A certain quiet seemed to gather over Berkeley on Thursday morning. As President Bush was inaugurated for his second term, it seemed many in Berkeley could only sit and watch in displeasure. 

The same was not true for a group of protesters who gathered at the Downtown Berkeley BART station. Armed with the poem, “Let America Be America Again,” by Langston Hughes, those gathered at the BART read the poem again and again, played music and read their own work and that of others.  

“We are listening to dea d language from D.C.,” said Al Young, a Berkeley poet and author. “I know what Hughes meant when he said, ‘Let America Be America Again.’” 

“O, let America be America again— 

The land that never has been yet— 

And yet must be—the land where every man is f ree. 

The land that’s mine—the poor man’s, Indian’s, Negro’s, ME— 

Who made America, 

Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain, 

Whose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain,  

Must bring back our mighty dream again.”  

The crowd, a mix of the yo ung and old, included several City Council members, the mayor and Ishmael Reed, the Oakland author and old friend of Hughes.  

Bill Trampleasure, a Berkeley resident, carried his United Nations flag and wore an American flag shirt, he explained, to reclai m the symbol. 

“When a nation loves itself more than the earth it shared with everyone, it’s trouble, war and destruction,” he said. 

Near the end of the event, Yaljfir Kafei, a.k.a Sleepee Bone Messiah, a 22-year-old hip-hop artist from Oakland, took the stage to recite a song called, “Breakin’ Away.” Raising his fists, and almost shouting into the mike, Kafei told a story about the world he knows as a young man. 

“It’s important to be here today because this country is built on blood and war, people are still eating unhealthy food, and living in ghettos,” he said. “It makes me sick to my stomach.”  

Earlier in the morning, Not In Our Name draped a large banner protesting the inauguration from the pedestrian bridge over Interstate-80 near the marina, slo wing early commute traffic along the highway.›

The City Council gave the go ahead Tuesday to the Seagate Building, which when completed will rise nine stories—the third tallest building in Berkeley. 

In other matters, the council endorsed the Kyoto Protocol on global warming and assigned the city’s air rights at the Ashby BART Station along the east side of Adeline Street to a consortium of disability organizations. In addition, the council held off voting on a plan to reduce auto lanes on Marin Avenue after holding a public hearing where 42 residents split on the issue. 

Seagate developer Darrell de Tienne of Seagate Properties Inc. said he planned to start demolition work sometime between March and June. When completed, the building slated for Center Street just west of Shattuck Avenue will rise 115 feet, include theater space, a retail shop and 149 apartments. 

Despite an 8-0-1 vote (Worthington, abstain) denying the appeal to Seagate’s use permit granted by the Zoning Adjustment Board (ZAB), several councilmembers criticized concessions given to the developer to maximize profits. 

In a separate motion, the council voted unanimously for a Planning Commission review of city procedures allowing extra stories for including art space and affordable units. 

At issue was city staff’s rationale for applying the two bonuses to maximize the building’s height from five stories to nine and its interpretation of affordable housing law to allow the below-market units to have on average fewer bedrooms and amenities. 

“I know this is a capitalist society and there is a certain hierarchy related to wealth and class,” said Councimember Max Anderson. “But I expected in Berkeley that we would take special care that we didn’t perpetuate those kinds of policies.” 

Nevertheless Anderson voted for the building, saying he couldn’t look a constituent in the eye if he opposed a project that provides affordable housing. 

Several councilmembers said that the building’s potential to lure upper income residents to the downtown and raise revenues outweighed concerns about process. “We have to stimulate the economy to broaden the tax base and pay for those things we value,” said Councilmember Linda Maio. 

Councilmember Kriss Worthington, fearing the opponents of the plan might file suit against the city, requested the council delay a vote until after a public hearing. Only Councilmember Dona Spring joined Worthington’s motion. 

Marin Avenue 

The council postponed until Tuesday its decision on the future of Marin Avenue, home to 21,000 daily car trips and the preferred route for many in North Berkeley to reach I-80.  

With Albany already set to re-stripe the bulk of the lower portion of Marin from four lanes of car traffic to two lanes with a center turning lane and side bicycle lanes, Berkeley has proposed to follow suit on four additional blocks heading east to The Alameda. 

Among the speakers at the meeting, the majority of those who lived on Marin supported the plan, arguing that speeding cars endanger pedestrians and bicyclists. Most of the speakers from nearby side streets or the Berkeley hills opposed it for fear that it would disperse traffic onto their streets and slow commute times. 

“I hope it does divert a little traffic,” said Dale Nesbitt, a Marin Avenue resident. “How would you like it if there were 21,000 cars zipping down your street so its too dangerous to cross.” 

“I feel bad for the people on Marin, but it’s a highway,” said Howard Stone, who lives near the avenue. 

Motorists average 31 mph on Marin, six miles above the speed limit, according to a report from the traffic engineering firm Fehr and Pierce. From 2001 through 2003, there were 114 collisions on the section of the avenue encompassed by the plan, according to the report. 

Last June, Berkeley resident Thomas Bowen was killed crossing Marin at Modoc Street when the driver in the inside lane didn’t see Bowen crossing the intersection, his neighbor John Stoops told the council 

Unconvinced that the re-striping project would improve safety, Michael Katz recommend the council take targeted pedestrian initiatives instead, like new traffic signals, while Albany tried re-striping. “It would be a wonderful controlled experiment,” he said. 

If approved, the $30,000 re-striping project would be reviewed after one year. City staff has pledged to perform before and after traffic studies at nine intersections to monitor the program’s success. 

Pressed by Councilmember Laurie Capitelli whether a 20 percent increase in traffic volume on side streets would be considered a limited diversion, City Bicycle Planner Heath Maddox replied that the city had not yet set thresholds for acceptable levels of traffic diversion. 

Other Matters 

The council voted unanimously to reject a proposed three-story house in the Berkeley hills that would have blocked the bay views of an existing house directly to the east.  

“If you’re here first, you shouldn’t have your view blocked by a neighbor’s construction,” said Mayor Tom Bates. 

The council instructed the ZAB to require the owner of the proposed home to either reduce it by one story or move it to the back of the lot. 

›

Berkeley’s town-gown dispute moved one step closer to the courtroom Thursday when the UC Board of Regents certified UC Berkeley’s 15-year-expansion plan. 

“They’ve really put our backs to the wall,” said Mayor Tom Bates Tuesday after the Regents Committee on Grounds and Buildings unanimously recommended the plan for approval. Hours after the committee meeting, the City Council voted to proceed with a lawsuit. 

Meanwhile the two sides remain several million apart on how much the university should pay the city as compensation for its exemption from city taxes that pay for services such as the fire department and sewers. 

The university has offered to boost its annual payments by about $500,000 to $1.1 million, said UC Berkeley Chancellor Robert Birgeneau after Tuesday’s committee meeting. City officials, facing a $7.5 million deficit this year, are holding out for between $3 and $5 million annually, according to UC spokesperson Trey Davis. 

Last year, the city released a consultant’s report that calculated the city lost $11 million annually in unpaid services to the university. UC officials criticized the study for not factoring in university contributions to the city’s economy. 

Bates refused to disclose the city’s proposal, but said he was asking that the university pay in the neighborhood of $1.7 million for fire services and $1.4 million for sewers.  

Chancellor Birgeneau argued that annual payments of $3 million would cost 300 students the chance to attend the university. “We’re willing to help [the city] in any way except take 300 students out of the university,” he said. 

The university’s Long Range Development Plan (LRDP) projects 2.2 million square feet of new administration and academic space, 2,600 new dorm beds and 1,800 to 2,300 new parking spaces by 2020. The university would defer 500 parking spaces if AC Transit builds a planned rapid bus system to serve the campus. 

City officials charge that the plan will further congest city streets and give UC Berkeley a blank check for a building boom that would strain city services and skirt strict environmental review. 

At Tuesday’s committee meeting, the mayor urged the Regents’ committee to postpone a vote until March to bolster the city’s negotiating leverage. 

“I believe if you ratify this we will be at a competitive disadvantage with the university,” he said. “They’ll have gotten what they need and can move forward.” 

Regent Odessa Johnson rejected the mayor’s argument, saying that the differences would take more than a few months to iron out and that the Regents would monitor negotiations even thought the plan’s approved. “I’m sure Berkeley will keep us informed how [the negotiations] go,” she said. 

Beyond the issue of university payments, the city has also failed to compel the university to pinpoint the exact location of new construction and set thresholds for which projects would require environmental impact reports—the most stringent form of environmental review.  

More progress has been made in bridging the divide over parking. UC Berkeley is offering to trim the number of new parking spaces further to below 1,800, and is looking to include BART as part of its faculty transit pass, said Irene Hegarty, the university’s director of community relations.  

Despite the Regents’ decision, Bates still hoped to avert a lawsuit, which he estimated would cost the city $250,000. A lawsuit could stall university construction on an Asian studies center whose EIR is tied to the long range plan and, if successful, could force the university to revise the plan. 

Should the city file suit, Bates expects it will retain as its lead attorney Michelle Kanyon of the Oakland firm McDonough Holland & Allen PC. 

At Tuesday’s committee meeting, Bates was joined by Councilmembers Gordon Wozniak, Darryl Moore, Linda Maio and Kriss Worthington, about a dozen city residents and two UC Berkeley student leaders. 

Addressing student concerns over the proposed increase in parking spaces, ASUC Executive Affairs Vice President Liz Hall told the committee, “If you’re really concerned about sustainability, you will send this plan back to UC Berkeley.” 

Andrea Pflaumer, a member of Berkeleyans for a Livable University Environment, urged the university to locate new research facilities in Oakland and Richmond. “Rather than make Berkeley bust at the seams any further, the university could use new facilities to help communities in a much broader area,” she said. 

In addressing the committee, Chancellor Birgeneau defended the plan’s scope of new development as well as its lack of specifics as necessary to meet future demand for research facilities. 

“More and more of the responsibility for research in the U.S. is falling on universities,” he said, adding that new endeavors like state-funded stem cell research meant that the university must keep its building plans flexible. 

A throng of anxious residents and two city councilmembers turned out Wednesday to meet the new owners, operators and remodellers of Berkeley’s long-troubled Harriet Tubman Terrace Apartments. 

They emerged from the meeting with significant concessions, especially a promise that no resident would have to pay anything during the days they’d be moved out of their apartments during renovations. 

Poorly maintained and long-plagued by drug, crime and accountability problems, the 91-unit senior housing complex at 2781 Adeline St. hasn’t officially changed hands, though residents learned that final approval by the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development is expected soon. 

Unlike most affordable senior housing in the city, Tubman is owned by a for-profit company. The outgoing owner, Los Angeles-based Century Pacific Housing Partnership, is selling to another for-profit, New Jersey-based Michaels Development. 

Though the sale isn’t final, pending approval by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), city officials scheduled the Wednesday meeting out of concerns that tenants of the affordable housing complex hadn’t been properly informed of the potential impacts of the sale. 

“They sent out two letters at our insistence, and we didn’t consider either one to be adequate,” said City Councilmember Kriss Worthington, who attended the session along with his recently elected colleague, Max Anderson. 

“There have been enormous worries and concerns among tenants that the change of ownership could mean that they could no longer afford the units. Their letters didn’t address the issue of affordability,” Worthington said after the meeting. 

Following the meeting, Residents and Tenants Council President Barry C. Gardner Jr. said he was pleased with most of what he heard, but wanted a second meeting to address residents’ security concerns. 

Speakers included officials from Michaels; Interstate Realty Management, the firm which will manage repairs and finances at the Adeline Street facility; a vice president of Icon Builders, which will conduct sorely needed repairs; and the executive director of Pacific Housing Inc., the non-profit firm that will provide education, training, recreation and other services for residents. 

“We know you have lots of concerns,” Bill Scheidig, MIchaels’ vice president of construction, told the 80 or so residents gathered in Tubman’s multipurpose room. “We thought it in your best interests to call you together and let you know what’s going to occur. We’ll be doing rehabilitation and remodeling early this year.” 

When one resident asked Scheidig if Michaels would retain the same on-site staff, his affirmative response drew applause from the audience.  

Residents expressed delight again when he assured them that their rents wouldn’t be going up, though subsidies might increase for his firm. 

One of the happiest bits of news for many residents was the announcement that Harriet Tubman Terrace would continue as affordable housing for the next 55 years, ensuring guaranteed housing for as long as current residents are alive. But the promised improvements also ranked high on their lists.  

Carin Schmidt, vice president and senior project manager for Icon, said her crews would be installing new kitchens in all the units, including floors and hardware, installing new toilets and shower valves as well as linoleum and fresh paint in all the bathrooms, putting in new windows, screens and patio doors and adding new smoke detectors and sensors in all units that will turn on entry hall lights when the door is opened. 

Other improvements will include adding two new boilers to improve the facility’s often ailing steam heating system, upgrading elevators, replacing the roof, renovating the entryway and repairing broken sidewalks and walkways. 

Under state and federal housing fund allocation statutes, a non-profit must be the managing partner of any subsidized housing project owned by a for-profit company. In the new Tubman Terrace ownbership structure, Sacramento-based Pacific Housing Inc. is the non-profit minority owner and managing partner. 

Cynthia Brooks, the tenant services manager, promised that residents would have a full range of programs, including table games, bingo, a regular game night and other activities based on a survey of resident interests. 

“We’re here to make that happen, and we anticipate we will begin our services in the summer,” she said. 

Scheidig, a property manager for 25 years, said construction would take from six to nine months. “We want to be completely done this year, and we’ll be doing 12 apartments a week. Residents will need to be out of their apartments for two days while working is going on.” 

“We’re all happy to see the renovation, but I’m concerned about the adequacy of the relocation allowance,” said Anderson, who was elected to the City Council in November. “I’m anxious that the changes be as smooth as possible, and I’m concerned with the people and their needs while all this is happening.” 

“There is a $200 allowance management will provide on the day of each move,” Scheidig said. “We will help relocating them for those two days if needed. We will select a hotel, but if they want to go and stay with friends, they’ll still get the money.” 

“People also need transportation, too,” said a resident. 

“I really want to hear a commitment from you that none of these residents will incur any expenses,” said Anderson. “The expenses this lady alluded to are real expenses. I don’t know of any hotel in Berkeley that rents rooms under $100 a night, and I want to make sure no one incurs any expenses.” 

“We can commit to that,” said Chuck Durnin, vice president of Interstate Realty Management. 

“Good,” said Anderson to the residents’ applause. 

Following the meeting, Anderson and Worthington expressed qualified satisfaction. 

“It’s an important step to have renovations for these seniors who have wanted them for a long time,” Anderson said. “I was also pleased at the significant commitment they made that tenants won’t suffer any out-of-pocket expenses—and my office is available to advocate for them if they have any problems.” 

“I want to see their promises in writing,” Worthington said. “We’ll write up a letter saying what we understand they said, and we’ll ask them to confirm it in writing to the residents, especially the agreement to cover expenses in case some residents have to be out of their apartments for a third night.” 

Residents and Tenants Council President Gardner said he was pleased at the outcome of Wednesday’s session, but cautioned than much remains to be done. 

A former HUD investigator, Gardner said safety concerns remain a big issue, especially problems with drug dealers who some residents invite into the building. 

“I have good relations with the police, and we had a narcotics raid here in June where four people were arrested, and that’s a bigger problem than all of the physical stuff with the building,” he said. “We have transients coming in through the front door, and I advise tenants not to talk to them because they’re dangerous. That’s the key thing now.” 

During the meeting, Michaels officials outlined plans to redo the entrance and lobby, but Gardner said additional steps are needed to ensure tenants safety. 

Gardner said the physical problems were real, due mainly to cheap construction methods. “They used aluminum wiring instead of copper, and the pipes are poor quality and can’t carry enough steam pressure to reach all the units adequately. 

“But we have these people coming in most nights, and that’s a far bigger problem.” 

Gardner liked what he heard about the new management. 

“The last time I saw any official from Gateway Properties of Fresno, the old management company, was back in April or May.” 

Chabad of San Francisco, an Orthodox Jewish congregation, had been listed as the previous tenant service provider, but Gardner said he hadn’t seen anyone from the group in years. Chabad did not return calls for this article. 

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With no dissent and much praise, the Berkeley Unified School District’s Board of Directors approved Berkeley High School’s third small school this week. 

The new School of Social Justice and Ecology (SSJE) is scheduled to join BHS’ Communications Arts and Science and Community Partnership Academy in the fall with a freshman enrollment of 56. 

The SSJE was listed on the board’s agenda as a conference item for possible placement on a future agenda, but the Board decided to act on it immediately instead. 

In an emotional scene in board chambers following the vote, SSJE promoters exchanged hugs with each other and with BHS principal Jim Slemp, and received handshakes of congratulations from board members. 

The BUSD board has committed itself to remaking the 3,000-student BHS into a half-small-school environment by the end of the next school year. 

Slemp noted that while BHS’ first two small schools were crafted out of existing school programs, SSJE was put together “from scratch.” 

Board Vice President Terry Doran called the approval of the school a major step “in a long journey to improve Berkeley High. This is so much greater than my original narrow vision of what was needed at the high school 15 years ago.” 

Student Director Lily Dorman-Colby said that she was particularly impressed with SSJE’s proposal to have students assigned to a single counselor to track them throughout their four years at the school. 

“The problem with Berkeley High is that there are opportunities, but only if you can get to them,” she said. “There’s nobody holding your hand.” 

BHS teacher Joel Hildebrandt, who will be moving from the larger school to teach at SSJE, said, “the climate has changed so that small schools are now in the forefront of Berkeley High. We’re making presentations to the board, instead of meeting in someone’s basement.” 

Hildebrandt was among five presenters at this week’s meeting. He was joined by parent Gina Wolley and BHS senior Scott Rasmussen, who worked on the SSJE proposal for more than a year even though he would never be able to attend the school. 

They presented a 43-page proposal and accompanying PowerPoint slideshow describing a school where science, math, and literacy will be blended together in a curriculum that emphasizes leadership, training and critical thinking, and where students will take trips to such locations as the Galapagos Islands and the Costa Rican rainforests to study ecology. 

Presenters stressed that while SSJE will have a higher graduation standard than most of Berkeley High (the goal will be UC-CSU-qualified for all graduates), grades and test scores are intended to be means to an end, rather than ends in themselves. One presenter noted that students will be allowed to retake tests and rewrite papers until they are satisfied with the results, with teachers acting more as collaborators than authority figures. 

“This is not going to be a ‘rip-and-rote’ environment,” she said. 

Math teacher George Palen explained that “learning at SSJE will be based on inquiry and problem-solving.” Rasmussen added that “SSJE will make high school not something to survive, but an experience to cherish. The most important thing is that students will be able to see their teachers in a new light, as real people.” 

The school board is scheduled to review an application for BHS’ fourth small school—the Arts and Humanities Academy—at its Feb. 2 meeting. 

In other action at Wednesday’s meeting, the board authorized the creation of an advisory committee to review the possible sale of the building and property at the old Hillside School, after rejecting a proposal to expand the committee to advise on all possible surplus properties in the district. 

Saying that he is “not willing to concede any other properties at the present time,” Director John Selawsky said that “surplusing school property is an extreme action and I don’t plan to make a habit of it.” 

The Hillside property has been ruled unsuitable for public school use because it sits directly on the Hayward earthquake fault. The board’s action in setting up the committee does not commit the district to selling the Hillside property, but only preserves that as a legal option. Those wishing to serve on the Hillside Surplus Advisory Committee were asked to contact the office of the superintendent or individual board members. 

The board also postponed, at Board President Nancy Riddle’s request, approval of a budget timeline so that Superintendent Michele Lawrence could include times for input from the district’s various budget advisory panels, especially the Planning and Oversight Committee of the Berkeley Schools Excellence Project. 

Riddle said these committees are “important to the budget process. Putting them in the timeline demonstrates to them and to the public at large our recognition of that importance.” 

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God of Compassion,  

You let your rain fall on the just and the unjust,  

Expand and deepen our hearts so that we may love as You love,  

Even those among us who have caused the greatest pain by taking life. For there is in our land a great cry for vengeance as we fill up death rows and kill the killers in the name of justice, in the name of peace.  

—Sr. Helen Prejean, CSJ  

Gilbert Saavedra took a small photo from his jacket pocket: a smiling Patty Geddling, murdered in 1981 by Donald Beardslee. “She was my cousin. Tonight she’s getting justice.”  

Geddling and Stacey Benjamin were murdered in 1981 by Donald Beardslee, now 61, while he was on parole for a 1969 murder. Beardslee, administered a lethal combination of diuent, pancuronium bromide and potassium chloride, was pronounced dead at 12:29 a.m. Wednesday. He had lost all legal appeals; Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger denied him clemency.  

“He was found guilty by a jury of his peers. Justice is justice,” said an emotional Saavedra, who walked with a few family members among the crowd that organizers estimated at about 500 people. They gathered at the San Quentin gates to pray, meditate, cry and speak out against “state-sanctioned killing.”  

Saavedra wanted others to understand his pain. “My cousin never got to see her children grow. Never got to see her grandchildren. Patty—the victims have rights too.”  

Death penalty foes, brought together by the Bay Area Anti-Death Penalty Coalition, addressed the crowd that swelled as midnight drew near, despite the icy cold. “We know that killing people here doesn’t bring anyone back,” said Sujal Parikh, of the Berkeley chapter of the Campaign to end the Death Penalty. A Hindu, Parikh said his faith teaches that non-violence is the highest creed.  

“All the ills of society get loaded down on this person (Beardslee) and they stop his heart,” said Wilson Riles, former Oakland City Councilmember, and former Western Region director of the American Friends Service Committee. Death, he said, is something that should be left to a higher power. “How can one man do the act of God? It shouldn’t be that way.”  

Former inmate Dorsey Nunn, organizer with Legal Services for Prisoners with Children, introduced the speakers. He asked, “Ask yourself at five minutes past 12—will you be any safer?”  

Speakers, including State Assemblymembers Sally Lieber, (D-Mountain View), and Mark Leno, (D-San Francisco), condemned Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger for refusing to grant Beardslee clemency.  

Talya Brott, 11, of Oakland, stood in the crowd listening and also blamed the governor. “I don’t think the death penalty is right,” she said. “Killing people who kill is contradicting themselves. Arnold Schwarzenegger can stop that right now.” If she had a chance, Talya said she would ask the governor, “What are you getting out of killing this person who is mentally impaired. You could stop it!”  

One of the defenses lawyers invoked in appeals that were denied is that Beardslee’s brain damage—he was said to have been impaired since birth, then brain damaged again in two separate accidents—was not considered and that, with modern medical equipment, the extent of the impairment could be proven.  

In a statement denying clemency, however, the governor had asserted earlier in the day, “We are not dealing here with a man who is so generally affected by his impairment that he cannot tell the difference between right and wrong.”  

While some called for a moratorium on the death penalty until the newly constituted California Commission on the Fair Administration of Justice could report on the fairness and effectiveness of California’s death penalty, many in the crowd opposed it under any circumstances. 

Faye Butler, 75, of Fremont, has come to all 11 vigils with Pax Christi since 1992. “I’m not at all for vengeance. Killing doesn’t stop killing; it continues the cycle of violence,” she said. 

Sally Hindman of the Berkeley Friends Meeting believes similarly. “Killing people is wrong,” she said, “especially killing to make amends for killing.”  

Beardslee was one of 640 people on California’s death row, the largest in the nation.  

For some, opposing the death penalty may be harder than others. Lee and Murray Richardson lost their 10-year-old son to murder. They spoke earlier in the evening at a prayer vigil at Saint John’s Catholic Church in El Cerrito. 

“First there was tremendous anger, then bewilderment,” Murray Richardson said. The words of St. John’s pastor Fr. John Maxwell helped him. “I began to open my heart,” he said. The couple has come to believe that “the state is as wrong for killing murderers as it is for murderers to kill.” The Richardsons work with Murder Victims’ Families for Reconciliation.  

Hal Carlstad, 79, of Berkeley Unitarian Fellowship’s Social Justice Committee, chose another way to express his opposition to the death penalty. Along with Fr. Louis Vitale of St. Boniface Catholic Church in San Francisco, and three others, he was arrested blocking the gate at San Quentin on Monday. Carlstad spent the night in jail; charges were dropped Tuesday. 

The experience was instructive, he said in an interview Wednesday. His cellmate was a 24-year-old man whose father was in prison. The young man had never held a job and has a number of arrests for theft. 

“The state needs to spend its funds on programs for people like him and not on executions,” Carlstad said.  

As the 12:01 a.m. Wednesday execution time drew near, the crowd at the San Quentin gates, continuously videotaped by prison officials atop a nearby roof, became still. The saddened voice of Father Bruce Bramlett, a San Quentin spiritual advisor, came over the loud speaker. “There is no more time to teach; there is no more time to protest. It is time to pray. Brothers and sisters, let us hold each other tight.”  

Two days before a four-hour community meeting on the proposed 2,500-slot addition to the Casino San Pablo card room, Sen. Diane Feinstein’s office announced she would introduce a bill to remove the site’s eligibility for tribal gaming. 

East Bay Assemblymember Loni Hancock, who is calling the 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday gathering, praised the move. 

“I’m very grateful that she’s doing it, and I hope she gets the support needed to pass it,” Hancock said. 

An earlier version of the bill failed to make it through the 108th Congress in 2003. 

U.S. Congressional Rep. George Miller had tacked on a rider to the Omnibus Indian Advancement Act of 2000, backdating the Lytton Rancheria of Pomos claim on land they purchased that year to 1988, making it eligible for a tribal casino. 

No new tribal casinos can be built on land acquired after that date unless the tribe was deemed to have unfairly lost their reservation status prior to that date. 

Feinstein’s bill would strike the line of the provision, eliminating the ability to expand the cardroom, while allowing the tribe to retain the land. 

“The people made in clear in the last election that they are concerned about increased gambling when they rejected Propositions 68 and 70,” Hancock said. 

The two measures, floated by conflicting gambling interests, would have resulted in further casino expansion. 

Hancock will be joined Saturday by two Democratic Assembly colleagues, Joe Nation from Marin County and Joe Canciamilla of Pittsburg, whose district abuts Hancock’s.  

Hancock has assembled an all-star panel featuring two of the country’s leading experts on gambling, Nelson Rose of Whittier Law School and economist William Thompson of the University of Nevada-Las Vegas. 

Margie Meija, president of the Lytton Band of Pomos, will present the tribe’s perspective at the meeting. 

Among the others on the program are Contra Costa County Supervisor John Gioia, San Pablo City Manager Brock Arner, city councilmembers from San Pablo, Richmond, Oakland, San Leandro and Alameda, and officials from the West Contra Costa County School District, CalTrans, the Hotel Employees Restaurant Employees union, the Sierra Club, and the Gambling Addiction Institute. 

Hancock said she is particularly concerned about the potential traffic impacts of “a Las Vegas-sized casino built right next to I-80” and by impacts on the nearby Doctors Hospital, the only public emergency room within a 25-mile radius.  

The Lyttons are one of five tribal groups who signed pacts with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger granting the tribes exclusive geographic franchises in exchange for 25 percent of net gambling revenues. 

The accords require legislative approval, and the San Pablo pact has been stalled after fierce opposition arose. Schwarzenegger and the tribe agreed to scale back the deal from 5,000 slot machines to 2,500, but that wasn’t enough for opponents. 

State revenues would be further reduced if two tribal groups win approval for casinos of their own at Point Molate and North Richmond—the latter a mere five or so miles from the San Pablo site. 

“Once the compact is signed, there is no guarantee that the negative effects of a giant casino will be mitigated,” Hancock said. “Under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), local governments have the right to enforce mitigations, but the San Pablo agreement is only called CEQAesque. No contract should be signed in any case without provisions for strict enforcement of compliance.” 

The Lyttons are building support through an impressive media campaign. 

Tribal leaders will present San Pablo Mayor Joe Gomes with a list of 1,500 casino supporters this morning (Friday) and are expected to attend Hancock’s meeting. 

Saturday’s meeting begins at 10 a.m. in the Knox Center for the Performing Arts at Contra Costa Community College in San Pablo. 

DIRECTIONS: Take I-80 to the El Portal Drive exit, then left under the freeway, continuing westbound to Castro Drive. The center is right at the intersection.

Mired in an eight-figure debt and hemorrhaging red ink just seven months ago, Richmond has finally emerged from debt, announced City Councilmember Tom Butt 

“Just 12 months after we were hit by a fiscal train wreck,” Butt said, “the city is once again solvent with a balanced budget, no structural deficit and no cumulative deficit.”  

Butt divided the credit among his fellow councilmembers, voters who enacted a new sales tax, city employees who agreed to a 10 percent pay reduction and to new management at the upper levels of municipal government. 

As a result of the debt elimination, Butt said, Moody’s Investors has upgraded the city’s bonds four ranks to Baa2. Similar upgrades are expected form Standard & Poor’s, the other major rating service. 

If the second upgrade follows, Richmond bonds will be once again considered investment grade and the city will be once again able to turn to the market to raise needed revenues, Butt said.  

—Richard Brenneman?

In a demonstration of Ward Connerly’s ability to influence California events even on his way out the door, the University of California Board of Regents this week debated diversity issues in American law schools and passed a policy affirming intervention in the K-12 achievement gap battles in Connerly’s last meeting as a regent. 

Connerly was appointed for his eight-year term in 1993 by then-Governor Pete Wilson. The two-day Regents meeting was held at the UCSF Laurel Heights campus in San Francisco. 

At Connerly’s request, regents heard a presentation from UCLA Law School professor Richard Sander on his controversial “mismatch” theory that affirmative action policies designed to give a boost to African-American law school admissions have actually been detrimental to the African-American law school applicants themselves. 

Shortly before, the regents approved Policy RE-56, co-introduced by Connerly and Student Regent Judi Anderson, “affirming engagement in the preschool-through-postsecondary education system as fundamental to the university’s mission.” 

Connerly is well-known for his belief that affirmative action is morally wrong and should be ended, both in California and in the nation. At Connerly’s initiative, the UC Regents banned affirmative action in the UC system in 1995. A year later, California voters passed Connerly’s Proposition 209, ending the practice in state agencies. 

What is less-known and little-discussed about Connerly is his companion belief that while government has no right to intervene to end racial inequalities, it has every responsibility to make sure that underrepresented minorities are equally prepared. This week, he made good on pledges to advance that agenda as well. 

“While it’s not critical to go to college to lead a productive life, for most people it’s the ticket,” Connerly told the regents. “This policy gets the university engaged in getting all our students into higher education. It’s not an asterisk or an afterthought. It’s part of our core commitment.” 

Anderson said that the new policy “sends a message to California schools that they need to address and ameliorate educational inequality in our state.” 

The new policy acknowledges that “significant gaps in achievement exist in the pre-K-16 education system” and pledges university support and resources in an “unambiguous effort” to “reduce educational inequities.” 

The proposal calls upon “the UC President, in collaboration with the Governor, the Legislature, the other segments of California public education, and business and community leaders, develop and implement a plan for meaningful, consistent, and long-term funding” for a program of ‘Academic Preparation and Educational Partnerships’ between UC and K-12 public schools. The proposal commits UC to “broad efforts … to build the capacity of [California’s] preschool-postsecondary education system to academically prepare students for their future endeavors.” 

The proposal passed unanimously, with little discussion. 

That was not the case with Professor Sander’s “mismatch” theory presentation, which drew some 30 minutes of dissent and debate. 

Sander’s presentation was a slideshow summary of his 117-page “A Systematic Analysis of Affirmative Action in American Law Schools” published this week in the Stanford Law Review. 

In the paper, Sander concludes that “the annual production of new black lawyers would probably increase if racial preference were abolished tomorrow.” In a Los Angeles Times interview last November, Sander said, “The big picture is that this system of racial preferences is no longer clearly achieving the goal of expanding the number of black lawyers. There’s a very good chance that we’re creating such high attrition rates that we’re actually lowering production of black lawyers, and certainly we are weakening the preparation of the black lawyers we are producing.” 

In his presentation to the regents, Sander said that lowering admissions standards to allow African-Americans into top-tier law schools has produced what he calls the “cascade effect,” meaning that each succeeding tier of schools is forced to admit what he called lesser-qualified blacks in order to reach racial goals. 

Connerly told Sander that his only criticism of the study was that its conclusions were based on the fact that affirmative action in the nation’s law schools is not working in its intended goal to produce more black lawyers. 

“I think the use of race is morally wrong, regardless of the result,” Connerly said. “If that weren’t the case, someone could come up with a study to show benefits from segregation.” 

UC Berkeley Boalt Hall School of Law Dean Chris Edley disputed Sander’s assumptions and conclusions in a following presentation to the regents, stating that the failure of many black lawyers to follow up top-tier law school inclusion with equal success in the workplace could be due to “lingering discrimination in our society,” and that prospective black lawyers should not be judged on their test scores alone. 

“Even in a color-blind world there will still be a score gap between blacks and whites,” he said, adding that it was performance that ultimately counted. “And a lot of things are driving performance other than standardized test scores that are stamped on students’ heads when they enter the door.” 

Answering Sander’s contention that higher grades, regardless of the prestige of the law school, were the real key to success after graduation, including bar passage rates and salary, Edley said that “if you say that it’s better to get an A from the University of Tennessee than it is to get a C from Vanderbilt, one possible response might be to say ‘My God! Don’t let them go to Vanderbilt, then!’ Another response might be to say, ‘What is it that Vanderbilt is doing wrong in preparing its black graduates for their careers? How can we change that?’” 

Regent Judith Hopkinson, a Gray Davis appointee, told Sander that “it bothers me that we would come to certain conclusions based on your research. It seems as if you only looked at racial factors, but it’s not clear that if you looked at socioeconomic factors, you wouldn’t come to the same conclusions.” 

And regent Tom Sayles, a Wilson appointee, said that if lower grades—and not graduation from prestigious law schools—were the main criteria for career success among all students—both white and black— “then maybe we should just be dumbing down and sending everybody to lower-tiered schools.” 

In the end, regents agreed with Edley’s contention that more research on Sander’s study was needed before any conclusions could be drawn or action taken. Edley called Sander’s Stanford Law Review paper “a good and needed addition” to that study. 

At an interview with reporters during a lunch break, UC President Robert Dynes said that Connerly’s legacy on the Regents Board was going to be mixed. 

“On such things as domestic partner benefits and lowering costs for students, he did good work, very good work” Dynes said. “But I disagreed with him on affirmative action. That’s no secret.” 

For his part, the 65-year-old Connerly said following the meeting that he was taking off from public life for a knee operation in a few weeks, after which he would be prepared to talk about any possible future actions.Å

Lily Hearst (nee: Lily Elisabeth Roger), the oldest citizen in Berkeley, died Wednesday at her home in her sleep.  

Lily was born in Oswiciem, Austria (Poland) on May 31, 1897. Her father was an official with the Railroad System of the Austrian Empire, a nd the family was living in Oswiciem at the time of her birth. She lived the first third of her life in Vienna. She was an avid piano student and a sports lover. 

She and her sister were among the most ardent and adventurous female skiers in the Vienna of their time, both proudly defying convention by wearing ski pants and rejecting skirts while on the ski slopes. 

It was on a ski train that Lily met her future husband, Alphonse Bernard Hirsch. Alphonse was a skilled mountaineer and skier, and it was this connection which initially brought them together. Climbing mountains was one of their great joys. 

As a married woman, Lily studied piano at the Music Academy of Vienna, and in the last decades of her life she was primarily known by her friends for her p assion for classical music. Her brother, Kurt Roger, was an accomplished composer. 

Following her marriage in 1929, Lily gave birth to two children in Vienna, Helga Louise in 1931, and Hans Eugen in 1935. In 1938, six months after the German anschluss, th e Hirsch family was fortunate to emigrate to the United States, and Lily’s life transitioned from her relatively privileged life in Vienna as the wife of a banker, to that of a woman raising two children in a third floor apartment in East Orange, NJ, whil e Alphonse commuted to his employment as an accountant in NYC. 

Near the end of World War II, Lily and Alphonse became American citizens and changed their family name from Hirsch to Hearst. During this period, Lily gave piano lessons to young students and retained her passion for music through attendance of concerts at Carnegie Hall and opera at the Metropolitan Opera. These years constituted the second third of Lily’s life. 

In 1970, Alphonse and Lily moved to Berkeley, California, to be near the family of their son who had been re-named John, a Professor of Chemistry at UC Berkeley. Thus, Lily began the last third of her life. Alphonse died in 1978. Lily retained her energetic interest in life for 26 more years, being an active member of the Berkeley Hiking Club and a swimmer at the Berkeley City Club, attending the North Berkeley Senior Center nearly every day, and devotedly attending both the weekly noon concerts at Hertz Hall on the Berkeley campus and every opera season at the San Francisco Opera. 

For years, she played and taught piano at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Up until late December 2004, Lily still rose early every morning to practice an hour on the piano, playing Chopin and Mozart before breakfast, and continued to give piano lessons to special friends. In the last three years, she was featured in the “How Berkeley Can You Be” Parade as the oldest living Berkeleyan. She attributed her longevity to her years of mountain climbing. 

Death came gently in her 108th year, on Jan. 19. She is survived by her daughter, Helga Shareshian, her son, John Hearst; four grandchildren, John and Steven Shareshian and David and Leslie Hearst; and by three great-grandchildren, Kiley and Zane Hearst, and Robin Shareshian. 

Donations in Lily’s memory may b e made to the North Berkeley Senior Center, 1901 Hearst Ave., Berkeley, 94709 or to a charity of your choice.

BERKELEY BOWL 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

All those who oppose Berkeley Bowl in West Berkeley obviously have never had to take the bus to go grocery shopping They have never had to dedicate most of a Saturday just so they can have food in the house. 

Berkeley Bowl is one of the unique places in Berkeley where I see women in saris shopping while chatting in Hindi; where Spanish is being spoken as the bins of many types of fresh chilis are perused; where there are durian, star fruit, a plethora of medicinal mushrooms, lotus root, nopales, and yes, potatoes other than white russets. There are over 800 varieties of potatoes in my native Bolivia, and I am glad that there is a store supporting small farmers who are growing heirloom varieties. 

I welcome a place where I can walk to buy potatoes that reflect the diversity of plants and the diversity of culture. And I thank Berkeley Bowl for always having fresh varieties of many things which are essential to third world cuisine. 

Xo Huarez 

• 

PUT IT IN WRITING 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Please, please, please, Planning Commission, so we don’t continue to have the distress to everyone concerned, as with the Roberts Center and 1650 La Vereda Road addition, make a decision in writing concerning when and how a project presented to city staff is put before the Landmarks Commission and the Zoning Adjustments Board. It is so hard to try to heal the wounds from these battles. 

Joan Seear 

• 

BUSH THE BELIEVER 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Regarding Jane Stillwater’s Jan. 14 letter: Believe it or not Bush is not acting, I mean the man is not even capable of remembering his lines if he was. But he is definitely a pathological liar, which is an illness where one actually believes their own lies. So we do not have an actor up there as president but actually we have a very ill person who believes his own lies. Also Bush is not the only one in his administration who is a pathological liar, there is quite a few there. Obviously this is not a good situation for the country or for the rest of the world. The question now is what can be done about having such ill people in these very powerful positions within the Bush administration? 

Thomas Husted 

Alameda 

• 

FLYING COTTAGE 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I have been considering a letter ever since the article you wrote on the “Flying Cottage” at 3045 Shattuck Ave. (Daily Planet, Dec. 21, 2004), because of various inaccuracies and biased reporting. Now I see a letter to the editor (Jan. 14) on your website in which one of the inaccuracies is repeated: “Andus Brandt told the Design Review Committee that a city employee looking over Christina Sun’s plans ... suggested she could add a third story.”  

Let me clarify the record on this. I, as architect of record, said “[Ms. Sun’s] original intention was to strengthen the foundation, when a helpful plan-checker suggested she could develop the whole under-floor area for little more expense ... Upon negotiating a contract, her contractor told her she could actually have two residential floors above a commercial space, if square footage is under 5,000.”  

One other item I’d like to clarify, while I’m at it, is that your article implied that the design was mine. It is not. You can call me if you’d like to know about my involvement.  

For lack of time I won’t address any other inaccuracies or biases in this letter. 

Andus H Brandt 

• 

DOWNTOWN 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

If it turns out that a convention center would not be economically viable for downtown or UC then I have some ideas for other uses that would perhaps benefit us. Build a modern hotel (which our downtown sorely needs) with underground parking, ice skating rink, bowling alley, live music dancing/night club venue and expose the creek on Center Street expanding the pedestrian walk way. This block with these amenities would be user-friendly to existing nearby communities and to distant communities through the BART. I believe there are not enough fingers on two hands to count the benefits. 

In short, Becky O’Malley’s editorial does a great job of stating what she does not want for Berkeley. She stands tall in the “build absolutely nothing” column. This would be ok except for the fact that she controls considerable financial and editorial resources which she brings to bear on the majority through her “Town Crier” the Berkeley Daily Planet. There seems to be no room in this paper for the role of “Town Booster” extolling a more optimistic view and direction of development in our town and its future. You have worked hard to bring this paper to the community, but as I recall the citizens helped fund it—so please remove the blinders from your editorial. The Daily Planet and the city would both benefit.  

Peter Levitt 

• 

PERALTA ELEMENTARY 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

A round of applause is due the California Board of Education for recognizing the outstanding work of parents and teachers at Oakland’s Peralta Elementary School. 

Last week the State Board of Education listened to parents and voted to grant the school an exception to an overly rigid rule that would have prevented Peralta from receiving an API school test score for 2004. The school had to apply to the state board for a waiver after a teacher made an error administering one question of 77 on the test to 17 students. Because Peralta is a small school, this put them over the threshold to deny them a test score.   

Peralta is a tight knit community where parents, neighbors, teachers staff and administrators work as a team to help every student, and their work shows. Scores went from 638 in 1999 to 757 in 2003. Peralta’s test score goal is 800 and they are almost there.     

It was a pleasure to support and work with such a dedicated school community to win the board’s approval and an honor to represent Peralta in the California Assembly. 

Wilma Chan 

Assemblywoman, 16th District 

• 

MORE FROM SPITZER 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

There are two basic genres of news publications in the free world: 1) newspapers who attempt to present balance and objectivity in their reportage 2) advocacy journals with defined ideological postures on the events they cover such as the Bay Guardian. For a newspaper to pretend to its readers to be the former when in reality its reportage consistently advocates the perspective of a particular stance is duplicity “in extremis.” 

Unfortunately, the Daily Planet—taking its cue from the news department of KPFA, aka Radio Jihad—regularly departs from the realm of balanced reportage when it comes to the Israeli-Palestinian issue. The paper’s Jan. 18 edition is exemplary. Assigned to cover the Rally Against Global Terrorism in which the bombed remains of a Jerusalem bus stood as a haunting symbol, the BDP’s writer chose to devote coverage of the pro-Palestinian counter-demonstration at a ratio of 3:1 to the content of the rally. In fact, while there were numerous quotes from the pro-Palestinian faction, there was not one sentence from the articulate speakers at the rally, including an Israeli doctor who treats Jews and Arabs alike and Nonie Darwish, an Egyptain who deplored the propaganda Arab children are inculcated with that ultimately leads to murderous martyrdom. 

No other news service, save Radio Jihad, covered the rally with such unmitigated bias. Correspondingly, may I suggest that Ms. O’Malley drop her pretense of objectivity and come out of the closet as the publisher of an advocacy journal which openly expresses her desire for the end of Israel as a Jewish state? Hopefully, by now, those few readers she has left will have recognized this rag for being the toxic font of bias which in truth it is... 

A question for the reporter: Since he saw fit to largely cover the pro-Palestinian demonstrators, why didn’t he put in print their two most prominent chants, regurgitated ad nauseum? After all, they speak volumes about the Palestinian stance on terrorism: “Black, red, green and white, we’re Palestinians. We’re here to fight.” And “Two, four, six, eight, we are martyrs, we can’t wait.” 

Dan Spitzer 

Kensington 

• 

TILDEN PARK 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Not all issues are earth-shaking; some are aesthetic. For instance: 

The best 360-degree viewspot in Tilden Park is on the broad, high, east-end trail variously known as Seaview or Ridgeway, at a hilltop lookout vista. As a reward for your uphill hike, you can see the bay, the Golden Gate and the ocean one way, and Mt. Diablo and beyond on the other. There’s a circular concrete-lined foundation there (probably a remnant of World War II fortifications), some 20 feet in diameter, on which, from time to time, people have placed over 100 stones in an attractive and intriguing spiral—instant folk art, which to those of us walking there are as attractive as, say, the piles of stones sometimes encountered in Yosemite Park.  

Unfortunately, these inviting Tilden designs get wiped out and thrown far down the hill periodically, probably by the powers that be that are fearful that nefarious cults (or Al Qaeda, perhaps???) will be dominating the park. Right now there is no design, not even a stone, left, just an unsightly concrete foundation. Hikers and bikers who stop there are baffled by all this gratuitous vandalization. If the spiral of rocks is so objectionable out in the wild, why doesn’t the park administration simply remove the whole concrete foundation? 

In the meantime, let sleeping stones lie! 

Paul Hertelendy 

• 

MISLEADING STORY, HEADLINE 

Editor, Daily Planet: 

I attended the Landmarks Preservation Commission meeting reported on by Richard Brenneman in your Jan 14-17 issue. I would not say that commission members “blasted” city Housing Director Tim Stroshane for his work on the Ed Roberts Center. Not even by a long shot. As Brenneman reports eight paragraphs later, members were disappointed and frustrated, which was more like it. 

While colorful language like “blasted” makes for entertaining headlines and one is accustomed to find it in tabloid journalism, Berkeleyans might expect better from its hometown paper, notwithstanding its tabloid format! Especially when the topic is civic in nature and the discussion is serious. 

Otherwise, readers may want to adjust their journalistic emotional thermostats down several notches to get an accurate picture of what Brenneman reports on and his headline writer summarizes. 

D. Mayeron 

• 

CRAGMONT ELEMENTARY 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

In response to last week’s article on Cragmont Elementary School: 

I was interviewed for this article last autumn, a few weeks before the November election. Measure B for our Berkeley Public Schools was on the ballot. At the time I was concerned that Berkeley might deny more funding but thankfully this measure passed. I stated then that while Cragmont Elementary School, with its awe-inspiring architecture and bay views, may appear to be the “public school on the hill,” our issues are the same in all our schools: how to meet the needs of each student. The enriching difference in our Berkeley public schools is diversity. We will succeed in our public education when every student feels valued, educated and safe. Sometimes the PTA seems disempowered to the belittling capacity of doing nothing more than supplying balls and hoola hoops for the playground. However, the bigger picture is that we are truly dedicated to doing something differently here in our Berkeley schools. I am grateful this article appeared on the Friday before Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s birthday. It is his vision and ideals we wish to put to practice here. The success of our schools depends upon the success of our community. If public education and diversity can thrive anywhere, it is here. 

Ann Williams 

Co-Chair, Cragmont PTA 

• 

A CORRECTION 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I understand that it is your policy that requests for clarification of facts incorrectly reported in the Berkeley Daily Planet must be made directly by the company involved, and that you were uncomfortable relying upon material provided by NORAM’s Communications Counsel, Ron Heckman. 

With regard to your December 28 story mentioning NORAM, your statements regarding the timing of NORAM’s business relationships with certain federally-recognized Indian tribes was not accurate, leaving the impression that NORAM jumped from one tribal partner to another. This erroneous impression certainly has the potential to harm NORAM’s good name and reputation in Indian Country. 

NORAM’s relationships with both the Guidiville Band of Pomo Indians and the Scotts Valley Band of Pomo date back to 2002. NORAM’s relationship with Scotts Valley preceded NORAM’s relationship with Guidiville by several months. 

NORAM’s relationship with each of the 3 tribes are not inter-related, and NORAM’s relationships with Scotts Valley and Lower Lake had nothing to do with any changes in our relationship with Guidiville. All of our tribal relationships were begun long ago and were pursued concurrently. 

I would appreciate your correcting the inaccurate impression your article created as the opportunity to do so presents itself. 

Please do not hesitate to contact me if you have any questions.  

Paul N. Filzer, 

General Counsel 

NORAM Equities, Ltd. 

Maitland, FL 



Click here to view the latest work by Justin DeFreitas

Two actions by California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in recent days show that the bare threads are beginning to show on his coat of many colors (note: “coat of many colors” is a Biblical reference for my Christian friends who think I don’t love them). 

Anyways, let’s take the governor’s actions in reverse order of chronology. 

This week, the Oakland Tribune reports that in an editorial board interview, Mr. Schwarzenegger referred to Attorney General Bill Lockyer, state Treasurer Phil Angelides and state schools chief Jack O’Connell “the Three Stooges” because they criticized his budget policies. The governor’s newly-acquired habit of ridicule-by-labeling his opponents is not one of the actions I’m speaking of. It’s an art at which Mr. Schwarzenegger is p articularly awful, but having hit a home run with his “girlie-men” remark last year, we can expect that he will keep taking mighty swings and whiffing for the rest of his political career, so we might as well get used to it (history is on our side in this conclusion; after giving one of modern movie’s most memorable and wittiest one-liners in The Terminator—“I’ll be back”—he repeated the attempt, ad nauseum, ad infinitum, in each of his subsequent movies, of which he had many, with increasingly dismal res ults). 

Anyways, again, the Tribune reports that in its interview with Mr. Schwarzenegger, the governor “referred to ‘all the investigations’ hamstringing some of his other outspoken Democratic foes.” The reference, of course, was to State Senate President Don Perata of Oakland, and the ongoing federal grand jury investigation into lobbyist Lily Hu and other aspects of Mr. Perata’s political empire. 

In this, the governor stepped dangerously close to the line, if not actually crossing over, and if you’re looking for a joke, here, sorry, but I haven’t got one. 

This column is no particular admirer of Mr. Perata, at whom we will continue to stick as many jabs as are both appropriate and possible. But an investigation, after all, is only an investigation. It is not a conviction, or an indictment. It is not even an allegation. Mr. Schwarzenegger, who stood in the pulpit at Oakland’s Allen Temple this week and praised Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. for his “courage, courage, courage,” might take care to be reminde d that the FBI was used repeatedly during Dr. King’s career—not to convict him of serious charges—but to smear him with innuendo and, thereby, discredit his work. As California governor and therefore the state’s judge of last resort (he decides, after all, the ultimate: who lives and who dies in our state’s death chamber), Mr. Schwarzenegger has a particular responsibility to pay attention to the foundations of law. While the rest of us might speculate, in public or in private, over the meaning and possib le outcomes of Mr. Perata’s recent legal difficulties, the governor—of all of us—needs to adhere to the fundamental tenet of American law: all citizens are presumed innocent of any and all crimes unless and until they are found guilty in a court of law. T his is something that both the left and the right of the political spectrums ought to be able to unite on. 

To talk of Mr. Perata’s odd lobbying activities is fair game, even for the governor. But for Mr. Schwarzenegger—who so often substitutes one-liners for thoughtful and reasoned comment—FBI and federal grand jury investigations ought to be way off limits. 

Which brings us back to the governor’s “Three Stooges” reference to Attorney General Bill Lockyer, state Treasurer Phil Angelides and state schools chief Jack O’Connell because of their criticism of his budget policies. “In particular,” the Tribune explains, the three top state Democrats were “attacking the governor’s borrowing to balance his spending plan and for what they say are his broken vows t o fully fund education.” 

Actually, it wasn’t what Mr. Lockyer, Mr. Angelides, and Mr. O’Connell say are Mr. Schwarzenegger’s broken vows to fully fund education. This rises beyond the level of political attack and up to the area of actual fact. 

Last yea r, in his efforts to present a balanced budget to the Legislature, Mr. Schwarzenegger made deals with various statewide groups. One of these groups was the state Education Coalition, an alliance of school boards, teachers and education workers unions, and PTAs. In exchange for the Education Coalition’s promise not to fight temporary suspension of Proposition 98 and K-12 education cuts in the 2004-05 state budget, Mr. Schwarzenegger promised to restore that money in the 2005-06 budget, and to make sure tha t public education got its full share of funding in the years beyond. This was not just a vague promise of unknown numbers to be figured out at a later date-the actual amounts are determined by the formulas laid out by the voters in Prop 98. It’s like the governor getting a book today, and promising to return to the bookstore next week to pay the $14.95. 

Only now it’s next week, and Mr. Schwarzenegger is back saying that he’s not paying. In the summary of his submitted state budget, he sums it up thus: “To achieve balance in 2005-06, virtually every part of state government must take a reduction in the funding that it would otherwise have received if spending were allowed to grow unchecked. … Last year, the education community joined with the governor in postponing $2 billion in what Proposition 98 would otherwise have provided. …[The 2005-06] Budget reflects a decision not to appropriate Proposition 98 increases of $1.1 billion in 2004-05 and $1.17 billion in 2005-06. These increases would otherwise hav e been required were the Proposition 98 guarantee allowed to run on autopilot next year.” 

Let us turn aside from the official reasoning given by the governor for the reneging, that “left unaltered, the operation of Proposition 98 would have crowded out a ll available general funds-and would have resulted in deeper and more severe cuts to health and human services programs provided by the state.” That may be true, but it’s not the point. 

Politicians—within their own circle—are the most honest people I kno w. No deal between politicians is made with a written contract. Most are done outside of public view, without even so much as a handshake. If carpenters’ tools of trade are their hammers, then politicians’ are their word. A politician might lie through hi s teeth to his constituents and the rest of the world, but among other players in the political world, he keeps his word, or he’s got nothing left with which to trade. 

Mr. Schwarzenegger remains a formidable power in California, still with an enormous re servoir of support among voters. In a straight-up contest between the governor and the rest of California’s politicians, Mr. Schwarzenegger will still win, hands-down. But it is with these other politicians that Mr. Schwarzenegger must deal in order to make his government move forward. And after the education pullback, who is going to trust his word? 

Like the ghost of Hamlet’s father, this one will come back to haunt. 

?

Bus Fracas Suspect Charged 

Berkeley Police identified the man arrested during a Sunday fracas over a bombed Israeli bus on exhibit at Martin Luther King Jr. Park as Reuven Kahane. 

An Oakland man, he identified himself to Jewish News Weekly in 2003 as the first cousin of Meir Kahane, founder of the Jewish Defense League in American and the anti-Arab Kach Party in Israel. 

The State Department currently lists Kach as a terrorist organization.  

The elder Kahane was convicted of arms smuggling in 1971, and JDL members were implicated in a series of bombings targeting Soviet and Arab organizations as well as American Jewish entertainment mogul Sol Hurok, whose talent agency booked Soviet artists. 

Numerous other JDL members have been convicted of bombings, assaults, and other charges. 

The same year Meir Kahane was convicted, he moved to Israel, where he founded the virulently anti-Arab Kach Party, later banned by the Israeli government. 

He was assassinated in New York in 1990 by an Arab terrorist who belonged to the same cell that bombed the World Trade Center three years later. 

Berkeley Police initially took both Kahane and his 14-year-old victim into custody, “when it was discovered that the young man was actually a victim,” said Berkeley Police Spokesperson Officer Joe Okies. 

Kahane was booked on one count of battery. 

“While there was lots of verbal confrontation, that was the only physical altercation,” Okies said.  

First Crash, Then Piece 

After two vehicles collided in the 2300 block of Curtis Street just minutes into last Friday, their respective motorists became entangled in a bit of verbal acrimony which soon escalated to something considerably more ominous when one of the aggrieved parties produced a piece and brandished at the other. 

Fortunately, a modicum of sense then entered the picture before a trigger-finger twitch could result in grievous bodily harm. 

When it was over, the unarmed party called nine-one-one. 

Officers discovered that the two parties knew each other before the fender-bending, and the case remains under investigation, said Officer Okies. 

How Shoplifting Becomes Robbery 

After an alert clerk at the Gilman Street Walgreen’s spotted a putative shopper stuffing goods inside his coat and heading to the door without stopping by the cash register, he confronted the fellow, who responded with a shove—in the process, dropping a considerable quantity of pilferage. 

By laying hands on the clerk, the shoplifter not only lost much of his swag; he had thereby transformed his lesser, potentially misdemeanor offense into something that carries the promise of lengthier incarceration, namely strong-armed robbery. 

The pushy felon remains at large, said Officer Okies. 

Stalking Suspect Nabbed 

A 53-year-old Berkeley man finds himself facing the possibility of a strenuous stretch in stir. 

After he made contact with his former partner in the predawn hours last Saturday, she called police, who arrived within minutes and launched a search of the surrounding area. 

Caught within minutes, the suspect was booked on suspicion of stalking and making threats of great bodily injury or worse to his ex-companion. 

Blue-eyed, Stranger 

A Berkeley woman called police last Saturday to report an odd occurrence of the day before. 

She’d been walking by the Salvation Army store in the 1800 block of University Avenue when she caught the attention of a thin, denim-jacketed, khaki-bag-carrying blue-eyed stranger, who then proceeded to show her a part of himself she didn’t want to see. 

Purse-Snatcher Caught 

Berkeley Police arrested three juveniles on suspicion of grand theft following a Sunday evening purse-snatching on Channing Way near the corner of Shattuck Avenue. 

Their victim called police, who arrived a moment later and found the trio within minutes during the subsequent area check, said Officer Okies. 

Trespass, and More 

An hour after police apprehended the trio of purse-snatching suspect, they were called to the 1900 block of McGee Avenue after the homeowners spotted a stranger doing sneaky things in their back yard. 

When police arrived, they took the 35-year-old man into custody after discovering he had a pocket full of amphetamine as well as some items that didn’t belong to him. 

Armed Robber Sought 

While many Berkeley folk were watching the six o’clock news Monday, one dreadlocked felon was carrying heat and looking for a victim and a 35-year-old woman was strolling along the 3200 block of Baker Street. 

The gunman walked up to the woman, pulled out his pistol and demanded cash. She complied, and the felon booked. 

No arrests have been made, said Officer Okies. 

Anonymous Victim 

A caller reported from College Avenue at 3:20 a.m. that he’d just been threatened by a man holding a black pistol. Police have little to go on, since the victim refused to give his identity.  

Wine Generator Swiped 

The operators of Kermit Lynch Wine Merchant at 1605 San Pablo Ave. called police at 9:43 a.m. Tuesday to report that someone had swapped their generator—an essential tool for maintaining the temperatures of delicate vintages during power outages. 

The generator remains at large. 

Brandished Nozzle? 

A College Avenue resident rang up Berkeley Police just at 4:41 Tuesday afternoon to report that two juveniles had swiped his hose nozzle and were brandishing in a threatening way at two others. 

By the time officers arrived to the corner of Beverly Place and Monterey Avenue, threateners, threatenees and the nozzle had trickled out of the scene. 

Radio Shack Rip-Off 

A strongarm bandit emptied the till at the 1652 University Ave. Radio Shack just before 9:30 p.m. Tuesday. 

Prescription Forger Bust 

Police arrested a 48-year-old Berkeley woman at Abbot’s Pharmacy, 2320 Woolsey St., Wednesday morning after she tried to fill a forged prescription. A second charge was added when investigators discovered she’d done the same thing at Elephant Pharmacy.  

Road Rage Threat 

Police are investigating a case of road rage that occurred following a minor fender-bender between two cars on Shattuck Avenue just south of Kittredge Street. 

The driver of one of the cars told officers that the woman behind the wheel of the other vehicle had barked out the threat that “my old man is going to kill you.”?

I celebrated Dr. King’s dream by accompanying my family to a church in West Oakland where my granddaughter and her choir had been invited to sing. This was the seventh annual Dr. King celebration for the Taylor Memorial United Methodist Church at Adeline and 12th Street. With almost 500 people packing the benches and the aisles, from nearly every community in the East Bay, I felt an excitement and enthusiasm that took me back to my college days organizing in the South during the late ‘60s. Like then, children came with their parents, music bounced up into the upper balcony, and we all merged our identities to celebrate Dr. King’s dream. 

Bridging the two eras, 90-year-old honoree Oscar Wright talked about his experiences growing up in the Mississippi Delta, and how much of a positive influence his father had been on him, insisting on registering to vote in 1939, a time when such actions were often punished with death. Mr. Wright eventually moved to Oakland and became dedicated to the education of its children. It was Mr. Wright who filed a lawsuit on behalf of African American students against the Oakland Public School District under the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Mr. Wright noted that much work is still to be done, and lamented the growth of AIDS, especially in Southern Africa. 

Keynote speaker Greg Hodge, Oakland Public School Board member, reminded all of us to read not just parts of Dr. King’s speeches but to study them in their entirety. He noted that Dr. King’s vision changed with his deeper involvement in social issues, leading him to stress the importance of economics, and an anti-imperialism philosophy. Mr. Hodge also emphasized Dr. King’s role as a “good father.” He finished by calling for even more holidays dedicated to women, such as Ella Baker and Fannie Lou Hamer. 

Oakland Councilmember Nancy Nadel was also honored for her support in helping to develop local programs that prevented violence, including training and jobs. Her work for Congresswoman Lee’s courageous stand for peace was also mentioned. 

It was an inspiring program, and after some wonderful singing and dancing from our youth, I left the church with renewed inspiration to continue working to fulfill Dr. King’s dream. Then, driving only a few blocks away, I noticed a group of people doing construction work behind a sign that said Habitat for Humanity, one of our ex-president’s Jimmy Carter’s initiatives. It turned out that about 30 employees from Kaiser Permanente had agreed to use this holiday to put into reality the very dreams of Dr. King. They had volunteered to help build homes in West Oakland for needy families who likewise would have to provide some sweat equity of their own. This amazing program can be reached at www.eastbayhabitat.com Some funding is provided by local corporations and various government agencies. But they can use as much people power as possible. Thank you Dr. King for your dream. We are still gaining from your legacy. 

Mel Martynn is a teacher and former aide to Berkeley City Councilmember Margaret Breland. 

Next Wednesday, Jan. 26, the Planning Commission will hold a public hearing run like a workshop on the proposed West Berkeley Bowl. The stipulation that the hearing is to be run like a workshop may seem trifling. It’s not, given the efforts of city staff and certain Planning Commissioners to railroad this controversial project through the legal channels required for approval.  

A little background: the 92,000-square-foot development proposed for Ninth and Heinz, just off Seventh and Ashby, includes a 55,000 -square-foot supermarket (25 percent larger than the existing, 42,000-square-foot Bowl) and a 30,000-square-foot warehouse. Traffic consultants say it will generate 50,000 new vehicle trips a week. The Seventh and Ashby intersection is already backed up in all directions. And the surrounding neighborhood is already parked up all day throughout the week.  

In May 2003, the architect and developer, Kava Massih, invited a group of local residents to a meeting where he unveiled plans for a 27,000-square-foot, neighborhood-scale West Berkeley Bowl, an idea that garnered unanimous support. Shortly thereafter, Massih changed his application to double the size of the market in order to draw traffic off Interstate 80 to what had morphed into a regional superstore. He never told the neighbors about the big change. Indeed, it appears that he never told city staff that he had originally presented a 27,000-square-foot market. What he did tell staff was that the local community overwhelmingly supported the larger project. But the great majority of nearby residents, businesspeople and educators—two schools are each within a block or so of Ninth and Heinz—have made it clear that they oppose an expanded, 55,000-square-foot market, due to concerns about increased congestion and air and noise pollution.  

For at least two years City staff have been meeting with Massih behind closed doors. Not once in all that time have they consulted the people who live and work near Ninth and Heinz. On Dec. 15, staff presented a schedule that moved the new Bowl through the Planning Commission to the City Council by Feb. 8, and through the Landmarks Commission and Design Review to the Zoning Adjustments Board on Jan. 27. Staff proposed that the Planning Commission do its part by scheduling a public hearing in January.  

Which brings us back to the differences between a workshop and a hearing. Many of the numerous speakers who trooped up to the Planning Commission’s public comment mike on Dec. 15 asked that the commission hold a workshop instead of a public hearing, because, they said, the planning process for the West Berkeley Bowl needs to be slowed down—a lot. Mary Lou van Deventer of Urban Ore, which is right across Ashby from the project’s proposed site, hit the nail on the head when she observed that a public hearing properly comes at “the end of a planning process.” Her main point was that “the public really needs to be consulted in a fundamental way.” Hence the commission ought to proceed as if planning for the new Bowl was in an early stage, not the final one.  

Van Deventer was right. Workshops, to cite the City of Berkeley Commissioner’s Manual, “are devices designed to elicit citizen input in an informal manner, allowing maximum interaction between citizens and commissioners or for commissions to work on issues in an in-depth manner” [emphasis added]. By contrast, public hearings are formal affairs in which members of the public each get a maximum of three minutes to speak and then have to remain silent unless queried by a commissioner.  

Beyond format, there’s an even more important difference. “Workshop sessions,” says the Commissioner’s Manual, “do not culminate in action.” But public hearings do, for they “are quasi-legislative; the commission is making policy or programmatic recommendations to the City Manager or City Council.” In other words, the focus of a public hearing is limited to a particular proposal or policy that appears on the public body’s agenda. To put it yet another way: It’s a lot easier for the chair to rule someone out of order at a public hearing than at a workshop.  

So if you wanted to put a project on a fast track, you would opt for a public hearing. Regrettably, that’s exactly what the Planning Commission did on Dec. 15. Commissioner Helen Burke, appointed by Councilmember Linda Maio, did move to hold a public workshop to facilitate full community discussion before setting the matter for a hearing. Her motion was immediately opposed by Mayor Bates’ Planning Commissioner, David Stoloff. “Workshops turn out to be negotiating sessions,” said Stoloff. “I don’t know what would be gained.”  

It was a shocking statement. Obviously, what might be gained from “a negotiating session” over a controversial project would be a solution acceptable to all parties. But Stoloff wanted to move the project forward as quickly as possible.  

So did Councilmember Wozniak’s appointee, Commission Chair Harry Pollack, who came up with the idea of holding a public hearing that was run like a workshop, to allow for dialogue without slowing down the process.  

This hybrid form was what the Commission finally approved, in large part due to the testimony of City Attorney Zach Cowan. Burke, fairly new to the Commission, asked Cowan, “Legally, what’s the deal here?” He never answered her question. A public hearing, he stated, could be held “in the identical manner as…a workshop.” Cowan said nothing about the quasi-legislative character of a hearing or the requirement that it culminate in official action. Thus misled, the commission approved a hearing.  

Now the commission needs to make good on its commitment to run that hearing like a workshop. This means more than allowing dialogue. If the meeting is really to proceed like a workshop, it needs to be open-ended. Everything is up for grabs. And it needs to involve “negotiations.”  

Specifically, the hearing-cum-workshop needs to negotiate the details of the project itself, and to consider the merits of the originally proposed, 27,000-square-foot market. On Dec. 15, Commissioners Stoloff and Pollock opined that the Planning Commission’s purview is limited to ruling on the amendments to the city’s General Plan, Zoning Ordinance and Zoning Map that are entailed by the new Bowl, and on the initial environmental study’s conclusion that these changes do not require an environmental impact report. The project itself, they asserted, was beyond the commission’s, and thus the hearing’s, scope.  

Of course, formal approval or disapproval of the project falls to the Zoning Adjustments Board. But if not for the project itself, staff would not be proposing these amendments to the General Plan, Zoning Ordinance and Zoning Map, much less considering the need for an EIR. So the specifics of the proposed West Berkeley Bowl need to be on the table, along with any other reasonably relevant matter.  

To make sure that this happens, the Jan. 26 hearing should begin by establishing that the ensuing discussion will have the format (give-and-take) and the substance (open-ended and in-depth) of a genuine City of Berkeley commission workshop. After that, everyone involved—commissioners, neighbors, applicant, architect-developer, and city staff—should work toward a neighborhood-friendly West Berkeley Bowl.  

Zelda Bronstein is a former chair of the Berkeley Planning Commission.  

?

A quarter-sheet flier can cause a lot of fuss. 

Madelyn Mackie, associate production manager of the Berkeley Repertory Theater, and her staff raced up and down the street Sunday, Jan. 16, ripping the small quarter-page fliers off the sidewalk where they’d been neatly placed between panels of poetry, offering “because of the event” as her excuse. 

A Heyday Books representative, publisher of the poetry book being celebrated at the event, apologized for the theater manager’s behavior, clarifying that the manager was not acting on Heyday Books’ behalf. 

Sherry Smith, former chair of the Berkeley Arts Commission, spent half an hour ripping up another 100 fliers from the streets, stating, “this is my free speech” when questioned. 

David Snippen, current chair of the Berkeley Arts Commission, apologized for her behavior. 

The flier in question stated, “Hey poets and poetry lovers, next time don’t pimp poetry for rich people’s property values. Art should benefit us all,” or sometimes ended with “Art should stay hungry, like the rest of us,” with a signature. Hardly a call to arms, but clearly a gentle criticism of the peculiarly cozy nature of the sidewalk poetry art project and the Downtown Berkeley Association, some of whose members own property on Addison, now much more valuable with its publicly funded enhancement. 

Robert Haas, the project’s curator, bristled with indignation that anyone would flier the event, and refused to shake the flier writer’s hand. Some poets implied that opportunities for poets are so few that if a little graft gets into the mix, it should be ignored. 

Perhaps. But other poets welcomed the fliers, expressing interest in the so-called Arts District’s curious origin and the issue of funding disparity. Some of them managed to appreciate that no one was protesting poetry, or books, or anyone in particular. A few of us manage to agree that opportunities to participate in and experience the benefit of art projects ought to be equitably shared by everyone. 

And someday, one hopes, everyone can agree that a tiny flier of protest, and the unexpected viewpoint it may illustrate, is as precious as poetry.

The Rockridge Soccer Club Running Rhinos of the Jack London Youth Soccer League were crowned state champions Sunday in the under-12 boys division of the California Youth Soccer Association (CYSA) Tide American Cup.  

After winning their preliminary round games in Sacramento in early December, the Rhinos advanced to the final rounds at the Ripon soccer complex near Modesto.  

The Rhinos advanced to the semi-finals defeating an skilled team from Clovis, 2-0, and then advanced to the finals defeating the East Fresno Sacred Heart Vikings, 4-1. These teams had beaten their previous Tide Cup opponents by a combined score of 27 goals to 2. In the finals, the Rhinos defeated the Fig Garden (Fresno) Jets, who came into the game having won all 37 of their games this season. 

The final game was tied 2-2 at the end of regulation time and was decided on penalty kicks after two sudden death overtimes were scoreless. 

Now in their sixth year, the Running Rhinos started as first-graders at Berkeley’s Emerson School. Last year, the team added players from Oakland’s St. Teresa’s school. 

The current Rhinos are mostly 6th graders at Berkeley’s Willard and Oakland’s St. Teresa’s school and include: Luca Castelloto, Joey Catanzarite, Fidel Felipe, Mikhael Gustin, David Lindheim, Nate Mills, Andrew McFann, Max Potter, Justin Passek, Ryan Tower, Dillon Tuckner, Adrian Villalpando, and Peter Walton. 

Dan Lindheim is the coach of the Running Rhinos. 



Berkeley Symphony’s inaugural Young Artist Award recipient Nigel Armstrong, a 14-year-old violin prodigy from Sonoma with invisible braces on his teeth, will perform his first professional concert with the Berkeley Symphony on Wednesday at Zellerbach Hall. 

It is not coincidental that Season Concert No. 3 is also Associate Conductor George Thomson’s subscription debut as conductor with the Berkeley Symphony. 

Armstrong’s mother, Kristen, played the violin at home when she was pregnant with Nigel, so he has always heard violin music. From age 3 Armstrong remembers hearing students playing violins across the street at Leta Davis’s Suzuki classes and concerts on Saturdays. At the ripe old age of 4, Armstrong asked his parents if he could start violin classes, and was told it was too early, he was too young, and it wouldn’t be good. So he waited until he was five and a half, and like many of us, went to his first lesson crying big tears for mommy. 

Then unfamiliar with Suzuki methods of learning basics and techniques, Armstrong “expected to learn to play a new song every week.” Mastering holding the violin just right and working with other students were new concepts that seemed at the time to hold back this eager boy.  

Armstrong kept being paired with another student, would pass that student in accomplishment, move on to another, and finally ran out of students in Davis’s locally well-known classes. (Davis’s “Little Fiddlers” play “in concert” on bales of hay at the Glen Ellen Village Fair every year.) 

Armstrong continued to work with Davis until he was 10, moved on to study with Daniel Kobialka, and then with Zaven Melikian, retired faculty member from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.  

According to Armstrong, Melikian helped him “remodel technique, and taught me the fundamentals of professional violin playing,” taking him from “little-kid style to playing a major repertoire.” After six years, Armstrong found that he needed a different approach to his music and that he no longer felt inspired by Melikian. 

Since June, Armstrong has been studying with Li Lin of the San Francisco Conservatory’s preparatory department, which is open to students at the pre-university level. 

Meanwhile, back in Sonoma, Armstrong has been on public school-directed home schooling and independent study since fourth grade, which he skipped. Technically now a tenth grader, he takes twelfth-grade math, eleventh-grade chemistry, English, world history, and P.E., with credits given for violin. 

At last Sunday’s Sonoma Community Concert benefiting tsunami relief, 10 bands played, but the applause thundered when Armstrong walked out on stage to improvise accompaniment to gray-haired guitar-plucking Michael Castle’s Ghost Highway. Sonomans enjoy occasional appearances by Armstrong fiddling, playing country music, or jazz at local events. 

Always having felt socially like “the other kid,” Armstrong is beginning to look around and see there is more to life, and maturely contemplates his future, asking himself, “Why am I here? Is there more to life? What do I want to be?”  

But the thrill of performance and succeeding at learning a new bar keeps him extremely focused on his music. Armstrong is happiest, he said, “when I am performing, and making progress on the violin,” remaining amazed at “what I have done. I enjoy making music with others and learning from them, and discovering with them.” 

Armstrong met George Thomson when Thomson was Music Director at San Domenico in San Rafael and Armstrong studied there under Malikian. Thomson invited Armstrong to solo with students “touring” Berkeley schools to introduce elementary students to music as a language. 

Armstrong is auditioning soon to enter the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, where at least one of his parents would move with him. His preferred next step appears to be going to an arts high school in Boston so he can study with renowned instructor Donald Weilerstein at the New England Conservatory of Music (and live in a dorm). 

Armstrong’s greatest thrills, he said, come from playing “any music—getting to respond to it, adapt to it, and let me become part of me. It enriches me.” 

On Wednesday, Armstrong will solo with Felix Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto in E Minor. The Berkeley Symphony Wednesday concert program includes Hector Villa-Lobos’s Bachianas Brasileiras No. 9, Charles Wuorinen’s Symphony Seven, and Carlos Chavez’s Symphony No. 2 (Sinfonia India). 

Tickets are $22-$49 or $10 for students. Show begins at 8 p.m. www.berkeleysymphony.org or call 841-2800 for more information and tickets. 

FRIDAY, JAN. 21 

THEATER 

Actors Ensemble of Berkeley, “Seduced” by Sam Shepard opens at 8 p.m. at the Live Oak Theater, 1301 Shattuck at Berryman, and runs Fri. and Sat. through Feb. 19. 649-5999. www.aeofberkeley.org 

"Bridge & Tunnel" workshop performances by Sarah Jones at 8 p.m. Thurs.-Sat., 7 p.m. Sun. through Feb. 20 at Berkeley Repertory Theater’s Thrust Stage, 2025 Addison St. Tickets are $30-$40. 647-2949. www.berkeleyrep.org 

Contra Costa Civic Theater, “The Mousetrap” Agatha Christie’s classic mystery Fri. and Sat. at 8 p.m. through Feb. 19 at 951 Pomona Ave., El Cerrito. Tickets are $10-$15. 524-9132. www.ccct.org 

FILM 

“Operation Free Mohawk: A Retrospective” Video installation and performance by Pete Kuzov and Edie Tsong at 7 p.m. at Berkeley Community Media, 2239 MLK, Jr. Way. Cost is $5-$15. 848-2288. www.betv.org 

David Thomson History of Hollywood: “The Crowd” at 7 p.m., “Sunrise” at 9 p.m. at Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

Indie Film Friday at 7:30 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Ward Churchill talks about “Kill the Indian, Save the Man: The Genocidal Impact of American Indian Residential Schools” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Oakland East Bay Symphony, mostly Mozart at 8 p.m. at Paramount Theater, 2025 Broadway. 625-8497. www.oebs.org 

Peking Acrobats at 8 p.m. at Zellerbach Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $22-$42. 642-9988. www.calperfs.berkeley.edu 

Los Cenzontles at 9:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Lecture and demonstration at 8 p.m. Cost is $5-$15. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Hali Hammer singer/songwriter at 7:30 p.m. at Fellowship Café, Cedar and Bonita Sts. A donation of $5-10 is requested. 

Jamie Laval & Hans York, Celtic fiddle and guitar, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $17.50-$18.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

The Real Thom Thunder, Lucy at 9:30 p.m. at Blakes on Telegraph. Cost is $10-$15. 848-0886. www.blakesontelegraph.com 

The Rulers, El Faye at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $6. 841-2082. www.starryploughpub.com 

Clairdee & The Ken French Trio at 9 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810. 

Monkey Knife Fight, original funk-jazz, at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

All You Can Eat, Challenger, Gift of Goats, Abi Yos Yos at 8 p.m. at 924 Gilman St., an all-ages, member-run, no alcohol, no drugs, no violence club. Cost is $6. 525-9926. 

Bobby Hutcherson All-Stars, with Nicholas Payton, James Spaulding, George Cables, Dwyne Burno and Lewis Nash at 8 and 10 p.m. at Yoshi’s at Jack London Square, through Sun. Cost is $16-$26. 238-9200. www.yoshis.com 

SATURDAY, JAN. 22 

CHILDREN  

Los Amiguitos de La Peña with Colibri, traditional and original Latin American music, at 10:30 a.m. at La Peña. Cost is $4 for adults, $3 for children. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

EXHIBITIONS 

Salon at the Giorgi “Mood Swings” a black-light puppet show, at 2 p.m. at Giorgi Gallery, 2911 Claremont Ave. at Ashby. 848-1228. 

FILM 

David Thomson History of Hollywood: “Heaven’s Gate” at 7 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

THEATER 

“Mathematics of Change” with Josh Kornbluth at 7:30 p.m. at the Berkeley Richmond Jewish Community Center, 1414 Walnut St. tickets are $18-$30. 848-0237, ext. 110.  

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Rhythm & Muse featuring Patrick Fitzgerald, pianist at 7 p.m. at Berkeley Art Center. Admission is free. 527-9753. 

The Kids of the Dayton Tribune present the newest issue of “The Dayton Tribune,” a youth written and edited magazine, at 4 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852.  

www.codysbooks.com  

Redmond O’Hanlon describes life on a fishing boat in “Trawler” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852.  

www.codysbooks.com  

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Four Seasons Concerts presents the Gryphon Piano Trio at 7:30 p.m. at Calvin Simmons Theater, 10 Tenth St., Oakland. Tickets are $25-$35. 601-7919. www.fourseasonsconcerts.com 

Ivan Ilic, piano, at 8 p.m. at Trinity Chapel, 2320 Dana St., between Bancroft and Durant. Tickets are $8-$12. 549-3864. http://trinitychamberconcerts.com 

American Bach Soloists perform J.S. Bach’s early cantatas at 8 p.m. at First Congregational Church, 2345 Channing Way. 415-621-7900. www.americanbach.org  

Peking Acrobats at 2 and 8 p.m. at Zellerbach Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $22-$42. 642-9988. www.calperfs.berkeley.edu 

Ras Midas and the Bridge and Root Awakning, roots rock reggae, at 9:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $12. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Darcy Menard, singer-songwriter, at 7:30 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

Blue and Tan, electro-acid-jazz funk at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Oak, Ash & Thorn, a capella, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $17.50-$18.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Annual Pat Parker Tribute and Celebration at 8 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Cost is $10-$20. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

Moment’s Notice a monthly salon for improvised music, dance and theater at 8 p.m. at Western Sky Studio, 2525 8th St. 415-831-5592. 

Bad Habittz, Sequenced Mindset, World Wide Sickness, metal, hip hop at 9:30 p.m. at Blakes on Telegraph. Cost is $8-$10. 848-0886. www.blakesontelegraph.com 

Extensions Jazz Quartet at 8 p.m. at the Jazzschool. Cost is $12. 845-5373. www.jazz- 

school.com  

Crater, The Nels Cline Singers with Ben Goldberg at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. 841-2082. www.starryploughpub.com 

Helen Chaya’s Acoustic Showcase at 8:30 p.m. at Epic Arts, 1923 Ashby Ave. Cost is $5-$10.  

The Arlington Houston Quartet at 9 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810. 

Mike Park, Colossal, Dan Potthast, Short Round, Shinabu at 8 p.m. at 924 Gilman St. Cost is $6. 525-9926. 

SUNDAY, JAN. 23 

CHILDREN 

Ralph’s World Full Band Show at 3 p.m. at the Julia Morgan Center for the Arts. Tickets are $15. 925-798-1300. www.juliamorgan.org  

EXHIBITIONS 

“Salvador Donkey,” an exhibition of recent drawings and paintings by Michael Dooley and Kathleen Henderson from 4 to 7 p.m. at the Ashby Stage, 1901 Ashby Ave. 841-6500.  

FILM 

David Thomson History of Hollywood: “The Shop Around the Corner” at 5 p.m. and “Shampoo” at 7 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

“How Photography and Film Shaped Memory of the Vietnam War” at 2 p.m. at the Oakland Museum of California, 10th and Oak Sts. in conjunction with the exhibit “California and the Vietnam Era.” 238-2200. www.museum.ca.org 

Sister Helen Prejean, author of “Dead Man Walking,” will introduce her new book, “The Death of Innocents: An Eyewitness Account of Wrongful Executions” at 7 p.m. at King Middle School, 1781 Rose. St. Tickets are $10-$12. Benefits Pace e Bene and KPFA. www.kpfa.org 

Poetry Flash with Beverly Burch and Jeanne Wagner at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. Donation $2. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Renée Fleming, soprano, at 3 p.m. at Zellerbach Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $34-$72. 642-9988. www.calperfs.berkeley.edu 

Bandworks featuring local youth bands at 3 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $4. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

The Art of the Trio with Taylor Eigsti at 4:30 at the Jazz- 

school. Cost is $12-$18. 845-5373. www.jazzschool.com 

Ronny Cox, singer-songwriter cowboy, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $16.50-$17.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Odd Shaped Case, Balkan music brunch, at 10 a.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

MONDAY, JAN. 24 

EXHIBITIONS 

“Celebrating African-American Artists with Disabilities” Exhibition opens at NIAD Art Center at 551 23rd St., near Barrett Ave., Richmond, and runs through Feb. 25. 620-0290. www.niad.org 

“The People and the Book” Paintings and rare books from the collection of the Magnes Museum opens at 2911 Russell St. www.magnes.org 

FILM 

Seeing through the Screen: Buddhism and Film at 3 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Page to Stage, a conversation with playwright Charles L. Mee and director Les Waters at 7 p.m. at Berkeley Repertory Theater, 2015 Addison St. 647-2949. www.berkeleyrep.org 

Ronald C. White, Jr. examines “The Eloquent President: A Portrait of Lincoln Through His Words” at 7:30 p.m. at Black Oak Books. 486-0698. www.blackoakbooks.com 

Jane Anne Staw and other writers describe “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 with Garrett Murphy from 7 to 9:30 p.m., at Priya Restaurant, 2072 San Pablo Ave. berkeleypoetryexpress@yahoo.com 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Songwriters Symposium at 8:30 p.m. at Blakes on Telegraph. 848-0886. www.blakesontelegraph.com 

Big Belly Blues Band at 8 p.m. at Yoshi’s at Jack London Square. Cost is $10. 238-9200. www.yoshis.com 

TUESDAY, JAN. 25 

EXHIBITIONS 

“Serving the People - Body and Soul: The Black Panther Party Photographs” opens at the Berkeley Public Library, 2090 Kittredge St. and runs to March 19. 981-6100. www.berkeleypubliclibrary.org 

“The Art of Living Black” Ninth Annual Bay Area Black Artists Exhibition opens at the Richmond Art Center, 2540 Barrett Ave., Richmond, and runs through March 20. 620-6772. www.therichmondartcenter.org 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

“Dublin Carol” the Aurora Theater production which opens Jan. 28, will be discussed at 1 p.m. at the North Berkeley Senior Center. 981-5190. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Bandworks featuring talented youth musicians at 7:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $4. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

The McKassons, fiddling and piano in the Scottish tradition, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $15.50- $16.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Carlos Oliveira and Harvey Wainapel at 8 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810. 

McCoy Tyner wiith Stanley Clarke and Billy Cobham at 8 and 10 p.m. Yoshi’s at Jack London Square, through Sun. Cost is $25-$35. 238-9200. www.yoshis.com 

Jazzschool Tuesdays, a weekly showcase of up-and-coming ensembles from Berkeley Jazz- 

school at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

WEDNESDAY, JAN. 26 

EXHIBITIONS 

“Acting Out” Photographs by Claude Cahun and Marcel Moore opens at the Berkeley Art Museum, 2626 Bancroft Way, and runs to Aug. 7. Admission is $5-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu  

“Blind at the Museum” An exhibition probing the nature of blindness and the visual arts opens at the Berkeley Art Museum, 2626 Bancroft Way, and runs to July 24. Admission is $5-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

Tino Soriano “La Zafra–The Sugar Cane Harvest” photographs from Haiti. Photographer’s talk at 5 p.m., followed by reception, at CLAS Conference Room, 2334 Bowditch St. 642-2088. 

FILM 

Film 50: History of Cinema “Edison to Early Griffith” at 3 p.m. and “Games People Play” at 7:30 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Peter Carey describes “Wrong About Japan: A Father’s Journey with his Son” at 7:30 p.m. at at Cody’s Books. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com 

Kate Coleman describes “The Secret Wars of Judi Bari: A Car Bomb, the Fight for the Redwoods, and the End of Earth First!” at 7:30 p.m. at Black Oak Books. 486-0698. www.blackoakbooks.com 

Berkeley Poetry Slam with host Charles Ellik and Three Blind Mice, at 8:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $5-$7. 841-2082 www.starryplough.com 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Wednesday Noon Concert, with The Mendelssohn String Quartet at Hertz Hall, UC Campus. Free. 642-4864. http://music.berkeley.edu 

Berkeley Symphony Orchestra, with Nigel Armstrong, 14 year old winner of the BSO Young Artist award on violin, at 8 p.m. at Zellerbach Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $22-$49. 841-2800. www.berkeleysymphony.org 

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

Ron Hacker & The Hacksaws, Daniel Castro Band at 8 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $10. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Happy Turtle, jazz-funk-lounge, at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Gomez-Mendez Duo, guitar and piano tango duets from Buenos Aires, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $15.50-$16.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Folk Revival with Saddlecats, Mercury Dime and Grizzly Peak at 8:30 p.m. at Blakes on Telegraph. Cost is $5. 848-0886. www.blakesontelegraph.com 

THURSDAY, JAN. 27 

EXHIBITIONS 

“Celebrating African-American Artists with Disabilities” Reception for the artists at 6 p.m. at NIAD Art Center at 551 23rd St., near Barrett Ave., Richmond. 620-0290. www.niad.org 

“Blind at the Museum” Curators’ talk on “What Does it Mean to See?” at 12:15 p.m. at the Berkeley Art Museum, 2626 Bancroft Way, and runs to July 24. Admission is $5-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

Preschool Art Show works of over 200 preschoolers. Reception at 5 p.m. at Habitot Children’s Museum, 2065 Kittredge St., at Shattuck. 647-1111, ext. 16. www.habitot.org 

FILM 

David Thomson History of Hollywood: “Magnolia” at 7 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

“Tragos” a cyber-noir thriller by Antero Alli at 8 p.m. at 21 Grand, 449-B 23rd St., Oakland. Filmmaker in person. Cost is $7-$12. www.verticalpool.com 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

William Powers describes “Blue Clay People: Seasons on Africa’s Fragile Edge” at 7:30 p.m. at at Cody’s Books. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com 

Taigen Dan Leighton discus- 

ses his translation of the works of Eihei Dogen, a 13th century Zen master in “Dogen’s Extensive Record” at 7:30 p.m. at Black Oak Books. 486-0698. www.blackoakbooks.com 

Word Beat Reading Series at 7 p.m. with featured readers Matt Wolf and Julia Vinograd followed by an open mic, at Mediterraneum Caffe, 2475 Telegraph Ave. 526-5985. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Paquito d’Rivera & The Assads, Cuban-born saxopho-  

nist, at 8 p.m. at Zellerbach Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $22-$42. 642-9988. www.calperfs.berkeley.edu 

Henry Kaiser & Grooves of Mystery at 8:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $9. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Cheap Suit Serenaders, ragtime and jazz, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $20.50-$21.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Golden Shoulders, WIllie Wisely at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $5. 841-2082 www.starryplough.com 

Showrinho, from Brazil, at 8 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Cost is $10. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

Amy & Karen, Jug Free America at 8:30 p.m. at Epic Arts, 1923 Ashby Ave. Cost is $5-$10.  

Brian Kane, solo guitar, at 8 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810.  

Selector at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277.œ

Following a complex move from Golden Gate Park and a hiatus in public exhibit programs, the California Academy of Sciences has been back in action for some months in abbreviated quarters in downtown San Francisco. 

The 152-year-old institution temporarily occupies a converted building south of Market on Howard Street, just around the corner from the Moscone Center. It will be there until at least 2008 when construction of a new and permanent academy building is finished in Golden Gate Park.  

Although the temporary facility is a bland concrete box on the outside, the inside is a treasure chest of creative exhibits and activities. 

The academy has worked out the bugs from the move, so to speak, and is once again a prime place to visit and a good reason to make a rainy day trip or weekend excursion to San Francisco, especially since the temporary site is just two blocks from a BART station. 

Although many aspects of the old academy are not on display—there are no wildlife dioramas or big astronomy, anthropology, or geology displays as there were in the park, and no planetarium—this can be considered a strength at the temporary location, where the compact format allows everything to be seen within a morning or afternoon. 

The absence of exhibits in some fields doesn’t mean the academy has abandoned those disciplines. Upper, non-public, floors house the academy’s splendid array of research collections and working scientists. 

There are three main parts to the public face of the temporary academy, spread out over two floors. Let’s take them in order, from the entrance. 

First, and most entrancing in some respects, is the “Ants” exhibit, on display through May, when a new exhibit on Chocolate is planned. 

There are lots of great elements to the exhibit, including cases of wood munching carpenter ants from the Sierra and chambers of “honey-pot ants” in which individual adults, their distended abdomens adapted into living storage containers, hang like tiny, golden, champagne grapes.  

Most of the displays show both ants on the surface and ants underground and are provided with magnifying lenses for really “up close” examination. 

There’s a colony of familiar, household, Argentine ants, amusingly arranged with a stack of dirty dishware on which the tiny creatures opportunistically scavenge food scraps, a scene reminiscent of more than a few Berkeley student apartments.  

Hanging, sculpture-like, models augment the living ant displays and show the complex structure of chambers and passages of typical colonies if you could extract them intact from the ground. 

Further on, a really intriguing display explores remarkable symbiotic or predatory connections between ants, thorn trees, blind snakes, butterflies…and anteaters, of course. 

The exhibit show stopper is the leafcutter ant display, spread out over one wall.  

At the right end is a chamber swarming with creatures relentlessly defoliating tree branches in a scene that’s like a tiny diorama depicting Bush administration forest policy.  

To the left, a vertical panel contains nests where the ants “plant” the decaying leaf fragments and “farm” them to raise a fungus that is their food. 

Between the two chambers, a long cabinet contains an ascending, artificial “branch.” Up it, like an entomological Birnam Wood, marches an endless legion of large, amber-colored, ants carrying segments of leaves. 

Temporarily unburdened ants descend in the reverse direction from nest to the cutting yard for new loads of leaf (note that, in an unequal division of labor, some make the trip with tiny leaf fragments while others hoist huge burdens).  

The activity is at once frenetic, purposeful, and mesmerizing. 

Further along, legions of tropical Army Ants occupy two room-sized Plexiglas cases visible from all sides. Pillows are thoughtfully provided so children can sprawl on the floor and watch.  

This was supposed to be the star attraction of the exhibit but took a wrong turn months ago when beetles hitch-hiked in on the cricket food supply and gradually killed off the ants.  

The exhibit has now been revamped, sans beetles, and stocked with two new Army Ant colonies, freshly collected in Central America by academy staff wielding portable vacuums (there’s a video showing the collection work).  

The Army Ants swarm over a landscape of logs, soil, and plants. Mostly they patrol for food, but periodically they “bivouac” into large, seething, masses of tens of thousands of ants clinging leg to leg, with the queen sequestered at the center. 

A further part of the ant exhibit asks Bay Area visitors to collect and identify ants near their homes and send information to the academy to help compile an accurate Bay Area ant survey. 

Beyond the ants is the temporarily transplanted Steinhart Aquarium. 

Steinhart staff managed to bring together miscellaneous small and mid-sized aquariums and several huge, cylindrical, metal tanks—with large Plexiglass windows inserted—to put on display a good part of the collection that was visible in Golden Gate Park.  

Along with fish, the penguins and the coral reef from the old Steinhart successfully made the journey, the latter in a vertical tank viewable from three levels.  

There’s even an alcove for the ever popular “flashlight fish” plus a piranha tank, although there is no alligator “swamp”, open-ocean Fish Roundabout, or marine mammal display. 

Some of the tanks in the makeshift quarters are too high for children to easily see; others have suitably low viewing windows. A “touching pool” provides smaller children with the opportunity to examine various tidepool creatures up close. 

Many of the fish have been compactly grouped into creative displays such as a “Colossal Tropical Rivers” tank that houses truly heroically sized creatures from the Amazon, Congo, and Mekong.  

Upstairs, there’s an astrobiology display that profiles some of Earth’s harshest natural environments to examine what conditions—including those suitable for life—might be like on other planets and moons. We went quickly through this section, which didn’t quite come together from my perspective; your time, like ours, may be more enjoyably spent amongst the ants and fish. 

Much of the upper floor is given over to a large, staffed, child-friendly Naturalist Center, brimful of books, computers, microscopes, models, and natural artifacts from animal skins to fossils.  

A creatively arranged—and heavily used—play area for toddlers is off in another corner of the floor, and an adjacent classroom is lined with older wooden furniture, artifacts, and photos from the various eras of academy history.  

The whole facility seemed well adapted to younger children, while still retaining considerable interest for adults. The level floors, open display layout, and elevator access also seem amenable to wheelchair users. 

Back on the ground floor near the reception desk you’ll find an extensively stocked museum store and a restaurant promoting “a socially responsible food supply.” 

The menu—sandwiches, salads, hot and cold beverages and so forth—looked good and reasonably priced, but the seating capacity is minuscule, so don’t count on having a sit-down meal there during the busier hours. 

Also on the ground floor and ascending the staircase wall is an elaborate collage of photographs documenting the academy’s field research activities throughout its history. 

Three other aspects of the public areas are worth mentioning. The displays are decoratively minimalist, but creative. Academy designers did a lot with modest materials and a bare-bones budget and facility. 

A good example is the sculptural “Snake Alley,” with walls and ceiling composed of sinuous ribbons of bent plywood boards that filter light from above. 

Second, much of the exhibit care occurs out in the open.  

We weren’t there for the announced feeding of the Army Ants, but as we wandered the amphibian area a staff member appeared with a container of fruit flies which he expertly transferred into a tank of vividly blue and green poison dart frogs. As a cluster of children and adults gathered, entranced, he cheerily explained what he was doing and answered questions about the habits of the hungry frogs. 

Third, the exhibit texts pull no punches when connecting to world events. Aquarium displays, for example, explain just how, where, why the fish they showcase are now extinct or threatened in the wild by human actions.  

In the insect area, displays document how now-ubiquitous Argentine Ants—accidentally brought into North America around 1908—may have contributed to the extinction of the Bay Area’s Xerces Blue butterfly early in the 20th century, and currently endanger desert horned toads by displacing their native ant food supply.  

The academy can be a fairly quick visit—we were through in two hours—and I was pleasantly surprised to see what had been in accomplished in a building that is small and inhospitable compared to the institution’s grand, historic, quarters in Golden Gate Park. 

Steven Finacom wrote about the last days of the old Academy of Sciences facility in the Dec. 26, 2003 Daily Planet. 

8

FRIDAY, JAN. 21 

City Commons Club Noon Luncheon with Ludmilla Kutsak on “The Fabergé Egg.” Luncheon at 11:45 a.m. for $13, speech at 12:30 p.m., at the Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant St. For information and reservations call 526-2925 or 665-9020.  

San Francisco Bay Flyway Festival Fri. through Sun. on Mare Island in Vallejo, celebrating the annual migration along the Pacific Flyway of hawks, shorebirds, ducks and geese and even monarch butterflies. 707-649-WING(9464) www.sfbayflywayfestival.com 

“Until When...” a documentary by and about Palestinians, refugees in their own land, at 8 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Dr. Jess Ghannam, one of the film’s producers, will answer questions. Cost is $8. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

Parent Equity Forum: “Leading My Child to Excellence and Equity” with Enid Lee, from 9 a.m. to noon at the Alameda County Office of Education, 313 W. Winton Ave., Room 142, Hayward. Free to parents in Alameda County. 670-4163. www.acoe.k12.ca.us 

Family Literacy Night Celebrate Dr. King’s Dream with Daaimah Waqia reading her book “A Different Kind of Beautiful,” at 7 p.m. at the Berkeley YMCA, 2001 Allston Way. 665-3271. 

Berkeley Chess Club meets Fridays at 7:15 p.m. at the East Bay Chess Club, 1940 Virginia St. Players at all levels are welcome. 845-1041. 

“Three Beats for Nothing” meets to sing 16th century harmony for fun and practice at 10 a.m. at the North Berkeley Senior Center. 655-8863, 843-7610. 

Women in Black Vigil, from noon to 1 p.m. at UC Berkeley, Bancroft at Telegraph. 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. Sponsored by the Buddhist Peace Fellowship. 655-6169. www.bpf.org 

SATURDAY, JAN. 22 

Dog Walk for Mud Puppies Bring your canine friend for a hike along South Park Drive. Bring a leash and baggies. Meet at 2 p.m. at the closed gate at the bottom of the South Park Drive near Botanic Garden. 525-2233. 

Ohlone Dog Park Clean-Up from 10 a.m. to noon at Grant St. and Hearst Ave. Sponsored by the Ohone Dog Park Assoc. www.ohlonedogpark.org 

Kids Garden Club For children 7-12 years old to explore the world of gardening. We plant, harvest, build, make crafts, cook and get dirty! From 2 to 4 p.m. at Tilden Nature Center, Tilden Park. Cost is $5-$6, registration required. 525-2233. 

Pt. Molate Walk with Berkeley Path Wanderers Explore Richmond’s historic and surprisingly wild Pt. Molate, with beaches, native grasslands, and a former Chinese fishing community, whaling station, and the world’s largest winery. Meet at 10 a.m. Take the Pt. Molate exit from I-580 (last exit before Richmond Bridge). Where the road divides in three, take the middle road; in about a mile park at the abandoned visitors center on the right, across from very large buildings. Easy walk, but dress for cold, wind, or rain. Bring water; lunch may be purchased at the diner at quaint San Pablo Yacht Harbor. 549-2908. zemeralds@aol.com 

Junior Rangers of Tilden meets Sat. mornings at Tilden Nature Center. For more information call 525-2233. 

Rose Pruning at 10 a.m. at Magic Gardens Nursery, 729 Heinz Ave. 644-2351. www.magicgardens.com 

Emergency Response Training Class on “Responding to Terrorism” from 9 a.m. to noon at the Public Safety building, 2100 Martin Luther King Jr. Way. To register call 981-5606. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/fire/oes.html 

“Playing to Learn” An educational conference on floor time and drama therapy with Barbara Kalmanson, Ph.D. and Charla Cunningham, RDT, from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. at Julia Morgan Center for the Arts, 2640 College Ave. Cost is $135, some scholarships available. 845-8542. www.juliamorgan.org 

Celebrate Jewish Earth Day Tu B'Shvat Seder led by Rabbi Michael Lerner from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. at 1027 Cragmont Ave. Please bring a main course vegetarian dish to share with 12-14 people. RSVP required, 528-6250. 

Auditions for the San Francisco Boys Chorus from 1:30 to 3 p.m. at the Interstake Center, 4780 Lincoln Ave., Oakland. To schedule an audition call 415-861-7464. 

Pre-School Storytime for ages 3-5 at 11 a.m. at the Albany Library, 1247 Marin Ave. 526-3720, ext.17.  

SUNDAY, JAN. 23 

Dynamite History Walk Explore Pt. Pinole’s explosive and peaceful past on this flat, easy-paced walk from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Reservations required. 525-2233. 

Feeder for Feathered Friends Learn to make different feeders to hang in your garden for over-wintering birds. From 2 to 4 p.m. at Tilden Nature Center, Tilden Park. 525-2233. 

“Winter Blooms!” Free garden tours at Regional Parks Botanic Garden in Tilden Park at 2 pm. 845-4116. www.nativeplants.org 

War Tax Resistance Information Find out more about this form of conscientious objection. Potluck and discussion at 4 p.m., basic information about war tax resistance at 5 p.m. at 2311 Russell St. Donations accepted, not required. 843-9877.  

Sister Helen Prejean, author of “Dead Man Walking,” will introduce her new book, “The Death of Innocents: An Eyewitness Account of Wrongful Executions” at 7 p.m. at King Middle School, 1781 Rose. St. Tickets are $10-$12. Benfits Pace e Bene and KPFA. www.kpfa.org 

“Another World Is Possible” a documentary of the 2002 World Social Forum along with protest films documenting the last two years of resistance in the Bay Area. From 3 to 5 p.m. at the Parkway Theater, 1834 Park Blvd., Oakland. Free. 601-8000. www.picturepubpizza.com/special-events/sunday_salon.html 

“A Beautiful Blend: Mixed Race in America” a documentary about Swirl, a national organization providing support to mixed race people, at 3 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

Berkeley Cybersalon, with Jay Harman, founder and CEO of PAX Scientific on “Alternative Energy,” from 6 to 8 p.m. at the Hillside Club, 2286 Cedar, between Spruce and Arch. Cost is $10. 

Lake Merritt Neighbors Organized for Peace Peace walk around the lake every Sun. Meet at 3 p.m. at the colonnade at the NE end of the lake. 763-8712. lmno4p.org 

Tibetan Buddhism with Bob Byrne on “Longchenpa: Master of the Nyingma Lineage” at 6 p.m. at the Tibetan Nyingma Institute, 1815 Highland Pl. 843-6812. www.nyingmainstitute.com 

Personal Theology Seminar with Cathleen Cox Burneo on “Jesus, A Peasant with Attitude” at 9:30 a.m. at Unitarian Universalist Church of Berkeley, 1 Lawson Rd., Kensington. 525-0302. 

MONDAY, JAN. 24 

Tea and Hike at Four Taste some of the finest teas from the Pacific Rim and South Asia and learn their natural and cultural history, followed by a short nature walk. At 4 p.m. at Tilden Nature Area, in Tilden Park. Cost is $5-$7, registration required. 525-2233. www.ebparks.org 

Berkeley High School Site Council meets from 4:30 to 6 p.m. in the school library. On the agenda are a report on recycling and a proposal by the Academic Choice Program. bhs.berkeleypta.org/ssc  

Derby St. Field Construction Plan Community Meeting at 7 p.m. at the Berkeley Alternative High School Multipurpose Room, 2701 MLK Jr. Way. 644-6066. www.berkeley.k12.ca.us 

“A Conversation about Creeks and Culverted Creeks” hosted by the Friends of Strawberry Creek from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. at the Berkeley Central Library Community Meeting Room. jennifermaryphd@hotmail.com or caroleschem@hotmail.com 

“Service Learning and the Development of Volunteerism in Chile” with Sebastián Zulueta, director of the Service Learning Center at the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, at noon in the CLAS Conference Room, 2334 Bowditch St. 642-2088. 

“At the Wizard’s Table: Shaman’s Altars in Peru” lecture and slide show by Douglas Sharon, director of the Phoebe Hearst Museum, at 3:30 p.m. at Pacific School of Religion, Chapel Room 6, 1798 Scenic Ave. 849-8201. 

Tu B,Shvat Seder with Rabbi Yehuda Ferris with song and stories at 7:30 p.m. at Redwood Gardens, 2951 Derby St. Cost is $8-$10. 540-5824. 

El Cerrrito Library Book Club meets to discuss “Cold Mountain” by Charles Frazier at 7 p.m. at the El Cerrito Library, 6510 Stockton Ave. 526-7512. www.ccclib.org 

World Affairs/Politics Discussion Group for people 60 years and over meets at 9:15 a.m. at the Albany Senior Center, 846 Masonic Ave. 524-9122. 

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

TUESDAY, JAN. 25 

Bird Walk in Tilden Meet at 7:30 a.m. at the Little Train parking lot, Lomas Cantadas and Grizzly Peak Blvd. to look for birds of the grassland and great views. 525-2233. 

Return of the Over-the-Hills Gang Hikers 55 years and older who are interested in nature study, history, fitness, and fun are invited to join us on a series of monthly excursions exploring our Regional Parks. Meet at 10 a.m. at Sobrante Ridge to explore this ecosystem and visit a rare stand of Alameda manzanita. Registration required. 525-2233.  

Introduction To Sustainable Landscape Design Create an environmentally friendly oasis in your yard using the principles of sustainability. Use of native plants, recycled materials, water conserving techniques and pest control will be discussed. From 7 to 10 p.m. at the Building Education Center 812 Page St. Cost is $35. To register, call 525-7610.  

“The Future of Education Funding in California” with Ken Hall, Chairman, School Services of California at 7 p.m. in the Berkeley High Library, corner of Addison and Milvia. 644-8549. www.berkeley.k12.ca.us 

Best Ski Tours in the Sierra and Beyond with Marcus Libkind, founder of Snowlands Networks, at 7 p.m. at REI, 1338 San Pablo Ave. 527-4140. 

“Epiphany West 2005: Truth and Dialogue” a conference with theologians exploring issues facing the Episcopal Church today, through Jan. 29, at Church Divinity School of the Pacific, 2451 Ridge Rd. 204-0720. www.cdsp.edu 

Ralph Nader, Matt Gonzales and Guests “End the Iraq War and Occupation” at 5 p.m. at St. Marks Church, 2300 Bancroft Way. Cost is $5-$10. 213-1569. 

Mills College MBA Open House at 7 p.m. at Reinhardt Hall, Mills College. For information call 430-3173. 

“Getting Along with Your Adult Children” a participatory workshop at 7:30 p.m. at the BRJCC, 1414 Walnut St. Cost is $35-$40. 848-0327, ext. 110. www.brjcc.org 

Berkeley PC Users Group Problem solving and beginners meeting to answer, in simple English, users questions about Windows computers. At 7 p.m. at 1145 Walnut St., near corner of Eunice St. All welcome, no charge. 527-2177.  

Organic Produce at low prices sold at the corner of Sacramento and Oregon Streets every Tuesday from 3 to 6 p.m. This is a project of Spiral Gardens. 843-1307. 

Family Story Time at the Kensington Branch Library, Tues. evenings at 7 p.m. at 61 Arlington Ave. 524-3043. 

School Age Storytime for ages 5 and up at 7 p.m. at the Albany Library, 1247 Marin Ave. 526-3720, ext.17.  

Brainstormer Weekly Pub Quiz every Tuesday from 7:30 to 9:30 p.m. at Pyramid Alehouse Brewery, 901 Gilman St. 528-9880. 

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. 548-3991. www.berkeleycameraclub.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. 26 

Winter Walk Berkeley for Seniors meets every Wednesday at 9:30 a.m. at the Sea Breeze Market, just west of the I-80 overpass. Everyone is welcome, wear comfortable shoes and a warm hat. Heavy rain cancels. 548-9840. 

“Children of the Dirt” and “The Tour, Baby!” Special screening of two great bicycling films at 7 p.m. at Berkeley High School Community Theater, enter on Allston Way across from Civic Center Park. Cost is $10, proceeds benefit the NorCal High School Mountain Biking League. 325-6502. www.norcalmtb.org 

“The Downside: No State Money, Crumbling Cities” with Terri Waller, Research Coordinator, Assemblywoman Loni Hancock’s office and Phil Kamlarz, Berkeley City manager at 1:30 p.m. at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Sponsored by the Berkeley Gray Panthers. 548-9696. 

“Radical Islamist Thoelogy: What Does it Mean for the Jews” with Yitzhak Santis of the Jewish Community Relations Council at 7:30 p.m. at the BRJCC, 1414 Walnut St. 839-2900, ext. 211. 

Berkeley School Volunteers Training workshop for volunteers interested in helping in Berkeley Public schools at 7 p.m. at 1835 Allston Way. 644-8833. 

“Dead Man” Jim Jarmusch film of an accountant on a spiritual quest at 7 p.m. at Humanist Hall, 390 27th St., Oakland. Free, $5 donations accepted. 393-5685. 

Artify Ashby Muralist Group meets every Wed. from 5 to 8 p.m. at the South Berkeley Senior Center, to plan a new mural. New artists are welcome. Call Bonnie at 704-0803. 

Stitch ‘n Bitch Bring your knitting, crocheting and other handcrafts from 6 to 9 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave. 548-5198. 

Gelateria Naia Blood Drive from 1 p.m. to 7 p.m. at 2106 Shattuck Ave. To make an appointment, stop by the store or call 883-1568.  

Tap Into It Jazz and Rhythm Tap classes at Montclair Recreation Center, 6300 Moraga Ave., Oakland. Experienced at 6:30 p.m., beginners at 7:30 p.m. 482-7812. 

“Radical Islamist Ideology: What Does it Mean for the Jews” with Yitzhak Santis at 7:30 p.m. at the BRJCC, 1414 Walnut St. Cost is $5. 848-0327, ext. 110. www.brjcc.org 

Berkeley Peace Walk and Vigil at the Berkeley BART Station, corner of Shattuck and Center. Sing for Peace at 6:30 p.m. followed by Peace Walk at 7 p.m. www.geocities.com/ 

vigil4peace/vigil 

THURSDAY, JAN. 27 

“The Death Penalty on Trial” with Cold Case Files executive producer and American Justice anchor Bill Kurtis, author of the new book “The Death Penalty on Trial” and UCB law professor Frank Zimring, author of “The Contradiction of American Capital Punishment,” at 6:30 p.m. at The Independent Institute, 100 Swan Way, Oakland. Cost is $15 for non-members. Reservations required. 632-1366. 

Black August Organizing Committee Fundraiser with Fred Hampton Jr., Chairman of the Chicago Chapter of the POCC, and Tarika Lewis, the first woman to join the Black Panthers, at 6 p.m. at Humanist Hall, 390 27th St., Oakland. 658-7079. 

Berkeley Gray Panthers Older People United discussion group for elders over 75, at 1:30 p.m. at 103 Addison St. 548-9696. 

“Seeds of Learning: Creating a Biblical Garden” with Shirley Pinchev Sidell at 7:30 p.m. at the BRJCC, 1414 Walnut St. Cost is $5. 848-0327, ext. 110. www.brjcc.org 

ONGOING 

Albany Berkeley Girls Softball League is looking for girls in grades 1-8 to play girls softball. Season runs March 5-June 4. Scholarships available. To register call 869-4277.  

Dance Access & Dance Access/KIDS! offers creative dance classes for children and teens with and without physical disabilities. All classes are held at Eighth Street Studios, 2525 Eighth St. Pre- registration is required. 625-0110. alisa@axisdance.org  

Youth Speaks Winter Workshops in writing and spoken word begin Jan. 24 in Berkeley and Oakland. For more information call 415-255-9035. www.youthspeaks.org 

Docent Training for the Magnes Museum for those interested in Jewish culture, history, and art. Classes will be held on Thursday evenings starting Feb. 3, at the Museum, 2911 Russell St. For more information contact Faith Powell at 549-6933. 

“Half Pint Library” Book Drive Donate children’s books to benefit Children’s Hospital and Research Center Oakland. Donations accepted at 1849 Solano Ave. through March 31. 

Medical Care for Your Pet at the Berkeley East Bay Humane Society low-cost veterinary clinic. 2700 Ninth St. For appointments call 845-3633. www.berkeleyhumane.org  

CITY MEETINGS 

Solid Waste Management Commission Mon., Jan. 24, at 7 p.m., at 1201 Second St. Becky Dowdakin, 981-6357. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/solidwaste 

City Council meets Tues., Jan. 25, at 7 p.m in City Council Chambers. 981-6900. www.ci. 

berkeley.ca.us/citycouncil 

Civic Arts Commission meets Wed., Jan. 26, at 6:30 p.m. at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Mary Ann Merker, 981-7533. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/ 

commissions/civicarts 

Disaster Council meets Wed. Jan. 26, at 7 p.m., at the Emergency Operations Center, 997 Cedar St. William Greulich, 981-5502. www.ci.berkeley.ca. us/commissions/disaster 

Energy Commission meets Wed., Jan. 26, at 6:30 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Neal De Snoo, 981-5434. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/energy 

Planning Commission meets Wed., Jan. 26 at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Janet Homrighausen, 981-7484. www.ci.berkeley. ca.us/commissions/planning 

Housing Advisory Commission meets Thurs., Jan. 27, at 7:30 p.m., at the South Berkeley Senior Center. Oscar Sung, 981-5400. www.ci.berkeley. 

ca.us/commissions/housing†

A bombed-out Israeli bus brought to Berkeley as part of a rally to address “global terrorism” drew hundreds of spectators to Martin Luther King Jr. Park Sunday. It also drew protesters who called the display propagandistic, one-sided and anathema to peace. 

The factions at the event exchanged heated words and a few moments of violence. 

Sponsored by the Israeli Action Committee of the East Bay, the bus was on display for most of the afternoon while various speakers addressed a crowd on the lawn behind the city offices. Across the street, protesters gathered in front of the Old City Hall.  

“It does not reflect the situation [in the Middle East], it only shows one side,” said Ayman Badr, gesturing to the burnt hulk of the bus. Around Badr, protesters waved Palestinian flags and shouted at supporters of the event who waved Israeli flags and gathered at the edge of the park to shout back. 

Badr held a sign with a gruesome picture of a disfigured Palestinian woman that read “this used to be a woman.” He said the bus rally only focused on the Israeli death toll. 

“We need this to show that it happens to Palestinians as well,” he said. “I am against killing innocent people,” referring to deaths on both sides.  

“I felt it was important to bring the bus here because many people in Berkeley are blasé about terror,” said Dan Kilman, a San Francisco resident. “Many people don’t think it can happen here.” 

A few yards away from Badr, hundreds of protesters gathered in a silent vigil, holding signs with the names and pictures of Palestinian children killed in the conflict. According to Barbara Lubin, the director of the Middle East Children’s Alliance, the vigil was meant to show that people on both sides of the conflict are dying. 

“We are here because we mourn the loss of all children and we thought it was important to bring their names and sometimes pictures because they are the ones that are invisible,” she said.  

Although MECA requested that people participating in the vigil restrain from engaging with people at the event, Lubin said she understood why some of the protesters decided to speak up. 

“They are kids, they are Palestinians, it’s their families who have felt the brutality of the occupation,” she said. “We welcome them on this side of the street.” 

While protesters kept to their side of the street during the majority of the event, a small group gathered at one corner of the park to confront the people waving Israeli and American flags. A yelling match ensued but Berkeley police broke it up and protesters crossed back.  

Later in the afternoon, another small group of protesters with Palestinian flags marched towards the bus rally. They were immediately confronted, while the Berkeley police rushed to get between the two sides. Several people again engaged in yelling matches, and at one point punches were thrown. 

The police wrestled a 14-year-old wearing a kaffiyeh—a traditional checkered scarf worn in the Middle East—to the ground and handcuffed him. They also handcuffed one of the event supporters who wore a kippah, a traditional Jewish religious hat. Both were taken to the police station.  

Small arguments continued throughout the rest of the event but police did not interfere. 

Susanne DeWitt said she was happy the event had a good turnout. Concerning the protesters, she said she was ignoring them. 

“How silly can you be, even in Berkeley,” she said, criticizing what she said was the inability of the protesters to understand that the real meaning of the event was to protest “global terrorism.” 

“I’m sick of children being killed on both sides,” said Liana Hail, from Santa Cruz. “But I believe that Israel has the right to exist.” 

She held a sign which read “Some Palestinians Are Terrorists.”  

Jim Hutcheson, the director of the Jerusalem Connection (formerly known as Christians for Israel) which owns the bus, said he expected the protest. He also criticized the protesters’ argument by claiming that there “is no such thing as a Palestinian people.” 

By 3:30 p.m., most people had dissipated. A group of the protesters waited next to the rear gate of the police station to receive the boy who had been handcuffed during the confrontation. When he finally came out, his friends greeted him with hugs. According to the boy, the police did not charge him with anything. 

Nadine Ghammache, who participated in the silent vigil, walked away still shocked by the display. 

“It’s dishonest,” she said. “Because if they are really concerned about peace, they would also bring uprooted [Palestinian] olive trees. Can they even bring a bulldozed home? What is so painful is that people are being caught in that one-sidedness. It keeps all the groups caught in a cycle of violence.” 

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Plans for the $120 million Memorial Stadium renovation moved a small step closer to realization Friday with the deadline for UC Berkeley’s call for submittal of qualifications from architectural firms. 

Six architectural firms arrived in time for consideration, said Tom Lollini, assistant vice chancellor for physical and environmental planning for capital projects. 

“We’ll be screening the submittals and making a short list of candidates who we’ll bring out and walk around the site and then schedule interviews sometime in the next two to four weeks,” he said. 

The 81-year-old structure, designed by architect John Galen Howard, sits in Strawberry Canyon directly over the Hayward fault, and thus demands extensive retrofitting to match the power of anticipated earthquakes. 

Asked if the retrofitted California Memorial Stadium would include permanent night television lighting, Lollini said, “Our hope is not only to make the venue attractive to fans of a Class I football team, but also to make it attractive to television.” 

It was the first acknowledgment that the university has not given up on its desire to install the lighting since community opposition forced it to rule out such lights nearly five years ago. 

Television lighting is a hot button issue for residents of Panoramic Hill, who have twice mounted successful challenges to earlier proposals to install permanent lighting. 

When asked for comment on Lollini’s remark, Panoramic neighborhood activist Janice Thomas responded, “Can you just say she fainted and didn’t respond? That the normally verbose advocate for her neighborhood was rendered speechless?” 

The architect selected will work with the San Francisco office of Studios Architecture, an international firm with offices in London and Paris which has been retained as the master architect on overall stadium planning.  

The new firm will draw up the construction budget, prepare the schematics and construction schedule, and make certain that adverse impacts are minimized. Lollini said the extent of the stadium project is still unsettled, pending the raising of the necessary construction funds. 

While the request for architectural qualifications estimated the project cost at $120 million, the university has also floated a figure of $140 million “and more.” 

The university plans to raise most of the cash from alumni devoted to the Golden Bears. It recently raised enough to guarantee Coach Jeff Tedford’s five-year, $1.5 million annual salary contract. 

Millions more have been raised for the stadium.  

Janice Thomas’ battle against stadium lighting began in 1999, when the university filed a categorical exemption from the California Environmental Quality Act, claiming the installation of 282 television lights constituted an accessory structure added on to an existing building. 

Organized as Neighbors of Memorial Stadium, Thomas and her allies hired attorney Brian Gaffney, who submitted a brief that successfully challenged the university’s move and led to a withdrawal of the exemption. 

The following year the school came back with an environmental impact statement checklist and a historic structure report on the stadium itself. A large turnout of angry neighbors at the following meeting led the school to say they were dropping the permanent lighting and had begun investigating the possibility of installing retractable lighting. 

Several months later the university sent neighbors a letter declaring their intent to abandon the project altogether. 

“Permanent lighting is completely unnecessary if they’re only going to use it at night and late afternoons only two or three times a year,” said Thomas. “It also makes me wonder what else they’d be doing at the stadium.” 

Thomas also objects to the failure of the university’s recently released Long Range Development Plan (LRDP) to address the stadium as a whole. “It would be nice if we could look at the stadium project as a whole—the retrofit, the intensification of use and the funding sources,” she said. 

The stadium itself would be fitted with luxury suites for corporate and wealthy fans along with new weight and locker room facilities. One proposal floated by the university last year calls for adding facilities for Boalt Hall law school, the Haas School of Business and a conference center in the retrofitted stadium. 

The discovery of Lollini’s Request for Qualifications for a stadium architect angered Berkeley city councilmembers, who shared Thomas’s outrage that the stadium hadn’t been thoroughly addressed in the LRDP. 

Mayor Tom Bates singled out the stadium RFQ in last Tuesday’s State of the City address, saying it was an example of the university’s failure to detail known projects in the long-range plan document. Bates and councilmembers plan to attend the UC Regents’ Building and Maintenance Commission today (Tuesday) in San Francisco to voice concerns over the LRDP.e

The dispute between Berkeley High School and Berkeley Alternative High School escalated last week, with principals of the respective schools differing sharply over which administration was responsible for the problem. 

The disagreement, which has been simmering in the background for more than a year and is now being mediated by BUSD Superintendent Michele Lawrence, centers around charges that BAHS students are being excluded from BHS extracurricular activities. Early last week, at a standing-room-only parent-student meeting at BAHS called by BAHS Principal Alex Palau and attended by Lawrence, several BAHS parents blasted BHS Principal Jim Slemp for not being present, and for being the cause of the problem. 

BAHS students say that the ban began as early as last school year, when a 2003-04 BHS cheerleader was told that she would not be able to come back on the squad this year because she was a BAHS student. Other BAHS students said they were turned away from tryouts this fall to participate in the BHS Spirit Week events. The ban also includes the BHS junior and senior prom (where BAHS students can go, but only as dates of BHS students), but does not include—at least for this year—the June graduation exercises at the Greek Theater. 

Late last week, during his State of the School address to the Berkeley High PTSA, Slemp responded to the charges, saying that he had implemented a ban on BAHS student participation in “our activities” because “we do not get any support or any funds from Berkeley Alternative High School” to deal with what he called “a dangerous situation.” 

Answering a written query from the floor following his address, Slemp charged that the BAHS administration and staff created the problem by “sending bunches of kids over to us without supervision. We don’t know who these students are. They don’t listen to us.” He said that while “we have not said that [the ban] is an absolute,” he said he was issuing a “challenge” to the BAHS administration to correct the problem. 

Apprised of Slemp’s comments by telephone, BAHS principal Palau at first said quietly “wow,” and then flatly denied that BAHS students have been sent to BHS extracurricular activities without supervision. “My staff—including myself, my school safety officer, or my counselors—always participate and help to supervise,” he said. 

Palau said that if Berkeley High had knowledge of specific instances where Berkeley Alternative students had caused trouble at BHS activities “these should have been documented and my office should have been notified.” He said that he knew of no such documentation or notification. 

Noting that funds for student activities are available from the state and district “for all students in the district,” Palau also noted that while he had been aware of “some concerns” by the BHS administration about BAHS student participation, he had never been formally notified that a ban was going to be put in place. 

He said that BAHS parents were “fairly indignant” about the situation. 

At last week’s BAHS meeting, parents sharply questioned Superintendent Lawrence about the source of Slemp’s safety concerns. Several parents charged that BAHS was being discriminated against because it is a predominantly African-American and Latino school, and that it had once been—though it is no longer—the high school’s repository for students with truancy or discipline problems. 

“We’re moving back into segregation,” one parent said, questioning why BAHS was being treated differently from Berkeley High’s Communications Arts and Science school and Community Partnership Academy, the two small schools that operate on the BHS campus. 

Another parent said that other parents should not listen to what she called Slemp’s “hypocritical statements,” saying that while the BHS principal was barring BAHS students from participating in activities to cheer for the BHS sports teams, “he comes down here and gets students from our school to play on his sports teams to make the ‘Big House’ look good.” 

BAHS staff confirmed that two BAHS students played on the BHS football team this year, one on varsity and one on junior varsity. Both were allowed to play the whole football season this year. 

Palau told participants at last week’s meeting that the dispute was really part of a larger debate going on in the district about two competing visions for Berkeley Alternative High School. 

“One vision is that we will continue moving towards a small school model, where students voluntarily attend because they believe they can learn better in our environment,” he said. “Another vision returns us to a time when we identified problem students at Berkeley High and moved them over here, voluntarily or involuntarily.” 

Palau said that he obviously preferred the small school model, and would work to continue to implement it. 

In keeping with Lawrence’s move to mediate the dispute, Palau said by telephone this week that he has already picked a committee from BAHS to meet with their counterparts at BHS. At last week’s school board meeting, Lawrence said that a meeting would be set up with Berkeley High’s Activities director and assistant principal in charge of activities. 

D

Local city councilmembers and state Assemblymember Noreen Evans (D-Santa Rosa) gathered in Cotati Friday to discuss the impact of casinos on their communities and consider a proposed statewide initiative that would impose a moratorium on new gambling pal aces. 

Among those attending was newly elected Richmond City Councilmember Gayle McLaughlin. 

Friday’s meeting was called by Frank Egger of Fairfax—California’s longest serving councilmember, now serving his tenth four-year term—and Sebastopol Councilmemb er Linda Kelley. 

Egger plans to be in San Pablo Saturday to attend a four-hour casino meeting called by Assemblymember Loni Hancock. 

Friday’s meeting was attended by 14 people, most of them elected officials from the North Bay. The group has scheduled a second meeting on Feb. 11. 

“All of them were concerned that mega-urban casinos would overwhelm their communities,” said Egger. “They’re exempt from sales tax, from transient occupancy tax, from income tax and from gross receipts taxes. The only taxes they’r e legally obligated to pay are taxes on employee wages.” 

Egger took issues with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s compact with tribes requiring they pay a quarter of net revenues to the state, contrasting it with Nevada, which taxes a quarter of gross revenues. 

“So we’re only getting 25 percent of twenty percent,” he said 

Egger drafted the Casino Moratorium Initiative, dubbed the California Indian Gambling Casino Moratorium and Planning Act of 2005. 

Its two key provisions are a five-year moratorium on all new tribal casinos unless authorized by a statewide election, and the creation of a 21-member California Indian Gambling Casino and Planning Commission. 

The proposed commission would hold statewide hearings and prepare a California Indian Gambling Plan f or presentation to the Legislature and governor no later that Dec. 31, 2010. 

The commission would make recommendations for the creation of a state gambling regulatory agency to replace the current California Gambling Commission and which would have final say over forwarding casino applications to the governor. 

Egger said some local lawmakers have been anxious about acknowledging their opposition to casino because of the potential impact of gambling industry donations on elections. 

“When I ran for the A ssembly in 2000, I had no money but I did have the support of David Brower, the Sierra Club and others,” Egger said. “When I was approached by a tribe that expressed interest in supporting me, I figured it was about work I’d done in support of Indian fishing rights. But it turned out they wanted my support for a casino proposal.” 

Egger said the proposed Point Molate casino and resort complex in Richmond, with its major auditorium for leading bands and performers, could pose serious problems both for the East Bay and Marin County. 

“If you think traffic on the San Rafael Bridge is bad now, just wait until there’s a casino. There’ll be day and night traffic,” he said. 

The casino site is located at the last I-580 exit in Richmond at the base of the bridge. 

On Dec. 1, the San Diego Union-Tribune reported that the state had conducted only one audit in the last two years of the 28 tribal casinos which have agreed to pay a portion of their profits to the state. All Native American casinos are required to send annual audits to the National Indian Gaming Commission, but that agency is barred from sharing the audits with states. 

While gambling experts told the paper that slot machines in successful casinos net between $300 and $600 daily, the money paid to the California Special Distribution Fund indicated an average take of $275. Skimming of casino winnings has been a favorite enterprise of organized crime, almost inevitable without rigorous auditing and enforcement, according to Joe Yablonsky, FBI Special Agent of Charge in Nevada in the early 1980s when the last of the old-line mobsters were evicted from the casinos.  

Hancock’s upcoming meeting, “Urban Casinos: Gambling with our Future?,” runs from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday in San Pablo at the Knox Center for Performing Arts at Contra Costa Community College [entrance at El Portal Drive and Castro Street]. 

Currently plans for four East Bay casinos are in the offing. The Sugar Bowl Casino planned for unincorporated North Richmond is furthest along, with Be rkeley developer James D. Levine’s plans for Point Molate close behind. 

Plans for a massive expansion of Casino San Pablo, a card room already owned by the Lytton Rancheria band of Pomos, have been temporarily stalled, due to the efforts of foes of a pro posed casino pact which Gov. Schwarzenegger signed. 

Members of the California Senate Governmental Organization Committee posed skeptical questions of tribe leaders when they held a hearing on the governor’s proposal on Jan. 12. 

Schwarzenegger’s proposal would give the state a fourth of the casino’s winnings, estimated at a $155 annual boost to state revenues. Last week’s hearing is the first of several that would be held before the proposal is presented to legislators for approval. 

A day before the Sac ramento hearings, Oakland City Councilmembers voted down a proposal by the Lower Lake Rancheria—Koi Nation tribe of Pomos to build a casino off Hegenberger near Oakland International Airport. 

Five councilmembers said they feared the traffic and social co nsequences of the casino, while two others, including one supporter, abstained from the vote.  

Egger said he became particularly alarmed when he mapped the development of casinos along a corridor along U.S. 101 from Laytonville in the north through Marin County and on through 580 over the San Rafael Bridge to San Pablo. 

“When you look at the map, you see a casino every 15 to 18 miles, with the exception of Marin County,” he said. “It’s like one long strip, except you have to drive from casino to casino.” 

In his newest budget plan, Schwarzenegger unveiled plans that would nearly double the staffing for the existing state gambling commission, and add more staff for the gambling division of the state Attorney General’s office, as well as significantly boo st the budgets for both.

Wired Magazine founder Louis Rossetto got his wish Thursday when Zoning Adjustments Board members gave him final approval for an addition to his mother’s recently landmarked cottage. 

The board also approved a University Avenue project by developer John Gordon that would allow him to demolish and replace one dwelling and convert seven other units into offices as part of a complex that will include two restaurants. 

Rossetto’s building, a redwood-sided cottage at 1650 La Vereda Trail designed by noted architect William Wurster, was the subject of a lengthy battle that began when neighbors filed a landmarking application after ZAB had already voted its approval of Rossetto’s initial expansion plans. 

The City Council upheld the appeal and sent the proposal to the Landmarks Preservation Commission where often-heated testimony was followed by adoption of landmark status for the structure. Rossetto then submitted a new plan which left the original structure intact and added two new bedrooms in a separate, nearly mirror-image clone separated from the original by a breezeway. 

Landmarks commissioners approved the design in December, and Rossetto and his attorney, Rena Rickles, brought the new plans to ZAB Thursday night. 

“This application has been scrutinized, micromanaged and looked at from all ends,” Rickles said. “I ask you to approve it exactly as designed because any change would send it back to the landmarks commission.” 

“Please let a frail 87-year-old woman have a bedroom so she can be near her grandchildren,” urged Rossetto, who had said the renovations were needed so that his mother wouldn’t have to climb stairs to the bedroom and would have an extra bedroom for a caretaker. 

Only one voice was raised in opposition. Joan Seear of the Daley’s Scenic Park Neighborhood Group said the approval process “was flawed, with so much chagrin and frustration felt by everyone.” 

Seear urged that city permits “should be flagged for all potential resources,” a move now being considered by the Planning Commission. 

When it came time for a vote, only ZAB member Carrie Sprague voted to oppose the project. 

University Avenue complex 

Board members unanimously approved Gordon’s plans to transform his property at 1952-60 University Ave. into an office and retail complex with two new restaurants with indoor seating and a common outdoor dining area at the site of the complex’s current parking area. 

Gordon bought the property in 2003, the same year the two buildings at the front of the property were declared Structures of Merit by the LPC. 

The site originally housed a nursery, but later owners brought in a collection of seven cottages built between 1880 and 1920, adding storefronts to the two buildings fronting University. 

Gordon’s plan’s call for demolishing one cottage—a dilapidated cottage at the southwest corner of the project—and raising the upper stories of three others atop new commercial structures, 

Another new single-story structure at the southeast corner of the site would house the complex’s only residence, for a caretaker/gardener. An existing rose garden along the northeast interior fence would be enlarged. 

The project won’t replace the seven parking spaces that will be lost or the seven dwelling units, which will be transformed into office spaces. Several ZAB members lamented that they couldn’t asses the project for a long-proposed but never-enacted parking trust fund, but nonetheless cast their votes for Gordon’s project. 

ZAB also gave the first of three approvals needed before the landmarked Howard Automobile building at 2140 Durant Ave. is converted into a Buddhist seminary, institute and book store. 

After the mitigated negative declaration issued Thursday, the Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) must approve plans for a two-story addition at the rear of the building and ZAB then must issue a use permit to allow construction.B

The City Council Tuesday is scheduled to vote on a plan to reduce auto lanes on a major North Berkeley traffic corridor, but not before residents get their chance to sound off on the proposal. 

Marin Avenue, stretching from the hills to the bay, is the preferred route for many North Berkeley residents to reach I-80. Under a plan backed by Albany and Berkeley officials, the avenue would be reduced from four traffic lanes to two, with bicycle lanes on each side and a center turning lane. 

After a seven-year drive from avenue neighbors in Albany to slow traffic on Marin—the primary access route for two elementary schools—the Albany City Council in October approved the plan. 

Berkeley’s City Council was asked to follow last month. However, amid dozens of e-mails from opponents of the project stating they hadn’t received notice of the plan, the council called for the public hearing first with a vote on the plan to follow. 

Regardless of Berkeley’s decision, Albany will proceed with the project, re-striping Marin from Stannage Avenue to the Berkeley border at Tulare Avenue. If Berkeley joins in, the project would extend four blocks further east to The Alameda. The change would be evaluated after a one-year trial period. 

Berkeley has spent $11,600 on the project’s environmental report and plans to seek grant money for the $30,000 needed to re-stripe the street if the council approves the project. 

At a Transportation Commission public hearing last October, 16 residents split on the plan. Supporters insisted that cars now drive too fast on the avenue, making it unsafe for pedestrians and cyclists, while opponents charged that reducing car lanes would bottleneck traffic during rush hour, spilling cars onto side streets, and increase air pollution from the added stop- and-go traffic.  

Currently, cars travel an average of 31 mph on the avenue, which is zoned for 25 mph, according to a report from the city’s transportation consultants, Fehr & Pierce. The firm also found that from 2001 through 2003, there were 114 collisions on the section of the avenue included in the plan, comparable to the statewide average of similar avenues. 

Fehr and Pierce concluded that the average rush-hour trip down Marin would increase by about 80 seconds with the reduced lanes, and average speed would be reduced to 26 mph. This result, the report suggested, would not be enough of a disincentive to push motorists onto side-streets. 

In other matters, the council is expected to approve an official city response to UC Berkeley’s Long Range Development Plan. The council has voted to sue the university if it doesn’t address its concerns over its plan to build 2.2 million-square-feet of new academic and administrative space, 2,600 new dorm beds and up to 2,300 new parking spaces over the next 15 years.  

The city is demanding more details about specific construction projects and stronger efforts to lessen environmental and financial impacts on the city. Tuesday morning, the council will voice its opposition at a meeting of the UC Regents’ Committee on Grounds and Buildings in San Francisco. 

The council is scheduled to vote on an appeal of the permits for the nine-story, 149-unit Seagate building, approved by the Zoning Adjustments Board. Last week, the council held over the vote on the building slated for Center Street, just west of Shattuck Avenue. 

The appellants are arguing that city staff erred in awarding additional floors based on bonuses for including arts space and affordable units. They also questioned the developer’s intention to outfit the affordable units with fewer amenities. 

After receiving approval from the Landmarks Preservation Commission and the ZAB, the Ed Roberts Campus proposal comes before the council Tuesday. The council will vote whether to grant the air rights at the Ashby BART Station, on the east side of Adeline Street, to the project. The center will house a consortium of disability rights and training organizations. 

The council is also set to become the first city to endorse the Kyoto Protocol, calling for the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. The United States is one of four industrialized nations—Australia, Monaco and Lichtenstein are the others—not to sign the accord. 

By endorsing the protocol, the city would pledge to keep emissions of greenhouse gases within levels called for under the protocol and lobby other cities to do the same. 

Berkeley-based KyotoUSA is leading the drive to get cities to endorse the protocol. Information about the organization can be found at www.kyotousa.org.›

New state laws mandate that California public schools must be “clean, safe, and functional,” and that all students be supplied with textbooks and other instructional materials and taught by qualified teachers.  

While these are admirable goals, not nearly enough funds have been allocated to meet them, Associate Alameda County School Superintendent Carlene Naylor told the Alameda County Board of Education last week. 

The requirements are a result of the August 2004 settlement of the landmark Eliezer Williams v. State of California lawsuit. 

“Obviously, this settlement was not put together by anyone who works in the real school world,” said Jacki Fox Ruby, a county school boardmember. 

The class action, filed in 2000 by a group of California parents backed by the American Civil Liberties Union and the Mexican American Legal Defense Fund, among others, claimed that the state failed to provide poor and underprivileged students with equal educational opportunities. The administration of former Gov. Gray Davis fought the lawsuit for three years, but Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger settled it. 

The settlement agreement and its enacting legislation requires that districts throughout the state provide necessary instructional materials to all students, maintain facilities in “good repair” at low-performing schools, and ensure that all classes have properly credentialed teachers. Among other terms of the settlement, parents are to be notified that they have the right to file complaints with their respective districts if they find any conditions in their schools in violation of the settlement agreement. 

The settlement and legislation gives added responsibility to county school superintendents to oversee local districts to make sure the terms of the settlement agreement are met. 

But at last week’s meeting, Alameda County School Superintendent Sheila Jordan and county school board members grumbled that the time given by the legislature to inspect schools, and the funds allocated to correct problems, was far from adequate. 

The Williams lawsuit legislation provided $5 million a year, for the next three years, to be spent throughout the state. 

As a result, beginning this year, county superintendents must annually produce a “state of the schools” report on schools ranking on the low end of the state Academic Performance Index (API). This year one BUSD school, Rosa Parks Environmental Science, was on that list, along with 62 Oakland schools and two Emeryville schools 

In addition, beginning in 2005-06, county superintendents must visit all of the low-performing schools in the first month of the school year to determine compliance with the settlement. The settlement also requires the county school districts to provide textbooks and other instructional materials to students if the local districts fail to comply with state law. 

The settlement legislation also set up an emergency facilities repairs account to fund “unforeseeable emergency needs” such as gas leaks, power failures, or pest infestations. 

Superintendent Jordan said her office was studying its responsibilities under the settlement. A report of the impact of the settlement on county district’s budget is scheduled be presented to the board at its Feb. 8 meeting.

Berkeley’s Design Review Committee will get their first look at plans for the David Brower Center Thursday night. 

The project, to be built at the site of the city parking lot at Fulton Street between Allston Way and Kittredge Street, will feature 97 affordable housing units and 31,700 square feet of office space for environmental groups, a 7,000-square-foot conference center, a restaurant and 8,500 square feet for retail sales built above a 145-space, four-level underground parking garage. 

Also on the agenda is a look at revised plans for Prince Hall Arms, a four-story 42-unit senior citizen residential building with street-front commercial at 3132 Martin Luther King Jr. Way. 

Committee members rejected the building’s color scheme and the proposed use of sheet metal siding at their Dec. 16 meeting. 

The panel will also look at plans for additions of office space to a building at 2107 Dwight Way and a remodeling of a commercial and office building at 1640-1650 Martin Luther King Jr. Way. 

The meeting begins at 7:30 p.m. in Workshop B of the North Berkeley Senior Center, 1901 Hearst Ave. 

—Richard Brenneman

At the moment that President George Bush takes the oath of office Thursday, at 9 a.m. Pacific time, Artists and Writers for Peace are calling on people to gather at BART Plaza in downtown Berkeley, and in 14 cities around the country, to read the Langston Hughes poem “Let America Be America Again.” 

Participants for the Berkeley gathering at the corner of Center Street and Shattuck Avenue will include former U.S. Poet Laureate Robert Hass and Councilmembers Kriss Worthington and Darryl Moore. 

After everyone assembled reads the poem in unison, participants can read the poem individually. Later musicians and poets will be invited to read and sing original works of protest. 

Bonnie Hughes, a Berkeley Civic Arts Commissioner, is organizing the event and working to spread it across the nation. So far, protest organizers in 14 cities including Omaha and Philadelphia, have agreed to read the poem aloud as the president takes the oath of office. 

“Let America Be America Again” was first published in 1936. 

For more information, or for a copy of the poem, see http://artistsandwritersforpeace.org/index.html. 

—Matthew Artz

Last November’s election remade one-third of the nine-member City Council, but it is only starting to impact Berkeley’s 45 council-appointed citizen boards and commissions. 

The three new city councilmembers, Darryl Moore, Laurie Capitelli and Max Anderson, have moved quickly to either retain or replace their predecessor’s appointees to the most influential commissions—Planning, Police Review, Landmarks Preservation and the Zoning Adjustment Board—while most vacancies in other commissions remain unfilled. 

Councilmember Anderson has the toughest task ahead. After appointing Transportation Commission Chair Rob Wrenn to the Planning Commission, Paralegal Jonathan Wafer to the Police Review Commission (PRC), and local business owner Sam Dykes to the Loan Administration Board, Anderson still faces 12 vacant commission seats, many of which were left unfilled by his predecessor Maudelle Shirek. 

Moore has seven vacancies to fill after appointing Raudel Wilson, a Mechanics Bank executive and the President of the Downtown Berkeley Association, to the ZAB; Sara Shumer, a retired professor of political theory to Planning; Sharon Kidd, his former opponent for his City Council seat, to Police Review; and Deborah Spaulding to the Citizen’s Budget Commission.  

Laurie Capitelli, who was left with a nearly full roster of commissioners from his predecessor Miriam Hawley, has four commission vacancies to fill after appointing Sherry Smith, president of the Berkeley League of Women Voters, to Police Review and Rick Judd, a land use attorney, to fill his former seat on the ZAB. 

In all, 73 commission seats remain vacant, according to the most recent tally from the city clerk’s office released this month.  

Vacant commission seats can hamper oversight of public money. The Energy Commission, for instance, which is listed in the city clerk’s roster as having only five of its nine seats filled, manages $338,000 in federal grants for home safety and repair. 

Other commissions with numerous seats to be filled include the Fire Safety Commission and the Commission On Labor, which have four vacancies and the Commission on Disabilities and the Homeless Commission which have three vacancies. 

The new councilmembers reported receiving many applications for possible appointments to the ZAB, but no interest for several other commissions. 

“We’re just going to have to beat the bushes,” said Councilmember Anderson who plans to fill his commission vacancies within the next few weeks. 

For the Planning Commission, which studies and advises the council on land use issues, Anderson tabbed Rob Wrenn, who he said would restore balance to the commission and give greater weight to neighborhood concerns. 

Wrenn, who resigned from the Planning Commission last summer to avoid serving his full eight-year term and being precluded from returning, said he would focus on completing a land use plan for the neighborhoods directly south of the UC Berkeley campus.  

Anderson also picked Jonathan Wafer, who he said was the grandson of Berkeley’s first African American Police Officer, to serve as his PRC commissioner. Wafer replaces Jackie DeBose, who resigned after the election. Anderson said he expected Wafer would, “defend the rights of citizens to be free of police excess while being fair to the police.” 

Anderson also said he planned to retain Jesse Anthony as his ZAB Commissioner. Anthony, like DeBose was a close friend of former councilmember Maudelle Shirek, whom Anderson defeated in November. He said Anthony, who usually votes to approve use permits for new buildings, had done a credible job, and praised the work of the commission and staff. 

Capitelli, a former ZAB member, selected Rick Judd, a land use lawyer from the Oakland firm Goldfarb & Lipman, from a pool of viable candidates. Judd’s legal background appealed to Capitelli, who hoped his appointment could help the ZAB better understand legal scenarios in which state laws conflict with city laws. 

Asked about how Judd might vote on controversial projects, Capitelli, who more often than not supported new construction, replied that Judd, “seemed like someone who would approach things in an even-handed way.” 

Capitelli had similar praise for Sherry Smith, who replaces outgoing Lucienne Sanchez-Resnik at the Police Review Commission. Noting the commission’s traditionally contentious relationship with the police department, Capitelli said he hoped Smith, a newcomer to police issues, could ease tensions. 

Capitelli also said he planned to retain Landmarks Preservation Commissioner James Samuels and that Planning Commissioner David Tabb would determine this spring if he wished to remain on the commission. 

Councilmember Moore said he picked Sara Shumer for the Planning Commission because she was “analytical and not ideological.”  

Moore said he became acquainted with his ZAB appointment Raudel Wilson from Rotary Club activities. “I find him to be very conscientious and easy to work with,” said Moore who added that Wilson’s Latino heritage also appealed to him. 

Wilson, in an interview last week, said that he likes most of the new buildings constructed over the past decade and he agrees with most ZAB decisions, including its approval for the nine-story Seagate Building slated to rise on Center Street. 

Moore also replaced former Police Review Commission Chair Jon Sternberg, one of the commission’s more activist members, with his Election Day opponent Sharon Kidd. Kidd has volunteer as the Youth Intervention Specialist for the Oakland Police Department for the past nine years. 

Moore complimented Sternberg, but said he opted for Kidd because she resides in his district and would increase minority membership on the commission›

Second-year Berkeley High School Principal Jim Slemp presented an ambitious eight-goal program to the school PTSA Thursday night, telling parents and teachers in a “State of the School” address that he is dedicated to raising academic scores for all BHS students and eliminating the achievement gap between social and racial groups. 

“Just getting all of our students to graduate is not enough,” Slemp said. “We want to make sure each of our students leaves with the possibility of attending a four-year college. We don’t want them to merely graduate to a job of flipping burgers.” 

Following the presentation, PTSA president Barbara Coleman said her reaction was “positive and favorable. I think he’s great. He’s committed to the children at Berkeley High.” 

Slemp came to Berkeley High in the summer of 2003 during a period of rapid principal turnover. When he was hired, Slemp was the fifth BHS principal in six years, with his predecessor—Patty Christa—lasting less than a month before resigning. 

On Thursday night, Slemp’s clear aim was to project the impression that those days of administrative turmoil were over, and long gone. The bulk of the address dealt with academic matters. 

“My personal goal,” he said, “is that every student at Berkeley High take at least one AP class.” 

He said that a proposal for restructuring of the school’s academic choice program would soon be presented to the school board. Saying that some students were coming into the high school reading at the second or third grade level, he proposed an accelerated reading class for ninth-graders in that situation, taken separately from their regular English class.  

He said that the school is looking at revising its daily class schedule “not this fall but the following fall” for the purpose of “increasing the daily student/teacher contact. Fifty minutes of class time just doesn’t give enough time for extensive instruction.”  

Saying that “we are cheating seniors” by leaving many of them with little to do in their twelfth year, he said he was going to propose raising the graduating requirement from 220 credits to 230. 

“Some of this,” he added with a smile, “will make for an interesting discussion.” 

Slemp emphasized that these changes were going to take a while, and the school had to focus on long-term commitment to change. 

“Improvement of student achievement is not going to happen in one or two years,” he said. 

Among the remaining goals, the principal pledged to: 

• Provide a safe environment at the school. One reform, Slemp said, would be that administration and staff plans to “respond rapidly and effectively to what has before been considered as minor infractions. There’s a tendency to let things go by saying, ‘Oh, those boys are just horsing around.’ But a lot of times, that’s the type of activity that leads to more serious problems. We want to intervene before those problems develop.” 

• Continue to reduce truancy. Slemp said that attendance has improved from 88-89 percent when he took over to 93-94 percent today. 

• Integrate the special education department with the rest of the school. “Isolating special ed is against the law and morally wrong,” he said. “All of our kids are all of our kids.” 

He said that one reform he has already instituted has been to include the school’s special education supervisor as part of his administrative team. “In the past,” he said, “the supervisor merely reported directly to the district, which left a situation where special ed was handled ‘over there,’ separate from the rest of the school.” 

• Continue to improve the high school facility, including custodial and maintenance care. “The buildings still don’t meet my white glove test,” he said, “but the school is looking better than it used to.” 

He announced that the C Building would be remodeled over the summer break, with new floors, lighting, student lockers, and ceilings, and a complete repainting, and promised that the job would be finished in time for school reopening in the fall. 

“I have nightmares that we’ll miss the deadline,” he said, “but everybody assures me that it will be done.” He also said that the South of Bancroft Master Plan—dealing with all of the facilities in that area of the schoolgrounds—will be ready for release to the public next week, and for presentation to the Board of Education shortly afterward. 

At the end of the presentation, in response to a written request from the audience to “please stay at Berkeley High,” the principal said he was committed to the school, saying that “when I came here last year, I refused to say that I was going to stay forever. Remember all the principals that left? They all said that they were going to stay, so it seemed to me that this was a jinx. But I’m here, and you’ve got me.” 

The reading of the “please stay” comment brought general applause from the audience. 

›

Berkeley High School will take a step towards building its small schools program Wednesday night when the Board of Education considers a proposal for the new BHS School of Social Justice and Ecology. 

The meeting begins at 7:30 p.m. at Old City Hall on Martin Luther King Jr. Way downtown. 

If approved, the School of Social Justice and Ecology would be scheduled to open in fall 2005 with 56 freshman and growing to a 250-student program by the fall of 2007. It will join the Communications Arts and Science and Community Partnership Academy, small schools already in place at Berkeley High. The board will consider the Arts and Humanities Academy at its Feb. 2 meeting. 

BHS Principal Jim Slemp said that it will “probably take one or two more” small schools beyond those four to reach the board’s goal of half the school’s students attending small schools. 

In other action at Wednesday’s meeting, the board will consider approval of a Surplus Facilities Committee to look into the sale or long-term lease of the former Hillside School, closed in 1983. In 1990 the district determined that the property was unsafe for reopening because it sits on a portion of the Hayward fault. 

The board will also hear a report on the district’s special education program, scheduled for 8 p.m.?

Berkeley could be in for a red hot debate over the future of the fireplace. 

Four years after the City Council outlawed high-polluting wood stoves and fireplace inserts in restaurants and all new construction, the Community Environmental Advisory Commission (CEAC) is considering an ordinance that could make the use of some fireplaces illegal. 

“The old law didn’t do anything to combat air pollution,” said LA Wood, a CEAC Commissioner and the driving force behind the move to regulate fireplaces in the city.  

He wants the commission to hold a public hearing on the issue by March and ultimately recommend that the council ban the use of all open fireplaces and allow wood burning only in fireplaces that have stoves or inserts certified by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). 

Berkeley Hazardous Materials Supervisor Nabil Al-Hadithy said that strict fireplace guidelines could be appropriate in cases when a chimney was positioned to blow smoke near a neighbor’s windows, but was less convinced that Berkeley needed to outlaw all non EPA-compliant fireplaces. 

“It seems a little bit difficult to justify it if the air quality readings don’t justify it,” he said. 

If the council adopts Wood’s proposal, Berkeley would join Sebastopol, Santa Rosa and Marin County as Bay Area jurisdictions that restrict fireplace use to follow EPA guidelines. The other jurisdictions have outlawed non-EPA-approved inserts or stoves, but still permit wood burning in open fireplaces.  

Considered by many a symbol of rustic comfort, the fireplace, although no longer a primary source for home heating, remains one of the region’s prime winter-time polluters. In the Bay Area, wood burning from fireplaces and other sources accounts for one-third of dioxin, a toxic compound, and contains cancer-causing substances such as benzene and formaldehyde, according to the Bay Area Air Quality Management District (BAAQMD).  

Wood smoke also produces inhalable particulate matter—tiny particles that can measure less than one micron in diameter (one human hair has a diameter of between 40 and 120 microns) and can become lodged in the lungs contributing to lung diseases and cancer. 

Sufferers from asthma, emphysema and heart disease are more prone to particulate air pollution. Children and elderly people are especially vulnerable, according to the district. 

During winter months, wood burning accounts for roughly 30 percent of PM 2.5 (particulate matter with a diameter of 2.5 microns) in the air, second only to auto exhaust, said David Fairley, a BAAQMD statistician. 

Winter is the season for weather patterns that trap pollutants. High pressure systems that sit stationary during colder months create a layer of warm air that blocks colder air near the ground, preventing particulate matter from escaping until wind and rain arrive. Berkeley’s location directly across from the Golden Gate means that the city is less likely than valleys to experience the stagnant weather patterns that trap pollutants. 

The air district doesn’t have monitors within Berkeley city limits, but nearby readings show the East Bay enjoys relatively clean air year round. Since 2002, Downtown Oakland has had an average PM 2.5 reading of 16 microns per cubic meter—far lower than the federal pollution threshold of 150 and the state threshold of 50. 

However, residents living beside prolific woodburners often breath dirtier air.  

“In places like the East Bay where regional air quality is generally good, wood smoke tends to be a highly localized problem,” said Michael Lipsett, public health physician with the California Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment. He said he has received numerous complaints about wood burning from residents in the East Bay hills. 

“It can be just one house or one block that gets the brunt of it,” he said. 

Aftim Saba, a North Berkeley resident, said his family has suffered from being directly adjacent to a neighbor’s chimney. The neighbor’s constant wood fires blew smoke directly into his home, he said, until last year when he hired a private inspector who found that the neighbor had built the fireplace without a city permit. 

“We were like prisoners in our own house; we couldn’t open any windows from November through April,” said Saba, adding that he and his children suffered respiratory illnesses from exposure to the smoke. 

Other jurisdictions have tried to cut down on wood smoke without requiring that residents switch to hi-tech fireplaces. 

In the San Joaquin Valley, which is more prone to weather patterns that trap particulate matter, the regional air board last year enacted regulations instituting no-burn days when particulate matter readings surpassed EPA thresholds. It also limited the number of fireplaces in new development lots and required home buyers to upgrade or disable their fireplaces. 

So far this winter, the San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District has called three no-burn days, said Kelly Malay, the board’s senior education representative. 

In the Seattle area, since 1989, the Puget Sound Clean Air Agency has had the authority to call a burn ban whenever the level of particulate matter hits 60 microns per cubic meter. Amy Fowler, an air resource specialist for the board, said it calls burn bans about once a year. 

Around Seattle, average air visibility has improved from 49 miles to 69 miles since 1989—a 40 percent increase that air agency spokesperson Mike Schultz said was partially due to the no-burn laws. 

Closer to home, Eric Stevenson, Air Monitoring Manager for the Bay Area air board said that particulate matter readings appeared to have dropped in Santa Rosa since the city required EPA-certified wood stoves and fireplace inserts in 2002.  

While a standard fire place emits between 50 to 75 micrograms of particulate mater, EPA-certified stoves and inserts emit an average of about four micrograms. 

Depending on the model, Potter said, a clean burning fireplace costs about $2,500 to buy and install. The cleanest and most popular of the EPA-certified devices is a gas-powered imitation log insert. 

Santa Rosa is the only Bay Area city whose ban on wood has taken effect, and the city has not actively enforced the law, said City Planner Joel Galbraith.  

Commissioner Wood said he would like to see Berkeley’s building inspection division enforce a ban. 

While Santa Rosa hasn’t experienced much opposition to its law, Berkeley residents opposed a ban on non-compliant inserts and stoves when the council last considered regulating fireplaces three years ago. 

“I can’t see them passing it,” said Elmer Grossman, a retired physician and a former CEAC member who helped draft the city’s current ordinance. “Look at the last election. You couldn’t get voters to tax themselves for basic services, they’re not going to pay $1,000 to upgrade their fireplace.” 

f

Unionized grocery workers from around northern California gathered Friday at the Oakland Hilton to announce plans to escalate their fight against three major grocery chains if the stores do not agree to protect health care and other union benefits. 

The announcement came just as the workers’ old contract expired. That contract prevented workers from calling for a boycott or going on strike. But now that it has expired, workers said they can, and will, do whatever it takes to win a fair contract.  

The th ree different stores that could be affected include Safeway, Albertsons and Kroger. All three had the option of continuing the contract until a new contract was signed but all refused, according to the union. 

“After more than four months [of contract neg otiations], the employers have made no movement in their economic bargaining,” said Ron Lind, a spokesperson for the eight United Food and Commercial Worker (UFCW) union locals that are part of the contract. He called the stores ‘health care offers “unwor kable” and “unacceptable.” 

The deadline for the stores to acknowledge the union’s demands is Jan. 24. 

According to Lind, the health care proposal that the stores have offered would make health care unaffordable for many employees. Currently, employees d o not pay for health insurance. Under the initial contract offer from the stores, employees would have paid as much as 20 percent of the premium cost. Workers would also have covered increases in premiums, which have risen sharply for the past several yea rs. 

“We have been committed and we remain committed to working out a contract at the bargaining table,” said Jennifer Webber, the director of public affairs for Safeway’s northern California division. “What happens at the parking lots does not impact what happens at the bargaining table,” she added, in reference to the rally. 

The union also announced that it would expand their campaign to Albertsons stores because of what it said was Albertsons “aggressive stance at the bargaining table.” Up until now, the union has only been targeting Safeway, asking shoppers to sign cards pledging to support the union in the event of a boycott or a strike. 

Another sticking point for the union has been the stores’ proposal for wages. According to the union, the latest offer from the stores includes a two-tier wage system that divides new and current employees. New food clerks, for example would start at $8.45, instead of around $9.45, an hour. They would top out at $17, instead of the current $21.16, an hour. It would also take new employees five times longer to reach the top of the job classification. 

“In my time at Safeway, I have been able to buy a house and put my daughter through college,” said Debra Talcott, a worker who spoke at the rally. “However, those days may be over.” 

Several of the employees said they were ready to go on strike. They did not seem to be daunted by the almost five-month strike that consumed southern California grocery stores last year. 

When asked what she thought of the possibility of a strike, Deborah Chesbrough, a 15-year employee at the Safeway in Menlo Park said, “I would be out there with my kids, although I know it is a last resort.” 

TOO MUCH CREDIT 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Responding to Jane Stillwater’s recent letters on George Bush (which I have appreciated very much). I think she credits him with too much rationality in calling him an actor. As I see it, an actor is intentionally performing a role, whereas George Bush has told us that God is guiding him. No doubt Karl Rove advises him to mention this infrequently, this being, at present, a secular state. 

Whether psychopath or sociopath, Mr. Bush appears to be unaware of and untroubled by reality. We must bend every effort to derail his scheme to destroy Social Security (by borrowing billions for privatization) thus making our deficit as huge as he can. 

Jane, I hope you are joining us in our Hands Off Social Security demonstration in San Francisco on Tuesday, Jan. 18 around noon (for information go to graypanthersberk@aol.com) Also take part in the huge write Congress campaign on Feb. 2 and 3. Let’s help the young workers see through the lies Bush and Cheney are using to arouse fears for their old age. Social Security will be there for them, if it is left alone now. 

Dorothy Headley 

• 

ELECTION COVERAGE 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I feel moved to try to respond to Jane Stillwater’s letter of Jan. 7-10. She reports that she has told many people that the election was fraudulent, and people don’t seem to believe it and don’t want to talk about it. 

I’m guessing that most people do not accept a shocking statement like that unless it is backed up by media coverage. There was virtually no coverage in the mainstream U.S. press about massive electoral aberrations (over 400,000 citizen incident reports nationally). The Daily Planet did better than other papers on this subject. I believe that the election result is based on fraud. I believe this because of many detailed studies posted on the Internet, and because I met with many others who had studied the evidence and were involved with me in trying to encourage Sen. Barbara Boxer to challenge the result of the election. 

Too bad that Jane Stillwater didn’t come to demonstrations with us. She could also have gone to a well-attended program about the election at Herbst Hall Jan. 4. Emily Levy, who helped Richard Hayes Phillips (see below) analyze the Ohio vote, received a standing ovation when she stated that, even setting aside the untold numbers of Democratic votes blocked by illegal suppression tactics employed by Ohio elections officials (such as deliberately providing too few voting machines in Democratic precincts so that long lines and wait times turned voters away, deliberately issuing false information about voting locations, making false threats of jail for small infractions if persons turned up to vote)—precinct-level analysis of votes incorrectly attributed to Bush or improperly diverted from Kerry, demonstrates that Kerry received more votes in Ohio than Bush, and therefore won Ohio’s 20 electoral votes and thus the presidency.    

In Ukraine, I am guessing that they have free media. The gap the Ukranian press reported between the exit polls and the “official” vote results were not believable, so Ukranians came out in droves to protest the theft of their election. They insisted on and got a revote! In our U.S. election, the exit polls at poll closing showed Kerry winning over Bush by about 3 percent, but the officially reported results claimed just the opposite, that Bush beat Kerry by 3 percent. This overnight “red shift” of approximately 6 million votes has never been acknowledged, let alone explained, by the mainstream U.S. press. 

The same kind of exit poll discrepancy that that U.S. government said proved electoral theft in Ukraine existed here in the U.S. elections too. 

The difference is that the U.S. news media refused to report evidence of electoral fraud and voter suppression, other than to ridicule the notion that any had occurred. 

With the mainstream press party to the deception, will the United States ever again have an honest election? 

For examples of electoral fraud evidence not being reported in the press, see the depositions of professors Phillips, Baiman, and Lange at www.freepress.org/departments/display/19/2005/990. 

Julia Craig 

• 

SOCIAL SECURITY 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

In his inauguration speech the president will surely present a compelling dramatization of the Social Security system’s imminent “crisis” and how privatization will come to the rescue. As he does, it may help to remember facts. There are many. Here’s one: George W. was not alive in 1935 when Social Security was born and not one of his supporters will be alive to benefit from much less to answer for the consequences of privatization. People not yet born will. They’ll be buried in red ink. How will they name a thousand trillion, a “1” followed by 15 zeros?  

Marvin Chachere 

San Pablo 

h

Click here to view the latest work by Justin DeFreitas›

My friend Taffy invited me to visit her in New York. She and her friends sent me a round trip ticket to the East Coast including a jaunt to Jamaica, to a resort where you walk around without clothes and pay for drinks with beads. I’m not much of a nudist but I’m big on accepting gifts with no strings attached. 

I told Taffy I’d come, without clothes or money, or my identity. Then I explained my theft problems. She said she would have me, even though someone with my I.D. was running stop lights in Vallejo, and I would have to rush back to the West Coast after the Caribbean vacation to prove to a judge that I was not the black woman with blonde hair and gold teeth in the cream-colored Jaguar. What I didn’t tell Taffy was that besides arriving sans cash or clothes, I’d land at Kennedy with one item: the flu. 

I didn’t tell her this because I didn’t know I had it until I stepped off the plane and dissolved into the passenger seat of her Suburu. I lay there prone all the way to Westchester County. When we pulled in front of her house in White Plains, I crawled up the stairs and collapsed into a bed in her guest room. I didn’t get up for the next eight days.  

Between sweats of biblical magnitude, I had plenty of time to think about my identity problem. I wished that the Vallejo woman had taken the flu from me along with my passport and credit cards. I wished she hadn’t tried to buy a car in my name in San Francisco, but I was grateful that she wasn’t able to do so because, despite the fact that she now owned most of my M.O., she still couldn’t prove she had the proper credit.  

While sweating I dreamt that people were chasing me and I had no face. Weird things happen when you combine influenza with identity theft. I don’t recommend it. 

Meanwhile, Taffy was crossing things off the list of activities she’d planned. No visits to the Whitney or MOMA. No ice skating, shopping at Loehmann’s or a trip to see a Broadway play. No hikes in the snow-covered woods, no swimming at the health club, no corned beef-on-rye at the 2nd Avenue Deli. Instead of having a pedicure together, Taffy took me to her doctor. She wasn’t feeling well either, so it was a double date.  

The Scarsdale doc didn’t bother to take my temperature. He listened to my list of complaints and said, “You’ve got the flu. Rest. Drink plenty of liquids. It will go away soon.” But when he heard Taffy’s symptoms, he jumped into action. He gave her a bag of medicines and prescriptions. She drove home, took a pill, and fell into bed. The next morning she wound up in the hospital, where she stayed for three days.  

In the meantime I got better. I made a list of things we could do when Taffy recovered. I wrote down kayaking in Long Island Sound. We had done this together the year before. Taffy had bundled me up in long underwear and all-weather gear, set me inside a little red kayak and told me to paddle east. The Sound was covered in ice which she instructed me to break through. I asked if this activity might be dangerous. 

She said no; I complied. I always do what Taffy tells me. See above for reference to nude trip to Jamaica.  

When Taffy got out of the hospital I showed her my list. “We’re not going kayaking,” she said. “Why not?” I asked. “Because I found out it’s unsafe to paddle in ice.” “Oh great,” I said. “Now you tell me.” “Shut up,” she replied. “You show up here with no identity and the flu, what do you know about anything?” “You’re right,” I said. “Point me in the direction of Jamaica. Maybe a good sunburn on my private parts will knock some sense into me.”  

“Probably not,” said Taffy. “But what the hell, you definitely have nothing to lose.” 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Peter Levitt’s defense of the proposed Seagate Building (Letters, Daily Planet, Jan. 14) doesn’t hold water. This structure should not receive City Council approval and should not be built. 

The proposal clearly violates the Downto wn Plan by trying to jam a nine-story building onto a block of Center Street that’s zoned for five. It violates the spirit, if not the letter, of its two-floor “affordable housing” bonus by ghettoizing its affordable units on lower floors. And it should c ertainly not be built as a condo palace (Mr. Levitt’s preference). 

But the fishiest thing about Seagate washed up in your Jan. 14 news story: City staff first granted the developers a two-floor “arts bonus,” based on some promised theater space. Then the y granted an “affordable housing” bonus of 25 percent—which state law requires—based on the resulting seven floors. 

But compounding bonuses like this was a procedural mistake. First, the City Council has never formally enacted an “arts bonus.” Second, the promised theater space never received a required use permit. So the affordability bonus should have been 25 percent of five floors—that is, one additional floor. 

Even if the compounding were valid, staff’ s arithmetic would be off. Twenty-five percent of seven floors isn’t two floors (which staff granted). It’s 1.75 floors, which is what they should have granted. 

(Anyone who’s seen the great movie Being John Malkovich knows how much architectural creativity such fractional floors can unleash.) 

City C ouncilmembers should undo staff’s multiple errors by rejecting Seagate. Dam it. 

Marcia Lau 

• 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

There are a lot of reasons for community opposition to the Seagate project as it is now proposed. Here is one of them: 

The city works fo r us, the residents of Berkeley who elect our officials and pay the taxes. The city does not work for the developers. It’s awfully generous of the Planning Department staff to void the Downtown Plan in order to maximize the developer’s profits, but that’s not their job. Their job is to ensure that developments conform to existing regulations and plans and to provide the residents (current and future) with appropriate, legal housing and business development. As far as I know, our city government didn’t tur n into a subsidiary of Darryl de Tienne’s company (the developer of the Seagate project) over the winter break, so it should still be answerable to the people, not the developers. 

Ignoring the Downtown Plan’s very clear height limits shows the Planning D epartment’s (and apparently some of the City Council’s) contempt for the people they’re hired to serve. I hope our elected officials send the flawed Seagate proposal back to the Zoning Adjustments Board for serious revision. 

Jesse Townley 

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The recent dust-up about reconfiguring Marin Avenue to make it safer for pedestrians has all the elements of a classic Berkeley political tempest in a teapot. A couple of op-ed articles in this paper asserted that the Marin Avenue reconfiguration is a scheme by bicyclists to disrupt motor traffic. 

Until recently the Marin Avenue project was only barely on the radar for cycling advocates. We are much more concerned, for example, with the state of Milvia Street in the downtown area. But it is instructive to see how quickly opponents of the Marin project identified bicyclists as the villains of the reconfiguration by stealth. 

Bicyclists make good targets when motorists feel frustrated and disempowered. Even in Berkeley many citizens assume that an automobile is the usual mode of transportation. Often when we want to pick up a box of screws at the hardware store, we grab the car keys and head out the door. We think about the store, and we think about the screws, but we don’t think about the car at all. 

The congestion in Berkeley concerns motorists and cyclists alike. In practice, bicycling activists are not interested in preventing people from driving. So, what is it that bicyclists and bicycling activists want? What are our goals? 

Many of us own cars and drive when it’s appropriate. But we are determined to use bicycles whenever possible. We don’t do it because we hate cars or drivers. We have adjusted our concept of what the appropriate use of a car should be. For a number of reasons we have decided to make driving our second choice. In a city where many of us live within three miles of our destination traveling by bicycle need not be an idealistic fantasy. In practice it is often more convenient to use a bike than a car. 

From reduction of air pollution to the savings on gasoline, there are lots of benefits to making a bicycle the primary choice for transportation. We cyclists have the opportunity to talk to our neighbors as we ride by. We don’t we get frustrated when we can’t find a parking place within feet of our destination. Nor do we expect to get downtown in five minutes. We have learned to allow decent amounts of time for things. 

The Bicycle-Friendly Berkeley Coalition believes that many people can use a bicycle for some trips and will experience some of the benefits. Our organization was founded almost 10 years ago and has over 400 paying members. Our goal is to create conditions that will make riding a bicycle as a means of everyday transportation more attractive to growing numbers of people. Among many other activities, BFBC has offered regular classes in safe bicycling skills that highlight the rules of the road and respect for the law. We teach people to stop at stop signs and traffic lights. We are aware that bicyclists must be ambassadors for good behavior. 

We’re interested in making Berkeley’s transportation infrastructure work well for everyone. This is not an easy task. Especially in Berkeley it is very hard to find universally pleasing solutions. In our efforts to make a constructive contribution to the public dialogue, we participate in the Transportation Commission. But in fact only three of the nine commissioners are regular cyclists. Only two transportation commissioners are members of the Commission’s bicycle subcommittee. 

By bicycling instead of driving we reduce congestion, making it easier for cars to get through town. It’s actually in motorists’ interests to encourage more people to ride bikes. 

At this point cars and motorcycles account for more than 60 percent of the traffic. Transit users account for 18 percent of all commute traffic. Pedestrians make up another 15 percent and bicyclists are about 6 percent of the traffic, which is much higher than the statewide average of 1 percent. When more people get out of their cars and walk or ride, walking and bicycling become safer, because motorists get used to looking out for them. So, not surprisingly, Berkeley is, by far, the safest place to walk or bike in California. 

It’s easy to see why the media have focused their attention on the more flamboyant aspects of bicycle activism like Critical Mass. It’s a way to tap into the commonly experienced frustration of being in a car, stuck in traffic. But it doesn’t really give anyone information about the work bicycle activists do to make streets safe and less stressful for everyone. 

We all benefit from sharing the resources of our public streets. Our dream in the Bicycle-Friendly Berkeley Coalition is to see bicycles become a part of the scenery, the way they are in Holland, Japan, or Germany. Bicycles are not just toys for little kids in OshKosh and bigger kids in Lycra and spandex. 

For information about BFBC go to www.BFBC.org. For information about how cyclists and walkers create safer streets, see www.tsc.berkeley.edu/html/newsletter/Spring04/syntax.html. 

Emma Gilbride and Phil Morton are co-chairs of the Bicycle-Friendly Berkeley Coalition.

The City of Berkeley is being asked to extend and ratify a plan for Marin Avenue reconfiguration that will have a very large impact on Berkeley traffic patterns and safety. This plan was cooked up by the City of Albany with some input from Berkeley’s traffic and planning staff and support from Berkeley’s bike lobby. As I outlined in a communication of October, 2004, there is no public record of the Berkeley City Council ever really endorsing this plan or authorizing Berkeley city staff to participate in its formation. Only on Oct. 21, 2004 was this plan, already a done deal in Albany, submitted to Berkeley’s Transportation Commission (fondly known in some quarters as the Bike Commission) where it was, unsurprisingly, ratified. Now we are to finally have a full public airing of this matter in Berkeley, at a Jan. 18 public hearing. 

I and many other Berkeley residents are deeply troubled by the Marin Avenue reconfiguration. Why are we troubled? 

We are emphatically not troubled by any thoughtful and democratic effort to curtail speeding and improve safety on Marin Avenue. It is simply not clear that, given all the variables, the proposed plan is the smartest way to achieve this safety while maintaining the viability of Marin Avenue as a key arterial. 

We are troubled by Albany’s lack of neighborliness and reciprocity in high-handedly curtailing the use of its streets by Berkeley automobiles and commuters. Do not Albany residents benefit hugely from their proximity to Berkeley? Do they not use our fine public library system gratis? Do they not send their homeless and special needs residents over the border for our excellent services? Do they not clog up our streets with their autos when there are football games or concerts to attend? Do they not allow mega-stores on our borders that bring traffic to Berkeley streets but tax benefits to Albany? And so on. Albany often behaves as a mini-Piedmont or faux-Orinda. Lucky Albanians, at least they have public officials who look after their interests. 

We are troubled by the failure of our own city officials to consult with us in a timely and democratic manner. 

We are troubled by the existence of a Berkeley fifth column of transportation planners and bike enthusiasts who, behind our backs, helped create a “fact on the ground” which is now very hard to reassess and undo. 

We are tired of Berkeley always being asked, in the name of some greater good, to make sacrifices that effectively enable others to avoid their fair share of the burden. This is true with respect to services for the needy, affordable housing, and UC expansion, to name just a few areas. The Marin Avenue reconfiguration is yet one more instance where Berkeley residents are left holding the bag. 

So what can be done at this late date?  

I ask our City Council to clearly speak out and act on behalf of its own citizenry. The council should reject the plan to reconfigure the four or so blocks of Marin Avenue that are within our city limits. The council should refuse to contribute any further funds or staff to the Albany reconfiguration project. The council should ask Albany’s outside funders (the Bay Area Air Quality Management District) to withhold all funding until this matter is satisfactorily resolved. The council should reject a negative declaration and ask for a full CEQA environmental impact report for the entire project. The council should ask our traffic planners to expeditiously come up with a safety plan for Marin Avenue that best meets our own diverse traffic needs. The council should pursue legal and political action against the City of Albany. This action could include, if necessary, a lawsuit demanding that Albany undertake a full EIR for the Marin Avenue reconfiguration. 

It’s time for Berkeley leaders to represent Berkeley interests. A good start has been made in our refreshingly tough stance with respect to UC expansion. If we can stand up to UC, we can certainly take on the City of Albany. 

Barbara Gilbert is a civic activist and former District 5 Council candidate.

Among the myriad qualities that distinguish Mozart from all other composers is his dramatic sense. Others may be inventive, ingenious, clever at writing melodies, but few have his intrinsic understanding of drama. 

Among jazz musicians, this quality is best exemplified by Louis Armstrong. So many Louis Armstrong recordings begin with what seem like acceptable improvised solos by his sideplayers until the curtains part and Pops steps forward to play a solo that is not only lyrical, crafted, imaginative and virtuosic, but also crackling with drama.  

Likewise, although Mozart excelled at every form of composition in a way that no other composer ever has, he found his center in opera, musical drama. Music for him, vocal or instrumental, involved the emotions and the interplay of personality, whether clashing or congenial. 

For Mozart, every instrument had a personality, especially when these instruments were played by his friends, students, patrons and associates.  

Until he was 9 years old, he would grow pale when the trumpet was played solo in his presence. Whether this was because it suggested Mars’ call to arms or Gabriel’s last trump of doom is unknown, but its timbre evoked a synaesthetic psychological response in the musical prodigy.  

Most of his compositions, like those of Duke Ellington, were conceived with the talents, limitations and humours of specific performers in mind.  

For their second concert of the season, the Oakland East Bay Symphony, under the direction of Michael Morgan, will be performing three of Mozart’s most dramatic masterpieces, all composed in June and July of 1788: Symphony No. 39 in E flat major (K. 543), the Adagio and Fugue in C minor for Strings (K. 546), and Symphony No. 40 in G minor (K. 550).  

About two weeks after completing these pieces, Mozart entered the opening bars of his final symphony, No. 41 (K. 551), the Jupiter, into his Verzeichnis aller meiner Werke, his autograph thematic catalogue of his compositions.  

In other words, during a six-week period, after the failure of Don Giovanni in Vienna, during the time that his infant daughter died, while composing half a dozen other pieces including the Adagio and Fugue, he carried these three symphonies around in his head and then wrote them down one after the other in fully orchestrated versions.  

Not only would that be difficult in itself, but these are the greatest symphonies of the 18th century and among the greatest pieces of music ever composed. The contrapuntal final movement of the Jupiter, which the OEBS performed a few years ago, is usually singled out for particular excellence, but all three symphonies are magnificent from beginning to end.  

Among other aspects, the three together encapsulate the progression from the full flowering of the classical to the first seeds of the romantic whose ripened ears were to be reaped by Beethoven. Listening to them in sequence is like hearing Charlie Parker’s passage from swing to bop on his Jazz at the Philharmonic recording of “Lady Be Good.” 

The most esoteric piece of the evening is the Adagio and Fugue, which, like Symphony No. 40, is in a minor key. This work is often, and with no evidence, linked with Mozart’s freemasonic compositions.  

He became a mason in 1784 followed shortly thereafter by Haydn and his own father. This was the same benchmark year he began keeping the Verzeichnis. The fugue was actually written in 1783 for two pianos (K. 426) and then refashioned in 1788 for strings with the addition of an introductory adagio. In it, he delights to tremble on the brink of discord.  

Although it has no real Masonic link or content, its exquisitely strange, powerful, modernistic harmonies and dark mood suggest the movement of an inexorable fate. We are reminded of Marvell’s words: “But at my back I always hear Time’s winged chariot hurrying near.” 

All of these old warhorses have been heard frequently in the Bay Area during the last few years in performances conducted by, among others, Neville Marriner and George Cleve. It doesn’t matter.  

Under Michael Morgan’s inspired direction, “age cannot wither nor custom stale” their “infinite variety.” Whether you favor the flying terpsichore of the minuets, the rollicking finale of the 39th or the opening of the 40th, which begins stately and plump like Joyce’s Ulysses, there is not a moment in these great works that is devoid of delight and surprise yet always with an undertone of poignancy.  

With a nod to the present, the concert will also feature the West Coast premiere of Chen Yi’s accessible Romance and Dance for two violins and string orchestra (1998) featuring OEBS co-concertmasters Terrie Baune and Dawn Harms.  

The highly regarded Ms. Chen was born in 1953 in Guangzhou, China, and is a graduate of the Central Conservatory of Beijing. She has lived and worked in the United States since 1986. In her compositions, she may combine traditional Chinese instruments like the pipa and erhu or the Chinese pentatonic scale with the Western orchestra.  

This will be the West Coast premiere of her Romance, which incorporates as the first of its two movements her earlier Romance of Hsiao and Ch’in. It has been described as bright and cheerful and, in its contemporaneity and texture, provides a nice contrast to the rest of the program.

TUESDAY, JAN. 18 

CHILDREN 

“Peter and the Wolf” presented by The Fratello Marionettes at 6:30 p.m. at Kensington Branch Library, 61 Arlington Ave. 524-3043. 

FILM 

Japanese Experimental Fim & Video at 7:30 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Temple Grandin, celebrated animal advocate, introduces “Animals in Translation” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com 

Kermit Lynch on “Inspiring Thirst: Vintage Selections from the Kermit Lynch Wine Brochure” at 7:30 p.m. at Black Oak Books. 486-0698. www.blackoakbooks.com 

Marilyn Sewell and Sandy Boucher discuss “Breaking Free” a collection of personal essays by women in the second half of their lives, at 6:30 p.m. at Berkeley Central Library, Shattuck and Kittredge Streets. 981-6151. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Courtableu at 8:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cajun dance lesson at 8 p.m. Cost is $9. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Peter Barshay and Murray Low at 8 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810. 

Rady Craig Trio, jazz, at 7 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave. 548-5198.  

Chris Botti, contemporary jazz trumpeter, at 8 and 10 p.m. Yoshi’s at Jack London Square. Also on Wed. Cost is $10-$20. 238-9200. www.yoshis.com 

Jazzschool Tuesdays at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

WEDNESDAY, JAN. 19 

FILM 

Film 50: History of Cinema at 3 p.m. and “The Most Dangerous Game” at 7:30 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Nicole Galland reads from “The Fool’s Tale” an historical novel set in 12th century Wales, at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com 

Sandra Gilbert reads from her new collection of poems, “Belongings” at 7:30 p.m. at Black Oak Books. 486-0698. www.blackoakbooks.com 

Berkeley Poetry Slam with host Charles Ellik and Three Blind Mice, at 8:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $5-$7. 841-2082. 

Café Poetry hosted by Richard Moore, aka Paradise Freejahlove, at 7:30 p.m. at La Peña. Donation $2. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

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

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

Peau de Chagrin at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Trouser, The Art Ghetto, Burke at 8:30 p.m. at Blakes on Telegraph. Cost is $4. 848-0886. www.blakesontelegraph.com 

THURSDAY, JAN. 20 

THEATER 

"Bridge & Tunnel" workshop performances by Sarah Jones at 8 p.m. Thurs.-Sat., 7 p.m. Sun. through Feb. 20 at Berkeley Repertory Theater’s Thrust Stage, 2025 Addison St. Tickets are $30-$40. 647-2949. www.berkeleyrep.org 

FILM 

David Thomson History of Hollywood: “Greed” at 7 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Phyllis Whetstone Taper reads from her novel of a 1927 California summer, “On Kelsey Creek” at 7:30 p.m. at Black Oak Books. 486-0698. www.blackoakbooks.com 

Malcolm Gladwell describes “Blink: Thin-Slicing, Snap Judgements, and the Power of Thinking Without Thinking” at 7:30 p.m. at at Cody’s Books. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com 

Word Beat Reading Series with featured readers Jan Steckel and Hew Wolff at 7 p.m. at Mediterraneum Caffe, 2475 Telegraph Ave. 526-5985. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Suzy & Maggie Roche at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $17.50-$18.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Emma Zuntz at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $5. 841-2082. www.starryploughpub.com 

David K. Matthews, solo piano, at 8 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810. 

Selector at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Bobby Hutcherson All-Stars, with Nicholas Payton, James Spaulding, George Cables, Dwyne Burno and Lewis Nash at 8 and 10 p.m. at Yoshi’s at Jack London Square, through Sun. Cost is $16-$26. 238-9200. www.yoshis.com 

FRIDAY, JAN. 21 

THEATER 

Actors Ensemble of Berkeley, “Seduced” by Sam Shepard opens at 8 p.m. at the Live Oak Theater, 1301 Shattuck at Berryman, and runs Fri. and Sat. through Feb. 19. 649-5999. www.aeofberkeley.org 

"Bridge & Tunnel" workshop performances by Sarah Jones at 8 p.m. Thurs.-Sat., 7 p.m. Sun. through Feb. 20 at Berkeley Repertory Theater’s Thrust Stage, 2025 Addison St. Tickets are $30-$40. 647-2949. www.berkeleyrep.org 

Contra Costa Civic Theater, “The Mousetrap” Agatha Christie’s classic mystery Fri. and Sat. at 8 p.m. through Feb. 19 at 951 Pomona Ave., El Cerrito. Tickets are $10-$15. 524-9132. www.ccct.org 

FILM 

“Operation Free Mohawk: A Retrospective” Video installation and performance by Pete Kuzov and Edie Tsong at 7 p.m. at Berkeley Community Media, 2239 MLK, Jr. Way. Cost is $5-$15. 848-2288. www.betv.org 

David Thomson History of Hollywood: “The Crowd” at 7 p.m., “Sunrise” at 9 p.m. at Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

Indie Film Friday at 7:30 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Ward Churchill talks about “Kill the Indian, Save the Man: The Genocidal Impact of American Indian Residential Schools” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Oakland East Bay Symphony, mostly Mozart at 8 p.m. at Paramount Theater, 2025 Broadway. 625-8497. www.oebs.org 

Peking Acrobats at 8 p.m. at Zellerbach Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $22-$42. 642-9988. www.calperfs.berkeley.edu 

Los Cenzontles at 9:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Lecture and demonstration at 8 p.m. Cost is $5-$15. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Hali Hammer singer/songwriter at 7:30 p.m. at Fellowship Café, Cedar and Bonita Sts. A donation of $5-10 is requested. 

Jamie Laval & Hans York, Celtic fiddle and guitar, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $17.50-$18.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

The Real Thom Thunder, Lucy at 9:30 at Blakes on Telegraph. Cost is $10-$15. 848-0886. www.blakesontelegraph.com 

The Rulers, El Faye at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $6. 841-2082. www.starryploughpub.com 

Clairdee & The Ken French Trio at 9 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810. 

Monkey Knife Fight, original funk-jazz, at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

All You Can Eat, Challenger, Gift of Goats, Abi Yos Yos at 8 p.m. at 924 Gilman St., an all-ages, member-run, no alcohol, no drugs, no violence club. Cost is $6. 525-9926. 

Bobby Hutcherson All-Stars, with Nicholas Payton, James Spaulding, George Cables, Dwyne Burno and Lewis Nash at 8 and 10 p.m. at Yoshi’s at Jack London Square, through Sun. Cost is $16-$26. 238-9200. www.yoshis.com 

SATURDAY, JAN. 22 

CHILDREN  

Los Amiguitos de La Peña with Colibri, traditional and original Latin American music, at 10:30 a.m. at La Peña. Cost is $4 for adults, $3 for children. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

EXHIBITIONS 

Salon at the Giorgi “Mood Swings” a black-light puppet show, at 2 p.m. at Giorgi Gallery, 2911 Claremont Ave. at Ashby. 848-1228. 

FILM 

David Thomson History of Hollywood: “Heaven’s Gate” at 7 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

THEATER 

“Mathematics of Change” with Josh Kornbluth at 7:30 p.m. at the Berkeley Richmond Jewish Community Center, 1414 Walnut St. tickets are $18-$30. 848-0237, ext. 110.  

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Rhythm & Muse featuring Patrick Fitzgerald, pianist at 7 p.m. at Berkeley Art Center. Admission is free. 527-9753. 

The Kids of the Dayton Tribune present the newest issue of “The Dayton Tribune,” a youth written and edited magazine, at 4 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852.  

www.codysbooks.com  

Redmond O’Hanlon describes life on a fishing boat in “Trawler” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852.  

www.codysbooks.com  

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Four Seasons Concerts presents the Gryphon Piano Trio at 7:30 p.m. at Calvin Simmons Theater, 10 Tenth St., Oakland. Tickets are $25-$35. 601-7919. www.fourseasonsconcerts.com 

Ivan Ilic, piano, at 8 p.m. at Trinity Chapel, 2320 Dana St., between Bancroft and Durant. Tickets are $8-$12. 549-3864. http://trinitychamberconcerts.com 

American Bach Soloists perform J.S. Bach’s early cantatas at 8 p.m. at First Congregational Church, 2345 Channing Way. 415-621-7900. www.americanbach.org  

Peking Acrobats at 2 and 8 p.m. at Zellerbach Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $22-$42. 642-9988. www.calperfs.berkeley.edu 

Ras Midas and the Bridge and Root Awakning, roots rock reggae, at 9:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $12. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Darcy Menard, singer-songwriter, at 7:30 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

Blue and Tan, electro-acid-jazz funk at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Oak, Ash & Thorn, a capella, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $17.50-$18.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Annual Pat Parker Tribute and Celebration at 8 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Cost is $10-$20. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

Moment’s Notice a monthly salon for improvised music, dance and theater at 8 p.m. at Western Sky Studio, 2525 8th St. 415-831-5592. 

Bad Habittz, Sequenced Mindset, World Wide Sickness, metal, hip hop at 9:30 p.m. at Blakes on Telegraph. Cost is $8-$10. 848-0886. www.blakesontelegraph.com 

Extensions Jazz Quartet at 8 p.m. at the Jazzschool. Cost is $12. 845-5373. www.jazz- 

school.com  

Crater, The Nels Cline Singers with Ben Goldberg at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. 841-2082. www.starryploughpub.com 

The Arlington Houston Quartet at 9 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810. 

Mike Park, Colossal, Dan Potthast, Short Round, Shinabu at 8 p.m. at 924 Gilman St. Cost is $6. 525-9926. 

SUNDAY, JAN. 23 

CHILDREN 

Ralph’s World Full Band Show at 3 p.m. at the Julia Morgan Center for the Arts. Tickets are $15. 925-798-1300. www.juliamorgan.org  

EXHIBITIONS 

“Salvador Donkey,” an exhibition of recent drawings and paintings by Michael Dooley and Kathleen Henderson from 4 to 7 p.m. at the Ashby Stage, 1901 Ashby Ave. 841-6500.  

FILM 

David Thomson History of Hollywood: “The Shop Around the Corner” at 5 p.m. and “Shampoo” at 7 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

“How Photography and Film Shaped Memory of the Vietnam War” at 2 p.m. at the Oakland Museum of California, 10th and Oak Sts. in conjunction with the exhibit “California and the Vietnam Era.” 238-2200. www.museum.ca.org 

Sister Helen Prejean, author of “Dead Man Walking,” will introduce her new book, “The Death of Innocents: An Eyewitness Account of Wrongful Executions” at 7 p.m. at King Middle School, 1781 Rose. St. Tickets are $10-$12. Benefits Pace e Bene and KPFA. www.kpfa.org 

Poetry Flash with Beverly Burch and Jeanne Wagner at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. Donation $2. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Renée Fleming, soprano, at 3 p.m. at Zellerbach Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $34-$72. 642-9988. www.calperfs.berkeley.edu 

Bandworks featuring local youth bands at 3 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $4. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

The Art of the Trio with Taylor Eigsti at 4:30 at the Jazz- 

school. Cost is $12-$18. 845-5373. www.jazzschool.com 

Ronny Cox, singer-songwriter cowboy, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $16.50-$17.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Odd Shaped Case, Balkan music brunch, at 10 a.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

MONDAY, JAN. 24 

EXHIBITIONS 

“Celebrating African-American Artists with Disabilities” Exhibition opens at NIAD Art Center at 551 23rd St., near Barrett Ave., Richmond, and runs through Feb. 25. 620-0290. www.niad.org 

“The People and the Book” Paintings and rare books from the collection of the Magnes Museum opens at 2911 Russell St. www.magnes.org 

FILM 

Seeing through the Screen: Buddhism and Film at 3 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Page to Stage, a conversation with playwright Charles L. Mee and director Les Waters at 7 p.m. at Berkeley Repertory Theater, 2015 Addison St. 647-2949. www.berkeleyrep.org 

Ronald C. White, Jr. examines “The Eloquent President: A Portrait of Lincoln Through His Words” at 7:30 p.m. at Black Oak Books. 486-0698. www.blackoakbooks.com 

Jane Anne Staw and other writers describe “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 with Garrett Murphy from 7 to 9:30 p.m., at Priya Restaurant, 2072 San Pablo Ave. berkeleypoetryexpress@yahoo.com 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Songwriters Symposium at 8:30 p.m. at Blakes on Telegraph. 848-0886. www.blakesontelegraph.com 

Big Belly Blues Band at 8 p.m. at Yoshi’s at Jack London Square. Cost is $10. 238-9200. www.yoshis.com 

TUESDAY, JAN. 25 

EXHIBITIONS 

“Serving the People - Body and Soul: The Black Panther Party Photographs” opens at the Berkeley Public Library, 2090 Kittredge St. and runs to March 19. 981-6100. www.berkeleypubliclibrary.org 

“The Art of Living Black” Ninth Annual Bay Area Black Artists Exhibition opens at the Richmond Art Center, 2540 Barrett Ave., Richmond, and runs through March 20. 620-6772. www.therichmondartcenter.org 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

“Dublin Carol” the Aurora Theater production which opens Jan. 28, will be discussed at 1 p.m. at the North Berkeley Senior Center. 981-5190. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Bandworks featuring talented youth musicians at 7:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $4. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

The McKassons, fiddling and piano in the Scottish tradition, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $15.50- $16.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Carlos Oliveira and Harvey Wainapel at 8 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810. 

McCoy Tyner wiith Stanley Clarke and Billy Cobham at 8 and 10 p.m. Yoshi’s at Jack London Square, through Sun. Cost is $25-$35. 238-9200. www.yoshis.com 

Jazzschool Tuesdays, a weekly showcase of up-and-coming ensembles from Berkeley Jazz- 

school at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

The taxonomists have been at it again, but this time they’ve done something that makes intuitive sense. Every couple of years the American Ornithological Union comes out with a supplement to its checklist of North American birds, with name and status changes. 

And birders often wince at the results: either “lumps”—two or more species merged into a single species—that reduce their life-list totals, or “splits” that produce lookalike new species almost impossible to separate in the field. There are always rumors in advance of the new supplement: Is this the year they’ll split the fox sparrows? Finally lump the northwestern crow? Bring back the Harlan’s hawk? 

This year the ornithological powers-that-be decided to break up the Canada goose. They used to recognize 11 subspecies within this common and widespread species, ranging in size from the big honkers to dinky mallard-sized forms. (What’s a subspecies? Basically a population that’s physically distinctive in some way but not so much so that it can’t interbreed with neighboring populations. It’s a slippery category, and some taxonomists would like to scrap it altogether. Often the difference between species and subspecies status is a judgment call. Is the island scrub-jay of Santa Cruz Island, which never has the opportunity to interbreed with the mainland western scrub-jay because neither form will fly across the Santa Barbara Channel, a “good” species? The AOU says so, based on differences in size and plumage and genetic distance. And this kind of thing matters, since subspecies—like the northern spotted owl—can be given protected status under federal and state endangered species laws). 

Back to those geese, though. After the split, seven of the larger subspecies are still known collectively as the Canada goose; four of the smaller subspecies now comprise the cackling goose species. 

The former Aleutian Canada goose, one of the few endangered species that has recovered sufficiently to be downlisted, is now the Aleutian cackling goose. And the subspecies that used to be called the cackling Canada goose, or cackling goose for short? David Allen Sibley, the field identification maven, is calling it the cackling cackling goose. I hope this doesn’t catch on. 

For California birders, it’s easy enough to tell the two species apart. 

A cackling goose in a flock of Canadas stands out like I would among the Golden State Warriors. Its head shape is distinctive: rounder, with a stubbier bill. Aleutian cackling geese, which turn up in the Bay Area during their migrations between their Arctic breeding sites and their wintering grounds in the San Joaquin Valley, are further distinguished by a white ring at the base of their black necks. 

(Cackling cackling geese used to winter in California as well, but most now stop off in Oregon). And there’s a vocal difference: Canadas, AKA honkers, honk; cacklers cackle. Where identification gets tricky is in the Central Flyway, where the winter ranges of the lesser Canada goose and the Richardson’s cackling goose overlap. But that’s not our problem. 

Birders and goose hunters have been aware of the different size categories of “Canada” geese for a long time. Why did it take the ornithological establishment so long to catch up? It seems that what prompted the split was a genetic study mainly focused not on the North American geese, but on their relatives—living and extinct—in Hawaii. 

If you’ve ever visited Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, you’ve seen the signs exhorting you not to feed or run over the nene—the only living Hawaiian goose species, and the state bird. (I spent a nene-less morning in the park; my only nene turned up at the Big Island Country Club on the Kona side, on the 12th hole, near the water hazard. Geese love golf courses—all that short grass, ready for cropping. Golfers, however, do not love geese). Palaeontologists have also found remains of extinct geese on Maui and the Big Island. The latter species, four times the size of the nene, was apparently flightless, with a massive tortoise-like beak that it must have used to feed on tougher vegetation than grass.  

To sort out the evolutionary relationships among the Hawaiian geese and their possible North American ancestors, scientists from the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History, Oxford, and Boston University compared samples of mitochondrial DNA, the stuff we all—geese and humans—inherit from our mothers. 

Since it seems unaffected by natural selection and accumulates mutations at a predictable rate, mt DNA is a handy tool for identifying evolutionary next of kin and determining when different lineages diverged. Their study included the living nene, the extinct giant Hawaii goose and the Maui goose, five Canada goose subspecies (two large, three small), and the barnacle goose of northern Europe, a bird that was once considered edible during Lent because of the folk belief that it was the mature stage of the gooseneck barnacle. 

The results? All three of the Hawaiian goose species appear to be the descendants of a single founding population of large Canada geese that reached the islands about 890,000 years ago. On the older islands, the grazing/browsing niche was already occupied by oversized flightless ducks, the moa-nalos. But when the Big Island formed some 400,000 years later, that niche was wide open, and the giant Hawaii goose took advantage of it.  

The scientists also found a deep divide between the large-Canada and small-Canada lineages, and a close relationship between the small Canada geese and the barnacle goose. They concluded that the “Canada goose” was actually a taxonomic grab bag, containing at least two distinct species. And the AOU followed up on that with this year’s revision.  

So those birders who keep life lists, and who had seen one or more of the small-Canada subspecies now separated as the cackling goose, got to add a new species without a trip to Attu, or even Point Reyes. Think of it as an ornithological stock split. (The smart money is keeping an eye on the warbling vireo.) 

›

TUESDAY, JAN. 18 

Bird Walk in Wildcat Canyon Meet at 7:30 a.m. at the end of Rifle Range Road to look for birds of the forest and creek-side. 525-2233. 

Tilden Mini-Rangers Join us for an active afternoon of nature study, conservation, and rambling through woods and waters. Dress to get dirty; bring a healthy snack to share. Girls and boys ages 8-12, unaccompanied by their parents. From 3:30 to 5:30 p.m. at Tilden Nature Area. Cost is $6-$8. Reservations required. 636-1684. 

Berkeley Garden Club “Care and Culture of Orchids,” potting demonstration, orchids for show and sale, by Sue Fordyce, grower at Orchids Ranch. Meeting at 1 p.m., program at 2 p.m. at Epworth Methodist Church, 1953 Hopkins St. 524-4374. 

Great Snowshoe Destinations in California Slide presentation at 7 p.m. with Michael White, author of Wilderness Press guidebooks at REI, 1338 San Pablo Ave. 527-4140. 

Marin Avenue Reconfiguration Public Hearing at 7 p.m. at Berkeley City Council Chambers, 2134 Martin Luther King Jr. Way. 981-7062. 

Fitness Tests for people 50 and over from 12:30 to 1:30 p.m. at the South Berkeley Senior Center. Free. You will receive personalized scores and tips on how to maintain or improve your fitness. 981-5367. 

School Age Storytime for ages 5 and up at 7 p.m. at the Albany Library, 1247 Marin Ave. 526-3720, ext.17.  

Brainstormer Weekly Pub Quiz every Tuesday from 7:30 to 9:30 p.m. at Pyramid Alehouse Brewery, 901 Gilman St. 528-9880. 

American Red Cross Blood Services Volunteer Orientation at 6 p.m. at 6230 Claremont Ave., Oakland. Advance sign-up needed, 594-5165.  

Get Organized for the New Year, with Eve Abbott, author and personal productivity consultant, at 7 p.m. at El Cerrito Library, 6510 Stockton Ave., 526-7512.  

“Getting Along with Your Adult Children” a participatory workshop at 7:30 p.m. at the BRJCC, 1414 Walnut St. Cost is $35-$40. 848-0327, ext. 110. www.brjcc.org 

“Tu B, Shuvat: A Meeting Point between Cyclical and Linear Time” with Avital Plan at 7:30 p.m. at the BRJCC, 1414 Walnut St. Cost is $5. 848-0327, ext. 110. www.brjcc.org 

Berkeley Salon Discussion Group meets to discuss “O.J., Peterson and The Death Penalty” from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Berkeley Richmond Jewish Community Center, 1414 Walnut St. Please bring snacks and soft drinks to share. No peanuts please. 601-6690. 

Organic Produce at low prices sold at the corner of Sacramento and Oregon Streets every Tuesday from 3 to 6 p.m. This is a project of Spiral Gardens. 843-1307. 

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. 548-3991. www.berkeleycameraclub.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. 

Acting and Storytelling Classes for Seniors offered by Stagebridge, at Arts First Oakland, 2501 Harrison St. Classes are held at 10 a.m. Tues.-Fri. For more information call 444-4755. www.stagebridge.org 

WEDNESDAY, JAN. 19 

Berkeley Communicators Toastmasters meets the first and third Wednesdays of the month at 7:15 a.m. at Au Cocolait, 200 University Ave. at Milvia. For information call Robert Flammia 524-3765. 

Mini-Farmers in Tilden A farm exploration program, from 10 to 11 a.m. for ages 4-6 years, accompanied by an adult. We will explore the Little Farm, care for animals, do crafts and farm chores. Wear boots and dress to get dirty! Fee is $3-$5. Registration required. 525-2233. 

Winter Walk Berkeley for Seniors meets every Wednesday at 9:30 a.m. at the Sea Breeze Market, just west of the I-80 overpass. Everyone is welcome, wear comfortable shoes and a warm hat. Heavy rain cancels. 548-9840. 

Grizzly Peak Cyclists at 8 p.m. at the Hillside Club, 2268 Cedar St. David Milne Smith, Ph.D., adventurer, author, and leadership trainer, will speak about “The Aging Athlete: How To Turn Each Moment into an Adventure.” 527-0450. 

“The Doors” Oliver Stone film of Jim Morrison’s self destruction at 7 p.m. at Humanist Hall, 390 27th St., Oakland. Free, $5 donations accepted. 393-5685. 

Health and Sexuality for the Mature Woman A lecturesponsored by the Alexander Foundation at 6:15 p.m. at the Claremont Resort, 41 Tunnel Rd. Cost is $10-$15. 527-3010. www.afwh.org/about/claremontlectures.htm 

Artify Ashby Muralist Group meets every Wed. from 5 to 8 p.m. at the South Berkeley Senior Center, to plan a new mural. New artists are welcome. Call Bonnie at 704-0803. 

Tap Into It Jazz and Rhythm Tap classes at Montclair Recreation Center, 6300 Moraga Ave., Oakland. Experienced at 6:30 p.m., beginners at 7:30 p.m. 482-7812. 

Fresh Produce Stand at San Pablo Park from 3 to 6:30 p.m. in the Frances Albrier Community Center. Sponsored by the Ecology Center’s Farm Fresh Choice. 848-1704. www.ecologycenter.org 

Stitch ‘n Bitch Bring your knitting, crocheting and other handcrafts from 6 to 9 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave. 548-5198. 

Fun with Acting Class every Wednesday at 11 a.m. at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Free, all are welcome, no experience necessary.  

Berkeley Peace Walk and Vigil at the Berkeley BART Station, corner of Shattuck and Center. Sing for Peace at 6:30 p.m. Peace Walk at 7 p.m. www. 

geocities.com/vigil4peace/vigil 

THURSDAY, JAN. 20 

Inauguration Protest “Let America Be America Again” at 9 a.m. at the Downtown Berkeley BART Station. The rally to read the Langston Hughes poem “Let America Be America Again” will start at the very moment the oath of office is being administered in Washington D.C. Everyone will have an opportunity to join in. www.artistsandwritersforpeace.org 

“Stop the War: Fight the Right” on GW’s inaguration at 5 p.m. at Civic Center, San Francisco. 415-821-6545. www.internationalanswer.org, www.actionsf.org 

“The Future of Energy: Transitioning from Fossil Fuels to Renewables” A panel discussion moderated by former PUC Commissioner Loretta Lynch at 7 p.m. at the Ecology Center, 2530 San Pablo Ave. Cost is $5-$15, sliding scale. 548-2220, ext. 233. www.ecologycenter.org 

Berkeley City Club Anniversary Events from 4 p.m. to 9 p.m. including tours of the historic Julia Morgan building and dinner. Cost is $15-$25. For reservations call 848-7800. 

Simplicity Forum on “Removing Anxiety to Simplify Your Life” at 6:30 p.m. at Berkeley Public Library, Claremont Branch, 2940 Benvenue Ave. 526-6596. www.simpleliving.net 

Berkeley School Volunteers Training workshop for volunteers interested in helping in Berkeley Public schools at 3 p.m. at 1835 Allston Way. 644-8833. 

WriterCoach Connection Volunteer Training Help students improve their writing and critical thinking skills. Training session from 6:30 to 9:30 p.m. To register call 524-2319. Other Trainings on Feb. 9, 16, Mar. 8, 15. www.writercoachconnection.org 

Montclair Safety & Improvement Council Public Meeting at 7 p.m. at the Montera Middle School, 5555 Ascot Dr. Presentations include Emergency Preparedness, Crime Prevention, Pedestrian & Traffic Safety, and Beautification. www.montclairsic.org 

“Krill: Constant Currency in the Fluctuating Oceanic Economy” with Dr. Baldo Marinovic at 12:30 p.m. at the Oakland Museum of California, 10th and Oak Sts. 238-2200. www.museum.ca.org 

FRIDAY, JAN. 21 

City Commons Club Noon Luncheon with Ludmilla Kutsak on “The Fabergé Egg.” Luncheon at 11:45 a.m. for $13, speech at 12:30 p.m., at the Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant St. For information and reservations call 526-2925 or 665-9020.  

San Francisco Bay Flyway Festival Fri. through Sun. on Mare Island in Vallejo, celebrating the annual migration along the Pacific Flyway of hawks, shorebirds, ducks and geese and even monarch butterflies. 707-649-WING(9464) www.sfbayflywayfestival.com 

“Until When...” a documentary by and about Palestinians, refugees in their own land, at 8 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Dr. Jess Ghannam, one of the film’s producers, will answer questions. Cost is $8. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

Parent Equity Forum: “Leading My Child to Excellence and Equity” with Enid Lee, from 9 a.m. to noon at the Alameda County Office of Education, 313 W. Winton Ave., Room 142, Hayward. Free to parents in Alameda County. 670-4163. www.acoe.k12.ca.us 

Family Literacy Night Celebrate Dr. King’s Dream with Daaimah Waqia reading her book “A Different Kind of Beautiful,” at 7 p.m. at the Berkeley YMCA, 2001 Allston Way. 665-3271. 

Berkeley Chess Club meets Fridays at 7:15 p.m. at the East Bay Chess Club, 1940 Virginia St. Players at all levels are welcome. 845-1041. 

“Three Beats for Nothing” meets to sing 16th century harmony for fun and practice at 10 a.m. at the North Berkeley Senior Center. 655-8863, 843-7610. 

Women in Black Vigil, from noon to 1 p.m. at UC Berkeley, Bancroft at Telegraph. 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. Sponsored by the Buddhist Peace Fellowship. 655-6169. www.bpf.org 

SATURDAY, JAN. 22 

Dog Walk for Mud Puppies Bring your canine friend for a hike along South Park Drive. Bring a leash and baggies. Meet at 2 p.m. at the closed gate at the bottom of the South Park Drive near Botanic Garden. 525-2233. 

Ohlone Dog Park Clean-Up from 10 a.m. to noon at Grant St. and Hearst Ave. Sponsored by the Ohone Dog Park Assoc. www.ohlonedogpark.org 

Kids Garden Club For children 7-12 years old to explore the world of gardening. We plant, harvest, build, make crafts, cook and get dirty! From 2 to 4 p.m. at Tilden Nature Center, Tilden Park. Cost is $5-$6, registration required. 525-2233. 

Pt. Molate Walk with Berkeley Path Wanderers Explore Richmond’s historic and surprisingly wild Pt. Molate, with beaches, native grasslands, and a former Chinese fishing community, whaling station, and the world’s largest winery. Meet at 10 a.m. Take the Pt. Molate exit from I-580 (last exit before Richmond Bridge). Where the road divides in three, take the middle road; in about a mile park at the abandoned visitors center on the right, across from very large buildings. Easy walk, but dress for cold, wind, or rain. Bring water; lunch may be purchased at the diner at quaint San Pablo Yacht Harbor. 549-2908. zemeralds@aol.com 

Junior Rangers of Tilden meets Sat. mornings at Tilden Nature Center. For more information call 525-2233. 

Rose Pruning at 10 a.m. at Magic Gardens Nursery, 729 Heinz Ave. 644-2351. www.magicgardens.com 

Emergency Response Training Class on “Responding to Terrorism” from 9 a.m. to noon at the Public Safety building, 2100 Martin Luther King Jr. Way. To register call 981-5606. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/fire/oes.html 

“Playing to Learn” An educational conference on floor time and drama therapy with Barbara Kalmanson, Ph.D. and Charla Cunningham, RDT, from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. at Julia Morgan Center for the Arts, 2640 College Ave. Cost is $135, some scholarships available. 845-8542. www.juliamorgan.org 

Celebrate Jewish Earth Day Tu B'Shvat Seder led by Rabbi Michael Lerner from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. at 1027 Cragmont Ave. Please bring a main course vegetarian dish to share with 12-14 people. RSVP required, 528-6250. 

Auditions for the San Francisco Boys Chorus from 1:30 to 3 p.m. at the Interstake Center, 4780 Lincoln Ave., Oakland. To schedule an audition call 415-861-7464. 

Pre-School Storytime for ages 3-5 at 11 a.m. at the Albany Library, 1247 Marin Ave. 526-3720, ext.17.  

SUNDAY, JAN. 23 

Dynamite History Walk Explore Pt. Pinole’s explosive and peaceful past on this flat, easy-paced walk from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Reservations required. 525-2233. 

Feeder for Feathered Friends Learn to make different feeders to hang in your garden for over-wintering birds. From 2 to 4 p.m. at Tilden Nature Center, Tilden Park. 525-2233. 

“Winter Blooms!” Free garden tours at Regional Parks Botanic Garden in Tilden Park at 2 pm. 845-4116. www.nativeplants.org 

War Tax Resistance Information Find out more about this form of conscientious objection. Potluck and discussion at 4 p.m., basic information about war tax resistance at 5 p.m. at 2311 Russell St. Donations accepted, not required. 843-9877.  

Sister Helen Prejean, author of “Dead Man Walking,” will introduce her new book, “The Death of Innocents: An Eyewitness Account of Wrongful Executions” at 7 p.m. at King Middle School, 1781 Rose. St. Tickets are $10-$12. Benfits Pace e Bene and KPFA. www.kpfa.org 

“Another World Is Possible” a documentary of the 2002 World Social Forum along with protest films documenting the last two years of resistance in the Bay Area. From 3 to 5 p.m. at the Parkway Theater, 1834 Park Blvd., Oakland. Free. 601-8000. www.picturepubpizza.com/special-events/sunday_salon.html 

“A Beautiful Blend: Mixed Race in America” a documentary about Swirl, a national organization providing support to mixed race people, at 3 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

Berkeley Cybersalon, with Jay Harman, founder and CEO of PAX Scientific on “Alternative Energy,” from 6 to 8 p.m. at the Hillside Club, 2286 Cedar, between Spruce and Arch. Cost is $10. 

Lake Merritt Neighbors Organized for Peace Peace walk around the lake every Sun. Meet at 3 p.m. at the colonnade at the NE end of the lake. 763-8712. lmno4p.org 

Tibetan Buddhism with Bob Byrne on “Longchenpa: Master of the Nyingma Lineage” at 6 p.m. at the Tibetan Nyingma Institute, 1815 Highland Pl. 843-6812. www.nyingmainstitute.com 

Personal Theology Seminar with Cathleen Cox Burneo on “Jesus, A Peasant with Attitude” at 9:30 a.m. at Unitarian Universalist Church of Berkeley, 1 Lawson Rd., Kensington. 525-0302. 

MONDAY, JAN. 24 

Tea and Hike at Four Taste some of the finest teas from the Pacific Rim and South Asia and learn their natural and cultural history, followed by a short nature walk. At 4 p.m. at Tilden Nature Area, in Tilden Park. Cost is $5-$7, registration required. 525-2233. www.ebparks.org 

“A Conversation about Creeks and Culverted Creeks” hosted by the Friends of Strawberry Creek from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. at the Berkeley Central Library Community Meeting Room. jennifermaryphd@hotmail.com or caroleschem@hotmail.com 

“Service Learning and the Development of Volunteerism in Chile” with Sebastián Zulueta, director of the Service Learning Center at the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, at noon in the CLAS Conference Room, 2334 Bowditch St. 642-2088. 

“At the Wizard’s Table: Shaman’s Altars in Peru” lecture and slide show by Douglas Sharon, director of the Phoebe Hearst Museum, at 3:30 p.m. at Pacific School of Religion, Chapel Room 6, 1798 Scenic Ave. 849-8201. 

Berkeley High School Site Council meets from 4:30 to 6 p.m. in the school library. On the agenda are a report on recycling and a proposal by the Academic Choice Program. bhs.berkeleypta.org/ssc  

Tu B,Shvat Seder with Rabbi Yehuda Ferris with song and stories at 7:30 p.m. at Redwood Gardens, 2951 Derby St. Cost is $8-$10. 540-5824. 

El Cerrrito Library Book Club meets to discuss “Cold Mountain” by Charles Frazier at 7 p.m. at the El Cerrito Library, 6510 Stockton Ave. 526-7512. www.ccclib.org 

World Affairs/Politics Discussion Group for people 60 years and over meets at 9:15 a.m. at the Albany Senior Center, 846 Masonic Ave. 524-9122. 

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

ONGOING 

Albany Berkeley Girls Softball League is looking for girls in grades 1-8 to play girls softball. Season runs March 5-June 4. Scholarships available. To register call 869-4277.  

Youth Speaks Winter Workshops in writing and spoken word begin Jan. 24 in Berkeley and Oakland. For more information call 415-255-9035. www.youthspeaks.org 

“Half Pint Library” Book Drive Donate children’s books to benefit Children’s Hospital and Research Center Oakland. Donations accepted at 1849 Solano Ave. through March 31. 

CITY MEETINGS 

City Council meets Tues., Jan. 18, at 7 p.m in City Council Chambers. 981-6900. www. 

ci.berkeley.ca.us/citycouncil 

Berkeley Housing Authority meets Tues., Jan. 18, at 6:30 p.m. in City Council Chambers. 981-6900. ww.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/housingauthority   

Citizens Humane Commission meets Wed., Jan. 19, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Katherine O’Connor, 981-6601. www.ci.berkeley.ca. us/commissions/humane 

Commission on Labor meets Wed., Jan. 19, at 6:45 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Delfina M. Geiken, 981-7550. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/labor 

Berkeley Rent Stabilization Board meets Thurs. Jan. 20, at 7 p.m. in City Council Chambers, Pam Wyche, 644-6128 ext. 113. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/rent 

Housing Advisory Commission meets Thurs., Jan. 20, 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. 20, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Peter Hillier, 981-7000. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/transportation?

Although I’ve lived in California for more than half my life, I’ve never gotten used to the way the seasons crowd each other here. In the Midwest, where I spent my childhood and 12 years as a young adult, winter meant a decent respite from the seductions of the natural world. There was no stigma attached to sitting at home next to the fire with a good book, no feeling when you looked out the window that life was moving on and if you sat still you’d get behind. Here in idyllic northern California the narcissii, the first garden flowers in more normal climates, are part of the Christmas decorations. Our Christmas tree is still green, and we’re slow to want to take it down, but outside the salvia wagneriana and the primroses are in the midst of their spring show. The tree next door that I see from my desk is in full bloom. The rainy intervals are welcome, because it’s hard to reconcile yourself to indoor work when there’s so much going on outdoors. 

Another impediment to sober reflection on the meaning of life is the constant barrage of information on the state of the world which is available to anyone with a radio, television, newspaper or Internet connection. In case you’ve managed to miss it, the state of the world is pretty dire right now. Tsunamis in Asia, genocide in Africa, war in the middle east, terrorism everywhere—if you’re inclined to worry about such things, it’s hard to know where to start worrying. The number of deaths of innocent humans is immense, unimaginable for those of us who have been blessed with lives free of real contact with such events. Hearing about the enormity of these catastrophes feeds the natural urge to hibernate, to escape. 

It’s hard, therefore, to focus on the meaning of the death of a single human being who was in no way distinguished. The State of California this week executed one Donald Beardslee, who most likely killed two and possibly three women. As compared to the numbers of innocents who have died around the world this week, one more death seems hardly to make a difference. It’s all the more admirable, then, that a few hardy souls were willing to gather outside San Quentin this week to make the point once again that every death diminishes all of us.  

The struggle against the death penalty has been going on for as long as I’ve been politically conscious. My 1961 graduating class at Cal picketed its own graduation ceremony in caps and gowns because the speaker was Gov. Pat Brown, who had failed to halt the execution of Caryl Chessman despite pleas from around the world. Since then, most of the rest of the world has seen fit to abolish the death penalty as unnecessary and cruel, but it lingers in most U.S. states, perhaps a legacy of our cruel Puritan founders’ obsession with sin, sinners and punishment.  

Revenge seems to be the major reason for state-sponsored killing these days, since there’s no practical reason for states to choose the death penalty any more. Amnesty International and a host of other organizations have documented the fact that capital punishment is far more expensive than life imprisonment. One study done in New York estimated the cost of an execution at three times that of a life sentence. Capital punishment is more costly even if the post-trial appeal process is excluded from the calculation, if decent care is taken during the investigation and trial to prevent as many fatal errors as possible. Even with all that expensive caution, a lot of mistakes have been made which have lately been uncovered by researchers in New York, Chicago and other places. 

The anti-abortion and pro-choice forces are gearing up for a big protest and counter-protest in San Francisco on Saturday, the anniversary of the Supreme Court’s decision in Roe v. Wade. It would seem that if the anti-abortion people, who are coming in bus loads from all over the state, are really sincere in their respect for any and all human life, more than a few of them should be carrying posters mourning the loss of the life of Donald Beardslee and calling for the abolition of capital punishment. The pro-choicers ought to do the same, regardless of their differing beliefs about when human life begins. Both sides ought to be able to agree that revenge killings of mature human beings are no longer necessary or humane.  

In California’s eternal spring, it is all too easy to forget that being pro-life, as both sides claim to be, should also mean being anti-death. Perhaps those same stalwarts who kept the vigil outside San Quentin on Wednesday would be willing to set up a recruiting table at the event, as a reminder that all those who claim to care about human life in the abstract should take responsibility for caring about each and every human life.  

—Becky O’Malley?

UC Berkeley’s latest long range development plan has been much criticized, and rightly so, by Berkeley’s civic responsibles. City officials have prepared a cogent criticism of the university’s plans, both disclosed and undisclosed, which is about to be taken up this week by UC’s Board of Regents. If past performance is any indication of future behavior, the Regents are unlikely to give the city much consideration. In the past, they have arrogantly asserted their right under the state constitution to do as they please, and there’s no reason to think they’ll change now. Chains are being rattled, lawsuits are being threatened, and it might all make some difference, but since the city has a history of backing down in confrontations with the mighty U, the Regents are probably not very worried. 

Lost in the discussion of UC’s upcoming building boom is a major enterprise which is barely mentioned in the Long Range Development Plan Environmental Impact Report. Late in 2003 Mayor Bates announced with pride that UC was planning a hotel-conference center for downtown Berkeley. After some preliminary skirmishes over turf, the city’s Planning Commission, with the City Council’s blessing, convened a task force to study the proposal. One of its conclusions: “The proposed new hotel and conference center and the relocation of the UC museums could give a significant boost to the downtown economy and add nearly $1 million per year to direct city revenues….Local businesses would benefit from these additional visitors.” 

The Brookings Institution issued a report this week which addresses such conclusions, Space Available: The Realities of Convention Centers as Economic Development Strategy. Based on its findings, it is clear that before the City of Berkeley gives its blessing to any convention center project the real economic costs and benefits of such projects should be carefully re-examined.  

The author, Heywood Sanders, a professor of public administration at the University of Texas at San Antonio, notes that “to cities, the lure of the convention business has long been the prospect of visitors emptying their wallets on meals, lodging, and entertainment, helping to rejuvenate ailing downtowns.” Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?  

But the conclusion of Sanders’ study is not so rosy. He finds that “the overall convention marketplace is declining in a manner that suggests that a recovery or turnaround is unlikely to yield much increased business for any given community, contrary to repeated industry projections. Moreover this decline began prior to the disruptions of 9-11 and is exacerbated by advances in communications technology. Currently, overall attendance at the 200 largest tradeshow events languishes at 1993 levels.” He warns that “this analysis should give local leaders pause as they consider calls for ever more public investment into the convention business.” 

Berkeley’s Task Force authors showed some awareness of potential problems with the project in their report, saying that “new development can create additional costs for the city” and “University acquisition of additional property in the area would decrease city revenues if UC does not pay the equivalent of property and related taxes, assessments, and fees.” They warned that “the City Council should closely consider the impacts and costs of these projects, as well as potential associated revenue sources, in order to maximize their net economic benefits.” 

The city’s demands for a full environmental impact report should not be limited to the impact of the university projects currently included in the LRDP. The LRDP should be expanded to reflect the full cumulative impact of all university-generated development which is planned for the greater Berkeley area, including the convention center project.  

Carpenter and Company, UC’s chosen hotel developer, is due to submit a proposal in March. The City of Berkeley in the meantime needs to do its own up-to-date economic analysis of the real costs and benefits of a project like this, using the findings of the Brookings Institution study. As funding for local government continues to shrink, Berkeley can’t afford to base its future on the pie-in-the-sky-by-and-by promised by the university.  

—Becky O’Malley