UC Berkeley dominated Berkeley’s land use news in 2005. -more-

While UC Berkeley projects dominated the politics of land use in the surrounding city, numerous other projects kept the city hopping in 2005. -more-

The biggest story in Oakland in 2005 was a story not actually scheduled to take place until 2006: the race to succeed Jerry Brown as mayor. -more-

Storm-related calls have kept Berkeley firefighters hopping over the past week, said Assistant Fire Chief Lucky Thomas. -more-

City officials, commissioners and the public spent much of 2005 not only debating the politics of development and land use but formulating proposals for new laws governing both new development and existing construction. -more-

The news reports about California’s weather at the end of 2005 and its consequences in many communities around here, coupled with the downpour on Monday, the first workday of 2006 for some of us, have inevitably engendered out-of-control metaphor formation. Here in Berkeley we have no major river to overwhelm the city, which they have in Napa. We have little fresh hillside construction to create landslides as they do in Southern California. Granted, our antique storm drains and aging utility wires create a few flooded intersections and short-term power outages, but by and large Berkeley can seem like an island in the storm most of the time. As it does, by and large, in the storm now gathering on the national political scene. -more-