Call to reserve tools and gloves. From 2 to 4 p.m. in Tilden Nature Area, in Tilden Park. For information call 525-2233. tnarea@ebparks.org  

Kids Garden Club: Plant Protection It’s getting cold out there and the plants need our help. We'll learn about plant defenses, and revitalize our scarecrow. Registration required. From 2 to 4 p.m. in Tilden Nature Area, in Tilden Park. Cost is $3. For information call 525-2233. tnarea@ebparks.org 

Winter Pruning and Maintenance A class on the critical January tasks of tree and shrub pruning. At 10 a.m. at Magic Gardens, 729 Heinz Ave. 644-2351. 

Overeaters Anonymous will host a Newcomers Information Day from 1 to 3 p.m. at St. John’s Presbyterian Church, 2727 College Ave. For more information call 923-9491. 

Shamanic Journeying Meditation using earth’s power centers, plant and mineral energies, Native American medicines, and concepts and principles from different meditation traditions around the globe, at 9 a.m. Free. For information and directions call 525-1272. 

Yoga for Seniors at the Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant St., on Saturdays from 10 to 11 a.m. The class is taught by Rosie Linsky, who at age 72, has practiced yoga for over 40 years. Open to non-members of the club for $8 per class. For further information and to register, call Karen Ray at 848-7800. 

Pet Adoptions, sponsored by Home at Last, from noon to 5 p.m., Hearst and 4th St. 548-9223. 

Car Wash Benefit for Options Recovery Services of Berkeley, held every Sat. from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Lutheran Church, 1744 University Ave. 666-9552. 

SUNDAY, JAN. 11 

Tibetan Buddhism, Bob Byrne on “The Final Words of Longchenpa” at 6 p.m. at the Tibetan Nyingma Institute, 1815 Highland Pl. 843-6812. www.nyingmainstitute.com 

MONDAY, JAN. 12 

Berkeley CopWatch organizational meeting at 8 p.m. at 2022 Blake St. Join us to work on current issues around police misconduct. Volunteers needed. For information call 548-0425. 

Women’s Cancer Resource Center, volunteer training, every second Monday of the month, from 6 to 8 p.m. at 5741 Telegraph Ave. To sign up call Emily at 601-4040, ext. 109. emily@wcrc.org 

ONGOING 

Albany Berkeley Girls Softball League offers an exciting opportunity for East Bay girls in grades 1-8 to learn softball, make friends and have fun! Registration starts in January; the season runs March 6 through June 5. For information call 869-4277. www.abgsl.org 

Vista Community College Classes in Computer Software begins Jan. 15. Enrollment is open through Jan. 24. Register on-line at www.peralta.cc.ca.us or at 2020 Milvia St., or call 981-2863. 

Creating Economic Opportunities for Women offers trrining programs for immigrant and refugee women. Orientations held during January, at 655 International Blvd., 2nd flr. Call 879-2949. 

Acting and Storytelling Classes for Seniors, offered by Stagebridge. Wednesdays and Fridays, at 10 a.m. and 1 p.m. at Arts First Oakland, 2501 Harrison St., close to BART and AC Transit. 444-4755. www.stagebridge.org 

Free Smoke Detectors for City residents and UC Berkeley students who live off-campus. Applications are available from the Environment, Health & Safety office of UC Berkeley, at any Berkeley Fire Station, or at the Fire Admin. Office located at 2100 MLK, Jr. Way. 981-5585.  

Free Energy Bill Payment Assistance The City of Berkeley has money to help low-income households pay their gas and electric bills. For applications contact the Energy Office at 644-8544. TDD: 981-6903. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/energy 

CITY MEETINGS 

Berkeley Rent Stabilization Board meets Mon., Jan. 5, at 7 p.m., in City Council Chambers, Pam Wyche 644-6128 ext. 113. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/rent 

Solid Waste Management Commission Special Meeting, Wed. Jan. 7, at 7 p.m., at 1201 Second St. Becky Dowdakin, 981-6357. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/solidwaste 

Commission on the Status of Women meets Wed., Jan. 7, at 7:30 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Ruby Primus, 981-5106. www.ci.berkeley.ca. 

us/commissions/women 

Community Environmental Advisory Commission meets Thurs., Jan. 8, at 7 p.m., at 2118 Milvia St. Nabil Al-Hadithy, 981-7461. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/environmentaladvisory 

Public Works Commission meets Thurs., Jan. 8, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Jeff Egeberg, 981-6406. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/publicworks 

Peace and Justice Commission meets Mon., Jan. 12, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Manuel Hector, 981-5510. www.ci.berkeley.ca. 

us/commissions/peaceandjustice 

Editors, Daily Planet:  

Sharon Hudson’s analysis of the Permitting and Development report (“City Report Fails to Cite Pro-Developer Staff,” Daily Planet, Dec. 19–22) is right on the money: Berkeley planning decisions on large projects are made with virtually no public input. As an immediate neighbor of Patrick Kennedy’s recently completed Acton Courtyard project at 1395 University Ave., I was privileged to experience the “process” first-hand.  

I started in the early 1990s, when I wasted several days attending public meetings on the University Ave. “plan.” The Acton – University intersection was a specific focus, but when the time came for development, city staff tossed out the public input like so much garbage. By the time hearings were held by the Zoning Board, essentially all decisions about the project had been made behind closed doors. Board members addressed Kennedy’s representatives by their first names, while treating neighbors like criminals.  

Kennedy’s hold on city government became apparent as soon as construction started. Oliver & Co, the contractors for most of Kennedy’s projects, took over the neighborhood like the US army took Baghdad. They ignored all restrictions on working hours imposed by the use permit, starting work at 7 a.m. and working all day Saturdays and sometimes Sundays. Their heavy equipment became a constant menace, circling the block every 15 minutes or so for months.  

When several of us complained and demanded a meeting, Kennedy’s and Oliver’s representatives feigned surprise at the working hour restrictions and denied that any restrictions could possibly apply to them. Kennedy’s manager sneered that he would “get the rules changed.” Translation: “We own the Planning staff right down to their socks.” 

Our phone calls, faxes, and letters to the Planning Department, to our Councilpuppet Margaret Breland, and to the Newspaper-Snatcher-in-Chief, went unanswered. About 20 of us signed a petition for redress, and we filed formal complaints. No one from Planning and none of our political “leaders” responded. We didn’t even get a courtesy call telling us to get lost. The only person courteous enough to listen was Joan MacQuarrie, the Chief Building Official, who imposed some temporary restrictions even though it is not part of her job to do so. This experience suggests to me that use permit conditions are meaningless, at least if your name is Kennedy.  

Contrast this with the fate of mere mortals who want to build something. If you are a homeowner who wants to add a room, you will face a gauntlet of hostility from Planning staff from the very start. As a contractor, I participated on a project where a single neighbor with a grudge delayed construction for a year, costing the owners $30,000 or more, even though the proposed new home met every zoning rule and required no variance of any kind. Acton Courtyard, on the other hand, violates virtually all zoning rules, including those on density, height, setbacks, and parking— not to mention that the city gave its darling developer the $1 mil parcel of land for free. Or maybe they just forgot to charge him, like they forgot to collect taxes on his other properties. 

In spite of my negative experience, I am by no means against higher-density development, and neither are most of my neighbors. I don’t even think the final result at Acton Courtyard is so awful (I speak for myself only here), although its harsh impact on the neighborhood could have been mitigated considerably if Planning staff had been open to real public input.  

Unfortunately, I don’t see any chance that things will change anytime soon unless there is dramatic change in political leadership. The present Berkeley establishment seems to be mired in the property-is-theft, government-knows-all model that gave us such monuments as East Berlin. If Berkeley is to develop humanely, we need new leaders who will embrace the incomparable energies and talents of its inhabitants—not just the few who can afford to buy the system. Failing this, I propose we update the name of the world’s most progressive college town; you know, Kennedyville has a nice ring to it. 

Paul Rude

OAKLAND—Walking unsteadily across a city rooftop, 26-year-old Wilson Barriga Posada holds an eight-foot radio tower in his arms.  

He wields it like a clunky, high-tech javelin, planting it near the edge of the roof so that he can dangle wires to his sound system on the sidewalk. Posada’s plan for the day: a do-it-yourself FM radio music broadcast, in Spanish. His target audience: the heavily Latino Fruitvale section of Oakland.  

His musical format is the underground, DJ-driven “sonido” style, which adds dashes of techno and hip-hop to a foundation based on tropical rhythms like cumbia and salsa. Posada says sonido is “authentic” and popular with Latinos, but virtually non-existent on commercial Spanish-language radio. 

“Pirate” radio, or microradio, as its advocates prefer, has strong roots in Northern California. Free Radio Berkeley, the region’s most well-known microradio venture, was founded in 1993 by radio activist Stephen Dunifer and ceased operating in 1998 after a legal battle with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). Other micro-power broadcasters, such as San Francisco Liberation Radio, have battled to stay on-air.  

Posada, a former Free Radio Berkeley DJ, says that in the 1990s he saw a need for Spanish-language microradio to bring the movement’s ethos to a more diverse audience.  

“The fact is that the so-called minority, now majority, communities that are here in California, the people that really need these (microradio) projects to be working for them ... we weren’t connecting with them,” he says.  

In April 2003, Posada launched Radio Sonidera 102.5 FM in Fruitvale, with help from Dunifer and other microradio activists. 

For now, he broadcasts on weekends only. Posada sets up behind a mobile taquería in a parking lot, or sometimes from the bed of a battered pickup that his off-and-on technical adviser, Ruben Tomar, uses to wheel around the equipment. 

On a recent Saturday, Posada, who wears his hair buzzed with a bushy rat-tail sprouting from the back, broadcast in Fruitvale’s shopping district in front of a café. Sympathetic owners let him plant the antenna on the roof. Posada says he doesn’t mind the risk such visibility entails. 

Latino families gathered around to watch. Microphone in hand, Posada intermittently shouted out his station’s frequency, handed out flyers to passersby and took requests via cell phone. Meanwhile, he shuffled CDs in and out of a boom box on a wobbly table. 

“Bueno, bueno, bueno,” he’d say between songs. “Seguimos aquí en la 102.5 FM, en Fruitvale.” 

Posada grew up in a working class family in Mexico City. His parents were migrants from two poor interior states, Guanajuato and Michoacan. Posada immigrated to the United States by himself at the age of 20—searching, he says, for the latest in music, radio and media knowledge. He drifted through various infatuations—salsa, punk, hip-hop, until he found sonido, which allowed him to combine it all. 

Like the spontaneous music of the original Jamaican reggae DJs of the 1970s, the process of making la música sonidera is an intrinsic part of its identity. It is created by charismatic DJs, the sonideros, such as Posada’s mentor, famed veteran DJ Ramón Rojo—Sonido La Changa. The sonideros perform in Mexican cities, especially in Mexico City’s teeming colonias, as peripheral neighborhoods are known, and increasingly in U.S. cities.  

Posada says much of his playlist is recordings of sonideros’ concerts. The DJs interact with the audience as they speak over tunes, rhyming, cracking jokes or intoning fans’ names. A danceable cumbia or salsa track is mixed with other sounds, everything from electronica to rap. On-air, Posada himself plays the role of sonidero. 

The concerts are often burned onto CDs as they are performed. After the show, the CDs are sold “like tortillas, except more expensive,” Posada says. In turn, the recordings are copied and re-copied by fans.  

The quick digital dissemination of the music, in a musical subculture that has little use for copyrights, means sonideros can even facilitate transnational communication. A DJ in Mexico will often give a “shout out” to an audience member’s relative living in Los Angeles or another U.S. city. As he lays down the tracks, the DJ will sometimes say, appropriating an expression often used in a derogatory way: “This one’s going out mojado-style, (wetback-style), across the border.” 

“This music is not depending on commercial conduits to spread itself,” says Posada, though some FM stations in Mexico City and L.A. are beginning to produce a slicker version of the sonido style. Both sonido music and microradio, he says, “are on the margins of commercial music culture.”  

Tomar, Posada’s occasional adviser, estimates that with 20-watt capacity and no-frills equipment, Radio Sonidera potentially reaches 60,000 people.  

That’s no threat to Spanish-language media conglomerates like Univision, which has three FM frequencies in the area, but it’s definitely an alternative—at least during the limited times when it is on-air.  

The FCC has cracked down on microradio stations this year, especially in the San Francisco area. Meanwhile, this summer’s FCC-approved rule changes in media ownership, activists say, will make it harder for community-based radio stations to secure a slice of the FM dial. 

Posada wants to expand to include daily morning and evening broadcasts. “If I succeed in what I am trying to do, then that’s a political statement of a kind—that people like me won’t be smothered and disappear in anonymity.” 

Marcelo Ballve is a writer and editor for Pacific News Service.

TUESDAY, JAN. 6 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Juan Diego Flórez, tenor, at 8 p.m., Zellerbach Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $32-$56, available from 642-9988. www.calperfs.berkeley.edu 

Tribute to Babtunde Olatunje with Arsenio Kounde at 8:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $9. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Dayna Stephens House Jam at 8 p.m. at The Jazz House. Donation $5. 649-8744.  

www.thejazzhouse.com 

Mimi Fox, solo guitar, at 8 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810. 

Jazzschool Tuesdays at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. A weekly showcase of ensembles from the Berkeley Jazzschool 848-8277. 

WEDNESDAY, JAN. 7 

CHILDREN 

Preschool Storytime, a program introducing books and music to promote early literacy skills, at 7 p.m. at Berkeley Public Library West Branch, 1125 University Ave. 981-6270. 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Berkeley Poetry Slam with host Nazelah Jamison and Karen Ladson at 8:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $7,  

$5 with student i.d. 841-2082.  

www.starryploughpub.com 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Chad Hinman and Cat Kinsey perform modern folk at the 1923 Teahouse at 8 p.m. Suggested donation of $7-$10, no one turned away for lack of funds. 644-2204. www.epicarts.org 

Whiskey Brothers performs oldtime bluegrass at 9 p.m. at at Albatross, 1822 San Pablo Ave. 843-2473. www.albatrosspub.com 

I.C.E. Conceptual Music Series, a collaboration with drummer Andrew Wilshusen, at 8 p.m. at The Jazz House. Donation $5. 649-8744.  

www.thejazzhouse.com 

Jules Broussard, Bing Nathan and Ned Boynton at 8 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810. 

Famous Last Words, folk/rock, at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

THURSDAY, JAN. 8 

THEATER 

Shotgun Players, “The Death of Meyerhold,” through Jan. 23 at the Julia Morgan Center for the Arts. Thurs.-Sat. performances at 8 p.m. and Sun. at 7 p.m. Tickets are $12-$18, available from 925-798-1300. 704-8210. www.shotgunplayers.org 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Christopher Baker, author of “Moon Handbook: Cuba” at 7:30 p.m. at Easy Going Travel Shop and Bookstore, 1385 Shattuck Ave. at Rose, 843-3533. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

“A Little Night Music” with the New Century Chamber Orchestra at 8 p.m. at St. John’s Presbyterian Church, 2727 College Ave. For ticket information call 415-392-4400. www.ncco.org 

Punk Show with Tempo at 8 p.m. at the Long Haul, a reading room, library and community center in South Berkeley located at 3124 Shattuck Ave. Donation of $3-$5 requested, no one turned away. Wheelchair accessible. 540-0751. www.thelonghaul.org 

The Jeb Brady Band, acoustic americana, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage Coffee House. Cost is $15.50 in advance, $16.50 at the door. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Stunt Monkey, Fountain Street Theater Band, Spinning Jennies at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $8. 841-2082.  

www.starryploughpub.com 

Keni El Lebrijano, flamenco guitar, at 8 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810. 

Mas Cabeza performs Latin jazz and modern Cuban rhythms at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

FRIDAY, JAN. 9  

CHILDREN 

Caldicott Stories at 10:30 a.m. at Barnes and Noble. 644-3635. 

EXHIBITION OPENINGS 

“Go Figure,” figurative art by Deann Acton, James Gayles, Jean Graham, Heather Robinson, and Elizabeth Romero. Reception with the artists from 6 to 8 p.m. at the Women’s Cancer Resource Center Gallery, 5471 Telegraph Ave. 601-4040, ext. 111. www.wcrc.org 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Berkeley High’s Dance Production at 8 p.m. at the Florence Schwimley Little Theater, Allston and MLK. Tickets are $5 for students, $10 for adults, available at the door. Come early, shows sell out! 644-6120. 

Slammin, an all-body band, at 8 p.m., at La Peña Cultural Center. Cost is $13 in advance, $15 at the door. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

Yennayer Berber New Year Celebration with Les Numides at 8 p.m. at The Jazz House. Sliding scale donation $10-$15. 649-8744. www.thejazzhouse.com 

The Vowel Movement, a beatbox showcase hosted by Andrew Chaikin and Tim Barsky, at 8:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $10 in advance, $12 at the door. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Real Sippin’ Whiskeys, Todd Novak of the Cowlicks at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $5. 841-2082. www.starryploughpub.com 

Brian Melvin at 8:30 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810. 

CartoonJazz, Jeff Sanford’s 13-piece band plays the music of Raymond Scott, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage Coffee House. Cost is $15.50 in advance, $16.50 at the door. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Mood Food at 9 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Sterling Dervish performs acoustic rock & roll at 9:30 p.m. at Beckett’s Irish Pub, 2271 Shattuck Ave. 647-1790. www.beckettsirishpub.com 

SATURDAY, JAN. 10 

CHILDREN  

Los Amiguitos de La Peña Music Together at 10:30 a.m. at La Peña. Cost is $4 for adults, $3 for children. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

FILM 

“Delicatessen,” a film about futuristic France, at 8 p.m. at the Long Haul, a reading room, library and community center in South Berkeley located at 3124 Shattuck Ave. Donation of $3-$5 requested, no one turned away. Wheelchair accessible. 540-0751. www.thelonghaul.org 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Berkeley High’s Dance Production at 8 p.m. at the Florence Schwimley Little Theater, Allston and MLK. Tickets are $5 for students, $10 for adults, availabel at the door. Come early, shows sell out! 644-6120. 

“Music for the Epiphany: Seeking Light in a Time of Darkness” Renaissance, Baroque and later music to celebrate the feasts from Advent through Candelaria performed by Coro Hispano de San Francisco and Conjunto Nuevo Mundo at 8 p.m. at St. Joseph the Worker Church, 1640 Addison St. Tickets are $15-$20 available from 415-431-4234. www.corohispano.org 

Healing Muses presents ”Mirth and Good Cheer - Medieval, Renaissance and Celtic Music for Midwinter and the Changing of the Seasons,” at 8 p.m. at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church, 1501 Washington Ave., Albany. Cost is $15-$18. All proceeds benefit the hospital music program. Advance reservations recommended. Wheelchair accessible. 524-5661. www.healingmuses.org 

Peter Zak, pianist, at 8 p.m. at the Jazzschool. Cost is $10-$12. 845-5373. www.jazzschool.com  

Great Night of Soul Poetry, Dale and Dan Zola’s celebration of the spoken word, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $16.50 in advance, $17.50 at the door. 548-1761.  

www.freightandsalvage.org 

The Aux Cajunals at 9:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cajun dance lesson with Patti Whitehurst at 8:30 p.m. Cost is $13. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Triple Play, jazz trio, at 7:30 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

Montuno Groove at 9:30 p.m. at La Peña. Cost is $10. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

Nino Moschella and Linn Brown at 8 p.m. at The Jazz House. Sliding scale donation $8-$15. 649-8744. www.thejazzhouse.com 

Mushroom, Jan Norberg at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $5. 841-2082. www.starryploughpub.com 

The Pit of Fashion Orchestra, conducted by Peter Barshay, at 8:30 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810. 

Sharp Knife, Chased and Smashed, This is My Fist!, Holy Ghost Revival at 8 p.m. at 924 Gilman St., an all-ages, member-run, no alcohol, no drugs, no violence club. Cost is $5. 525-9926. 

Matt Berkeley Group performs jazz and funk at 9 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Nicole McRory at 9:30 p.m. at Beckett’s Irish Pub, 2271 Shattuck Ave. 647-1790. www.beckettsirishpub.com 

SUNDAY, JAN. 11 

EXIBITION OPENINGS 

Berkeley Art Center Annual Member’s Showcase, reception at 2 p.m. Exhibition runs to Feb. 14, Wed.-Sun., noon to 5 p.m. 644-6893. 

FILM 

“La Passante” at 2 p.m. at the Berkeley Richmond Jewish Community Center, 1414 Walnut St. Donation $2. 848-0237.  

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Poetry Flash with Kay Ryan and Elena Karina Byrne at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. Donation $2. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com 

Max Byrd reads from his new novel “Shooting the Sun” at 7:30 p.m. at Black Oak Books. 486-0698. www.blackoakbooks.com 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Organ Recital by Paul M. Ellison, performing works of Tomkins, Zipoli, Pärt, Brahms, and Bach, at 6:10 p.m. at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church, 2300 Bancroft Way at Ellsworth. Donation. 845-0888. 

Chamber Music Sundaes San Francisco Symphony musicians and friends, perform Mozart, Grieg and Andriasov at 3:15 p.m. at St John’s Presbyterian Church, 2727 College Ave. Tickets are $7-$18, available at the door. 415-584-5946. 

Healing Muses presents ”Mirth and Good Cheer - Medieval, Renaissance and Celtic Music for Midwinter and the Changing of the Seasons,” at 4 p.m. at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church, 1501 Washington Ave., Albany. Cost is $15-$18. All Proceeds Advance reservations recommended. Wheelchair accessible. 524-5661. www.healingmuses.org 

Ta Ke Ti Na Workshop with Zorina Wolf from 3 to 6 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $35. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Biodiesel and Bluegrass A Musical Benefit for Grassroots Sustainable Energy, at 1 p.m. at Humanist Hall, 390 27th St., between Broadway and Telegraph, Oakland. Sliding scale donation of $5-$15, children under 10 free. Childcare provided. Proceeds to benefit the grassroots shadow convention for the National Biodiesel Board conference in February. Sponsored by Berkeley Biodiesel Collective. 658-2899. www.berkeleybiodiesel.org 

Marcos Silva Quartet, Brazilian music at 4:30 p.m. at the Jazzschool. Cost is $12-$18. 845-5373. www.jazzschool.com  

John McCutcheon, Appachian folk roots, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage Coffee House. Cost is $19.50 in advance, $20.50 at the door. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

MONDAY, JAN. 12 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Jane Anne Staw discusses “Unstuck: A Supportive and Practical Guide to Working Through Writer’s Block” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com 

Poetry Express, featuring Jan Steckel, from 7 to 9:30 p.m., at Priya Restaurant, 2072 San Pablo Ave. berkeleypoetryexpress@yahoo.com 

Mikel Dunham, photographer and thankgha painter, will show slides from his new book “Samye: A Pilgrimage to the Birthplace of Tibetan Buddhism” at 7:30 p.m. at Black Oak Books. 486-0698. www.blackoakbooks.com 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Earplay Reveals the Unheard, with three classical works based on poetry at 8 p.m. at Yerba Buena Center, 701 Mission St., SF. Tickets are $12-$18 and are available from 415-978-2787. 

Editors, Daily Planet:  

Sharon Hudson’s analysis of the Permitting and Development report (“City Report Fails to Cite Pro-Developer Staff,” Daily Planet, Dec. 19–22) is right on the money: Berkeley planning decisions on large projects are made with virtually no public input. As an immediate neighbor of Patrick Kennedy’s recently completed Acton Courtyard project at 1395 University Ave., I was privileged to experience the “process” first-hand.  

I started in the early 1990s, when I wasted several days attending public meetings on the University Ave. “plan.” The Acton – University intersection was a specific focus, but when the time came for development, city staff tossed out the public input like so much garbage. By the time hearings were held by the Zoning Board, essentially all decisions about the project had been made behind closed doors. Board members addressed Kennedy’s representatives by their first names, while treating neighbors like criminals.  

Kennedy’s hold on city government became apparent as soon as construction started. Oliver & Co, the contractors for most of Kennedy’s projects, took over the neighborhood like the US army took Baghdad. They ignored all restrictions on working hours imposed by the use permit, starting work at 7 a.m. and working all day Saturdays and sometimes Sundays. Their heavy equipment became a constant menace, circling the block every 15 minutes or so for months.  

When several of us complained and demanded a meeting, Kennedy’s and Oliver’s representatives feigned surprise at the working hour restrictions and denied that any restrictions could possibly apply to them. Kennedy’s manager sneered that he would “get the rules changed.” Translation: “We own the Planning staff right down to their socks.” 

Our phone calls, faxes, and letters to the Planning Department, to our Councilpuppet Margaret Breland, and to the Newspaper-Snatcher-in-Chief, went unanswered. About 20 of us signed a petition for redress, and we filed formal complaints. No one from Planning and none of our political “leaders” responded. We didn’t even get a courtesy call telling us to get lost. The only person courteous enough to listen was Joan MacQuarrie, the Chief Building Official, who imposed some temporary restrictions even though it is not part of her job to do so. This experience suggests to me that use permit conditions are meaningless, at least if your name is Kennedy.  

Contrast this with the fate of mere mortals who want to build something. If you are a homeowner who wants to add a room, you will face a gauntlet of hostility from Planning staff from the very start. As a contractor, I participated on a project where a single neighbor with a grudge delayed construction for a year, costing the owners $30,000 or more, even though the proposed new home met every zoning rule and required no variance of any kind. Acton Courtyard, on the other hand, violates virtually all zoning rules, including those on density, height, setbacks, and parking— not to mention that the city gave its darling developer the $1 mil parcel of land for free. Or maybe they just forgot to charge him, like they forgot to collect taxes on his other properties. 

In spite of my negative experience, I am by no means against higher-density development, and neither are most of my neighbors. I don’t even think the final result at Acton Courtyard is so awful (I speak for myself only here), although its harsh impact on the neighborhood could have been mitigated considerably if Planning staff had been open to real public input.  

Unfortunately, I don’t see any chance that things will change anytime soon unless there is dramatic change in political leadership. The present Berkeley establishment seems to be mired in the property-is-theft, government-knows-all model that gave us such monuments as East Berlin. If Berkeley is to develop humanely, we need new leaders who will embrace the incomparable energies and talents of its inhabitants—not just the few who can afford to buy the system. Failing this, I propose we update the name of the world’s most progressive college town; you know, Kennedyville has a nice ring to it. 

Paul Rude

A compromise designed to increase public parking spaces at Library Gardens—a massive housing development slated to replace a downtown parking garage—appears to have stalled, and the project is now set to go before the city’s Zoning Adjustment Board with just 11 spaces set aside for the public. 

Negotiations between the project developer TransAction Companies and the Berkeley-Albany YMCA on construction of an underground public parking lot broke down last week over how much the YMCA should contribute to the project and how many parking spaces and hours should be devoted to them. 

“We provided them with what we thought was a generous offer and we’re disappointed in their response,” said TransAction Senior Vice President John DeClerq. 

The 176-unit development—the largest ever planned for the city center—would rise just west of the library at the site of the 362-space Kittredge Street garage. The project has drawn opposition from downtown merchants who fear the loss of the garage’s parking spaces will keep people away from the downtown’s chief attractions—the YMCA, library and movie theaters that bring in visitors who patron other downtown shops. 

To head off a fight at Thursday’s ZAB hearing and prevent future appeals, DeClerq last month proposed teaming up with the YMCA to build one level of parking below the development that would provide 124 extra parking spaces, seventy-five percent of which would be available to Y members during peak hours of 6-10 a.m. daily and 4-7 p.m. on weekdays. The public would have rights to the entire lot during other times of the day. 

The Downtown Berkeley Association(DBA)—a merchant group on which DeClerq serves on the executive board and is about to become its treasurer—announced last month they would withdraw their opposition to the project if DeClerq and the Y could strike a deal. 

But the Y rejected TransAction’s initial offer, which called for it to pay $5,000 per month on a 30-year lease to secure parking for its members and chip in $1 million over ten years for construction of a lot the city has estimated would cost between $ 6.8 and $10 million.  

DeClerq in turn rejected a counteroffer issued by the Y Friday calling it “significantly less than we had hoped.” 

The Y offered to pay $500,000 up front, with no future monthly payments and no 30-year lease. Their proposal also called for rights to all of the added parking spaces throughout the day except for a window from 1-4 p.m. when the lot would be available for the public, DeClerq said. 

The Y had been paying $5,000 per month for its members to park for free at the Kittredge garage until DeClerq terminated the deal in November in preparation for beginning construction. 

Failure to reach an agreement before the Thursday ZAB meeting would complicate negotiations, but not kill the deal, said YMCA CEO Larry Bush. “I see that as an instrumental point, but we’re going to pursue this all the way through,” he said. Bush refused to discuss the terms of the Y’s counteroffer. 

Without a deal in place, DeClerq said he’ll present ZAB with his current proposal providing 116 parking spaces, all but 11 reserved for residents of the complex. That plan meets all city development requirements, has the support of the planning department and is expected to pass the ZAB. 

A win at the ZAB level wouldn’t necessarily give TransAction a green light for the development. 

DeClerq predicted the Y would appeal to City Council any ZAB ruling favorable to TransAction and wage other delaying tactics to forestall construction, scheduled to start this spring. 

A lengthy delay could cost Transaction millions in carrying costs on the garage and lead to higher construction prices, said a source close to the negotiations. 

“Both sides are playing chicken,” the source added. “DeClerq knows he can build the project, but he doesn’t want it delayed. The two sides are struggling to work out a compromise and neither wants to blink first.” 

Bush refused to speculate if he would appeal a ZAB ruling to council. 

When first proposed in 2000, Library Gardens was the darling of downtown developments. In addition to the 176 units of one- and two-bedroom apartments—projected to house about 300 tenants—and the five retail shops still included in the design, the project also called for two levels of underground parking, replacing all of the spaces lost from the Kittredge lot. 

But despite unanimous approval from both the ZAB and Council, DeClerq pulled the plug on the project in 2002, complaining that the costs to build underground parking—roughly $45,000 per spot—made the development unfeasible. 

When he reintroduced the project in late 2002 without the promised parking the DBA turned on it, arguing that the plan threatened the viability of anchor tenants served by the lot that they estimated serves 3,000-5,000 visitors daily.

The late Fred Lupke spent a great deal of his time and energy in the last two years of his life opposing the Library Gardens development, primarily because of the negative effect he knew it would have on the Berkeley Public Library, an institution he loved and used all the time.  

Fred appealed the first version of Library Gardens because of the effect the massing of the proposed building would have on the public library, by blocking light and views from our windows and inhibiting pedestrian access from the high school, among other reasons. But the effects of the first version of Library Gardens were relatively benign compared to the “revised version” that is going to the city’s Zoning Adjustments Board for a public hearing on Thursday, Jan. 8, at 7 p.m. in the Council Chambers at Old City Hall. 

After prevailing over Fred’s appeal and winning approval for a massive 176-unit, five-story housing development just to the west of the Berkeley Public Library on the site of the existing Kittredge (former Hink’s) parking garage, the developer pulled a massive bait-and-switch fraud, just as Fred feared he would. While the first version of Library Gardens had some negative effects on the library, it at least proposed to replace all of the 362 public parking presently located at 2020 Kittredge in a new two-level underground parking garage beneath the housing development. But after winning approval for the housing development, the developer, John DeClerq of the Transaction Corporation, “discovered” that the underground parking would cost too much to build. In early 2003, he came back to the city with a “revised version” that contains only 116 parking spaces, 110 of which are city-required parking for the 176 housing units and 3,000 square feet of ground floor retail space. The version going before the Zoning Adjustments Board this Thursday contains a total of only six parking spaces for the use of the public to replace the 362 that are there now, though in recent days (perhaps with the intent of reducing and dividing the opposition), DeClerq has started to suggest that he might be willing to provide more if someone else provides a million dollars or so to subsidize them.  

The fact that the housing component of the development is exactly the same size and design as that already approved means, in effect, that the only issue the ZAB will be considering this Thursday is whether the developer can eliminate the underground parking garage. Of course, as could be expected, this is very unpopular with every institution in the downtown: the library, the Downtown Berkeley Association, the Arts District, individual small businesses, and the Berkeley YMCA, all of whose patrons have used the Kittredge parking garage very heavily. All of these institutions submitted comments against the Draft Subsequent Environmental Impact Report for the Library Gardens Project conclusion that removal of the parking would not cause significant environmental impacts.  

Nevertheless, in a country that values private property rights, many people even in the downtown are halfway persuaded of DeClerq’s argument that he and his partners should not be required to maintain or replace the public parking if they say they cannot afford to do so. Should not the owner of a parking garage be allowed to go out of business and develop his property for some other use? After all, with one major exception, the parking in the Kittredge parking garage isn’t actually required by use permits for downtown businesses. If it is mostly just parking for members of the public, should not the “public” (maybe the City of Berkeley) be required to replace it, if it needs to be replaced, not the owner of the Kittredge parking garage? It is this argument that I want to comment on here.  

DeClerq and partners say that, as private property owners, they have no responsibility to provide parking for the public and other businesses. What this argument overlooks is that the Transaction Corporation, the heart of the partnership that is proposing Library Gardens, has owned and still owns, downtown properties that have a close inherent relationship to, and dependence on, parking in the Kittredge (Hink’s) parking garage. In 1987, the Transaction Corporation purchased the entire block that included the Shattuck Hotel and the closed Hink’s Department store. The latter was then undergoing redevelopment as the Shattuck Cinemas, Mel’s Diner, other businesses. Now, as everyone who has lived in Berkeley as long as I have probably knows, the Kittredge parking garage had been built in 1947 by the Hink’s family to serve the patrons of their department store and other businesses in property the family owned. True, no use permit actually required this parking because zoning that applied to the downtown at that time was too rudimentary to consider the issue. But the fact is that the Hink’s (Kittredge) garage served specific properties by meeting their parking demand, and did not simply serve some undifferentiated “general public.” People who stayed at the Shattuck Hotel were directed to park at Hink’s and not elsewhere. People who shopped in the department store got to park in the Hink’s parking garage.  

Now, when the Transaction Corporation bought the Hink’s block, and a few years later also bought the parking garage from the Hink’s Family Trust, they took over the established parking relationship between the garage and their commercial property. Obviously, they profited from it both by having parking available for the businesses in the property they owned, and in being able to charge the patrons of these businesses to park in their garage. In my view, this makes the fact that the parking was not a “legal” requirement in use permits essentially irrelevant.  

In any case, the use permit for one major downtown property that the Transaction Corporation used to own, and probably still owns in part, does specifically require provision of parking in the Kittredge parking garage. The use permit issued on Jan. 20, 1987 for the 1,249-seat Shattuck Cinemas complex requires: 

To avoid parking impacts in the evening, the applicant should be conditioned to extend the valet service in the Hinks lot to include the evening operation. Notices should be posted in the theater lobby indicating that parking is available in Hinks. Newspapers and other printed advertising should include a notice that parking is available.  

Soon after issuance of this permit, the Transaction Corporation bought the Hink’s development that included the movie theater and therefore assumed the obligation of providing the use permit’s required valet parking in the Hink’s lot. . 

Now, of course, the Transaction Corporation wants us to forget all of this, and they’ve steadily taken steps to break off and bury the relationship between the businesses in their commercial property and their parking garage. First, they sold off the Shattuck Hotel as a commercial condominium. Next, they sold the portion of the Hink’s building that contains the Shattuck Cinemas to a new partnership, though it is rumored that they retain some ownership of the new entity. I wonder whether it was a condition of the “sale” that the new owners not protest loss of parking in the Kittredge parking garage? 

So after taking profits out by selling these properties, the Transaction Partners happily go on to develop the parking garage as a large housing development. Of course, all the businesses in the properties that depended on the Hink’s parking garage still exist and still create a demand for parking in the downtown. But the Transaction Partners pretend that meeting this demand isn’t their responsibility. It is the responsibility of the “public” —which means that you and I are expected to pay for it!  

To complete this miserable racket, the Transaction Partners are now apparently offering to replace some of the parking they are proposing to demolish, but only if someone gives them a subsidy of a million dollars or so to build one level of underground parking. (No details are available since DeClerq only recently proposed this in the Downtown Berkeley Association.) Of course, the Transaction Partners have nothing to lose and a lot to gain from making this “offer.” Even if no one can afford it, the very fact they’ve made the offer demonstrates their “concern” about the parking situation in the Downtown and helps to reduce opposition to their project. It also creates a dilemma for some large institutions like the YMCA that may be tempted to negotiate for some parking for their members rather than opposing the project outright. (It is kind of hard to do both.) And the Board of Trustees of the Berkeley Public Library, who previously opposed Library Gardens have now decided that they are “neutral” on the project, in return for an offer from DeClerq to guarantee parking in Library Gardens for the two categories of patrons who are most egregiously harmed by lack of parking near the library: disabled people and mothers with their children who are attending “story hour.” But these are small categories who will maybe occupy the six public parking spaces in Library Gardens, and DeClerq hasn’t disclosed what these parkers will be expected to pay… 

As for me, I’ll be down at the City Council Chambers on Thursday night, as I know Fred Lupke would have been, asking the ZAB to deny a use permit for Library Gardens on the grounds of its detriment to the public library, the YMCA and every institution in the Downtown.  

Jane Scantlebury has worked as a reference librarian in the Berkeley Public Library since 1986. She is a shop steward in her union, SEIU 535. She was a friend of the late Fred Lupke.

Austrian immigrant Arnold Schwarzenegger’s victory in the recent recall election is one the highest profile immigrant success stories in California’s history. Yet immigrant success has been an important contributor to the state’s economic and cultural vitality since long before Schwarzenegger ascension. 

The stories of three restauranteurs from Vietnam, Ethiopia, and Mexico on a short stretch of Berkeley’s Telegraph Avenue personify the dreams and contributions that thousands of immigrants have made to California.  

Kiet Truong, 33, Vietnamese, owner, Unicorn, 2533 Telegraph Ave. 841-8098, www.unicorndining.com. 

Truong arrived in the United States in 1979 when he was nine years old. His ethnic Chinese family fled Vietnam to escape political persecution. As a child, he loved science and math. His interests led him to pursue a computer engineering degree. Until three years ago, he worked as a systems engineer. Then, along with many other technical workers in the Bay Area, he lost his job during the dot-com collapse. 

Seeing how tenuous it is to work for others, Truong resolved to become an entrepreneur. He grew up with a love for fine food thanks to his mother’s great cooking. When he got the entrepreneurial bug, his mother was working at Oakland’s Le Cheval Vietnamese restaurant. She agreed to come to work for Truong. 

In September 2001, with financial assistance from his brother, Truong signed a lease for his Telegraph Avenue location in a spot that had seen a numerous restaurants come and go with none of them succeeding.  

Following 9/11, restaurants throughout the Bay Area felt an immediate negative impact on sales. “What could I do? I had just opened Unicorn, and I knew it would be tough. Working 12 to 15 hours per day six days a week, I’ve managed to survive when seven out of 10 restaurants that opened in 2002 have already closed.” 

Truong attributes his success to his unique cuisine and ambiance. Unicorn specializes in dishes from the Chao Zhou province of southern China, where influences of Vietnam and Malaysia show up in the spiky flavors of curry, tamarind, mint, and lemongrass. Meanwhile, the ambiance is California contemporary-chic with a pleasingly arty decor. The unique look, which Truong designed and built, is so well executed that it is already spawning copycat versions around Berkeley.  

Roman Zewde, 45, owner, Fin Fine, 2556 Telegraph Ave., Berkeley. 883-0167. 

When she worked in the catering department at International House on the UC Berkeley campus, Zewde dreamed of opening a restaurant as popular as her mother’s in Addis Abbaba, Ethiopia. But, it took her years to save up the money and get the experience she needed. 

Twelve years after arriving in the United States, Zewde realized her dream in June 2001 when she opened Fin Fine, a restaurant specializing in Ethiopian cuisine. Zewde works in the kitchen six days a week preparing traditional Ethiopian cuisine with an emphasis on seafood dishes that are hard to find at other Ethiopian restaurants in the Bay Area. 

Zewde believes in making everything from scratch including injera that is flat bread made from a dense grain called teff. The bread, which is always served cold, covers the entire dish and all the food is placed on top of it. Injera tastes best at the end of the meal, after it has soaked up all the good juices. However, rolls of it come to the table where one tears it into smaller pieces that are used to scoop up vegetable stews or slow-cooked meats. 

“It’s a dream come to true to own my own restaurant in America. And, I’m proud that people come from San Francisco, San Jose, and Sacramento to eat the food I make,” said Zewde. 

Mario Tejada, 73, owner, Mario’s La Fiesta, 2444 Telegraph Ave. 848-2588. 

In 1954, Mario Tejada immigrated to the United States from Guanajuato, Mexico. As soon as Tejada became a citizen, the United States military drafted him, and he served in Korea until 1956. 

In 1959, Tejada saw a classified ad for a sandwich shop for sale on Telegraph Avenue. Seeking a change from his carpenter’s job, he managed to purchase the shop and used his carpentry skills to convert it into a Mexican restaurant. 

“The secret to my success was introducing real Mexican food to Americans. We were one of the first restaurants in the Bay Area to serve chile verde and chile colorado. Also, we weren’t afraid to give people real hot sauce instead of the watery stuff that people were served in other places,” said Tejada. 

“Our business got another big boost in the early ‘70s when we introduced the super burrito to the East Bay. People just couldn’t get enough of our fat burritos stuffed with meat, beans, rice, sour cream, guacamole, and salsa,” added Tejada. 

Mario’s has been open for so long that Tejada has seen many customers come back years later with children and grandchildren. “We have great regulars who live and work in the area. It’s like they are part of our family,” concluded Tejada.  

Showing equal amounts of disdain for, impatience with, and incredulity at the arguments of Berkeley activist-attorney Rick Young, Alameda County Superior Court Judge James Richman late last week denied Young’s petition to amend or delete the ballot arguments against Berkeley’s Instant Runoff Voting (IRV) measure. 

The judge’s expedited ruling, held after a half-hour hearing in Oakland court, means that the anti-IRV arguments signed by City Councilmembers Gordon Wozniak, Maudelle Shirek, and Betty Olds will appear as originally written on next March’s Berkeley ballot. The referendum will be listed as Measure I. 

In papers filed with the court, Young charged that “both the Argument Against and the Rebuttal to the Argument In Favor of Measure I contain statements that are false, misleading or inconsistent with the requirements of” California electoral law. California courts in the past have not allowed arguments for or against measures on the ballot which have been shown to be false or misleading. 

Young’s assertion was supported by Berkeley City Councilmember Dona Spring, a strong IRV supporter, who was not present at the hearing, but told the Daily Planet in a telephone interview that “there were three major untruths and a lot of red herrings” in the anti-IRV ballot arguments.  

Among other items from the ballot arguments,” Young cited statements that “IRV systems are currently not legal in California,” “in most forms of IRV all votes are not counted,” and “IRV costs more.” All of these ballot argument statements, Young asserted, were either false or misleading. 

But Young withered under close questioning by Judge Richman, who chastised the attorney for asking the court to, in the judge’s words, “throw out ballot arguments without providing any proof that the arguments were false. Do you think that this is how elections should work, in your heart of hearts?” 

Richman told Young that “what you ought to do is go out during the election, go into the coffee klatches in Berkeley, and tell people that Mr. Wozniak is wrong in his arguments, and why. You shouldn’t be asking the court to do this.” 

In his argument, Young made several references to an opinion on Instant Runoff Voting by “Secretary of State Bill Lockyer,” prompting Berkeley attorney Fred Feller to say at one point, “There has been only one untrue statement established at this hearing, and that is that Bill Lockyer is not now, nor has he ever been, Secretary of State.” Lockyer is state Attorney General. Feller represented Wozniak and Berkeley Transportation Commission chairperson Dean Metzger, an anti-IRV ballot argument signator. 

Asked by the judge if he wanted to add anything to the discussion, Deputy City Attorney Zack Cowan smiled, held up his hands, and said, “I’m just here to watch.” Cowan represented City Clerk Sherry M. Kelly. 

Young conceded that he was not properly prepared for the hearing, stating, “I’ve only been an attorney for two years, I’ve never done this kind of thing before [filed against a ballot argument], a friend of mine was put in the psych ward, and I was sick this weekend.” 

In the courthouse hallway following the judge’s terse ruling of “petition for writ of mandate denied,” Young said he still considered the failed lawsuit a victory. 

“Gordon [Wozniak] got the message,” he said. “It’s not okay to mislead the public. And if you try to do that, you’ll find yourself in court.” He also said he would like to debate the issue with the Councilmember before voters go to the polls in March “if I have time to prepare.” 

Wozniak said he did, in fact, receive a message, but not necessarily the one intended by Young. “Some of the people who signed the ballot arguments were getting served by Mr. Young at six in the morning, with papers that said they might be liable for court costs,” the Councilmember said. “One person came to me as a result and wanted to take her name off of the ballot arguments. This was an attempt at intimidation. It’s a free speech issue. It’s the kind of tactic that doesn’t belong in Berkeley.” 

The anti-IRV ballot arguments were also signed by Metzger, 2002-03 ASUC President Jesse Gabriel, Berkeley Police Review Commission chair William White, Panoramic Hill Association President Janice Thomas, Community Environmental Advisory Commission chair Sara MacKusick, and Berkeley business executive Helen Meyer. Young’s petition listed City Clerk Kelly as a respondent and the nine listed signators as “real parties in interest.” 

Wozniak was the only named party who appeared in court during the hearing, and Young referred almost exclusively to the Councilmember in making his arguments to the court. The petition, legal arguments, and the judge’s decision all had to be rushed through to meet a noon, Friday deadline for any changes to be made to the ballot statements. 

Instant Runoff Voting eliminates runoffs by allowing voters to rank candidates in a 1-2-3 order on the first ballot of an election. Under most runoff election systems, if no candidate wins a majority of the votes on the first ballot, voters must come back to the polls for a second time to choose between the top two vote-getters.  

Under IRV, however, the last-place candidate is eliminated and the “second choice” votes of those who voted for the eliminated candidate are passed on to the remaining candidates. The process is continued—eliminating the bottom candidates and passing on their next choice votes—until one candidate eventually gets a majority. 

IRV made the March Berkeley ballot after a vote of Berkeley City Council. If passed, the runoff system would not go into effect until certain conditions are in place, including the development of election software that would allow it to be consolidated with a general Alameda County election. 

IRV has been approved for implementation in San Francisco, San Leandro, Santa Clara counties, and in limited instances in Oakland, but has not yet been used in any election in the Bay Area.

NEIGHBORHOOD ANTENNAE 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I read “a group of residents in Berkeley has been fighting to stop Sprint antennas near their residential area.” 

They are right. Many people throughout the world are in trouble and moving because of antennas in their neighborhood. 

The facts are there already, it’s not because they are anxious or worried, they move because their bodies are severely ill as a result of chronic exposure to pulsed e.m.-fields directly or indirectly (by interference) produced by low levels of microwave radiation. 

This is not my opinion, this is not to be discussed. It is real life and it is happening everywhere where antennas are installed near people. 

Please be sensible and keep the antennas away from the Berkeley neighborhood. 

Frans van Velden Msc 

The Hague, NL 

• 

PHALLOCENTRISM 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

While I often enjoy reading Zac Unger’s irreverent take on life in Berkeley, I was a bit alarmed by the phallocentrism in his recent column about baby names (“What’s in a Name?, Daily Planet, Jan. 2-5). I understand that choosing an appropirate name for a child is an important decision for a young family, but why deride the name “Alex” merely because more women are adopting it? And suggesting that a man named Alex should change his name to “Peter, Rod or Lance”—must all men be brainwashed by their testosterone? I think Mr. Unger should stick to talking about Hummers in the future and avoid subjects that might offend your female readers. 

Toby Millman 

North Oakland 

• 

LIBRARY GARDENS 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I’m writing as a board member of Berkeley Ecological and Safe Transportation (BEST). Our group would like to see the Library Gardens project become “car-free housing”. 

BEST notes that only 59 residential parking spaces are required for the number of units developer DeClerq is proposing to build. Yet, he is planning 105 residential parking spaces. This is not only more parking than is required; it’s also more parking than in any other housing project approved for construction in downtown in the last 10 years. 

Car-free housing means that residents have the option of signing a lease agreeing that they would not own a car, and therefore not require a parking space. The spaces for car-free units could then be made available as public parking. Library Gardens is an ideal location for car-free living; it’s downtown, in walking distance of everything, one block from BART and served abundantly by buses. The project could well exemplify transit oriented development. 

Car-free housing projects have been very successful in Europe and in San Francisco. 

Library Gardens is another opportunity for Berkeley to show some progressive leadership in transportation and housing policy. BEST suggests that a car-free project would be a win-win solution. The parking that is built could all go for shoppers, theater and movie-goers, and other short-term visitors. There are environmental benefits too, because car-free residents would not add to traffic or to air pollution. 

City CarShare is active in Berkeley, so car-less residents who have occasional need for a car could have access to one. 

City employees now get an ECOPASS for using public transit, The school district and Peralta College can do the same, rather than spend money on more parking spaces which will just make congestion worse. 

Car congestion doesn’t just happen; it is caused by public policy that deliberately encourages cars over transit. 

Steve Geller 

• 

AN OBVIOUS ALTERNATIVE 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

After Paul Glusman did everything possible to alert the city officials to the imminent danger of this elm tree which has been “falling down in sections” (“Berkeley Officialdom Ignores an Impending Danger, Daily Planet, Jan. 2-5), the $1,800 he spent to repair the damage to his car may have gone a long way in hiring a company himself, or with neighbors, to remove the tree. It seems an obvious alternative to the many months of risking human life or injury. Being an attorney, he could probably even find a way for our compassionate city to reimburse this cost. Also, with his other frustration, if he didn’t wish to sweep up the “glass fragments all over the sidewalk” on Bancroft Way, downtown, himself, there are any number of persons who would have been happy to be paid to do so.  

Gerta Farber  

• 

CALCULATING THE DIFFERENCE 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

During her broadcast on Dec. 16, Diane Sawyer asked President Bush about the still-not-found WMDs in Iraq. “What’s the difference?” Bush, responded, “the possibility [was] that [Saddam Hussein] could acquire weapons.”   

  Mr. Bush, the difference between a hypothetical “could” acquire weapons versus a genuine “has” the weapons is approximately 400 American lives lost, 4,000 Iraqi civilians killed, and 400 thousand million American taxpayer dollars wasted.   

  It is unconscionable that the president, the chief steward of the public’s trust, would deceive us so gravely. Even worse if the well-coordinated lies from the administration were actually a colossal, incompetent miscalculation.   

  While political pundits yammer about Bush’s re-election, citizens are calling for his impeachment and incarceration. 

Bruce Joffe 

Piedmont 

Veteran Berkeley technology reporter Henry Norr has reached a settlement with the San Francisco Chronicle, which suspended him last April, ostensibly for participating in protests before the Iraq invasion started. 

Norr agreed not to disclose the financial specifics, but the amount was substantial enough that he’s planning to do only free-lance writing for a while. The Chronicle will continue to pay his retirement and health benefits.  

Norr fans, especially East Bay techies, turned the firing into a major cause celebre, setting up a website, whereishenrynorr.com, and replacing the cover sheets on Chronicle coin boxes around Berkeley’s Bart station and elsewhere with ‘Where is Henry Norr?’ posters. They also organized a demonstration on his behalf at one of Executive Editor Bronstein’s public appearances, and called for circulation and advertising boycotts.  

The Chronicle’s Monday story about the settlement claims that “Norr’s termination occurred as a result of events arising out of his role in anti-war protests against the current war in Iraq.” Norr concedes that his Iraq opposition, including his arrest in San Francisco, played a part in his eventual firing, but he thinks there’s more to the story. His statement, published in Monday’s Chronicle article, says that “because I didn’t violate the ethics policy the Chronicle had in place at the time, it is clear I was fired because of my political views—my opposition to the war in Iraq and Israel’s occupation of Palestine.” 

In an interview with the Daily Planet Monday, Norr went on to say that “I can’t prove it, but I have a strong suspicion that one of the main reasons I was fired is because of my support for Palestine.”  

Norr’s July 2002 column about a billion-dollar Israeli Intel plant built on land guaranteed to Palestinians in a 1948 treaty was the subject of a heated campaign by pro-Israel groups, and he incurred further criticism for a vacation trip to the Occupied Territories with the International Solidarity Movement. 

He himself is Jewish by background, though not religious, and he answers accusations that he’s anti-Semitic with the quip that “anti-Semites used to be people that hated Jews, but now they’re people that Jews hate.” 

Chronicle Managing Editor Robert Rosenthal told the Planet he couldn’t comment on Norr’s charges because he wasn’t around when the Intel story appeared. He joined the paper in October of 2002. 

Phil Bronstein and Deputy Editor Narda Zacchino, who were there, are both out of town, and Chronicle “Reader’s Representative” Dick Rogers told the Planet he knew nothing more about the issue than he’d read in Monday’s article about the settlement. 

Verbatim publication of Norr’s statement was a major sweetener of the deal for him. 

He said that the Chronicle retained the right to do a final edit on his words, but “in fact they didn’t make changes, though they added their part. My [Newspaper] Guild lawyers were blown away—they’d never heard of such a thing.” 

Under the union contract between the Chronicle and the Media Guild, unresolved grievances go to binding arbitration. In November 2003, Norr went to Palestine to participate again in the International Solidarity Movement. When he returned, he learned through the Guild’s lawyers that management was eager to settle instead of going through with the case. 

“Basically,” he said, “they offered me some money, my pension and other retirement benefits (which I would otherwise have lost), and publication of an article like the one that appeared today.” 

He told the Planet that the Chronicle promised him an unpleasant future at the paper even if he won. “They implicitly threatened that even if they were ordered to reinstate me, they’d never let me write for the paper again—they’d make me a copy editor or a mailboy or something—and the lawyers advised that there wouldn’t be much I could do about that, because determining the actual work assignment is considered a management prerogative. All in all, that wasn't a very attractive scenario,” he said. 

The downside, he noted, aside from not getting his job back, is that he has to withdraw the complaint he filed with the state labor commission, which means he doesn’t get to challenge the illegality of his firing. 

The Chronicle article quoted managing editor Rosenthal as denying that the paper had violated any laws. Norr wondered whether Rosenthal had ever read sections 1101-1106 of the California Labor Code, which states, Norr says, with no qualifications and no exemptions for journalists or anyone else, that “No employer shall make, adopt, or enforce any rule, regulation, or policy ...controlling or directing, or tending to control or direct the political activities or affiliations of employees” and “No employer shall coerce or influence or attempt to coerce or influence his employees through or by means of threat of discharge or loss of employment to adopt or follow or refrain from adopting or following any particular course or line of political action or political activity.” 

Norr had one final comment on the statement attributed to Rosenthal in the article that appeared today: “On the question of the appearance of conflict of interest, it's astonishing to me that he uses that as a justification for preventing an antiwar demonstrator from covering personal technology, yet apparently sees no problem in having a Sacramento bureau chief whose wife is Arnold Schwarzenegger's deputy chief of staff, and was previously a flack for Maria Shriver.”

More than 130 people opened their hearts and their wallets during an emotional fundraiser for the earthquake-devastated city of Bam at a jam-packed Santa Fe Bistro Sunday night. 

The event, sponsored by Berkeley’s Persian Center, raised an astounding $70,000, which will go to create critically needed housing for as many as 70 Bam families. 

During the event, Relief International President Dr. Farshad Rastergar announced that an anonymous donor put up $20,000 in matching funds to build housing. Those funds were quickly matched and then Persian Center Boardmember Shahin Tabrizi added another $5,000 to be matched. 

Organizers asked for a minimum donation of $100 at the door, but to help meet the matching funds, many guests donated $1,000. David Behring, president of Wheelchair International, announced that his nonprofit organization is shipping to Iran four containers loaded with 280 wheelchairs each to help the thousands who were seriously injured. 

“For a last minute event, the response has been overwhelming,” said Persian Center President Niloofar Nouri. “People were so moved, that the Santa Fe Bistro waiters and waitresses who volunteered their time at the event were writing checks along with the doctors and lawyers.” 

Guests, many who broke into tears during a slide show that graphically depicted the devastation, were treated to dinner, which was co-sponsored by Berkeley developer Soheyl Modarressi in honor of his late father Seyed Hossein Modarressi and Sante Fe Bistro owner Ahmad Behjati.  

The 6.7 earthquake struck the city shortly after 5 a.m. on Dec. 26, killing more than 35,000 people, injuring thousands more and leaving untold numbers homeless in the middle of a freezing cold winter. According to some estimates, nearly 70 percent of the city’s mostly mud-brick structures collapsed in the quake.  

Several of the 18 Berkeley residents and city employees who traveled to Bam last April during a humanitarian mission for Wheelchair International, held back tears while they spoke of the overwhelming kindness of the Bam residents whose fates are now unknown. 

There was the man who offered a ride to an American stranger who had just arrived at Bam’s bus depot, the school teacher who was eager to take time explaining the town’s remarkable history and the woman who served tea and date cookies to travelers in the city’s venerable 2,000-year-old citadel with its ancient parapets, corner towers and lancet windows. 

Former Councilmember Polly Armstrong said she was amazed at how Bam teenagers were steeped in their country’s poetry and history as if those subjects were part of the landscape. 

“It was amazing,” she said. “When was the last time you heard an American teenager recite a favorite poet?” 

City of Berkeley information technology employee Dona LaSala remembered a young boy who was thrilled with the small gift of a post card “just because it was from an American.” 

Berkeley Neighborhood Liaison Michael Caplan remembered the dozens of friendly children who ran up to the Americans to use their one English phrase, “Happy birthday!” 

Later, during a slide show of the devastated and transformed city, many guests wiped away tears as they took in pictures of dust-covered old people staring incomprehensibly at the rubble, a man walking among the debris with a lifeless, mud-covered child draped over each shoulder and the dozens of canvas-wrapped bodies laid side by side in mass graves. 

Nouri said the magnitude of the destruction will likely mean that relief efforts will be ongoing for at least the next year and perhaps longer. She said that a listing of upcoming fund raising events will be maintained on the Persian Center’s website, www.persiancenter.org. 

The Persian Center is collecting new medical supplies and looking for volunteers. The center is located 2029 Durant St. For drop-off information, call 848-0264. 

For information about donating money, blood or other supplies visit the National Iranian American Council at www.niacouncil.org/iranquake.asp or Relief International at www.ri.org. 

Checks payable to “Iran Quake Relief/ Relief” can be mailed to: Relief International, 1575 Westwood Blvd. #201 Los Angeles, CA 90024. (800) 573-3332.

Shattered Glass at Amoeba 

A customer took offense when he was accused of switching tags on CDs at Amoeba Music Friday, and on being ordered to leave the Telegraph Avenue shop, he wrapped up his hand and punched his fist through a store window. The vandal then fled north on foot, eluding store security, but not the police who detained him on Durant Avenue. Thomas Williams, 20, of Fairfield was arrested for vandalism and an outstanding arrest warrant. 

Telegraph Robbery 

A man walked into a Telegraph Avenue tattoo parlor late Tuesday night, grabbed money from an unattended cash register and raced out the door. A clerk called police, and after their search ended when UC police arrested Rodney Walker, 19, of Oakland for burglary and a probation violation. 

Nonprofit Trashed 

Burglars stole a 200-pound safe and ransacked the offices of a Berkeley nonprofit during the Christmas holiday, tipping over desks, ripping out phones and rifling through file cabinets, stopping only to enjoy some holiday maraschino cherries and ginger ale left in the refrigerator, employees said. 

“It was just a mess,” reports Juliette Majot, executive director of the International Rivers Network, a nonprofit that works to halt dam projects in undeveloped countries. 

The biggest loss, however, was the 3’ x 3’ safe filled with holiday donation checks that burglars hauled out of the 1847 Berkeley Way office over the holiday weekend. 

Majot estimated IRN lost about $2,000 in donation checks, though she expects contributors to replenish the funds. No cash was stored in the safe, and the burglars opted to leave behind computers. 

By Monday employees had gathered up the empty soda bottles and cherry jar from the floor and otherwise restored order to their office and remained determined to push on. 

“This makes you appreciate what you have and how easy it is to lose,” Majot said. “We’ll just have to buy a new safe and bolt this one to the ground.”  

Flower Pots Tossed 

A resident of the 2000 block of Ward Street called police Tuesday afternoon to complain that an acquaintance was throwing objects at her house and vandalizing her flower pots. The victim refused to press charges against the purported vandal and police said they couldn’t confirm if anyone was actually throwing flower pots or other objects. 

Armed Robbery 

A gunman robbed a Berkeley teenager as he walked along the 1300 block of Virginia Street late Tuesday afternoon, stealing the youth’s wallet before he fled east towards the North Berkeley Bart station. 

In one ill-chosen, offhand remark on New Year’s Day, President Bush undercut the immediate possibility of improved relations with Iran, savaging the efforts of his own State Department.  

It seemed that Washington was at last doing something positive for American-Iranian relations in the wake of the terrible human tragedy of the earthquake in Bam, Iran. The State Department was poised to sponsor a blue-ribbon humanitarian visit by relief experts headed by former Red Cross director, now U.S. Senator Elizabeth Dole (R-N.C.).  

In his remarks on the Bam tragedy, President Bush first praised his own administration for its compassion. Then he knocked the Iranians on the head. “The Iranian government must listen to the voices of those who long for freedom, must turn over Al Qaeda (members) that are in their custody and must abandon their nuclear weapons program,” Bush said.  

The Iranians thanked the United States for its concern, and then rejected the humanitarian visit, saying that such an event was “premature.”  

There is no doubt that President Bush’s remarks were the prime reason for the rejection of the humanitarian visit when one examines the reactions of Iranian officials as reported by London’s Financial Times and other press sources on Jan. 5. The Iranians immediately became suspicious that the U.S. visit was a political ploy.  

“Political issues must be examined and resolved in their own place, for which there are conditions,” said Kamal Kharrazi, the foreign minister addressing the decision to reject the visit.  

Hamid Reza Asefi, Iran’s foreign ministry spokesman, noted that Washington was speaking with “different voices.” He reiterated on Jan. 4 that Iran was open to talks based on “mutual respect,” but insisted the United States should not “tell Iran what to do,” referring clearly to the president’s remarks.  

In the wake of the Bam earthquake, the U.S. government provided relief aid, and more important, the ineffective economic sanctions against Iran that have been in place for nearly two decades were lifted for 90 days to allow financial aid to be transmitted to the Iranian disaster victims. Secretary of State Colin L. Powell, in an interview published in the Washington Post on Dec. 30, said that Iran’s recent actions had been “encouraging” and that the United States was open to “the possibility of dialogue at an appropriate point in the future.”  

But the neo-conservatives in Washington could not let well enough alone. As it lifted the ban on economic activities, the Bush administration issued a series of disclaimers pointing out that the sanctions were lifted temporarily for purely humanitarian purposes, with no implications for change of policy.  

In his remarks, Bush’s three “conditions” for improved relations reflect specious and inaccurate characterizations of Iran. The first, his charge to “listen to the voices of those who long for freedom,” is astonishingly vague. Most Americans do not realize that Iran has open and fair elections. The Iranian constitution, which gives inordinate power to conservative clerics, is now seen as flawed by many Iranian citizens. However, the nation follows its precepts assiduously.  

Elections for the Iranian parliament, the Majlis, will take place this year, and the nation will choose a new president next year. These events will be telling. Many Iranians are disappointed with the efforts of “reformists” such as President Khatami (who can not succeed himself). They plan to boycott the elections to deny the clerical establishment legitimacy if reform candidates are not allowed to run. Thus the Iranian people are likely to find their own solutions to their problems with representative government.  

Next, Bush’s call for Iran to give up members of Al Qaeda is a baseless charge. It presumes that these people exist. Iran repatriated Al Qaeda members fleeing from Afghanistan shortly after the American invasion, and there is no proof at all that there are any others of any consequence still in Iran. Merely to charge Iran with releasing these ephemeral people is to maintain the demonizing charge that Iran is the “chief sponsor of terrorism” in the world. In fact, Iranian officials have absolutely no reason to protect Al Qaeda members: They are utterly opposed to both the Taliban and Al Qaeda on both religious and political grounds.  

The last charge in the Bush message is equally specious. Iran has now complied fully with every international protocol for its nuclear development program, including additional international inspections. There is now no nation in better official compliance with international safeguards against weapons development than Iran.  

When Washington accuses Iranian leaders over and over of things they haven’t done, or are in the process of correcting, they simply retaliate with equally specious accusations. Iran’s leaders receive Bush’s statements as a clear indication that there is no way to deal with U.S. leaders on a rational basis. Everything gets set back to square one.  

President Bush desperately needs a verbal caretaker, such as former White House advisor Karen Hughes, at all times. When a U.S. president speaks, even in a casual manner, the world listens. Offhand remarks on sensitive issues risk doing irreparable damage.  

PNS contributor William O. Beeman teaches anthropology and directs Middle East Studies at Brown University. He is author of the forthcoming book, Double Demons: Cultural Impediments to U.S.-Iranian Understanding.

“What brought you to the United States?” I asked Irit as she stood in my kitchen, drinking a Diet Coke. My nephew Bryce ran into the room laughing, grabbed onto the back of my knees and hid from my neighbor, five-year-old Clyesha, who was chasing him while holding a new doll swathed in a pink blanket. Clyesha had on pajamas decorated with green and red dancing reindeers. On her feet was a pair of fuzzy bedroom slippers. 

Bryce shrieked as he ran out of the room and Clyesha followed, sliding on the hardwood floor and disappearing around the corner. My mother tapped me on the shoulder and asked where I kept the peppercorns. I pointed to a cupboard on the other side of the room. My father struggled nearby, cursing under his breath as he attempted to carve the turkey. “This knife is dull,” I heard him growl. My sister-in-law, Yuka, stood at the stove and stirred the gravy with a wooden spoon while sipping a glass of white wine. Harvey sat in the living room chatting with my husband, Ralph. Lynn and Rachel mixed the salad dressing and asked if I had serving utensils. “Over there,” I said, nodding to the drawer that my brother was rifling through, searching for an olive pitter.  

I turned my attention back to Irit. “Why not come to the United States?” she asked, answering my question with a question. “Doesn’t everyone want to come here?”  

“I don’t know,” I said, moving out of my brother-in-law’s way as he carried a bowl of Brussels sprouts into the dining room. “I’ve never lived anywhere, but here. I don’t know what it’s like to leave family and friends behind and move to a foreign country.”  

“Well,” said Irit, “think of it this way.” She moved closer to me as Hans pushed through the crowded kitchen, looking for something to wipe up a spill in the dining room. “Don’t worry,” he said as he passed by again, a wad of paper towels in his hands. “I’ve got it under control.” 

“You know what it is like when someone gives you an onion and says that it is sweet?” asked Irit, grabbing my attention once more.  

“I guess so,” I answered. 

“Do you want another drink?” shouted Teddy Franklin as he squeezed by me. “I’m making one for your mother. She still can’t find those damn peppercorns.”  

“Yes,” I said and handed him my glass. I turned back to Irit. “Go on,” I nodded, “I’m listening.”  

“When someone gives you an onion,” she repeated, “and says that it is sweet, you believe them, yes?”  

“Yes,” I answered, more firmly this time, but just then Andrea walked into the room and I got distracted by her black leather dress with the slit up the side.  

“I’m here,” yelled Andrea.  

“We can see that,” said Teddy Franklin, handing me my freshened drink. “Now where’d your Momma go?” he asked, but he didn’t wait for an answer.  

I turned my attention back to Irit. “Okay,” I said, “about those onions.”  

“Yes,” said Irit. Her husband Clint came up behind her and asked, “Where are the photos of Juji and Niju? Harvey wants to see them.”  

“Upstairs in my coat pocket,” she answered and turned back to me. “Where was I?” she asked.  

“The onions,” I prompted.  

“Ahh, the onions. They are sweet, but then someone gives you an orange and says, ‘Try this,’ and you do and it is much sweeter than the onion. It is much sweeter than anything you have ever tasted and you know then what you have been missing all those years when all you had were onions. You see?” she asked, peering over her glasses. “That is why I came to the United States from Israel and stayed. That is why Clint left Romania. Perhaps it is why Hans came from Nicaragua and Yuka from Japan. We all like onions, but oranges are sweeter.”  

“Time to eat,” shouted my father as he carried the big platter of turkey into the dining room.  

“Don’t forget the stuffing,” instructed my mother as she followed after my Dad. “Next time you go to the store, you need to buy peppercorns,” she whispered into my ear as she passed by.  

“Here’s the gravy,” said Yuka.  

“Here’s the olives,” said my brother.  

“We’ve got the salad,” said Lynn and Rachel in unison.  

“I’m not hungry,” said Andrea. “I’ll just eat some pie with ya’all later.”  

“I’m starved,” said Hans.  

“Here’s a photo of our dogs,” said Clint to no one in particular.  

“The Brussels sprouts are cold,” said my brother-in-law. 

“Let’s eat,” shouted Ralph.

An Alameda County Superior Court judge has ordered a quick turnaround in the Beretta unsafe pistol lawsuit, with jury selection in a new trial to begin in Oakland this week. 

The suit by the family of Kenzo Dix against the Maryland gunmaker ended in a hung jury late last December. A jury ruled in favor of Beretta five years ago in the same case, but that verdict was thrown out by a California Appeals Court. 

The lawsuit stems from the accidental Berkeley shooting death of the 15-year-old Dix by his then-14-year-old friend Michael Soe. Dix’ parents have claimed that the shooting resulted in part from a defective safety design of a Beretta pistol. 

—J. Douglas Allen-Taylor

Whether you’re dining out on piping hot naan or sampling masala paste for your homemade Indian dish, wherever you live in the Bay Area, it’s all but assured that almost every ingredient made a pit stop at a saffron-scented warehouse in West Berkeley. 

Twenty years after it was founded to keep beer flowing at what was then the Bay Area’s 16 Indian Restaurants, Vik Distributors—the parent company of West Berkeley’s famous chaat house—has emerged as chief supplier to over 250 Bay Area Indian restaurants and grocery stores. 

“People don’t need to pack food in their suitcases anymore,” said Vinod Chopra, the company’s president who arrived in Berkeley from Bombay in 1982 to find the supply of Taj Mahal beer at the San Francisco restaurant where his brother worked spotty at best. 

A marketer of pharmaceuticals in his native country, Chopra set out the following year to apply professional distribution practices to the nascent Indian beer market, winning an exclusive contract to supply the brews to Indian restaurants in every Bay Area county. 

Chopra quickly expanded into the food business, importing such Indian staples as rice, lentils and an array of spices for his restaurant accounts.  

Though tamarind, cardamom and coriander are synonymous with India, stringent government quality standards have kept many Indian products from crossing U.S. borders, forcing Chopra to scour the globe for “Indian food.”  

He gets his tamarind from Thailand and green cardamom from Guatemala, but hopes that, as India continues to modernize, its products will pass muster with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. The FDA also has longstanding bans on Indian mangoes and chikoos—a kiwi like fruit—much to the dismay of Indian shoppers. 

Chopra said his business has merely added variety to a Berkeley Indian food market that’s been bustling for decades. Before the rise of Silicon Valley shifted the community’s center of gravity south, Berkeley was the hub of Northern California Indian culture—with immigrants coming from as far as Sacramento to buy groceries, clothes, jewelry and electric converters for their 220-volt appliances. 

“Before the tech boom, many Indians gravitated to Berkeley either as professors or students at the university,” Chopra said. “Now it’s mostly the old timers with tough habits to break who come here to shop.” 

Despite the decline of jobs in Silicon Valley and visas for Indian tech workers, Chopra said the food business remains stable. Most threatening he said, is not the drop in new immigrants but the rising popularity of Indian spices that has attracted national brands like Schilling into what was once the exclusive territory of Indian merchants. 

The bigger brands buy at cheaper prices, but once Chopra gets the food to his warehouse, expenses are minimal. “We’re like the Costco for Indian restaurants,” he said. “Other companies might buy it for less, but their packaging and distribution costs are higher.” 

From his warehouse Chopra can deliver virtually anything an Indian restaurant could possibly want—food, tandoori ovens, even statues of Ganesh, a Hindu deity.  

What doesn’t go to local restaurants heads to grocery stores, including Vik’s own shop in West Berkeley.  

Among customers sifting through aisles of Indian curry paste, ginger paste and toothpaste, satisfaction with the selection depended on where in India the customer hails from. For those from the north or west—where Chopra grew up—the selection in Berkeley rivals that of home. “You get more things here than you get in India,” said Varsha Salan. “Here we can have food from all over India. There, only the food from our region was available.” 

But for Subha Sirnivasan, an immigrant from South India, Berkeley doesn’t have all the delicacies of her childhood. “You can get the common things here, but for a lot of South Indian groceries I have to go to Sunnyvale.” 

Though Chopra said he doesn’t plan on expanding his selection anytime soon, he’s recently returned to his roots, becoming the exclusive importer of Sula, the first Indian wine brought to the U.S. 

The wine has found a home at restaurants known for spicy food including The Slanted Door in San Francisco, but Chopra so far hasn’t bothered to sample his latest offering. 

“I’m purely a scotch man,” he said.

Growing up in Calcutta, high holidays meant not turkey or ham, but fish.  

Fish with spinach, fish curry, fried fish, fish egg chutney and the piece de resistance, fish-head curry.  

When my parents first moved to England in the ‘50s, my mother pretended to the fishmonger that she had a cat, so she could take fish heads home for a curry. Today, I can go to my local Asian supermarket in San Francisco and buy fish with heads and tails, not to mention Thai basil, basmati rice and frozen durian. Immigration once meant re-creating a left-behind life out of poor substitutes. Now, with the real McCoy available at the corner store in our global village, it’s hard sometimes to believe that we have to give up anything at all.  

For traditional Hindus, crossing the “kala pani,” or black water, that separated India from the West once meant a loss of caste. Whether they lost their caste or not, the price the first immigrants paid was severe. Punjabi farmers who came to the fields of California in the early 1900s were not allowed to bring wives. Many ended up marrying Mexican-American women and watched their children, with names like Isobel Garcia Singh, grow up more Catholic than Sikh.  

My parents went to London by ship. The extended family came to see them off, for there was no telling when they would make the long journey back. Traveling across places they’d only seen on maps, such as the Suez Canal and Bay of Biscay, and violently seasick in their cramped economy cabin, they arrived to a cold, unwelcoming England. Not only were there no fish heads for a leisurely Sunday afternoon curry, but every spice that was once common and familiar had to be hoarded for special occasions.  

Soon they learned how to substitute—which fish resembled their beloved hilsa, how to make a dessert of sandesh out of ricotta cheese. As they marveled, “Isn’t it almost like the real thing?” at the back of their minds there was always a lingering sense of loss. It spurred them to ride three buses and a train to see some visiting artist from India performing in England.  

When I arrived in the Midwest over a decade ago, I too, like my mother a generation before, learned to make do. Fueled no doubt by the memories of her own voyage west, she had tucked between my shirts and underwear, a year’s worth of carefully labeled turmeric, cumin and coriander. In a little notebook she had written down basic recipes for simple curries that might evoke a taste of home.  

But home was lost. I might have cumin and coriander, but what about the more exotic panchphoran and posto? I didn’t even know what to call them in English. Home had become a slim blue airmail letter that often took three weeks to get to Illinois from Calcutta.  

Nobody needs that anymore. News from home comes daily via e-mail. I can walk into an Indian cash and carry in Sunnyvale and get my Ayurvedic hair oil at nine o’clock at night. I can order customized CDs of my favorite Bengali songs online. Bollywood blockbusters release here at the same time as they do in India.  

That is how it should be. Immigration these days means giving up less and less. People still risk their lives to cross into America across scorching deserts or sealed in cargo containers. For most of us, however, immigration is now more banal, about plane tickets and visas. But what does it mean when, thanks to the marvels of technology, immigration is no longer the sloughing off of one’s skin it once was? Our journeys are no longer forged so much in loss and re-invention. Now they’re imbued with the cockiness of seizing the best of both worlds.  

The next generation of immigrants will not need to sift through their lives wondering what to pack and what to shed. But they will also never learn to value the country they left and the one they come to in the way my parents did. My mother’s fish curry once symbolized the loss of one home and invention of another. Mine is merely a good copy, its ingredients picked up casually from the freezer of an India Mart in Sunnyvale. It is only when you re-create your curry out of lies to the fishmonger and stand-in spices, when the news of death in the family comes weeks too late in a dog-eared letter, that you really reflect on the price of immigration and why you choose to do it.  

Sandip Roy is host of “Upfront,” the Pacific News Service weekly radio program on KALW-FM, San Francisco.  

California now ranks dead last in the country in per capita arts spending, at three cents per person, according to the most recent report from the almost-extinct California Arts Council. Last year, the 27-year-old Arts Council was decimated by a 94 percent budget cut from the Legislature and the governor. This situation is deeply ironic in a state which owes so much to the entertainment industry, which in turn has always relied on the talent produced by California’s formerly excellent arts education program, especially since so many of our political leaders, including the current governor, came from that industry. 

Gavin Newsom, the new mayor of San Francisco, famous as the author of “Care not Cash,” now wants to be seen as a supporter of the arts, even though he has no previous track record as a patron of arts events. Steven Winn in the San Francisco Chronicle did a long column on Newsom’s arty intentions on Tuesday, quoting him as saying, “It's important, symbolically and substantively, that I demonstrate not just a passing interest or election-day promise. It's important that I show my commitment.” Good enough, but he might have a way to go.  

La Boheme opened Tuesday night at the San Francisco Opera. There were banks of searchlights criss-crossing the sky out in front. Asked why, a ticket-taker said they were there because the new mayor was supposed to be attending. In the balcony, we didn’t see him, or at least we probably didn’t see him. The third act opened on a snowy Paris street scene, with homeless beggars huddled under blankets on the stage. In strode a top-hatted gentleman in an opera cloak, who ostentatiously kicked the beggars out of his way as he passed. In the audience, in the balcony, a stage-whisper: “Is that Gavin Newsom?” Well, no, probably not, but you never know. Good taste tip for the newbie: Going to the opera is great, but hold the searchlights. Nonetheless, bravo to Newsom for trying to do the right thing. 

Matt Gonzalez probably had more support from working artists in the recent election, especially from the ones who claim to have inherited the counter-cultural mantle. A favorite tactic of cost-cutters is to pit supporters of “elite” arts like classical music against supporters of “popular” art forms like murals, in contention for the shrinking dollar. That’s a trap we shouldn’t let ourselves fall into. All of the arts cross-nourish one another, and supporting any of the arts benefits the whole community. Principal actors in the beloved populist San Francisco Mime Troupe make the rent in the off season as Equity actors in more bourgeois houses like ACT.  

It all starts in the schools. Berkeley Symphony (and L.A. Opera) Conductor Kent Nagano credits his career to publicly funded arts education, as does Oakland Symphony conductor Michael Morgan. Both are devoted supporters of in-school music programs.  

The arts programs have traditionally been the crown jewels of Berkeley’s public school system. A recent New Yorker article profiled soprano Lorraine Hunt Lieberson, now 49, who graduated from Berkeley High School. “They had an amazing music program—an orchestra and three choirs,” she told the writer. “I sang solos in Mozart’s C-Minor Mass and had a wonderful time as Golde in Fiddler on the Roof.” Many other Berkeley High graduates, especially jazz musicians, have gone on to fame and fortune, but even more now share their talents with students and audiences in less glamorous settings closer to home. 

Berkeley audiences have a couple of upcoming chances to see how well our school music programs are doing these days, and to contribute to their support. Berkeley High’s usually fabulous Dance Production will play at the Florence Schwimley Little Theater, on the Allston Way side of the high school campus, at 8 p.m. for the next two weekends: Jan. 9, 10, 16, 17. There will be a festive performance and benefit for Berkeley High Jazz Ensemble, Thurs. Jan. 15 at 7:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. 

If you have time to get involved with what’s going on at the state level, you should plan to attend the upcoming California Arts Council meeting in San Francisco on Wednesday, Jan. 14, 2004. Titled “ Arts Funding Cuts in California: A Critical Response on the State of the Arts by State and National Leaders,” the meeting is a response to the statewide arts funding crisis. Councilmembers will assess the serious economic situation facing arts organizations in California as well as review the goal of the California Arts Council to advance arts, culture, and creativity in the state. The meeting will start at 10 a.m. in the Judicial Council Board Room (third floor) of the Hiram Johnson State Building, 455 Golden Gate Ave., San Francisco. It will run until 3 p.m. with a one-hour lunch break at noon. The public is invited to attend and address the meeting during public comments. 

Becky O’Malley is executive editor of the Berkeley Daily Planet. 

Holiday gatherings offer a chance to meet new people and find out what’s going on outside of Berkeley. Christmas cards and phone calls from distant friends are another way to get a window on the rest of the world. What I’ve learned this year is that planning issues and answers (or lack of answers) are remarkably similar throughout the country. From a farm friend back east: “We are still enjoying central Pennsylvania although there has been a great spurt of building around here—condominiums and McMansions going up with great abandon on some of the best farmland in the East. Progress marches on! It can’t be any crazier than California, though.” A young friend brought her brother from a midwestern university town to a Christmas party. He’s chair of his local historic preservation organization, and he reports that privately developed high-rise apartments are rapidly displacing the charming turn-of-the-century frame houses that sheltered generations of students with low rents. His major complaint is that easily disproved “affordability” criteria have been used as political cover for buildings which soon turn into high-priced market rate rentals. As a devoted progressive Democratic party activist, he’s particularly unhappy that his recently elected Democratic mayor has turned out to be in the developers’ pocket. Closer to home, some residents of an older East Bay exurb, who call themselves “democratic socialists;” complain that in their town trees are being cut down and potential parkland converted to apartments in the name of “saving the wilderness.” They still believe in what now seems to be an old-fashioned slogan, “think globally, act locally,” and they don’t think that filling up their local open space will prevent tenants of the new developments from moving to condominiums and McMansions on formerly rural lands as soon as they can afford it. Any of this sound familiar? 

Any editorial on growth-related controversies will elicit several passionate letters from true believers in the wide variety of quasi-solutions that have been proposed for the problem of excessive development in all the wrong places. All of these writers, if asked, would undoubtedly describe themselves as “progressives.” One camp (Smart Growth) contends that infill in Berkeley (or maybe El Cerrito) will stop McMansions in Fairfield or Carmichael. Doesn’t do much for central Pennsylvania, of course. Another (New Urbanism) contends that if you must build in Fairfield or central Pennsylvania, subdivisions comprised of houses close together with front porches will win out over McMansions on large lots. Maybe. But that’s what they already have in small towns in the Midwest, in areas which are still experiencing rural flight, and there in-town builders have another rationale for why their products are needed.  

The real secret is that the only way the building industry makes money is by building new buildings, and it’s always been willing to pay for the privilege. The major national contributor to both political parties has historically been the construction industry (though they may now be outbid by prison guards, who are really only a sub-set of the building lobby anyhow). Often, as in Berkeley, both “opposing” candidates are heavily subsidized by developer contributions. A little-noticed revision to election law raising the individual campaign contribution limit would make that even easier here, though Berkeley developers have traditionally circumvented the law by attributing large sums to their subcontractors and their mothers-in-law.  

Existing housing stock statistically has lower rents than new buildings which replace it. Rehabbing existing housing provides more jobs for more diverse workers than new construction. What re-use of old buildings doesn’t offer is excessive profit margins for big builders. Planning policy should be guided by what’s best for the overall community, not by what’s most profitable for developers. All over the country, like-minded progressive activists are fighting the same kinds of battles as we are in Berkeley, and we should be talking to one another all the time, not just during the holidays.  

Becky O’Malley is executive editor of the Berkeley Daily Planet.