You come upon them almost as a pleasant surprise from out of the past, like an explorer finding a shining obelisk poking out of a sea of Egyptian sand. 

The eight San Francisco Bay Historical Markers stand along the Richmond shoreline—the east bay’s most accessible waterfront—where you can find some of the most spectacular views in the area. 

Along the curving shoreline to the north are sweeping views first of Emeryville’s shimmering towers, then of Oakland’s downtown skyline, and then the slow rise of the foothills leading up to the horizon. To the right are the working Richmond docks where containers the size of boxcars—they actually are boxcars—are dropped by cranes like Star Wars creatures into the holds of carrier ships the size of enormous buildings. Straight ahead are the bay waters themselves, cool and gray, spanned by great bridges, the hunting island once owned by Bing Crosby, and far across, the golden domes and spires of the city of San Francisco. 

Sixty-five years ago, a small city population of workers—90,000 at its height—looked out upon this same magnificent Richmond shoreline view as they built the ships that helped win World War II for America and the allies. 

Part of the untold story of how that happened—and how Richmond went overnight from a Southern-like, mostly-white backwater town of 23,000 to a multicolor, multicultural city of 100,000—is now told in Richmond’s Bay Trail Markers. 

They are unlike the old roadside historical markers which simply remark, a little dryly and dolefully, that “200 Yards From Here, In 1864, A Command Of Confederates Was Ambushed By Union Soldiers,” and nothing more. 

Instead, Richmond’s Bay Trail Markers are living testimonials set on 18-foot-tall metal stanchions (“suggesting,” the marker brochure explains, “the prow of a massive wartime ship”). Permanently embossed on graffiti-proof surfaces, the markers themselves contain old photos and quotations from the people who worked in the wartime shipyards, many of whom are alive today and continue to play a role in Richmond’s political, social, and economic life. 

One marker shows the clubs and theaters and cowboy bars that sprung up to entertain the massive numbers of off-duty workers; another depicts the stories of the Italian-American and Japanese-American Richmond citizens suddenly finding themselves ostracized, interned, and enemies in their home towns (“When my family returned to the nursery, all the glass panes in the greenhouses were broken. I didn’t see it because I was overseas with the 442nd in Italy.” reads the poignant quote); another shows Richmond’s segregated union halls. 

Dedicated last fall, the markers are designed so that each can be viewed alone and separately by people walking along the waterfront or as an entire story outlining Richmond in the war years. 

The marker design was a collaboration of the design firm Mayer/Reed, visual artists James Harrison and Lewis Watts, and writer Chiori Santiago, but they were the brainchild of Berkeley historian Donna Graves. 

“Credit for the markers needs to go to Donna,” says Betty Reid Soskin, a Richmond resident who works for the Rosie The Riveter Park project of the National Park Service and who worked in the segregated union hall during World War II and whose quotation appears on one of the markers. 

“She was determined that they reflected the reality of those times, and that they included authentic voices,” she said. “She insisted on that.” 

Soskin was also one of several local persons who sat on the marker’s advisory panel while what Graves calls “some difficult topics of race and segregation and patriotism” were being hammered out. 

Graves, who will only admit that she “kind of put the project together,” said the idea for the markers came while she was working on the Rosie the Riveter Memorial, which honored the women who worked the wartime shipyards while men did the fighting overseas. 

“We came across so many rich stories about wartime Richmond during that time,” Graves says. “I was interested. I thought others would be. It adds a layer of history and memory to an area of the city whose past has pretty much been wiped away. It’s not intended to be just a Richmond story told to other people in Richmond. It’s telling the Richmond story to the world.” 

She was hired to develop the project by the Richmond Redevelopment Agency, which has jurisdiction over construction on Richmond’s waterfront. A third of the project money came from the Redevelopment Agency, with the rest coming from the California Coastal Conservancy and the Association of Bay Area Governments. 

“We wanted the markers to be living memorials, rather than simply the sort of plaques on a stick you usually see,” she explained. “Everywhere during the second World War, Americans were being bombarded with the rhetoric that everyone was welcome on the home front. But the reality of minorities on the Richmond shipyards was a difficult period of tension where discrimination continued. While all that was going on, these were everyday people doing extraordinary things in extraordinary times.” 

A Planning Commission majority, against the outspoken wishes of Chair Harry Pollack, Wednesday night elected the panel’s three representatives to the panel that will create a new plan for an enlarged downtown district. 

The Downtown Area Plan Advisory Committee (DAPAC) was formed in response to the settlement agreement reached after the city sued UC Berkeley, challenging the school’s Long Range Development Plan (LRDP) outlining expansion plans through 2020. 

By a five-four vote, commissioners Gene Poschman, Helen Burke and Susan Wengraf were elected to the 21-member committee over the strenuous objections of Chair Harry Pollack. 

Wengraf joined with Pollack, David Stoloff and James Samuels to oppose the motion by Commissioner Rob Wrenn, but they were outvoted by Wrenn, Poschman, Burke, Sara Shumer and Mike Sheen. 

Discussion of appointments was the last item of business, and Pollack opened by saying he planned to make the appointments at the commission’s next meeting, to which Burke replied, “What will change?” 

“I’m asking for one more week,” replied Pollack. “More than three of you have asked to be on it.” 

“Very few people have been appointed,” Wengraf said. “Linda Maio appointed two who are totally unknown to me (Winston Burton and Victoria Eisen). Betty Olds has appointed two (Jenny Wenk and Dorothy Walker), and Laurie Capitelli appointed one (Mim Hawley),” she said, referring to the two appointments each city councilmember is allowed to make. “I have no clue at all about what the community wants. We don’t have to do it tonight.” 

“We have three appointments, three out of nine” planning commissioners. “If anyone is juggling the balance, it should be the council,” added Shumer. 

“I prefer to do it tonight,” said Wrenn, adding that “it should be the three members with the most experience in downtown planning issues—Susan, Gene and myself, but I don’t want it myself.” 

“The chair has the authority to make appointments,” said Stoloff. 

“I’m only asking that we wait a week,” said Pollack. 

“Aren’t you going to be appointed by a councilperson?” Wengraf asked Wrenn. 

“There are rumors to that effect,” Wrenn answered. “And if there are five planning commissioners appointed, one will have to go. I don’t want to be [one of the three] because I’m hoping to be on the Planning Commission not that much longer. I’m in favor of Gene, Susan and Helen,” he said, moving their appointment. 

The second came from Shumer. 

“I have a different opinion,” Pollack declared. “It’s unfortunate you don’t have the courtesy to wait. James Samuels certainly brings a lot of experience. He’s an architect and he served on the landmarks commission for a long time. He has at least as much experience as David and me,” he said, adding, “Your criteria are suspect.” 

“It’s the tradition of the commission to respect the wishes of the chair,” said Wengraf. “I can’t remember a time when we didn’t. We can wait a week and we may have more information.” 

Stoloff objected too, but when the vote was called, Wrenn and his allies carried the day. 

“This is an unfortunate precedent,” declared Pollack. 

“Does that mean I’m on?” asked Wengraf. 

“If you want to resign, we’ll have to pick someone else at our next meeting,” said Poschman. 

Then Wengraf suggested that Burke might not want to serve because she’s already chairing the city’s Creeks Task Force and serving on two other committees—but Burke said nothing. 

Wengraf then tried another gambit, suggesting that, with Kriss Worthington calling for more diversity on city commissions, Sheen, an Asian, might be a more appropriate appointment—but Sheen said nothing. 

The two alternatives suggested by Pollack and Wengraf were also the commission’s newest members. 

With the addition of the three commissioners, the 8 of the DAPAC’s 21 slots have been filled. All the remaining appointments will be the choices, two each, of city councilmembers, with one remaining for Capitelli. Councilmembers have to make their appointment by Halloween, the deadline they imposed. 

As the title acknowledges, DAPAC serves only in an advisory capacity, and it is the planning commission itself which is responsible for producing the document itself. 

The committee is charged with completing its work by November 2007, and the resulting plan, after more work by city and university planners must be presented to the City Council by May 25, 2009. 

Home teaching permits 

At the direction of the City Council, commissioners tackled the issue of people who teach and tutor pupils in the own home. 

Under existing codes, music teachers, math tutors and others who offer instruction at their own residences are required to pay $2,200 for their fees, and when told of the number, they walk away, said Planning Manager Mark Rhoades. The figure was set in 1999 with the strong backing of then-Mayor Shirley Dean. 

In January, the commission had recommended that home teaching be placed under an administrative use permit (AUP), which requires city staff time and notice to neighbors, to which they can raise objections and concerns about issues such as noise and parking. 

AUPs in residential neighborhoods, however, cost $1,362.70—a number councilmembers said was too high when they sent the issue back to the Planning Commission. 

Assistant Planner Fatema Crane presented the commission with a proposal that would recoup 75 percent of staff time costs, which would have brought the cost of the permit, with various other fees, to $826.50. 

Rhoades acknowledged that even the lesser figure wouldn’t result in any lines at the Planning Department’s Milvia Street office, adding, “The council wants to legitimize them. The bar to entry is far too high process-wise and fee-wise. 

Poschman said he wanted to keep the applications under the AUP process so that neighbors were notified, and Burke moved to keep the AUP but lower the fee for home teaching to $100. 

Wengraf offered a substitute motion that kept the $100 fee but lowered the permit to a zoning certificate, which doesn’t require notification. Stoloff seconded the motion, only to see it defeated. 

AUPs, unlike zoning certificates, can be appealed to the Zoning Adjustments Board. 

Burke’s motion carried the day, with Pollack, Wengraf and Samuels in opposition. 

In other business, commissioners got their first look at proposed fees for appeals of decisions by the Planning and Landmarks Preservation commissions and for the Zoning Adjustments Board. The issue will come up for formal consideration at a later meeting. 

Commissioners also got a first look at proposed transportation services fees to be paid by developers of new projects in the city and designed to fund alternative transit and other transportation modes that will reduce their motor vehicle traffic. 

The decision on the fees will be left up to the city Transportation Commission.  

›

The Berkeley City Council Tuesday began tackling a dirty problem that could cost property owners up to $4,500. 

Under a 1987 cease-and-desist order from the San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board for local cities to repair city-owned sanitary sewer lines to reduce ground water contamination, Berkeley has been working to repair the aging system that carries sink and toilet water to an East Bay Municipal Utility District treatment facility. 

To comply with the water board’s 30-year cease and desist order, Berkeley has replaced about half of its main sanitary sewer lines. 

But the city has determined that about half of the leakage from its sanitary sewers comes not from the city-owned sewer mains but from creaky clay pipes, known as sewer laterals, that connect private buildings to the main sewer line.  

And now the council must decide how to make property owners pay for repairs. 

The sewer laterals, which are the responsibility of property owners, pose a couple of problems. Most are damaged, either from intruding tree roots or wear and tear, and leak contaminated water which can flow into creeks and the bay. Also many properties have illegal sewer hook-ups that send rain water run-off into the private sewer laterals and through the sanitary sewer system.  

The extra water, especially during the rainy season, sometimes overwhelms the sanitary sewer system, resulting in blockages that back-fill sewer water, potentially contaminated with hepatitis and e-coli bacteria, into bathtubs and city streets. 

“This really isn’t all that optional,” Public Works Commission Chair Sara Shumer told the council. “We’re talking about health and safety issues.” 

Repairing a sewer lateral will cost property owners between $3,500 and $4,500, and few property owners will be exempt from the costs, said Acting Public Works Director Claudette Ford. Out of 31,300 buildings with sewer laterals, Ford estimated 75 percent would need repairs. 

The council expressed unanimous support for requiring property owners to repair sewer laterals as a condition of selling their homes or doing remodeling work estimated to cost more than $100,000, or $50,000 if the work includes two or more sewer hookups. However, the council was not ready to endorse recommendations from the Public Works Commission that property owners be made to fix sewer laterals when the city is replacing the sewer main running down the street, and that in three years the city would begin mandatory inspections of laterals on streets where the city has already replaced the sewer main. 

Although repairing laterals at the same time the city replaces its sewer line would lower costs for property owners, councilmembers feared some wouldn’t be able to afford the work.  

“I can see some homeowners where an outlay of $3,000 to $5,000 would be prohibitively expensive,” said Councilmember Laurie Capitelli. The council asked for city staff to return with options to help low-income property owners pay for repairs. One possibility would be for the city to pay for repairs and recoup the money when the property is sold. 

Several cities subsidize lateral repairs, but Berkeley’s sewer fund ordinance prohibits the fund from paying to do repair work on private property, said Deputy City Attorney Zach Cowan. The city can subsidize repairs from its general fund, he added. 

Susan Schwartz, an advocate for keeping Berkeley’s many creeks contamination-free, praised the council for beginning to address the sewer issue. But Berkeley Property Owners Association President Michael Wilson, contacted after the council meeting, said the council needed to find a way to make sure homeowners don’t have to foot the bill. 

“The city can’t just continue to issue edicts without any regard to real world financial concerns,” he said. 

The water board recently required cities to manage the private sections of sanitary sewer systems and has been hinting that it might impose fines for cities that fail to reduce contamination, said Jeffrey Egeberg, engineering manager for the Public Works Department. 

“They are strongly encouraging that we do this,” he added. 

In Alameda County, the leaders at regulating private sewer laterals are Albany, which requires inspection upon sale of property or remodeling that exceeds five percent of the assessed property value, and Alameda, which requires inspection upon sale for buildings over 25-years-old. 

Regulating sewer laterals to the extent recommended by the Public Works Commission would cost the city $437,900 a year. The program would be paid for by fees charged to property owners, including a $185 certificate of compliance fee. 

In cases where the city orders property owners to inspect their laterals, if the lateral does not need repairs, the city would pick up the $185 fee.  

Inspections, which cost between $75 and $350, involve inserting a camera through the private lateral. 

In cases where the lateral was damaged by tree roots from a city-owned tree planted on the lawn extension beside the sidewalk, the city would be responsible for repairing the lateral. 

In most cases, fixing a lateral wouldn’t require a property owner to dig up a front yard. Egeberg said new technology allows construction workers to insert a new lateral, made of plastic, through two holes, one near the street and the other near the building.

Faced with growing neighborhood complaints, West Berkeley’s Pacific Steel Casting Company announced Tuesday that it plans to install a carbon filter designed to eliminate the burning rubber smell wafting from its factory. 

The filter, which Pacific Steel hopes to have installed by September 2006, will cost several million dollars, said former state Assemblymember Dion Aroner, a partner with AJE Partners, who is a spokesperson for the company. 

“Pacific Steel is saying they believe they know what the problem is, and they’re going forward with a solution,” she said. 

Pacific Steel installed carbon filters on its other two plants in 1985 and 1991 in response to neighborhood complaints about the smell. At the time, the company said a filter wasn’t needed for the third plant because it was rarely in operation. 

However as demand for steel castings has risen over the past two years, Pacific Steel has increased production in the third plant, Aroner said. 

“I’m glad to hear they’re finally doing it,” said Janis Shroeder, a West Berkeley resident and member of the West Berkeley Alliance for Clean Air and Safe Jobs. But Shroeder and alliance member Andrew Galpern still fear that plant at 1333 Second St. is emitting harmful chemicals throughout West Berkeley and Albany. 

“Their goal is to eliminate the odor, but they’re not addressing the fact that they are pumping other stuff into the air which won’t be captured by the filter,” Galpern said. 

Pacific Steel is scheduled to undergo a health risk assessment, overseen by the Bay Area Air Quality Management District beginning later this year. The testing is expected to be completed by March, Aroner said, and will cost Pacific Steel about $500,000. 

Prior studies by the Air District showed that emissions of cancer-causing particles were barely within state standards. 

Also, in an agreement with Berkeley officials, Pacific Steel will still proceed with odor tests of all three plants determine the exact source of the burning rubber smell. The study will be prepared by environmental consultant Environmental Resources Management (ERM) and supervised jointly by the city, Pacific Steel and a monitor assigned by the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.  

Since March, the Air District has cited Pacific Steel with three notices of violation for releasing noxious odors. 

Shroeder, who along with other West Berkeley residents sued Pacific Steel in 1984 over the issue, said the odor has dissipated in her neighborhood but worsened in others after the company inserted carbon filters on the two plants. 

The filter is designed to absorb carbons released from the plant during the production of steel castings. Pacific Steel says the burning rubber smell is a by-product of heating sand molds and pouring in liquid steel, which then cools to form a steel mold. 

In an unsuccessful attempt to reduce the odor, Pacific Steel tried different binders in the sand molds, but the quality of the mold was poor, according to Aroner. 

The proposed filtration system would essentially rebuild the interior of the third plant, Aroner said. Before the company can move forward with installing the system, it must receive approval from the air district and Berkeley. 

The city’s toxics manager, Nabil Al-Hadithy, said Pacific Steel’s plan appeared solid. “It looks like they’re cutting to the chase,” he said. 

Councilmember Linda Maio, who represents the adjoining neighborhoods praised the proposal. “It sounds like a major commitment of bucks,” she said. “We hope what they’re doing will get the job done.” 

”

For progressive activists, living in the East Bay has the defect of its virtues. It’s gratifying to reside among politically like-minded others but frustrating to find oneself mostly preaching to the choir about matters of state, national and global concern. (Local affairs are not nearly so consensual, as readers of the Daily Planet are acutely aware.) For that reason, many locals went far afield during last year’s presidential campaign. Since last fall, the missionary impulse has faded in most left-liberal quarters. But at the Wellstone Democratic Renewal Club (WDRC), tapping new constituencies has remained a high priority, leading to some novel political initiatives.  

Founded in the spring of 2005, WDRC now has nearly 300 members, making it one of the largest Democratic Party clubs in the Bay Area. From the start, the group’s mission has included building a progressive network in the Democratic Party from the ground up. Achieving that goal has led Wellstoners to reach well beyond their geographical base, which centers in Berkeley and Oakland.  

For the last month or so, the club’s Peace Committee has been soliciting donations for an extensive newspaper ad campaign in support of House Joint Resolution 55, a bipartisan Congressional joint resolution requiring the president to begin the total withdrawal of all military forces from Iraq no later than October 2006. 

The Wellstoners intend to place full-page ads next month in the Oakland Tribune, the Tri-Valley Herald, the Hayward Daily Review, and the Berkeley Daily Planet. 

The ads will thank local Congressional co-sponsors—Representatives Miller, Lee and Stark—and urge readers to encourage elected officials and bodies to support the resolution. The names of donors who helped pay for the ads, which cost between $1,300 (Daily Planet) and $3,800 (Oakland Tribune) apiece—will also appear. Beyond publicizing HJR 55, the campaign is intended to be a pilot project for similar grass-roots efforts in communities around the state and the country.  

Last spring, WDRC undertook an even more ambitious outreach project. Club members went into the 11th Congressional District (CD 11) seeking allies in their struggle against Republican efforts to privatize Social Security. They chose the 11th District partly because of proximity. CD 11 is a torturously gerrymandered area that includes portions of four counties—Alameda, Contra Costa, San Joaquin and Santa Clara—and cities as diverse as Danville, Manteca and Stockton.  

The 11th District had an additional appeal for the Wellstoners: It’s represented in Congress by Richard Pombo, the seven-term, right-wing Republican from Tracy who chairs the House Resources Committee. WDRC member Jody Ginsberg, a resident of San Leandro, describes Congressman Pombo as a longtime “stealth candidate” who recently gained visibility and notoriety through his proposal to gut the Endangered Species Act. (That proposal passed the House on Sept. 29.) 

Pombo is circulating a draft of a bill to sell 15 national parks and naming rights to visitors’ centers and trails. He’s also been a staunch supporter of President Bush’s campaign to privatize Social Security.  

The Wellstone Democratic Renewal Club had endorsed and campaigned for Pombo’s opponent in last fall’s election, Jerry McNerny. McNerny had never run for office and was operating with a shoestring budget. Nevertheless, he got 40 percent of the vote. 

When Pombo jumped aboard Bush’s campaign to privatize Social Security last winter, the Wellstoners decided that working in the 11th Congressional District offered a political two-fer: they could mobilize around saving Social Security and in so doing, undermine Pombo’s base. About 90,000 people in Pombo’s District draw Social Security. It seemed like fertile territory for progressive action. 

Starting last April, a team of six to eight WDRC members made weekend trips to Lodi, Stockton, Manteca, Oakdale, Pleasanton and Danville. They brought along the brochure that had been prepared by the club’s Social Security Committee and an anti-Pombo petition. In each place, the Wellstoners would hook up with local activists. 

“We started going to farmers markets and sitting next to local Democratic club tables,” says WDRC member Matthew Hallinan. 

The Wellstoners also worked with the Tri-Valley Progressive Action Network, the Gray Panthers and the California Alliance of Retired Americans (CARA). They discovered that every town and city in the Central Valley has a CARA club. In Stockton and Fresno, Hallinan says, CARA is “actually a force.”  

The immediate response to their efforts was heartening. The WDRC piece on Social Security, Hallinan says, was “the only brochure I’ve passed out in a long time that wasn’t immediately thrown away.” 

“We created a buzz every time we showed up,” Ginsberg says. “People would rush up. I’ve never had such an easy job tabling.” 

In her view, that’s because Social Security is basically an economic issue, and with a few exceptions, like Danville, the 11th Congressional District is not an affluent area. 

“Even if people are Republicans, they want Social Security,” she said.  

Some younger people did not rush up—at least not at first. 

Ginsberg says that she “saw mothers and kids disagreeing—and I’m talking about grown kids thirty years old. A mother would drag her son over to the table, saying, ‘You have to learn.’ By the end, I saw a lot more young adults who were knowledgeable on the issue. Rock the Vote has information on their website about why Social Security is important to young people. We drew on their information for our flyer.”  

On May 10, the Wellstoners joined a protest in front of Congressman Pombo’s Stockton office on the 70th anniversary of Social Security. They had balloons, a cake, and a big, gift-wrapped box with a card that said, “Happy 70th Birthday, Social Security.” They were not greeted by the congressman.  

In July WDRC members carried a pro-Social Security banner in a Fourth of July parade in Danville. They marched with McNerny supporters, members of the local Democratic Club and a peace group. 

“I’ve never seen such a polarized community,” Hallinan says. “We were booed and cheered.” But it was also in Danville, he said, that the club had “the best luck” with its organizing efforts.  

By the end of the summer, the Wellstoners decided to pull back from the 11th District. 

“All of us work,” Hallinan explains. “Driving two or three hours every weekend was too much.” 

And while people flocked to the club’s petition and supplied assistance, local residents proved reluctant to take the initiative. 

“We became convinced that [Social Security] is a great issue, but we couldn’t get a volunteer base,” Hallinan says.  

Hallinan and Ginsberg both say that WDRC will return to CD 11. Jerry McNerny has built a grass-roots network there and wants to run against Pombo in 2006. 

There’s talk of a fight in the Democratic primary; Congresswoman Tauscher may back another candidate. In any case, the Wellstoners plan to register voters, to make endorsements and to work for the candidates and issues they support. 

Hallinan says, “We just got our toes in the water.”  

Photo: Contributed photo  

Members of the Wellstone Renewal Club demonstrate in front of Rep. Richard Pombo’s Tracy office. The seven-term Republican Congressmember chairs the House Resources Committee.›

On a six-to-three vote, city councilmembers Tuesday approved proposed amendments to Berkeley’s condominium conversion ordinance, preparing the ground for a final vote next Tuesday. 

The measure is an interim step, needed to allow the 40 or so conversions now in the pipeline to proceed while the city works out a more definitive piece of legislation, first in a workshop with city councilmembers and officials on Jan. 17. 

“This ensures the grandfathering in of previously existing tenancies-in-common so that those that were in the pipeline that were already existing in 1992 can continue” to go through the conversion process along with the rental units where owners have proposed to convert, said Housing Director Steve Barton. 

The city conversion ordinance allows for conversions of 100 units a year, a quota that hasn’t been met so far this year, he said. 

“All who have already applied would be ready to go forward,” he said. 

The major areas of conflict Tuesday involved conversion fees and which, if any, tenants an owner would be allowed to evict once embarked on conversion. 

The proposed ordinance offered two alternatives for duplex owners who had lived on the property or in another Berkeley rental for at least seven years. Under the first, the city would charge no fees for conversion while the second would keep the fee at the current rate of five percent of the sales price. 

For larger rental properties in the pipeline, the interim ordinance caps conversion fees on larger units at 12.5 percent when owners agree to put existing occupants under rent control to protect their rights. 

The purpose of the fees is to mitigate the loss of affordable housing by providing cash for the city’s Housing Trust Fund to provide for new affordable units. 

“The legal basis for the fee is the change in value from rental to ownership,” said City Attorney Manuela Albuquerque. “The legal rationale is that you are losing affordability.” 

The ordinance allows conversions without bringing the buildings up to city code standards, while the existing ordinance requires code compliance before conversion, Barton said.  

The second set of alternatives dealt with tenant protections. Under the first variant, only low- and moderate-income tenants as well as the elderly would be protected from eviction, while the second version protected all tenants regardless of age or income. 

The city Housing Advisory Commission voted Monday evening to support the amendments that would protect the rights of existing tenants to remain in the buildings after conversion and would cap fees to 5 percent for owner-occupied two-, three- and four-unit properties, which would also not be counted under the 100-unit quota system. 

Councilmember Kriss Worthington moved adoption of the ordinance with the total tenant protection provision and the 5 percent fee for owner-occupied duplex conversions. 

Councilmember Laurie Capitelli offered a third protection variant that would have protected the low- and moderate-income tenants, the elderly and those with disabilities, while allowing eviction of higher-income renters. 

Capitelli’s motion went down to defeat with only Gordon Wozniak and Betty Olds joining him. Linda Maio, Darryl Moore, Max Anderson, Dona Spring and Mayor Tom Bates then joined with Worthington to pass his original motion. 

“There’s a lot more work to do,” said Bates. “I’m going to support this, but I’m not happy with it. I’m really eager for January so we can sink our teeth in it.” 

Soft story changes 

The second major piece of legislation before the council also carried the day, this time by a unanimous vote. 

At issue was an amendment to the Berkeley Municipal Code to adopt an inventory of so-called soft story buildings and to adopt a section of the 2003 International Existing Building Code and Amendments. 

Soft story buildings are structures with ground floors that are especially vulnerable to collapse in a major earthquake, and the new building code amendment sets forth requirements for stabilizing the structures. 

The measures place the nearly 400 buildings with 5,000 residential units on a city Inventory of Potentially Hazardous Buildings and requires owners to notify residents and the public of the potential dangers and gives owners 180 days in which they can appeal their listing. 

Owners of listed properties will then have two years to submit an engineering report analyzing whether the building is capable of handling a major temblor. 

The changes adopted Monday don’t require owners to make the changes, an issue to be taken up later by the council. 

Other business  

The council also: 

• Denied an appeal of a Zoning Adjustments Board (ZAB) decision to approve the construction of a second story to a home at 1322 Kains Ave. Neighbor Laura Riggs contested the approval because the added story will cast her house into partial shadow. 

• Denied an appeal challenging ZAB’s approval of the partial demolition of a single-story Victorian cottage and its conversion into a three-story, three-unit condominium at 2901 Otis St. and overturned a Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) decision to declare the building a structure of merit, then remanded the project back to ZAB and the LPC. 

• Affirmed a ZAB decision to allow the opening of a new gelato restaurant at 2170 Shattuck Ave. 

• Partially overturned a ZAB decision approving construction of a new home at 2615 Marin Ave., approving an appeal by neighbors to lower the roofline by a foot to restore part of their views of the Bay and remanded the project back to ZAB. 

• Approved a 31-month contract with Universal Building Services, a union shop, to provide janitorial at the city Public Safety Building through fiscal year 2008. Councilmembers Kriss Worthington and Max Anderson voted against the contract. 

• Delayed until next Tuesday a vote on a resolution calling on the council to reaffirm its support for the full demolition and removal of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory’s Bevatron and Building 51. 

• Approved on first reading the sale of the last major piece of surplus city property, a building at 2344 Sixth St., to LifeLong Medical Care, Inc., for $2.2 million. 

• Adopted a revised Housing Element of the General Plan after making revisions required after the state Department of Housing and Community Development rejected earlier drafts. Only Dona Spring voted against adoption. 

• Adopted unanimously the city plan and zoning amendments and the environmental documents required before the Gilman Street Playing Fields can be built on the southern parking area of Golden Gate Fields on land owned by the East Bay Regional Parks District, a project hailed by Worthington as “the second biggest accomplishment of the Bates administration.”f

Berkeley veterans are promising to press forward with the city’s annual Veteran’s Day commemoration without the support of one of Berkeley’s most famous veterans. 

On Monday Country Joe McDonald, chairperson of the Veterans Day Commemoration Committee and writer of numerous anti-war songs, abruptly canceled the event scheduled for Nov. 11 after committee members rejected his choice for a keynote speaker, Bill Mitchell. 

Mitchell, a veteran and the father of a soldier killed last year while serving in Iraq, is a co-founder along with Cindy Sheehan of Gold Star Parents for Peace. 

While veterans on the committee say they have nothing against Mitchell or his politics, they want the commemoration to be politically neutral. 

“This is a time to honor our comrades who served this country,” said Ed Harper, adjutant of Disabled American Veterans Chapter 25. “It’s a memorial. It shouldn’t be about the war.” 

Harper, who said he would demonstrate against the Iraq War any day but Veterans Day, maintained his view was seconded by the long-standing committee members other than McDonald, including DAV member Nathaniel Harrison, residents Tim and Linda Perry and Martin Snapp, a Berkeley-based reporter for the Knight Ridder corporate newspapers whose report on the controversy appeared in the Contra Costa Times, the San Jose Mercury News and the East Bay Daily News. Harper charged that when McDonald rejoined the committee as chair earlier this year he brought in several anti-war members seeking to politicize the event. 

McDonald was backed on the committee by Hal Carlstad, who joined the committee earlier this year. 

McDonald countered that the committee’s position amounted to censorship, which shouldn’t be tolerated at a city-sponsored event. 

“It’s a slippery slope to ask a Gold Star father and military veteran to censor his remarks,” McDonald said. “The event should be a day for veterans to say what they feel.” 

Berkeley Mayor Tom Bates is planning to meet with McDonald and the Veterans Day committee next week to salvage the event, said his Senior Aide Julie Sinai. 

Committee members said the event will go on with or without McDonald. 

“I don’t know how he could cancel it,” said Tim Perry. “It wasn’t his event to cancel. Now he’s thrown everything into confusion.” 

Harper said McDonald had e-mailed event participants, including the Cal Band, that the event was canceled.  

McDonald said a Veterans Day commemoration would be impossible without the support of the entire committee. 

“Otherwise it’s just a private party,” he said. “It’s not the event we’ve been doing.” 

Berkeley has held Veterans Day Commemoration’s at Civic Center Park since 2002. The half-hour event, which usually draws about 200 spectators, had typically featured politically neutral speakers, Harper said. Last year’s keynote was delivered by a retired brigadier general. 

The committee had approved two other speakers proposed by McDonald: Councilmember Dona Spring and Michael Blecker, the executive director of Swords to Ploughshares, an organization assisting homeless and low-income veterans. 

Spring said if the event goes forward she would speak and “do whatever they want me to do.” 

Blecker, who did not return phone calls for this story, criticized the Iraq War in a recent address to Bay Area United Against War. 

Mitchell, contacted at his home near San Luis Obispo, said the committee’s concerns were misplaced. 

“I’m not sure what I would have said, but I’m an intelligent enough guy not to give a raging anti-war speech at a Veterans Day rally,” he said. “It wouldn’t be appropriate.” 

Mitchell faulted the committee for not contacting him about the speech. 

“I mostly talk about my son and try to get people to see that people are dying in the war,” said Mitchell, adding that he would still be willing to deliver the keynote speech, but only if the committee placed no conditions on what he could say. 

Berkeley is one of the few East Bay cities that holds annual Veterans Day commemorations. Alameda County’s biggest event this year will be in the city of Alameda. That city rotates commemorations on a five year cycle with Oakland, San Leandro, Hayward and Fremont. 

3

Although employment of local workers in the multimillion dollar Vista College construction project in Berkeley has jumped dramatically since a Project Labor Agreement (PLA) was put in place, Peralta College district trustees said they were disappointed that more has not been done to include both local workers and minority contractors in the project. 

Consultant Jake Sloan of Oakland-based Davillier-Sloan labor management consultants told Peralta trustees last week that employment of local workers by the firms building the new Vista campus—Amoroso Construction and its subcontractors—has jumped from 3.5 percent to 25 percent. However, that number is only half of the 50 percent total local hiring goal in the agreement signed between Peralta and Amoroso. 

Davillier-Sloan is under contract with Peralta to assure company compliance with the Project Labor Agreement of the Vista construction project. 

Sloan also reported that the hiring of local apprentices for the Vista project has jumped from 0.03 percent to 8 percent of all workers, again short of the 20 percent goal called for in the PLA. 

Sloan said that his company had identified six contractors on the Vista project “who we don’t think have made the best effort [for local hiring], and we have identified them as being in apparent non-compliance” with the PLA. 

Sloan said that his company plans meetings with those contractors soon, adding that the contractors could be taken to arbitration by the district if they continued to be out of compliance. He did not identify the contractors by name. 

With ethnicity-based affirmative action programs virtually outlawed entirely in California, Peralta is using still legally-permissible “local hiring” provisions to stand in for minority hiring goals, since a large percentage of the population in the district’s five-city service area (Oakland, Alameda, Berkeley, Emeryville, and Albany) is minority. In addition, Peralta has policies in place to encourage construction companies under contract to hire minority subcontractors. 

Trustee Nicky Gonzalez Yuen asked if it was accurate that only 2 percent of the contract work for the Vista project was being done by African-American workers, a figure he said was given to Peralta trustees earlier this year by an African-American business representative. 

“I honestly don’t know,” Sloan told him. “We haven’t been instructed by you to compile that type of information.” 

After Sloan said that under the PLA, companies need only prove that they have made a “good faith effort” to comply with the local hiring goals, Trustee Alona Clifton told him it was a “very sad outcome that we have been getting from Amoroso, their good faith effort notwithstanding.” 

And trustee Linda Handy said that her biggest concern was about the issue of minority subcontracting, noting that she was “very discouraged to find that these [minority subcontractor] processes are being circumvented by companies waiting until the last minute to fax a request or send information to [minority] companies, making it impossible for them to respond in a timely manner.” 

Handy added that “although I am glad to see that compliance numbers are rising, I want to see those numbers at the top of our compliance goals. Even at 25 percent, it’s not enough. It’s not truly representative of the numbers of people in our service area who are paying the taxes that are creating these opportunities.” 

With the PLA also calling for 20 percent of the Vista construction jobs to go to apprentices, all of whom should be local residents, Trustee Bill Withrow suggested that the low number of actual local apprentices on the project (8 percent) might be overcome by “feeding people into those jobs from our college vocational programs. Since there’s a shortfall, this should be an opportunity to use the colleges to provide job opportunities for young adults in our service area.” 

But Sloan replied it was not that easy, and that local unions often provided an extra hurdle to overcome. 

“You can prepare your students to enter apprenticeship programs, but you can’t control the entry into those programs,” he said. “The unions control that.” 

Sloan said that while some trade unions operate year-round entry into their apprentice programs, “the trades that we are really focusing on getting local people into—plumbers, electricians, and sheet metal workers, for example—only accept apprentices once per year, and sometimes not that often. Even then, they only accept a certain number.” 

Sloan added that some unions, like the Teamsters, don’t operate apprentice programs at all. 

He said that the union apprentice programs are “extremely difficult to get through. I went through both college and an apprentice program as a young man, and college was easier. In the apprentice program you have to work every day and go to school at night, and they have very strict rules for absenteeism. After you finish the program, to get on the work list, you have to pass both a written and an oral exam. It’s not easy.” 

District staff said that Peralta will soon be hiring a contract compliance officer to assist with the local hiring and minority subcontract provisions of its construction contracts. In addition, under questioning, Trustee Withrow said that Peralta’s newly-hired inspector general could also assist in that effort. 

“This is an important segment of what we do,” he said. 

Berkeley landlords can tack an additional seven-tenths of one percent onto the rents they charge tenants, the annual general adjustment rate approved Tuesday by the Rent Stabilization Board. 

The figure represents 65 percent of the increase in the Consumer Price Index for the Bay Area during fiscal year 2005, which ended June 30. 

The increase doesn’t apply to tenants who occupied their rentals after Jan. 1, 2005 and whose rents were established under the Costa-Hawkins Rental Housing Act. 

The board also adopted an emergency regulation that will allow landlords to offer vacant units to disaster victims at below-market rate without forfeiting their right to later raise rents to market rates. 

Along with the regulation, board members adopted a resolution applying the new regulation to assist victims of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita to find temporary housing in the city. 

Similar measures were adopted by the Oakland City Council on Oct. 4. 

Jay Kelekian, the board’s executive director, said the regulation was adopted to ease concerns of landlords who were worried that they would be locked into the lower, unprofitable rates. 

“We want to help someone who offers reduced rent to someone who has to wait two months until their FEMA check arrives, or someone else who needs six months to get back on their feet,” Kelekian said. 

“We’re also preparing guidelines and a worksheet to help landlords and tenants understand the conditions under which the lower rates are granted,” he said. 

Once the negotiated period of low rents passes, landlords will be allowed to raise rates back to market levels, Kelekian added. 

The regulation and resolution were approved by unanimous votes. 

—Richard Brenneman

Four years removed from nearly being taken over by the county, the Berkeley Unified School District received welcomed news from Standard & Poor’s. 

The Wall Street rating agency rated the district’s debt offering SP-1+, the highest rating for its category. 

“This means we’re back on good financial footing and it’s amazing considering where we were a few years ago,” said Deputy Superintendent Eric Smith. 

Like many districts, the BUSD must borrow money to meet payroll while waiting to receive local property tax dollars. 

In years when the Alameda County Board of Education did not approve the district’s budget because of high deficits, the district had to borrow the money against other district funds, Smith said. 

By issuing a tax secured note, the district can borrow tax free and then re-invest the funds in securities that gain interest. Smith expected the district to net $100,000 in interest income from the transactions.  

—Matthew Artz

Once again, the Berkeley Police Department’s public information officers failed to respond to calls from the Daily Planet, this despite an e-mail sent to all regional media promising that Officer Steve Ergo would respond to all calls placed by the media between 4 and 5 p.m. Thursday. 

The last time the department responded to calls by deadline on the paper’s production day was Oct. 6›

To view Justin DeFreitas’ latest editorial cartoon, please visit www.jfdefreitas.com To search for previous cartoons by date of publication, click on the Daily Planet Archive.

CLEAN MONEY 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

While many minor issues divide us, on most major issues we stand united. For example, most Americans believe in fairness at the polls. While almost everyone would agree that both sides of a proposition must be allowed to present their case to the voters, Proposition 75 was put on the November ballot simply to silence some of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s harshest critics: our nurses, teachers, police, and firemen. When you slash funding from one side of a debate, the other side has a distinct, unfair advantage. Money buys votes.  

I agree that we need to reduce the big buck contributions that fuel our politicians and propositions, but let’s be fair about it. I would fully support legislation limiting the total dollar amount contributed by any individual, corporation, or union to $1,000 per year. With a level playing field, maybe our politicians would start to care more about us, their constituents, than the corporations currently bankrolling their campaigns.  

Vote no this November and let’s move forward together—fairly. Ask your state legislator to sponsor and support clean money legislation. Google “clean money” for more information. 

Mike Kirchubel 

• 

POINT PINOLE 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Point Pinole Regional Park, where Whitney Dotson stands in the photo in the Daily Planet (Oct. 18), is a place more people should explore. The expansive Breuner marsh that Dotson views in the distance is one of many panoramas in this rare breed of park, one that one goes to, less for the park itself, than for the magnificant views. 

There is the Breuner marsh from the south side of the park. The panoramas from the Point Pinole hillside in the middle show the undeveloped shoreline of Marin, while to the north one can gaze on the vast expanse of San Pablo Bay, and the view of the large Whittel marsh on the park’s north east side equals in open space the tranquility seen in your photo of the Breuner marsh. Every effort should be made to save the Breuner marsh from development, not only for the usual reasons of protecting shoreline and stopping urban sprawl, but also for protection of one of the rare places along our bay where you can look in the distance and imagine what our bay was like before urbanization. 

Ted Vincent 

• 

SPORTS FIELDS 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

If LA Wood has anything to support his/her idea that there is such poor air quality to the west of Interstate 80 at the location where the city is proposing to build the much needed new sports fields that no one should exercise there, please provide it. The city is normally exceedingly cautious about such things. Lots of joggers, bikers, kite flyers and dog walkers currently use the pedestrian bridge, frontage road trail and Chavez Park, not to mention the jockeys who work out every morning at the track. If all LA Wood has is an opinion, so what? Every bay boater knows that the prevailing summertime winds are from the northwest except before an incoming storm when the wind rotates to come from the south. Rarely in the winter there is a north wind. I believe that an off-shore easterly breeze is extremely rare in this area especially in the summer when the fields would be in use. Because of the prevailing northwesterly, the air at the bay shore has traveled a fetch of thousands of miles over the ocean and in my experience is always deliciously fresh at the race track and Chavez Park. It is what is so exhilarating about those places.  

Dennis White 

• 

LESS THAN TASTEFUL 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

How quickly we forget, so let me be the canary here. 

The outrage expressed by letter writers over the proposal to develop the parking lot at Golden Gate Fields, is of course heartening. At least some of us still oppose the deification of sales tax revenues. 

But before you glorify the local Sierra Club and Citizens for the Eastshore State Park, can I remind you of their less than tasteful role in all this? 

In August 2004, at a public meeting, Norman LaForce, presented the local Sierra Club’s proposal for the development of this very site. LaForce introduced the 325,000-square-foot plan now being proposed. An upscale Fourth Street-type retail and hotel complex, smack on the lips of the state park which LaForce has been so vocal about protecting from off-leash dogs and unleashed art. 

The deal which LaForce, CESP, local politicians, Magna Corp. and East Bay Regional Parks crafted involved the ball field portion south of Golden Gate Fields. A bunch of extremely high powered lawyers, businessmen and Sacramento style politicians working together for the betterment of all, right? The payoff for the Sierra Club and other so called environmentalists is that they have wrung some concessions from the developers about “open space” and “habitat preservation.” 

But at what cost? To the quality of life for the human beings of this entire area? The reality is that it is the Sierra Club which has brought us the mall at Golden Gate Fields, which will produce more toxic emissions from cars, parking garages, traffic, plastic and Styrofoam than we can possibly imagine. 

But the really toxic emissions are from those posing as protectors of the environment, when the only environment they care about is that which precludes human beings. 

Jill Posener 

• 

ISRAEL/PALESTINE 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

A few weeks ago I argued in these pages that if the Peace and Justice Commission has been packed with persons intent on burying the issue of Palestine/Israel, it is incumbent on the rest of us to engage in dialog about it elsewhere. I suggested that 2006 be proclaimed the “Year of Talking about Israel and Palestine” and that many organizations in the City of Berkeley, both public and private, take part. 

I’m pleased to report that my plan appears to be off to a robust start. Of course hats off to Becky O’Malley who continues to publish both news and a wide variety of opinion with regard to this topic. The range and liveliness of the discussion is rare, and I would be surprised if she is not being subjected to considerable pressure to lay off. 

But there’s more! Not only has the Middle East Children’s Alliance lined up a great fall series including talks by dissident Israeli professor Ilan Pappe on Oct. 29 and award-winning journalist Robert Fisk on Nov. 19, as well as a performance by the Ibdaa dance troupe from Dheisheh refugee camp in King Auditorium on Nov. 26, but other organizations are getting involved. Friends of the Berkeley Public Library is sponsoring a report back from the West Bank by Wendy Kaufmyn this Sunday, Oct. 23, at 2 p.m. in the main library and the Berkeley Art Center is opening an exhibit on Nov. 6 called “Justice Matters: Young Artists Consider Palestine” (through Dec. 17). Many thanks to all for helping to break the silence. 

But if you’re neither Jewish nor Palestinian, why should you care? One, because at least $3 billion of your taxes goes every year to Israel (more foreign aid than to any other country), most of it for buying weapons from the U.S. Some of these weapons are used by Israel, some sold on to other countries, making Israel an essential element of our military-industrial complex. Two, our government’s protection of Israel which permits it to flaunt international law is a primary reason for Arab/Muslim anger with the United States. And three, members of the Bush administration who believed it would benefit Israel are directly responsible for our invasion of Iraq. One, two, three reasons why certain people don’t want the Berkeley Peace and Justice Commission to learn, know, and act. One, two, three reasons why we all must. 

Joanna Graham 

• 

CHAMBER OF COMMERCE 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Having just received my mail, in reading the consensus opinions of the leadership of the Berkeley Chamber concerning the November Ballot positions, I find it appalling that this chamber would choose and publish their stand. 

I was naive to think the Berkeley Chamber would be more progressive and support or oppose those propositions that would actually benefit the greater public. My position is no on the first six and yes on the last two but I see by your choices, you are selling out our school teachers, firefighters, police, and union members with your support of Propositions 74 and 75. You are willing to give Arnold Schwarzenegger more budgetary power with your support of Prop. 76 when the example of this unnecessary special election is costing taxpayers upwards of $70 million dollars and is only supporting his own power grabbing agenda. 

Your support of the gerrymandering, Prop. 77, in a non-census year which is an obvious attempt to get more Republican votes out of California, is beyond reproach. The very crooked party that has nearly bankrupted this country, sent us to an unethical war on Iraq, consistently reduces the benefits of our most needy citizens while giving tax breaks to the wealthiest, endangers the environment with its hideous legislation, etc. is typical of the Republican party along whose lines you are supporting. Then you support Prop. 78 when it clearly is a drug company supported charade to squash Prop. 79 which actually could do some good for our lower income citizens. Last, your opposition to Prop. 80 is ludicrous! Non-regulated energy left the door wide open for the screwing we took from Enron, who incidentally are good friends and supporters both of our governor and the miserable excuse for a president we are suffering under. 

Rainbo Graphix will not be a member of any organization that is opposed to the general public interest and you can consider this my cancellation of 

membership. I will expect a pro rated check for my dues and I intend to clean up that unknowingly tainted money by donating it toward the defeat of 

Propositions 73 through 78. 

Beverly Hill  

Owner, Rainbo Graphix 

Emeryville 

• 

GUNS AND LIABILITY 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

The powerful gun lobby is aggressively seeking to pass legislation that will provide unprecedented blanket liability exemption for gun manufacturers and dealers. The gun lobby has pushed for a vote this week that will free them from all responsibility for deaths and injuries resulting from their products. The vote this week is the last chance to stop this reckless bill. 

The House leadership, receiving instructions from the gun lobby, has refused to consider the disastrous consequences of this legislation. Particularly outrageous is that, if this bill is passed, a dealer may no longer be held accountable for knowingly selling weapons to terrorist organizations or cop killers. This is disgraceful and demonstrates the lengths to which Republican House Leadership will go to keep the NRA and the gun lobby happy. 

Dr. Marc Pilisuk 

• 

NATIVE AMERICANS 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Although I strongly dislike Gov. Schwarzenegger and don’t approve of anything he’s doing, I don’t think that the Native Americans should be so offended over his veto of the bill that would have taken away the name “redskins” from school mascots. “Redskins” is not a bad term and should not be taken as an insult. The settlers called the Native Americans that because the grease and clay they smeared on themselves to prevent mosquitoes from biting and the cold from getting in made their skin look red. I’m sure many people are not aware of this so I thought I’d write it. 

Hannah Garrett 

• 

KATRINA’S  

AFTERSHOCKS 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

When the imbalance of forces in nature makes an adjustment we get a hurricane, earthquake, tsunami, tornado, fire, flood, etc. It becomes a disaster only if it destroys property and kills people. Such destruction may be widespread and short-lived. In its wake, however, there are bumbling aftershocks, tremors of culpable neglect, slides of incompetence, swirls of profiteering and self-centered political spins—acts of God followed by acts of man.  

In last year’s season hurricane Ivan destroyed the dream home near Pensacola that my sister and her husband remodeled for their retirement. Rebuilding it cost them nine months of anguish, frustration and effort.  

Katrina hit New Orleans with a whammy like that of Ivan and the city might have handled it the way it handled Betsy (1965) and Camille (1969) except that it got hit with extraordinary man-made aftershocks. First, of course, the levees having been allowed to deteriorate collapsed causing a flood that was predictable and predicted. Evacuation was inept and leadership was clumsy.  

The president hesitated, complemented the incompetent and dramatized his empty promises in a series of staged scenes. Rescue was haphazard. Desperation smothered civility so that only the fittest could survive. Those who had nowhere to go and no means of getting there were herded like cattle from the purgatory of poverty into the inferno of the Superdome where they served their sentences and then were carried willy-nilly in bunches to safe, far away and unfamiliar locations.  

Law enforcement’s self-regard grew frustrated, impotent and ultimately lawless. The physically and mentally impaired, the infants, the aged, the hospitalized and the incarcerated had less to lean on afterwards than before. Money poured in but there was little it could buy. Cruise ships provided housing for the rescuers but none for the rescued. FEMA acquired tens of thousands of trailer homes but couldn’t put them in place, food shipments it couldn’t use and paid millions a day for long-term tenure in short-term accommodations.  

My youngest brother and his wife fled New Orleans two days ahead of Katrina. Last week they got their first look at their home; it had been submerged for days in four feet of water and vacant for an additional three weeks. Even before Katrina it was not the home they’d moved into after their wedding because my brother is an energetic and skilled craftsman who added-on for three decades. It grew new bedrooms, new baths, a balcony, a family room, upstairs rooms, a patio, a playground for grandsons. Every inch showed his vision and bore the marks of his toil. It was a place to live in and, like an organism, a living place. But not anymore. 

My brother’s post Katrina possibilities are essentially different from our sister’s. She lost the accumulations of a lifetime—photos, books, mementos, heirlooms, clothes, everything. Her retirement is no longer surrounded by things but by memories of things. My brother’s plight is different. The city of New Orleans is in ruins; the aftershock caused ineffable misery and although the city may live again it will never be the same. My brother’s home, an essential part of his life, is likewise in ruins. His anti-Katrina life is gone and memories of it provide at best a flimsy basis for revival.  

Marvin Chachere 

San Pablo 

• 

PROP. 73 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

In California, small-minded men, Republicans and anti-abortionists, have commandeered the initiative process to bring us Prop. 73. In a farcical exploitation, a minority of religious extremists are trying to force parental notification and their viewpoint on the majority of Californians.  

Prop. 73 has nothing to do with parental notification but is part of an ongoing effort to roll back Roe v. Wade. Religion has bought the election in efforts to force their lopsided morality on women and teenagers. 

Vote no on Nov. 8 and send a message to religious zealots that abortion is none of their business, to remain in their churches, and stay out of a woman’s womb. The decision of abortion is up to a woman, her doctor, her family and her God, not church activists. 

Every law restricting women’s reproductive rights—whether in the form of parental notification, limiting the access to emergency contraception—is a step backward and harmful to women.  

Ron Lowe 

Nevada City 

• 

BHS REUNION 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

The Berkeley High School Class of 1975 is putting together a 30th class reunion. The BHS Class of ‘75 30th reunion will be held at the Doubletree-Berkeley Marina on Dec. 31. We have a great night planned so be sure to reserve a spot early. The reunion will begin at 7 p.m., dinner at 8 p.m. and then partying until 1 a.m. We will have dinner, dancing, drinks, and a few surprises! There will be a full-service, no host bar all evening and free champagne at midnight. If you would like to stay at the hotel, you may call them directly at (510) 548-7920, tell them you are with the BHS reunion and they will offer you a discounted rate.  

You may confirm your attendance by joining classmates.com (no charge to be a basic member) or e-mail Marcia (Edelstien) Cunha at mlc22@sbcglobal.net or Amanda (Fahle) Ellis at AMANDA757@aol.com. Please send us e-mail addresses of any alumni who may not be members of classmates.com. We are trying to locate as many class members as possible! 

Amanda Ellis 

Chico 

?

Bangkok, Thailand—You may have noticed that the neo-conservatives surrounding the Bush administration have quit crowing about the new “American Empire.” They’ve been in retreat ever since it became apparent that the Iraqi occupation was a catastrophe, a blunder so ghastly that even stalwart Republicans such as Henry Kissinger and Reagan-era National Security Agency director Lieutenant General William Odom called it “the greatest strategic disaster in United States history.” 

Of course, this wasn’t the only administration blunder, just the most notorious in a string that includes plunging the nation into deep debt, weakening our national security, ignoring the consequences of global climate change, and so on. Here in Asia, the Bush blunder that gets all the attention is what masquerades as China policy: the tactical ambivalence that on the one hand treats the People’s Republic as the new market frontier and on the other hand as the last bastion of the evil empire. 

Bangkok newspaper headlines are not about “Plamegate” or whether Bush’s Christian buddy, Harriet, will get to sit on the Supreme Court. There’s not even much reportage about Iraq—there are terrorists in the south of Thailand who are competing for attention. The big news here is the Bush administration’s feeble attempts to reign in the Chinese tiger. Treasury Secretary John Snow is in China attempting to get Beijing to make economic changes that will reduce the U.S. trade deficit; high on the administration’s wish list are revaluation of the yuan and opening China’s financial market to foreign banks. 

While he was lobbying, unsuccessfully, on these issues, Snow gave the Chinese some advice: they should quit saving as much and take on more debt. In other words, the Chinese should run their economy as we do ours: adopt the monetary policy “don’t worry, be happy.” 

The Beijing leaders thanked Snow and Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan for their visit, but gave no indication that they would follow their advice. Why should the Chinese rulers change their economic policies? Their society is prospering; mammoth skyscrapers and huge new cities are popping up across the country—they’re the world’s largest producer and consumer of steel and cement—and their 1.3 billion citizens are rapidly transforming from docile peasants into ferocious consumers. Asian observers of US-China relations, believing that in the global game of poker Beijing now holds all the cards, ask, “Why is the Bush administration so clueless about China?” 

The answer lies in the reality that George W. has no interest in actually governing America. Karl Rove calls the shots about American policy, strictly from a political perspective. As a result, the Bush administration has no strategic plan for China—they are shooting from the hip, day after day. The inherent danger in this lackadaisical attitude is that unless American develops a strategy to cope with China’s growth, we will wake up in a couple of decades and find that it’s Beijing that’s talking about empire, while Americans are forced to accept their new status as a has-been power. 

America should respond to China by, first, recognizing that we live in a world far different from that envisioned by the neo-conservatives, who are obsessed with cold-war symbols and strategies. China is not Russia. Beijing spends much less on defense than does the United States. However, it graduates significantly more engineers and scientists than America, is our largest creditor, and also does more of our manufacturing than we do. The Chinese are busy developing trading partnerships all across Asia, while the United States remains focused on building airfields and forging military alliances.  

America needs a strategic vision to guide it in the 21st century. We need a plan that recognizes that the United States is no longer in an arms race, but in a global economic competition; one where it’s not what you threaten, but what you produce that sways the other nations.  

While there are many aspects of such a strategy, one place to start would be retention of a strategic manufacturing capability. For example, we don’t need to retain a lot of semiconductor plants, but it makes sense to ensure that the most advanced products that Americans design are being built on semiconductor lines within the United States. Furthermore, we must revitalize our cities; if we let our communities decay, then we can expect the most valued segment of the modern work force—so-called knowledge workers—to opt to live elsewhere. They will move out of the U.S. to countries where there are healthy cities with affordable housing, good schools, reliable public transportation, and reasonably priced healthcare. 

The dream of American empire may be gone, but that doesn’t mean that the United States is finished as a world power or that we have to take a backseat to China or any other nation. However, recovering from neoconservative grandiosity does mean that we have the vision required for a new strategy for America. And that’s our problem: the Bush Administration is incapable of providing the leadership we need. 

Bob Burnett is a Berkeley writer and activist. He can be reached at bobburnett@comcast.net. This article also appeared in the Huffington Post.

To appreciate the possibilities of a legalized sideshow in Oakland, you have to put aside the preconceptions that have been built upon the five-year history of the illegal street sideshow movement. Instead, you must go back to the way things were before the Oakland Police Department chased the sideshows out of the parking lots and into the streets. 

In the 1990s and before, the sideshows were late-night outdoor gatherings of African-American young adults in East Oakland parking lots-first at Eastmont Mall, and later at Pac ‘n Save on Hegenberger, on the way to the airport. These young people were not interested in breaking the law or running from police or terrorizing the community-what they wanted was a safe space, in their own neighborhoods, where they could gather to show off their “tight” cars, play music, and socialize. 

The “showing off their cars” part sometimes involved doing “donuts” (an East Oakland car sport that goes back decades, long before the sideshows). But “donuts” were a relatively small part of the original sideshows, which were more leisurely, picnic-like events than the 15-minute street corner affairs we’ve come to know. More often the “showing off their cars” thing in the original, parking lot sideshows involved fixing up cars with special rims or wheels or paintjobs, stereos in the trunk, home theaters in the dashboard, two-toned shag carpeting on the seats and floors and ceiling, and the like-the kind of thing you see on the “Pimp Your Ride” show. These parking lot sideshows were traditional courtship rituals, what you find in every human culture and most animal societies, where the males try to outdo themselves in showing off their prowess and talents to appreciative young females. In the animal world, male peacocks display the largest, gaudiest, brightest tailfeathers. In the original, parking lot sideshows, young men vied for female attention by displaying the largest, gaudiest, brightest cars. It was a natural, normal, rite of passage and it bothered almost no-one, not the owners of the parking lots, nor the people in the neighborhoods where it took place. And they were a welcome antidote to the horrific violence taking place at the time on Oakland’s streets. 

Award-winning Oakland documentary filmmaker Yakpazua Zazaboi once described coming over from Daly City in 1993 and encountering the Eastmont Mall sideshows for the first time: “It was just black folks and cars everywhere. It filled up the whole lot, all down there by Taco Bell and where the old McDonald’s used to be. People was walking around just talking. Having fun. And the thing that made me fall in love with it was the fact that here we are in Oakland, but was from the other side of the bay that was supposedly feuding with Oakland at that time, but people weren’t tripping off any of that. They weren’t looking at us as if we were a threat. They was more like a welcoming thing, like, ‘Man, you see us, now get out the car and be with us.’” 

After Oakland police shut down the parking lot sideshows and pushed them into Oakland’s streets, setting up the wild, frantic, illegal affairs we so often see on newsclips, Zazaboi and some of his friends spent several years trying to win official support for a legal, sanctioned sideshow venue in the city of Oakland. Their idea was to hold a legalized sideshow in some enclosed arena where people would pay a small fee to enter, hip hop music would be played all over the area, food and beverages would be sold, and auto accessory vendors would pay a fee to operate booths. One entire location would be set aside for people to park novelty cars and show off their accessories. Another area would be a fenced-off arena, safe from spectators, where stunt drivers could do car tricks, among them the traditional “donuts” and other auto maneuvers that we see so much on the evening news. As Zazaboi described it several years ago, the events would be something like an “auto fair” or an “auto rodeo,” generating tax money for Oakland and promoting entrepreneurship among African-American Oakland youth who had been long marginalized by their native city. But attempts to hold those legalized sideshows were consistently blocked by top Oakland city officials. 

Zazaboi’s major fear, however, has not that the legalized sideshows would never take place in Oakland, but that the idea would be taken over by some outside promoter who would steal the idea, come into Oakland and reap all the profits, giving nothing back to either the community or the people who created the original venues 

Earlier this month, that’s exactly what happened. Not in Oakland, but nearby, at the Alameda County Fairgounds in Pleasanton. 

There, on a sunny Saturday afternoon, a Southern California-based group of promoters called Vision Entertainment held what they call both “Hot Import Daze” and “Hot Import Nights,” which is a legalized sideshow in everything but name. 

Who is Vision entertainment? I don’t know, but you can see their website yourself at www.hotimportdaze.com/. (be sure to turn down the volume when you do). A promotional paragraph on the website explains what they’re doing: “Now in its ninth year, Hot Import Nights (HIN) is positioned at the forefront of the sport compact car culture. Hot Import Nights is the leading lifestyle car show featuring hundreds of thousands of attendees, hundreds of the nations top show cars, hundreds of exhibitors, and the nation’s top DJ’s, artists, models and musicians. Consisting of more than 20 events throughout the United States, Hot Import Nights has taken the import scene to new heights, attracting record numbers in cities across the nation and setting a new standard for car shows.” 

At the Pleasanton event, the HID-HIN promoters blocked out areas across the Alameda County Fairgrounds yard where car owners competed in contests to show off their engines and accessories. Vendor booths were everywhere, presumably paying a fee to the promoters for the privilege of access to the hundreds of consumers passing by. In the outdoor arena that was temporarily renamed the “urban stage,” hip hop and break dancers and deejays also competed for prizes. On another stage, young women in bikinis strutted in what looked like a scene from a spring break video. In an area of the parking lot, concrete barriers had been erected in a circle, and a group of Japanese national (not Japanese American) stunt drivers were showing off maneuvers called “sliding,” many of them very similar-but far inferior-to the “siding” and the “donuts” that you see on East Oakland streets. 

From boom boxes all across the fairgrounds, the sounds of black hip hop entertainers blasted forth-Ludacris to Naz to Nelly. But these recorded artists comprised almost the entire black presence at the event. There were crowds of young white folks, Latinos, and Asian-Americans among the hundreds-perhaps thousands-I witnessed as I walked through the crowd (paying $20 a head to enter the fairgrounds gates), but only a small handful of African-Americans here and there. I don’t know how the “Hot Import Daze-Nights” Alameda County event was advertised. Unlike the days of the 1950’s segregation, no-one put up a sign saying “No Colored Allowed.” But modern marketing is compartmentalized, targeted to the nth degree by what events you leaflet and what radio stations you advertise on, and so either the Alameda County event organizers chose not to target African-Americans in Alameda County, or else the targeting was so bad that most young African-American car and hip hop enthusiasts chose not to attend. 

In any event, let us not dwell on the negative. Instead, let us focus on the fact that the Hot Import Daze-Nights promoters showed that a legalized sideshow is not only possible in the area, but can be highly successful. After this, what reason can Oakland city officials give for denying their promotion by Oakland entrepreneurs inside the city? 

We’ll wait. We’ll see. 

›

Already during 2005, millions of human beings trapped by natural disasters have been saved through the rapid response of United Nations agencies. U.N. workers have, often at great risk to themselves, physically delivered differing types of lifelines—food, medical supplies, and shelter—to victims of the tsunami in the Pacific, Hurricane Katrina and hurricane Rita here in the United States, and most recently, the devastating 7.6 earthquake in Pakistan. Were it not for the capability of the U.N. to carry out humanitarian efforts in any part of the world on a moment’s notice, the resulting loss of life and land might well have negatively impacted millions more. 

The media typically spotlight the more catchy U.N. news stories about bureaucratic inefficiencies and allegations of wrong-doing at the U.N. Fair enough: it seems you have to accept that when you’re an organization with little policing power taking orders from 191 member nations. The end result of emphasis on the U.N.’s weaknesses means little room for exposure of its strong accomplishments. 

Let’s be specific. When Hurricane Katrina struck, it took a couple of days for the U.S. to begin to send in help. The United Nations stepped up to the plate with an offer of help, which President Bush publicly accepted. And so it came about that the United States was, for the first time in its history, a recipient of aid from the United Nations, through two different U.N. agencies. 

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), headed by an extraordinarily capable Under-Secretary-General Jan Egeland (a UC Berkeley alum, incidentally), met with administration officials and arranged for the U.N.’s crisis teams to go to work. A day or so later, former U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Ann Veneman, currently serving as UNICEF’s Executive Director, publicly offered the US government UNICEF teaching kits for 300,000 U.S. schoolkids suddenly far from home and school. That educational lifeline provided a way for displaced schoolkids to keep up their education and also, incidentally, helped calm them as they engaged in familiar tasks. 

Came the Pakistan earthquake and Jan Egeland, coordinator of disaster relief efforts of several U.N. agencies (the High Commissioner for Refugees, UNICEF, the World Health Organization, and the World Food Programme) quickly flew into Pakistan and requested that President Musharraf lift all customs restrictions on incoming supplies, and provide three-month visas to aid workers. It was done. The work proceeds. 

The U.N. World Food Programme, one of the U.N.’s most efficient agencies, quickly supplied emergency foodstuffs to 37,000 people in Pakistan. The U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees speedily brought in 15,000 tents and 220,000 blankets—absolute necessities for sustaining life in that part of the world as winter begins. UNICEF is bringing in water treatment plants. The World Health Organization has deployed 11 surgical teams, and is providing essential medicines for 210,000 people for one month. All that was done. Quickly. Lives were saved. 

As impressive as those statistics are, no one can promise that sufficient amounts of aid will actually reach all those who need help in time. 

Something to reflect on—perhaps to act on—on this year’s 60th anniversary? 

Rita Maran is a lecturer on Human Rights at UC Berkeley and president of the United Nations Association-USA East Bay Chapter. The U.N.’s 60th anniversary is Oct. 24. 

I fully support UC’s removal of the clothing box at People’s Park. That the free box was an effective distribution system for used clothing for the poor is an illusion. After the ambitious entrepreneurs had taken the best clothes for resale, the rest were ruined, usually within hours, by rain, dirt, and careless handling. Thus the noble experiment became, ironically, a continuing demonstration of “Darwinian” capitalism and waste—two things supporters of the free box surely decry.  

I too am sorry the experiment didn’t work out, but it didn’t. And for the many nearby residents not directly benefiting from it, most of whom are themselves lower-income people already tolerating more than their share of litter, visual clutter, and social “vibrancy,” the box became the very definition of an “(un)attractive nuisance,” detracting further from their marginal urban environment.  

I like the concept of a free clothing exchange—or for that matter, the free exchange of all “previously owned” items in our over-consuming society; it would be very nice if this were possible. Flea markets and garage sales are the closest thing we have to this; then come the nonprofit thrift stores such as the Salvation Army and Goodwill. To administer these in an organized manner that serves both patrons and donors requires work and resources, so they are not free.  

I understand that even their low prices may be too high for some people. Unfortunately, however, there can be no benign “free” exchange of goods in the public sphere because any such activity, in order to remain effective and non-detrimental, requires substantial organization and policing; this takes money and/or the relentless volunteer services of capable, dedicated people. Except for the (inadequate) managing and cleanup of the free box site provided involuntarily by the taxpayers, that oversight was missing at People’s Park, with the result that the exchange benefited a few but was damaging to everyone else. 

If, however, some charitable person or organization wishes to provide such a service, and will accept legal responsibility for running the program properly and assuring that it is not detrimental to the community (I think some churches already provide similar services), I am sure some altruistic council member will be happy to volunteer a location in his or her district that is appropriate for a clothing exchange. I suggest that Southside not be considered again at this time, since Southside has provided this service for several decades now. It’s only fair to give some other neighborhood an opportunity to facilitate this excellent idea, once the bugs are worked out. Any volunteers? 

Sharon Hudson is a People’s Park neighbor.

People’s Park, a Berkeley landmark, has a tradition of free exchange. The tradition of sharing food, sharing music, trading clothing, giving away helpful information (and yes, sometimes love) without compensation is more than 35 years old. The freebox, one of the best examples of this tradition, is simply a box into which one puts old or simply unwanted items for the next person to use, and takes whatever interests them. 

The university has recently threatened a group of community gardeners and park supporters wishing to replace the traditional freebox. Reconstruction efforts are suddenly surrounded by police who videotape everyone’s every move, and tensions are high enough that community residents and city officials currently share a concern about keeping the peace. 

Before the situation becomes more heated, here is some information about the freebox tradition. 

“The freebox is for the poor.” Not true. The freebox is for everyone. As you drop something off, you might see a jacket that interests you just because of its pretty color. Try it on, enjoy it for a time, and put it back in the box when you’re done. 

“The freebox is for clothes.” How silly. The freebox is for books, dolls, toys, kitchen items, anything you don’t plan to use that you suddenly see is simply taking up space in your life. Let someone else enjoy it for awhile, and save yourself a trip to the recycling center. 

“It’s wrong to sell the freebox clothes.” This is silly, too. The freebox in People’s Park gets so many donations that the people who grab an armful of clothing to try to resell it for money (and good luck with that) are a blessing. If the next guy wants to make quilts out of clothing, that’s all right too, and no longer the business of the donor. Some people have deliberately donated signed T-shirts from celebrities hoping somebody noticed the signature and either had a really great day or made a bundle on EBay. 

“It’s wrong to take clothes for yourself.” Not true. The freebox is a great place to get inspiration for the Halloween costume of your dreams. 

“It’s wrong to take clothes for others.” Again, who makes this stuff up? When you see the purple wig you know would make your friend’s heart dance, just sitting there in the freebox, take it. 

“The clothes are just for wearing; for instance, you shouldn’t take the shoelaces out of the shoes.” This may be inconvenient for people who want the shoes with laces intact, but one local doll-maker used to do this and create fabulously inventive artwork. Quilts, artwork, it is all okay. 

“The freebox is a ‘park’ thing.” Not entirely. The park’s surrounding blocks often sprout cardboard freeboxes from time to time, and other more durable freeboxes exist in west, south, and north Berkeley. 

“The people who congregate around the freebox are selfish, aggressive crackheads.” You’ll hear this a lot, but if at times it’s true, it’s beside the point. Selfish, aggressive people get to use the freebox, and the park, and the streets, and the sidewalks. That’s life. But we’re not rolling up the streets because we don’t like some of the people walking by. The absence of the freebox for the last six months didn’t cure the world of selfishness or drug abuse, if that’s what the university thought would happen, so there’s no need to deprive the park of its  

traditions. The answer to selfishness might be more, rather than less, freeboxes. 

“The freebox needs to be cleaned up and supervised.” Maybe. If so, the park has never in its entire history had so many paid staff members and volunteers at the ready to do just that if they weren’t so busy tossing armloads of clean, useable clothing in the dumpsters and locking them down. But it would be a worthy experiment, alternatively, to allow interested community members to build, plant, play, and create in the park without the current constant threat of arrest or SLAPP-suit action, allowing the park’s natural community to reconvene and help out. Lots of people mess up the clothes, but lots of others fold them. It’s kind of like the sweater piles at the GAP stores, except nobody gets paid. 

“The university just hates the freebox.” Again, maybe. Maybe the university just hates the park, too. But maybe we’ve also come a long way as a community, and maybe we’re capable of working out our differences without arrests, lawsuits, and violence. Understanding the freebox as a tradition is a small, but worthy first step. 

Carol Denney is a musician and activist.›

Laura Menard’s letter in your Oct. 18 edition about the small claims law suit against Lenora Moore contains allegations and insinuations, which require a response, tedious as the task may be. 

Menard:  

While it is “absolutely true” that defendant Moore is relying heavily on outside counsel “that is not the case for the plaintiffs.”  

The Facts:  

The 15 plaintiffs are relying heavily on Neighborhood Solutions, an organization specializing in bringing mass small claims law suits against property owners. According to an article in the February 2003 edition of the MacArthur Metro that organization has a staff attorney, Kathleen Aberegg. The head of Neighborhood Solutions, Grace Neufeld testified in court that she sought legal advice in drafting a demand letter on behalf of the plaintiffs. Their response to a motion to dismiss by Ms. Moore cited legal authority. They’re not wanting for legal assistance. 

Menard:  

“Moore has given responsibility of her defense to attorney Osha Neumann and paralegal Leo Stegman, both employed by East Bay Community Law Center and organizers of CopWatch.” 

The Facts: 

I have not been “given responsibility” for her defense. Parties can not be represented by a lawyer in small claims court actions. The law permits a lawyer “to provide advice to a party.” I have done that. I have also put considerable energy into trying to open up a dialogue with the plaintiffs about a real "neighborhood solution” to the problems of drug activity—so far with no success. Leo Stegman, who is not a lawyer, is assisting Ms. Moore as the law allows when the court determines that a party cannot properly present his or her claim or defense and needs assistance. Ms. Menard’s reference to CopWatch is, of course, gratuitous. I have assisted Copwatch and support their work, but am not an “organizer” for them. Incidentally my work on this case has nothing to do with the East Bay Community Law Center. I am not on the staff of that organization. I have a contract with them to work for a limited number of hours supervising legal clinics serving homeless and low income members of our community. 

Menard: 

“ . . .desperate to place responsibility anywhere but where it belongs, Neumann suggests it is the fault of the district attorney for not prosecuting enough. . .  

The Facts: 

Sometimes responsibility for neighborhood problems “belongs” in more than one place. Plaintiffs allege that Ms. Moore has permitted members of her family to sell drugs in her neighborhood. They complain that her children and grandchildren come back to the neighborhood even after they have been arrested and convicted. I wondered why the district attorney did not impose a stay away order from the neighborhood as a condition of probation or parole. I was told the district attorney thought the defendants lived with Ms. Moore and couldn’t be barred from their home. They don’t live with her. The district attorney was mistaken.  

Menard:  

Neumann “complains that the neighbors are negligent for not calling the police.”  

The Facts:  

Under pressure of the lawsuit Ms. Moore took out restraining orders against seven of her own children and grandchildren. The plaintiffs argued the restraining orders were ineffective because Ms. Moore was reluctant to enforce them. What the plaintiffs didn’t seem to know is that they don’t have to wait for Ms. Moore to call the police. They can do so themselves if they observe a violation of the orders. I let them know this was the case in a letter and mentioned it in court.  

Menard: 

Neumann “devised a new defense, suggesting elder abuse, without giving any evidence.”  

The Facts:  

The restraining orders obtained by Ms. Moore are authorized under an act specifically designed to prevent elder and dependent adult abuse. By issuing the restraining orders the court found that she was an elder who had suffered such abuse. That’s not something I invented. She can not control the behavior of her children even though she may lose her home because of their behavior There are many victims in this case. This law suit will do nothing to help any of them. 

Osha Neumann is an attorney, artist and activist.›

I am a resident of South Berkeley. I have been assisting Lenora Moore in presenting her defense. In the Lenora Moore case I feel that the plaintiffs have displayed a sense of privilege and entitlement. Not only are they trying to get Ms. Moore to sell her family home through the small claims court process, but they have attacked anybody that is assisting Ms. Moore in defending herself.  

Reasonable minds can disagree about complex issues such as how we want to deal with crime, homelessness and people with mental health problems in our neighborhoods. There are 15 plaintiffs who have filed a lawsuit Ms. Moore. They have filed a plethora of legal documents with the assistance of Neighborhood Solutions Inc., yet they imply that Ms. Moore is not entitled to the same type of legal assistance that they have received. Under the law, she is entitled to have her day in court, and the small claims court commissioner has determined she is entitled to legal assistance. Ms. Moore is a taxpayer, a homeowner, a resident of Berkeley and a citizen. She should be afforded the same rights that all of her neighbors enjoy.  

As an African-American Berkeley progressive I feel that we should first talk to each other to find a solution to problems in the neighborhood. Litigation and law enforcement should be a last step, not the first one. The plaintiffs seem to want these proceedings to be no more that a formality. Their sense of entitlement is shocking. 

They fail to see Ms. Moore’s suffering. She is 75 years old, has a part-time job, is the caretaker of her disabled husband and legal guardian of her two grandsons. She has been an active member in her community. She has worked for and helped to start non-profits that provide services to the underserved and underprivileged South Berkeley community. She does not use or sell drugs, and nobody has accused her of this conduct. She has not benefited from any illegal activity. On the contrary, she has suffered seeing several of her family members with substance abuse problems, two of her sons in prison, and the violent death of a grandson. As a mother, grandmother and community member she has suffered witnessing drug sales and use in her community, and is well aware of how they adversely affect people.  

The plaintiffs attempt to paint her as the second coming of Ma Barker. This depiction could not be further from the truth. When we state facts on her behalf, they don’t dispute the facts. They demonize Ms Moore and the presenter of the facts. They imply that she should submit and surrender to their demands to sell her home. The small claims court is an adversarial forum that they have chosen, and they act as if Ms. Moore is committing a crime just by defending herself in this matter.  

I became involved in this case to assist Ms. Moore in setting the facts straight and having her day in Court. There are 15 plaintiffs against Ms. Moore that have substantially more means and human resources to present their case than she does. This is why members of the progressive community have decided to assist her in her defense. South Berkeley is a very diverse community. At Ms. Moore’s Oct. 13 court appearance every plaintiff except one appeared to me to be White. This group of plaintiffs by no means represents a racial cross section of South Berkeley. A rational person that understands gentrification cannot turn a blind eye to the racial make up of this group of plaintiffs and the race of the defendant, and we must see the plaintiffs’ demand for Ms. Moore to sell her longtime family home in this context. 

I don’t feel there is a judicial solution to Ms. Moore’s personal problems and the problems of the neighborhood. This lawsuit has a polarizing effect, and is not being pursued in a spirit of neighborliness. I have not seen any documents from any of the plaintiffs showing that they would accept any outcome of their conflict with her short of her selling her family home.  

Most of the time when you try to dictate a solution to others it tends not to be effective. I feel that the time, effort and energy put into this lawsuit would be better spent getting all the parties and relevant agencies together to find a common sense non-litigious solution.  

Leo Stegman is a Berkeley paralegal.ô

In his Oct. 4 Daily Planet commentary, “New Owners Did Not Fire Honda Workers,” Chris Regalia is technically correct. All that is required to follow his argument and absolve the new Berkeley Honda management of responsibility for the plight of the former Jim Doten workers and the continuing picket line and demonstrations is to enter the realm where angels dance on the heads of pins. 

On May 22, Jim Doten wrote a letter to all his employees, saying that he had the “unpleasant task of having to terminate all employees,” that they had the right to apply for the continuation of their jobs, and adding that he believed “you will find the new owners very pleasant to work with.” 

The Machinists’ Union, which represents most of the dealership’s workers, had made a modest request, that the new owners retain the workforce for 100 days on a trial basis and evaluate how they perform. It seems clear to me that if individual performance were really the issue, the offer would have been accepted. Instead, they were fired. That in a formal sense Jim Doten rather than Tim Beinke fired them misses the point completely. In order to consummate the sale, Doten did the dirty work for the new owners. This obviously was the arrangement. 

Indeed all employees were given very brief interviews. Of 26 union members, 15 were not rehired, and 11 were. Many of those who were retained decided to leave and strike for two reasons: out of solidarity with their longtime work-mates now without jobs, and because they believed they were training their $12-an-hour replacements, fresh from technical school. They felt that soon they risked being left out of work, with their union severely weakened or gone as well. 

Regalia implies that those who were not rehired were not “top performers” or “efficient.” What about the 31-year veteran Gold Level Honda-certified mechanic who just happened to be the shop steward of the union? Is that a mere coincidence?  

As for those wonderful 401-Ks that Beinke unilaterally substituted for the defined benefit pension plan Doten workers formerly had: There are some people--evidently Regalia is one--who might prefer a 401-K, where income rises and falls with the stock market. But many people, myself included, prefer a dependable, guaranteed amount. In any case, those offered work at the New Berkeley Honda weren’t given a choice. 

I spoke recently with one of those offered a job at $3-an-hour above his former wage. He was three years short of eligibility for a pension worth retiring on under the old plan, and he asked if they would be willing to put in writing that he could work long enough to qualify for the equivalent status in the new 401-k retirement package. He was told no, they couldn’t do that, and the subject was quickly changed. 

As for the “corporate citizenship,” “family” atmosphere and contributions to the community touted by Regalia and in Berkeley Honda’s recent half-page Planet ad, I reply that decency and fairness begin in one’ s own back yard. 

And I refer you to Raymond Barglow’s wonderful Daily Planet letter (Oct. 7): “Let’ s make that community an authentic one and give the fired workers our support”--regardless of who, technically, did the firing. 

Donna Mickleson is a Berkeley resident. 

a

Editors, Daily Planet: 

This fall the City Council will consider a ordinance restricting the Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC), so as to prevent landmarking cranks—as defined in the pages of the San Francisco Chronicle and East Bay Express, as well as by big-time builders and real estate speculators—from historifying more “ugly” buildings-also as defined by the above. As an erstwhile crank, I thought I might spill my story. 

Like taking that first drink, it all started innocently enough. In 2003 my wife Lise and I were notified that a local real estate developer had bought the two old Victorians next to ours on Sixth Street. He wanted to merge the lots and build four to six units; the plans showed boxy multiplexes that we thought further eroded an 1880s neighborhood. We met with him, got rebuffed, and decided to see if there were any rules about tearing down old houses. At that point we knew not the LPC from the lawn bowling commission. 

We hoped the Planning Department might counsel citizens about landmarking procedures, and could mediate the likely conflicts between neighbors and developers. The city planner assigned to our case asked why we didn’t like pretty new buildings. We replied that the neighborhood was from the 1880s, and was already being encroached upon by Walnut Creek-style condos. She replied: “I’m from Planning, I don’t know anything about history.” This adversarial omen was confirmed at our first LPC meeting; not only Planning but the city attorney and a portion of the LPC viewed us as impediments to “progress.” Later on from a Machiavellian viewpoint, we could say: “OK, Planning get hefty fees from the developers, whereas the neighbors just get in their way.”  

I had been an activist but on foreign policy and social justice issues. While we worked for progressive city candidates—including Tom Bates—we did this knowing little of the workings of city government. I knew there was a bureaucracy—I had bumped heads with them while at Berkeley Mental Health for 20 years, and later on with the Mental Health Board. But with a Berkeley-kind of hubris I assumed that our apparatchniks reflected liberal values. 

And I ignored an early land-use experience while on the steering committee of BCA (the organization of local progressives.) We had opposed a development at Rose and Shattuck, one that eliminated the only gas station and mechanic in the area, and was already a difficult intersection. To my surprise heavy arm-twisting came down from BCA-held city hall. I shrugged off the experience, joked that after all, Berkeley was not Chicago—real estate interests can’t have that much clout here.  

Lise and I went ahead with a petition to landmark a district of 11 houses on Sixth, Addison, and Fifth Streets. We went door-to-door collecting the necessary 50 signatures, met many neighbors for the first time, and began to realize just how remarkable was this collection of “working man” Victorians, literally from the horse and buggy days.  

A year or so later, after many LPC meetings, phone calls, e-mails, looking through archives at the Bancroft Library, BAHA, and even the Mormon Temple, this effort culminated on March 1, 2004, in the declaration of the Sisterna Tract Block 106 Historic District by the LPC. They had received a copiously illustrated 48-page report, now in the city history section of the Berkeley Public Library. I say this to other would be landmarkers, as it would have helped us to have seen such a document. It was composed by Lise, Sarah Satterlee, and 14 other volunteers, including an architect, a woodworker and an urban archaeologist.  

At the celebration party Lise said, (quoted in the Daily Planet on March 9, 2004): “Usually, when people think of Berkeley, they think in terms of the university, or Maybecks in the hills. But this district grew out of a fascination with the discovery of a rich, unexpected history, peopled with immigrants, often Spanish speaking—such as the Chilean Sisterna—driven from distant homelands by poverty, famine, and oppression. This was a record of a working class town that began before there was a gown (UC).” 

What she didn’t say at the party was that this was won over the dead body of City Planning, and that the LPC was hardly filled with historicizing zealots. We eked out a 5-4 vote by dint of persistent neighborhood turnout at long meetings. The commissioners seemed to lean over backwards accommodating real estate speculators and their retinue of lawyers and architects. The LPC proved timid in challenging the Planning Dept., despite its obvious bungles, such as chronic failure to notify neighbors of meetings.  

The tax revenue hungry city, pushed by the real estate/building lobby, touts the new ordinance as reining in a LPC run by typical Berkeley nuts—the kind the corporate media loves to portray. The real problem lies in the opposite direction. We had been astonished to learn later—not from Planning or the LPC—that other cities actually encourage historic and neighborhood preservation. Berkeley, despite the liberal image we all love, has yet to do so.  

e

The line of great jazz trumpeters, young men with a horn, begins with the legendary New Orleans cornetist Buddy Bolden. You can read a brilliantly fictionalized account of his life in Michael Ondaatje’s 1976 novel Coming Through Slaughter. 

Although Bolden never recorded and from 1907 until his death in 1931 was institutionalized in a mental hospital, those who heard him agreed that he had great volume, a talent for beautiful ornamentation and a profound feeling for playing the blues on the brass horn.  

Bolden’s proto-jazz playing influenced the next generation of players like King Oliver and Freddie Keppard, masters of the four-bar break. It was when Oliver wrote to young Louis Armstrong asking him to leave New Orleans to join his band in Chicago that jazz as we know it was born. 

Armstrong himself influenced tens of thousands of musicians directly (and millions indirectly), and among them were dozens of brilliant ‘30s swing trumpeters, veritable gods on earth, like Hot Lips Page, Cootie Williams, Red Allen, Buck Clayton, Jonah Jones, Bill Coleman, Harry Edison, Rex Stewart, Joe Thomas, Ray Nance, Benny Carter, Charlie Shavers, Doc Cheatham and especially Roy Eldridge. Although this list may seem obscure, in a sane world, streets would be named after these artists and their monikers would be more famous than those of presidents.  

Eldridge was the link between Armstrong and Dizzy Gillespie, between swing and bop. Dizzy even took Roy’s chair in the Cab Calloway orchestra. By the ‘40s, Diz was the leadi ng trumpeter in jazz, the trend setter, and the only alternative styles in bebop were those of Fats Navarro, more directly influenced by saxophonist Charlie Parker, and Miles Davis, who went to Lester Young, Billie Holiday and Thelonious Monk for his ins p iration.  

By 1950 Navarro was dead of tuberculosis compounded by his heroin addiction, but he had a successor in his young friend Clifford Brown. Dizzy Gillespie said that Clifford picked up from Fats all the things that he, Dizzy, was not doing with t he trumpet. Clifford Brown will be celebrating his 75th birthday on Oct. 30. That is, he would be celebrating it if he had not been tragically killed in a car crash in 1956 along with pianist Richie Powell, Bud’s younger brother, and Powell’s pregnant wif e Nancy, who was driving. 

Clifford had grown up in Wilmington, Delaware and by his late teens was driving to Philadelphia to play with Fats, Dizzy and Bird. Ominously, he lost a year in 1950 when he was hospitalized after a serious auto accident. He firs t recorded in 1952 and was soon included on sessions with the bop arranger Tadd Dameron and drummer Art Blakey.  

His greatest recordings were made during the last two years of his life as a member of drummer Max Roach’s quintet along with tenor saxophoni st Sonny Rollins and Powell. This was among the most important jazz combos of all time, the quintessential hard bop band. Here Powell was able to give free rein to his virtuosity, lyricism, gorgeous warm, sweet tone and fluent ideas. For a brief instant t he se giants flashed across the sky, spurring each other on to record perfect extended masterpieces like “Pent-up House,” “Valse Hot” and “I Remember April.” These performances were at once free flights of the imagination and seamlessly coherent creations. T heir emphasis on thematic improvisation changed the direction of jazz. 

Following the accident, Max Roach had a virtual nervous breakdown. The remaining members of the quintet went their separate ways. A special moment in jazz history was lost. After Clifford’s death, tenor saxophonist Benny Golson wrote the elegiac “I Remember Clifford” in memory of his late friend. It has since become a jazz standard. 

Now, in honor of the diamond anniversary of Clifford’s birth, Golson, a master composer, arranger and performer in his own right, comes to Yoshi’s along with trumpeters Arturo Sandoval, Randy Brecker, Jeremy Pelt and Valery Ponomarev and a rhythm section of the Mulgrew Miller Trio to pay homage to the man who had the most beautiful sound and most inve ntiv e ideas on the trumpet after Louis Armstrong. 

The tunes played will be either Clifford’s compositions or from his repertoire, along with pieces like Golson’s elegy that have become associated with Brown. You can also expect a good old-fashioned cutting c ontest to break out when these four top-rated trumpeters take the bandstand together. That would certainly make it a happy birthday for Clifford. 

Photograph: Tenor saxophonist Benny Golson wrote “I Remember Clifford” in memory of his late friend. 

Clifford Brown 75th Birthday Celebration will be celebrated at Yoshi’s, 510 Embarcadero West, Oakland, Tue., Oct. 25 through Sun., Oct. 30, with shows at 8 p.m. and 10 p.m. For more information call 238-9200. 

i?

The United Nations Day Peace Concert Committee and the Oakland East Bay Symphony will present “A Concert for Peace and Humanity” this Sunday at the Oakland Paramount Theatre. 

The 7 p.m. concert, celebrating the 60th anniversary of the founding of the United Nations and the centennial of the late Dag Hammerskjold, second U.N. Secretary-General who died in 1961 on a peace mission to the Congo, is a UNICEF benefit for Hurricane Katrina relief to children in the Gulf area. 

Following a flag procession of U.N. members, Musical Director Michael Morgan will conduct members of the Oakland East Bay Symphony in Aaron Copeland’s “Fanfare for the Common Man,” followed by “A Mass for Peace in the Third Millenium” by American composer John Vitz, with a Symphony and Chorus for Peace. David Morales, leading Cantare Con Vivo, will conduct Leonard Bernstein’s “Chichester Psalms,” and Swedish composer Hugo Alfven’s “Aftonen (This Evening).” 

New Music/pop ensemble Neo Camerata will play leader/viola player Mark Landson’s “Volkante Heroa (A Hero’s Journey).” The concert will conclude with a sing-a-long of “We Are The World,” led by vocalist Natasha Miller and the assembled concert artists, marking the 20th year of the Lionel Ritchie-Michael Jackson hit anthem. 

During the program, Swedish actress Caroline Langerfeld, who starred in TV’s “Nash Bridges” and as Queen Elizabeth in ACT’s Mary Stuart during her five years’ residence in the Bay Area, will read from Dag Hammerskjold’s journals, Markings, an international bestseller after its publication in 1963. 

Preceding the concert, at 6 p.m., Hon. Wiilhelm Wachtmeister, former Swedish ambassador to the United States, will present a lecture “Dag Hammerskjold—An Ambassador for Peace.” 

Wachtman was Hammerskjold’s assistant, who was originally scheduled to fly with Hammerskjold from Leopoldville in the Congo for talks with Moise Tshombe of separatist Katanga on the plane that crashed near the Katangan border, killing Hammerskjold and 15 others aboard. Wachtmeister’s lecture will be followed by Cantare Con Vivo in a selection of Swedish folksongs. 

Noel Cisneros of KRON-TV 4 will act as master of ceremonies. The honorary committee members for the event include Congresswoman Barbara Lee, Assemblywoman Loni Hancock, Oakland Mayor Jerry Brown and Berkeley Mayor Tom Bates. A benefit reception with the artists and dignitaries will follow the concert on the mezzanine of the theatre.  

Dag Hammerskjold, the second and most celebrated Secretary-General of the United Nations, is perhaps best remembered for his personal peace missions and negotiations, and for the unusual self-portrait that emerges from Markings, his “sort of White Book concerning my negotiations with myself—and with God,” personal journals meant for posthumous publication. 

Born in 1905, the youngest son of a prime minister of Sweden and scion of a family of government officials and military men, Hammerskjold is credited with coining the phrase “planned economy” while undersecretary to the Minister of Finance and head of the Bank of Sweden, during a time when he drafted, with his older brother Bo, undersecretary to the Minister of Social Welfare, legislation that led to Sweden’s ‘welfare state” in the late 1940s-early ‘50s. 

Hammerskjold also drew attention as international negotiator, participating in talks leading to the postwar economic reconstruction of Europe, the revised United States-Sweden Trade Agreement, the organization of the Marshall Plan, and Sweden’s declining of membership in NATO. 

Avoiding all party membership, even when attaining cabinet rank, Hammerskjold served with the Swedish Foreign Ministry and represented Sweden at the U.N. He was elected as Secretary-General in 1953 by a vote of 57 out of 60 and was re-elected in 1957. 

During his years as secretary-general, Hammerskjold established protocols for the Secretariat of 4000 that strengthened its independence from national interests. He personally negotiated the release of American soldiers captured during the Korean War, helped end the military actions of the Suez Crisis of 1956, commissioned the United Nations Emergency Force (the first mobilized by an international agency) with the idea of a U.N. “presence” in world trouble spots. 

Hammerskjold directed the establishment of a U.N. Observation Group in Lebanon in 1958, leading to the withdrawal of U.S. and U.K. troops sent there. His “preventive” diplomacy” took him to the Congo, responsible for U.N. peace-keeping forces, and to his death--of which he wrote in Markings, “Tomorrow we shall meet,/Death and I--/And he shall thrust his sword/into one who is wide awake.” 

For more information, see www.oebs.org. 

3

Berkeley Arts Festival will present playwright Wajahat Ali and poets Boadiba, Karla Brundage and Tennessee Reed in a reading by New Voices from the Before Columbus Foundation this Sunday at 4 p.m. at the Arts Festival Gallery, 2324 Shattuck Ave. in downtown Berkeley. Admission is free.  

Wajahat Ali, whose impressive first play, The Domestic Crusaders, premiered at Berkeley Rep, presented by Before Columbus Foundation, was born and raised in the Fremont area of Pakistani descent and describes himself as “neither a terrorist nor a saint.” The Domestic Crusaders, a family drama with humor, portrays three generations of a Pakistani-American family in the Bay Area in the wake of 9/11, celebrating a birthday and hearing family secrets revealed. 

Ali began writing the play in the fall of 2001 while a student of well-known writer and Before Columbus founder Ishmael Reed at UC-Berkeley. Reed has said of Ali: “I think he stands up there with the best playwrights in the tradition of ‘kitchen table drama.’” Ali, now a second-year law student at UC-Davis, is writing a prequel and sequel to his play to form a trilogy. Involved with making plays, sketches and films since childhood, Ali has also performed improv stand-up comedy. 

Boadiba, a poet from Haiti, has had her work published in Beatitude, Quilt, Ishmael Reed’s Konch, Tribes, Gas and Open Gate—as well as in An Anthology of Haitian Creole Poetry. Her new book, Under the Burning White Sky, will be published late this year by Ishmael Reed’s publishing company. 

Karla Brundage is a Berkeley native, whose poetry and essays have appeared in Bamboo Ridge, Konch, Hip, Mama, and Oahi Review. Her Multi America: Essays on Cultural Wars and Cultural Peace was published by Viking in 1997, and Adam of Ife: Black Women in Praise of Black Men by Lotus in 1992. She performed with Rhodessa Jones in The Medea Project at San Francisco’s Yerba Buena Center in 1994. 

Tennessee Reed was born in Oakland and teaches at Merritt College. She has read in England, The Netherlands, Germany and Japan. Her books of poetry include Circus in the Sky, Electric Chocolate, Airborne and Animals and Others. 

“I ran into Ishmael on the street,” said Bonnie Hughes of the Berkeley Poetry Festival, “and asked him what to do about poetry and young people; he came up with this program. He read on Inauguration Day, when we called people to the Downtown BART station, reading ‘Let America Be America Again.’” 

Hughes also talked about the Berkeley Arts Festival. 

“Every day’s a festival in Berkeley; there’s always something going on of somebody’s particular interest,” she said. “I wanted something that would go on longer than a day—for a month—with many different people, about the different things that makes Berkeley percolate. This way, every year, there’s a glimpse at what’s ongoing in the whole scene, and over time, you can see whole works develop—a whole evening of one person’s music, say, rather than just a little taste of it in a festival setting.” 

Hughes added, “Landlords let us use empty storefronts rent-free, and with a volunteer crew, all the money we take in can go to the performers, and we can keep prices low, $10 tops.” 

Hughes also mentioned other forthcoming events, like Saturday’s jazz concert with John Schott’s Dream Kitchen, Richard Hadlock, Suzy Thompson, Mal Sharpe and Ben Goldberg, and the S.F. Mime Troupe’s Ed Holmes and Amos Glick performing their “Dick ‘n Dubya Show (Republican Outreach Cabaret)” on Oct. 27, all at the Festival Gallery. 

›

FRIDAY, OCT. 21 

EXHIBITIONS 

“Art Heals” an exhbition of works by four artists on approaches to healing. Reception at 6 p.m. at the Main St. Initiative, 1101 MacDonald, Richmond. 236-4050. 

“China’s Culktural Revolution” with photographer Li Zhensheng, talk at 3 p.m., panel discussion at 6:30 p.m. at North Gate Hall, UC Campus. 

FILM 

Berkeley Art Center International Small Film Festival at 7:30 p.m. to Oct. 22 and Oct. 27-29 at Berkeley Art Center, 1275 Walnut St. Free. 644-6893.  

Doctor Atomic Goes Nuclear “Pandora’s Box” at 7 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. 642-0808.  

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Narendra Jadhav reads from his autobiography “Untouchables: My Family’s Triumphant Journey Out of the Caste System” at 12:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books on Fourth St. 559-9500. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Berkeley Arts Festival: “The Unsung Malvina” Judy Fjell and Nancy Schimmel sing newly-found songs by Malvina Reynolds at 7 p.m. at Redwood Gardens, Community Room, 2095 Derby St. www.berkeleyartsfestival.com 

Berkeley Music Centenary The history, people and feats of Berkeley’s Music Dept. at 4 p.m. at Hertz Hall, UC Campus. Free. 642-4864. http://music.berkeley.edu 

Marvin Sanders, flute and Lena Lubotsky, piano, at 8 p.m. at Giorgi Gallery, 2911 Claremont Ave. Cost is $10. 848-1228.  

Elaine Kreston, original compositions for early and contemporary instruments at 8 p.m. at the Hillside Club, 2286 Cedar St. Cost is $10-$15. 701-1787. 

California Bach Society, choral music, at 8 p.m. at St. Mark’s Episcopal, 2300 Bancroft Way. 415-262-0272 www.calbach.org  

The Tuva Trader “Tyva Kyzy” at 8 p.m. at Julia Morgan Center for the Arts. Tickets are $14-$16. 925-798-1300. www.juliamorgan.org  

Mariz, Portuguese fado, at 8 p.m. at Zellerbach Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $24-$46. 642-9988. www.calperfs.berkeley.edu 

La Familia Son! CD release party at 9 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Cost is $10, includes C.D. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

The Jazz Express at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $7. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

Grapefruit Ed, The Flux at 9:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $13. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Lua at 8 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave. 548-5198.  

Eric Anderson, Sonia, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $18.50-$19.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Helene Attia Quartet at 9 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810.  

Damond Moodie and Dave Lionelli at 7:30 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

Mad Happy, Rapatron, Lacoste at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $6. 841-2082. www.starryploughpub.com  

Hostile Takeover, Hit Me Back, CInder, Right On, at 8 p.m. at 924 Gilman St. Cost is $7. 525-9926. 

Jen Scaffidi, Rooftop Rodeo at 8:30 p.m. at Epic Arts, 1923 Ashby Ave. Cost is $5-$10.  

Mushroom, psychedelic funk, at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Dee Dee Bridgewater at 8 and 10 p.m., through Sun. at Yoshi’s at Jack London Square. Cost is $14-$24. 238-9200.  

SATURDAY, OCT. 22 

CHILDREN 

Los Amiguitos de La Peña with Gary Lapow at 10:30 a.m. at La Peña. Cost is $5. 849-2568.  

FILM 

Farewell: A Tribute to Elem Klimov and Larissa Shepitko at 7 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

William Byrant Logan honors “Oak: The Frame of a Civilization” at 4 p.m. at Cody’s Books on Fourth St. 559-9500. 

Paul Collins introduces his biography of Tom Paine “The Trouble With Tom” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com 

Ursula Steck reads from “The Next World” at 2 p.m. at Changemakers Books, 6536 Telegraph Ave. Oakland.  

Peggy Knickerbocker, author of “Simple Soirées, Seasonal Menus for Sensational Dinner Parties” at 1 p.m. at The Pasta Shop, 1786 4th St. 528-1786. 

Stevanne Auerbach author of “Smart Play-Smart Toys” at 1 p.m. at The Ark, 1812 4th St. 849-1930. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Berkeley Arts Festival: John Schott’s Dream Kitchen, where old-time jazz meets the avant-garde at 8 p.m. at 2324 Shattuck Ave. www.berkeleyartsfestival.com 

The Avenue Winds, woodwind quintet at 8 p.m. at Trinity Chapel, 2320 Dana St. Tickets are $8-$12. 549-3864. http:// 

trinitychamberconcerts.com 

Flauti Diversi “Bach to Bach” at 8 p.m. at St. David of Wales Church, 5641 Esmond Ave., Richmond. Tickets are $15-$18. 527-9840. 

Neopolitan Contemporary Dance “So Delicious” at 7:30 p.m. at Julia Morgan Center for the Arts. Tickets are $20-$25. 925-798-1300.  

Moment’s Notice Improvised music, dance and theater at 8 p.m. at Western Sky Studio, 2525 Eighth St. Cost is $8-$10. 415-831-5592. 

Gypsy Soul, acoustic rock at 8 p.m. at Unity Church, 2075 Eunice St. Tickets are $15. 528-8844. 

Company of Prophets, CD release party at 9 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Cost is $8-$10. 849-2568.  

Indiegrrl Tour concert with Irina Rivkin, Ter-ra, & Mare Wakefield at 8 p.m. at Rose Street House of Music, 1839 Rose St. 594-4000 ext. 687. 

Pickpocket Ensemble at 9:30 p.m. at Albatross, 1822 San Pablo Ave. Cost is $3. 843-2473. www.albatrosspub.com 

Yancie Taylor Quartet at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $7. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

John Jorgenson Quintet at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $21.50-$22.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Ken & The New Incredibles, alt rock, at 8 p.m. at Spuds Pizza, 3290 Adeline St. Cost is $7 per family. 558-0881. 

Ralph Alessi’s This Against That at 8 p.m. at the Jazzschool. Cost is $12-$18. 845-5373. www.jazzschool.com 

The Sidewinders, Harry Best & Shabang in a benefit for Ashkenaz at 9:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $13. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Stolen Bibles at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Audrey Shimkas Quartet at 9 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810.  

Sam Misner & Megan Smith and Lo Cura at 7:30 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

Brown Baggin’, Oaktown funk, at 9 p.m. at Shattuck Down Low, 2284 Shattuck Ave. Cost is $12. 548-1159.  

Halloween Ball with The Catholic Comb, Mr. Loveless at 9 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $6. 841-2082.  

Emily Lord at 8:30 p.m. at Epic Arts, 1923 Ashby Ave. Cost is $5-$10. www.epicarts.org 

Killing the Dream, Allegiance, More to Pride, The Answer at 8 p.m. at 924 Gilman St. Cost is $6. 525-9926. 

SUNDAY, OCT. 23 

EXHIBITIONS 

“Fermenting Berkeley” An exhibition on the production, sale, and social aspects of alcohol in Berkeley from the 1870s - 1970s. Reception from 3 to 5 p.m. at the Berkeley History Center, 1931 Center St.Exhibit runs to March 25. 848-0181. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/histsoc/  

“Taisho Chic: Japanese Modernity, Nostalgia and Deco”guided tour at 2 p.m. at the Berkeley Art Museum, 2625 Durant Ave. 642-0808.  

FILM 

Dutch Voices: Jos de Putter and Peter Delpeit “Diva Dolorosa” at 4 p.m. and “Tigre Reale” at 5:35 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

“The Forgotten Refugees” at 4 p.m. at the BRJCC, 1414 Walnut St. Cost is $5. 848-0237. 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Berkeley Arts Festival “New Voices From the Before Columbus Foundation” with Karla Brundage, Tennessee Reed, Boadiba and Wajahat Ali at 4 p.m. at Berkeley Arts Festival Gallery, 2324 Shattuck Ave. 655-9496. 

“When Summa Fell” A reading of the historical drama by Heikki Ylikangas at 2 p.m. at Finnish Kaleva Hall, 1970 Chestnut St. Coast is $5. 849-0125. 

Micah Garen and Marie-Hélene Carlton tell their story in “American Hostage: A Memoir of a Journalist Kidnapped in Iraq and the Remarkable Battle to Win His Release” at 7 p.m. at Cody’s Books on Fourth St. 559-9500. 

Geraldine Kim and Malia Jackson read from their poetry at 8 p.m. at Pegasus Books, 2349 Shattuck Ave. 649-1320. 

Poetry Flash with Aaron Shurin, Paul Hoover and Donald Revell at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. Donation $2. 845-7852. 

Laila Lalami on her story of Morocco, “Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits” at 7:30 p.m. at Black Oak Books. 486-0698.  

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Oakland East Bay Symphony United Nations Day of Peace Concert at 7 p.m. at the Paramount Theater, 2025 Broadway. Tickets are $20-$40. Proceeds benefit UNICEF’s Hurricane Katrina Relief Fund. 652-8497. www.oebs.org 

András Schiff, pianist, at 3 p.m. at Zellerbach Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $34-$58, available from 642-9988. www.calperfs.berkeley.edu 

Sequentia, medieval music, at 7 p.m. at Hertz Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $42, available from 642-9988. www.calperfs.berkeley.edu 

Neopolitan Contemporary Dance “So Delicious” at 7:30 p.m. at Julia Morgan Center for the Arts. Tickets are $20-$25. 925-798-1300. 

Upsurge Jazz and Poetry Celebration at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $10. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

Mitote Jazz with Arturo Cipriano, saxophone, at 7:30 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Cost is $12-$14. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

Quartet San Francisco at 4:30 p.m. at the Jazzschool. Cost is $20. 845-5373. www.jazz 

school.com 

Duck’s Breath Mystery Theater at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $20.50-$21.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Israeli Folk Dance at 2 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $7. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Ross Hammond, jazz, at 10 a.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344.  

Keren at 4 p.m. at Spuds Pizza, 3290 Adeline St. Cost is $7. 558-0881. 

Americana Unplugged: The Freelance Disciples at 5 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

MONDAY, OCT. 24 

EXHIBITIONS 

“Tinta Bella” color photographs by Jenna Zabin opens at the Photolab Gallery, 2235 Fifth St. and runs to Dec. 3. 644-1400. 

FILM 

“Panorama Ephemera” A 400-year journey through history and landscape, including scenes of the 1923 Berkeley fire, by Rick Prelinger at 7:30 p.m.at the Hillside Club, 2286 Cedar St. Cost is $5. 527-0450.  

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Shana Penn describes “Solidarity’s Secret: The Women Who Defeated Communism in Poland” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852.  

“Poetry Faceoff” featuring Nazelah Jamison and Selene Steese at 7 p.m., at Priya Restaurant, 2072 San Pablo Ave. berkeleypoetryexpress@yahoo.com 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Laura Love & Jo Miller, bluegrass, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $18.50-$19.50. 548-1761.  

Slammin All-Body Band at 8 p.m. at Yoshi’s at Jack London Square. Cost is $10. 238-9200.  

TUESDAY, OCT. 25 

EXHIBITIONS 

“Breaking the Silence: Israeli Soldiers Speak Out Against the Occupation” Photography exhibit and presentation at 12:45 p.m. at Boalt Hall, UC Campus and at 7:30 p.m. at Berkeley Friends’ Church, 1600 Sacramento at Cedar. Presented by American Friends Service Committee and Jewish Voice for Peace. 415-565-0201, ext. 26. 

FILM 

Experimental Works from Bay Area Schools at 7:30 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808.  

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Berkeley Arts Festival A reading of Arnie Passman’s play, “Soul Control; Control of Soul” by James King and Allen Taylor at 8 p.m. at 2324 Shattuck Ave. Cost is $5. www.berkeleyartsfestival.com 

Teed Rockwell reads from “Neither Brain Nor Ghost: A Nondualist Alternative to the Mind-Brain Identity Theory” at 5:30 p.m. at University Press Books, 2430 Bancroft Way. 548-0585. 

William T. Vollman reads at 5:30 p.m. at the Mills College Chapel, 5000 MacArthur Blvd., Oakland. Part of the Contemporary Writers Series. 430-2236. 

Tell on on Tuesdays Storytelling with Terri Varela, Ron Jones, Teresa Walsh, Blaed Spence at 7:30 p.m. at Julia Morgan Center for the Arts. Cost is $8-$12 sliding scale. www.juliamorgan.org 

For Young Readers: Brian Jacques introduces his 18th book in the Redwall series, “High Rhulain” at 7 p.m. at Cody’s Books on Fourth St. 559-9500. 

Peter Menzel and Faith D’Aluisio describe “Hungry Planet: What the World Eats” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com  

The Whole Note Poetry Series with Kirk Lumpkin and Dennis Fritzinger at 7 p.m. at The Beanery, 2925 College Ave., near Ashby. 549-9093. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Ellen Hoffmaan with Singers’ Open Mic at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. 841-JAZZ.  

Howard Barken Trio at 7 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave., at Dwight. 548-5198.  

Clifford Brown 75th Birthday Celebration Trumpet Summit with Arturo Sandoval, Benny Golson, Randy Brecker and many more at 8 and 10 p.m. at Yoshi’s at Jack London Square, through Sun. Cost is $18-$30. 238-9200. 

WEDNESDAY, OCT. 26 

THEATER 

Piccolo Teatro di Milano “Arlecchino” at 8 p.m. at Zellerbach Hall, UC Campus, through Oct. 30. Tickets are $65. 642-9988. www.calperfs.berkeley.edu 

FILM 

Berkeley Arts Festival: “The Debt of Dictators” a documentary on the World Bank at 8 p.m. at 2324 Shattuck Ave. www.berkeleyartsfestival.com 

Doctor Atomic Goes Nuclear “Fail Safe” at 7:30 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808.  

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Berkeley Writers at Work with Michael Pollan, Knight Professor of Journalism, at noon at the Morrison Library, 101 Doe Library, UC Campus. http://writing.berkeley. 

edu/bwaw/ 

Julia Scheeres reads from her memoir “Jesus Land” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852.  

Byron Nelitsos will read from “One World Democracy” 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. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Music for the Spirit with Ron McKean, organ, Music from the Underworld, in celebration of Halloween, at noon at First Presbyterian Church of Oakland, 2619 Broadway. 444-3555.  

Eric Cornforth, Axton Kincaid, Sonya Greta, acoustic music at 6 p.m. at Mama Buzz Cafe, 2318 Telegraph Ave., Oakland. 465-4073. 

Calvin Keys Trio at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. 841-JAZZ.  

Voice of Comoros, Nawal, at 9 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $12. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Inspect Her Gadget, Crystal and the Wolves at 9 p.m. at Bear’s Lair Brewpub, 2475 Bancroft Way, UC Campus.  

Orquestra Soroa, salsa music, at 9:30 p.m. at Shattuck Down Low. Cost is $5-$10. 548-1159.  

Helsinki Skylight at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

THURSDAY, OCT. 27 

EXHIBITIONS 

“Taisho Chic: Japanese Modernity, Nostalgia and Deco”guided tour at 12:15 and 5:30 p.m. at the Berkeley Art Museum, 2625 Durant Ave. 642-0808. 

FILM 

Berkeley Art Center International Small Film Festival at 7:30 p.m. to Oct. 29 at Berkeley Art Center, 1275 Walnut St. Free. 644-6893.  

Dutch Voices: Jos de Putter and Peter Delpeut “Lyrical Nitrate” at 7 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808.  

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Adam Gopnik describes Paris in his new book for all ages “The King in the Window” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852.  

Byron Nelitsos will read from “One World Democracy” at International House, 2299 Piedmont Ave. Cost is $3.  

Word Beat Reading Series with Ira Brightman and Buford Buntin at 7 p.m. at Mediterraneum Caffe, 2475 Telegraph Ave. 526-5985. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Singing for Palestine, a benefit for Asala, with Betsy Rose and Vocolot at 7:30 p.m. at Kehilla Social Hall, 1300 Grand Ave., Oakland. Donations are $15-$30. 559-9460. 

Peter Mulvey at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $17.50-$18.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Denise Perrier & Her International Trio at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $5. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

Randy Craig Trio at 7:30 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave., at Dwight. 548-5198.  

Salane and Friends at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $5. 841-2082 www.starryploughpub.com 

Cambio por Cambio, an evening of Cuban music, song and dance at 6:30 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Donation $10-$15, benefits three delegations to Cuba. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

Marcos Silva Duo at 8 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810.  

Beatdown Reunion at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

THEATER THIS WEEK 

Actors Ensemble of Berkeley ” Six Degrees of Separation” Fri. and Sat. at 8 p.m. at Live Oak Theater, 1301 Shattuck Ave. through Nov. 19. Tickets are $10. 649-5999. wwwaeofberkeley.org 

BareStage Productions “The House of Bernard Alba” Fri. and Sat. at 8 p.m., Sun. at 2 p.m. at 20 Cesar Chavez Student Center, UC Campus. Tickets are $6-$8. www.tickets.berkeley.edu 

Berkeley High “The Laramie Project” Sat. and Sun. at 8 p.m., also Oct. 28 and 29, at the Florence Shwimley Little Theater, Berkeley High Campus. Tickets are $12, $6 student. 332-1931.  

Berkeley Rep “Finn in the Underworld” at 8 p.m. at the Thrust Stage and runs to Nov. 6. Tickets are $43-$59. 647-2949. www.berkeleyrep.org 

Berkeley Rep, “Our Town” at 8 p.m., and runs through Oct. 23. Tickets are $45-$59. 647-2949. www.berkeleyrep.org 

California Shakespeare Theater, “The Tempest” at 8 p.m. at Bruns Amphitheater, 100 Gateway Blvd., between Berkeley and Orinda, through Oct. 23. Tickets are $10-$55. 548-9666. www.calshakes.org 

Central Works “Achilles & Patroklos” Thurs.-Sat. at 8 p.m., Sun. at 5 p.m. at The Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant Ave., through Nov. 20. Tickets are $9-$25. 558-1381.  

Contra Costa Civic Theater, “You Can’t Take it With You” Fri. and Sat. at 8 p.m., Sun. at 2 p.m. at Pomona Ave. at Moeser Lane, El Cerrito, through Oct. 22. 524-9132.  

“Jane Austen in Berkeley” a dance-drama spoof, Sat. and Sun. at 7:30 p.m. at the Bread Workshop Café, 1398 University. Free. 841-9441. 

Lunatique Fantastique “Executive Order 9066” Thurs. -Sat. at 7 p.m., through Oct. 21 at 2120 Allston Way. Tickets are $15-$22. 415-826-5750. 

Unconditional Theater’s “Political Dialogues” Sun. Oct. 23 at 7 p.m. at Epic Arts, 1923 Ashby Ave. Cost is $5-$10. www.epicarts.org 

Berkeley Arts Festival “Dick ‘n Dubya” Republican outreach cabaret Thurs. Oct. 27, at 8 p.m. at Berkeley Arts Festival Gallery 2324 Shattuck Ave. Cost is $10. 841-1898. 

Albany High School Theater Ensemble “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead” Thurs. Oct. 27 at 7 p.m., Fri. and Sat. at 8 p.m. at Albany High School Little Theater, 603 Key Route Blvd. 558-2500, ext. 2579. 

v

Just because the A’s aren’t playing in this year’s World Series doesn’t mean that there is no joy in Oakland this October. 

Just a few miles from the stadium where the Oakland Athletics came up short in their run for the division title this year, the Oak land Museum of California is presenting “Baseball as America,” a traveling exhibit from the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y. 

The exhibit tells the story of the intersection between baseball and American culture over the past 150 years, displayi ng 520 artifacts. This is the first time the museum has lent out memorabilia. 

The exhibit offers a welcome respite for fans tired of allegations of steroid use. The Bay Area played a large role in the scandal which dominated the sport this year, with the BALCO drug lab trial, leaked testimony by former Oakland Athletic Jason Giambi about his drug use, a tell-all book by his former teammate Jose Canseco, and endless speculation about the drug habits of San Francisco Giants slugger Barry Bonds. 

The first room of the Oakland Museum exhibit takes a more celebratory look at Bay Area baseball, filled with memorabilia from the Giants, the A’s and the Oaks, Oakland’s minor league team from 1903 to 1955. After the Oaks left for Vancouver, Oakland was without pro fessional baseball until 1968 when the A’s moved to town.  

Two related exhibits accompany the Hall of Fame show at the Oakland Museum. “The Latino Baseball Story: Photographs by Jose Luis Villegas,” features 60 photographs, many chronicling the early yea rs of former Athletics star shortstop Miguel Tejada. 

The other exhibit, “Oakland’s Coach: The Legacy of George Powles,” celebrates the famed McClymonds High School coach. Powles coached from 1947 to 1975, mentoring many players who became major league st ars, including Frank Robinson, Curt Flood, and Joe Morgan. 

Mark Mederios, acting executive director of the Oakland Museum, said the Bay Area has much to be proud of in its contributions to the game. He singled out Robinson, who became the first African-A merican manager in the major leagues, and Flood, who in 1969 fought a trade to another team, arguing that players shouldn’t be treated as property. His complaint made it to the U.S. Supreme Court in 1972, and although he lost, the case paved the way for t he advent of free agency in 1975. 

“Baseball fans and non-fans alike can both come in here and realize that the game is more than wins and losses,” Mederios said. “More than any other sport, baseball has mirrored American history. There have been wars and segregation. Ted Williams fought in the Korean War. After 9/11 there was healing for New York at Yankee Stadium.” 

Ted Spenser, curator of the traveling exhibition (Oakland is the ninth stop out of 10), said that to understand how meaningful baseball has been in American life, one need look no further than the oldest and newest artifacts in the exhibit, both of them baseballs. 

One of the balls was found by a firefighter in the rubble of the World Trade Center. The other is from the first game where admi ssion was charged. The 1858 game was a benefit for the New York City firefighters. 

“No matter where you go in American culture you find baseball,” Spenser said. “There is the good and the bad. The problems of American society have been reflected in baseb all.” 

He pointed to a portion of the exhibit displaying a home plate from a internment camp baseball field, an artifact he considers one of the most poignant displays in the exhibit. He said that American culture is as tied to the game today as it ever w as. In fact, he said, the recent controversies show just how passionate the public still is about the sport. 

“I don’t believe for a minute that a separation is taking place,” Spenser said. “Baseball is being held much more accountable that other sports h ave been because of the connection that exists, and that produces the backlash. The game has had a rough time, but it will heal.” 

Jane Forbes Clark, Hall of Fame board chair and granddaughter of Stephen C. Clark, who founded the Hall of Fame in 1937, sai d the exhibit was not an attempt to defend baseball against criticism that the game is too driven by money to protect its integrity or prosecute steroid use. 

“I don’t think there is anything defensive about it,” she said. “The more we looked at our colle ction the more obvious it became how many parallels baseball has to American culture. It relates to everyone’s lives. This exhibit reflects how people in America have always felt about baseball but it has never been articulated before.” 

Hall of Famers St eve Carelton, Orlando Cepeda, Juan Marichal, and Joe Morgan, all of who played with the Giants, were on hand for the opening of the Oakland exhibit last month. Morgan, who grew up in Oakland and played for Powles at McClymonds High, also played with the A’s. 

Now an announcer with ESPN, he said that he hoped the Oakland exhibit would help fill the many seldom-used diamonds around the Bay Area. 

“When you have the baseball history that we do in the Bay Area, maybe this will help bring players back to the f ields here to follow in the footsteps of these men and rejuvenate baseball in our cities,” Morgan said. “When I played as a kid I wanted to be like Frank Robinson.” 

But as Morgan hoped for a rebirth of interest in baseball, he said he also realized the s port is in a time of crisis. He said he was concerned that many records have been broken by players suspected of using steroids. 

“It’s too late to be concerned about records,” he said. “I am concerned, but we waited too long to care. It’s too late.” 

Mor gan said that he recently was talking to Willie Mays about the problem. Mays, a star of the Giants in New York and San Francisco in the 1950s and ‘60s and the godfather of Barry Bonds, said that once the current generation of players retire, the problem w ill disappear. 

“Like the ‘Deadball Era,’ maybe we’ll have to say that this is the ‘Steroid Era,’” Morgan said. “They will have to address it someway in Cooperstown in the future.” 

Contributed photo: Willie Mays was known to stop for a game of stickball with local youths on his way to and from the Polo Grounds for New York Giants games in the 1950s. 

The Oakland Museum of California, 1000 Oak St., is presenting Baseball a s America through Jan. 22. For more information call 238-2200, or see www.museumca.org. 

FRIDAY, OCT. 21 

City Commons Club Noon Luncheon with Phillip F. Elwood, “Jazz, Recordings and American Social History.” Luncheon at 11:45 a.m. for $13.50, speech at 12:30 p.m., at the Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant St. For information and reservations call 526-2925.  

Benefit for OXFAM Katrina Relief Fund with Cajun and Creole music, readings and refreshments at 7:30 p.m. at Berkeley Richmond Jewish Community Center, 1414 Walnut St. Donation $10 and up. Sponsored by Balck Oak Books. 486-0698. 

Country Faire with homemade crafts and food, from noon to 4 p.m. and Sat. from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. at First United Methodist Church, 201Martina St., Pt. Richmond. 964-9901. 

Conscientious Projector Film Series “Redemption” The life of Stanley “Tookie” WIlliams at 7 p.m. at Berkeley Fellowship, Cedar at Bonita. Suggested donation $10. 

“The EcoVIllage at Ithaca” with Liz Walker at 7 p.m. at the Ecology Center, 2530 San Pablo Ave. Cost is $5-$10 sliding scale. 548-2220, ext. 233. 

“China’s Cultural Revolution” with photographer Li Zhensheng, talk at 3 p.m., panel discussion at 6:30 p.m. at North Gate Hall, UC Campus. 

“Osama” A screening of the film followed by a discussion at 7:30 p.m. at Buttner Auditorium, College Prep School, 6100 Boradway, Oakland. Free. www.college-prep.org 

“Demystifying Activism One Breath at a Time” with Holly Near at 8 p.m. at Unitarian Universalist Church of Berkeley, One Lawson Rd. Suggested donation $20. 525-0302, 306. 

Battle of Trafalgar Victory Ball, sponsored by the Bay Area English Regency Society, at 8 p.m. at Arlington Community Church, 52 Arlington Ave., Kensington. Tickets are $15-20. 650-365-2913. 

French Conversation Night at 6:30 pm at the Alliance Francaise of Berkeley, 2004 Woolsey St. Potluck, bring a dish to share or a bottle of wine. 548-7481.  

Spirit Walking: Chi in Water Class Meets Fri. at noon at Berkeley YMCA, through Dec. 9. Cost is $21-$50. 665-3228. 

Berkeley Chess Club meets at 8 p.m. at the East Bay Chess Club, 1940 Virginia St. 845-1041. 

Women in Black Vigil noon to 1 p.m. at UC Berkeley, Bancroft at Telegraph. 548-6310. 

SATURDAY, OCT. 22 

Where Do All the Leaves Go? Learn about why leaves change color and fall, and other signs of autumn, for ages 7 and up, from 2 to 4 p.m. at Tilden Nature Center, Tilden Park. Cost is $5-$7, reservations required. 525-2233. 

Walking Tour of Oakland Chinatown Meet at 10 a.m. at the courtyard fountain in the Pacific Renaissance Plaza at 388 Ninth St. Tour lasts 90 minutes. Reservations can be made by calling 238-3234. www.oaklandnet.com/walkingtours 

Groceries from the Garden A hands-on after-school workshop for educators on how sustainable agriculture and locally grown food benefit the health of students and the environment. From 4 to 6 p.m. at UC Berkeley Richmond Field Station, 1327 South 46th St., Richmond. Cost is $20. Registration required. Sponsored by the Watershed Project. 665-3430. www.thewatershedproject.org 

Dolores Huerta Interviewed by Amy Goodman at 7:30 p.m. at First Congregational Church, 2501 Harrison St. at 27th, Oakland. Tickets are $15 in advance, $18 at the door, $50 for reserved seats and reception. Benefits Pace e Bene Nonviolence Service. 268-8765. www.paceebene.org 

Options for Youth in Times of War A counter-recruitment conference Sat. 9:30 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. and Sun. 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. at Valley Life Sciences Building, UC Campus. Free for youth under 25. Donation $10-$25. 268-9006. www.objector.org/moos-bay.html 

Haiti Action with attorneys representing Haitian political prisoners at 5:30 p.m. at Trinity United Methodist Church, 2362 Bancroft Way. Cost is $15-$30, includes dinner. RSVP to 548-4141. 

Sports 4 Kids Benefit Yard Sale from 8 a.m. to noon at Rosa Parks School, 920 Allston Way at 8th St . 

Alameda Public Affairs Forum with Peter Schrag, discussing “The California Special Election: What are the Issues?” at 7 p.m. at the Home of Truth Center, 1300 Grand Street, Alameda. www.alamedaforum.org 

NAACP Life Membership Banquet with Belva Davis and Byron Williams at the Elks Lodge in Alameda. Tickets are $50. 232-2171. 865-1151. 

Friends of the Richmond Public Library Booksale from 11 to 3 p.m. in the Community Room adjacent to the Main Library at 525 Civic Center Plaza, Richmond. 

The Misty Redwood Run A 10 K fun run to benefit the Bay Area Coalition for Headwaters. Starts at 8:30 a.m. at Redwood Regional Park, Redwood Gate entrance, 7867 Redwood Rd., Oakland. Cost is $20-$25. Register online at www.theschedule.com 548-3113.  

Brew at the Zoo a benefit for the Oakland Zoo with live music, animal feedings and behind-the-scenes tours from 6 to 9 p.m. at the Oakland Zoo. Tickets are $30. 632-9525.  

Origins of Halloween, Celtic and South American stories at 6 p.m. in Oakland. Cost is $7-$10. Call for location and to reserve a space, New Acropolis Cultural Association, 986-0317. 

Evergreens in the Garden with garden designer Aerin Moore at 10 a.m. at Magic Gardens, 729 Heinz Ave. 644-2351. 

East Bay Genealogical Society with Marston Watson, the direct descendant of sixteen patriots who served in the Revolutionary War, at 10 a.m. in the Library Conference Room of the Family History Center, 4766 Lincoln Ave., Oakland. 635-6692.  

Albany Berkeley Girls Softball League Clinic for grades 2-9 from 1 to 4 p.m. at Grove/ Russell Park. Please RSVP to clinics@abgsl.org 

Free Help with Computers at the El Cerrito Library to learn about email, searching the web, the library’s online databases, or basic word processing. Workshops held on Sat. a.m. at 6510 Stockton Ave., El Cerrito. Registration required. 526-7512.  

Spirit Walking Aqua Chi (TM) A gentle water exercise class at 10 a.m. at the Berkeley High Warm Pool. Cost is $3.50 per session. 526-0312. 

SUNDAY, OCT. 23 

United Nations 60th Anniversary Celebration from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. at Jack London Square, Oakland. Peace ceremonies at noon, multicultural dance and music and international foods. 849-1752. www.unausaeastbay.org 

Morning Bird Walk to welcome back the Northern Flicker, Kinglets and others, at 9:30 a.m. at Tilden Nature Area, Tilden Park. 525-2233. 

Solo Sierrans Sunrise Hike Meet at 6 a..m. at Inspiration Point in Tilden Park. We’ll start by moonlight, and watch the sun rise from Wildcat Peak and return before noon. Bring warm clothing and flashlight. Rain cancels. 601-1211. 

Halloween Animals Learn the facts and myths about owls and bats from 2 to 4:30 p.m. at Tilden Nature Area, Tilden Park. Cost is $6-$8, registration required. 525-2233. 

Berkeley Historical Society Walking Tour of the transformations around the Old Santa Fe Station, from 10 a.m. to noon. Cost is $8-$10. For information call 848-0181. www.cityofberkeley.info/histsoc 

Days of the Dead Family Festival with craft activities, music, dance, cermonia and mercado, from noon to 4 p.m. at the Oakland Museum of California, 10th and Oak Sts. 238-2200. www.museumca.org 

House Tour of the Homes of Haddon Hill from 1 to 5 p.m. A self-guided tour of nine beautiful homes and the Cleveland Cascade. Cost is $25-$35. For reservations call 763-9218. www.oaklandheritage.org  

Peace It Together A collaborative art festival for healing and peacemaking from 1 to 5 p.m. at Charlie Dorr Park on Acton St. between Bancroft and Allston.  

Free Sailboat Rides between 1 and 4 p.m. at the Cal Sailing Club in the Berkeley Marina. Bring warm waterproof clothes. www.cal-sailing.org 

East Bay School for Girls Raffle and Auction from 2 to 4 p.m. at St. John’s Presbyterian CHurhc, 2727 College Ave. 849-9444. www.ebsg.org 

International Women’s Writing Group meets to discuss writing about ancestors at 3 p.m. at Cody’s Books on Fourth St. 559-9500. 

“In the Shadow of Gaza” a report-back with Wendy Kaufmyn who volunteered with the International Women’s Peace Service at 2 p.m. at Berkeley Public Library, Community Room, 2090 Kittredge St. 981-6100. 

Berkeley City Club free tours from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. at 2315 Durant Ave. 848-7800. 

Free Garden Tours at Regional Parks Botanic Garden in Tilden Park Sat. and Sun. at 2 p.m. Call to confirm. 841-8732. www.nativeplants.org 

MONDAY, OCT. 24 

Flu Shots for Berkeley Residents age 60 or over or “high-risk” from 9 a.m. to noon, and 1 to 2 p.m. at the North Berkeley Senior Center. 981-5300. 

Berkeley Reads Together Free copies of “House on Mango Street” by Sandra Cisneros in English and Spanish will be distributed at 2 p.m. at all Berkeley Public Library locations, while supplies last. 981-6100. 

“Watershed Consciousness” A conversation with Michael Rochette, at 5:30 p.m. at Berkeley Public Library, Kittredge at Shattuck. Sponsored by Friends of Strawberry Creek. 

Freedom From Tobacco Class from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. at the South Berkeley Senior Center. Free acupuncture option. 981-5330. 

Amazon Gathering: Healing Arts of the Rainforest at 7 p.m. at the Teleosis Institute, 1512B Fifth St. Donation $15. RSVP to 558-7285. 

AARP Driver Safety Certification Program from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m., also on Oct. 31, at Jewish Family & Children’s Services, 828 San Pablo Ave., Albany. To register, call 558-7800. 

“Contemporary Drug Therapy for Parkinson’s Patients” at 10:30 a.m. at Elephant Pharmacy, 1607 Shattuck Ave.  

Family Storytelling Night with Muriel Johnson telling African folk tales, at 6:30 p.m. at Bananas, 5232 Claremont Ave. Registration required. 658-7353. www.bananasinc.org 

Kensington Book Club meets at 7 p.m. at the Kensington Library, 61 Arlington Ave. 524-3043. 

TUESDAY, OCT. 25 

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. Meets at 10 a.m. at Tilden Nature Area. For information and to register call 525-2233.  

Celebrate Halloween with Bats with Maggie Hooper of the Bat Conservation Fund at 6:30 p.m. at the Kensington Library, 61 Arlington Ave. 524-3043. 

“Einstein the Peacenik” with Dr. Lawrence Badash, Professor Emeritus, History of Science, UC Santa Barbara, at 7 p.m. at the Florence Schwimley Little Theater, Berkeley High School. Free, all welcome. 

Berkeley High School Site Council meets at 4:30 p.m. in Conference Room B in the Admin. Building. On the agenda are Intervention updates (including 10th grade counseling), a discussion of the IB process and timeline and subcommittee sign ups. 525-0124. 

Exploring Argentina, a slide presentation with Wayne Bernhardson at 7 p.m. at REI, 1338 San Pablo Ave. 527-4140. 

Flu Shots for Berkeley Residents age 60 or over or “high-risk” from 10 a.m. to noon at St. John’s Presbyterian Church, 2727 College Ave. For information call 981-5300. 

“Living with Threes and Fours” with Meg Zweiback, nurse practitioner, at 7 p.m. at Bananas, 5232 Claremont Ave. Registration required. 658-7353. www.bananasinc.org 

“Land Resititution in South Africa” at 4 p.m. in 652 Barrows Hall, UC Campus. 642-8338. 

Tuesday Tilden Walkers Join a few slowpoke seniors at 9:30 a.m. in the parking lot near the Little Farm for an hour or two walk. 215-7672, 524-9992. 

Sing-A-Long from 1 to 2 p.m. at the Albany Senior Center, 846 Masonic Ave. 524-9122. 

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. corner of Eunice. All welcome, no charge. 527-2177.  

Berkeley Camera Club meets at 7:30 p.m., at the Northbrae Community Church, 941 The Alameda. 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. 845-6830. 

WEDNESDAY, OCT. 26 

Flu Shots for Berkeley Residents age 60 or over or “high-risk” from 12:30 to 2:30 p.m. at the South Berkeley Senior Center. 981-5300. 

Berkeley Community Fund Awards Dinner at 5:30 p.m. at H’s Lordships, Berkeley Marina. Tickets are $50. 525-5272. www.berkfund.org  

November Election Propostion Review with Phil Hayes of SEIU on Props 73-78 and TURN on Prop 80 at 1:30 p.m. at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Sponsored by the Berkeley Gray Panthers. 548-9696.  

Future of the Supreme Court with Bob Egelko, Legal Affairs Reporter for the San Francisco Chronicle, at 1 p.m. at the Albany Senior Center, 846 Masonic. 524-9122. 

“Lessons of Katrina” Panel discussion of New California Media’s Multilingual Poll at 4:30 p.m. at 109 Moses Hall, UC Campus. www.ncmonline.com 

“Exposing the Imposters: Public Deception & Animal Cruelty at Foster Farms” at 7 p.m. at 200 Wheeler, UC Campus. www.fosterfacts.net 

Smoke Detector Safety Day at Habitot, 2065 Kittredge St. 647-1111, ext. 16. 

Walking Tour of Jack London Waterfront Meet at 10 a.m. at the corner of Broadway and Embarcadero. Tour lasts 90 minutes. Reservations can be made by calling 238-3234. www.oaklandnet.com/walkingtours 

“Girl Trouble” A documentary about three local teenagers in the juvenile justice system at 7 p.m. at Ellen Driscoll Auditorium, Frank Havens Elementary School, 325 Highland Ave., Piedmont. Sponsored by Piedmont Diversity Committee, Piedmont League of Women Voters and DiversityWorks. 835-9227.  

Bayswater Book Club meets to discuss “The Lost Christianities” by Bart D. Ehrman at 6:30 p.m. at Barnes and Noble Coffee Shop, El Cerrito. 433-2911. 

The Berkeley Lawn Bowling Club provides free instruction every Wednesday at 10:30 a.m. at 2270 Action St. 841-2174.  

Walk Berkeley for Seniors meets every Wednesday at 9:30 a.m. at the Sea Breeze Market, just west of the I-80 overpass. 548-9840. 

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 

Sing your Way Home A free sing-a-long at 4:30 p.m. every Wed. at the Albany Library, 1247 Marin Ave. 526-3720. 

Prose Writer’s Workshop An ongoing group made up of friendly writers who are serious about our craft. All levels welcome. At 7 p.m. at BRJCC, 1414 Walnut St. 848-0237. georgeporter@earthlink.net 

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. 

Berkeley Peace Walk and Vigil at 6:30 p.m. followed by Peace Walk at 7 p.m. www.geo 

cities.com/vigil4peace/vigil 

THURSDAY, OCT. 27 

Flu Shots for Berkeley Residents age 60 or over or “high-risk” from 10 a.m. to noon at the West Berkeley Senior Center. 981-5300. 

Seymour Hersh on “The Chain of Command: The Road from 9/11 to Abu Ghraib” at 7:30 p.m. at MLK Student Union, UC Campus. www.savio.org  

“Natural Textiles and Weaving Cooperatives of Southeast Asia” with Rebecca Burgess at 7 p.m. at the Ecology Center, 2530 San Pablo Ave. 548-2220, ext. 233. 

Parent Voices Policy Debate on the ballot propositions for November at 7 p.m. at Bananas, 5232 Claremont Ave. Registration required. 658-7353. www.bananasinc.org 

Celebrate Hallowe’en at 5:30 p.m. at the Richmond Public Library, 325 Civic Center Plaza, Richmond. 620-6557. 

Easy Does It Disability Assitance Board meeting at 6:30 p.m. at North Berkeley Senior Center. All welcome. 845-5513. www.easyland.org 

Mars Lecture and Telescope Viewing at 7 p.m. at the Chabot Space and Science Center, 10000 Skyline Blvd., Oakland. Tickets are $8. 336-7300. www.chabotspace.org 

Democratic World Federalists with Byron Belistos at 7:30 p.m. at International House, 2299 Piedmont Ave. Cost is $5. 642-9460. 

Holiday Card Stamping Learn how to make greeting cards for the holidays at 10 a.m. at Albany Senior Center. 559-7225. 

World Affairs/Politics Group for people 60 years and older meets at 3:30 p.m. at the Albany Senior Center, 846 Masonic Ave. Cost is $2.50. 524-9122. 

World of Plants Tours Thurs., Sat. and Sun. at 1:30 p.m. at the UC Botanical Garden, 200 Centennial Drive. Cost is $5. 643-2755. http://botanicalgarden.berkeley.edu 

CITY MEETINGS 

Parks and Recreation Commission meets Mon., Oct. 24, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Virginia Aiello, 981-5158. 

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

Citizens Budget Review Commission meets Wed., Oct. 26, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. 981-7041.  

Civic Arts Commission meets Wed., Oct. 26, at 6:30 p.m. at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Mary Ann Merker, 981-7533.  

Disaster Council meets Wed., Oct. 26, at 7 p.m., at the Emergency Operations Center, 997 Cedar St. 981-5502. 

Energy Commission meets Wed., Oct. 26, at 6:30 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Neal De Snoo, 981-5434. 

Planning Commission meets Wed., Oct. 26, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Janet Homrighausen, 981-7484.  

Police Review Commission meets Wed. Oct. 26, at 7:30 p.m. at the North Berkeley Senior Center. 981-4950. 

Commission on Early Childhood Education meets Tues. Oct. 27, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Angellique De Cloud, 981-5428. 

Zoning Adjustments Board meets Thurs., Oct. 27, at 7 p.m., in City Council Chambers. Mark Rhoades, 981-7410. ¶

Richmond residents opposed to a developer’s plan to build 1,000 residential units at Breuner Marsh are looking to the East Bay Regional Park District (EBRPD) to insist the land be preserved as open space. 

Senior park staff have recommended using eminent domain to force the sale of the 238-acre property and add it on to adjacent Point Pinole Park in order to preserve a wetlands habitat they say is critical for the health and survival of several endangered species. 

The park district board of directors is scheduled to decide whether to adopt the proposal at a Nov. 1 public meeting, which will be held at their offices in Oakland. 

“We feel it’s very positive, it’s what we wanted,” said Whitney Dotson, a resident of the nearby Parchester Village neighborhood who has been one of the staunchest supporters of preserving the marsh. “The parks department is stepping up to the plate.” 

The Richmond City Council has vowed to fight the park district’s proposal and has authorized staff to file a legal challenge if the district moves ahead with the plan. 

This is not the first time the site’s owners, Don Carr and Bay Area Wetlands LLC, have tried to develop at Breuner Marsh since they acquired the property in 2000. In 2001, they proposed a light industrial park at the site, but a similar coalition of community and environmental groups rallied to defeat the plan. The current plan calls for a mix of 1,050 residential units and retail development, as well as a transit station. The marsh is currently zoned partly as light industrial and partly as open space.  

Dotson and other opponents of developing the marsh came out to Point Pinole Park on Saturday for the second annual North Richmond Shoreline Festival, which was held to raise awareness of the development proposal and to promote opposition to it. The event, which featured a free BBQ and entertainment, drew more than 100 people. 

“We’ve got to get the community plugged in to what this represents,” said Dotson, who pointed out that in the late 1940s developers of Parchester Village agreed to leave the marsh as open space to be enjoyed by residents of the historic African-American community. Residents say they fear the increase in noise and traffic that would result if the development plans are realized, as well as the loss of the area’s aesthetic appeal.  

Environmentalists point to dwindling wetlands in the Bay Area, over 85 percent of which have been lost to either landfill or development, according to Arthur Feinstein, former executive director of the Golden Gate Audubon Society. 

The loss of Breuner Marsh, says Feinstein and others, would severely impact endangered species such as the salt marsh harvest mouse and the California clapper rail, a bird which once ranged from Monterey to Humboldt County, but is now only found in the San Francisco Bay Area. 

But not everyone in town sees it quite the same. 

Last month the Richmond City Council voted 5-3 to oppose the park district’s proposal for eminent domain as well as to authorize legal action to stop it. City leaders cited the potential loss of up to $4 million in annual revenues. Others argued that Richmond’s existing parks were already underutilized. 

At least one councilmember was critical of the park district’s failure to inform the city of its intentions, and said that lack of dialogue may have affected the council’s vote.  

“Had they contacted the city before we started hearing what their intentions were, things might have turned out differently,” said Councilmember John Marquez. “As two public entities we ought to have communication.” 

For their part, park district staff said they’ve offered a fair deal. According to Nancy Wenninger, the district’s land acquisitions manager, the site’s owners turned down an offer of $4.9 million for the land despite having paid $3 million in 2000—though that’s small change compared with the reported $50 million deal nearly negotiated in 2003 that would have sold the parcel to another residential developer, Signature Properties. 

While eminent domain has gotten a lot of attention following a recent Supreme Court decision, Wenninger was careful to distinguish that the park district’s use of it follows a long established provision under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) that allows the state to acquire land for the public good. The park district most recently used eminent domain in Hercules to construct a portion of the Bay Trail. 

“Eminent domain is our method of last resort. We much prefer to deal with a willing seller,” Wenninger said. “We’ve made an offer based on appraisals of a fair market value,” adding that the developer would have to spend a lot of money and effort to push development plans forward—including a change in zoning laws—without any guarantee of success.  

Wenninger said she expected a much bigger battle over eminent domain in Richmond, where the park district is already involved in litigation with the city over development of the Point Molate Casino. 

Despite the friction between the city and park district, some city officials applauded the park district’s initiative. 

“There’s too much effort on dollar signs and revenues, and not enough on giving the community what it wants and needs,” said Gayle McLaughlin, one of the three Richmond council members to vote on the side of the park district. “To allow development to deface this incredible area would really be a crime.”

The new Berkeley Bowl planned for the corner of Ninth Street and Heinz Avenue in West Berkeley “would not result in any significant and unavoidable impacts,” according to the conclusion of the massive draft environmental impact report (EIR) prepared by Christopher A. Joseph & Associates, a Petaluma consulting firm. 

The 90,970-square-foot project includes two buildings, a 83,900-square-foot market building and a 7,070-square-foot food services building. Both two-story buildings will be 40 feet high. Beneath the larger building will be a 99-space parking lot, with an additional 102-space surface lot. 

Before the project can be built, the City Council must amend the city’s General Plan and zoning ordinance designating a 1.9-acre portion as Avenue Commercial followed by an ordinance change to rezone the land as West Berkeley Commercial. 

The land that would house a proposed warehouse to serve both the new and the existing stores doesn’t require a change from its current Manufacturing-Light Industrial (MU-LI) zoning but would require an amendment to the zoning ordinance. 

The document singled out four primary areas of concern: air quality, hydrology and water quality, land use and planning and transportation/traffic. 

The report’s authors concluded that: 

• There won’t be any significant increase in toxic air contaminants when the new store is up and running, and dust and other potential impacts arising from construction can be reduced to insignificance by implementing a series of mitigation efforts. 

• Impacts on underground water quality, and runoff from the site can be resolved through control measures. 

• Project impacts related to conflicts with applicable land use plans, policies, and regulations would be insignificant. 

• The project is consistent with the goals of the city’s General and West Berkeley plans. 

• The developer should be responsible for installing a new traffic light at the intersection of San Pablo and Heinz avenues to reduce traffic impacts to an acceptable level for San Pablo Avenue. 

• The Ninth Street stop sign at Potter Street should be eliminated to reduce traffic queues, and left turns from Potter on to Ninth should be banned. 

• The project will cause a 2 to 3 percent increase in use of on- and off-ramps at the Ashby Avenue/I-580 interchange, a less-than-significant level, according to the report. 

• Delivery vehicles should arrive and depart before 11 a.m. to alleviate potential traffic problems. 

Alternatives 

EIRs must include alternatives to the project under consideration, and one proposal offered was relocation of the facility from West Berkeley to Emeryville. The report’s authors then rejected the site because owner Glen Yasuda doesn’t own it, the City of Berkeley has no jurisdiction over the site, site conditions haven’t been assessed and the relocation wouldn’t mesh with the project’s objectives. 

The report also considered reducing the scale of the project at the existing site but rejected that option because a smaller facility “would be a convenience store rather than a full service supermarket,” and thus inconsistent with the owner’s intent. 

Two other alternatives were analyzed, the first a 50,000-square-foot, single-story light industrial and manufacturing building. While the facility would generate less traffic than a supermarket, the EIR rejected the proposal because it hasn’t been proposed and because it’s unlikely given the current land prices and market demand in the area. 

Another alternative offered was a 150,000-square-foot office building, similarly rejected because it hasn’t been contemplated by the city or the owner. Both were also rejected because they didn’t meet the owner’s intent to provide a full-service grocery store. 

Comments 

The EIR also includes public comments received during preparations for both the EIR and the initial study which preceded it. 

Neil Mayer, the founding director of the city’s Office of Economic Development and later community development director, raised his objections in a Feb. 9 letter drafted in response to the initial study. Now a private consultant, Mayer was instrumental in the creation of the West Berkeley Plan. 

While the EIR declared the project consistent with the plan, providing the requisite plan and zoning changes were approved, Mayer disagreed, noting that the plan calls for maintaining the existing MU-LI areas and enforcement of “prohibitions against retail uses” in the MU-LI district. 

“Plainly, the goal of the plan is to avoid any losses of manufacturing,” he wrote. 

He also cited the General Plan’s Economic Development element, which calls on the city to “continue to implement the West Berkeley Plan, with its emphasis on strengthening the city’s manufacturing sector.” Most of the comments focused on the initial study, a less thorough document than the EIR. 

Writing of behalf of Zelda Bronstein, former Planning Commission chair and a Public Eye columnist for the Berkeley Daily Planet, Oakland attorney Stuart M. Flashman said the initial study failed “to take into account the light industrial areas. In particular, light industrial uses can be severely constrained by having adjoining, or even nearby, non-industrial areas.” 

Flashman wrote that the study also “fails to consider the potential cumulative impact of the proposed use change in conjunction with other rezonings that would likely follow.”  

Eugenie P. Thomson, a consulting civil and traffic engineer, wrote on behalf of several West Berkeley businesses, including Urban Ore, Ashby Lumber, Inkworks, Aerosol Dynamics and Meyer Sound. 

“The 90,00-plus-square-foot store on a parcel significantly smaller than most grocery stores at the corner of two minor streets could result in major parking overflow and traffic impacts onto the neighboring streets,” Thomson declared. 

She proposed two alternatives for consideration in the EIR, a store the same size as the 30,000-square-foot structure originally proposed by Yasuda for the site, and a store the same size as the 50,000-square-foot Pak N Save at 40th and San Pablo. 

She faulted the initial study for using 2003 statistics as the base for traffic condition studies—the same baseline used in the EIR—because the store won’t open until 2008 to 2010. The study also excluded the warehouse area from the store’s total area, which she said violated the standards of the Institute of Transportation Engineers. 

“The analysis produced no impacts association with this large project, which in fact would generate 6,000 to 8,000 cars per day in an area that already has significant traffic congestion and parking shortfalls,” Thomson wrote. 

Public review period 

Members of the public have until Nov. 21 to offer comments and suggestions for drafting the final EIR document. 

Comments should be addressed to Principal Planner Allan Gatzke, City of Berkeley, 2180 Milvia St., 1st floor, Berkeley 94704. 

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Is Peralta Community College District Trustee Marcie Hodge running for the 6th District Oakland City Council seat against incumbent Desley Brooks in next June’s election, and if so, whose idea was it? 

While Hodge says that she is not considering running—not yet, at least—many local political observers say that she is, and Brooks believes that she was recruited to do so by Brooks’ political enemy, Oakland City Council President Ignacio De La Fuente. 

De La Fuente denies that, and says that it was Hodge who approached him asking for support to run against Brooks. 

Both Brooks and Hodge are African-American women serving their first terms in elective office. Brooks defeated Oakland City Councilmember Moses Mayne in 2002, while Hodge won the open Peralta Area 2 seat last November over high school counselor Johnny Lorigo after Trustee Lynn Baranco chose not to run for re-election. 

While the Oakland City Council District 6 seat and the Peralta Trustee Area 2 seat are both in East Oakland, the boundaries of the trustee seat are mostly southeast of the council seat. A small portion of the two districts overlaps between Seminary and 73rd avenues. 

Asked last week if she was considering running against Brooks, as has been widely assumed, Hodge said “No. That’s not something I’m thinking about,” but added that “I might take a look at it at the beginning of next year.” 

But Brooks says that Hodge has been picked by De La Fuente to run for the Council seat, and that Hodge was not the Council President’s first choice. Brooks said that earlier this year, De La Fuente approached “several black women—maybe as many as 10—to run against me,” adding that De La Fuente turned to Hodge after the others turned him down. 

Brooks mentioned former Oakland City Clerk Ceda Floyd and Linda Handy, who serves with Hodge on the Peralta Trustee Board, as two of the women who had been approached by De La Fuente to run. 

Asked by telephone if he had approached anyone to run against Brooks, De La Fuente said. “That’s not true. Absolutely not. I have not approached anyone.” 

De La Fuente said that some months ago Hodge and her brother, former Oakland School Board member Jason Hodge, “approached me and said that she was interested in running.” 

De La Fuente said that he has also been approached recently for support by a male candidate considering running against Brooks, who he is going to meet with next week. He said he was not at liberty to release the name of the candidate. 

Handy, who lives in the City Council 6th District, said that she had “no comment” when asked about the De La Fuente overtures, and only said that “I am not running for the 6th District seat.” 

But another black political leader, who asked that she not be identified by name because “I still do some business with the city, and I don’t want to alienate anybody at City Hall,” confirmed that De La Fuente had approached her to recruit to run against Brooks. 

De La Fuente supported Brooks’ predecessor in the 6th District seat, Moses Mayne, both when Mayne was first elected to council and during Mayne’s unsuccessful run for re-election against Brooks in 2002. Brooks and De La Fuente have publicly clashed almost from the moment Brooks was sworn into her council seat. 

De La Fuente recently appointed Hodge to the City Council Budget Advisory Committee, a position that would give her visibility in city issues. Two local papers reported De La Fuente saying that he made the appointment at Hodge’s request, both of them linking the appointment with De La Fuente’s belief that Hodge was considering running against Brooks. 

And the Oakland Tribune reported that De La Fuente hosted a $1,000 a plate fund-raiser for Hodge in Oakland’s Fruitvale District last week. Hodge said she was using the proceeds of the fund-raiser to promote Peralta issues. She would not have to run for re-election to her Peralta Trustee seat until 2008. 

When Hodge was elected to the Peralta Trustee board in November, she was part of a board overhaul in which four of the seven trustees chose not to run for re-election. But while her three freshman board counterparts—Bill Withrow, Cy Gulassa, and Nicky Gonzalez Yuen—immediately became active and vocal members of the board, Hodge has been slower to have her impact felt. She does not serve on any of the board’s most powerful committees—Budget, Policy, or Technology—and until recent weeks, unlike Gulassa and Yuen especially, she largely remained silent during board deliberations. 

But last month, she received headlines in local newspapers when she called during a board meeting for the elimination of the Peralta District’s international studies department, charging that the department was wasting “millions of dollars.” The department recruits students to the four Peralta colleges from outside the country. 

In a later op-ed piece in the Oakland Tribune, Hodge called the international studies department a “rogue department,” writing that she has “asked Chancellor Elihu Harris why he has permitted staff from this department to spend so lavishly and travel the world while tuition for students continues to rise. My questions have not been answered, and the stonewalling on the part of the chancellor and his staff continues. After demanding an accounting of the expenditures of this rogue department several weeks ago, I was shocked by what I saw. The director of this department has, for years, been allowed to travel the globe and spend shamelessly. Receipts that I obtained show endless travel to such places as Singapore, England, South Africa and Beijing, along with stays in the finest hotels in the country.” 

Hodge said following a later board meeting that her criticism of the International Studies Department was part of her “fiscal responsibility to my constituents. It would be irresponsible for me not to raise these questions.” 

Harris and other board trustees—including Bill Withrow—quickly defended the International Studies Program, saying that because international students pay full tuition that goes directly to Peralta instead of being funneled through the state, the program generates funds for the district. And Handy was particularly critical of Hodge, saying that her charges against the International Studies Department were motivated by a desire to get publicity for Hodge’s run for the 6th District City Council seat. 

“Board members should be critical of what goes on in the district; that’s our job,” Handy said. “But I don’t think we should be tearing down the district for our own personal political purposes.” 

For her part, Brooks said she was not worried about a possible challenge from Hodge. 

“I’m not going to run my campaign based upon what an opponent is doing, I’m going to base it on what I’ve been doing for my district, and what I intend to do,” she said. “Hopefully, that will be sufficient.” 

Hodge is the second member of her family to show an interest in running for Oakland City Council after election to a school district board. In 2004, while still on the school board, her brother Jason briefly entered the race for the District 7 Oakland City Council seat after reports that incumbent Larry Reid was not running for re-election. Jason Hodge stopped campaigning when Reid announced that he was still running, but his name remained on the ballot. Reid easily won re-election to the District 7 City Council seat. 

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The Berkeley Public Library, already beset with labor-management problems, risked further alienating organized labor this month when it hired a non-union firm to do its janitorial work. 

Starting Oct. 1 the library replaced its unionized janitorial contractor, Universal Building Services of Richmond, with Oakland-based Nova Commercial Company. The Library Board unanimously approved a three-year, $500,000 contract with Nova last month without asking if the company hired union labor. 

“If I had known, I would have abstained,” said trustee Darryl Moore, adding that library staff should have addressed the union issue. “It’s disappointing. I thought that the city had some kind of preference system for union employers.” 

City Attorney Manuela Albuquerque told the Daily Planet that the U.S. Supreme Court has prohibited local governments from taking into account whether contractors use union labor. 

Universal’s three-year contract with the library expired at the end of September. 

The janitorial contract with Nova comes as library employees have feuded with Director Jackie Griffin over staff restructuring at the library and the implementation of a new system for checking out books. 

Librarian Andrea Segall e-mailed councilmembers Oct. 5 about the non-union contract. She warned that the janitors “may lose their health care, have wages slashed, or even lose their jobs.” 

Nova, however, might lose its contract with the library. Moore said Library Director Jackie Griffin e-mailed trustees that the library has been displeased with Nova’s work and might seek to terminate the contract based on poor performance. 

SEIU Local 1877, which represents janitors, staged a brief protest outside the library earlier this month, but has not returned telephone calls for this story. 

Library Trustee Ying Lee said she had been informed that the union had called off its picket. 

In the past, Berkeley had hired janitors in-house, but recently the city has contracted out some of the jobs to outside firms, all of which used union labor. Janitors employed by those firms make a base salary of $11 an hour plus health benefits through a regional contract established with Local 1877. 

The five janitors covered under the new library contract must earn at least $11.04 an hour with health benefits ($22,984 a year) or $12.84 an hour without health benefits to comply with Berkeley’s Living Wage Ordinance. 

Janitors who are city employees make a base of salary of $44,400 a year plus benefits. 

Nova did not respond to telephone calls for this story. 

Community Relations Librarian Alan Bern said that Nova did not enter the lowest bid, but outranked other bidders because it has a long history of working with libraries and offered strong references. 

Should the library terminate its contract with Nova, it would then be free to contract with the company offering the next highest ranking bid.  

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In a sign of increased scrutiny over district operations that began last January when four new board members were elected, the Peralta Community College District Board of Trustees has hired an inspector general to report directly to the board on district operations. 

The inspector general will expand the duties previously carried out by the district’s internal auditor’s position, which only had responsibility over fiscal matters. Peralta’s internal auditor’s position has been vacant for the past two years. 

Late last week, the board announced the hiring of Gail Waiters for the part-time position at an annual salary of $50,000. According to Peralta Information Officer Jeff Heyman, Waiters was formerly city manager of San Ramon. 

Heyman said he believed the addition of the inspector general position would “help the public keep confidence that the district is looking out for their interests.” 

Waiters will evaluate district operations through both scheduled and unscheduled on-site inspections, and has been given a broad mandate to look into educational, hiring, fiscal, and construction and building matters. Waiters is also expected to be the board’s initial contact for “whistleblower” employees who wish to report concerns about district operations. 

The new position was instigated by freshman trustee Bill Withrow of Alameda, but was eventually approved with general support from both new and veteran trustees. Waiters was hired on a 6-1 vote. 

Withrow, who is a retired naval officer, said inspector generals are common in the military (“Napoleon had one,” he said), and “a lot of corporations have started the practice, but Peralta’s inspector general is unique in California’s community college system. My goal is to have Peralta take the leadership in a lot of these areas.” 

He said that board members “often hear about issues or rumors or perceptions concerning the district, but up until now we’ve never had mechanisms in place to address these problems. The inspector general’s position will allow the district to conduct formal investigations quickly. If there is substance to the complaints, the board and the district can immediately address them. It will help us to cut a lot of the clutter out.” 

Withrow said that the inspector general, the general counsel, and the chancellor will all work in a partnership in reporting directly to the board of trustees, “with the chancellor, obviously, acting as the senior partner.” 

In explaining the purpose of the position, Peralta Trustee Cy Gulassa said following a board meeting earlier this month that the hiring of the inspector general was not a response to any particular problem at the district, but was designed to give trustees an independent look at district activities. 

“It’s part of our general responsibility to our constituents,” he said. “The IG’s reports will give us a better tool for evaluation and carrying out our jobs.” 

Trustee Linda Handy, the head of the board’s Technology Committee, said that Waiters’ first task will be to produce an evaluation of the Peralta’s ongoing district-wide conversion to PeopleSoft information management system. The finance, human resources, and payroll portions of that conversion were scheduled for implementation this summer, with the entire software scheduled for full implementation by October 2006. 

At the end of the summer, shortly after PeopleSoft’s payroll software was installed, Peralta’s payroll suffered significant problems, with some workers paid twice, some workers not paid at all, and some withholding funds not forwarded to outside agencies. 

While Peralta Chief Information Officer Andy DiGirolamo blamed the problems on Peralta staff error rather than software error, trustees said the errors had made them leery about the upcoming scheduled conversion to online student registration under the PeopleSoft software. Board members have sharply questioned DiGirolamo over the PeopleSoft implementation. 

Last June, Peralta trustees approved a $30,000 study and assessment of the community college district’s information technology operations by Hewlett-Packard. But HP officials declined to enter into the contract after they learned that trustees had included a provision that HP would not be able to later bid on any items that were touched on by the study, and that study is on hold. 

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In the past two weeks, several more Cal football players have given witness statements to investigators in the murder of Meleia Willis-Starbuck, according to John Burris, the attorney for co-defendant Christopher Hollis. 

Burris, who declined to specify the number of witnesses who have come forward in the past two weeks, credited press reports for pressuring the football team to cooperate with investigators. 

“They were not forthcoming at the outset. Now my sense is that they are coming forward,” Burris said. 

UC Berkeley Associate Vice Chancellor of Public Affairs George Strait said that the university has not changed its approach to the investigation and has been forthcoming from the start. 

According to police, Willis-Starbuck and several female friends got into an argument with a group of men outside Willis-Starbuck’s College Avenue apartment the night of July 17.  

During the argument, police say Willis-Starbuck called Hollis, 22, to come to her defense. Hollis arrived and from about half a block away fired several bullets into the crowd, striking Willis-Starbuck in the chest. 

Christopher Wilson, 20, who police say drove Hollis from the crime scene, has also been charged with murder. He is free on $500,000 bail. 

Burris maintains that Hollis intended to shoot above the heads of people crowding College Avenue in order to disperse them. He said additional testimony from football players was important to gauge the threat of physical violence Willis-Starbuck felt when, Burris said, she called Hollis and told him to “bring the heat.” 

Burris is maintaining that the killing does not constitute murder because Hollis was under the impression that Willis-Starbuck was in grave danger. 

Hollis, who was a fugitive until last month, will not seek bail, Burris said. 

Hollis and Wilson appeared in court together Friday. Judge Winfred Scott delayed setting a preliminary hearing date for both defendants until Nov. 17 to allow their defense attorneys more time to review new witness statements. According to Burris, Friday was the first time Hollis and Wilson had been in the same room since the night of the shooting.  

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To raise funds to renovate Berkeley’s first racially integrated church, the Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association (BAHA) has joined with the South Berkeley Community Church to hold a Wednesday night meeting that will explore the church’s history. 

Built in 1910 as Park Congregational Church, the 1802 Fairview St. structure was designed by Arts and Crafts architect Hugo W. Storch and was declared a city landmark in 1976. 

The gathering will kick off the church’s capital restoration campaign to raise the funds needed to restore the venerable building. 

Author Susan Dinkelspiel Cerny leads off the 7:30 program at the church with a talk on the historic character of South Berkeley. 

Members of the congregation will follow with their own stories. 

Perhaps the best known speaker will be former Berkeley City Councilmember and noted civil rights activist Maudelle Shirek, a charter member when the church was reorganized as an integrated congregation in 1943. 

Architectural historian Bradley Wiedmaier will talk about architect Storch and how the Arts and Crafts movement transformed the Mission style. 

A catered reception follows. 

BAHA’s John Beach Memorial Lecture Fund is sponsoring the event, and the suggested donation at the door is $15. Checks should be made out to the SBCC Capital Restoration Fund, and potential donors who don’t attend Wednesday can send checks to the church, 1802 Fairview St., Berkeley 94703.a

The article “Diversity Lacking in Council’s Commission Appointments” in the Oct. 14 issue mistakenly attributed to Councilmember Gordon Wozniak the quoted opinion that Bates’ appointment of only one African-American was “pretty sad, and pretty surprising. For years, the NAACP used to give [former mayor] Shirley Dean a hard time because she only had one African-American appointment. After that, to her credit, she appointed a number of African-Americans, at least as many as four. But now I see that Bates has the same number of African-American appointments as Dean had.” The quote should have been attributed to Councilmember Kriss Worthington.3

One of the country’s most famous anti-war activists is now one of Berkeley’s newest residents. 

Cindy Sheehan, who gained the world’s attention with her protest outside President George W. Bush’s ranch in Crawford, Texas, has moved into a Berkeley apartment following her separation from her husband. 

“I needed a place to stay, and some friends got me an apartment,” she said. 

Not that Berkeley will see much of the mother who lost her son Casey in the Iraq war in April 2004. 

“I spend most of my time traveling, and I’m home maybe seven to 10 days a month,” she said following a Friday press conference in the San Francisco office of Assemblymember Mark Leno. “I spend a lot of time in Southern California, and tomorrow I’ll be in New York City.” 

Sheehan said that when she told Republican Sen. George Allen of Virginia that she had moved to Berkeley, he laughed and said, “Well, of course you did.” 

Berkeley, she said, was a more congenial place for her than Vacaville, where she had lived with her husband prior to the separation 

Her San Francisco press conference was organized in support of a resolution by Berkeley Assemblymember Loni Hancock calling for the return of the state’s National Guard from overseas duty. 

Before the press event, Sheehan met with an aide to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who listened to her concerns and promised to present them to the state’s chief executive. 

Hancock’s Assembly Joint Resolution No. 36 calls on the Legislature to ask the state’s congressional delegation “to call on Congress to restore the balance between the federal government and the states vis-à-vis the National Guard, by limiting federal control to cases where there is an insurrection or a declaration of war...” 

The resolution also calls on the state legislature to ask Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger “to ensure that the president and Congress take immediate steps to withdraw California National Guard troops from Iraq.” 

Hancock’s aide, Armondo Viramontes, said the assemblymember will push the resolution as one of the Assembly’s first priorities when the Legislature opens for business in January. She has drawn 17 co-sponsors, numbering conservatives among their ranks. 

California currently has 5,800 National Guard troops on duty overseas, with 2,300 of them in Iraq, said Viramontes. 

“The National Guard and the reserves account for 50 percent of the casualties, but not 50 percent of the troops. They are not trained properly and they are not equipped properly. Their own government doesn’t support them,” Sheehan said. “I know families who have had to hold bake sales to raise money for body armor.” 

Sheehan said activists should organize on a state-by-state basis to hold the governors of each state responsible for the fate of the National Guard troops. 

Leno, Viramontes and Sheehan declared that California needs the National Guard at home to handle domestic emergencies. 

“What’s going to happen if we have an earthquake in California or fires? Who’s going to protect California?” Sheehan asked. Recent “national disasters we’ve had in this country prove that having our National Guard overseas has made our country more vulnerable.” 

“Immediately recall them,” Viramontes urged. “Right now. Not this week. Not next month. But right now.” 

Hancock was unable to attend because she was in Romania where her father, veteran New York Liberal Party activist Donald S. Harrington, had died last month. 

Sheehan offered bitter criticism of the Bush administration, which she described as arrogant. 

“They think that because they now control all three branches of government, they can do whatever they want,” she said. “They have imposed a virtual dictatorship for the past five years. It is very ironic that George Bush says he’s spreading freedom in Iraq when he’s destroying it here at home.”?

Berkeley Iceland will apparently remain open for business after city officials approved its proposal to quiet the rink’s temporary refrigeration system, which the city feared would disturb neighbors. 

The temporary system could be in place at the rink’s parking lot on the corner of Milvia and Ward streets as early as the end of the week, said Manuel Ramirez, the city’s environmental health manager. 

Iceland had delayed installing the system because it generated ambient noise readings of 83 decibels, compared with the 67 decibels generated by Iceland’s permanent system. The city’s ambient noise ordinance, passed after the 65-year-old rink started business, prohibits noise levels above 45 decibels. 

To reduce noise levels below 67 decibels as required by the city, Deborah Jue, sound engineer at the Oakland firm Wilson, Ihrig and Associates, proposed a sound blanket covering for the system. 

Jue said the covering, which would be mounted on a frame, would be made of insulated material with a density of one pound per square foot. 

“It’s not like a shower curtain,” she said. If the machine is still too noisy, Jue said, Iceland could also add soundproofing insulation around the exhaust fan. 

Assistant Fire Chief Gil Dong said that with the noise issue apparently resolved “everything appears to be a ‘go’ and is moving forward.” Last week, city safety officials had renewed threats to close the rink after Iceland told them that the temporary system would require a custom-made covering that could take up to four months to install. 

Earlier this year the city ordered Iceland to install the temporary system while the rink upgraded its permanent refrigeration system, which Dong said lacked safety devices and contained too much ammonia for firefighters to contain in a major leak. 

Dong said that once the temporary refrigeration system was installed and met city noise requirements, Iceland would pump out the 4,200 pounds of ammonia in its permanent system. Under an agreement with the city, Iceland can operate the temporary system until April 15 when upgrades to the permanent system must be completed. 

Lucretia Edwards, who might best be remembered as the mother of Richmond’s magnificent 3,000-plus acres of shoreline parks, died peacefully at her home on Oct. 12. She was 89 years old. 

Lucretia is survived by her daughter, Hannah Edwards, two sons, John Edwards and Barnaby Edwards and his wife Linda, and their son Sam Edwards. She was preceded in death by her late husband, Tom Edwards. Plans for a memorial service are still in the planning stage and will be announced later. 

After moving to Richmond with her husband Tom shortly after World War II, Lucretia became a legend of community activism. She credited her mother, a “perfect Quaker lady” from Philadelphia, with instilling in her a sense of equality and fairness, as well as civic-mindedness. 

Childhood summers spent at the New Jersey shore fostered in her a love of the water. It’s no surprise that she married a man who worked for Standard Oil, now called Chevron, as an oil tanker docking pilot. Fifty-seven years ago, they bought a house in Point Richmond with a panoramic view of the Bay. Lucretia raised three children in that house, and she lived there until the day she died.  

Lucretia, however, was much more than civic-minded. She had vision. From the day she arrived in Richmond in 1948, she knew it was “ridiculous” that Richmond’s 32 miles of shoreline offered only 67 feet of public access. “I was enraged by what I saw,” said Lucretia. “You hardly knew that the Bay was there.” Lucretia’s refined manner and soft voice belied the strength of her convictions. 

In addition to all her good ideas, she knew what she had to do to get the parks built, and her commitment never wavered. “I joined the League of Women Voters and started finding buddies who agreed with me. Then we just went to meeting after meeting talking about how badly the city needed waterfront parks.” She took federal, state, regional, and local officials—any officials who would listen—out to the bay front to see the possibilities first-hand. “We took them out one at a time, so we could divide and conquer. We did a lot of walking.” The women’s secret weapons were gourmet picnics and lots of cheap champagne, always served liberally as if at a world class resort on Richmond’s scenic beaches, islands and promontories. 

She became the leader of Richmond’s Contra Costa Shoreline Parks Committee, also known as “the little old ladies in tennis shoes,” who coined such slogans as “Tanks, but no tanks,” to suggest that at least some of Richmond’s beautiful waterfront should be used for something other than storing petroleum products. 

Creating the Miller-Knox Regional Shoreline Park was one of her proudest achievements. She lobbied heavily for the park, and just as plans were solidifying, the owner of a key parcel that included the park’s highest point, Nicholl Knob, decided to sell to a developer who planned high-rise apartment buildings. Lucretia wept at the news. Her husband, distraught at seeing Lucretia this way, cashed in his pension and bought the land for her as a surprise gift. The Edwards kept ownership of the land until the East Bay Regional Park District could buy it—at the same price the Edwards had paid for it several years earlier. 

Not stopping with what is now Miller-Knox, Lucretia and her friends also brought Point Pinole Regional Park into the East Bay Regional Parks District. Lucretia’s Shoreline Committee and others successfully placed East Brother Light Station, the Point Richmond Historic District and the Winehaven Historical District at Point Molate on the National Register of Historic Places. 

Of Winehaven, which she saw for the first time in the mid-1970s, Edwards once said, “I fell in love with the buildings. They are so astonishing, those great red-brick castles. They're so out of place, it just made me laugh!” 

In the 1980s, there was a move by the master developer of Marina Bay and the City of Richmond to shift some of the previously master-planned Marina Bay waterfront park sites to locations of less prominence and to replace them with housing and commercial development. Lucretia sued the city and settled only after the city committed to preserve the original park sites, one of which later became Lucretia Edwards Park (also part of the Rosie the Riveter World War II Home Front National Historical Park), dedicated in 2002,  

Shirley and I first met Lucretia shortly after moving to Richmond in 1973. She spotted me as a “live one” and made sure I was immediately so immersed in community affairs that I didn’t know what had hit me and was never able to extract myself. She took me under her wing, and in short order, I became president of the Point Richmond Neighborhood Council, a charter member of the Richmond Community Development Commission and, later, president of the Point Richmond Business Association. Lucretia served as treasurer of my campaign committee for all the years I ran for office. 

In 1978, Lucretia took me to East Brother Light Station, and I became hooked. Lucretia had found out from her husband, Tom, a tugboat captain for Chevron, that the lighthouse was slated for demolition. We subsequently formed a non-profit corporation, East Brother Light Station, Inc., www.ebls.org, and restored the lighthouse, still operating some 25 years later as a bed and breakfast inn in order to maintain the historic structures. Lucretia was a founding member and served on the board of directors of East Brother for many years. 

But Lucretia was more than a savior of shorelines and a historic preservationist. In 1989, she was recognized by Congressman George Miller in the Congressional Record for being chosen the Eleventh Assembly District's Woman of the Year by Assemblyman Bob Campbell. The California State Senate and Assembly honored her and 101 other distinguished women at special ceremonies sponsored by the Women Legislator's Caucus. Her involvement in civic affairs began in the 1950s as a member of the League of Women Voters. She was a leader in the establishment of Richmond's neighborhood councils and served on numerous city and county commissions and advisory boards, including the John T. Knox Freeway affirmative action committee and the citizens committee to approve plans for the San Pablo Wildcat Creek Flood Control Project. 

Lucretia also worked hard in the race riot years of the 1960s fighting racism in Richmond, where she was one of several founders of the North Richmond Neighborhood House. 

Her files on Richmond were also legendary. She could access reams of information on city activities going back decades, citing key municipal actions sometimes conveniently forgotten years later by most. She has authored numerous pieces on Richmond’s tumultuous but always fascinating history, including Port of Richmond 1901-1980, as a project of the Richmond Area League of Women Voters, and A Short History of How the Neighborhood Councils Started in the City Of Richmond, California. 

By far, Lucretia’s most enduring legacy is the inspiration she has left for the generations that follow her footsteps, providing an example of how just one tenacious individual can change a city forever and make it a better place for all. 

Tom Butt is a member of the Richmond City Council.

The City Council will take up soft story buildings tonight (Tuesday), an amendment to the city’s condominium conversion ordinance and a host of other measures ranging from approving the budgets of local Business Improvement Districts to a renewal of the city’s needle exchange program. 

Soft story buildings are structures especially vulnerable to earthquakes because of large openings for storefronts or parking. Most are wooden buildings, but some are built on a large concrete slab supported by quake-vulnerable concrete or concrete blocks. 

A visual city survey identified nearly 400 larger apartment buildings with soft story vulnerabilities which could render 95 percent of the structures with nearly 5,000 rental units uninhabitable in the event of a major temblor. 

A great shake would inflict loss of housing, injuries and death on many tenants and leave owners facing loss of income and massive repair costs. 

Loss of tax revenues would hit city coffers hard at the very time major repairs were needed in the local infrastructure. 

One major question still to be addressed, according to the staff report by City Planner Dan Marks, is the question of how owners can recoup their losses. Since at least 70 percent of the units are renting at or above current market rates and earning more than a fair return on investment, current ordinances would prevent passing the costs of retrofit on to tenants. 

As a first step toward implementing the retrofit program, Marks has recommended that the city adopt Chapter A4 of the International Existing Building Code, which “offers the most current and highly developed version of nationally recommended standards” for analysis and retrofit problem apartments. 

The code wouldn’t lead to immediate reoccupancy, but would prevent catastrophic collapse, Marks said. 

The ordinance up for adoption tonight paves the way for the retrofit program by: 

• Placing identified buildings on an “Inventory of Potentially Hazardous Buildings.” 

• Requiring owners of the structures to notify tenants and the public about the condition of their structures. 

• Giving owners a two-year window to submit an engineering report analyzing the buildings’ seismic adequacy. 

• Requiring the city building official to prepare guidelines and amendments to deal with soft story buildings with non-wood-framed ground stories.  

• Adopting the new building code chapter. 

Later legislation will deal with such issues as deadlines for retrofits, implementing an appeal process for owners who feel their structures were improperly listed and development of a fair and effective mitigation program. 

“Our only commitment has been to evaluate existing conditions,” said Marks. The next steps could include a decision to enforce the retrofits, “but only if that’s what the council decides.” 

The proposed amendments to the condo conversion ordinance would: 

• Eliminate limitations on the number of vacant units before conversion is allowed. Under the current ordinance, conversions are allowed only with vacancy rates of 25 percent or less. The revision would eliminate this restriction, which city Housing Director Stephen Barton says would “greatly reduce the competitive advantages of condominium conversion over TIC (tenancy in common) conversion. 

• Bar conversion to condominiums for 20 years after an owner used the Ellis Act to go out of the rental business and evict all tenants, and for 10 years if the evictions were used to make the units available for the owner to occupy. 

• Revise the city’s conversion ordinance, which allows conversion of 100 units annually based on the number of tenants who sign notices of intent to purchase to give double weight to tenants who have occupied a property for five or more years. 

• Exempt inclusionary units, which must continue to be affordable to current lower-income tenants. 

• Exempt conversion to condos of tenant-in-common units established before August 1992, from the 100-unit limit and exempt them from payment of housing mitigation fees required of other conversions. 

Additional amendments to the condo ordinance will follow from a Jan. 17, 2006, workshop with the city council and will address fees and other issues that need to be addressed before the existing 12.5 percent conversion fee expires on Jan. 31. 

Two items listed on the consent calendar may spark some controversy. 

The first is a joint resolution by Councilmembers Gordon Wozniak, Darryl Moore and Linda Maio asking that the city reaffirm two earlier votes calling for the demolition and removal of the UC Berkeley Bevatron and the building that houses it. 

The second proposal, drafted by Councilmember Dona Spring, calls on the city manager to write Library Director Jackie Griffin and the library’s board of trustees to: 

• List the actual and estimated costs of implementing the controversial RFID program;  

• Ask why the existing bar code checkout system isn’t being used instead. 

• Ask the trustees to seriously evaluate whether it’s in the best public interest to continue with the RFID program. 

The council meeting begins at 7 p.m. in the second floor chambers at the old City Hall building, 2134 Martin Luther King Jr. Way.C

There’s no police blotter today because Berkeley Police spokesperson Officer Joe Okies is on vacation through the end of October and his temporary replacement didn’t return calls by deadline Monday..

Summer dust, first rain trigger power outages 

Berkeley firefighters were kept jumping Saturday after the first rain of the season mixed with dusty power lines produced power outages in south Berkeley. 

Power to traffic lights and homes was disrupted by shorts and the occasional utility pole fire, said Deputy Fire Chief David P. Orth. 

Traffic lights were knocked out along a stretch of Ashby Avenue, and an outage that darkened lights along the Martin Luther King Jr. Way extension through the Oakland border wasn’t resolved until Sunday. 

“It’s a common phenomenon with the first rain acting on the buildup of dust on lines over the summer,” said Orth, who added that Pacific Gas & Electric washes down high tension lines to prevent even broader outages.

To view Justin DeFreitas’ latest editorial cartoon, please visit www.jfdefreitas.com To search for previous cartoons by date of publication, click on the Daily Planet Archive.

UC PARKING 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

On Tuesday Oct. 11, Becky O’Malley wrote about her frustration using the parking machine in the Recreational Sports Facility Garage prior to a performance at Zellerbach Hall. Certainly being in a line of 50 people approximately 30 minutes before an event is not optimal logistics. I was surprised by her comments about the parking technology located there. On a sign posted on the wall at the machine are the following instructions: 

General Public/Non-Permit Parking 

1) To pay with coins or bills, insert money. 

2) Press the green button to obtain ticket. 

3) Clearly display ticket on dashboard. 

There is only one green button on the parking machine. These machines have been in place since 1999, and have served the university well throughout that time notwithstanding the wear and tear they take. It is always an option for Cal Performances to hire an attendant to assist patrons with machines for their events, but that would be costly and they hope to save those costs if patrons arrive with enough time to deal with parking and other pre-event plans such as a meal. 

We truly regret Becky’s inconvenience, and want to make sure our visitors to the campus get the service they need. If she or anyone else needs any assistance or support with the use of campus parking facilities, they should feel free to contact UC Berkeley Parking & Transportation in advance of their visit at 643-7701. 

Nadesan Permaul 

Director of Transportation 

UC Berkeley 

• 

DEMEANING OURSELVES 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Writing rubbish about Elvis Presley stealing black music demeans your publication. Tat sort of nonsense insults your readers’ intelligence. Bing Crosby and Sinatra etc. sang so-called black music without some fool accusing them of stealing or not giving credit! Beethoven used an Irish Air for his magnificent Symphony No. 7! 

Maurice Colgan 

Swords, Ireland 

• 

RFID 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

During the public Forum on Aug. 1, sponsored by Berkeleyans Organized for Library Defense (BOLD) and the Library Trustees, Gordon Wozniak sat on the panel as the designated expert on radiation effects. 

Mr. Wozniak told us that certainly the ionizing radiation at the top of the wave-length spectrum is dangerous to human health. Cells are damaged by exposure to x-rays, for example. But he denied that human health could be affected by exposure to low-level radiation at the bottom of the spectrum, stating, as I remember, that no reputable studies have shown otherwise. 

During comments from the public, several speakers contradicted Mr. Wozniak’s opinion and referred to studies showing that long-term exposure to non-ionizing, low level radiation endangers human cell integrity. 

This is a disagreement that needs to be sorted out and clarified before library employees in particular are subjected to further exposure in their workplace. 

Corrine Goldstick 

• 

DERBY STREET FIELD 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Creating a baseball field at the Derby site not only provides much needed field space for BHS students during the school year, but also frees up space for over 7200 kids to visit the fields at San Pablo Park—and these are the kids in our city who are the most underserved as far as parks and recreation space. As long as BHS uses the San Pablo field (which is also one of the only remaining parks to have a community center), no other teams or organizations in that neighborhood can use the San Pablo fields after school. A baseball field at Derby will work well with the one-afternoon-a-week farmer’s market while meeting the daytime field needs of multiple teams in a central and accessible location. As a city that cares about ALL of our kids, we should close the single block of Derby and create a field that can help fulfill many, many dreams.  

Iris Starr  

• 

SHORT-SIGHTED 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

John Selawsky’s comments present a very short-sighted view of the proposed Derby Street field and the costs to build it the way it should be built. He is probably correct in assuming that the estimates are not exact, building anything these days generally costs more than expected. 

What he is not taking into account is the amount of support for the big new park that will come from the people of Berkeley. Without the School Board’s go-ahead, there has been no fundraising possible. Now that there is an initial stamp of approval, look for a majority of the community and businesses to show their support. 

I question why the Farmers’ Market is opposed to such an obvious improvement to their “storefront.” Is there a cost we are not aware of for them to drive up every week to a better facility that will increase their sales potential? Being moved to a different street a block or two away during construction could be problematic, but maybe development of their site could be done first and fenced off during construction. They are an important feature of our new park and should be well accounted for. 

BUSD will certainly have planners and designers on board who will address and solve the challenges of traffic, parking and emergency routes. This neighborhood is not only residential, it is mixed use with the UC Facilities Plant, Iceland, schools and business next to the park site. A large park will create a buffer and transition to the residential areas around the park. 

This project was designed and ready to be built over seven years ago. The “stalling” came from the other group. We are not looking for a “big league” field. We want the best park possible with a varsity field for our public high school student-athletes and the community to enjoy for generations to come.  

Bart Schultz 

• 

DRUG HOUSE 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

In his article, “South Berkeley Drug House Case Lands in Small Claims Court,” J. Douglas Allen-Taylor ignores important testimony and draws his analysis from his own perspective. He suggests that both the plaintiffs and the defendant are relying heavily on outside counsel. While this is absolutely true of defendant Moore, that is not the case for the plaintiffs. 

Moore has given responsibility of her defense to attorney Osha Neumann and paralegal Leo Stegman, both employed by East Bay Community Law Center and organizers of CopWatch. 

We the plaintiffs have only received procedural support from Neighborhood Solutions. Neighborhood associations familiar with the assistance of Neufield’s non-profit understand the immense work required by residents in preparing a nuisance lawsuit. Allen-Taylor simply ignored the testimony of Neufield as to her limited role when a community unites in response to a public nuisance. 

On the other hand, Moore’s cause has now entered the realm of “Berkeley political theater” with all the nonsense of disingenuous supporters protesting in the courtroom and canvassing the neighborhood with “cease and desist” flyers. 

As Moore’s advocate, Stegman clearly doesn’t know the neighborhood; he couldn’t correctly describe the infamous intersection. In court he described Lenora Moore as a hard working, employed grandmother keeping the family together, is that not the definition of a “matriarch”? 

In previous court filings, Osha Neumann was listed as a witness who would testify that the police are used as a tool for gentrification by targeting poor black residents. Typical CopWatch dogma. Now desperate to place responsibility anywhere but where it belongs, Neumann suggests it is the fault of the district attorney for not prosecuting enough. Further he complains that the neighbors are negligent for not calling the police every time one of the supposedly restrained family members is in the area. Called as a witness, Neumann performs as a lawyer. He offered no witness’ testimony instead he devised a new defense, suggesting elder abuse, without giving any evidence. Why didn’t their two other witnesses testify to elder abuse? Why at the previous hearing did Lenora explain how proud she is of her family and how they all like to be together? Why is there no record of elder abuse? Allen-Taylor does not include the police testimony quoting Moore saying she does not want the restraining orders enforced, that she obtained them just to satisfy the neighbors. 

It was ironic to hear a CopWatch organizer argue that the police need to harass south Berkeley residents more. Will CopWatch start advocating for effective law enforcement of drug trafficking as opposed to wasting taxpayer money in trumped up complaints against the police? 

Laura Menard 

• 

CRYING RACISM 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

It is abhorrent to me how frequently in Berkeley people call out racism to block the actions of other people who are working to make our community a safer, cleaner, more beautiful and hence, better place to live. To love and appreciate the diversity of our neighborhoods is not at all at odds with wanting to control drug dealing, with its toxic pollution and violence. I laud Paul Rauber and his neighbors for their attempt to clean up their street. 

Teddi Baggins 

• 

“GENTRIFICATION TOOL” 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I am responding to your Oct. 11 article, “Residents Look to Neighborhood Solutions for Help.” 

As a nine-year resident of the Oregon Street neighborhood, I am very familiar with the goings on at 1610 Oregon St., home to Lenora Moore, the lead defendant in one of the cases referred to in this article (I live a block and a half away). Much evidence exists, both anecdotal and legal (documented police raids and subsequent court cases), that supports the idea that many of the goings on at the Moore place of residence are downright dangerous and constitute a threat to the safety of residents and a public nuisance to our neighborhood. 

I take issue with Mr. Stegman’s quote that implies that this lawsuit (referred to in the article), is being used as a gentrification tool. Residents of my neighborhood have been trying to end the dangerous and unlawful activities that occur in this neighborhood because we live here. Many of us are raising families here. Lots of children live here—lots of elderly folks, people of all colors, and ethnicities, and persuasions. In fact, this is one of the most racially and economically integrated neighborhoods in this city. And many of us who live here want to keep it that way. What we don’t want, is to feel blind and impotent in the face of threatening, violent actions by a couple of our neighbors. 

This is the second lawsuit being leveled against the residents of 1610 Oregon St. The first lawsuit was “won” by the neighbors, I believe, but the drug dealing and dangerous behaviors have continued. Many of us, here, are exhausted and disheartened by knowing that crack cocaine and heroin and guns are available on our street.  

Even though my family did not join this current lawsuit as a plaintiff, we support our other neighbors who did. We did not sign on for a variety of reasons, many of them practical in nature, but a notable reason that we did not agree to being a plaintiff in this lawsuit against the residents of 1610 Oregon St., was fear. For the lead plaintiffs in the first lawsuit, whom we knew, had their fence firebombed. They have since left Berkeley. 

I want to thank my neighbors who were not too afraid to speak up about the ugliness of this kind of activity. I want beauty for all of us here in Berkeley. None of us should have to live in fear. 

Diana Rossi 

• 

HOUSING ELEMENT 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I was glad to see that the “Housing Element,” written under the guidance of the Planning Commission, has reached the City Council’s agenda. 

I write in defense of the Neighborhood Preservation Ordinance (NPO) because the current Housing Element document denigrates this citizens initiative, held dear by residents since 1973. 

First, the report implies that apartment construction dropped in Berkeley because of the NPO. Actually, during that period, cities in the entire bay area had a similar drop in multiunit developments, without an NPO of their own. 

There are two other unmentioned circumstances that caused the failure of housing units to increase. When the BART tunnel was dug, housing units were destroyed along its path. The city lost hundreds of low-income homes that were demolished in order to provide space for two enormous parking lots adjoining the North and South Berkeley BART stations. Modest, low-density homes were sacrificed, contradicting the design concept of connecting dense populations with mass transit. Why did BART planners miss the opportunity to place a station at the university campus where it could have had heavy usage? 

Additionally, by not acting at that time, the City Council allowed conversion of residential units to commercial use, such as lawyers offices, therapy clinics, etc. 

The Neighborhood Preservation Ordinance has not been given credit for initiating the inclusionary, low-income housing unit plan for new apartments. If one reads page 7l of the Housing Element about how developers have to stiff wealthy tenants in order to make up the income lost from low-income rents, you would never know that the federal government is in fact helping pay “market rate rents” to the landlords in the Section 8 program.  

Developers are regularly given money saving concessions besides market-rate rents for their low-income units, such as reductions in parking spaces, useable open space, set backs, and increases in height. Then there is the incentive of a density bonus of 25 percent for more upscale units than are allowed in the city’s land use laws. Thanks to Sacramento, politicians just last week Increased that bonus to 35 percent. 

Martha Nicoloff 

• 

LEARN FROM MISTAKES 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Making mistakes is not the only avenue to learning but it is very common. In fact, knowing what not to do often precedes knowing what to do. Ask any plumber, electrician or Major League Baseball pitcher. This does not mean that the more mistakes we make the more we learn but rather that if we try we can benefit from our mistakes.  

It is easy to accept this bit of common sense applied to individuals both in their personal and professional actions.  

For five years our nation has had a CEO who admits to no mistakes. If, in fact, President George W. Bush has made no mistakes then we may conclude that he therefore has learned little. If he has made mistakes but he is not aware of doing so then his executive ability is severely crippled. Finally, if he is aware of mistakes “preemptive war, exploding deficits, unqualified and incompetent appointments,” etc. but refuses to admit them, then more the fools are we to trust him.  

Marvin Chachere 

San Pablo 

• 

HARRIET MIERS 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Harriet Miers is clearly not qualified. She lacks the credentials and intellectual strength to serve on the Supreme Court. She will have to sit in the Not Qualified Section with Breyer, Souter and Ginsberg. 

W. O. Locke  

Emeryville 

• 

MAYORAL RACE 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Chris Thompson in his East Bay Express Oct. 13 commentary had this to say about Ignacio De La Fuente’s candidacy for mayor: “Oakland has another man who wants to be mayor, a nasty little power broker tainted by his role as an arm-twister in state Senator Don Perata’s political machine. He’s mean, foul-mouthed, and ruthless, and he’d do more for Oakland in a week than Ron Dellums would in four years.” 

It’s too bad that Mr. Thompson doesn’t understand that what he describes as Ignacio’s assets are the very attributes that most in Oakland find offensive if not embarrassing. Given the results of an early poll in which Ignacio’s negatives were determined to be extremely high, I remain convinced that Oaklanders are not clamoring to elect a” foul-mouthed arm-twister, and ruthless” candidate to serve as mayor.  

Ignacio not only twists arms, he twists facts. According to Ignacio’s biographical statement on his official city web site, he claims to be the one who is credited with the revitalization of Fruitvale’s International Boulevard shopping area, including major developments of the Fruitvale Transit Village. If this is in fact the truth, why did the San Francisco Foundation, the East Bay Business Times, and the 2004 Ford Foundation Report credit Arabella Martinez, the former chief operating officer of the Spanish Speaking Unity Council, for having been the driving force behind the development of the Fruitvale Transit Village?  

Ignacio’s meanness and ruthless behavior is most evident on Tuesday night. One only has to watch the council meetings to get a clear view of his bully tactics to silence the public, as well as his colleague, Councilmember Desley Brooks.  

Given the way things are now, Oaklanders have little or no say in the running of their government, and/or policy matters that affect the quality of our lives. In fact, President Bush would be proud of Ignacio as only his cronies, supporters and contributors are allowed to have a say and/or a seat at the decision making table. All of the others are ignored, and worst still, silenced and/or discredited.  

Thank God for Ron Dellums’ entry into the mayor’s race. His continued capacity to organically and passionately connect with “we the people” inspired more in 40 minutes, than Ignacio’s “foul-mouthed arm-twister, and ruthless” manner has in the 10-plus years he has been in office. 

Toni Cook 

Oakland 

• 

MEDIA 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Long after WMD, the U.S. major media continues the Iraq charade. I am not the first commentator to note that the current election is not designed to promote democracy in Iraq. The U.S. promoted “constitution” foments continuing civil strife and civil war so that the U.S. government’s permanent military bases in and U.S. political dominance of Iraq will be justified. It is “our” government which has ensured the removal and replacement of the old reasonably democratic Iraqi constitution with one that guarantees a religion based government and the resulting sectarian strife, the disempowerment of women who had a strong role under Saddam’s dictatorship, and ultimately the collapse of Iraq as a nation state. The media allows the government to treat a vote for this “constitution” as a harbinger of democratic reform when these U.S. imposed “reforms” are the guarantor of disaster for Iraq. 

Marc Sapir 

• 

BERKELEY HONDA 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

The Oct. 14 letter from Edith Hallberg typifies the knee-jerk reactions shown by the protesters in this situation. While her letter is filled with accusations and suppositions, none are supported by facts. How does she know what the Berkeley Honda owners’ intentions are? Never mind what they say their intentions are or what they have done in the past, it only matters to Edith what she wants their intentions to be in order to justify her position. While she is certainly entitled to her opinion, the lack of logic shown in her letter should lead anyone to question her motives and those of the protesters. 

She cites the change of ownership at Spenger’s Fish Grotto and the subsequent replacement of it’s “loyal workers.” She then chastises Berkeley Honda as much worse because they have “insulted the community by trying to capitalize on the good name of Jim Doten.” Excuse me for pointing out the obvious, but if the new owners were so interested in capitalizing on Jim Doten’s name, why did they change it? Spenger’s on the other hand, using the former company name and retaining its atmosphere gets a free pass from her?  

Edith cannot drive and will never own a Honda, yet she and the others want to shut down Berkeley Honda. She supports the continued harassment of customers and workers until she can decide who should work there. Presumably she does eat every day, but simply no longer eating at Spenger’s satisfies her outrage at them. Until she, or any of the protesters show any kind of balance, fairness or logic in their arguments, they will continue to strain credibility. 

Chris Regalia 

• 

BUSH BY THE BAY 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Bush by the Bay  

Los Angeles-based developer Rick Caruso is a Bush Ranger—someone who helped raise more than $1 million for Bush’s reelection campaign (Daily Planet, Oct. 14). Caruso is currently proposing a mall development for the Albany waterfront. Presumably, some of the profit from this endeavor would go to other politicians of the Bush ilk. Without even examining the details of Caruso’s proposal, I would urge all Albany residents to join with the Sierra Club and say no to what henceforth should be known as Bush by the Bay.  

As I prepared to send this letter, a friend told me of another slogan that has a nice ring to it: No L.A. by the Bay.  

Michael Fullerton  

• 

AVIAN FLU 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Whatever one’s point of view on the efficacy of the avian flu scare, let’s err on the side of caution, insist on shots, and hope that the chickens don’t come home to roost. 

Robert Blau  

• 

ALBANY BULB 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I live near the Albany Bulb and the racetrack. I have followed and photographed the work of the artists at the Bulb and hang out at the Albany Bulb beach. The other day I was there around sunset and took the road through the parking lot at the back of the racetrack. On the edge of the 80-foot cliff going down to the bay are some old gnarled trees. From behind the trees you get a spectacularly wonderful view of the bay and the Golden Gate Bridge. This view was lit up by a fantastic red sunset. It was stupendous and I went back several times to try to photograph the scene. It is difficult to photograph and I am still working on it.  

Then reading the last issue of the Daily Planet, I see that there is a proposed plan to build a big shopping mall right in this area. I was astonished that this was even being considered. Why would a shopping mall be placed on the one of the most beautiful locations along the shore of the East Bay? Do we need more shopping? Is there not enough shopping along San Pablo and the towns both North and South. Costco is a few blocks away. There are two Targets within two mile of the track There is a big shopping mall in El Cerrito. I understand that Albany will be hurting for tax income if the track closes. If the race tracks quits taking gamblers money and Albany has less revenue it will be a big temptation to move in on those open bits of ground—the race track, and the race track parking lots—to create places to buy more stuff.  

We don’t need more stuff. We do need a shoreline developed for use of local people for recreation, boating, sports, birds and for art creation as at the Bulb. This shore presents a unique opportunity to make the coastline usable by the people. We already have a huge freeway separating the city and the people from the shore, and a noisy railway system cutting through the city. These were mistakes of the past. 

Planning the proper use of what remains of the shoreline and increasing access to this shore is an essential task for the growth of the East Bay. Development of the race track and Bulb area for shopping malls and hotels would be a huge step backward, a return to the times of the Berkeley dump and the Albany Landfill. Garbage would be replaced by more “garbage shopping.” Should we give up our shoreline to support more consumerism??? 

Dan Robbin 

• 

OUTLAW PLACES 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

We need outlaw places. Places where dogs run free and surprises happen. Unexpected lizards scurry from sun-warmed rocks, rebar juts, unreinforced climbs home our reflexes, hummingbirds flash and loop, goldfinches and house finches (”California redheads”) summer, sweet alyssums startle our noses, and art happens, like it or not. 

I am afraid that the state would herd the lizards into an enclosure and the people into an official LIZARD VIEWING AREA, establish lanes for migrating birds, control all dogs, and shrink-wrap our souls. 

We need outlaw women who speak the truth and change the world: Cindy Sheehan, Rosa Parks, Margaret Sanger, Amy Goodman ... Some of us don’t need to take back the night because we never lost it. 

We need outlaw men unafraid to be outed as nice guys. They get to love plants and animals and women and other guys just as they are and would never join an army to kill them. 

Ruth Bird 

A Lively Collection Awaits at the Berkeley Public Library 

Step off the elevator at the fifth floor, and you enter the main library’s world of art and music. Light flows down from the big skylight and in the background some fine Miles Davis is playing. At another time, it might be Hawaiian music or perhaps a Baroque quartet. 

In front of you are the long shelves with books on such subjects as fine art, architecture, design, crafts, landscape design, theater, film, entertainment and even sports—and, of course, music. Ahead are other shelves holding thousands of CDs and cassettes representing a music collection impressive breadth. 

On a recent day Andrea Segall, who is responsible for the books, was at the reference desk. Andrea is one of the two full-time art and music librarians. Coming from eight years at the downtown San Francisco library, she has been at Berkeley’s Art and Music Department for 15 years. 

Pointing out a new light table backed by a bank of small drawers, she said with obvious pride: “This is our art slide collection, the only one accessible to the public in Northern California. It’s an invaluable resource for both students and teachers who often are teaching where there are no collections available. Here they can check out 60 slides at a time to illustrate their lectures.” 

She led the way back to the corner cubby where head librarian, Pat Mullan, a 20-year Berkeley library veteran, has her office. 

“We think this is a wonderful place to work,” Pat said. 

Andrea nodded in agreement. 

“Because we are a small group which includes four part-time librarians we can make our decisions by consensus,” Pat continued. “Where else can you spend part of your time listening to music, reading reviews, and then have the budget to buy those things that we know will enrich people’s lives?” 

Pat said she was committed to the idea that art and music are an essential part of the human experience. 

Pat seemed to move almost seamlessly in conversation from her work at the library to her own personal musical interests. She is a big band jazz trombonist. 

“I play with one group which has been getting together every week since 1966,” she said. She’s also a member of the Montclair Women’s Big Band. They will be performing soon at the Oakland Museum as part of a benefit for Girl Inc. 

Helping patrons with research is also part of being a librarian, she said. 

“Sometimes someone finds an old painting in their attic and want to know something about it,” Andrea said. (So far nobody’s unearthed an original Van Gogh). “Or maybe a performer is looking for a particular piece of sheet music, and we’ll try to find it in our sheet-music collection.” 

Leaving the office area, we went back through a room that houses a collection of 7000 vinyl LPs and a shelf of folio art books, some of which look like they would require a handcart to move. 

And just who uses the library? These days it looks like a lot of people. Some are sitting at one of the tables with books spread out around them. Someone else appears to be listening to a CD on a tape player. You might recognize a musician like John Schott looking for a particular recording.  

John will be at the library Dec. 9 with “John Schott’s Dream Kitchen” to perform old time jazz with John on the guitar doing the vocals, along with a tuba player and a percussionist. They will perform at 8 p.m. in the main reading room—the venue of the recent jazz series. 

The Art and Music Department sponsors a variety of programs including shows like photographer Katharine Bettis current exhibit, “Single Moms: Invisible Lives” on display downstairs in the central catalog lobby. 

And then there are the noon concerts held upstairs where you’re invited to come and bring your lunch. You can call the library, check out the Daily Planet’s Arts Calendar, or go on the library’s website for the coming events. The honoraria for all the performers are paid by the Friends of the Berkeley Public Library. 

The Art and Music Room hasn’t always been in such elegant digs. When Bruce Munly started the collection in 1960, it occupied a space in the main reading room. As the collection grew, it moved into the downstairs west corner once occupied by the library catalogers.  

But when the main library was refurbished and a new wing was built, the Art and Music Department moved to the top floor under its lovely skylight with north-facing windows overlooking downtown Berkeley and the hills beyond, where good music and beautiful books await. 

Phila Rogers is a member of Friends of the Berkeley Library.i

I hadn’t planned to write another column about Meleia Willis-Starbuck so soon but things change and this is about more than Meleia. No sooner did I write my last column saying I hoped that John Burris, her accused murderer’s attorney, wasn’t attempting to lay the foundation for blaming Meleia for her own death with his statement that Christopher Hollis’ bringing of the gun to the scene of the crime was an example of his being “too dependable,” than Burris was quoted that same week stating that he knew that Meleia asked Hollis to “bring the heat.”  

Those closest to Meleia insist that she would never make such a request nor would she use that phrase. So, who says she did? Her accused murderer? Some unnamed Cal football player? Who? It is so easy for the public to take rumor and innuendo and make it fact, as evidenced by a letter to the editor printed in the Oct. 11 edition of this newspaper which does exactly that, taking it as fact that Meleia requested the gun and unjustly blaming her for her own demise. 

And so it goes.  

Having spent many years working in television and advertising, I know something about using words and images in order to sway a society full of non-readers to specific opinions, whether those have to do with which detergent to buy, car to drive or politician to vote for. As a law school grad, I know a bit about legal maneuvering as well. 

Only those who were at the scene of the crime know what was said and done, and even then, opinions and perspectives will vary. We bring our life experiences and biases to every situation. Objectivity is more of a goal than a reality. My own opinions concerning the sensitivities of the sports world are based in growing up in a household of men—three brothers and a father, sports fans all—and having worked in television news and observed first-hand the predominance sports coverage has always been granted over other issues much more important to society as a whole.  

My objections to the deification of sports and to the plantation-like treatment of athletes was heightened after taking an undergraduate course at UC Berkeley taught by Dr. Harry Edwards, “The Sociology of Sports.” Through Dr. Edwards’ lectures and related readings, I came to understand sports as industry and athletes as commodities. 

Dr. Edwards likened the sports industry to slavery, drawing stark parallels between the buying and selling of young men who are then beaten up and battered on the playing field before they are discarded or traded in for newer, younger models. 

Of course, the athletes’ participation is voluntary, unlike slaves who had no choice. But the similarities remain. Most of these recruits are from working class backgrounds; undereducated and poorly skilled. Growing up in a society which measures one’s worth by the quantity and quality of one’s material possessions, these young men see few options that will bring them the money, women and other toys they’ve been taught to crave. It’s no secret that many of these athletes are coddled through college, placed in less challenging courses and provided with tutors to help maintain their eligibility and strict schedules to keep them out of trouble until their contracts are signed and their able bodies delivered.  

Does this picture describe the Cal football players who disrespected Meleia and her friends? Perhaps. We cannot know for sure because not a single one of them has had the courage to speak up and hold himself accountable, no matter how small his role.  

Predictably, their handlers will say that; 1) they are cooperating with the police and; 2) they have been instructed not to say anything until the investigation has been completed. Of course. But, nothing is keeping them, as individuals, from stepping up and expressing their sorrow for what happened to a woman whose company they desired, then argued about, then disrespected until she lay there dead on the streets of Berkeley. Self-respect, morals, values and courage turn to cowardly mush when money is concerned. That’s the way the game is played.  

I attended Meleia Willis-Starbuck’s birthday memorial Oct. 10, the day she would have turned 20 years old. I looked over the crowd of about 150 or so people to see if any one of them could have been a beefy Cal football player, come to pay his respect.  

Hard to tell. There were a couple of big guys there but who knows? Most likely, none of them showed up, content to keep their mouths shut in hopes that it will all soon go away; that no one will ever know which of them called Meleia a bitch, which of them listened while she tried to explain why that term was so offensive, which of them felt any remorse as she lay bleeding to death at their feet. Instead, they keep their eyes on the real prize; the contract, the check, the bling, the temporary glory. That’s what a winning team does. Nothing else matters.n

My dad has been asked by the widow of his best friend in the Army to contribute to a memory book about her deceased husband. Specifically, the widow has requested tales of heroism and valor during my father and her husband’s stint in the Army Air Corps, 1944 to 1945. 

This has been a difficult assignment for my 80-year-old dad. He’s not much of a writer or reader, but more important, he’s fairly certain his old buddy, Ted, told his wife and children some lies about the Army and his individual contributions to World War II. My father knew he was in trouble when the widow said to be sure to include stories of flying B-52 bombers. The war ended before Ted and my dad got a chance to climb inside an airplane, let alone fly one. My father wants to cover his buddy’s ass, but he doesn’t know exactly what he’s covering for. 

My mother and I have suggested that he simply tell the truth, but that’s not an easy thing to do when the truth is 62 years old, and buried under a lifetime of experiences, emotions, and sentiment. My dad began the first chapter by waxing poetic about his personal departure from his small town in southern New Jersey. He kissed his parents goodbye, hopped a train to Philadelphia, and enlisted for military duty. We advised him to get to his initial meeting with Ted as quickly as possible. He didn’t need to tell us how sad and excited he was about leaving home. This was Ted’s story, not his. 

My dad asked me to edit his writings. At first I was hesitant. Did I really want to read the chronicles of two naïve 18-year-olds who never got further than Texas during World War II? But after several requests, and desperate e-mails, I acquiesced. 

The initial submission was hard to get through, but before long I found a natural rhythm to my dad’s words. I sent him an edited version of the first installment with questions. What did he talk about with Ted on that long, hot, three-day troop train ride to Keesler Field, Biloxi, Miss.? How did he pass the time? Was he bored, scared, anxious? My father responded with additional details, and as his memories multiplied and expanded, his language became more vivid, his sentences straightforward and eloquent. 

Between the lines I can catch his innocence, bewilderment, fears, and patriotism. There are passages that are sad, funny, and poignant. My father spends a great deal of time skirting around the details of “short arm inspections,” an apparently life changing experience I must decode, but that I eventually comprehend. 

There is a lot of marching and drilling, drilling and marching, saluting and additional saluting, bad food and more bad food. I can overhear pieces of conversations between his comrades, imagine the sorrow of young men reduced to tears over letters (or no letters) from home, glimpse the humiliation and panic of guys “washed-out” and sent to units heading for the front. There is even a boxing match with a bear, and, when my father and Ted finally get to Eagle Pass, Texas, there are several revealing, drunken forays across the Mexican-U.S. border. 

It’s the little details that catch my attention, that take my breath away and let me know what my dad was really like when he was an inexperienced, innocent young kid. A passage that lists the contents of his Army-issued duffel bag is particularly telling: socks and underwear, shorts and T-shirts, a Bible from my grandmother, a photograph of my 17-year-old mother in her bathing suit, an in-depth cataloging of his shaving and sewing kits. 

I take a break from editing my dad’s stories. I read the headlines coming out of Iraq. I see the film clips on the evening news of young men in Army-issued clothes eating really bad food, carrying rifles, marching back and forth, not necessarily knowing what they are doing, or why they are there. 

I hope they come home alive and undamaged, able to partake fully in life, able to one day write down their own truths, their own stories and memories to share with children, grandchildren, and friends. 

First there was Green Party candidate, Audie Bock. In 1999 she stunned political experts and beat long-term black Oakland Mayor Elihu Harris for an assembly seat in a special election in Oakland. 

Next, there was Jerry Brown. The controversial and iconoclastic former California governor had been out of politics for seemingly eons, yet still trounced a field of black candidates to win the Oakland mayor’s spot. 

Bock and Brown are white and they still beat black candidates and a seasoned black incumbent in a city where blacks still made up the majority of voters. Their victories spelled trouble, big trouble, for black politicians not only in Oakland and the Bay Area, but statewide, and maybe even nationally.  

Now there’s former Congressman Ron Dellums. The near septuagenarian almost certainly recognizes the danger signs. His bid for Oakland mayor is as much about reversing the free-fall of black politicians as winning a mayor’s seat. Though Dellums represents the old guard, it’s the old guard that still has the political savvy, name recognition and charisma to win a major office. And that also tells much about the failure of black politicians to mentor a new breed of younger blacks for political office.  

A likely Dellums victory will be more about one man’s personal triumph than a reversal of that disturbing pattern. But it should be, because things are that bad.  

When the state Legislature met in the early 1990s, there were nearly a dozen blacks in the state Legislature, and blacks held the mayorships in three of the state’s four biggest cities: Los Angeles, Oakland and San Francisco. Since then, the number of legislators has dwindled to half that total, and blacks hold no mayorships in any of California’s major cities. There are no black state representatives north of L.A. County.  

While blacks have sped backwards politically in state politics, Latinos and Asians have rocketed forward. Latinos hold about one-third of the seats in the legislature, the lieutenant governor post and some of the most visible positions in state government. The number of Asian elected officials is more than double that of blacks statewide.  

Nationally, the growth in the number of black elected officials has stagnated. Black politicians blame their political slide on voter apathy, alienation, inner city population drops, suburban integration and displacement by Latinos and increasingly Asians. These factors have contributed to the fall-off. But black politicians must also share much of the blame. 

The Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, a Washington, D.C., public policy think tank, found that the frustration of many black voters with black politicians has soared so high that less than one out of four eligible black voters bothered to cast a ballot in many recent municipal and statewide elections. 

Many black politicians make little effort to inform the black public of vital legislation and political actions that directly impact black communities. Their all-consuming obsession is to elect more black Democrats to office and to retain those already there.  

Black politicians are also crippled by their near total dependence on the Democratic Party for patronage, support, and assorted party favors. Few would dare break ranks with the party and attempt to pressure the Republican Party to take black issues seriously. 

Many Latino and Asian leaders and elected officials, on the other hand, are not straight-jacketed by mind-numbing obedience to the Democratic Party. They have pushed the Democrats and Republicans to knock off the immigrant bashing, increase funding for bilingual education programs, champion Latino political representation and spend millions on outreach programs to Latino voters. They are leaving blacks in the political dust.  

The plunging number of black elected officials should be a wake-up call for black leaders. Guilt-laced appeals for “black solidarity” and voter registration caravans and buses are not going to make blacks dash to the polls to vote for politicians they feel have failed them. They will, however, jam the polls to vote for politicians they feel are genuinely concerned about their plight, no matter what their color. The Brown and Bock victories, and the victories of whites to mayorships in big cities across the country proved that.  

Black politicians must find a way to reconnect with the black poor and craft an agenda that can motivate, inspire and renew the belief that black politicians can deliver the goods. That agenda must emphasize jobs, quality schools, health care and police accountability. Black elected officials must also broaden their agendas to build coalitions and alliances with Latinos and Asians.  

Those black politicians who can adapt to the rapidly changing class and ethnic realities in California and nationally will survive and be effective players in state and national politics. Those who can’t will vanish from the political radarscope. A Dellums win in Oakland won’t change that political truth.  

Earl Ofari Hutchinson is a nationally syndicated columnist and political analyst.  

a

The Berkeley City Council is scheduled to discuss the potential benefits to several communities of not demolishing the Bevatron, a retired nuclear accelerator, and recommend instead that it be preserved as a historical landmark and education facility. As the council has no actual authority in this matter, this would be a recommendation only and most likely would be ignored by the Department of Energy, which runs Lawrence Berkeley National Lab (LBNL).  

The City of Berkeley has always had the courage to speak truth to power, especially at times like this, when the interests of the Berkeley community coincide with other communities against the Lab’s plans. 

Those communities that would benefit from preserving the Bevatron would be:  

1) Berkeley citizens, who would not have to endure the seven-year demolition process involving radioactive and hazardous substances hauled on thousands of truck trips and a dusty toxic mess in densely populated neighborhoods across Berkeley, 

2) Students of science and history who could enjoy this unique circular building where four Nobel prizes were achieved and observe directly the machinery that provided our knowledge of new elements and nuclear processes,  

3) The communities who have the waste dumps slated to receive the Bevatron’s toxic and radioactive debris which otherwise could remain harmlessly sealed within the walls and structure of the facility,  

4) The taxpayers who could save the $84 million budgeted for the unnecessary demolition. LBNL admits they have no plans for the site. The savings could instead be used for cleaning up toxic areas at LBNL still waiting for funding.  

Unfortunately, Councilmembers Wozniak, Moore and Maio have placed an item on the agenda for tonight (Tuesday) wholeheartedly endorsing the destruction of the Bevatron and referring the following week’s agenda item to the city manager, political language for dumping it.  

This is a disappointing attempt to fast-track the development whims of the university-LBNL complex.  

One has to wonder why such action is necessary to head off a discussion that at best or worst could only end in a non-binding recommendation.  

Mark McDonald is a Berkeley resident. 

On June 24, 2004 the City of Berkeley, a Charter City, entered into a contract with Checkpoint Systems Inc., New Jersey, to “deliver, install and make operational the Intelligent Library System (radio frequency identification technology) at the Berkeley Public Library...” for $643,000.  

This City of Berkeley contract for RFID, allowing the expenditure of $643,000 (plus interest on the $500,000 borrowed for the purchase) of Berkeley taxpayers’ money (about 95 percent of library money comes from property taxes) was signed by only Jackie Griffin, director of library services, a deputy city auditor and the city clerk. The space provided for the city attorney’s signature, titled “Approved as to Form,” is blank, i.e. unsigned. This is a violation of article XI, sec. 65 of the charter of the City of Berkeley which states that all contracts shall be drawn under the supervision of the city attorney. 

Furthermore, the $643,000 expenditure for the RFID system violates the Berkeley Municipal Code, in that it exceeds the amount set by ordinance of $50,000 for the purchase of supplies, equipment and materials [BMC. sec.7.18.010C] [Ord. 6786-NS#1(part), 2003]. Each purchase of supplies, equipment and materials “which exceeds the amount set by ordinance...shall be done by contract authorized by resolution of the City Council” [Charter Article XI sec. 67(a), p.37]. This $643,000 contract never came before the City Council and therefore it violates the City Charter by not having been authorized by a City Council resolution. Of course, this gross violation precludes any public knowledge of, and therefore public input regarding, a huge expenditure of taxpayers money for an “Intelligent Library System” (RFID) with the potential to snoop into Berkeley library users’ reading habits, an insult to the world renowned city of the Free Speech Movement, and a bonanza to Patriot Act enforcers. 

To those who say “But the library trustees held public meetings,” please note that the one and only notice of a Board of Library Trustees (BOLT) meeting is posted on the bulletin boards outside of Old City Hall. (But we don’t know if that was so in 2003-2004.) Do you know when the BOLT meets, and therefore when to make a special trip to Old City Hall to check the agenda? And what about special meetings? Check the website daily, if you have a computer. The trustees have thus far failed to insist that the library director place a stack of trustees’ meeting agendas on information and reference desks in the Berkeley Public Libraries so that patrons will know when the board is meeting and what is on the agenda.  

SEIU 535’s Sept. 21, 2005 memo to Berkeley City Council members and the Board of Library Trustees reveals that the cost of RFID to Berkeley citizens is not just the initial “$650,000” but is estimated to be as high as $2.5 million dollars! Their estimate doesn’t include the cost of the Aug. 1, 2005 Community Forum on RFID for which they hired a KQED producer for M.C. and had other scientists and experts present, apparently solely a PR attempt to convince the public that RFID is beneficial, rather than to give some open-minded reconsideration to the RFID system, which all 25 community speakers fervently condemned. 

Why is it that the library director has spent at least $1.7 million on library staff and temporaries’ wages for the installation and operation of RFID tags in library materials when the contract with Checkpoint Systems states that Checkpoint “will deliver install and make operational the Intelligent Library System”? At the Oct. 12, 2005 BOLT meeting, we learned that the RFID tags for DVDs and CDs are still not operational, coming loose and in some cases damaging patrons’ players. 

All contractors with the City of Berkeley must comply with the city’s Living Wage Ordinance and its’ Equal Benefits Ordinance for domestic partners. How do we know whether Checkpoint System is paying its New Jersey workers a living wage? We do know that they were not in compliance with the Equal Benefits Ordinance when they signed the contract. Who is monitoring the contract to see whether or not they are now in compliance? 

Could there be a connection between the huge expenditures on the RFID system and the move toward hiring intermittent library assistants (20), part-time employees (15 hours/week) and contracting with a non-union janitorial service? Who is checking that all these employees are getting a living wage ($12.87/hour without medical benefits)?  

Come to the City Council Meeting at Old City Hall Tuesday tonight (Tuesday, Oct. 18) before 7 p.m. Sign up to speak and raise these questions. Please ask the councilmembers to support agenda item 23 on the consent calendar titled: Questions Regarding RFID. 

Protest the $2.5 million and ballooning boondoggle, a privacy invading RFID system with potential long-term health effects from chronic low level radio frequency radiation.  

P.S. The RFID contract is cancellable! 

Gene Bernardi is a member of Berkeleyans Organizing for Library Defense (SuperBOLD). 

The recent discussions on planning for an avian flu pandemic highlight a critical problem in disaster planning—our inability to predict the future. Even if, as with Hurricane Katrina and the 9/11 terrorist attack, a few people may have anticipated and forewarned of potential disaster, these events appeared to have a low probability of occurring in the near future. As a result, few people in public policy-making positions were prepared to spend the time, money and political capital necessary to prepare for them. So how do we plan for an appropriate disaster response without wasting limited resources chasing after every potential disaster? 

The next big epidemic may not be avian flu, but rather some other disease. It may be a disease with which we are familiar, such as anthrax or smallpox, spread by terrorists; or a disease we have never heard of that suddenly mutates and jumps from another species to our own, such as HIV or SARS. The next big natural disaster may well be one that we anticipate in theory; fires, floods and earthquakes have been with us since the beginning of human history. However, the timing, location and impact of these events are equally unpredictable. 

The most efficient and effective approach to disaster planning would be to focus our efforts on planning for the predictable human needs resulting from potential disasters. Disasters have been thoroughly studied and well described. We can be prepared to respond to their logistical demands, such as evacuating large communities immediately prior to an impending disaster, or sheltering and resettling displaced populations immediately afterwards. We can plan for a rapid epidemiological investigation, as well as for systematic treatment, immunization and quarantine at the first appearance of an epidemic. We can plan for rapid deployment of first responder teams from outside a disaster zone in the event that local first responders are overwhelmed by a disaster, or are too preoccupied with their own families‚ needs to report for duty. 

The essence of this approach to disaster planning would be to prepare the logistical infrastructure that would be needed for a wide variety of circumstances. If there is an appropriate role for the new Department of Homeland Security, it surely includes identifying the logistical problems common to many types of disasters, and development of the infrastructure necessary to address these problems. Our country is spread over a large geographic area, and relies on many layers of government, a wide variety of private sector businesses, and multiple nonprofit organizations for all aspects of disaster response. Therefore, planning for interagency coordination and communication should be a major component of building a logistical infrastructure for disaster response. 

When we criticize our political leaders and government administrators for failing to anticipate disasters, we encourage them to demonstrate that they are “doing something.” This results in wasted effort, such as initiating color-coded terror alerts after a major terrorist attack, and a national program to provide smallpox vaccinations for healthcare providers that was never fully implemented. Instead, we should hold our governmental leaders accountable for preparing the logistical infrastructure necessary to respond to disasters effectively and efficiently. 

This approach does not preclude planning for the prevention of specific events, such as an avian flu epidemic or particular types of terrorist threats; or for mitigation of known impacts, such as strengthening levees and building earthquake resistant structures. However, if we do a good job of preparing the disaster response infrastructure, we will be less likely to waste time and money trying to prepare for unpredictable potential disasters or, worse, trying to prepare for the next disaster by planning for the last one. 

El Cerrito resident Ken Stanton works in Berkeley as a registered nurse.  

B

The 23rd annual San Francisco Jazz Festival begins this Thursday and continues for another 42 events through Dec. 10. This is the most concentrated amount of great jazz available in the Bay Area all year. 

The performances are matched to beautiful locations like the Palace of the Legion of Honor’s Florence Gould Theatre where admission to the museum is included in the ticket price, Davies Hall, the Palace of Fine Arts, and Herbst Theatre with its magnificent autumnal murals by Sir Frank Brangwyn. 

Besides straight-ahead musical performances that range through mainstream, avant-garde, Latin, African, French, klezmer, Broadway and gospel, there are also classes, interviews and films that can broaden and enhance the experience of the music. The following programs are just the top picks from a consistently great lineup: 

Abbey Lincoln has moved from one among many jazz song stylists to take her place in the tiny pantheon of all-time great jazz singers. Over the years she has been a big band singer, a competent supper club chanteuse, a cutting-edge jazz vocalist with groups led by her then husband percussionist Max Roach, and a film starlet. 

At some point she pulled all of these disparate parts of herself together and became one of the most individual and fully-realized vocalists in jazz. She did this by learning to express herself through her original songs, poems set to lovely tunes that are the perfect vehicles for her emotion-drenched voice. She also knows which standards work best for her, from Yip Harburg’s Depression-era “Brother, Can You Spare a Dime” to Bob Dylan’s “Mr. Tambourine Man,” and can turn a group of talented young accompanists into top flight jazz performers. This event, at 7:30 p.m., Wednesday, Oct. 19, at Herbst Theatre, kicks off the festival and was originally an members-only event. Now some tickets are being made available to the general public. 

The World Saxophone Quartet—David Murray, Oliver Lake, Hamiet Bluiett and Bruce Williams plus guests Gene Lake, Matthew Garrison and Lee Pearson—will present the music of Jimi Hendrix at 7:30 p.m. and 10 p.m., Thursday, Oct. 20, at the Great American Music Hall. 

Hendrix is usually considered a ‘60s psychedelic rock musician, but in fact his music is closer to a cross between B.B. King’s blues and John Coltrane’s free jazz saxophone. The Quartet is one of the all-time great jazz combos, combining wide-ranging interests with stellar performers Murray, Bluiett and Lake. Their recordings are studded with performances of various tunes retrieved from the world of rock, pop, blues and soul. Far from being daunted by Hendrix, they are probably closer to where he would have been now, had he lived long enough to figure out who he was then. 

Etta James, the queen of Rhythm and Blues, brings her Roots Band to Nob Hill Masonic Center at 8 p.m., Saturday, Oct. 22. She has been a giant since she pleaded “Dance with Me Henry” back in the ‘50s. Although known as a blues singer, like Dinah Washington or Big Maybelle, she is just as great doing jazz interpretations of standards, as witness her album of songs dedicated to Billie Holiday. As with Abbey Lincoln, she approached her place at the table of great jazz vocalists from her own oblique direction.  

Clarinet virtuoso Don Byron was at the festival last year with drummer Jack DeJohnette in a tribute to tenor sax legend Lester “Prez” Young. He performed at the festival a few years before that playing the klezmer compositions of Mickey Katz. He returns this year, at 3 p.m. and 7 p.m., Sunday, Oct. 30, at the Palace of Fine Arts Theatre, doffing his pork pie hat in favor of a shtreimel, to present the music of Sam Musiker, a great swing and klezmer player, and his father-in-law Dave Tarras, arguably the greatest klezmer clarinetist to ever record.  

Byron first came to the attention of the public as the star soloist with the Klezmer Conservatory Orchestra, a group formed at the New England Conservatory of Music where he was a student. The KCO was performing a wide variety of Jewish music, but Byron became most interested in those players, like Mickey Katz and Sam Musiker, who were as much swing players as klezmer players. He points our attention to the fact that much of what we think of as the golden age of Yiddish culture took place in the United States, not Eastern Europe. Far from being a falling away from a great tradition, klezmer in America is actually the fruition of that tradition.  

Barbara Cook is not a jazz singer, but she is one of the greatest Broadway and cabaret performers of the last half century. A Broadway legend ever since she created the role of Marian the librarian in the original production of The Music Man, she’ll present masterful interpretations of tunes from the “Great American Songbook” at 8 p.m., Friday, Nov. 4, at Davies Symphony Hall. 

These are the same songs—from Broadway shows, Hollywood films, tin pan alley and jazz composers—that jazz musicians have been interpreting since the ‘20s. Cook represents one source of these standards, but also reveals the way jazz techniques have constantly enriched Broadway ever since Sissle and Blake’s 1921 musical Shuffle Along.  

Finally, the Ornette Coleman Quartet will perform at 8 p.m., Saturday, Nov. 5, at Nob Hill Masonic Center. In the world of jazz, Ornette is an eccentric among eccentrics. When the harmonic inventions of Charlie Parker were being pushed to a dead end of baroque chordal elaboration, Ornette stepped forward with what was considered an atonal form of jazz. He might just as well have been described as stepping backward to retrieve the most primitive field hollers and street cries. Although his rhythm section—two string bassists and his son Denardo on drums—seems beside the point, his own playing is always fresh, lyrical and surprising and he remains one of the seminal influences in the history of post-bop jazz. 

For more information on the San Francisco Jazz Festival call (415) 788-7353 or visit their website at www.sfjazz.org.a

The African-American Shakespeare Company is providing the opportunity to see one of the more obscure ventures of the Bard, Two Noble Kinsmen, at the African-American Art & Culture Complex, on Fulton Street in San Francisco, through this weekend. 

The authorship of the play has long been questioned. Director David Skillman asks, “Did Shakespeare write it? Or did he and John Fletcher write it? Or did John Fletcher write by himself?” In recent years, there has been a more general acceptance of Shakespeare’s participation, even possibly sole creation, of this strange, scrappy excursion into the popular entertainments of Elizabethan and Jacobean times. It is the predecessor of soap opera, but with a message. 

Skillman notes that this tale of “love, honor and fate,” in which the efforts of the characters “are impeded by events unseen and unpredicted,” raises “very relevant issues of friendship and love in the form of three relationships.” It hasn’t been produced in the Bay Area for more than 20 years. 

He has staged this baroque tale set in ancient Thebes in a contemporary style ... in fact, in the neighborhood. The two kinsmen of the title, Palamon (Norman Gee) and Arcite (Austin Ku), are security personel (“Prince Security” on bill caps and jacket backs) at housing projects in San Francisco. 

Kings and princes become local politicos and their factotums include a reverend. News broadcasts barge in between scenes of protests of love and honor. 

“I have certainly taken liberties with the story,” says Skillman. “Gone are Moorish dancers, gorillas ... and a whole host of other characters ... I streamlined the story ... by merging multiple characters into one so as to create community continuity.” 

The mood teeters back and forth between melodrama and burlesque, with the two kinsmen split over the rights to the love of Emilia (Camelia Poespowidjojo.) They’ve seen her from within the prison where they’re shackled after an uprising in Thebes. 

Skillman’s cast is, for the most part, young and energetic, and at their playful best when playing. Many of the best moments are those between the kinsmen, antagonists alternately expressing mutual love or hate (or both at the same time). Austin Ku’s Arcite is a case in point: his competent portrayal of the banished lovelorn who sneaks back into Thebes becomes real playing when he’s hilariously disguised as a poet in Afro wig and sparkly glasses, in what amounts to a slam for Emilia’s affections. Sometimes a more vigorous staging would help support these enjoyable farcical turns. John Ford, the film director, once told an actor who couldn’t find a demeanor of gravity for melodrama, “then play it for laughs.” 

And there are laughs among the impossible twists and turns of plot, enhanced by Skillman’s deliberate anachronisms. Reviving these old plays is like touring an exhibition of perpetual motion machines, Rube Goldberg-like devices whose engines of word and incident lumber along fantastically, backfiring and acting up like the hot-rodding cars the director’s interpolated into the action. 

Allegorical commonplaces of baroque speech radiate from cliffhanging situations: 

“I am very cold, and all the stars are out, too,” says the jailer’s daughter (Dawn L. Brown), in love with Palamon, her father’s prisoner. She chases him into the woods when he escapes. “The sun has seen my folly ... All the little stars that look like agates.” 

After many twists and turns, the end is sudden and ironic, barely providing a friction brake for a speed stop to the racing plot, piling up catastrophes. 

This community troupe has taken an unusual play as a project, and tried putting it on in a different style. The results are mixed, but even the most tentative triumphs of contemporary performers voicing lines, such as Hippolyta (Sheylon Haywood) and Emilia’s exchange on the Narcissus myth: “Were there not maids enough? ... Men are mad things” or the kinsmen, arguing politely while eating Krispy Kremes: “Be rough with me; pour this oil off of your language” should give heart to this and other adventurous companies to try one of these seldom-done plays and “make it new.” 

African-American Shakespeare Company presents Two Noble Kinsmen through Oct. 23 at African-American Art & Culture Complex, Buriel Clay Theater, 762 Fulton St., San Francisco. For more information, see www.african-americanshakes.org. 

Sometimes the greatest mysteries are closest to home. Just ask Kent Brown, a Berkeley man who’s embarking on a quest to learn about his grandmother. 

And what a grandmother. 

Beryl Booker was anything but the stereotypical grandma. After all, how many grandmothers played with the 4 Toppers, Marian McPartland, Slam Stewart, Miles Davis, Dinah Washington and the incomparable Billie Holiday? 

How many African American women had their own integrated jazz trios in the 1940s? 

Though she’s little known today outside jazz circles, the woman who started out as a child prodigy in Philadelphia is still played today on jazz and public radio stations across the country. And her piano work on Billie Holiday’s posthumous ladylove album will be a lasting testament to her work. 

“She’s still popular among other musicians,” Brown said, “and she may have created the first popular jazz trio.” 

Born on June 23, 1923, she grew up near the corner of 13th and Wallace streets in Philadelphia. A prodigy, she developed her keyboard chops without any formal training, and she was playing with the 4 Toppers by the time she was 19. 

Considering her unique career and illustrious company, it’s not surprising someone’s thinking about making a film about her life—and that’s where Brown, who knows his way around the film world, comes in. 

An audio and film sound editor, Brown has worked for Lucasfilm, Fantasy Records and Pixar. Among his better-known projects are the films Monsters, Inc., Finding Nemo, for which he did pre-production work, and Tomb Raiders. He’s also worked on shaping the sound for CDs, including albums for Blues singer Dorothy Moore and The Mad Lads, an R&B group. 

Brown became interested in a film about his grandmother in part because he wanted to resolve a breach in his family. His mother, Gillian, was born on June 7, 1943, less than three weeks after Beryl turned 18, and the mother-daughter relationship was rocky.  

“Not that there was hostility,” he said. “By the time I was born [my grandmother] was an alcoholic.” 

Brown’s mother moved to Berkeley when he was 5, he said, “but I can still remember Grandma sitting at that big old piano.” 

Gillian, a talented pianist in her own right, opted for a career in academia. With the help of a scholarship, she went on to earn a master’s degree at Temple University. Once settled in Berkeley, she went on to chair the Masters in Management Program at John F. Kennedy University, then moved on to UC Berkeley, where she was practicum coordinator for the Kenneth E. Behring Center for Educational Improvement at the Graduate of School of Education when she died in June 2004. 

“I lost my mother and my brother in the same year,” said Brown, “and it renewed my interest in my grandmother as a way to connect with my mother. It’s also a way to reconnect with a lost period in my own past, which I can only remember in terms of going to studios and clubs with these groups and these big, fancy guitar-like things.” 

One of his few clear memories of that period is meeting another jazz great, Ella Fitzgerald. 

Brown did reconnect with his grandmother when she moved to Berkeley a month or two before her death on Sept. 22, 1978. 

“She died when I was 14, and I didn’t take it that seriously at the time,” he said. “We both loved music, and we even talked about writing songs together. But she wasn’t in good shape. The jazz lifestyle isn’t noted for longevity.” 

Brown has made one trip to the East Coast to gather material for his project. “I went back to locate her ex-husband and niece, who were basically estranged from her,” he said. 

His biggest booster is his spouse, Akana Nobusa-Brown, executive director of the Japan Pacific Resource Network, an Oakland-based non-profit organization which seeks to build bridges across the Pacific on issues of community empowerment and social justice. 

Brown is also working to assemble a complete discography, a listing of all the recordings his grandmother made over the years. That too is proving difficult, he said. 

Compounding his difficulty is the simple fact that most of the musicians who played with his grandmother have died. “I have talked to Marian McPartland and Mister C, but most of her folks are gone,” he said. 

But he’s not giving up. 

“They say that jazz is the only truly American art form, and I can see a lot of parallels between today and the time when jazz took root. They were desperate times” for the African American community, “and today’s youth face conditions that are very similar,” he said. “I hope I can make some of the connections with that proud history for today’s young people. 

“I also see jazz and jazz musicians as forebears of the civil rights movement. There was a lot of crossing of color lines in those days, and those were the folks who set the stage for what followed.” 

And for an example, he points to his grandmother, whose 1940s trio consisted of an African American pianist/singer accompanied by white women on bass and drum.  

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TUESDAY, OCT. 18 

FILM 

Peter Kubelka: Films and Lectures “The Edible Metaphor” at 7:30 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808.  

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Jack Marshall introduces his memoir “From Baghdad to Brooklyn” at 7:30 p.m. at Black Oak Books. 486-0698.  

Simon Winchester describes “A Crack in the Edge of the World: America and the Great California Earthquake of 1906” at 6:15 p.m. at the Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant Ave. Tickets are $40, $50 per couple which includes a copy of the book. Sponsored by Cody’s Books. 845-7852.  

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Swamp Coolers, Cajun, Western swing at 8:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $9. 525-5054.  

Ellen Hoffman and Singers’ Open Mic at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $5. 841-JAZZ.  

PhilipsMarine, jazz, at 7 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave., at Dwight. 548-5198.  

Plena Libre, from Puerto Rico, at 8 and 10 p.m. at Yoshi’s at Jack London Square. Cost is $10-$18. 238-9200. www.yoshis.com 

Jazzschool Tuesdays at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-827. 

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

WEDNESDAY, OCT. 19 

EXHIBITIONS 

Art in Progress Open studios at 800 Heinz Ave. from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. 845-0707. 

James D. Phelan Art Award in Printmaking with Jesse Gottesman, Cynthia Ona Innis and Matthew Hopson-Walker. Reception at 6 p.m. at Kala Art Institute, 1060 Heinz Ave. Exhibition runs to Dec. 3. 549-2977. 

FILM 

Berkeley Arts Festival: “Raising the Roof” and “Democracy in the Workplace” at 8 p.m. at 2324 Shattuck Ave.  

Cine Documental “Fernando is Back” and “100 Children Waiting for a Train” two films from Chile at 7 p.m. in the CLAS Conference Room, 2334 Boawditch St. 642-2088. 

Doctor Atomic Goes Nuclear “Crossroads” at 7:30 p.m. and “Half-Life: A Parable for the Nuclear Age” at 9 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808.  

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Café Poetry hosted by Paradise at 7:30 p.m. at La Peña. Donation $2. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

Mario Livio describes “The Equation The Couldn’t Be Solved: How Mathematical Genius Discovered the Language of Symmetry” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852.  

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  

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Wednesday Noon Concert, with University Symphony at Hertz Hall, UC Campus. Free. 642-4864.  

Music for the Spirit with Ron McKean, organ, at noon at First Presbyterian Church of Oakland, 2619 Broadway. 444-3555.  

Anne Sofie von Otter, mezzo-soprano, at 8 p.m. at Zellerbach Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $34-$58. 642-9988.  

Karashay, Chirgilchin & Stephen Kent, Tuvan throat singers and didjeridu, at 8 p.m. at the Hillside Club, 2286 Cedar St. 701-1787. 

Whiskey Brothers, Old Time and Bluegrass at 9 p.m. at Albatross, 1822 San Pablo Ave. 843-2473.  

Joe Beck Trio at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $5. 841-JAZZ.  

Bernard Anderson & The Old School Band at 9 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $9. 525-5054.  

Tribute to the Conga, salsa music, at 9:30 p.m. at Shattuck Down Low, 2284 Shattuck Ave. Cost is $5-$10. 548-1159.  

Atlas Ensemble at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

John Hammond, acoustic blues, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $18.50-$19.50. 548-1761. 

THURSDAY, OCT. 20 

EXHIBITIONS 

“In Living Color: Street Scenes” recent paintings by S. Newman. Reception at 4 p.m. at the LunchStop Café, Metro Center, at the Lake Merritt BART Station. 817-5773. 

“Taisho Chic: Japanese Modernity, Nostalgia and Deco” Guided tour at 12:15 and 5:30 p.m. at the Berkeley Art Museum, 2625 Durant Ave. 642-0808. 

“All-College Honors & Scholarship Awards Exhibition” Reception at 6 p.m. at Tecoah Bruce Gallery, Oliver Art Center, California College of the Arts, 5212 Broadway. 658-1223. 

FILM 

Berkeley Art Center International Small Film Festival at 7:30 p.m. Oct. 20-22 and Oct. 27-29 at Berkeley Art Center, 1275 Walnut St. 644-6893.  

Peter Kubelka: Films and Lectures, Metric Films and “Poetry and Truth” at 7:30 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808.  

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Local Authors Dorothy Bryant and Molly Giles will read from their works at 8 p.m. at Julia Morgan Center for the Arts. www.juliamorgan.org 

Nomad Spoken Word Night at 7 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344.  

Gregory Maguire introduces his new novel “Son of a Witch” at 7 p.m. at Cody’s Books on Fourth St. 559-9500. 

Word Beat Reading Series with Raymond Nat Turner and Zigi Lowenberg at 7 p.m. at Mediterraneum Caffe, 2475 Telegraph Ave. 526-5985. 

“Avant-Garde Jewish Poetry and Music” with John Amen at 7:30 p.m. at the BRJCC, 1414 Walnut St. Cost is $5. 848-0237. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Brian Joseph at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $17.50-$18.50. 548-1761.  

Tina Marzell Trio at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $5. 841-JAZZ.  

43rd Street Prog Showcase at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $5. 841-2082.  

Mark Levine and John Wiitala, piano and bass, at 8 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810.  

Dhol Patrol at 9:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Bhangra dance lesson at 9 p.m. Cost is $8. 525-5054.  

Dee Dee Bridgewater at 8 and 10 p.m., through Sun. at Yoshi’s at Jack London Square. Cost is $14-$24. 238-9200.  

Witches Brew at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

FRIDAY, OCT. 21 

THEATER 

Actors Ensemble of Berkeley ” Six Degrees of Separation” Fri. and Sat. at 8 p.m. at Live Oak Theater, 1301 Shattuck Ave. through Nov. 19. Tickets are $10. 649-5999. wwwaeofberkeley.org 

BareStage Productions “The House of Bernard Alba” Fri. and Sat. at 8 p.m., Sun. at 2 p.m. at 20 Cesar Chavez Student Center, UC Campus. Tickets are $6-$8. www.tickets.berkeley.edu 

Berkeley High “The Laramie Project” Sat. and Sun. at 8 p.m., also Oct. 28 and 29, at the Florence Shwimley Little Theater, Berkeley High Campus. Tickets are $12, $6 student. 332-1931.  

Berkeley Rep “Finn in the Underworld” at 8 p.m. at the Thrust Stage and runs to Nov. 6. Tickets are $43-$59. 647-2949. www.berkeleyrep.org 

Berkeley Rep, “Our Town” at 8 p.m., and runs through Oct. 23. Tickets are $45-$59. 647-2949. www.berkeleyrep.org 

California Shakespeare Theater, “The Tempest” at 8 p.m. at Bruns Amphitheater, 100 Gateway Blvd., between Berkeley and Orinda, through Oct. 23. Tickets are $10-$55. 548-9666. www.calshakes.org 

Central Works “Achilles & Patroklos” Thurs.-Sat. at 8 p.m., Sun. at 5 p.m. at The Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant Ave., through Nov. 20. Tickets are $9-$25. 558-1381. centralworks.org 

Contra Costa Civic Theater, “You Can’t Take it With You” Fri. and Sat. at 8 p.m., Sun. at 2 p.m. at Pomona Ave. at Moeser Lane, El Cerrito, through Oct. 22. 524-9132. www.ccct.org 

Lunatique Fantastique “Executive Order 9066” Thurs. -Sat. at 7 p.m., through Oct. 21 at 2120 Allston Way. Tickets are $15-$22. 415-826-5750. www.themarsh.org 

EXHIBITIONS 

“Art Heals” an exhbition of works by four artists on approaches to healing. Reception at 6 p.m. at the Main St. Initiative, 1101 MacDonald, Richmond. 236-4050. 

“China’s Culktural Revolution” with photographer Li Zhensheng, talk at 3 p.m., panel discussion at 6:30 p.m. at North Gate Hall, UC Campus. 

FILM 

Berkeley Art Center International Small Film Festival at 7:30 p.m. to Oct. 22 and Oct. 27-29 at Berkeley Art Center, 1275 Walnut St. Free. 644-6893. www.berkeleyartcenter.org 

Doctor Atomic Goes Nuclear “Pandora’s Box” at 7 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Narendra Jadhav reads from his autobiography “Untouchables: My Family’s Triumphant Journey Out of the Caste System” at 12:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books on Fourth St. 559-9500. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Berkeley Arts Festival: “The Unsung Malvina” Judy Fjell and Nancy Schimmel sing newly-found songs by Malvina Reynolds at 7 p.m. at Redwood Gardens, Community Room, 2095 Derby St. www.berkeleyartsfestival.com 

Berkeley Music Centenary The history, people and feats of Berkeley’s Music Dept. at 4 p.m. at Hertz Hall, UC Campus. Free. 642-4864. http://music.berkeley.edu 

Marvin Sanders, flute and Lena Lubotsky, piano, at 8 p.m. at Giorgi Gallery, 2911 Claremont Ave. Cost is $10. 848-1228.  

Elaine Kreston, original compositions for early and contemporary instruments at 8 p.m. at the Hillside Club, 2286 Cedar St. Cost is $10-$15. 701-1787. 

California Bach Society, choral music, at 8 p.m. at St. Mark’s Episcopal, 2300 Bancroft Way. 415-262-0272 www.calbach.org  

The Tuva Trader “Tyva Kyzy” at 8 p.m. at Julia Morgan Center for the Arts. Tickets are $14-$16. 925-798-1300. www.juliamorgan.org  

Mariz, Portuguese fado, at 8 p.m. at Zellerbach Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $24-$46. 642-9988. www.calperfs.berkeley.edu 

La Familia Son! CD release party at 9 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Cost is $10, includes C.r. 849-2568.  

The Jazz Express at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $7. 841-JAZZ.  

Grapefruit Ed, The Flux at 9:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $13. 525-5054. 

Lua at 8 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave., at Dwight. 548-5198.  

Eric Anderson, Sonia, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $18.50-$19.50. 548-1761.  

Helene Attia Quartet at 9 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810.  

Damond Moodie and Dave Lionelli at 7:30 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

Mad Happy, Rapatron, Lacoste at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $6. 841-2082.  

Hostile Takeover, Hit Me Back, CInder, Right On, at 8 p.m. at 924 Gilman St., an all-ages, member-run, no alcohol, no drugs, no violence club. Cost is $7. 525-9926. 

Jen Scaffidi, Rooftop Rodeo at 8:30 p.m. at Epic Arts, 1923 Ashby Ave. Cost is $5-$10.  

Mushroom, psychedelic funk, at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Dee Dee Bridgewater at 8 and 10 p.m., through Sun. at Yoshi’s at Jack London Square. Cost is $14-$24. 238-9200.  

SATURDAY, OCT. 22 

CHILDREN 

Los Amiguitos de La Peña with Gary Lapow at 10:30 a.m. at La Peña. Cost is $5. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

THEATER 

“Jane Austen in Berkeley” a dance-drama spoof, Sat. and Sun. at 7:30 p.m. at the Bread Workshop Café, 1398 University. Free. 841-9441. 

FILM 

Farewell: A Tribute to Elem Klimov and Larissa Shepitko at 7 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

William Byrant Logan honors “Oak: The Frame of a Civilization” at 4 p.m. at Cody’s Books on Fourth St. 559-9500. 

Paul Collins introduces his biography of Tom Paine “The Trouble With Tom” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com 

Ursula Steck reads from “The Next World” at 2 p.m. at Changemakers Books, 6536 Telegraph Ave. Oakland.  

Peggy Knickerbocker, author of “Simple Soirées, Seasonal Menus for Sensational Dinner Parties” at 1 p.m. at The Pasta Shop, 1786 4th St. 528-1786. 

Stevanne Auerbach author of “Smart Play-Smart Toys” at 1 p.m. at The Ark, 1812 4th St. 849-1930. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Berkeley Arts Festival: John Schott’s Dream Kitchen, where old-time jazz meets the avant-garde at 8 p.m. at 2324 Shattuck Ave. www.berkeleyartsfestival.com 

The Avenue Winds, woodwind quintet at 8 p.m. at Trinity Chapel, 2320 Dana St. Tickets are $8-$12. 549-3864. http:// 

trinitychamberconcerts.com 

Flauti Diversi “Bach to Bach” baroque flute, viola de gamba, harpsichord and voice at 8 p.m. at St. David of Wales Church, 5641 Esmond Ave., Richmond. Tickets are $15-$18. 527-9840. 

Neopolitan Contemporary Dance “So Delicious” at 7:30 p.m. at Julia Morgan Center for the Arts. Tickets are $20-$25. 925-798-1300.  

Moment’s Notice A salon for improvised music, dance and theater at 8 p.m. at Western Sky Studio, 2525 Eighth St. Cost is $8-$10. 415-831-5592. 

Gypsy Soul, acoustic rock at 8 p.m. at Unity Church, 2075 Eunice St. Tickets are $15. 528-8844. 

Company of Prophets, CD release party at 9 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Cost is $8-$10. 849-2568.  

Indiegrrl Tour concert with Irina Rivkin, Ter-ra, & Mare Wakefield at 8 p.m. at Rose Street House of Music, 1839 Rose St. 594-4000 ext. 687. 

Pickpocket Ensemble at 9:30 p.m. at Albatross, 1822 San Pablo Ave. Cost is $3. 843-2473. www.albatrosspub.com 

Yancie Taylor Quartet at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $7. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

John Jorgenson Quintet at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $21.50-$22.50. 548-1761.  

Ken & The New Incredibles, alt rock, at 8 p.m. at Spuds Pizza, 3290 Adeline St. Cost is $7 per family. 558-0881. 

Ralph Alessi’s This Against That at 8 p.m. at the Jazzschool. Cost is $12-$18. 845-5373.  

The Sidewinders, Harry Best & Shabang in a benefit for Ashkenaz at 9:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $13. 525-5054.  

Audrey Shimkas Quartet at 9 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810.  

Sam Misner & Megan Smith and Lo Cura at 7:30 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

Brown Baggin’, Oaktown funk, at 9 p.m. at Shattuck Down Low, 2284 Shattuck Ave. Cost is $12. 548-1159.  

Halloween Ball with The Catholic Comb, Mr. Loveless at 9 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $6. 841-2082.  

Emily Lord at 8:30 p.m. at Epic Arts, 1923 Ashby Ave. Cost is $5-$10. www.epicarts.org 

Killing the Dream, Allegiance, More to Pride, The Answer at 8 p.m. at 924 Gilman St. Cost is $6. 525-9926. 

Stolen Bibles at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

SUNDAY, OCT. 23 

EXHIBITIONS 

“Fermenting Berkeley” An exhibition on the production, sale, and social aspects of alcohol in Berkeley from the 1870s - 1970s. Reception from 3 to 5 p.m. at the Berkeley History Center, 1931 Center St.Exhibit runs to March 25. 848-0181. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/histsoc/  

THEATER 

Unconditional Theater’s “Political Dialogues” at 7 p.m. at Epic Arts, 1923 Ashby Ave. Cost is $5-$10. www.epicarts.org 

FILM 

Dutch Voices: Jos de Putter and Peter Delpeit “Diva Dolorosa” at 4 p.m. and “Tigre Reale” at 5:35 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

“The Forgotten Refugees” at 4 p.m. at the BRJCC, 1414 Walnut St. Cost is $5. 848-0237. 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Berkeley Arts Festival “New Voices From the Before Columbus Foundation” with Karla Brundage, Tennessee Reed, Boadiba and Wajahat Ali at 4 p.m. at Berkeley Arts Festival Gallery, 2324 Shattuck Ave. 655-9496. 

Micah Garen and Marie-Hélene Carlton tell their story in “American Hostage: A Memoir of a Journalist Kidnapped in Iraq and the Remarkable Battle to Win His Release” at 7 p.m. at Cody’s Books on Fourth St. 559-9500. 

Geraldine Kim and Malia Jackson read from their poetry at 8 p.m. at Pegasus Books, 2349 Shattuck Ave. 649-1320. 

Poetry Flash with Aaron Shurin, Paul Hoover and Donald Revell at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. Donation $2. 845-7852.  

Laila Lalami on her story of Morocco, “Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits” at 7:30 p.m. at Black Oak Books. 486-0698. www.blackoakbooks.com 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Oakland East Bay Symphony United Nations Day of Peace Concert at 7 p.m. at the Paramount Theater, 2025 Broadway. Tickets are $20-$40. Proceeds benefit UNICEF’s Hurricane Katrina Relief Fund. 652-8497.  

András Schiff, pianist, at 3 p.m. at Zellerbach Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $34-$58, available from 642-9988.  

Sequentia, medieval music, at 7 p.m. at Hertz Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $42, available from 642-9988.  

Neopolitan Contemporary Dance “So Delicious” at 7:30 p.m. at Julia Morgan Center for the Arts. Tickets are $20-$25. 925-798-1300. 

Upsurge Jazz and Poetry Celebration at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $10. 841-JAZZ.  

Mitote Jazz with Arturo Cipriano, saxophone, at 7:30 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Cost is $12-$14. 849-2568.  

Quartet San Francisco at 4:30 p.m. at the Jazzschool. Cost is $20. 845-5373.  

Duck’s Breath Mystery Theater at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $20.50-$21.50. 548-1761.  

Ross Hammond, jazz, at 10 a.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344.  

Keren at 4 p.m. at Spuds Pizza, 3290 Adeline St. Cost is $7. 558-0881. 

Americana Unplugged: The Freelance Disciples at 5 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277.?

All through September, I’ve been seeing warblers in the backyard: not the yellow-rumps that spend the winter, but migrants of other species stopping over during their southbound flight—yellow warblers running the gamut from bright to drab, orange-crowns, a female Townsend’s, at least one Wilson’s. 

Fall warbler identification on our flyway is easier than back east, where you have to contend with a myriad of species and some really nondescript first-year plumages. East or west, Wilson’s is one of the easiest: a small bright yellow bird with a green back and, in adult males, a black yarmulke. Its name honors Alexander Wilson, a contemporary and competitor of Audubon who lacked his rival’s flair for the dramatic and talent for self-promotion. 

There’s always an element of mystery when it comes to migrants: Where have they come from, and where are they headed? Some western warblers, like the Townsend’s warbler, end up somewhere in California; most, including the Wilson’s, are bound for Mexico and Central America. With both breeding and wintering habitats under pressure, it’s become important for conservationists to learn which populations winter where and what routes they take. For warblers, that’s something of a challenge. 

Historically, banding (or as the British call it, “ringing”) was the best key to the travels of migratory birds. It’s still important: thanks to banding studies, we know that less than 11 percent of first-year Wilson’s warblers nest near where they were hatched, although they tend to return to their first nest site in succeeding years. The technique has its limitations, though. No matter how many songbirds you band in their summer habitat, the odds of detecting banded birds on their wintering grounds are vanishingly small.  

As of the turn of the century, 140,000 Wilson’s warblers had been banded in the United States and Canada; only three of those were ever recovered in Mexico and Central America.  

For larger birds, like the stars of Winged Migration, there’s now a high-tech alternative: portable radio transmitters that allow satellite tracking. A recent study of northern pintails, for instance, followed one duck from the Sacramento Valley through the Warner Valley in Oregon and the Kenai Peninsula and Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta in Alaska to her stopping point on the Kanchalan River in Siberia. Radiotelemetry has also worked with hawks and albatrosses. But a Wilson’s warbler weighs about a third of an ounce, and rigging it with a transmitter is just not practical. 

To a limited extent, genetic analysis can indicate a migrant’s point of departure. Studies of both nuclear and mitochondrial DNA show a clear distinction between eastern and western populations of Wilson’s warblers. But with nuclear DNA, at least, it’s harder to discriminate between, say, a California breeder and a bird from the northern Rockies. Biologists speculate that there’s a lot of gene flow among western populations. 

The best clue, it turns out, is feather chemistry. The isotopic content of a warbler’s feather can reveal how far north it was when the feather grew—and to a degree, how far uphill and away from the seacoast. An isotope, remember, is a stable form of an element like carbon or hydrogen, with a specific atomic weight. 

Carbon can be either C12, with six protons and six neutrons, or C13, with an extra neutron. Add a neutron to plain hydrogen and you get deuterium. The ratio of heavy to normal carbon and hydrogen isotopes is related to latitude: the nearer the North Pole, the higher the proportions of deuterium and C13. These elements follow a path from rainfall to plants to plant-eating insects to insect-eating-warblers. When a warbler goes through its summer molt after nesting, the new set of feathers it grows contains a distinctive isotopic signature.  

So all you have to do is mist-nest a warbler in Mexico or Costa Rica, snip a feather sample, and run it through your mass spectrometer, and you’ll have a rough idea of the location of its breeding grounds. The technique was apparently first used by biologists at Dartmouth with the black-throated blue warbler, an eastern species that winters in the Caribbean. Other researchers, including Sonya Clegg and Mari Kimura at San Francisco State’s Center for Tropical Research, then applied it to western birds like the McGillivray’s and Wilson’s warblers. The San Francisco State group also looked at genetic patterns for a finer-grained resolution. 

As reported in a 2003 article in Molecular Ecology, the hydrogen isotopes had some interesting stories to tell about the travels of the Wilson’s warbler. The bird shows a pattern of “leapfrog migration”, with the northernmost nesters wintering farthest south—a phenomenon previously documented for a few other species, like the fox sparrow. Since coastal nesters have higher deuterium values than interior nesters, Clegg, Kimura, and their colleagues were also able to report that warblers from coastal sites like Oregon’s Siuslaw National Forest and California’s Pillar Point spend the winter in western Mexico—Baja California Sur and Sinaloa, to be exact. Colorado warblers, on the other hand, migrate to comparable latitudes in eastern Mexico. 

Given that, I could conclude that the Wilson’s I saw from my back steps was headed for the neighborhood of Cabo San Lucas, or maybe Mazatlan. And I could only hope that it found semi-intact habitat when it got there. Wilson’s is less specialized in its wintering-ground preferences than some other warblers; in Costa Rica, it’s even been observed above timberline, in the chilly paramo. But it would find a cornfield, or a beach resort, less than ideal.  

The recent report on diversity on Berkeley’s commissions, which was sparked by Councilmember Kriss Worthington with colleagues Darryl Moore and Max Anderson as allies, will provide food for thought for a long time in the city. I’ve only seen the news accounts, but haven’t read the report myself, or even seen a tight statistical analysis of its data or methodology, so I’m not in a position to comment intelligently on its results per se. But the question of whether students in a college town should be represented on civic bodies in proportion to their numbers in the population is an interesting one which lends itself to a bit of blue-sky analysis. 

No one would now argue that student residents shouldn’t be allowed to vote in local elections, but when I was the wife of a graduate student in a Midwestern college town that was taken for granted. When I was a “temporary” resident of Ann Arbor (we stayed 12 years) I argued (and would still argue) that a current student generation represents the class interests of all the students who will come after them, and that’s why they need to vote in local elections. Most places, including Berkeley, have now come around to that point of view. California has ever-tighter restrictions on becoming an official Californian for tuition fee purposes, but at the same time all students who are U.S. citizens can register to vote with no restrictions from the day they move in.  

But is that the same as saying that students should have exact percentage representation on all local governing bodies at all times? I’m not so sure. We’re not close to that yet, but should we be working toward it? 

Councilmember Worthington, whose district includes most of the younger students who live in the big dorms, is proud of his record in this area: about half of his appointments to commissions have been students. But veteran observers of students’ commission performance are not so sure that the results have been all good. They complain that student appointees miss many meetings, with exams and trips “back home” frequently given as excuses. Students can be tempted to accept appointments because they are a worthwhile notch on post-school resumes, but the tedious work of participation is less attractive. I myself have seen too many student appointees have trouble following the ball at commission meetings because they haven’t done their homework: haven’t read their packets or made the site visits needed for decision-making. I’ve seen others who illustrate the cliché that a little learning is a dangerous thing, who have attempted to cram a real-life situation with local humans involved into paradigms half-mastered from Planning 101.  

On the other hand, some of the best work on boards and commissions has also been done by student commissioners. It’s generally accepted that the high school member of the Berkeley School Board (who can’t even vote) is often the liveliest and most intelligent participant in discussions. Student commissioners like Jesse Arreguin have added vigorous independent voices to decision-making. Whatever problems there might be with the wrong students being put on commissions could be remedied by consistently finding the right students. 

One of the less desirable consequences of Berkeley’s shift to district elections from at-large elections is that many students are crammed into a couple of council districts. Before district elections, at least one and often more students were elected city-wide. When district boundaries were redrawn a couple of years ago, the council majority made an unsuccessful (and not very intelligent) attempt to create at least one district where students might hope to capture a council seat. If the “progressive” council sincerely wanted to create a student seat, their math was seriously off, and some have questioned their sincerity.  

The result in District 8 in the last election was to create a district where the beleaguered progressive long-term residents of the neighborhoods suffering most from university impact were marginalized by the decision of so-called progressives from other parts of town to support a student candidate who was sure to lose. Cynics have portrayed this campaign as a tactic aimed at corralling student votes for their mayoral candidate, with no real desire to elect a student councilmember. Bottom line: both progressive candidates, the student and the neighbor, lost. The most conservative candidate won. But since the mayor has revealed himself to be far, far to the right of the person progressives thought they were drafting, this might have been the plan all along. 

Here’s a modest proposal for remedying this sorry state of affairs. How about adding two more at-large councilmembers? This would probably ensure the election of a student voice to the council, since students could pool their votes regardless of where they lived. And with each at-large councilmember appointing commissioners, it would also solve the commission diversity problem. 

An incidental benefit of adding at-large councilmembers would to give perspective to the role of the mayor, who under the Berkeley City Charter should be little more than an at-large member with a few ceremonial duties thrown in. Recent incumbents have abrogated to themselves duties not allocated by the charter, like making back-room deals with the biggest local developers about how our city should be redesigned. If mayors were simply one of three at-large councilmembers, it might be harder for them to throw their weight around. Initiative, anyone?  

Topic A among the chattering classes on Sunday was the curious case of Judith (we all call her Judy now) Miller. People we talked to (five or six regular New York Times news consumers, intelligent, well-educated, on top of things) had all read the two pieces in the Times, one by other reporters and the other by Judy herself, and they uniformly reported themselves to be more confused than ever. It’s less and less clear (1) what she thought she was doing, (2) why she went to jail, and (3) what “The Times” wearing all its various departmental hats (news, editorial, publisher) thought it was doing. 

Here are a few of the hardest passages to parse from the reporters’ piece, with the questions raised by those with whom we talked about them: 

“As Ms. Miller, 57, remained resolute and moved closer to going to jail for her silence, the leadership of The Times stood squarely behind her. ‘She’d given her pledge of confidentiality,’ said Arthur Sulzberger Jr., the publisher. ‘She was prepared to honor that. We were going to support her.’ But Mr. Sulzberger and the paper’s executive editor, Bill Keller, knew few details about Ms. Miller’s conversations with her confidential source other than his name. They did not review Ms. Miller’s notes.” 

Why, from the beginning, didn’t the editors at the Times, including Keller, the executive editor, know all about the big national stories a key reporter was working on? Supposedly what differentiates a newspaper from a blog is that newspaper reporters get the benefit of interactive criticism and advice from experienced editors who are outside the story. Editors are not there just to catch the misspelled names that the spell-checker skipped. This passage sounds like Miller was routinely encouraged to go out on any limb she chose in reporting a story, with editors prepared to catch her only when she started to fall.  

More: 

“Interviews show that the paper’s leaders, in taking what they considered to be a principled stand, ultimately left the major decisions in the case up to Ms. Miller, an intrepid reporter whom editors found hard to control. ‘This car had her hand on the wheel because she was the one at risk,’ Mr. Sulzberger said.” 

“Interviews show…?” With whom? About what? This kind of quasi-passive sentence construction always sounds like the writer has something to hide. Did “interviews” turn up any other “leaders” who advised her? Did any of the Times’ numerous editors ever suggest to her that protecting whistle-blowers who help you get to the truth is not the same thing as shielding spin-doctors who are trying to shape your story?  

Is Judy special, somehow different from other Times reporters? The ex-Timesmen quoted in the article seemed to think so: 

“‘Judy is a very intelligent, very pushy reporter,’ said Stephen Engelberg, who was Ms. Miller’s editor at The Times for six years and is now a managing editor at The Oregonian in Portland. ‘Like a lot of investigative reporters, Judy benefits from having an editor who’s very interested and involved with what she’s doing.’ ” 

Do other, less pushy reporters at the Times also operate unsupervised? In the 30-odd years I’ve known investigative reporters, a newish breed with a cowboy attitude that first surfaced in the early seventies, I’ve never met one who didn’t need to interact with an editor.  

Another ex-Times editor said that Judy had told him “I can do whatever I want.” How many other reporters can say the same? Perhaps the Times should reveal which of its investigative stories are written by unsupervised reporters, so readers can assign a credibility index to them.  

Miller appears to be managing her own legal case with no guidance from Times management and little consensus among her Times-paid lawyers. Is she doing a good job of it? Not really. For example: “... she said she felt that if Mr. Libby had wanted her to testify, he would have contacted her directly.” 

Are we really supposed to believe that she spent three months in jail because she was reluctant to have her lawyer ask Scooter Libby’s lawyer if he really, really, really did mean that he didn’t mind if she revealed his name? Sorry—this isn’t a story about a high school girl who’s trying to decide whether to invite her heartthrob to the prom. That’s what lawyers are for, to be intermediaries so their clients can avoid the potential embarrassment of making requests that are rebuffed.  

If anything sensible is starting to emerge from this unbelievable saga, it’s how perilous it is for the news media to rely on nameless sources for major stories. The overuse of this practice started with the Pentagon papers, and was reinforced by Watergate, but it leaves reporters and editors vulnerable to being used as conduits for phony information handed out by duplicitous sources for their own benefit. Judy was conned once by Achmed Chalabi, who planted the infamous nuclear tube story for which the Times later apologized. The paper seems to have learned nothing from the experience, since they turned her loose right away to be similarly spun by Libby, Rove, Cheney et al. The Wen Ho Lee story was a similar debacle, in which the Times’ formerly respectable Jeff Gerth and another reporter allowed themselves to be duped by administration operatives into doing a phony espionage story with their editors apparently out to lunch.  

Here at the Daily Planet we don’t get many big-time stories like these. But you will seldom (I’d really prefer never) see quotes or stories in this paper attributed to “an anonymous source,” “ officials” or “leaders.” Once in a very great while a vulnerable person will tell us something so important that we’ll decide we have to pass it along while concealing the speaker’s identity, but in such cases you can be darn sure that the editors know the whole story, including who the source is. We think that should be the rule for all news media. 

c

TUESDAY, OCT. 18 

Mini-Rangers at Tilden Park Join us for an afternoon of nature study, conservation and rambling through the woods and water. Dress to get dirty, and bring a healthy snack to share. For children age 8-12, unaccompanied by their partents. Cost is $6-$8. Registration required. 636-1684. 

Berkeley Garden Club “Creating a World Class Plant Collection in Your Backyard” with Paul Licht, director, UC Botanical Garden, at 1 p.m. at Epworth Methodist Church, 1953 Hopkins St. 527-5641. 

“Compost: Green Waste to Gardener’s Gold” at 4 p.m. at Franklin Elementary School, 915 Foothill Blvd., Oakland. Cost is $20. Sponsored by the Watershed Project. 665-3546. 

Hiking and Backpacking Big Sur, a slide presentation with Analise Elliot at 7 p.m. at REI, 1338 San Pablo Ave. 527-4140. 

“Our Town” Benefit for Berkeley Historical Society and Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association at 8 p.m. at Berkeley Rep. Tickets are $30. For reservations mention code #100. 647-2949. 

“Ending Hunger and Poverty in the US and Africa” A workshop from 4 to 6 p.m. followed by a dinner fundraiser for the Food First/Institute for Food Development and Policy at Jack London Aquatic Center, 115 Embarcadero. For reservations call 654-4400, ext. 234. www.foodfirst.org 

“Managing HIV/AIDS in Botswana” with Prof. Alinah Segobye, Univ. of Botswana, at 4 p.m. at 652 Barrows Hall, UC Campus. 642-8338. 

“Shrinking Cities and Culture Led Regeneration” with Jasmin Aber, Inst. of Urban and Regional Development, at 7:30 p.m. at International House, 2299 Piedmont Ave. Cost is $5. 642-9460. 

Berkeley Salon Discussion Group meets to discuss “Energy Systems: Ours and Theirs” from 7 to 9 p.m. in a private home. Call for details 527-1022. 

“Do It Yourself Investing” with Marty Schiffenbauer at 7 p.m. in the Community Room, Berkeley Public Library, 2090 Kittredge. 981-6100. 

Feng Shui for a Healthy Home with Nadine Oei of Integrated Spaces for Healthy Living at 7 p.m. at El Cerrito Library, 6510 Stockton Ave. Free. 526-7512.  

American Red Cross Blood Services Volunteer Orientation at 6 p.m. at 6230 Claremont Ave. RSVP to 594-5165. 

“Living with Ones and Twos” with Meg Zweiback, nurse practitioner, at 7 p.m. at Bananas, 5232 Claremont Ave. Registration required. 658-7353. www.bananasinc.org 

Berkeley Walking in Authority, Women’s Missionary Society March begins at 8 a.m. at Old City Hall to St. Paul AME Church, 2024 Ashby Ave. 848-2050. 

Family Story Time at 7 p.m. at the Kensington Branch Library, 61 Arlington Ave., Kensington. Free, all ages welcome. 524-3043. 

Tuesday Tilden Walkers Join a few slowpoke seniors at 9:30 a.m. in the parking lot near the Little Farm for an hour or two walk. 215-7672, 524-9992. 

Berkeley Camera Club meets at 7:30 p.m., at the Northbrae Community Church, 941 The Alameda. 548-3991.  

St. John’s Prime Timers meets at 9:30 a.m. at St. John’s Presbyterian Church, 2727 College Ave. 845-6830. 

Healthy Eating Habits Seminar at 6:30 p.m. in Oakland. Free, registration required. 465-2524. 

WEDNESDAY, OCT. 19 

Tilden Tots Join a nature adventure program for 3 and 4 year olds, each accompanied by an adult (grandparents welcome)! We’ll have a treasure hunt from 10 to 11:30 a.m. Cost is $6-$8. Registration required. 636-1684. 

Tilden Explorers An after-school nature adventure program for 5-7 year olds, who may be accompanied by an adult. We will have a nature treasure hunt from 3:15 to 4:45 p.m. at Tilden Nature Center, Tilden Park. Cost is $6-$8, registration required. 636-1684. 

South Berkeley Community Church Capital Restoration Campaign with speakers on the history of South Berkeley, at 7:30 p.m. at 1802 Fairview St. at Ellis. Sponsored by Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association. Suggested donation of $15 benefits the church’s restoration campaign. 841-2242. www.berkeleyheritage.com 

Berkeley Reads Together Kick-off with free book giveaway of “The House on Mango Street” by Sandra Cisneros at 11:30 a.m. at the West Berkeley Senior Center, 1900 Sixth St., with Mayor Tom Bates and Library Director Jackie Griffin.  

Walking Tour of Old Oakland around the restored 1870s business district. Meet at 10 a.m. in front of G.B. Ratto’s at 827 Washington St. Tour lasts 90 minutes. 238-3234. 

“Baffled by the Ballot?” A pre-election forum on the November election ballot measures, with Assemblywoman Wilma Chan, Sharon Cornu, head of Alameda County Central Labor Council and Serena Clayton, Executive Director, California School Health Centers Association at 7 p.m. at the Rockridge Library, 5366 College Ave., Oakland. 

“Gaza First or Gaza Last” a lecture with Marcia Freedman, Jewish Alliance for Justice and Peace at 7 p.m. in the Dinner Boardroom, GTU Hewlett Library, 2400 Ridge Rd. 649-2482. 

Home/Office Hazard Reduction Learn about low-cost actions you can take to make your home or office safer at 2:30 p.m. at Easy Does It, 1744A University Ave. Sponsored by Collaborating Agencies Responding to Disaster. 451-3140. 

“Intellegent Design: A Unique View of Globalization and Science” with Dr. Gunther Stent at 7:30 p.m. at International House, 2299 Piedmont Ave. Cost is $5. 642-9460. 

Acupuncture and Integrative Medicine College Open House at 6 p.m. at 2550 Shattuck Ave. Tours and information for prospective students. To RSVP call 666-8248, ext. 106.  

Community Gathering at the Berkeley Drop-In Center from 7 to 8:30 p.m. to meet staff and members and discuss future activities, at 3234 Adeline St. 652-9462. 

Berkeley Public Library Teen Amnesty Week through Sat. Oct. 22. Teens, bring your high school ID, and the Berkeley Public Library will work with you to clear your library record. 981-6135, 548-1240 (TTY). 

“Time for an Oil Change” A lecture on dietary fats at 10:30 a.m. at Alta Bates Summit Merritt Pavilion, Cafeteria Annex B, 350 Hawthorne Ave., Oakland. Cost is $5. RSVP to 869-6737. 

Berkeley Communicators Toastmasters at 7:15 a.m. at Au Coquelet Cafe, 2000 University Ave. at Milvia. 435-5863.  

Entrepreneurs Networking at 8 a.m. at A’Cuppa Tea, 3202 College Ave. at Alcatraz. Cost is $5. 562-9431.  

“American Jewish Films of the 60s and 70s” with Riva Gambert at noon at the BRJCC, 1414 Walnut St. Brown bag lunch. Cost is $5. 848-0237. 

Dishka for Enlightenment and Healing at 7:30 p.m. at Berkwood Hedge School, 1809 Bancroft Way, enter on Grant St. Donation $15-$35. 453-0606. 

THURSDAY, OCT. 20 

Tilden Tots Join a nature adventure program for 3 and 4 year olds, each accompanied by an adult (grandparents welcome)! We’ll have a treasure hunt from 10 to 11:30 a.m. Cost is $6-$8. Registration required. 636-1684. 

“Adventures of a Wildlife Photographer” From Kenya to the Alameda Wildlife Refuge, with Eleanor Bricetti at 7:30 p.m. at the Northbrae Community Church, 941 The Alameda. Sponsored by the Golden Gate Audobon Society. www.goldengateaudobon.org 

Lights On Afterschool Berkeley’s after school programs will be open to the public from 4 to 7 p.m. with student performan- 

ces, special activities, art projects, food and fun. Start at 3 p.m. at Civic Center Park. 883-6146. www.afterschoolalliance.org  

LeConte Neighborhood Association meets at 7:30 p.m. at the LeConte School Cafeteria. Agenda includes Downtown Area Plan, UC Student/Neighbor Relations, Disaster Preparedness, and a report from our Berkeley Police Beat Officer. KarlReeh@aol.com 

Peoples’ Radio Public Forum on the State of KPFA at 7 p.m. at Fellowship of Humanity Hall, 390 27th St/411 28th St., between Broadway and Telegraph in Oakland. Donation of $5 requested, no one turned away for lack of funds. 326-3268.  

Simplicity Forum on Cutting Costs at 6:30 p.m. at Claremont Branch Library, 2940 Benvenue. 549-3509. 

“Mao’s Revolution: What Remains?” with Roderick MacFarquhar and Orville Schell at 7:30 p.m. at Sibley Auditorium, UC Campus.  

“Rumi and Islam: The Mystical Path of Sufism” at 7 p.m. at Starr King School for Ministry, 2441 LeConte Ave. 845-6232.  

FRIDAY, OCT. 21 

City Commons Club Noon Luncheon with Phillip F. Elwood, “Jazz, Recordings and American Social History.” Luncheon at 11:45 a.m. for $13.50, speech at 12:30 p.m., at the Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant St. For information and reservations call 526-2925.  

Country Faire with homemade crafts and food, from noon to 4 p.m. and Sat. from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. at First United Methodist Church, 201Martina St., Pt. Richmond. 964-9901. 

Conscientious Projector Film Series “Redemption” The life of Stanley “Tookie” WIlliams at 7 p.m. at Berkeley Fellowship, Cedar at Bonita. Suggested donation $10. 

“China’s Cultural Revolution” with photographer Li Zhensheng, talk at 3 p.m., panel discussion at 6:30 p.m. at North Gate Hall, UC Campus. 

“Osama” A screening of the film followed by a discussion at 7:30 p.m. at Buttner Auditorium, College Prep School, 6100 Boradway, Oakland. Free. www.college-prep.org 

“Demystifying Activism One Breath at a Time” with Holly Near at 8 p.m. at Unitarian Universalist Church of Berkeley, One Lawson Rd. Suggested donation $20. 525-0302, 306. 

Battle of Trafalgar Victory Ball, sponsored by the Bay Area English Regency Society, at 8 p.m. at Arlington Community Church, 52 Arlington Ave., Kensington. Tickets are $15-20. 650-365-2913. 

French Conversation Night at 6:30 pm at the Alliance Francaise of Berkeley, 2004 Woolsey St. Potluck, bring a dish to share or a bottle of wine. 548-7481.  

Spirit Walking: Chi in Water Class Meets Fri. at noon at Berkeley YMCA, through Dec. 9. Cost is $21-$50. 665-3228. 

Berkeley Chess Club meets at 8 p.m. at the East Bay Chess Club, 1940 Virginia St. 845-1041. 

Women in Black Vigil noon to 1 p.m. at UC Berkeley, Bancroft at Telegraph. 548-6310. 

SATURDAY, OCT. 22 

Where Do All the Leaves Go? Learn about why leaves change color and fall, and other signs of autumn, for ages 7 and up, from 2 to 4 p.m. at Tilden Nature Center, Tilden Park. Cost is $5-$7, reservations required. 525-2233. 

Walking Tour of Oakland Chinatown Meet at 10 a.m. at the courtyard fountain in the Pacific Renaissance Plaza at 388 Ninth St. Tour lasts 90 minutes. Reservations can be made by calling 238-3234. www.oaklandnet.com/walkingtours 

Groceries from the Garden A hands-on after-school workshop for educators on how sustainable agriculture and locally grown food benefit the health of students and the environment. From 4 to 6 p.m. at UC Berkeley Richmond Field Station, 1327 South 46th St., Richmond. Cost is $20. Registration required. Sponsored by the Watershed Project. 665-3430. www.thewatershedproject.org 

Dolores Huerta Interviewed by Amy Goodman at 7:30 p.m. at First Congregational Church, 2501 Harrison St. at 27th, Oakland. Tickets are $15 in advance, $18 at the door, $50 for reserved seats and reception. Benefits Pace e Bene Nonviolence Service. 268-8765. www.paceebene.org 

Options for Youth in Times of War A counter-recruitment conference Sat. 9:30 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. and Sun. 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. at Valley Life Sciences Building, UC Campus. Free for youth under 25. Donation $10-$25. 268-9006. www.objector.org/moos-bay.html 

Haiti Action with attoneys representing Haitian political prisoners at 5:30 p.m. at Trinity United Methodist Church, 2362 Bancroft Way. Cost is $15-$30, includes dinner. RSVP to 548-4141. 

Sports 4 Kids Benefit Yard Sale from 8 a.m. to noon at Rosa Parks School, 920 Allston Way at 8th St . 

Alameda Public Affairs Forum with Peter Schrag, discussing “The California Special Election: What are the Issues?” at 7 p.m. at the Home of Truth Center, 1300 Grand Street, Alameda. www.alamedaforum.org 

NAACP Life Membership Banquet with Belva Davis and Byron Williams at the Elks Lodge in Alameda. Tickets are $50. 232-2171. 865-1151. 

Friends of the Richmond Public Library Booksale from 11 to 3 p.m. in the Community Room adjacent to the Main Library at 525 Civic Center Plaza, Richmond. 

The Misty Redwood Run A 10 K fun run to benefit the Bay Area Coalition for Headwaters. Starts at 8:30 a.m. at Redwood Regional Park, Redwood Gate entrance, 7867 Redwood Rd., Oakland. Cost is $20-$25. Register online at www.theschedule.com 548-3113.  

Brew at the Zoo a benefit for the Oakland Zoo with live music, animal feedings and behind-the-scenes tours from 6 to 9 p.m. at the Oakland Zoo. Tickets are $30. 632-9525.  

Origins of Halloween, Celtic and South American stories at 6 p.m. in Oakland. Cost is $7-$10. Call for location and to reserve a space, New Acropolis Cultural Association, 986-0317. 

Evergreens in the Garden with garden designer Aerin Moore at 10 a.m. at Magic Gardens, 729 Heinz Ave. 644-2351. 

East Bay Genealogical Society with Marston Watson, the direct descendant of sixteen patriots who served in the Revolutionary War, at 10 a.m. in the Library Conference Room of the Family History Center, 4766 Lincoln Ave., Oakland. 635-6692.  

Free Help with Computers at the El Cerrito Library to learn about email, searching the web, the library’s online databases, or basic word processing. Workshops held on Sat. a.m. at 6510 Stockton Ave., El Cerrito. Registration required. 526-7512.  

Spirit Walking Aqua Chi (TM) A gentle water exercise class at 10 a.m. at the Berkeley High Warm Pool. Cost is $3.50 per session. 526-0312. 

SUNDAY, OCT. 23 

Morning Bird Walk to welcome back the Northern Flicker, Kinglets and others, at 9:30 a.m. at Tilden Nature Area, Tilden Park. 525-2233. 

Solo Sierrans Sunrise Hike Meet at 6 a..m. at Inspiration Point in Tilden Park. We’ll start by moonlight, and watch the sun rise from Wildcat Peak and return before noon.Bring warm clothing and flashlight. Rain cancels. 601-1211. 

Halloween Animals Learn the facts and myths about owls and bats from 2 to 4:30 p.m. at Tilden Nature Area, Tilden Park. Cost is $6-$8, registration required. 525-2233. 

Berkeley Historical Society Walking Tour of the transformations around the Old Santa Fe Station, from 10 a.m. to noon. Cost is $8-$10. For information call 848-0181. www.cityofberkeley.info/histsoc 

Days of the Dead Family Festival with craft activities, music, dance, cermonia and mercado, from noon to 4 p.m. at the Oakland Museum of California, 10th and Oak Sts. 238-2200. www.museumca.org 

House Tour of the Homes of Haddon Hill from 1 to 5 p.m. A self-guided tour of nine beautiful homes and the Cleveland Cascade. Cost is $25-$35. For reservations call 763-9218. www.oaklandheritage.org  

Peace It Together A collaborative art festival for healing and peacemaking from 1 to 5 p.m. at Charlie Dorr Park on Acton St. between Bancroft and Allston.  

Free Sailboat Rides between 1 and 4 p.m. at the Cal Sailing Club in the Berkeley Marina. Bring warm waterproof clothes. www.cal-sailing.org 

East Bay School for Girls Raffle and Auction from 2 to 4 p.m. at St. John’s Presbyterian CHurhc, 2727 College Ave. 849-9444. www.ebsg.org 

International Women’s Writing Group meets to discuss writing about ancestors at 3 p.m. at Cody’s Books on Fourth St. 559-9500. 

“In the Shadow of Gaza” a report-back with Wendy Kaufmyn who volunteered with the International Women’s Peace Service at 2 p.m. at Berkeley Public Library, Community Room, 2090 Kittredge St. 981-6100. 

Berkeley City Club free tours from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. at 2315 Durant Ave. 848-7800. 

Free Garden Tours at Regional Parks Botanic Garden in Tilden Park Sat. and Sun. at 2 p.m. Call to confirm. 841-8732. www.nativeplants.org 

MONDAY, OCT. 24 

Flu Shots for Berkeley Residents age 60 or over or “high-risk” from 9 a.m. to noon, and 1 to 2 p.m. at the North Berkeley Senior Center. 981-5300. 

Berkeley Reads Together Free copies of “House on Mango Street” by Sandra Cisneros in English and Spanish will be distributed at 2 p.m. at all Berkeley Public Library locations, while supplies last. 981-6100. 

Freedom From Tobacco Class from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. at the South Berkeley Senior Center. Free acupuncture option. 981-5330. 

AARP Driver Safety Certification Program from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m., also on Oct. 31, at Jewish Family & Children’s Services, 828 San Pablo Ave., Albany. To register, call 558-7800. 

Amazon Gathering: Healing Arts of the Rainforest at 7 p.m. at the Teleosis Institute, 1512B Fifth St. Donation $15. RSVP to 558-7285. 

“Contemporary Drug Therapy for Parkinson’s Patients” at 10:30 a.m. at Elephant Pharmacy, 1607 Shattuck Ave.  

Family Storytelling Night with Muriel Johnson telling African folk tales, at 6:30 p.m. at Bananas, 5232 Claremont Ave. Registration required. 658-7353. www.bananasinc.org 

Kensington Book Club meets at 7 p.m. at the Kensington Library, 61 Arlington Ave. 524-3043. 

CITY MEETINGS 

City Council meets Tues., Oct. 18, at 7 p.m in City Council Chambers. 981-6900.  

Board of Library Trustees Special Meeting at 2 p.m. at the Central Library, 4th Flr. Story Room. 981-6195. 

Citizens Humane Commission meets Wed., Oct. 19, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. 981-6601. 

Commission on Aging meets Wed., Oct. 19, at 1:30 p.m., at the South Berkeley Senior Center. William Rogers, 981-5344.  

Commission on Disability meets Wed., Oct. 19, at 6:30 p.m. at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Don Brown, 981-6346. TDD: 981-6345.  

Planning Commission meets Wed., Oct. 19, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Janet Homrighausen, 981-7484.  

Design Review Committee meets Thurs., Oct. 20, at 7:30 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. 981-7415.  

Fair Campaign Practices Commission meets Thurs., Oct. 20, at 7:30 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Prasanna Rasaih, 981-6950.  

Transportation Commission meets Thurs., Oct. 20, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. 981-7000.