Responding to the engine failure of two city trucks last year, city leaders in January scrapped its two-year-old program to power its fleet of nearly 200 trucks entirely on a derivative of vegetable oil. -more-

Berkeley’s era of budget deficits could be over by 2009, City Manager Phil Kamlarz told the City Council Tuesday. But to get out of the red, which the city has been in since 2003, Kamlarz is proposing a litany of cuts this year to close an $8.9 million deficit. -more-

The Berkeley Unified School District settled a potentially embarrassing expulsion discrimination class action lawsuit this week, leaving Superintendent Michele Lawrence “pleased that we could reach an agreement” and plaintiffs’ representatives praising Lawrence and the district’s cooperation. -more-

After several weeks in which both sides maintained silence about contract mediation, the Berkeley Unified School District abruptly changed tactics this week, providing partial information on its latest offer to the Berkeley Federation of Teachers in an e-mail news release. -more-

Fifteen South Campus neighbors have won a $67,500 judgment against Le Chateau, a UC Berkeley student co-op they blame for years of strewn trash, late night noise and a plague of vermin. -more-

Patrick McCullough, the Oakland man who shot a 16-year-old boy in the arm during a fight outside his house last month, will not face criminal charges, Assistant District Attorney James Lee said Wednesday. -more-

Two young women slashed the throat of a 75-year-old Berkeley woman Wednesday evening as she and her husband strolled along Euclid Avenue past the Berkeley Rose Gardens. -more-

Rock Attack -more-

City officials have issued a formal call for a consultant to help reshape the streetscape and traffic flow around the Berkeley BART Plaza. -more-

Berkeley Unified School District Academic Performance Index (API) scores released this week by the California Department of Education contained “no surprises,” according to BUSD Superintendent Michele Lawrence, and show that district schools continue their placement in the mid-to-top level among California schools. -more-

California lawmakers took action against the genocide in Darfur Wednesday, aided by three East Bay teenagers who read written testimony submitted by U.S. Rep. Barbara Lee. -more-

Three new measures designed to control the spread of casinos took forward steps this week, including one federal law and two proposed amendments to the California Constitution. -more-

Berkeley’s program that allows city employees and residents to share city cars was named as one of 50 semifinalists for the Innovation in American Government Award. -more-

Major changes now being planned at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) include a major move off-campus and a step toward demolition of one of the facility’s major structure. -more-

When Alameda County progressives recently got wind of President Bush’s resubmission of seven federal judicial nominees previously rejected by the U.S. Senate for being too extreme, they did what many progressives all over the country did: They decided to party. -more-

BROWER CENTER -more-

Click here to view the latest work by Planet cartoonist Justin DeFreitas -more-

A recent UnderCurrents column was linked in Mayor Jerry Brown’s new online blog (http://jerrybrown.typepad.com/), but do you think maybe this one was a mistake? -more-

While parked on Shattuck Avenue, sipping a latte and waiting for the Berkeley Public Library to open, I eyed two well-worn women as they ambled by, deep in conversation. One, with grayed-brown curls seeping out of her frayed knitted cap, clutched an overstuffed garbage bag to her side. She seemed quite intense as she spoke to her companion: “I think back in time to when things have disappeared and you’ve been drunk and you didn’t know you lost it…” -more-

Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi didn’t wait for the result of the joint American-Italian probe into the killing of Italian secret service agent Nicola Calipari, and the wounding of Italian journalist Giuliana Sgrena, before announcing the withdrawal of Italian troops from Iraq. Combined with a hastily arranged Ukrainian departure and a planned Romanian retreat, Berlusconi’s announcement shatters the so-called Coalition of the Willing, rendering the Iraq occupation a de facto Anglo-American operation. -more-

Ann and Dean Metzger’s op-ed “Why UCB Should Follow the Lead Of the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor” (Daily Planet, March 4-7) was very frustrating. It begins in the first two paragraphs by seeming to seek a middle ground in the present fight between the City of Berkeley and UC Berkeley by examining the relationship of Ann Arbor, Mich. to the University of Michigan (UM). After those two paragraphs though, the article takes a different tone, implying that UM bends over backwards for Ann Arbor and thereby implies that UCB should act likewise. Worse though than the articles faux-unbiased stance, is that it is based on a false premise. Namely that Ann Arbor and Berkeley are in similar situations. Having spent roughly four years living in both cities, I feel I am qualified to point out the failings in the Metzgers’ premise. -more-

Ann and Dean Metzger write in the March 4-7 Daily Planet that the University of Michigan has been “a partner in many capital improvement projects” in the city of Ann Arbor and that the University of California campus in Berkeley should follow Michigan’s lead. -more-

If you wanted to know what Jewish music sounds like, would you turn to a beatboxing hip-hop artist? An avant-garde string quartet? A master of ancient Middle Eastern musical traditions? -more-

Going into the foolsFURY Incubator/Shotgun Lab staging of Monster in the Dark is, in a number of ways, like walking in the dark. The publicity for the work-in-progress, playing Mondays and Tuesdays at the Ashby Stage, dwells on the theme, ‘what are you irrationally afraid of?’—and that the show is a work-in-progress, an exploration, and not much more than that. -more-

Poets David Gitin and Jack Marshall—both long involved with poetry in the Bay Area, and long acquainted with each other—will read their poems at 7:30 p.n. Monday, March 21 at Moe’s Books on Telegraph Avenue. -more-

FRIDAY, MARCH 18 -more-

Just as some city planners behave as though a brand new museum with no budget left for art, and a brand new library without librarians, are just fine, so some gardeners seem to think that a manicured garden without wildlife—often called pests—is also acceptable. This seems to be true of some environmentalists, too. -more-

FRIDAY, MARCH 18 -more-