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With its roster finally decided Thursday, the advisory group that will work with city and UC Berkeley officials on a new downtown plan is ready for its first session Monday night. 

The meeting of the Downtown Area Plan Advisory Committee, which begins at 7 p.m. with the swearing in of the panel’s 21 members, will be held in the General Purpose Room of the North Berkeley Senior Center, 1901 Hearst Ave., at Martin Luther King Jr. Way. 

The Planning Commission elected three of its own members and each city councilmember named two, with Councilmember Kriss Worthington naming his two appointments Thursday afternoon—Patti Dacey and Jesse Arreguin. 

A member of the Landmarks Preservation Commission, Dacey also serves on the city Public Works Commission and the LeConte Neighborhood Association Board of Directors. 

“She also served on the board of directors of Berkeley Tenants’ Union number seven back when we had tenants’ unions,” said Worthington. 

His second pick was Arreguin, who bridges the town/gown gap by serving as a Berkeley Rent Board commissioner, as a city housing commissioner and is a UC Berkeley student. 

Mayor Tom Bates appointed the chair, Bay Conservation and Development Commission (BCDC) Executive Director Will Travis.  

The Downtown Area Plan was mandated by the settlement of the city’s lawsuit against the university, filed after the school revealed its Long Range Development Plan (LRDP), for 2020. 

Matt Taecker, a planner hired just to work on the plan, said he looks forward the meeting. 

“We’re ready to bring people up to speed, and I think we’re going to have a good meeting,” he said. 

The agenda, which is available on the committee’s website at www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/dapac, allows three-and-a-half hours for the initial session. 

After a presentation by Taecker and other city staff, the meeting will feature a 45-minute public comment period, followed by a discussion of the existing downtown plan and an overview of the tasks ahead for the commission. 

Taecker said the committee will take a walking tour, with the public invited, through the planning area from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 26. Details will be posted on the city’s website. 

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

Two lawsuits challenging the settlement—and therefore the legitimacy of the planning process—are now pending further action in the courts. o