Seven years after Jerry Brown was elected mayor of Oakland in part on a promise that his “10K Initiative” would lead to a retail revival in the city’s downtown, the area where the housing component has been most successful has yet to see the promised commercial development. -more-

Should Berkeley charge developers a fee to help alleviate traffic generated by their projects? And, if so, how much? -more-

City employees are driving less and using more alternative forms of transportation, according to a survey unveiled at Thursday night’s Transportation Commission meeting. -more-

Mark Treeker, an organizer with the organization The World Can’t Wait, led a mock detainee through Sproul Plaza Monday afternoon. Participants rallied against Boalt Hall Professor John Yoo’s role in drafting U.S. legal memos that the group says led to torture in places such as Guantanamo Bay and Iraq. -more-

City Councilmembers will face a relatively light agenda when they meet tonight (Tuesday), including a proposed revision to Berkeley’s “by-right” home addition ordinance and two competing resolutions on the demolition of a UC Berkeley landmark. -more-

Berkeley planning commissioners will get their first chance Wednesday to ponder rezoning West Berkeley to attract car dealerships. -more-

Ignacio Chapela, the UC Berkeley professor whose tenure battle came to symbolize the movement to protect scientific research from corporate interests, withdrew his lawsuit against the school last week, but promised to continue to “expose a deeply damaging miscarriage of the university’s mandate.” -more-

In response to accreditation warning letters sent out by the Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC) earlier this year, the Peralta Community Colleges District and its four member institutions released mandated reports last week outlining progress made in addressing WASC’s criticisms. -more-

A month ago, for the first time in 40 years, Barbara Morita walked into a church in El Cerrito and sat quietly in a pew. -more-

Sex abuse alleged -more-

CORRECTION -more-

In his Oct. 14 New York Times column, “Questions of Character,” Paul Krugman lamented the media’s failure to discern the true character of President Bush. Krugman observed that in 2000 the press portrayed George as an “honest, likable guy” and in 2004 as “a strong effective leader.” -more-

In Tony Mirosevich’s non-fiction class at San Francisco State University, we are constantly asked to explore the soft, wavy lines between truth and fiction, between what is real and what is not real. For a recent assignment we were instructed to write about a personal memory and combine it with someone else’s memory of the same event, or write our remembrance of a singular occurrence at several junctures in our lives, filtered through time, emotion, and experience. -more-

We all know that street crime is a problem in Berkeley. While we may differ as to its causes, we all understand that the economic transformation currently underway in South Berkeley is a huge contributor to that problem. Economic dislocation and gentrification are the realities of South Berkeley. In many neighborhoods, economic “gaps” between residents contribute to generate tension and suspicion. Newly arrived, white neighbors are offen are offended by the conditions they find in these neighborhoods. Working closely with police to identify “suspicious” people and “drug dealers,” neighborhood groups are finding “creative ways” to “combat” drug dealers. Apparently, this includes holding an 75-year-old woman responsible for “allowing” drug activity in her neighborhood. -more-

Smart students! Nobel prizes! Touchdowns! Is this what the “blue and gold” means to you? If so, you may not realize that along with the good comes a dark side that dominates the lives of those who live near UC. If gold reflects the prestige and glamor of UC Berkeley, then blue represents the bruised and distressed Berkeleyans who underwrite that glamor. -more-

Josiah Royce (1855-1916) was born at 207 Mill St. in Grass Valley, high in the Sierra gold country, and spent the first 10 years of his life there. He remembered the town as full of weather-beaten old shacks and rusting machinery. Years later his wife described it as “a place that was nothing in a situation that was nowhere.” -more-

Modern Italian theater began in the 16th century with the first commedia dell’arte troupes. Drawing upon a vast reservoir of fools from every village and town in Italy, they created the well-known masked characters of the lovers Pierrot and Columbine, the old dotard Pantaloon and his constant antagonist the ridiculous Doctor, the intriguer Brighella, the braggart Captain, cowardly Scaramouch, Punchinello, source of the English Punch, and, the most famous clown of all, Harlequin. -more-

TUESDAY, OCT. 25 -more-

I don’t usually do advocacy; sitting back and watching things go to hell is more my style. But with Halloween approaching, it seems like an auspicious time to make a pitch for the barn owls of Berkeley. -more-

TUESDAY, OCT. 25 -more-