The little red wagons have been swapped for grown-up soft coolers (still red), wagon operators have been replaced by food runners about twice as tall, and food portions are slightly larger, but everything else is about the same: Alternative High School students are receiving a free morning meal. 

On the heels of a successful pilot at Le Conte Elementary School, where students receive classmate-operated red wagon deliveries of trans fat-free, corn syrup-free breakfast food each morning, Alternative High School students are the latest recipients of the Berkeley universal breakfast program. 

Every morning at 8:45 a.m., a representative from each classroom picks up a freezer-sized cooler bag filled with fresh fruits, milk, fresh-baked muffins, organic cereal and other healthy comestibles, and carries the supplies back to classmates for a morning feast. Students eat while teachers take attendance and give announcements. 

Universal breakfast at the alternative school is part of a districtwide effort to encourage students to fill up on wholesome food in the morning. The program is predominantly funded through a federal grant and state reimbursements. 

“All kids should have a healthy start to their day, and not all kids get one,” said Ann Cooper, director of nutrition services for the Berkeley Unified School District. 

Cragmont and Washington elementary schools are expected to join the program in the next six weeks, she said. 

Alternative High School Health Specialist Joy Moore says many students don’t eat breakfast before coming to school. 

“We’re concerned that the kids come to school without eating, then rush to the liquor store at break,” she said, where they buy junk food like soda, packaged doughnuts and candy. 

On March 22, students at the alternative school ate their first free breakfast. When the Daily Planet visited the school Wednesday, about half the students were chowing down—and offering mixed reviews.  

“It’s O.K.,” said Duillermo Ronquillo, a senior, who consumed a muffin in just a few bites. “It could be better. It kind of looks like the food we got back in kindergarten when we got cookies and milk.” 

Wednesday’s meal included low-fat, hormone- and antibiotic-free milk, apples and muffins baked fresh from the Fullbloom Bakery. Another day during the week, students might get fresh scones, yogurt and juice, or foccacia, pears and milk.  

Mayra Marin, a senior, commended the pastries for keeping her alert during class.  

“It helps me stay awake,” she said. “It gives me energy.” 

History teacher Jorge Melgoza agreed the food helps keep students’ attention. 

“When they do eat, they focus,” he said. “Whereas before, they would just nod off.” On Wednesday, though, Melgoza was the only one in his class eating. 

Marcos Soto, a senior, wasn’t eating because he had munched on two doughnuts and chocolate milk before school. Lisette Cooper, a senior, had also already eaten breakfast, but she said she generally likes what the district serves. 

“It’s healthy for you, it’s not like we’re eating junk food,” she said. “If we didn’t have this, we’d be at the store buying chips or soda.” 

Food services assistant Sulma Zevallos said that about half the meals are coming back untouched. “But yesterday, one bag came back totally empty,” she said. 

Moore guesses students are still getting acclimated to the program and to a menu that may be different from what they’re used to eating. Also, she said some students were expecting a hot breakfast—pancakes, eggs, bacon and sausage—and were mildly disappointed to see cold food only. Other students, like Ronquillo, complain the portions are “kid-sized.” 

But Moore is convinced their complaints indicate that the program is working. 

They went from having no breakfast to demanding a better breakfast,” she said. “They’re invested in the program.”

The Oakland City Council took its first formal look at the massive Oak Street to Ninth Street waterfront development project Tuesday night, hearing presentations both from the developers themselves and an overflow crowd of organizations and Oakland resi dents that spilled over into two downstairs hearing rooms at City Hall. 

Interest in the issue was so high that the clerk noted that 110 people filled out speaker card requests after coming to the meeting. That was in addition to representatives of several organizations that had consolidated their presentations to the Council in blocks of time. 

At issue is a 64-acre parcel of land that sits on Oakland’s estuary south of Jack London Square, bounded north and south by Fallon Street and 10th Avenue, and on the east by Embarcadero. 

The land is currently owned by the Port of Oakland. The proposed 3,100 residential unit, 200,000 square foot commercial space development would dwarf the 850 residential unit, 29,000 square foot commercial space Forest City devel opment currently underway in Oakland’s uptown area.  

One of the major issues of contention in the Oak To Ninth controversy is the developer’s proposal to destroy some 90 percent of the Ninth Avenue terminal, a 1,000 foot by 180 foot, 47 foot tall structu re built in 1930 by the Port of Oakland.  

Many local organizations and individuals want to preserve the terminal building. 

A study released last year by the University of California, Berkeley, City Planning 290E class, “Historic Preservation in Califor nia” noted that “few buildings along Oakland’s waterfront remain standing that capture the spirit of the Port of Oakland’s early history. As shipping methods have changed and modernization has occurred, the last vestiges of the historic working waterfro nt have been wiped away by new construction.” 

“Today, one of the last landmarks from this earlier era to survive is the Ninth Avenue Terminal,” the class study continued. “In fact, the Ninth Avenue Terminal is the last of the break-bulk terminals constructed as a part of the Port of Oakland’s massive modernization and improvement program during the later half of the 1920s. The Ninth Avenue Terminal is unparalleled in its importance to the built heritage of the Oakland Waterfront. This massive structure, constructed between 1929 and 1952, offers the community a variety of opportunities to create a lasting landmark and civic resource right alongside the San Francisco Bay.” 

While the initial CEQA study on the development was prepared almost two years ago, in the spring of 2004, and the project has been going through a series  

of public processes, including Environmental Impact Report scoping review, hearings before Oakland’s Design Review Committee, the Landmarks Preservation Advisory Board and the Parks and Recreation Advisory Commission, as well as a series of small public meetings sponsored by the developer, public interest in the project is just beginning to mount. 

The development won Oakland Planning Commission approval on March 15th. It now faces a series of hurdles before City Council, including certification of the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) report, amending the city’s landmark Estuary Policy Plan to accommodate proposed changes in the type and density of housing that the plan a llows, creating of new zoning for the area, and reaching an agreement with Oakland Harbor Partners, the creation of the homebuilders Signature Properties and Concord commercial developers Reynolds & Brown.  

Oakland Planning Director Claudia Cappio told C ity Councilmembers Tuesday night that the Oak To Ninth plan provides a “somewhat different vision of housing than is presently in the estuary plan.” 

The project has already needed special state legislature even to get this far. According to a report by W aterfront Action, an Oakland-based organization dedicated to public access to the city’s waterways, “under the provisions of the California State constitution, the Public Trust lands now located within the planned Oak to Ninth project cannot be used for h ousing and other non-trust uses. The project property includes over 75 percent Public Trust land, so the Port [of Oakland] arranged for Senator [Don] Perata to carry legislation to trade the ‘after acquired’ Public Trust lands within the Oak to Ninth are a for another site in Oakland of equal or higher value. The bill was approved by the Governor September 15, 2004.”  

At one point at Tuesday’s hearing, Oakland Harbor Partners president Michael Ghielmetti noted that both opponents and supporters of the de velopment had worn yellow t-shirts to the meeting with message announcing their respective positions. 

“I hope this is an omen that we can work out our problems,” Ghielmetti said. 

But consensus seemed far away, as representatives of such organizations as the Oak To Ninth Community Benefits Coalition blasted the proposal for everything from its affordable housing and public space provisions to its changes to the existing Estuary Policy Plan. 

Oak To Ninth coalition members said that they wanted an agreeme nt between the city and the developers for 20 percent onsite affordable housing, that the majority of that affordable housing be made up of two- and three-bedroom units for families with children, and that they be within reach of families with income unde r $50,000. 

The coalition also asked that construction of the project be set up so that 300 Oakland residents can be hired as building trades apprentices. 

Fernando Marti, an architect with Asian Neighborhood Design, wanted guarantees that the promised op en space in the project would actually be available to the public. 

“Who are all these parks and amenities for?” he asked. “Are they only going to be for the condominium owners, or are they going to be for all of Oakland?” 

That concern for open space was echoed by former Oakland City Councilmember John Sutter, who said he was “speaking on behalf of the Estuary Policy Plan,” which was adopted as part of Oakland’s General Plan in 1999 and is supposed to dictate what can and cannot be built along the city’s waterfront. 

“What good are the plans if we don’t follow them? The [Oak To Ninth] proposal does not follow the [Estuary Policy Plan] in so far as open space is concerned. The Estuary Plan calls for 35 acres of open space in this area. This [development] plan calls for about 21 acres of new open space.” 

His voice rising, Sutter told Councilmembers to “give us the parks that we were promised. Give us the parks that we voted for.” 

Sutter mentioned the passage of Measure DD, the 2002 water bond measure tha t called for new open space and public park development along Oakland’s waterfront area. 

And Steve Canada, a resident of 5th Avenue near the proposed project area, said, “I am not anti-development, but I have serious concerns about this development.” 

Canada said that he had come to several presentations by Oakland Harbor Partners “and I’ve seen different parts of this project get moved around like pieces on a Monopoly board. I’m concerned that this moving around will continue once this project receives council approval and the project is out of Council’s reach.” 

Infighting over the proposal has already reached City Council, even before Council began formal deliberations on the idea.  

Members of a Grand Lake area organization were circulating an e-mail earlier this week from 3rd District Councilmember Nancy Nadel, a candidate for Oakland mayor in the June elections. 

“I think the city and the port approached this project backwards,” Nadel wrote. “We should have done a specific plan and then found devel opers who would do what we want. When I asked the planning director why that wasn’t the process as outlined in the Estuary Plan, she said that it was less expensive for the city and port to ask the developer to do a plan. And that’s what they did. The res ult is a project that uses too much open space, has buildings that are too tall for the waterfront, tears down an historic building without studying whether it could have a good use, and minimally includes affordable housing. In its current state, it is not a good deal for Oaklanders. The developer will make 17% profit just on the land deal alone—we don’t know what additional profit will be made on the build-out.” 

Nadel’s e-mail concluded that “this is one of the last big parcels of public land and we shouldn’t just give it away.” 

Organization members were also circulating a response from District 2 Councilmember Pat Kernighan, who wrote, “There are certainly plenty of issues raised by the Oak to Ninth project, but I am getting the impression that to o much of the commentary is based on inaccurate facts. … Nancy is incorrect that the proposed project ‘tears down an historic building without studying whether it could have a good use,’ The staff report includes a 25 page, in-depth study of 5 reuse scenarios for the Ninth Ave. Terminal with projected costs and incomes. It concludes that none are financially feasible, but please read it for yourselves, analyze the numbers and draw your own conclusions.” 

Kernighan said that “I am still weighing the good and the bad on this project. There is a lot of information to consider. I understand that there will be divergent views on the value of the project, but let’s all at least get the facts before we make up our minds.” 

Photo by Stephan Babuljak 

Transmerdian Warehouses employee Thomas Ma cleans up water inside of the Ninth Avenue Terminal Building in Oakland. A UC Berkeley study called the structure unparalleled in its importance to the built heritage of the Oakland waterfront. 

Berkeley police arrested two suspects in the Saturday night murder of a father who was shot after he took a gun away from a party goer in his Prince Street home. 

Aderian “Dre” Gaines, 36, died in the bedroom of his home in the 1500 block of Prince Street after he was shot shortly after  

9:30 p.m. Saturday. 

A friend, identified only as “Nat” or Nathaniel, was also shot in the arm. Police have declined to give his name. “He doesn’t want it released,” said Berkeley police spokesperson Officer Ed Galvan. 

The two suspects James Freeman, 29, and Antonio Harris, 18, were arrested in Oakland Wed-nesday, Galvan announced in a written statement. 

Harris, described by Galvan as “the identified shooter,” barricaded himself inside a home near 83rd Avenue and Olive Street in East Oakland after Berkeley Police arrived at the scene about 5 p.m. 

The Berkeley officers called in the Oakland Police Department SWAT Team, and “after a short standoff, Harris surrendered,” Galvan reported. 

Freeman was arrested without incident earlier in the day at an apartment on Kirkham Way in West Oakland by Berkeley homicides investigators, accompanied by a contingent from the BPD Barricaded Suspect Hostage Negotiation Team and Oakland officers. 

Harris was charged with one count of murder and one count of attempted murder. Freeman was booked on one murder count only. 

The murder occurred during a party at the Gaines home, where the family had been hosting events at which participants were charged for admission. 

Saturday night’s party was the celebration of a local student’s 15th birthday, and word of the event had circulated by cell phone text messages, police reported. 

The two suspects were identified as members of a group who, witness Natasha Jackson saiid, had demanded entry and threatened to kick down the door if they were refused. 

Jackson said she called for Gaines after seeing one of the guests, “a 29-year-old,” dancing with a pistol tucked into the waistband of his pants. 

Gaines took the pistol, which Jackson identified as a black nine-millimeter semiautomatic. 

“After Gaines kicked him out of the party, the suspect returned and shot Gaines to death,” Galvan reported. 

Gaines was slain in the front bedroom of the house and “Nat” was apparently shot near the back steps. 

The older man and the shooter then piled into a car along with eight others and fled the scene, Jackson and other witnesses reported. 

Jackson said the older man had many tattoos, including one that identified him as claiming West Oakland identity and another featuring a pistol. 

Party goers had to sign in, and they were also frisked for weapons, Jackson has said. Police took the sign-in sheets, which identified attendees by their geographical area. 

The fence outside the Gaines residence was marked by graffiti, including those of the “South Side Boys,” the name of a South Berkeley gang. Symbols for Oakland groups had been X-ed out. 

One neighbor, who asked not to be identified, said shots had been fired outside after an earlier party at the home, but Galvan was not available Thursday to confirm the account..

After almost five years of struggle between management and workers, peace has finally descended on the majestic Claremont Resort & Spa. 

Unite Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Local 2850 announced Monday that the hotel had finalized contracts wit h hotel and spa employees. 

Hotel workers had been without a contract since September 2001 when management blocked spa workers from joining the union. 

What changed, according to both workers and management, was the new hotel owner. Orlando, Fla.-based CN L Hotels & Resorts, Inc. bought the Claremont in 2004 from KSL Recreation Corp. CNL kept KSL on as the operator for one and one-half years until August when KSL was replaced by management from Interstate Hotels and Resorts. 

“With KSL, I came to work like I was coming to a war zone; there was a lot of stress,” said Fidel Arroyo, who has been a cook at the Claremont for 11 years. Each day Arroyo would think, “Maybe today is the day I lose my job.” 

But in August, the work environment for Arroyo and the other workers was transformed. 

“Immediately, with Interstate everything changed. They gave us a raise immediately,” he said. “And all the management inside the hotel started changing their attitudes.” 

Like Arroyo, Claremont General Manager Mike Czarcinski was in a celebratory mood. 

“I’m overwhelmed with joy,” he said, giving credit to the hotel owners for the positive outcome. “It’s not just Interstate that saw the light. It was the ownership changes to CNL.” 

The agreement raises the workers’ wages and l owers the amount they pay for benefits immediately and continues over the life of the contract. 

“By the end of the contract in 2009, we’ll be matched with the Marriott and Hilton (wages),” Huber said, adding that the new contract includes thousands of dollars in bonuses and retroactive pay. And the employers’ responsibility for paying for benefits increased significantly.  

Another union victory went to spa workers who were able to vote on whether they wanted to unionize. The vote that brought them into the union was held two weeks ago. 

For Arroyo the settlement means he gets just under a $2/hour wage hike over the next two and one-half years and his expenditure for benefits for his family plummets immediately from $250 to $80 and will end up at $25 by the end of the contract period. 

“With KSL we were just showing up for negotiations—it was a waste of time,” said Wei-Ling Huber, HERE Local 2850 vice president, who helped to mount support that included the Rev. Jesse Jackson, a group of local clergy and a unanimous Berkeley City Council. 

There had been lively picket lines and what Huber called “a very successful boycott” of the hotel.  

That boycott has been called off.  

During the labor strife, Arroyo had paid a price for supporting the union. He was suspended from his job two different times. The first suspension came when he was leafleting in front of the hotel, but a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board got him reinstated. The second time he allowed a photo of himself and his family to be used on a union poster calling for the hotel boycott. After that, he was written up “for little things,” he said, and suspended for a week. But an appearance on a local radio show brought a flood of calls to the hotel. “The company had to bring me b ack,” he said. 

Czarcinski said he’s not thinking about the strife of the past. 

“Management is focused on the present and the future. The union and the Claremont are the winners,” he said, urging support for the hotel. “We want to be part of the Berkeley-Oakland community.””µ

A cautious Peralta Board of Trustees gave Chancellor Elihu Harris limited authority to explore the administrative takeover of the troubled Compton Community College District, but only after inserting language giving the board a greater say in the outcome. 

The controversial proposal passed on a 5-1-1 vote at Tuesday’s trustee meeting, with Trustee Nicky Gonzalez-Yuen abstaining because of disagreements over when Harris would be required to report back to the board, and Trustee Marcie Hodge voting no. 

Trustee William Riley said that he was “dumbfounded that out of 109 community colleges in the state, Peralta was the only one it came down to. It makes me wonder, if we were in the same situation as Compton, would somebody come to our aid? The way it looks now, nobody would.” 

Board President Linda Handy added “if not us” stepping in to help, “then who?” 

Handy said that while there were “still more questions than answers” about the proposed takeover, she said that she was confident that there was “a powerful team working on providing those answers.” 

She included Chancellor Harris and California Assemblyman Mervyn Dymally as members of that “powerful team.” 

And Vice President Bill Withrow said that while “we are still not at ease” about the proposal and “we don’t yet know what role we will be playing,” he said that “knowing [Chancellor Harris] like I do, I know that this will be a collaborative effort with both the Peralta and the Compton stakeholders.” 

Following the vote, Harris said that he would immed iately have his staff members begin meeting with Compton officials, faculty, employees, and students to hear their concerns about the proposed takeover. 

But while saying that the Peralta Federation of Teachers would support the administrative takeover “s o long as we can make sure that Peralta is not harmed in any way” and union rights in both districts are protected, PFT President Michael Mills blasted the state accreditation body whose actions have brought Compton College to the brink of closure. He sai d that the Western Association of Schools and Colleges’ actions in taking away Compton’s accreditation are unconscionable. 

“WASC is functioning as a star chamber,” he said. “The problem at Compton was being taken care of. The Board of Trustees was stripp ed of its power, and a trustee was appointed by the State Chancellor to oversee the district. We can understand WASC’s concerns over the financial problems at WASC, but that had nothing to do with quality of the academic content at the school. Don’t punis h the administrators and students. They didn’t do anything wrong. If the trustees broke the law, put those sons-of-bitches in jail. But why take away the college’s accreditation? Why is WASC’s actions continuing? Compton’s not the story. WASC is the story.”  

Compton, which operates a single college that had a 6,600 student enrollment in 2004, began its present round of problems in January of 2003, when reports of financial problems and irregularities were received by the office of State Community College Chancellor Mark Drummond. A year later, Drummond put the district on a Priority One watch list, installed a Special Trustee to run the college, and later suspended the trustee board itself. 

But Drummond’s actions apparently did not satisfy the Western A ssociation of Schools and Colleges (WASC), the same body that accredits the Peralta District colleges. 

Shortly after the state chancellor’s office took over operation of Compton, WASC stripped the district of its accreditation. Compton was allowed to rem ain open pending an appeal, but a denial of that appeal by WASC could mean the closure of the school as early as the end of the spring semester. 

A month ago, after several other state community colleges passed on the job, Drummond asked Peralta Chancello r Harris to explore the possibility of Peralta’s taking over administration of Compton College until the school is able to regain its accreditation.  

If Compton’s appeal of its accreditation removal is upheld, the takeover will not be necessary. 

At Tuesday’s Peralta trustee meeting, Chancellor Harris made an appeal for adoption of the resolution authorizing his office to explore the administrative takeover, saying that “many students in the Compton area will not be served if Compton College goes out of existence.” 

Stating that the state chancellor’s office has promised to pay Peralta’s administrative costs, and proposed legislation by California Assemblymember Mervyn Dymally (D-Los Angeles) “would create a firewall so that there will be no legal exposu re to Peralta,” Harris said that the administrative takeover “will allow us to do a good deed with no detriment to ourselves.” 

The chancellor was joined in his appeal to the trustees Tuesday night by Assemblymember Dymally and members of the Compton Coll ege staff. 

Dymally assured trustees that the takeover was envisioned only as a “temporary relationship,” and that he would consult Peralta officials and staff members to make sure that their concerns were addressed in his supporting legislation. 

But while Harris assured trustees that the resolution authorizing exploration of the administrative takeover “by no means signifies that this is a done deal or an agreement” and was requested by the state chancellor’s office only “to show that we intend to work with this process,” Peralta trustees balked at the resolution’s original language that some said earlier would have given Harris “carte blanche” to forge an agreement. 

Instead of authorizing Harris to “enter into” the agreement with Compton, board member s substituted language—co-written in intense negotiations over a 24 hour period by Board Vice President Bill Withrow and Trustee Cy Gulassa—to authorize Harris only to “explore the development” of those agreements. 

Gulassa said that under the original resolution “again we’re being asked to ‘trust me.’ We’ve been asked to ‘trust me’ too often, and ‘trust me’ can get you into trouble.” 

Gulassa called the amendments a “cautionary step backwards.” 

The resolution requires Harris to submit a final agreement to the trustee board “no later than June 30.” 

Shortly after Harris gave assurances to Gulassa that he would make periodic reports to the board and the public on the progress of the negotiations with Compton officials over the takeover, board members rejected an amendment by Trustee Gonzalez-Yuen that would have required Harris to submit the final agreement by May 23. 

Gonzalez-Yuen said he wanted the final proposal to be submitted prior to the end of June—widely-reported as the proposed closure date for Compton—because “I don’t want to have staff come here and say there’s no time for adjustments to the proposal, telling us ‘if you don’t vote for this exactly as it is, Compton is dead.’” Harris told trustees that the June 30 closure date was incorrect, an d that Compton could be closed any time WASC decides to upon rejection of the appeal. 

In announcing her opposition to the takeover, Trustee Hodge called the takeover proposal “dangerous and irresponsible. We cannot educate the world.” 

Saying that she fe ared that siphoning off Peralta resources to Compton “could jeopardize the educational mission at Peralta,” Hodge said she was concerned that “in two years, Peralta could be left bankrupt and holding the bag.” 

Asked following the vote for his position on the proposed Compton administrative takeover, Peralta District Academic Senate President Joseph Belinski said, “I don’t know. I need something in writing before I can react. My next step will be to ensure that the District Academic Senate is involved in the negotiations.” 

a

Oakland Police responding to a report of a car crash on Brookdale Avenue at 9:05 p.m. Tuesday found a 40-year-old Berkeley woman suffering from multiple gunshot wounds. 

Aberial Denise Bradley had apparently lost control of her late-model car after the shooting, and the vehicle slammed into a light pole. 

Oakland Police spokesperson Officer Roland A. Holmgren said Bradley was rushed to Highland Hospital, where she was pronounced dead at 9:42 p.m. 

Holmgren was able to provide little additional information, but a published account said Bradley had dropped off her 9-year-old son with a relative a half hour before the shooting. Holmgren asked anyone with information about the crime to call Oakland Police at 238-3821..

Further tests are needed to determine just what killed a Berkeley man whose body was discovered in a burning car near his home at 1900 El Dorado Ave. early Friday morning. 

Kevin D. Shepard, 40, was a Spanish teacher, said Alameda County Coroner’s Supervising Investigator Cheryl Gibbs. 

Firefighters discovered the body after they were called to the scene to battle the blaze, which had been reported by neighbors. 

The body, which had been so badly burned that identification could only be determined by dental records, bore no obvious wounds. 

Gibbs said that though an autopsy was performed Monday, no cause of death has yet been established pending the outcome of additional tests..

What’s that old saying? There’s no such thing as a free, uh, wind turbine. 

It wasn’t the monetary costs associated with the gratis apparatus that worried City Councilmember Betty Olds at the March 21 meeting when the City Council faced the question of accepting the turbine. Olds’ concern was that, as has happened at the Altamont Pass wind farm in southeastern Alameda County, birds would be killed by the turbine’s whizzing blades. 

Moreover, Olds was afraid that by installing the electricity-generating equipment as a demonstration project at the Marina, the city would be promoting wind turbines, which would send the wrong message to the public.  

So Olds added a stipulation to which the council agreed: before accepting the Southwest Wind Power turbine, the Golden Gate Audubon Society would have to give its O.K. to the project. It did so on Wednesday, with a caveat—GGAS asked the city to monitor the turbine and to remove it if it killed birds. 

“We can’t be so scared by the technology that we don’t try,” said Patty Donald, coordinator of the Shorebird Nature Center at the Marina, where the turbine will stand. Donald is very enthusiastic about the project, because the wind turbine will add to the other “green” energy and building materials showcased at the center, which include solar electricity, radiant heating, natural linoleum floors, sustainable harvested wood and recycled glass countertops.  

“If it was chopping up birds—then we’d take it out,” Donald said. 

In confirming that the Audubon Society had given its O.K. and that the city would accept the turbine, Alice La Pierre, the city’s energy analyst, underscored that if birds were killed, the turbine would be removed. 

As for monetary costs, the city pays the piper—initially. The Southwest Wind Power turbine, valued at $5,500 retail, has been offered to the city without cost in exchange for the manufacturer running tests on the equipment. All Berkeley has to do is pay the $12,000 installation costs. The city will recuperate these funds over about 11 years. The turbine is expected to produce 7,000 kilowatt hours of electricity annually, a savings of about $1,100 every year.  

Southwest Wind Power marketing director Miriam Robbins said the city and SWP signed a confidentiality agreement regarding the wind turbine and declined to talk about the agreement. La Pierre said it had to do with the city not disclosing information about the company’s proprietary equipment. 

After the council meeting, Samantha Murray, conservation director for the Audubon Society, visited the proposed site near the Marina’s nature center and Adventure Playground. 

“Of course we’re very sympathetic with pursuing reusable energy,” Murray said. At the same time she said she is acutely aware of the avian deaths at Altamont Pass. She said she would caution against siting the turbine on a flight corridor.  

Donald said she’s been observing the site for 20 years and it isn’t on a migratory path for birds. Moreover, the proposed turbine would be 40 feet high. 

“Birds don’t migrate at 40 feet,” she said. 

The bad rap for wind turbines comes from the experience at Altamont Pass, where, according to a Southwest Wind Power report, there are more than 6,500 turbines sited along a migratory route for birds.  

At Altamont Pass there have been more birds of prey killed than at any other wind facility in North America, according to the Tucson-based Center for Biological Diversity. 

“Research by raptor experts for the California Energy Commission indicates that each year, Altamont Pass wind turbines kill an estimated 881 to 1,300 birds of prey, including more than 75 golden eagles, several hundred red-tailed hawks, several hundred burrowing owls, and hundreds of additional raptors including American kestrels, great horned owls, ferruginous hawks, and barn owls,” according to the center’s website.  

While La Pierre pointed out that two local owners of windmills say they have never had a bird killed, Murray of the Audubon Society said one cannot assume that birds haven’t been killed, just because the remains of dead birds haven’t been seen.  

Before giving its O.K., the Audubon Society consulted experts in the field, according to La Pierre. With the organization’s blessing, the city does not need further council approvals to move ahead with installation of the wind turbine.  

“The Audubon Society wants us to monitor the project and we will,” La Pierre said. 



Oakland teachers will hold a one-day strike April 20 if contract talks fail to lead to a settlement, the union announced yesterday. 

“The school employees of this district do not want to strike, but we have to set a deadline. We have to send a message . . . that we want this contract settled,” said Ben Visnick, president of the Oakland Education Association, which represents 3,200 educators in the Oakland Unified School District (OUSD). 

For two years, the union has been engaged in a bitter fight with the school district over contract negotiations. Talks are currently stalled due to disagreements on healthcare and teacher prep time. 

Union members voted on March 22, 1,054 to 330, to authorize the strike. Visnick hopes setting a strike date will hasten the settlement process.  

At press time, no talks were scheduled, Visnick said. 

The union is urging district negotiators to follow a fact-finding report released in January that said the district can afford to pay for the union’s healthcare and preparation period requests. 

Currently, the union is pressing for a healthcare program where members contribute half a percent of their salaries toward insurance premiums. The district is offering to split the cost of future health benefit increases. 

The union is also asking for staffed elementary school teacher preparation time that’s paid for through the district’s general fund. The district wants to support those periods through school site categorical funds. 

Other union concerns include support of guidance counseling, substitute teacher pay and processes for transferring teachers to different schools in the district. 

District spokesperson Alex Katz said the district made significant strides toward meeting the union’s requests with an offer last week. The ball is in the union’s court to submit a counter-proposal, he said.  

“It’s sort of coming out of left field for them to announce a strike a month from now when we have a proposal on the table,” he said.  

If an agreement is not reached, the school district’s classified employees will unite with teachers in a walkout, Visnick said. Classified employees, including secretaries and security officers, are also waging war against the school district over contracts.  

Schools will have to close if this happens, Visnick said. 

Katz countered that the schools will stay open. 

Oakland teachers last went on strike in 1996. 

The union representing 6,000 San Francisco public school employees voted Wednesday to authorize a strike, calling into question the possibility of a joint Oakland-San Francisco strike.  

“Both unions would be stronger in their work action if we strike together,” Visnick said. “We hope it doesn’t come to that, but it is a possibility.” 

Explaining why he wants to run for mayor, Richard Berkeley paraphrased Emiliano Zapata: “The only reason to take power is to give it back to the people,” he said. 

Berkeley turned in organizational papers to the city clerk on Wednesday. When a minor error on the form he filled out is corrected, Berkeley will be eligible to raise funds for his campaign. 

He will face incumbent Mayor Tom Bates and other challengers, who include former Planning Commissioner Zelda Bronstein and community activist Zachary RunningWolf. The formal filing period for the November elections begins mid-July and ends mid-August. 

Berkeley says he’s running for office because current local and federal governments leave poor people out of the equation.  

In the past, Berkeley says he has worked closely with people and organizations that serve the disenfranchised and enhance neighborhoods: The Berkeley Food Conspiracy, the Berkeley Co-ops, the Berkeley Farmers Markets, and former Councilmember John Denton. He also worked on the North Berkeley Area Plan. 

Berkeley said he would like to do something about health care services for the poor. 

“You have to take two buses to get health care,” he said. “Community services should be where the poor are—if you’re poor, you’re in trouble.”  

If elected, Berkeley said he would find out what people want. 

“I would send people out to the neighborhoods with questionnaires to put people in touch with neighborhoods.” 

Berkeley, who calls himself “an old Jewish guy from New York,” says his last name is truly Berkeley, though it was changed by his father from Berkowitz..

The downpour didn’t stop some 30 people from searching for “sunshine”—open, accessible government—at a community meeting in City Hall Monday evening.  

Councilmember Kriss Worthington called the meeting to gather citizen input for a strong mandate for open government in Berkeley.  

The councilmember said he plans to use the citizen input to correct and enhance what he characterized as a “weak” draft sunshine ordinance written by the city attorney.  

Sunshine laws, which exist in San Francisco, Oakland, Contra Costa County, Benicia, Los Angeles and elsewhere, are local ordinances that strengthen state and federal open meeting and public information statutes. 

Opening more police records to the public, getting the library board to meet at a time when the public can participate, disallowing lawsuit settlements made before the public has a chance to see the agreements, permitting all who wish to address city officials at public meetings the right to do so. These were just a few of the issues brought to the table. 

“Democracies die behind closed doors,” said 40-year Berkeley resident Peter Sussman, quoting a judge who was speaking in secret deportation hearings. A newspaper and book editor and open government activist with the Society of Professional Journalists, Sussman gave an overview of the need for local sunshine laws. 

He pointed out that in the five years since a sunshine ordinance was first raised in Berkeley the city has made progress, especially in augmenting public information available on the city web site. 

Ensuring compliance with the sunshine ordinance will be key. 

“Commissions in San Francisco and Oakland monitor compliance,” Sussman said.  

The Berkeley city attorney’s draft, on the other hand, says that if citizens believe that the Sunshine Ordinance has been violated, they need to take their complaints to the city manager for relief. 

“There’s a lot of work left to do, because the people who decide what you should know are the very people about whom you’re trying to get information,” Sussman said. “So we’re leaving the fox in charge of the chicken coop.” 

Worthington said the task is two-pronged. One is strengthening and refining existing laws that guarantee open government and the second is educating the public about these laws. 

In a recent case, Worthington said, a commissioner on the Zoning Advisory Board shared a draft proposal with the public that was going to be reviewed by a ZAB subcommittee. He was chastised by his fellow commissioners for making the draft public. 

“We actually don’t need a sunshine ordinance to address that—it’s already state law,” Worthington said. “That person is required by law to give that information to the public.”  

Andrea Prichett of Berkeley’s Cop Watch said the city’s current system for providing police records is inadequate—it’s hard for a suspect to get arrest reports without an attorney, she said, and then when they get them, the reports are not those originally written by the officer, but a summary of the officer’s report, written by a supervisor. Also, the reports are heavily redacted, Prichett said. Prichett often works with people who are arrested and then have their charges dropped. Detailed police reports are particularly important in these cases, she said. 

Worthington pointed out that in the city attorney’s draft ordinance, the public has little power over public information available from the police department. 

Police can change public information policies at any time only “subject to advance public notice and review by the Police Review Commission,” the draft ordinance says. 

Participants also said any new ordinance should target all of the city’s boards and commissions. Worthington said the library board is particularly egregious in this area, having changed its meeting time to 5 p.m. “when working people can’t attend,” and listing items as oral reports on agendas, then taking action on them. 

Dean Metzger, Zoning Adjustment Board member, said something has to be done to prevent items coming to the City Council at the last minute and Carl Friberg said legal settlements should be made available to the public before the council votes on them. 

Worthington plans to compile the suggestions and turn them over to a volunteer attorney experienced in drafting sunshine ordinances. He will then propose a City Council workshop to review the draft, make final changes and then bring it to the council for a vote. If the council doesn’t approve it, he says he’ll bring it to the electorate, as was done in San Francisco. 

Those interested in raising issues for the ordinance can contact Worthington’s office at 981-7170 or worthington@ci.berkeley.ca.us. 

There is simply nothing like a freshly harvested homegrown vegetable for flavor. That easiest of all vegetables to grow, the humble radish, is absolutely at its tastiest best when pulled from the ground in spring, given a good scrub under the kitchen tap, and eaten then and there. Pungent, crisp, it is the very essence of spring. 

One might well ask, spring? Even with frost lying thickly on garage roof and ground, wilting the cabbages? The fact is that radishes do not seem to mind a touch of frost, even a heavy-handed one. Still, I confess to a couple of trade secrets. 

First, I sowed the plump seeds last fall, so that they could dawdle through the dark months, with little spurts of growth in mild weather. And I had lots of help from my Wriggly Wranch, tiny red worms from the compost bin. 

I was given a handful of these creatures about two years ago, and ordered a set of trays in which they were supposed to live. I placed the trays in the kitchen, and provided the worms with the materials they were said to like—shredded leaves, a little earth for grit, and kitchen trimmings. In theory, when the bottom tray materials had been consumed, the worms would move into the tray above, leaving behind compost. 

This did in fact work, but I was concerned that whenever I removed the lid, a cloud of midges arose. The legs of the tray set had to stand in cans of water or oil to keep out ants. Altogether the system did not help my constant struggle for a life of simplicity and ease. So I chucked the lot into my outdoor compost bin and hoped the wriggly worms would survive. 

Before sowing the radish seeds I groveled into the bottom of the compost bin and amazingly came up with a couple of pails of the dark crumbly stuff one reads about in gardening books. I tossed this o n to the vegetable plot, spreading it thinly. When a couple of weeks later I dug it under, I was surprised to find the normally heavy texture of the earth, the tilth, had miraculously become ideal for seeds, so I sowed carrots and beets as well. Sowing radishes sparingly, about four inches apart, saves the bother of later thinning. When crowded, they tend to send up flower stalks rather than plump their roots. 

Saying that radishes are easy to grow is not strictly truthful. I here confess that this is my first, my only success. Yet in the weedy patch of my garden euphemistically called the meadow, radishes grow wild. These have coarse leaves and thick gnarled stems appropriate for their common name which derives from the Latin radix, for root, and when th ey look about to take over everything else, I remove a few. I do so reluctantly, because all through the summer and well into fall they produce delicate flower petals of pastel yellows, pinks, ivory and purple, visited by butterflies and even hummingbirds. These are edible, and so are the leaves and seed pods when green. The ancients made oil from them. With just about every part of them of use, I look on them fondly, as a potential famine crop. You never know. 

In the cruciferae family, radish, Raphanus sativus, is described variously as having no known wild ancestor, or as deriving from China. Either way, it is truly prehistoric, known to the ancients. There is little doubt that Apollo enjoyed them. Radishes were presented to him in gold containers, bee ts in silver, and turnips in lead, a truly Olympian distinction. Numerous varieties grow all year in Mediterranean climates like ours. They come in all shapes and sizes, from fat ‘Round Black Spanish’ to cylindrical ‘China Rose’ and the small red or red a nd white ones I grow. 

Radishes contain measurable amounts of the B and C vitamins. Along with green celery and black olives, they are an essential component of that quintessential American dish, the relish plate. Worthy of gold in the speed with which the seeds germinate and their ease of handling, they are fun for junior gardeners to grow and sample on the spot. And if your brood prefers to emulate Luna Lovegood and wear them as earrings, they’ll still need a good wash first. 

On March 15, Berkeley police seized 120 pounds of dried marijuana, more than 5,000 plants, $120,000 cash and several weapons from a growing outfit headquartered at 809 Allston Way in West Berkeley. 

Seven people were apprehended in connection with the operation. It was the largest pot bust in the department’s recent history. 

But was it legal? 

A skim through Sec. 12.24 of the Berkeley Municipal Code would yield a resounding no. 

In 1979, Berkeley voters passed the Berkeley Marijuana Initiative II (BMI II), an ordinance that makes the possession, cultivation, sale and transportation of marijuana the police department’s lowest priority. The law is on the books today.  

BMI II calls on the Berkeley City Council to ensure that officers do not issue citations, make arrests or expend public funds on pot crimes. The ordinance further stipulates that all marijuana law enforcement activities must be reported to the City Council and the Police Review Commission on a semi-annual basis. 

A reader raised the legal conundrum in the March 24 issue of the Berkeley Daily Planet.  

“The recent pot bust in Berkeley was not merely a massive waste of police resources—it violated city law,” said Attorney Martin Putnam in a letter to the editor. 

Putnam is the parent of one of the suspects arrested March 15, and he may have spoken too soon. 

That’s because before BMI II, there was BMI I. Voters passed the first initiative in April of 1973, forbidding police from making arrests for pot crimes unless cleared by the City Council. The California Attorney General promptly challenged the law. Four months later, in Younger v. Berkeley City Council, an Alameda County Superior Court dealt initiative activists the death knell: The city must allow Berkeley police to enforce marijuana laws. 

In his ruling, Judge Lionel Wilson struck down the ordinance for modifying laws governing a police officer’s right to make arrests, preempting state marijuana laws and violating city code that gives the City Manager discretion over police personnel—not the City Council.  

The city has interpreted the decision as a permanent entity. In 1980, a defendant arrested for possession of less than an ounce of marijuana filed for a case dismissal, citing BMI II. A municipal court judge roundly rejected the motion, upholding the precedent that state marijuana and arrest laws preempt local law. Deputy City Attorney Matt Orebic said he has not heard of any other legal challenges to the 1973 verdict. 

That’s not to say the ordinance is unbending, though. Following passage of Proposition 215 in 1996, which allows for the use and cultivation of medicinal marijuana with a doctor’s recommendation, Berkeley established guidelines allowing patients to use, possess and cultivate a small amount of marijuana for “personal medical purposes.”  

As a result, the city interprets Wilson’s ruling as applying only to unlawful marijuana. But 5,000 plants and 120 pounds of pot grown are still game for seizure, as is an eighth from a non-medical street dealer on Telegraph Avenue. 

So if the ordinance doesn’t carry any weight, why keep it around?  

For one thing, Orebic said, there aren’t any procedures in place for getting rid of it. 

“There are sometimes old laws on the books that have been banged around by the courts and just sit there,” he said. “Just because a court rules something unenforceable, it doesn’t require the legislature to take it off the books.” 

Dale Gieringer, coordinator of the California chapter of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML) guesses it’s a political piece.  

“It’s not a legally enforceable kind of thing, it’s politically enforceable,” he said, pointing out that one facet of the law that remains intact is a requirement to report the activities of police officers apropos marijuana law enforcement. The upshot is that when there is a spike in pot-related arrests, as was the case several years ago following a crackdown on Telegraph Avenue, Gieringer said, people know about it and raise hell accordingly.  

The marijuana ordinance also pays lip service to what Berkeley’s pot policy would look like if not bound by other local, state and federal laws.  

“These lowest priority ordinances in my opinion don’t have any teeth,” said Bill Panzer, an Oakland-based criminal defense lawyer specializing in pot crimes. “But it is a policy point. It shows what the people believe. Now it’d be nice if the police took into account where the people are at.” 

A South Berkeley birthday party for a 15-year-old turned lethal Saturday night after the host tried to relieve a heavily tattooed man of a black pistol. 

Aderian “Dre” Gaines, 36, died from a gunshot at his home in the 1500 block of Prince Street. A friend of the dead man’s, a 35-year-old identified only as “Nat,” was shot in the arm. 

Berkeley Police spokesperson Officer Ed Galvan said reports of gunshots began flooding the city’s emergency dispatch center at 9:37 p.m. Arriving officers said between 75 and 100 youths were leaving the scene as they arrived. 

“Dre was struck twice in the chest,” said Natasha Jackson, a neighbor and family friend who was helping to host the party. “The paramedics said one of the bullets grazed his heart.” 

“He was a hero,” said Afeni Gaines, the slain man’s spouse. “He died protecting the children.” 

It was the city’s third murder of the year, and the second stemming from a teenage party. Juan Ramos, an 18-year-old from El Cerrito, died in a Feb. 10 stabbing at an unsupervised party in the 700 block of Contra Costa Avenue, and Keith Stephens, 24, was fatally shot on Feb. 19 in the 1200 block of Carrison Street. 

Police have arrested no suspects in any of the slayings. 

Strangers arrive 

Jackson said the incident began when the gunman arrived at the party with a group of 11 or 12 younger men. 

“He said if we didn’t let him in, he would kick down the door. I went and got Dre. He said he wouldn’t let them in for free. After he searched them, he took their money and let them in. He has a good heart,” Jackson said. “I didn’t have a good feeling, so I followed them into the back.” 

During the search, Jackson saw a collection of designs inked on the older man’s body. 

“He had a West Oakland tattoo on his forearm, he also had a tattoo of a pistol and some dragons, and there was a basketball on his side. They were all high off of something, walking through and mugging everybody. I had a funny feeling, so I followed them,” she said. 

Jackson said she followed the older man, who had identified himself as a 29-year-old North Oakland resident, into the kitchen, and as he was dancing with his arms raised, she saw a pistol tucked into his waistband. 

“It was an all-black nine,” she said, referring to a nine-millimeter semi-automatic, a popular handgun caliber. 

“I went and got Dre and he followed me back into the kitchen. I turned on the light and Dre grabbed him. I lifted up his shirt and Dre took the gun and walked him toward the door. Then this young fellow grabbed the pistol and ran out, and Dre followed him. Then I heard a shot, and Feni (Afeni’s nickname) calling, ‘My husband’s been shot. My husband’s been shot.” 

The gunman had come back into the house and confronted Gaines in the bedroom at the front of the house. 

Afeni Gaines, who witnessed the shooting, said she begged the gunman not to kill her husband. “Then the guy said, ‘Bitch, you better shut up before I smoke you.’”  

“Nat” was shot seconds later, and fell down the stairs at the rear of the house, where paramedics later found him. He was taken to Eden Medical Center in Castro Valley, said Berkeley Fire Department Deputy Chief David Orth. 

Endless minutes 

Jackson and Afeni Gaines said police arrived within moments of the shooting, but an ambulance didn’t arrived for what Jackson estimated as 20 to 30 minutes. 

“I kept telling them to call an ambulance,” Jackson said. 

“I’m yelling at the children, ‘Call the ambulance! Call the ambulance,’” said Afeni Gaines. 

But Orth said paramedics were on the scene in less than 10 minutes. While one team attended to Gaines, a second attended to the injured man, who was in the back yard, Orth said. 

“I can understand why it seemed longer,” Orth said. 

Police and Fire Department logs show that paramedics were dispatched at 9:40 and arrived on the scene at 9:45.  

After determining that Gaines was dead—a finding paramedics can make under county law—the coroner assumed jurisdiction. 

Gaines’s body remained in the bedroom where he was killed until 6 a.m. Sunday. 

For 13-year-old Wilesha Jones, Saturday night’s tragedy was the second time she’d lost a father to a gunman. Her birth father, Willie Jones, had been slain in Oakland’s Bushrod Park when she was a year old. 

“He had seen a shooting and he was going to testify,” said Afeni Gaines. “They knew it, and they killed him. It’s still unsolved.”  

Fourth party 

Jackson, a close family friend and Prince Street neighbor, said Saturday’s party was the fourth such event held at the Gaines’s home. 

“We wanted something safe for kids to do,” she said. 

“We charge $2 to get in, 50 cents for sodas and 75 cents for hot dogs, or a dollar if they want some chili on it,” Jackson said. 

Attendees had to sign in, and strict quotas were set for different communities because of rivalries that could turn violent. “We have them sign in by which set they’re from—North Oakland, West Oakland, Berkeley, and so on,” said Jackson. “We had them all.” 

Police have taken possession of the records. 

Galvan said anyone who gives a party for a large number of teens should follow some basic rules. 

“If you’re hosting a party, you shouldn’t let anyone in you don’t know,” he said. “You also shouldn’t let in anyone who seems to be intoxicated. You need to limit the size of the party and you need to have a guest list. And you shouldn’t promote the party by text messaging or by emails.” 

Galvan said announcements of Saturday night’s party spread by text messages. 

Charging admission for parties without a business license is also a violation of city code, he said. “As soon as you start charging, you need a business license, although as I understand it, they were only charging $2 to cover costs.” 

Balance skewed 

Jackson said quotas were set to keep the numbers in balance and prevent any one group from dominating. 

But the arrival of the tattooed man and his group of a dozen or so companions threw off the balance. 

“That’s why my dad was killed,” said Wilesha Gaines. “There were too many West Oakland people.” 

“The guys who came were new,” said Afeni Gaines. “We thought we’d give them a chance.” 

All guests were searched before they could enter the house, a modest two-story Victorian a half-block east of Sacramento Street. 

While most of the guest were teens, the gunman said he was 29, and claimed he had arrived to look after his sons, said Jackson. 

“I don’t know where the gun came from,” she said. “I don’t know how they got it in.” 

“My dad’s a hero,” said Wilesha. “If he didn’t take the gun, something worse would’ve happened. He was just here and now he’s gone. He was a good dad.” 

Afeni Gaines said she would be moving from the Prince Street home. “We moved in last February. We’re moving from this house. God knows we can’t stay here. But we love Berkeley, and we’ll continue to live in Berkeley.” 

Galvan said investigators are currently contacting people who attended the party, and he asked anyone who attended and those with possible information about the shootings to contact homicide investigators at 510- 981-5900.

A Berkeley cinema staple for 35 years has closed.  

Act 1&2 Theatre at 2128 Center St., showed final screenings of C.S.A.: The Confederate States of America and Summer Storm to sparse audiences Sunday before closing down for good. 

The lease for the two-screen cinema, owned by Landmark Theatres, had run out, said Vice President of Marketing Ray Price.  

He refused to comment on specific reasons for the closure, but said, “In general, one of the problems with theater properties is the retail value of the square footage is higher than the value of the theater. Other retail venues can better afford to pay that.” 

“It’s not uncommon,” he said. 

Landmark operates 57 theaters nationwide and specializes in art-house first-run independents, foreign film classics and other nontraditional cinema. In the East Bay, the company owns the California Theatre, Shattuck Cinemas, Piedmont Theatre and the Albany Twin. It acquired Act 1&2 in 1994. 

Employees who chose to stay with the company were given the option to transfer to other theaters, said Act 1&2 Manager Chris Hatfield. 

Last week, a theater employee told the Daily Californian on condition of anonymity that the theater was closing because low customer turnout was exacting a toll on financial solvency. Price would not confirm that. 

“No one will comment on the financials of theaters,” he said. 

But it’s not a mystery why small cinemas are struggling, said Grand Lake Theater owner Allen Michaan. 

“It’s just getting harder and harder for people to survive,” he said, pointing to a wave of small theater closures in San Francisco in recent years, including the St. Francis, the Alexandria and the Coronet, which shut down last March. 

In Berkeley, eight theaters compete for moviegoer dollars. Additional competition comes from surrounding megaplexes including the 16-screen AMC multiplex in Emeryville, built in 2002.  

Moreover, the film industry itself is in a slump. In 2005, box office admissions were down 8.7 percent in the United States, from 1.54 billion to 1.4 billion, and down 7.9 percent worldwide, according to the Motion Picture Association of America. 

Industry watchers quibble over whether the drop results from the wide availability of DVDs—some released simultaneously when films are screened—increased ticket prices or a slew of underwhelming movies. 

Landmark as a whole, however, appears unfazed by the downturn. The company added 11 screens in 2003 when Mark Cuban and Todd Wagner of 2929 Entertainment took ownership from Dallas-based Silver Cinemas. 

The company constructed a new theater in Washington, D.C., in 2004, a cinema lounge in Indianapolis in December, and is in the process of implementing a DVD retail division. 

The building housing Act 1&2 was built more than 70 years ago, and had been a furniture store, a shoe store and a children’s clothing boutique before it was reinvented as a cinema in 1971..

The state chancellor of the California Community College system has asked the Peralta Colleges to become the administrative agent for Compton Community College in an effort to keep the troubled, 6,600-student Southern California school from being disbanded on June 30 because of loss of accreditation. 

Peralta Chancellor Elihu Harris, who has been working on the takeover deal for several weeks, has recommended approval to the Peralta Board of Trustees. 

But details of the proposed administrative takeover are so sketchy that even trustee supporters of the proposal said they would not commit until they see more information, and the Peralta Federation of Teachers is requesting that the proposal include language that protects Compton’s employees and existing union contracts. 

Peralta was apparently not the first choice of state Community College Chancellor Mark Drummond to take over the Compton District. Peralta Trustee Cy Gulassa said it was his understanding that “six or seven districts within driving distance of Compton were approached, but none of those wanted to intervene.” 

Enabling legislation for the takeover of the Compton district by another community college district was drafted by California State Senator Mervyn Dymally (D-Los Angeles) a year ago and is presently sitting in limbo in the Senate Education Committee. However, sources at Peralta say that the legislation is being written in key parts to reflect concerns by Peralta representatives. 

The Peralta Board of Trustees is scheduled to formally review the Compton proposal for the first time tonight (Tuesday), first in closed session and then in public session at the board’s regular meeting to begin at 7 p.m. at the Peralta Administration offices, 333 East 8th St. in Oakland. 

“Compton is the only historically-black community college we have in California, and I’m in favor in principle of doing what we can to save it,” Peralta Trustee Alona Clifton said on Friday. “But the devil is in the details, and I haven’t seen the details yet.” 

“I’m glad that the state chancellor’s office has asked us to intervene,” Peralta Board President Linda Handy said in a telephone interview early this week. “At least it shows that they are working on the problem and not just walking away and allowing the dismantling of Compton.” 

But Handy added that “my first responsibility is as a Peralta trustee, and I have to make sure that this is something which Peralta can do. The full proposal has not yet been worked out, so I don’t know what position I will take.” 

But Trustee Gulassa says that the lack of information on the proposal prior to its appearance on Tuesday’s board agenda “irritates the hell out of me. There’s been a total lack of information. There has been no briefing of trustees. I’ve not heard anything but second or third hand gossip.” 

Gulassa said that when he attempted to ask questions of Peralta administrators after the administrators came back from trips to Compton “the only thing I got back was one word answers. I’ve talked with faculty senate representatives, and they say they are only getting second hand information. It appears that they are out of the loop as well. I am distressed that this issue may have tremendous value, but the way it is being presented to the Peralta constituents devalues it.” 

With the information that he has so far, Gulassa said “it just does not make any sense for Peralta to take this on. Elihu has described this as ‘missionary work,’ and It is a noble idea for one institution to keep another one from going under, but if your own church is burning, you don’t run off trying to help someone else. Saving Compton is a worthwhile mission, but we’re probably not the ones to do it. I’m categorically opposed unless somebody comes up with more detail.” 

The background report in the agenda packet for Tuesday’s trustee meeting does not provide any details on the proposal, but includes only a proposed resolution for trustees. The resolution would authorize the Peralta Chancellor’s office to “enter into any necessary agreements” with the Compton Community College District and the State Chancellor’s office to facilitate the administrative takeover.  

While the resolution would authorize Harris to work with the state chancellor and state officials “to obtain the financial resources” to facilitate Peralta’s administrative takeover, the proposed amount of financial resources to be provided for Peralta is one of the details that was not available to trustees or the public prior to the meeting. 

While the resolution gives no timeline as to how long the Peralta-Compton arrangement would be in effect, the resolution calls on state officials to “developing a recovery plan aimed at restoring accreditation to Compton College.” 

Meanwhile, the Peralta Federation of Teachers union, has expressed skepticism over the deal. 

Saying that “the PFT cannot allow the [Peralta] District to be a party to ‘union busting,’ union officials say that under the original state legislation authorizing an administrative takeover of Compton “the unions and their contract were to be dissolved and the 109 faculty and 200 staff were to be laid off and stripped of their seniority, rehire and bump rights.” 

A message to Peralta teachers on the PFT website said that this legislative language was “not an accurate reflection of the strong statements uttered by the State Chancellor” in support of union rights, and is urging that the authorizing state legislation include language that “would honor Compton’s existing unions, their bargaining agreements and their rehire rights.” 

In addition to its concerns over union rights issues, the PFT report said that the organization has raised questions with Chancellor Harris over whether the Compton proposal might have an adverse effect on passage of the district’s upcoming $390 million construction bond measure, whether the responsibilities might place an “administrative burden” because of the 400 mile distance between the East Bay and Compton, and whether Peralta has a “readiness for another battle with WASC after spending countless person hours to remove our four colleges from WASC’s Warning List.” 

The Peralta Colleges have just come out from under an accreditation battle of its own. At its January meeting, the Western Association of Schools and Colleges’ (WASC) Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges announced that based upon its most recent progress reports and visits, it was removing Merritt, Laney, Berkeley City College (formerly Vista College), and the College of Alameda from “warning” status. 

While accreditation had never been removed from the four Peralta Colleges, the “warning” status puts colleges on notice that their accreditation could be removed if WASC’s required improvements were not made.  

Compton Community College, which was founded in 1927 as part of the Compton Union High School District and was later split off as a separate college district in 1950, became an overwhelmingly African-American college in the 1960s. Since the mid-1990s the college has seen an influx of Latino students, and the student population is presently 54 percent African-American and 40 percent Latino. 

WASC announced it was pulling its accreditation of Compton last summer and called for intervention by State Chancellor Mark Drummond because of findings of fiscal and educational mismanagement by the college administration and board.  

According to a notice on Drummond’s workshop, WASC “concluded that Compton College could not manage its own recovery.” 

Since that time, Drummond has taken over management of the college, appointing a special trustee, and at the same time looking for another California community college district to take over administrative responsibilities. 

If trustees approve the Compton administrative takeover, it will be the Peralta district’s second experience in long-distance operations. 

From 1968 to 1988, Peralta was the administrative agent for Feather River College in Plumas County, a relationship that the online Feather River history calls “a unique and innovative educational experiment” between two districts geographically separated by more than 250 miles.” 

The history goes on to say that “in 1988, it was determined that the future of Feather River College and the needs of the citizens of Plumas County would be best served if the college became and independent, locally controlled community college district.” 

The Feather River Community College district was formed in 1988, a Board of Trustees was elected, and the online history concludes that “the District entered a new era that one faculty member described as its ‘declaration of independence.’””

Richmond’s getting ready to take the Plunge. 

The venerable structure in the heart of Point Richmond has been closed for five years, victim of an earthquake, a fire and years of neglect. 

But thanks to strong support from the community and a combination of state grants, the Richmond Municipal Natatorium may once again become the Bay Area’s premier swimming hole—hopefully “within a couple of years,” said Ellie Strauss, who has been working hard to make it happen. 

The venerable structure was built in an era when America was obsessed with swimming and housed pools in majestic buildings, said Strauss, a long-time member and officer of Richmond Friends of Recreation and a leader of the restoration effort. 

Another obsession located the plunge at its prominent location in Point Richmond. 

Convinced by a confidence man that oil lay beneath the city, promoter John Nicholl literally sunk his fortune into the ground, drilling through the bedrock until he found not oil but water—an artesian well that poured out a thousand gallons a minute. 

A disillusioned Nicholl finally gave the site to the city in 1924, which built the plunge at the site, opening it a year later as the Municipal Natatorium, when a throng of swim fans eagerly waited to try the waters. 

Swimmers from around the Bay Area swarmed to the pool, said Strauss. 

“For years and years it was the centerpiece of West [Contra Costa] County,” she said. “It was used during the summer by people from Marin and San Francisco.” 

Today, the Plunge is one of the few remaining grand pools left in the country. 

“There’s one in San Diego, which was renovated with funds from a developer,” she said. “Unfortunately, we don’t have a developer up here willing to do that.” 

The building has been a challenge. After years of neglect and little maintenance, the building was in sad shape even before the Loma Prieta Earthquake of Oct. 17, 1989. 

Cracks from the quake are visible in the stucco-covered brick walls and, as an unreinforced masonry building, it is considered unsafe. Richmond voters rejected a bond measure to fund restoration in 1997, though the city allowed the Plunge to remain open on a “swim-at-your-own-risk basis through August, 2001. 

By that time, the building’s antiquated plumbing, electrical, mechanical and other systems were failing, and the city couldn’t afford the repairs. 

A small fire last October and periodic incursions by the homeless in search of shelter have inflicted further indignities on the venerable landmark. 

So Strauss and a cadre of recreation activists and north Richmond residents decided to do something about it. 

As president of Richmond Friends of Recreation, Strauss had ready allies at hand, who took on the task of raising the funds themselves, forming the Save the Plunge Trust so they could receive tax-deductible contributions for the project. 

“There’s a hard-core group of about 40 or 50 people, which includes members of the Friends of Recreation and several people who swam at the Plunge in the old days, and the events we’ve been holding have been well-attended,” Strauss said. 

The project received a major boost when filmmakers Nick and Sari Arrington produced a documentary about the site, The Plunge—Time Laps , which aired on KQED. 

One viewer inspired by the film was Berkeley architect Todd Jeremy, and after a call to the city and another exchange of phone calls and meetings, he has become the architect for the restoration. 

“The city had looked at several plans, but because the costs were between $8 million and $11 million, no one could see a way to do it. Then Todd Jeremy came along and found a way to do it for a lot less, about $4 million,” Strauss said. 

The trust has been busily holding benefits, concerts and dinners to raise the money, as well as filing applications for other funds. With about half the money in hand or committed—including grants under three different state programs—the project is almost ready to begin. 

“We’re going to do it in stages,” she said. “The first thing is to get the building safe.” 

A so-called Belvedere monitor—a second roof above the main roof with celestory windows to improve air circulation in the building—which was removed in the 1970s will be restored, and the interior walls will be opened up and the pool itself will be retiled. 

Because the building is a landmarked structure in the Point Richmond Historic District—which is listed in the National Register of Historic Places—all renovations must be approved by the state Office of Historic Preservation, a process now almost complete, Strauss said. 

The city’s Design Review Board has already approved the plans, she said. 

“If all goes well, we could be open again in a couple of years,” she said. “It will be restored to its old, beautiful self.” 

Strauss’s commitment to the Plunge has outlasted her residence in Point Richmond. Though she’s been living in Cloverdale the last two years, she remains very committed to the plunge and to RFOR. 

More dinners and other fund-raisers will be in the offing, until the last dollar is raised. 

For more information about the Plunge and the restoration campaign, the Trust’s web site at www.richmondplunge.org..

The ongoing saga of the Gaia Building took a new turn Thursday night when members of the Zoning Adjustments Board (ZAB) voted to reopen the thorny issue of culture. 

The board will look at just what the city intended when it let developer Patrick Kennedy construct a bigger building in return for adding two floors that were supposedly devoted to use for cultural activities. 

“That’s not a good outcome,” Kennedy told Deputy Planning Director Wendy Cosin after the vote. 

“The fact that they’ve agreed to hold a public hearing is great,” said Jos Sances, chair of the city’s Civic Arts Commission (CAC). 

“I’m very pleased,” said Anna de Leon, who has emerged as the principal antagonist of Kennedy, her landlord. De Leon owns Anna’s Jazz Island on the ground floor of the Gaia Building, 2116 Allston Way. 

Kennedy was allowed to add two extra floors of apartments to the building in exchange for building the two floors under the city’s ill-defined “cultural bonus,” which awards greater building size in return for creating space for culture in downtown Berkeley. 

One issue before ZAB is just what qualifies as cultural use? 

The second issue is the so-called 30 percent “performance standard,” a nebulous term spelled out in a June 6, 2003, letter endorsed by Carol Barrett during the time she served as the city’s Planning Director. 

According to the interpretation now used by the city, the figure means that if the cultural bonus space is used for performances 30 percent of the time, then it may be used for other kinds of events for the remainder of the time. 

At present, the two cultural floors have two tenants. 

De Leon’s Anna’s Jazz Island occupies part of the ground floor; the rest of the floor and the mezzanine above are leased to Gaia Arts Management, a firm created by Gloria and Tom Atherstone, who own Glass Onion Catering in West Berkeley. 

That company has been leasing out space to The Marsh Berkeley, a local extension of a San Francisco theatrical company, and for a variety of public and private events including parties, meetings and rock concerts. 

By the time Thursday night’s meeting had ended, the board had voted 6-2-1 to limit the use of the mezzanine floor to uses that have already been approved by ZAB under the existing use permit. Members Bob Allen and Raudell Wilson voted against the measure, and Carrie Sprague abstained. 

The board passed 8-0-1 (Sprague abstaining) two other motions, one that would allow the use of the second or mezzanine floor—which had been halted because no certificate of occupancy had been issued—and the other to hold a hearing on the much-debated performance standard. 

“This is a very serious issue that goes right to the heart of the [use] permit,” said ZAB Secretary and Principal Planner Debra Sanderson before the vote. 

The use permit mandates that half of the mezzanine floor be reserved for non-profit cultural groups and requires that uses be consistent with ZAB’s intent and subject to possible review by the board and the CAC. 

“I don’t think that would allow catering to continue, but it is not covered by the existing use permit anyway,” said board member Rick Judd in making the motion to enforce the existing permit. “I have no problem considering a use permit modification, but the public has never had the opportunity to bring its position before us.” 

Allen and Wilson said they were happy with the way the building is now being used. 

“I personally enjoy having something at the Gaia Building,” Wilson said. 

Allen said the current uses are much better than the floors’ originally intended use as a home for the Gaia Bookstore, a new age venue that closed before the building was ready. 

“Let’s not manage them down to the last degree,” Allen said. 

By restricting the floors to a narrow range of uses, Allen said the board could be setting itself up for repeated hearings. 

“I don’t feel the owner has to proceed if he deviates from ZAB,” said Judd. “This whole project has a way of shape-shifting, it appears . . . given how many generations of small changes” the proposed uses have gone through. 

One voice that wasn’t heard during the meeting was that of Allen Matkins, Kennedy’s San Francisco attorney. 

Matkins rose to speak during the discussion but was silenced by Chair Chris Tiedemann, who noted that the session was not a public hearing, and that Matkins had failed to address the board during the public comment period at the start of the meeting. 

The decision to reexamine the cultural bonus came as good news to Sances and the other CAC members who attended Thursday’s meeting. 

The commission has been critical of Kennedy and the way the city has permitted the building to be used for uses other than those defined in the permits. 

“The fact that there will be a public hearing is great,” Sances said. “It will give the public a chance to weigh in. He [Patrick Kennedy] got two extra floors of apartments out of it, and it would be great to have the space for cultural events.” 

De Leon, whose letters of protest were written after she said rock concerts and a loud party disrupted performances at her cafe, said she was pleased with the outcome. 

“All I asked was that they live up to their commitments,” she said. 

Kennedy was clearly angry. 

“So do I blow up the building? It sat empty for four years, and I moved heaven and earth to find tenants,” he said. “The Marsh theater has held more performances in the last four months than the Berkeley Rep and the Aurora Theater—and maybe more than both combined. I’ve brought a jazz club downtown, and I’ve added life to a downtown that needs it—all with the blessings of the planning department and staff who said I was in compliance. To continue in pursuing this and closing down The Marsh is a counterproductive move.”

The Zoning Adjustments Board voted to declare Black & White Liquors a public nuisance Thursday after attempts at a compromise were torpedoed by state law and city code. 

The liquor store at 3027 Adeline St. had been the source of numerous complaints from neighbors, who complained that alcoholic customers were committing abusive behavior, sometimes at their homes. 

Attempts to solve the problem by less punitive measures foundered after the board was informed that state law and city codes precluded some of the solutions the board had seemed willing to make. 

Efforts to regulate the size of liquor bottles sold were precluded by state law, said ZAB chair Chris Tiedemann, as was an attempt to impose regulations by a zoning certificate. 

In the end, the board was left only with the option of voting a public nuisance finding, something Black & White owner Sucha Singh Banger had told the board he hoped to avoid. 

Among the conditions imposed by the board in the finding were: 

• Mandatory alcohol crime prevention classes for all store employees and the owner, to be completed within three months. 

• New hours of operation, running from 9 a.m. to 10 p.m., Thursday through Saturday, and 9 a.m. to midnight on Friday and Saturday. 

• Requiring all liquor sold to be packaged in clear plastic bags bearing the store’s name. 

• Installation of new exterior lighting along Adeline and Emerson streets. 

• Installation of video surveillance cameras covering the store’s exterior and retention of the resulting recordings for 90 days. 

• A requirement that Banger meet with neighbors in a three-block radius from the store to form a neighborhood watch group, and to meet with neighbors on a bi-monthly basis to discuss the store’s impact on the neighborhood. 

• A ban on sales to obnoxious customers, including those who loiter or drink in public or on neighbors’ properties, and those who are noisy, aggressively panhandle, litter, defecate or urinate on public or private property or commit other disturbances. 

In other action, the board also voted to deny approval to a bell tower added to the Jesuit School of Theology at 1725-35 Le Roy Ave. 

The tower had been constructed without a city permit, and board members and neighbors were critical of the design. 

The board voted to give the seminary until May 25 to come up with a better design.

Berkeley’s public schools are ranking higher than ever in the Academic Performance Index when compared with similar schools, according to data released Wednesday.  

The state Department of Education issued annual school rankings that determine how K-12 institutions are faring compared with similar schools and schools statewide. Rankings are based on a scale of 1 to 10 (1 being the lowest and 10 being the highest).  

All Berkeley Unified School District (BUSD) schools ranked in the top three deciles when compared with similar schools. Berkeley High School and each of the three middle schools earned the highest ranking. 

The most impressive gains came from Rosa Parks Elementary School, which jumped from a 1 in 2004 to an 8 in 2005. 

BUSD spokesman Mark Coplan attributes the success to a culmination of measures aimed at pulling Rosa Parks out of Program Improvement, a No Child Left Behind initiative that monitors and disciplines low-performing schools. 

Since being placed on Program Improvement five years ago, Rosa Parks has received a new parent resource center, more funding earmarked for staff development and 60 additional tutors. These efforts are paying off, Coplan said. 

Washington and Whittier also showed significant improvement on similar schools rankings, each moving from a 4 to a 9. Le Conte trailed just behind. In 2004, it received a ranking of 4, in 2005 it received an 8.  

“The message that comes across is when looking at schools with similar problems, Berkeley Unified School District is doing pretty well,” said Neil Smith, Director of Educational Services.  

The ratings are based on comparisons to 100 schools with similar demographics, such as ethnicity, socioeconomic status, number of English language learners and average class size. 

This year, the State Board of Education adopted six additional characteristics to improve reporting accuracy. They are: grade span enrollments, students enrolled in gifted and talented programs, students with disabilities, students re-designated fluent in English, migrant students and students in small classes. 

The other rankings, which offer a comparison to schools statewide, shows some BUSD sites losing ground. Five elementary schools and two middle schools, Longfellow and Willard, each dropped a single rank. 

However, four elementary schools, including Rosa Parks, moved up a rank, and Oxford moved up two ranks to the ninth decile. 

Berkeley High and King Middle School both earned rankings of 7, as they did in 2004.  

Educators often consider statewide standing a misleading measure of performance because it fails to account for schools’ individual characteristics. 

All rankings derive from the Academic Performance Index (API), a statewide testing model that attributes a numerical value between 200 and 1,000 to academic performance. Schools strive to achieve 800.  

Wednesday’s data also included API scores, but they are old news to educators who first got a glimpse of the numbers—and publicized them—last fall. A new set of API scores is due this fall.  

The API, instituted under the California Public Schools Accountability Act of 1999, is based on STAR tests for grades two through 11, and the high school exit exam for grades 10 and 11. This year is the first year all high school seniors must pass the exit exam to graduate.  

The Alternative High School received the lowest ranking possible when compared to schools statewide, though it is held to a different standard because too few students took the exit exam to yield statistically accurate results. 

Overall, Smith said he is pleased with the district’s results but does not want to overemphasize data when BUSD looks at how to improve its programs. 

“I don’t want to invest everything in the California standard tests,” he said. “They’re important, but they remain just one measure of what we do.””

Calling for peace in Iraq and denouncing federal legislation that would criminalize undocumented U.S. residents, the 27-day Latino March for Peace from Tijuana to San Francisco took a detour through Oakland Monday morning. 

Some 200 marchers were cheered by hundreds of students at St. Elizabeth’s Catholic High School in the heavily Latino Fruitvale district, before marching some 40 blocks to a rally and rest stop at Laney College.  

Before noon, the marchers took BART across the Bay to a series of rallies in San Francisco that would end the month-long protest.  

War resister Camilo Mejia, who spent nine months in jail for refusing to return to fight in Iraq, was among the core group that had walked most of the 241 miles. 

After the Laney College rally, he told reporters that he could see irony in the current situation: “You have Latinos here who are being heavily recruited [to fight], while you have their parents and relatives being treated as criminals.”  

The federal legislation that passed the House and is before the Senate is HR 4437 that would criminalize undocumented immigrants and increase the potential for employer discrimination and abuse of workers.  

Mariposa Burciaga of MEChA, an acronym that translates as Chicano Student Movement of Aztlan, was among the Laney students who organized to bring the protest to the college. 

“A lot of students aren’t aware of what’s going on,” she said. “It’s important to know what’s going on in the world, especially the effects on people of color. [The legislation] is unfair and inhuman.”  

Latinos are just beginning to understand their power, she said: “We are like the sleeping giant.”  

Stephen Allen, an 11th grader at the Life Academy, one of Oakland’s small high schools, spoke to the crowd. He said he’d had to decide whether to stay in class, “but I thought it was more important to be here, fighting for the rights—not just of Latinos—but everyone.”  

Denise Morales, 15, had a personal reason for walking out of her Life Academy classes. Morales said her parents came from Mexico to work. “They shouldn’t call us animals because we want a better life,” she said.  

Oakland’s Street Academy, the Latino Peace Alliance, Labor Against the War and UC Berkeley’s Peace and Conflict Studies were also represented at the Laney rally.  

A Peralta Federation of teachers delegate to the state California Federation of Teachers Convention this past weekend, Susan Schacher said she was at the Laney College rally protesting the war and celebrating the union’s non-endorsement of Sen. Dianne Feinstein “because of her stand in support of the war and the war budgets.”  

At the heart of planning the march was Fernando Suarez Del Solar, whose son was killed March 27, 2003, seven days into the war.  

Addressing the high school students at the early morning rally at Saint Elizabeth’s, he said: “Three years ago my son died in Iraq. Three years ago I lost my son, who, like you, had dreams. I never want to see your faces on the propaganda for war.”  

He called on the students to act: “You all collectively have to change what is wrong.””

Candida Martinez, booking agent for the Shattuck Down Low, stood in the drizzle Friday evening watching the picketers in downtown Berkeley and remarked on the irony that women opposing sexual slavery would demonstrate against Girl Fest, another organization fighting sexual exploitation of women. 

But Marcia Poole, of Women Against Sexual Slavery, saw some irony of her own. 

“The building [where Girl Fest was having a party] is owned by the biggest sex slaver in Berkeley,” she said in a phone interview Friday afternoon, referring to Lakireddy Bali Reddy, whose family business owns the building at 2284 Shattuck Ave., where the Down Low is located. 

In 2001, Reddy, a wealthy Berkeley landowner, was sentenced to eight years in prison, convicted, among other charges, of transporting minors to the U.S. for illegal sex and work. 

“Shame on Girl Fest for Supporting Sexual Slavery,” read the sign carried by protester Diana Russell, an emeritus professor at Mills College who has written extensively on women and child abuse. 

Joel Mark’s sign said: “This building owned by sex-slaver Reddy; boycott Girl Fest concert.”  

The evening event at Down Low was the kick-off party for a weekend Girl Fest conference, mostly held at UC Berkeley. There would be panels, film, music, art, spoken word and dance aiming to educate people on preventing violence against women. Girl Fest is produced under the auspices of the nonprofit The Safe Zone Foundation, based in Hawaii where the organization has put on annual Girl Fest conferences since 2003. 

“They’re going to be in the building where the girls worked as indentured servants,” Poole said, underscoring that the Down Low business owner would give rent money to the Reddys that he took from bar receipts that night. 

Kathryn Xian, who calls herself Girl Fest’s “Non-Executive” director, said she’d heard about the Reddys’ ownership and history some three weeks earlier, but she had a different view of holding the event at that particular nightspot. 

“They own the land, not the club,” she said by phone. “The land existed before the Reddy family. We’ll send a message to all sex traffickers. We’re going in there to reclaim the land that has been taken away from all women.” 

And, she added, “The Down Low owner (Daniel Cukierman) wants to do it here—to be loud and proud about it.”  

That evening, as Poole and the others picketed, Cukierman stood beside Martinez at the door of his club watching them: “The Girl Fest is a good organization; they do good work. We’re honored to have them here,” he said. 

At the last minute, Councilmember Kriss Worthington offered to help Girl Fest find another venue, but says he was not taken up on the offer. While he was not at the picket, Worthington said he supported it. 

“The City Council supported the boycott of [Reddy-owned restaurant] Pasands,” he said. “We expressed strong opposition to the horrible abuse of immigrant women and girls.” 

Poole said it was important to remember what the Reddy family had done. In addition to the conviction of Lakireddy Reddy, his sons Vijay and Prasad Lakireddy were convicted of similar but lesser charges. Vijay served two years in prison and Prasad got probation. Lakireddy’s uncle, Jayprakash Lakireddy and his aunt, Annapuma Lakireddy, pled guilty to immigration fraud and did not receive jail time.  

The immigration fraud and sexual abuse came to light after 17-year-old Chanti Prattpati died in 1999 of carbon monoxide poisoning in a Berkeley apartment owned by the Reddys. The Reddys were not held responsible. 

Prattpati’s 15-year-old sister survived the gas poisoning, caused by a blocked heating vent, and eventually told authorities that she and her sister were brought to the United States and forced to have sex with Reddy and other family members..

Depending on your political leanings, you may be exceedingly glad—or plumb horrified—to learn your child is maladjusted.  

Or so a study conducted by UC Berkeley Professor Emeritus Jack Block and his wife Jeanne Block, now deceased, might indicate.  

Beginning in 1969, the Blocks assessed personality traits in more than 100 Bay Area children. Twenty years later, subjects were tested for political persuasion. Those who had exhibited hypersensitive, insecure tendencies grew up to be conservatives, while those who were confident and resourceful grew up to be liberal.  

The report was published online in the Journal of Research in Personality in October.  

Children were independently observed by three nursery school teachers at age 3 and again, by a different set of teachers, at age 4. Those subsequently deemed conservative were often described as “feeling easily victimized, easily offended, indecisive, fearful, rigid, inhibited and relatively over-controlled and vulnerable.” 

Kids who later identified as liberals, on the other hand, were seen as self-reliant, energetic, somewhat dominating, relatively under-controlled and resilient. 

Block concludes, “It would appear that early identifiable personality characteristics, stemming from constitutional origins always interweaving with the cultural surround, seem to influence an approach to the world and a reaction to the world that tends, over the years, to evolve into a worldview, a weltanschauung, on a wide variety of issues, many of them political.” 

Jeff Greenberg, head of the social psychology program at the University of Arizona, said that doesn’t necessarily follow. 

“While the research is impressive,” he said, “I did find the descriptions of the findings in the journal article biased, and that the article overlooks a number of alternative explanations for what was actually found.”  

Greenberg points out that a 1960s–1970s Berkeley nursery school setting was likely more comfortable for children from liberal families and was therefore biased against children from conservative backgrounds. Alternatively, he said, since maladjusted children tend to reject the values of their surroundings, it could be argued that the fearful, insecure children would dismiss Bay Area liberalism, and turn to conservative ideology. In short, personality as an antecedent to political persuasion doesn’t necessarily bear out. 

“Now if the Blocks are right, they would find the same thing if they had assessed children from an Ames, Iowa, nursery school during the Reagan era,” Greenberg said. “The well-adjusted Iowan kids would grow up to become liberal and the kids not well-adjusted in that nursery school setting would grow up to be conservatives.” 

Block concedes the study’s limited subject pool—just 95 children living in Berkeley or Oakland during an ultraliberal era—narrows the scope. 

Nonetheless, he stands by his conclusions. In declining a request for an interview, he said, “The study speaks for itself.” 

Some campus conservatives think not. They’re calling his work a “wasteful masquerade,” and have accused the study of passing off “allegedly biased political assertions as scientific study.” 

The California Patriot, UC Berkeley’s undergraduate conservative publication, issued an online statement March 22 demanding accountability: 

“Berkeley must explain to its affiliates, students and admirers why university time and money has been wasted on such a poorly veiled political attack. In a time of rising housing costs and bloated tuitions, for Berkeley to be supporting and funding studies such as these is simply inexcusable.” 

The study was funded through a grant from the National Institute of Mental Health.  

In 2003, two UC Berkeley professors contributed to research linking conservatism to resistance to change and tolerance for inequality. The study earned a frosty reception from conservatives on and off campus. One of the major points of contention was the article’s assertion that Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussoli and Ronald Reagan shared the same conservative qualities.  

Which could make you wonder: What were they like as little kids, anyway??

Hispanic media report that hundreds of thousands of immigrants and their supporters are marching in cities across the country on behalf of immigrant rights. 

In the last few weeks, more than 50 demonstrations—described by some cities as the largest in their history—have occurred in Milwaukee, Providence, Trenton, Minneapolis, Knoxville, Seattle, St. Louis, Staten Island, Chicago, Washington, Portland, Grand Rapids, Tucson, Phoenix, Atlanta and Los Angeles. 

Los Angeles 

Hundreds of thousands of people marched through the streets of Los Angeles March 25 to legalize the millions of undocumented immigrants in the country, reports Jazmín Ortega in Spanish-language daily La Opinión. An estimated 500,000 demonstrators flooded the streets in protest of the Sensenbrenner bill (HR4437), which analysts predict will turn undocumented immigrants into criminals, along with those who help them, such as doctors, priests and teachers. 

The massive protest for immigrant rights had its first “pop quiz” March 24 when about two thousand students in the Los Angeles area left their classes and took to the streets, reports Jorge Morales Almada in La Opinión. 

At 8:10 a.m. on that Friday, about 500 students walked out of their classes. Half of them headed for South Gate High School and the other half walked to Bell High School, where hundreds of students were gathered. Guarded by police, they continued marching to Jordan and Southeast high schools, crossing through streets in the predominantly Latino cities of Huntington Park, South Gate and Bell. 

The protest was organized days before through emails and flyers, reports La Opinión.  

Police reported no arrests or major difficulties, except for traffic problems in the area. 

“I think this is racial,” Bianca Gudiel, a 16-year-old student who participated in Friday’s walkout, told La Opinión. 

“Lots of Blacks, Asians and Europeans have come to this country. My mom is an immigrant too and she came here to get ahead. Everyone came here for freedom, to have a good life, so we can have a good education,” she said. “Even the governor is an immigrant.” 

José Artemio Arreola, one of the central organizers of the March 10 protest in Chicago, joined organizers in Los Angeles on Saturday, reports Andrea Alegría in the Spanish-language newspaper Hoy. 

“They are working in a very similar way to what we did in Chicago,” Arreola told Hoy, adding that, unlike the Chicago protest, the Los Angeles march had the support of unions. 

“The most important thing is to try to send a message of unity,” he said, “and not to forget that the eyes of the world are on Los Angeles this weekend.” 

Chicago 

The Chicago protest drew more than 300,000 demonstrators, according to Spanish-language newspaper La Raza.  

Led by pro-immigrant organizations like Centro Sin Fronteras (Center Without Borders) and the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant Rights, it included protesters from a variety of backgrounds. Although the majority of protestors were Mexican, other groups also participated in the march, including Irish, Salvadoran, Chinese, Vietnamese and Polish immigrants. 

Meanwhile, thousands of immigrants protested March 24 in Atlanta, Phoenix and Tucson. 

Phoenix 

With approximately 30,000 protesters, the march in Phoenix was the largest in the city’s history, reports La Opinión.  

“A human river flooded the streets” of the city, the newspaper reports, as men, women and children marched toward the office of Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Arizona with signs that read “I’m not a criminal, I’m a worker” and “If my job is permanent my residency should be too.” 

Mexican immigrant Irma López told La Opinión that she did not support “these kinds of racist laws.”  

“What we want,” she said, “is for them to give us the opportunity to work honestly, and for them to respect our rights as human beings.” 

Tucson 

In Tucson, another 1,500 people participated in a similar protest. 

Atlanta 

And in Atlanta, Latino workers and consumers made their absence felt in a citywide boycott, reports La Opinión. 

According to organizer Teodoro Maus, an estimated 80,000 Latinos did not show up for work on Friday. 

About 200 demonstrators gathered in front of the Georgia Capitol in a separate protest. Some demonstrators were wrapped in the Mexican flag and carried signs that said, “Don’t be scared, we’re Hispanics” and “We have a dream too,” referencing the famous civil rights speech by Martin Luther King Jr. 

The Atlanta boycott was organized by the March 17 Alliance, a coalition of radio broadcasters, religious and community leaders who called for the protest one day after the Georgia House of Representatives approved bill SB529, introduced by Republican Sen. Chip Rogers. 

The bill will return to the state senate for a vote with new amendments, including one that would force undocumented immigrants to pay an additional five percent charge when they send remittances electronically. 

More protests were slated for Monday, when faith leaders from across the country will hold a demonstration in Washington, D.C. And in Boston, more than 500 protesters are expected to march to Tremont Temple for a religious celebration in support of immigration reform. 

The Berkeley Police Department addressed growing concerns related to teen parties in Berkeley at the Northbrae Church Community Center last Thursday, two days before a teenage party in the city ended in the death of one of the parents. 

In February, a teenager was also killed at a Berkeley house party. 

The forum “How Many Parties Are Too Many?” was well attended by parents of Berkeley teenagers concerned about the sudden rise in violence and vandalism at house parties in the city. About 50 people filled the meeting room at the center. 

The majority of teen parties in the city take place in the south campus area, followed by the north campus area, according to the police. The West Berkeley area has had the least number of parties recently.  

The importance of having a chaperone present at teen parties could not be stressed enough, police said. The problem of underage drinking was also discussed at great length. 

The police also shared the results of a study conducted by the Alameda County Behavioral & Healthcare Services which found that 58 percent of Berkeley High School students said they had consumed alcohol in the last three days compared to zero percent of Berkeley Alternative High School students. In contrast, 17 to 35 percent of students in Alameda County admitted to consuming alcohol over the same period. However, 6 percent of Berkeley High students had said that it was easy to get alcohol in Berkeley compared to 23 percent at the alternative high school. 

BDP Area Coordinator Officer Dave Nutterfield outlined social factors such as peer pressure and technology that lead to out-of-control teen parties. 

“Because of technology such as cell phones and myspace.com, parties attract up to 250 kids instead of the 20 or 30 that were originally invited,” he said. “In order to control those 250 to 300 rowdy kids, 75 percent of the Berkeley police force is taken up on certain days.”  

Four to six officers from Berkeley police’s “Party Control Unit” patrol the neighborhoods every weekend. Nutterfield said. 

He also described ways in which peers could control parties that went out of control. 

“Always have a designated person on the spot to call 911,” he said. “It’s also a good idea to turn off lights, music and ask people to leave immediately.” 

Nutterfield added that most teenagers were afraid to contact the police for help because alcohol or drugs could be found on the party premises. He said, “Don’t be afraid to call us because of the presence of alcohol or drugs. We just want to make sure that you get home safe.” 

In case the parents are out of town and the party goes out of bounds, neighbors have a very important role to play in notifying the police. 

“Parents should also let neighbors know from before that they are leaving town and need them to keep a close eye on their children in case parties are thrown,” Nutterfield said. 

Officer Jessica Nabozney told the group about the dangers of teenagers chatting online with strangers. 

“There’s a whole lot of sick people out there waiting to take advantage of your child,” she said. “It is important to keep an eye on Internet activities.””

San Francisco was the site of a “reverse rebellion” last weekend. 

BattleCry, an initiative of Texas-based Teen Mania—one of the world’s largest Chirstian youth organizations—brought its message to the Bay Area, drawing hundreds of supporters to a rain soaked rally. The group preaches against elements of popular culture which they say are contributing to the spread of STDs, drug and alcohol abuse, violence, and suicide among teenagers. 

Teenagers gathered on San Francisco City Hall steps last Friday to declare the “BattleCry Bill of Rights,” which seeks to allow children to grow up without being exploited for financial gain. 

As the words “We will pursue purity throughout our lives ... We will not be seduced by a fabricated idea of sex and love ... We will save our bodies and hearts for our future spouse, and once married, we commit to pursue faithful and enduring relationships,” grew louder at the rally, there were sporadic bursts of chants such as “The Christian right is wrong,” and “Go home” from anti-BattleCry groups who had gathered to oppose the rally. 

Sister Mary Timothy, from the satiric gay group Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, told The Planet that this was a cry to battle. “We are in the order of men and women who promote joy,” she said. “These kids are being brainwashed to start hating everyone who is different from them. We want to stop that from happening.” 

Elisa Welch, a member of Code Pink and Women for Peace, had just one message for BattleCry: “Shut up and go home. We don’t need more people like you taking over our children’s lives.” 

Natasha, a teenage spokesperson for BattleCry, took the criticism in good spirit. 

“We know that there are some people here who don’t support us and that’s okay,” she told the Planet. “The Lord has told us to love all. We are not here to condemn anyone or hate anyone. We are against media which glamorizes sex, drugs, and alcohol and we want to live a life of truth instead of temptation.” 

Echoing Natasha’s words were teenagers Aubri, Suzie and Jayme who had come down from Portland, Ore., to participate in BattleCry. 

“Praise the Lord,” they chanted unanimously. They said the protest had been spiritually exhausting. They said they joined the rally to help bring a stop to all the aspects of modern culture that take people away from God. 

Aubri, Suzie, and Jayme were not alone. More than 25,000 supporters of BattleCry gathered in the AT&T Stadium in San Francisco that evening and on Saturday to address topics of alcohol, sex, culture, and faith through empowering messages, high-voltage music and interactive drama. 

Concord native Ron Luce, 44, who created Teen Mania in 1986 to help teenagers caught in a “life of hopelessness and despair,” spoke at the event. He was joined by artists and bands including Delirious, TobyMac, and KJ-52. 

Teen Mania has worked to make sure teenagers and parents hear statistics such as “MTV airs (on average) 9 sexual scenes per hour and more than 8 un-bleeped profanities per hour,” or that “thousands of young people between the ages of 15-24 will commit suicide this year” and “approximately four million teens will contract a sexually transmitted disease (STD) this year.” 

Luce’s speech decried how sex and violence have been glamorized, “It’s ‘virtue terrorism’ and teens have had enough,” he said. “The media and retailers who peddle this garbage for the sake of cash and controversy are doing so at the expense of our children.” 

The Saturday event also marked the unveiling of www.mybattleplan.com which was described as the Christian alternative to myspace.com and would cater to the interests of Christian youths. 

BattleCry will be repeated in Detroit April 7 to 8 and Philadelphia May 13  

to 14..

Last week I pulled an unopened box of shredded wheat off the top shelf in our pantry to offer to grandchildren, and happened to notice that its “sell by” date was 2003. That’s how long it’s been since I visited that shelf, and, not coincidentally, that’s how long we’ve been running this paper. Many things in our lives stopped when this enterprise started. The relentless pressure of twice-weekly deadlines, coupled with the never-ending minutiae of running an understaffed small business, leaves little time for frivolous entertainments like eating shredded wheat.  

The first issue of the revived Berkeley Daily Planet came out on April 1, 2003, an amusing date which is also the anniversary of the city charter. For literature majors of my generation, T.S. Eliot was hands-down the poet most taught and most read in academia, and few of us turn the calendar page to April without thinking of the first lines of “The Waste Land”:  

April is the cruelest month, breeding 

Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing 

Memory and desire, stirring  

Dull roots with spring rain. 

For a bred-in-the-bone Californian, these lines are perhaps less poignant, but those of us who have spent any time in places where everything dies in winter can’t fail to be moved by them. April is the month of hope, cruel because the hope is inevitably touched by nostalgia and anxiety.  

What were our hopes for the Planet three years ago? Here’s part of it: 

“Local coverage well done can give local citizens the information they need to take responsibility for the actions of local government.” Have we succeeded in this goal? Some would say we’ve succeeded too well, since we’ve just lost one of our liveliest writers to participation in the political process. There’s certainly been more talk about what local governments, not only Berkeley’s but those of our neighbors north and south, are up to. But has it affected their actions? Have outcomes been altered? That’s not clear. 

As we were launching, the Fine Arts Theater was being demolished, and the UC Theater stood empty. Despite the developer’s pious and hypocritical promises that Fine Arts would be rebuilt, neither theater has been revived as a film venue. This week we’ve heard that another Berkeley movie house, the Landmark Act 1&2, is closing. Could the Berkeley city government have done anything to prevent this, or are we simply at the mercy of international economic forces which are destroying local movie houses everywhere?  

This is just one example. There’s a host of other failures and missed opportunities for government responsibility in other arenas which the paper has chronicled but not yet affected. Thanks to the Planet, citizens have learned about the infinite variety of casinos being foisted on the East Bay, but have they been stopped? Will the Albany shore be turned into a hideous and vulgar shopping center?  

Is it worth the time and effort it takes to shine a little light on what’s going on for our readers?  

And would it have been worth it after all….? asked Eliot’s Prufrock.  

Many of our readers live very comfortable lives despite the storms raging around us. Northern California is as close to paradise on earth as makes no difference. Berkeley has become Valhalla for many successful warriors who have made their mark elsewhere. They’ve moved to Berkeley (or just “winter” in Berkeley) to live peacefully in some Maybeckian eyrie in the hills, venturing out occasionally to one of our many exquisite restaurants, submitting to an occasional interview by a member of the Eastern media in a lovely hillside garden. For readers like this, the daily struggles of flatland readers with congestion and pollution as chronicled in these pages must seem remote. It must be hard for them to imagine the indignation felt by those whose major neighborhood open space is the BART parking lot, now coveted as a development site by those who profit from the building process.  

But for all of us here, in hills and flats alike, there’s a constant temptation to abandon today’s fray in whatever way we can afford, to enjoy whatever serenity and comfort we can manage. For many, it’s mostly in our much-maligned Back Yard, a place of refuge—but only until it’s assaulted by someone who wants to shadow it with a big ugly building. And we get the same anguished complaints from hill-dwellers who face losing a precious view. 

It’s a shame that Eliot died before hyperlinks were available. “The Waste Land,” his central work, is loaded with allusions, some of which are modestly footnoted, but he could have gone wild with modern tools for connecting the dots. He quotes there a line of Baudelaire’s which is a favorite of mine. I think of it frequently when I’m at any gathering of Berkeley notables, or when I’m reading the letters to the editor in the Planet:  

“…hypocrite lecteur, mon semblable, mon frere..” (Hypocritical reader, my look-alike, my brother.) 

The paper has had a spate of letters recently from self-righteous people who challenge other residents’ rights to defend their own little corner of the earth, hollering NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard) as if it were an insult instead of the rallying cry of the Love Canal victims. As an Ashby Avenue resident of 35 years, I can’t help being offended myself by the writer who is more than willing to add to the enormous traffic burden that those of us who live on this residential street carry (probably at significant risk to our health) just so that he can have a cheap grocery store in his own back yard. But that’s what the paper is for, to put all kinds of ideas out in the open for scrutiny and challenge, even though some of them are offensive to some of us some of the time. It all comes down to a question of whose ox is being gored, or whose backyard is being invaded.  

y

It’s been three years since the United States invaded Iraq, so the press this month has been full of reminiscences tempered by a pinch of self-doubt. Some of the many high-visibility commentators, both press and politicians, who were dead wrong about what was going on have acknowledged that they were duped by the official story, but many have not. The Daily Planet was in the process of re-inventing itself that same month three years ago, and we’re proud to say we’ve been aware of how bogus this invasion was from our first day, and have told our readers about it (not that many of them were fooled anyhow.)  

Another journalist who was right from Day 1, Henry Norr, was fired for being right in the wrong place at the wrong time. He was the technology columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle, and he was ostensibly fired for participating in an anti-war demonstration, though some suspect that his previous activities on behalf of Palestinians might have played a part too. We had his personal story in our first issue, and in today’s paper you can find his review of new books about torture, as practiced in this war and elsewhere.  

The most chilling assessment of where this country is going with its war against Iraq seems to be emanating from ex-Republican Kevin Phillips. His new book, American Theocracy, contains his latest analysis of the motivation for the war, which is—surprise!—the vast pool of oil on which Iraq sits. His picture of the future seems to be the establishment and maintenance of a few permanent American military bases in Iraq to stand guard over the oil, with perpetual chaos among the locals “off-base” not a problem as long as the walls around the bases are high enough.  

“Of course,” say those familiar with recent history: the French plan for holding on to Vietnam in the early ‘60s. It didn’t work then, but it might work in Iraq for 10 or 20 years, until the multinational oil conglomerates can suck up all the oil and attendant profits. Hearts and Minds have nothing to do with it, not those of the Iraqi people nor of American voters. Phillips also believes that the American political system is under attack at its core from the new Christian right, working towards the establishment of a theocracy based on the principles of evangelical Christianity, and that this struggle is distracting voters from what the oilmen are up to in Iraq.  

Against this background of continuous international turmoil, it’s sometimes hard to concentrate on much else. But daily life goes on, and responsible citizens should continue to be aware of what’s being done by government at all levels in their names. We believe that it’s important to hear from participants as well as observers. For that reason, the Daily Planet has been featuring two regular columnists who are personally engaged in political activity, a conscious departure from the journalistic convention of giving column space only to the uninvolved.  

Bob Burnett will continue to report on national and international politics for our “Public Eye” column, but we’re losing Zelda Bronstein for the time being. She’s taken a leave of absence from her own Public Eye column on local issues to run for mayor of Berkeley. (We do plan to repeat our successful election forum feature of 2004, where candidates are given a substantial amount of space on a regular basis to present their views, so we hope to see Ms. Bronstein again in that capacity along with her competitors.)  

In her place, we’re asking other people who are involved in local politics in the East Bay to try their hand at writing Public Eye columns. Anyone who is both a good writer and a participant in the action is welcome to try out for this slot. We don’t have to agree with your opinions, and in fact we hope to get a revolving roster presenting a variety of sometimes opposing points of view. The main criterion is quality: the ability to put together 800 or so lively and literate words from time to time on the state of the East Bay as you see it. Send your efforts to public.eye@berkeleydailyplanet.com.  

—

Peralta Trustee Alona Clifton was misquoted in the March 28 issue of the Planet. She said “Compton is the closest we have in California to a historically-black community college,”not “Compton is the only historically-black community college we have in California.”  

In the same article, Mervyn Dymally was identified as a California State Senator. Dymally served in the California State Senate in the 1960s, and was later elected to the United States Congress. After retiring from Congress, he was elected to the California State Legislature as an Assemblymember, where he now serves.n

THE DATA ARE IN 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Environmentalists arise! The data are in. Official state estimates from the Department of Finance show that in 2005 there were 500,000 new residents in California. The majority of the increase involved new foreign immigrants and a relatively high birth rate among immigrants. I have personally benefited in the past—my beloved and legally adopted son was born in the Dominican Republic. And, yes, I have also benefited from cheap illegal labor. But now we are all starting to pay the delayed costs of an over-burdened infrastructure resulting in loss of open space, crowded highways, hospitals going out of business, high housing costs, water shortages, and poorer air quality. The governor has proposed a massive $222 billion 10-year bond to address infrastructure problems. Realistic environmental policy must come to terms with the fundamental issue of poorly regulated population growth. 

Robert Gable 

• 

POLICE PROCEDURE 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Many people share Becky O’Malley’s grumblings (March 24) that police priorities appear misplaced. My favorite is when I discovered California State Police saturating the UC Santa Cruz campus and issuing tickets to skateboarders. You could be certain that people were dying on the highways the same time that the state police had decided to make the campus a safer place (in the middle of the day). 

Ms. O’Malley, however, fails to understand that the local marijuana industry and her car break-in are directly related. From her description, the “hapless thug” was so incompetent, I would bet he was high on drugs at the time. Moreover, the contents of her car appear to have been fairly low value, probably just enough to buy alcohol and marijuana. 

In Berkeley, my car is broken into once every 18 months, and each time the bandit appears incompetent and comes away with spare change. I can’t help to think that these break-ins are at the hands of substance abuser searching for just enough cash to buy their next fix. 

Kudos to the Berkeley Police Department for their recent West Berkeley pot bust. These arrests benefit our entire community in a multitude of ways, and that’s how I want to see my property tax dollars spent. Too bad that every time I drive around one of Berkeley’s new $20,000 traffic circles, Ms. O’Malley’s words ring true: “...it’s our tax dollars at work where it’s convenient, and not at work where we need them to be.” 

Paul Kalas 

• 

DERBY FIELD 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I have read many bizzaro commentaries about the differences between open and closed Derby but hats off to Mark McDonald. He has made statements that are so baseless that it is hard to imagine where he could possibly have come up the concepts. 

BUSD, has not and is not involved in the Gilman Fields project. Nor for that matter are the schools from Albany or Richmond. There is absolutely no truth to his claim that BUSD was going to come up with $2 million for the Gilman Project or any amount of money for that matter. It’s never even been  

discussed—and I’ve been at every meeting since we started pushing for playing fields in Eastshore State Park six years ago.  

When the City of Berkeley, not the School Board, initially proposed a plan for Derby, the Farmers’ Market supported its move to another site. However, in the middle of the process, the Farmers’ Market reconsidered its position. The closed-Derby plans developed by the athletic community has allocated 45,000 square feet for the Farmers’ Market (with no fencing along MLK) and community compared to the 27,000 square feet under open-Derby. Under the open-Derby plan the Farmer’s Market is losing its parking “cut-ins.” It would not surprise me in the least for the Farmers’ Market to come to the realization that the closed-Derby plan developed by the athletic community is far superior to what they are going to have under open-Derby. Just wait until open-Derby is finished and they really are limited to Derby Street.  

The notion that an open Derby is a multipurpose field and closed Derby is a baseball only field is a concept fostered by the opponents of closing Derby. The closed-Derby plan developed by the athletic community has a regulation soccer/football/lacrosse/rugby field that has no part of the field in the dirt. Closed Derby is not a plan supported by “one small vocal sports group” as Mr. McDonald states. It is supported by the presidents of the Albany Berkeley Soccer Club (900 players) and Alameda Contra Costa Youth Soccer (3,000 players) as well as many other athletic groups including the Berkeley Cougars who serve 185 at risk low income minority children who spoke in support of closing Derby in front of the Berkeley City Council. This on top of the athletic director for BUSD and coaches from BHS sports from girl’s rugby to women’s soccer.  

And as for funding, the Berkeley general fund isn’t going to fund this project. The $100,000 being asked by BUSD was something resulting from the Mayor’s (and several council persons) offer to share the costs of the EIR at a City Council meeting.  

Enough is enough. We all support building the interim plan and the entire athletic community as well as no small number of neighbors who also live around the Derby Street site look forward to a closed Derby in the near future. 

Doug Fielding 

• 

PETER’S BACK 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Uh-oh: Peter Levitt is back and flinging his favorite epithet, “NIMBY” (letter, March 28). This time, his target is newly declared mayoral candidate Zelda Bronstein.  

I long ago tired of the Build Absolutely Anything Anywhere (BAAA) crowd’s failed arguments for subsidizing the further enrichment of rich developers. But I’ve especially tired of their name-calling. Here are some personal resolutions that I invite others to also consider: 

First, the next time someone cries “NIMBY” without even bothering to define the acronym, fill it in for yourself: “Not Intimidated By Mad Yelling.”  

From what little I’ve read of Ms. Bronstein, that fits her to a “T” (TFHTAT). Back when she held some power and influence as Planning Commission chair, she insisted on sharing it, by vigorously advocating transparent government and broad participation in city decisions. Since resigning, she’s pursued the same goals from the less comfortable perch of activist, columnist, and now machine-free candidate. Don’t you want an owl guarding the foxhouse that is City Hall? 

Second, the next time someone whines “NIMBY” in hopes of silencing a debate they can’t win, view everything else they say as suspect. And give their target the benefit of the doubt (see above). 

Finally, when someone is lazy enough to substitute shorthand epithets for coherent arguments, question their competence even in their claimed specialty. By this criterion, I fear I can no longer trust Mr. Levitt to make a payroll, hire or fire other human beings, or even properly apply a lox schmear to my bagel at his Saul’s Deli. QED. TTFN. 

Marcia Lau 

• 

THIN GRUEL 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Last week the owner of a North Berkeley deli wrote that: “Zelda Bronstein, how can she run for mayor, she has never met a payroll.” I was glad to see that Calvin Coolidge (“The business of America is business”) is alive and well in Berkeley. All one has to do is shout: “I am a businessman, therefore I know”—and he doesn’t have to explain what he knows, or how it applies to, um, promoting the general welfare.  

Now I have to admit that the businesspeople running Washington are demonstrating their hard-headed commercial skills to the world. I only wish that the deli boss would show his smarts by shaping up his rather slovenly-looking wait-staff—and while he’s at it, stop serving chopped chicken liver with the consistency of thin gruel. Come to think of it, his letter has the consistency of thin gruel. 

Neal Blumenfeld 

• 

99-CENT MISS SAIGON 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Thanks to the Planet’s Ken Bullock for telling us about “The 99-cent Miss Saigon” March 14). I squeaked into the sold-out final performance and, like everyone else, ended up on my feet clapping my hands raw at curtain time.  

This was the freshest, most surprising treat I’ve seen on a Berkeley stage since Shotgun Players wowed everyone with “The Death of Meyerhold” in 2003. 

Actually, the Miss Saigon company had neither stage nor curtain—they worked magic with a basic schoolroom. Now they have no venue in which to extend their run. Let’s hope they find one so that more folks will have a chance to enjoy this great pocket musical. 

Michael Katz 

• 

MORE ON DERBY FIELD 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

In response to C. Gilbert’s letter, the real irony of the Derby Street plans is that the closed-street plan actually has MORE paving than the open-street plan. The open-street plan—which came out of a public BUSD process last year, includes Derby Street (a public street with 65 public parking spaces and emergency access from the local fire station), one basketball court, a restroom structure and site walkways—has approximately 45,500 square feet of paving.  

The closed-street plan, drawn up last summer by BUSD without public input, proposes removal of Derby Street only to replace it with a large, fenced blacktop area—the proverbial “parking lot”—along the entire west end of the site facing MLK. This paved area is for the once weekly use by the Farmers’ Market, minimum daily use as two basketball courts and BUSD parking. The closed-street plan also has a fire lane (required by the Fire Department for site access), a restroom structure and site walkways, all adding up to approximately 52,000 square feet of paving. Two other important items of note are that 1) the configuration of the large paved rectangle does not work nearly as well as an open street does for the Farmers’ Market, and 2) the 315 afternoons a year that the closed-street black top area is not a Farmers’ Market, it will simply be a large paved vacant lot with not much use. 

Adding to the irony is the fact that the active playing field area for the two plans is the basically the same. The open-street plan yields approximately 130,000 square feet of playing fields. The closed-street field yields approximately 132,000 square feet of field space. What’s more, the dirt infield of the baseball diamond in the closed street plan overlaps the multi-sport field, compromising its use for soccer, lacrosse, field-hockey, rugby, football and other field sports. The open-street plan does not present this overlap between the practice infield diamond and the multi-sport playing field, making for a much more useful multi-sports field. 

Maybe the Ecology Center and others who have actually studied the plans are onto something. The open-street plan is greener, more multi-purpose, more affordable and has funding available. Build the multi-use fields now and keep Derby open.  

Susi Marzuola 

• 

GIRL FEST PROTEST 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Last Friday evening the Berkeley nightclub Shattuck Down Low hosted a benefit for Girl Fest as part of a conference to educate people on preventing violence against women. The nightclub was picketed by Diana Russell and others because the nightclub building is owned by the Reddy family, several of whom have been convicted of crimes against women. 

Diana Russell has for many years written and lectured on the connection between sadistic pornography and violence against women and children. Also for many years she has focused our attention on the crimes of the Reddy family. We all owe her a debt of gratitude. 

But, I and many other feminists, wish that instead of picketing Shattuck Down Low that she and her supporters had been able to appreciate the nightclub’s generosity and also how much women would benefit. The money will help to prevent future Reddy-like crimes. 

Nancy Ward 

• 

CREEKS 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

A writer recently suggests that we should try to ignore the creeks just because we don’t know when they will be restored. Hopefully some residents have longer-term goals, and it appears inevitable to me that most creeks will be restored in coming decades. 

Strawberry Creek passes nearly under my home, and I bought this house the day it was listed specifically because the neighborhood will be so much more improved when it is restored someday. 

Be realistic: The culverts were unnatural and unsustainable/ temporary and will be too expensive to maintain, besides depriving us of wonderful creek aesthetics. 

The other inevitabilities for Berkeley are significant population growth this century, a restoration of local rail transit, and less traffic as autos become less needed and more expensive to operate. This is among the best locations worldwide for a city, and it will become as dense as European cities are now—get used to it. Our descendants will need more parks more than they will need every expensive-to-maintain street. 

For example, when University corridor is eventually built-out with modern four—and six-story buildings, perhaps this century, those thousands of residents and employees will need more parks or we will risk slum-like conditions. Future residents need us to plan ahead now so that the length of Strawberry Creek can someday be Berkeley’s “Central Park.”  

To start, the creek should be restored on BUSD property between Browning and the old gymnasium as part of the redevelopment there. Once Browning is also someday closed there, our block will finally be able to restore the creek on our private property, before or when the culvert inevitably fails. 

Let me clarify that the ordinance currently limits construction on my own lot and closing Browning will also increase traffic on my street, but the benefits are greater. The local apts will have much happier residents not needing to drive elsewhere to find parks, and Addison will become a popular/safe bike route connecting the university and train station, reducing UC’s traffic and parking problems once the commuters and delivery trucks can no longer use Browning/Addison as a speedway.  

A creek in my yard? Ten to 20 years is a long time to wait, but these things take time as surely as it took decades to replace Berkeley’s incredible rail transit system and beautiful creeks with dangerous traffic. 

Sennet Williams 

• 

ALBANY WATERFRONT 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I visited the controversial Albany waterfront, and reveled in its flora, fauna, sights, sounds and smells. I saw where four, then six, unleashed dogs plunged and leaped in the foam, playing with their owners (who threw sticks) and with each other. Happy dogs, they never heard of Rick Caruso and his upscale ambience! But these dogs will be leashed and fenced in if a huge “mixed use development” (with a Nordstrom’s, no less!) and a six-story garage frown over their spot of bay. 

Walking north, overlooking the path to the Bulb, I saw a flock of about 60 plump, matter-of-fact little willets, dredging for food with their long bills. Time stood still for them. The Bulb is their village, and the Albany tax base another country. Noise, fumes, density, Nordstrom’s wrappers would choke all such life. The dead watercourses in Rachel Carson’s 1962 classic, Silent Spring, come to mind. 

Nature abhors an upscale ambience. Shouldn’t you? Please save our Albany shore! 

Anne Richardson 

Albany 

It’s business as usual with the Ashby BART “development.” In a recent move by Ed Church and the South Berkeley Neighborhood Development Corporation (SBNDC), SBNDC is now going to choose a team of people who will represent all of South Berkeley to the City Council in a process to hire a developer for the Ashby BART site. And this before we have had one conversation as a community about what we want regarding the Ashby BART station. 

Generally, Tom Bates and Max Anderson have been telling people that they started out too fast, that they now want to slow down and find out what the community wants at the BART station. They say they want what the community wants. 

I have spoken to community members, local business owners, and other South Berkeley groups, and my impression is that there is widespread interest in some kind of community open space at the Ashby BART, a piazza-like structure with retail, outdoor eating and art, perhaps some community meeting space and a small amount of affordable housing IF housing can be fit into that format. My general impression is that there is widespread support for a space that will allow for the continuation of the Ashby Flea Market, ON THAT SITE. 

So, this sounds good. Let’s get together, figure out what we want and do it! 

But . . . The wind is blowing in a different direction. 

Tom and Max and Ed and other city council members, when pressed, actually tell us that they are only open to a plan that is primarily high density housing. They have said this in a meeting with the Flea Market, in meetings with various other groups, in personal communications I have had with them and in various forums. They also agree that this would not be compatible with the vision for a community piazza such as that described above or with a space that would support the continuation of the Flea Market at their present location. There us a widespread belief among these folks and a few hundred “workforce” families is the best medicine for South Berkeley. 

And recent developments demonstrate the same. The latest move in this drama is that Ed Church, in the name of the South Berkeley Neighborhood Development Corporation, has issued a call for nominees to become part of a “task force.” The specific and only task assigned to this task force is to advise the City Council on signing a contract with a developer for the Ashby BART site, before there is an opportunity for any kind of broad community process to decide what we want, if anything. This was the very thing that concerned us when we first read the Caltrans proposal: if the process starts out by contracting with a developer to build high density housing, how can we decide to do anything else. Our role will be relegated to deciding the color of the walls of the fortification we will walk past.  

While Tom Bates assured us at his meeting at the AME church that they would be tearing up the proposal and instead implementing a community driven exploration, Ed’s move belies this fact by following the proposal to a T. 

Upon reading his announcement, I immediately sent Ed an e-mail asking two questions: 

1. Who will be making the selection among the nominees for the final task force and how will that be done? 

2. Since Max and Tom have been telling everyone we can do whatever the community wants at the BART station, how does this square with starting off with a contract with a developer for housing at the site? 

He has not responded. It has been about a week since I sent the e-mail. This is not a group that is real open about their plans for us.  

Soon after seeing Ed’s announcement, I learned from an SBNDC board member that the task force will be selected by the SBNDC board. Even though this task force will be said to represent us as a community, none of us will have any part in making the final selection among nominees. 

While this is going on, Max has been offering various groups pieces of this project in hopes of appealing to their self-interest and get their support for what he wants. He has promised free parking to churches in the area, art space to Epic Arts. He has offered the Northern California Land Trust, of which I am a member of the board, a piece of the high density housing. Sounds like he is hawking his plan, not spending time finding our what we want. He’s supposed to be representing the desires of the community that elected him to represent US. 

If we really want this process to be driven by us, and if we want something at the BART station that supports a broad community vision, we are clearly going to have to fight for it, and this means standing up to Tom and Max and ED and SBNDC and speaking up for our community. This means saying it is not OK for you to select a task force and then say it represents us. 

There is some action we can take immediately. 

There have been appeals circulated this week to send Caltrans a last rush of letters as they make their final decision on the SBNDC proposal to let them know that we are still not satisfied with the process this group and the City are leading. In addition, there will be a petition circulated asking for a moratorium on any activities, like hiring a developer, until a REAL community process that truly involves all voices in the community can be completed. It is in violation of Tom and Max and Ed’s promise to support what the community wants to go ahead with any agreement with any developer. 

Please join this process. Write a letter and sign the petition. The petition will be circulated at the Flea Market this weekend and there will be copies around other places, including some local e-mail lists. 

Here is the contact information for Caltrans: 

Tom Neumann, Chief 

Office of Community Planning 

Division of Transportation Planning 

California Department of Transportation 

1120 N St., MS#49 

Sacramento, CA 95814 

tom_neumann@dot.ca.gov 

Kenoli Oleari is a member of the Neighborhood Assemblies Network. 

ª

Write on behalf of some landmark preservation dispute and people roll their eyes over how the preservationists have just gone too far, pushed too hard, and need a more balanced perspective.  

Developers, after all, they’ll point out, have created important community benefits with their new construction. Respond by saying that the new buildings are almost uniformly ugly, poorly built, overpriced as both housing and retail, and absent both open space and cultural amenities, and they’ll usually reply that housing is in such crisis that such buildings are worth building even if they only help a few.  

What’s never calculated is the net loss of the amenities that could have been there, that the community can now never have until the building comes down decades from today and more sensible planning prevails. 

Blaming developers is short-sighted. One of the largest local developers once stated that he’d be a fool not to take whatever profitable opportunity the City Council and the Planning Department was willing to let him get away with. Blaming preservationists who try to protect remnants of the past is even worse, as the ranks of poorly paid or unpaid historians willing to spend time and money working to protect history from short-sighted development grow more and more thin.  

As another election rolls near, remember to put the blame for the monstrous new edifice in your neighborhood, which brought only overpriced housing and displaced decades-old and respected businesses with useless, short-lived, non-neighborhood-serving retail, squarely on the shoulders of the Berkeley City Council. 

This group of elected politicians could, if they chose, take a stand against inappropriate development, re-direct their Planning Department to reprioritize neighborhood concerns, honestly address transportation and parking problems, and populate commissions with appointees dedicated to making sure new developments address an honest balance of concerns. 

If the Planning Department and the City Council are ready to sell out the public, you can hardly blame the developers who profit after the fact or the preservationists whose dedication to history sometimes affords uneasy protection for qualified buildings. The real protection against the new breed of ticky-tacky developments should be elected representatives with the courage to demand the realistic planning that neighborhoods, both residential and commercial, deserve. 

When the next election rolls around, grill the incumbents on the building that gutted your neighborhood. Get the facts as to why the so-called retail stood empty for so long, and why the toxics over which the building was built remain in place. Demand, in writing, promises from challengers, so that voters have some honest options. And above all, pay attention. If we sleep through the destruction of the city we love, we have only ourselves to blame. 

Carol Denney is a Berkeley musician and activist.›

MONSTROSITY 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

What genius do we have to thank for that monstrous upchuck of steel and concrete filling the sky the entire block between Kittredge and Bancroft between Milvia and Harold Way? 

And who gets the booby prize for authorizing this and other recent affronts to what we used to believe was the architecture of the Western World? 

Who has the authority to make such decisions without a vote by the citizenry? 

And where do we go to say what we think before the monstrosity is plopped down to rise up before us, with no backhoe big enough to haul it away to the dump? 

Dorothy V. Benson 

• 

YOU’RE KIDDING 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Zelda for mayor? You’re kidding right? Zelda you are right. It is “our” town. But who is “our”? 

Is it the minority political class of NIMBYs who find time to permanently sit on city commissions advising, obstructing and slowing down the running of the city? 

Is it the neighborhoods that see the city purely from the perspective of their street and have no vision for the greater city? 

Or is it the overwhelming majority of citizens who go about there business every day trying to make a living? Who, if they had the time to ponder the question, would probably choose a strong mayor model unhindered by 30 commissions. After all, an ineffective mayor can be removed from office every election. 

However you are a good writer and probably a good teacher. But mayor? As a small business person I find this quite scary. You have never had to make a payroll. Never had to hire or fire another human being. You have never built a business or building that houses people or businesses. 

You know how to complain and naysay—we see this in your writing. But you have no vision or experience that would provide solutions to your complaints. 

Peter Levitt 

Proprietor of Saul’s Delicatessen 

• 

SEA SCOUTS 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I appreciated your coverage of the City of Berkeley’s victory against the Sea Scouts. Your readers deserve to know that Diane Woolley, former waterfront commissioner and city council representative, was the person whose initial objection started the city’s examination of the use of the waterfront by discriminatory groups. 

Diane Woolley was personally targeted by the Sea Scout lawsuit, and never wavered through years of hostile personal attacks. The entire town, and those who care about justice, owe her our deepest gratitude. 

Carol Denney 

• 

OUT-OF-TOWNERS 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

In the March 24 Daily Planet article headline “Many Homeowners Pan Creeks Ordinance Recommendations,” Suzanne La Barre quotes Igor Skaredoff who attended a recent joint meeting between the Creeks Task Force and the Planning Commission. She notes that Mr. Skaredoff is, in fact, a Martinez resident. 

A Martinez resident?! Why should a Martinez resident participate in a Berkeley meeting on a topic that primarily impacts Berkeley homeowners? Why should the opinion of any non-resident be part of the city’s decision-making process? It is utterly preposterous that a non-resident should have a voice in this contentious issue. While the Urban Creeks Council, of which Mr. Skaredoff is a member, may have legitimate environmental concerns, the Berkeley creek/culverts issue is one that must be solved only by those who own affected property in the City of Berkeley. This is not an issue for outside interests with no financial liabilities or stakes in the outcome. Nor is it an issue for renters. Neither outsiders nor renters would be affected in the same potentially devastatingly financial way as Berkeley property homeowners. 

To her credit Ms. La Barre noted Mr. Skaredoff’s out-of-town residency. In future reports on this and other city issues, it would shed much needed light and perspective if reporters included the terms, “Berkeley homeowner” or “Berkeley renter” with each name and quote. And continue to identify outsiders as such. In whatever form this ordinance reaches the City Council, the council must understand the source of opinions and make its decision in favor of homeowners. It would be sheer folly to hold affected homeowners liable for past permitting policies and locations of historic city culverts.  

By definition, Berkeley homeowners are environmentally aware, environmentally involved, environmentally advanced. Most homeowners probably would agree that any creek ordinance/revision should address future development on undeveloped parcels but should not in any way restrict or jeopardize property rights of Berkeley property owners beyond zoning and building ordinances that rightly and fairly affect all property development. 

Barbara Witte 

• 

CREEKS 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I am a 23-year resident of Berkeley living on Codornices Creek at Beverly Place. I have also been a civil engineer for the Santa Clara Valley Water District for 15 years, currently working in watershed operations, stream stewardship, and flood protection, and formerly in the district’s permitting unit. 

I appreciate and support the work of the Creeks Task Force (CTF) in the difficult balance among creek stewardship, public safety, and the use of property. I believe that the CTF Recommended Revisions to the Creeks Ordinance presented in the March 22 staff report maintains this balance very well and should be adopted without modification. The recommendations governing construction near streams are fair and implementable. 

I am particularly interested in culverts since I have one on my property, in addition to having Codornices Creek in an open channel. Culverts conveying creeks are inherently different from storm drains in that the flows through them are part of the stream system itself, rather than feeders to a stream, and this should be acknowledged. However, for the purposes of the ordinance revision, Recommendation 5 is appropriate in treating setbacks and access issues from culverts as storm drains in order to allow them to be addressed from a public safety standpoint. 

Appropriate maintenance of storm water conveyances—the creeks, which includes preserving the stability of streambanks by not allowing construction close to the stream, is a crucial part of flood protection and public safety. 

I also stress that a creek is an amenity for the individual property owner. Beyond the esthetic value of the connection with the natural watershed, numerous studies have shown substantial increases of value of properties which have well-maintained creeks adjacent. For this reason, it benefits us all to protect our streams. I, therefore, suggest rewording Statement of Agreement 1 to “Creeks are a community and individual asset that should be protected and enhanced.” 

William C. Springer 

• 

AN AMAZING EVENT 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Why did not the national media, or our local media, report on this amazing event? 

Two and a half days ago a 400-foot ship, the Queen of the North, struck a sea-mount in the inland passage of British Columbia and sank in 1,300 feet of water. All the passengers and crew were rescued in the dead of night in the teeth of a raging storm. 

The mayday of the Queen of the North was heard by what the Canadians call a “local band of aborigines” at Hartley Bay. Apparently, all that live in this vast watery wilderness go to bed with their radios tuned to the Coast Guard hailing frequency. Upon notice of the wreck and in the dead of night and under the direction of the elders: the men ran to the beach and took to their boats; the women went straight to the kitchens; the children stripped bedclothes from their beds and assembled dry clothing. At dawn the rescued passengers and crew reached shore and were taken to the band’s long house to be supplied with fresh cakes, muffins, breads, hot drinks, dry cloths, bedding and to receive first aid. 

The Queen was stuck fast to the rock for half an hour before the Captain gave the order to abandon ship. The evacuation was carried out in a seaman-like manner, the storm not withstanding. The passengers and crew were in the life-rafts for only about twenty minutes when they observed the Queen slide off the rock and sink in the blink of an eye. 

It appears all but two of the passengers are accounted for. 

There is a boat-load of irony to go along with this story. Examples: the chief naval officer of the BC Ferry fleet was on board to show the boat to prospective buyers; the Queen was a sister ship to the “Estonia,” which sank in the North Sea with a huge loss of life about 15 years ago; two of the passengers were seen ashore after the rescue but can no longer be found; the ship was equipped with the full compliment of modern navigational equipment but was drastically off—course in a very wide channel—the same channel that the same crew and Captain had traversed countless times before in equal, or worse conditions. 

Two and a half days and not a peep from any U.S. media. Though there was plenty of reporting on a cruise ship fire that injured no one (a heart attack not withstanding) and did not impede the seaworthiness of the ship and no rescue was required, this story of brave men, women of fiber, sinking ship, raging storm and all the rest went unnoticed. Do you not think the band at Hartley Bay deserves a larger place in history? 

Tom Farrell 

Richmond 

• 

YOUTH 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

As a parent of three children who were raised in Berkeley, and a grandparent of three others, I applaud the efforts of your paper in providing in-depth coverage of the issues involving our youth. (Even the spate of recent homicides). Additionally, at a recent Berkeley city and schools’ 2x2 meeting, I was pleased to hear both Superintendent Michelle Lawrence and Mayor Tom Bates agree to develop plans for increased interaction between them in the hopes of integrating even more efforts. As a former aide to Councilmember Margaret Breland I was fortunate in attending many meetings where youth issues were addressed. We are fortunate to be living in an area where a community like ours has dedicated much funding and efforts to support our young people. 

As the fall election looms, this seems like a good time to make sure broad youth issues are addressed, especially ones that benefit large numbers of our youth. At Berkeley High many of the students leave at lunch and don’t return to school. Why couldn’t we have many intramural sport options at that time? Couldn’t this be written into the proposed measure? High school-age youth tend to get into the most trouble between the hours when school closes and dinnertime. After school youth intramural choices, including additional support classes would go a long way in addressing these problems. This too could be added to the bond measure. Also I agree with Councilmembers Anderson and Moore that youth centers are a priority. Evening entertainment, sport, and academic programs throughout the city would provide a benefit to all of Berkeley’s citizens. Part of a down payment for such a center might even come from the proposed environmental study for Derby Street, that is $100,000 each from the school district and the city. There are a lot of youth issues that proponents of measures as well as candidates can begin addressing. Perhaps your paper could sponsor a forum on various topics. I suggest that youth be at the top of the list. 

Mel Martynn 

• 

DERBY STREET IRONY 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I’m a late-comer to the Derby Street controversy, but I can’t help but notice an irony in the position of the Ecology Center and others. Whereas 35 years ago environmentalists would have been singing that they “paved paradise and put up a parking lot,” now the cry is to save a street from being ‘unpaved,’ as if they are in short supply! Can’t another suitable street be found? 

C. Gilbert 

• 

DERBY STREET 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I take exception to the letter written by Phyllis Orrick, in the last edition of this paper, commending Terry Doran for his comments regarding the Derby Street sports field. Mr. Doran’s comment, “the School Board should not be in the business of using resources intended for students to satisfy general community needs,” reflects the narrow, selfish view of someone who does not understand or value the School Board’s role as leaders of our community. Some of the very students Mr. Doran is referring to do actually live in the Derby Street area and will be impacted by the board’s decision. Also, his statement implies that the school district exists in and of itself outside of neighborhoods and community’s. I would hope, if nothing else, the board would strive, to be good neighbors and take into consideration what a closed Derby Street would do to that South Berkeley Community. I would like to see open green space and playing fields without closing the street. 

Though I don’t expect much from Mr. Doran (his motives, are suspect) I hope others in our community recognize the inherent inequity in a School Board decision that would spend millions of dollars and take who knows how long, to close a street just to create a “regulation-size baseball field” which would serve a few families a year with kids who play baseball. I think there has been a lot of wasted time an energy on the closed street proposal—time which could have been spent assisting the almost 50 percent of African American and Latino Berkeley High School seniors who have not passed the exit exams. I wish Mr. Doran would use his time, energy and skill to solve that problem instead of creating one for the people who live on and around the Derby Street property. I think an open street multi-use ball field makes the best use of school district resources while creating a space that benefits the entire community including students. 

P. Smith 

• 

VICTIMLESS CRIME 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Perhaps your “police message/major pot bust” article on Tuesday could have offered another slant to the story besides the opinions of Officer Galvan. What particularly irked me was the proof “that marijuana is not a victimless crime” coming from the 2003 unsolved murder in my neighborhood. Why this crime is so often cited as “marijuana related” is a further mystery to me. Also, unless I’m mistaken, suspects must be tried and found guilty before “all will spend time in jail.” Lastly, how “huge” is a pot bust in Berkeley where for decades enforcing marijuana laws has been lowest priority.  

As a Berkeley homeowner, disabled medical cannabis patient and patient activist, I have a different perspective on marijuana cultivation. When individual patients and patients’ collectives are hindered from growing their own medicine by unrealistic plant quotas, large scale and for-profit cultivation operations are bound to occur more frequently. If patients were freer to grow their own medicine, prices would be lower, at least somewhat discouraging large commercial operations, which your article described.  

Charles Pappas 

• 

MAKING AMERICA SAFER  

Editors, Daily Planet: 

The conflict in Iraq is a Bush and Republican war and not an American war. World War II was an American war. The conflagration in Iraq is a war of ideology. The war was sold to the American people under false pretenses. 

All the dead, wounded and maimed soldiers are visible signs of a war gone bad. Society’s domestic services and infrastructure are being gutted to pay for the war. 

President Bush is still claiming that war in Iraq has made Americans safer at home from terrorist attacks. What does the one have to do with the other? 

Midterm elections are fast approaching and Bush, Cheney and Republicans have the market on fear cornered. 

Ron Lowe 

Grass Valley 

Who could oppose something as apple pie as a baseball facility? Anybody, as long as the impacts and costs are too severe.  

The letter by baseball parent Ed Mahley (March 17) promoting a regulation baseball facility for the Derby Field contains many false facts. Moreover, his letter demonstrates why folks are so polarized about this last shred of open space in our part of town. It is disappointing to see how little the baseball proponents care about other kids’ sports teams, costs, and those people who will be seriously affected by the huge facility they are trying to jam into our crowded neighborhood. The proposed regulation facility would cost unknown millions of dollars that we don’t have and most likely will be used primarily by this one small sports group. Mr. Mahley claims that Berkeley High’s baseball teams can only use Derby Field if Derby Street is closed and a regulation-size baseball facility is installed. This is not true as the field with Derby Street left open is still a huge area and would serve well as a practice field and still guarantee usage by other school sports teams. The Derby-Open plan would also guarantee access to the public when not in use by school athletes and preserve the popular Farmers’ Market as is. The 10 regulation games could still occur at the San Pablo Field which is regulation size.  

Who’s going to pay the undetermined millions for their new baseball facility? I believe the City of Berkeley’s general fund is the only source available right now. The school district is already requesting the city to pay $100,000 towards the impact study to close Derby Street. The school district does have the $800,000 needed to construct the multi-use plan which includes the baseball practice field and leaves Derby Street open. This plan is the product of a long public process involving hired architects and serves everybody, guaranteed, including the Farmer’s Market and the public. The ballpark proponents claim that mysterious outside donors will foot the bill for the regulation size ballfield, but many years have passed and these have so far failed to appear. The expensive artificial turf at Berkeley High School’s football field is in bad shape and needs replacement and no outside support has materialized here either. Warning to reader: The baseball ballpark proponents have recently added “multi-use” to their title, borrowing from their opposition the original “multi-use field” group. There is no guarantee that any other Berkeley High sports team would be able to use the ballfield facility. There is no credible guarantee that the public won’t be locked out to prevent damage to the expensive baseball diamond, as some other school departments do. There is a possibility that the proposed baseball facility would be rented out to other baseball groups. Although they deny it and it may not happen immediately, the baseballers are thinking night games with night lights and a sound system. This is one reason why many of the locals are so bitter about this issue. Any Berkeley citizen should ask themselves how they would feel about paying for a bright noisy sports facility in front of their house on the only open space around that they probably would be locked out of between games? 

Especially frustrating is the fact that the Berkeley Unified School District is currently partners with the school departments of Richmond and Albany in a multiple field sports complex near Gilman Street and is sharing costs on a variety of fields for different sports except baseball. The other cities’ school departments have been forced to proceed without Berkeley regarding their regulation baseball field and are scrambling to replace the $2 million dollars that would have been Berkeley’s share. Berkeley’s school district is not participating because of their plan to build their own baseball facility at Derby Street, regardless of how much more expensive it is and who it impacts. They claim it is better for the baseball players to have the closer location. Why is it all right for all the other sports teams to use the Gilman street site but not the baseball players?  

When the School Board first tried to take possession of Derby Street seven years ago, they told the Farmers’ Market they had to leave. Fortunately, public support for the market and the inability to find another location halted the city from surrendering the land to the school district . Now the baseballers are back and say that the market can move around the corner onto a basketball court that will be built. Readers should understand the hostility this school board holds for the Market and to move it off city controlled land onto school district controlled land does not bode well for it’s future . This was demonstrated last week at the School Board meeting when public pressure finally forced the board to move ahead with opening the field which has been in limbo all these years hostage to the baseball facility plan. Assuming that Berkeley’s student athletes would be using the field and needing bathrooms, a request was made to open those at the adjacent Alternative School. Just the possibility that a Berkeley citizen attending the market might use the bathrooms caused the board to issue a resounding no. We need an affordable multi-use field that serves everybody for Derby Field. The City Council should not cooperate with any effort to close Derby Street, a vital emergency route, for just one small vocal sports group.  

Mark McDonald is a Berkeley resident. 

›

The approval of the West Berkeley Bowl has turned into an absurd saga, strung out over two years by a hand full of people with the money and time to use the system for their own personal agendas completely ignoring the needs of the local community. It’s the power of the moneyed few over the working families of West Berkeley. 

The real question—is this an autocracy funded by wealthy political ideologues who want to shape Berkeley in their eyes to meet their needs? I thought that era ended with the kings and queens of Europe in the 18th century and, oh wasn’t that the reason the United States was founded—for the people by people—to escape the tyranny of the few? 

There are two big issues with the Berkeley Bowl Project. Traffic and land use. The traffic studies required by the Environmental Impact Report have shown the project to cause additional traffic congestion not mitigated by project alternatives. Yes, there’s no question that the Berkeley Bowl will generate additional traffic and may cause some additional congestion at peak hours on Ashby Avenue. I say so be it! That is a small price to pay for a much overdue grocery store to serve South West Berkeley and West Oakland neighborhoods. 

This community includes a wide-ranging population of younger new homeowners, lower income working families and older retired folks—many without transportation who often use the local liquor stores as their main source of food. In addition, this area of Berkeley has the highest number of children per household, again, with no convenient option for groceries and fresh produce. And let’s not forget the dramatic development changes coming. There are numerous new housing projects already approved or under construction right on San Pablo, within blocks of the site and one right next to the proposed project–hundreds of new households all with the common need of accessible fresh groceries. 

The other issue is land use and the loss of industrial land. What does this really mean? It means that disused, undeveloped property that has been vacant for over 50 years cannot be used to serve the community. The loss of old manufacturing and industry in West Berkeley is a regional trend that has been going on for 40 years. The best use is for zoning that supports community needs. Not the perceived needs of a small cadre of political ideologues who do not care about the working families of this neighborhood. 

Community needs, desires and issues come first. We should thank the owners of the Berkeley Bowl for proposing such a great project that any nearby city would want. One that includes meeting space for the neighborhood, an eating court, an outdoor pedestrian area and provides not only good food but great affordable organic produce for the local community of West Berkeley. 

Lastly, let’s take a closer look at the opposition to this project. It’s primarily funded and supported by someone not living in the neighborhood, living in the Berkeley Hills, who can afford her own traffic engineer, her own lawyers and to put other individuals on her payroll to stop what she personally considers against her desires for the City of Berkeley. Is this democracy? The power of the few over the needs of the many? 

You decide. Come to the next public meeting and get this project approved. 

Steven Donaldson is president of Brand Guidance Design Intelligence.

The prospect of rebuilding the gutted neighborhood at the Ashby BART station brings fresh awareness of older problems in our area. For the new life to take root and grow we have to dig out the gravel in the garden that is stunting the existing growth. Every gardener knows this is where the real work is. It is an essential effort that will enable the whole place to thrive. 

Let us consider Adeline Street in Berkeley, between Shattuck Avenue and Martin Luther King Jr. Way. For many drivers it is a wide and welcome relief from the more constricted streets that feed this stretch of Adeline from both ends. However, the real character of Adeline is best experienced at night time. This is the same landscape that edges our interstate freeways: an unfriendly concrete desert. But our well-lit wasteland does not serve something wider, faster and darker; it divides quiet residential neighborhoods. 

Years of walking kids to school in the mornings have given me plenty of first-hand experience trying to get across this barrier. It is done daily, but long experience has only reinforced the sense of danger I feel heading out into traffic at those crosswalks. Traffic reluctant to stop, eager to get to smooth wide space just ahead. 

What were they thinking? Adeline reflects the intentions of the traffic engineers very well: streamlined frictionless flow, to bring traffic through this area as quickly as possible. Why would anyone want to stop here? At least they were consistent. It is the same pat from the back of the shovel they gave our neighborhood when they dug up the three blocks of homes for BART’s Ashby parking lot.  

Frictionless flow has its place in the river of life, but life is nurtured and experienced best in eddies and quiet backwaters. The vast streams of traffic going through the Adeline/Ashby intersection do not leave much room for peace and quiet at the edges, and that underlies many problems well known to people who live around, or try to cross over, or hope to run a business near that intersection. An illustration of the problems of being so near the fast lanes is found in the beautiful center divider area with its forty-year old trees and well-kept lawns. It is a fine park, almost entirely not used at all. It is not connected to anything else, and Adeline’s traffic makes it extremely dangerous all along its edges. One step over the six-inch curb and you are history.  

There is a spot along Adeline with a quiet edge, where a little eddy was designed in, and the contrast is amazing in its clarity. The line of parking spots and the wide sidewalk on Adeline just north of Ashby have supported the whole curved corner’s worth of commerce while also being about the only pleasant spot around to stop and rest.  

When we do not have quiet edges we make them ourselves, for survival! There is not much here to work with except space, and we back away, putting a little more distance between ourselves and danger, and so we have a wide wasteland, with traffic. To help get a handle on just how wide I measured the marked crossings at the Ashby/Adeline intersection. I had to walk 200 feet curb-to-curb to cross Adeline, or, 150 feet from the Safety Island‚ to the other side. For some perspective I measured San Pablo Avenue at Dwight Way. That curb-to-curb distance is 76 feet. San Pablo also has a line of cars parked along its curbs there, and this acts as a buffer zone for the first few steps away from the curb—the distance of actual roadway a pedestrian has to cross is about 60 feet. Getting across Adeline is something like crossing San Pablo three times!  

Does Adeline need to be so wide to handle a high volume of traffic? The City of Berkeley says that 18,100 cars go by on Adeline in a day versus 29,500 cars for San Pablo at Dwight Way. I think the answer is no.  

So how did this come about? One possible clue is that the Adeline right-of-way is 100 feet wide. As a former engineering student I can imagine the thrill felt by the designing engineer when it became apparent that Adeline was going to be built using this cool round number. San Pablo Avenue at Dwight Way is home to a growing little commercial district. This group of businesses has managed to thrive alongside San Pablo, a California State Highway with high traffic counts, because San Pablo Avenue is the size it needs to be rather than a designer’s fantasy, and it has been detailed to serve pedestrians and shops as well as cars, trucks and busses.  

The area alongside our stretch of Adeline has also grown since it was designed. Grown in spite of the engineers and designers‚ attitudes and intentions, in spite of the difficulty the rush of traffic on our frictionless street imposes on natural growth taking root. The inhibiting influence of the street itself is well documented, and the attitudes that underlie its design are also still with us. Attitudes displayed in Safeway’s pullout because they thought the area just would not support a real supermarket. Attitudes we spent millions of dollars entrenching with reinforced concrete and are now an expensive problem to remove. But think of the Cypress Freeway, think of the Embarcadero in San Francisco. There is real human cost to supporting and continuing these deeply flawed installations, and real value in fixing them. When we remove them we are not just taking out concrete and steel, we are digging out an entire value system that looked at our part of town and saw—not much. 

Adeline is not as bad as the Cypress or Embarcadero freeways, and to help it we won’t need something that registers on the Richter Scale. The fix is not nearly that dramatic or expensive. A fairly simple adjustment will do. The main problems are too much space and the lack of a quiet edge. We just need less road and more places to stop. 

For starters why don’t we just close half of it? A few cones and flashing lights and we could try it out for free, just to see. We could close the western half, and steer all the traffic into the other side. Just half of Adeline is still a full size street! For the first time since the trains came out it would be an appropriate size! The street would belong to all the people, not just the motorists. We would be happy to share, we would never let go back to how it was! 

South Berkeley is our home. Our streets are our lifelines and our connection to the city we share and love. Adeline must support all of us as we live and thrive. Like the sign says at the edge of town, we are HERE already. Let us feel something of Berkeley’s true character as we travel on and live alongside this important thoroughfare.  

David Soffa is a Berkeley resident.›

When Bush Jr. first launched the Iraq war three years ago, I published an article titled “War Programming,” which took him to task for the timing of it.” I argued: 

“The timing of this war is all wrong. By programming the war against the NCAA basketball tournament, Bush, Jr. really cut into the war ratings . . . You think people will be paying full attention to the war when they’ve got their attention focused on Pittsburgh and Wagner?” 

Three years later, Pittsburgh got eliminated in the second round and Wagner didn’t even make the big dance. But we’ve still got the same war. 

I thought Bush Jr. was really stupid for programming the war against NCAA basketball. But now I get it. Who’s going to go to an anti-war rally when they can stay home and watch the University of Memphis State and Oral Roberts?  

For a lot of folks, it was a tough choice: enjoy the exciting new war programming live all the way from On-The-Road-To-Baghdad, or zone out to the annual March ritual of college hoops. They’re both games, but one is for the glory of March Madness, prestige, recruiting and corporate lucre, and the other is for keeps. 

Pat Tillman was a great recruiting chit for the war: a star football player who gave it all up to serve in Bush Jr.’s vanity war. He was a perfect poster boy for the political right: rugged, handsome, heroic and willing to follow Bush Jr.’s lead. When poor Pat died by “friendly fire,” Bush Jr. made him out to be a martyr. That was the cover for having made Pat into a stooge, and a dead one at that. Since then, Bush Jr. has managed to make Pat’s poor mother into a stooge, because she has the audacity to inquire into the details of her son’s tragic death 

At the time, I wondered why Pat didn’t just stay in Tempe or San Jose, enjoy the hoops tournament and get ready for football camp. What happened was this: 

Pat bought into the programming and the program. Bush Jr. said that our country was under attack and Pat bought it. Bush Jr. said that we needed real live American heroes to go over there and stand up to Saddam, so Pat volunteered.  

In hindsight, I can understand why Pat got swept up in the wrong kind of March Madness. How could a fine, upstanding American guy not resist the siren call to fight, when all the early reporting on the war seemed so glamorous and seductive. 

Let’s review those halcyon days of three years ago: 

Fox News, CNBC, CNN and the major networks kept us super-informed and super-patriotic that week. CNN had their screen split into four segments, replete with banners, graphics and a news blurb streamer. Fox News kept us primed with a big “WAR ALERT” bordered in orange, along with a ticker at the bottom with the latest sound bites in type. Fox also had a constant reminder that the “Terror Alert” was “High,” along with the ongoing “WAR ALERT.” Do you think they were trying to scare us, or just recruit brave guys like Pat Tillman? 

We had live cameras on the battlefields with announcers talking about what the troops were doing, saying, and thinking. Like the basketball announcers, they filled the airwaves with a lot of speculative prattle. I quickly found that following that new kind of war was exhausting, so I channel-surfed back to Pittsburgh and Wagner. 

I never did figure out what defined a WAR ALERT, and why Fox was able to scoop all the other networks on it. I guess Fox had the scoop thanks to their White House connections. 

Wall Street got in on the action too and gave Bush Jr. props for igniting the whole, delicious thing. On Day 2, Wall Street announced that this new war was great for business and trading. They were some of the cheerleaders saying, “Go Pat Go.” Other cheerleaders egging Pat on took the form of “embedded reporters” right in our living rooms. They didn’t just report the war—they sold it!  

I wondered if there was a conflict between their “embedded interests” and honest reporting, but I was repeatedly assured that this was just another liberal myth. We got live action of buildings blowing up and explosions in the background, with the added attraction of announcers commenting on “the awesome display of military power.” And they said it with a real sense of awe and deference in their voices. How could a red-blooded boy like Pat Tillman, and others like him, not swoon over that stuff? 

However, on the third day of the new war, I got a little worried when Fox reported that the troops had not yet reached Baghdad, but they were already tired. They were also concerned about having enough fuel left to fight the battle once they got to Baghdad, and sleep deprivation among the troops. A shocking thought occurred to me: what if Rummy had accidentally underestimated a thing or two. It made me wonder if they were going to schedule a “rest day” before the invasion of Baghdad. I got worried that someone might try to sneak up on us on rest day. That wouldn’t be fair, but nothing is in love and war. I began to worry, “I hope these young troops realize that they’re stuck with the army they have and not the one they want.” Then that crook Rummy stole my material without attribution. 

I don’t understand why nobody else calls him Bush Jr.? It seems to be a perfectly good way to distinguish him from Bush Sr. Now we know why Bush Sr. chose Dan Quayle as his vice president? Because he’s so much like Jr. 

What Bush Jr., Cheney and Rummy gave us three years ago was the ultimate boy movie that just won’t end. We had at least five networks of “All War, All The Time,” complete with split screens and live-action cheerleaders. All those news anchorwomen were really pretty, more so than usual during the original War Week, and they made great cheerleaders for that real life boy movie. Television news is all about packaging. Content is a throw-in once in a while. 

At first I thought that Bush Jr. was really stupid for underestimating the popularity of basketball. But this year, when I didn’t make the annual demonstration so I could watch Memphis and Oral Roberts, I realized I’d been snookered. Now I understand the strategy all along was to program the war anniversary against the NCAA basketball tournament, in order to keep the crowds down at the demonstrations. All of this illustrates that there is a huge silent majority who would rather watch basketball than demonstrate against anything—even a war. 

I have sacrificed important basketball-viewing time in order to offer these observations. So like the troops, I too have made a sacrifice for the war effort. Or maybe it’s because of the war effort. In any case, there are other things I’d rather be doing than writing about a war. Heck, three years ago, I missed almost all of the Pitt-Wagner game, and the word “heck” wasn’t even in my vocabulary. That Bush Jr., he’s one smart cracker—don’t let the Gentlemen’s C fool you. 

H. Scott Prosterman holds an M.A. in Middle Eastern Studies from the University of Michigan. He frequently publishes humor and political commentary in a variety of publications and websites. 

U.S. Secretary Of State Condoleeza Rice’s recent visit to Jakarta was the concluding act in the Bush administration’s five-year drive to whitewash the Indonesian military’s sordid past, green light Indonesia’s occupation of West Papua, and forge another l ink in Washington’s plan to ring China with U.S. military bases and allies. 

Shortly after the 2001 inauguration, then-assistant secretary of defense and former ambassador to Indonesia Paul Wolfowitz began a campaign to dismantle U.S. restrictions on mili tary aid to the Tentara Nasional Indonesia, or “TNI” as the armed forces are known. The aid was cut in 1999, following the TNI’s rampage in East Timor that killed thousands of civilians, forced 250,000 into concentration camps in West Timor, and destroyed 70 percent of the tiny country’s infrastructure.  

Not a single TNI officer has served a day in jail for those massacres, and the only civilian convicted of any crimes—the former governor of East Timor—had his sentence overturned by the Indonesian Suprem e Court.  

Wolfowitz argued that “re-engaging” with the TNI would make the military more sensitive to human rights. “More contact with the West and the United States and moving them in a positive direction is important both to support democracy and suppor t the fight against terrorism,” he said. 

But the Indonesian military’s “worst abuses,” counters Ed McWilliams, former State Department political counselor in the U.S. Embassy in Jakarta, “took place when we (the U.S.) were most engaged.”  

The 9/11 attac ks gave the White House the opportunity to undermine the military aid embargo in the name of fighting terrorism, even though the TNI has been implicated in the wide spread use of terrorism against its political opponents. 

In 2001, several members of Kopa ssus, the most notorious unit in the TNI, murdered Papuan independence leader Theys Eluy after he attended an army dinner. In an effort to destabilize the regime of President Abdurrahman Wahid, the military quietly encouraged the right-wing Muslim organiz ation, Laskar Jihad, to attack Christians in Ambon, Maluku and Central Sulawesi islands. And in 2004, the military and the Indonesian State Intelligence Agency were implicated in the poisoning death of human rights lawyer Munir Said Thalib. 

The one incid ent that caused the TNI trouble with the U.S. Congress, however, involved accusations that it had a role in the 2002 murder of two American teachers and an Indonesian colleague near the huge Freeport McMoRan gold and copper mine in West Papua. 

The TNI cl aimed the attack was engineered by the Free Papua Movement (OPM), a group resisting Indonesia’s 1969 unilateral seizure of West Papua.  

But the OPM vigorously denied any involvement in the ambush, and human rights groups and the local police instead implicated Kopassus. 

A police report argued that the OPM “never attacks white people,” and found that the teachers were killed with an M-16, the TNI’s basic weapon. The OPM is generally armed with bows and arrows. Based on the investigation of the incident, then Police Chief of West Papua concluded that the TNI was behind the ambush. 

According to a Washington Post story, Australian intelligence intercepted phone calls from Indonesia’s then Commander-in-Chief, Endriartono Sutarto, discussing carrying out the ambush as a way to discredit the OPM and get the U.S. to declare it a “terrorist” organization. 

The TNI had another motive as well. From 1998 to 2004, Freeport paid out $20 million to the TNI to “protect” the company from growing anger by locals at envi ronmental destruction caused by the company’s Gasberg Mine. The mine generates 700,000 tons of waste daily, and has covered 90 square miles with tailings. Under pressure from the U.S. Justice Department and the Security and Exchange Commission, however, F reeport cut back on the payments. The suspicion is that the “ambush” was blackmail by the TNI: pay up or bad things happen. 

Attorney General John Ashcroft and the FBI soon rode to Wolfowitz and Rice’s rescue, indicting self-described OPM “commander” Anth onius Wamang for the attack, even though the OPM says Wamang works for Kopassus. This past January, the FBI helped arrest Wamang and 11 other civilians, including a priest, a teenager and several farmers, for the murders. 

The arrests allowed the Bush adm inistration to declare Indonesia a “strategic partner,” and waive congressional restrictions on military aid. The latter will increase six-fold by 2007. Meanwhile, the TNI has poured troops and police into West Papua to crush demonstrations against Freepo rt and smother growing sentiment for an independent West Papua.  

“West Papua has long been neglected by the international community,” says Karen Orenstein of the East Timor and Indonesian Action Network. “Secretary Rice should … press Jakarta to heed cal ls from West Papua for demilitarization and a fair share of the income from its resources, and demand that Indonesia fully open West Papua to the outside world.” 

Australia’s close ties to the Bush administration are little like taking up with Tony Soprano: no matter how much you do for the big guy, you’re going to get whacked in the end. 

First, in the teeth of widespread opposition, John Howard’s conservative government sent 900 troops to Iraq, and coughed up $1.2 billion to support them. A recent poll by Hawker Britton found that almost two-thirds of the public wants the troops to leave in the next few months. 

Second, the Howard government agreed to join the U.S., anti-ballistic missile system, which angers its largest trading partner. Exports to Chin a are what keeps Australia’s economy in the black. 

Third, Howard signed a free trade agreement with the United States which will put a dent in Australia’s farm industry, and place the country’s financial services at a distinct disadvantage to its far lar ger and wealthier U.S. counterpart. 

So do the Aussies get a hug and a kiss? 

Not exactly. 

The Iraqi government recently blacklisted the Australian Wheat Board Ltd. (AWB) because a U.N. investigation implicated the latter in a bribes-for-wheat scheme with the Saddam Hussein regime. The ban deep-sixed a one million ton deal, and dropped AWB’s shares eight percent on the Australian Stock Exchange. Similar bribes by Turkish and Jordanian companies were ignored, as was embargo busting by U.S. oil companies. 

According to the Financial Times, one source close to the AWB charges that Iraq imposed the ban at the urging of U.S. wheat interests. “The U.S. is going to attempt to secure maximum commercial advantage” from the AWB ban, he said, adding, “so much for t he coalition of the willing.”  

Then Rice showed up in Canberra to denounce China for human rights violations, military spending, and its currency and intellectual property rights policies. She called China a “negative force” in the Pacific. Asked if Chin a should see Rice’s comments as cause for concern, one unnamed State Department official replied, “I think we certainly hope so.” 

Aussie Foreign Minister Alexander Downer hurriedly distanced himself from Rice’s rhetoric, and “welcomed China’s constructiv e engagement in the region,” and making it clear that Australia does not “support a policy of containment of China. We don’t think that is going to a be productive or constructive policy at all.” 

Lie down with dogs…. 

Kiwi pluck. The New Zealand union “U nite” has launched an organizing drive at Starbucks and McDonalds, and has launched a global e-mail campaign to flood the two giant corporations with protest messages. Go to: laborstart.org/cgi-bin/solidarityforever/show_campaign.cgi?c=80. 

New Zealand today, tomorrow… 

My grandfather Ellis was a dreamer, a visionary who always had more ideas and plans carried around in his pockets than he had room in his life to complete. The house he and my grandmother once had off of Seminary Avenue in East Oakland was full of his projects—gardens and sheds and walkways—in various stages of completion and uncompletion. Once, he decided he wanted to add an upstairs bedroom to the house and immediately began to build it, starting with an outside staircase. The staircase was completed and then my grandfather got distracted by other things, so that for the longest it hung there on the side of the house by itself, a stairway to noplace. 

My grandfather is a beloved figure in the Allen family, his eccentricities on these spare projects always forgiven, because he never left his main duties undone. He was a Pullman porter who kept his wages and tips in his pockets and stayed on the train while many of the other porters hit their favorite station stops along the way, and when my grandfather got back to Oakland he’d empty all of the money out on the bed for my grandmother to manage, asking her only for some change to buy cigarettes. 

In 1998, Oakland thought we had elected such a man as mayor. We knew that Jerry Brown had his quirks and eccentricities, but we also believed him when he said he was all grown up and ready to get down to business. 

It didn’t exactly end up that way, did it?  

Like the Nazgûl racing across Mr. Tolkien’s Mordor towards Mount Doom near the end of the third book, Mr. Brown appeared as a bright comet across the Oakland sky “shooting like flaming bolts,” but eventually, “as caught in the fiery ruin of hill and sky,” he simply “crackled, withered, and went out.” With nine months still to go in his administration, there is hardly a trace of the mayor’s presence in and around Oakland, except, maybe, to use the city as a backdrop to his campaign for California attorney general. 

The signs of the mayor’s inattention, sometimes bordering on boredom, are everywhere. 

At Mr. Brown’s official website on the city server, there is a schedule page on which Oakland residents are supposed to be able to see the mayor’s official calendar and what events he is attending to every day. If Mr. Brown’s online schedule is to believed, the mayor of Oakland has not done anything on the job since Sept. 18, 2005. That’s the last entry for the schedule.  

And even then, much of the work had little to do with what we were paying him for. Mr. Brown was on three week vacation from Aug. 25 through Sept. 14. When he got back in town he had a few ceremonial duties, but mostly the mayor was appearing on talk shows that perhaps had something to do with his Oakland work, perhaps not: a live interview on KABC radio in Los Angeles on Sept.16, Fox News interview on Sept. 17, Fox News, “At Large with Geraldo Rivera” on Sept. 18, when the schedule entries end. Nice work, if you can get it, as they used to say in my grandfather’s day. 

Mr. Brown’s personal blog on the web has suffered a similar fate. Launched with much fanfare early last year, it drew the attention of veteran bloggers who commented on how interesting it was that Mr. Brown was able to keep up with new trends. (For those of you who don’t keep up with the new trends, a blog, short for web log, is an online diary, or running commentary, that its owners write to several times a week, and often every day.) Mr. Brown himself, in one of his first posts, wrote that he was “glad to see all the lively responses to my entry into the blogosphere. I welcome the robust debate.” The debate was apparently not robust enough, and Mr. Brown’s last entry was posted in October of last year. 

Even when local events force Mr. Brown to turn his attention away from statewide campaigning and back to his Oakland duties, he seems oddly disengaged and removed from the realities that everyone else is experiencing in this city. 

Asked by a UC Boalt Hall law student earlier this week if the recent explosion of violent crime in the city was giving Oakland a negative image, Mr. Brown said it was not. “I don’t think there is a negative Oakland image,” the Oakland Tribune quoted the mayor as saying. “There is some crime going on, and historically that is true. But crime is down 30 percent from a 30-year average. And it just so happens that we’ve got a little surge.” 

A little surge? 

Earlier this month, during the heated debate how to deploy more police on city streets, Oakland Chief of Police Wayne Tucker reporting increases in the city since this time last year of 300 percent for homicides, 127 percent for assaults with a deadly weapon, 100 percent for robberies, and 47 percent for sexual assaults. There were 33 homicides in Oakland already in the first three months of this year when I began this column, 34 by the time I finished. That’s a trend that would put us over 130 murders if it continued for a 12 month period, a ghastly statistic. 

But Mr. Brown needs “law and order” credentials in his run for attorney general, and so must fiddle with statistics and downplay what everybody else in Oakland feels is a big deal. 

That “crime is down 30 percent from a 30-year average” sounds impressive only if you forget what was happening over the past 30 years. In 1976 Oakland—like every other major American urban center—was in the middle of the crack epidemic, and murders and violent crime skyrocketed as drug dealers fought over the lucrative new turf and crack addicts stole everything in sight to pay for their monstrous new habits. The early ‘90s saw another wave of violence as crack dealers fought over turf. Comparing the recent crime wave to those days doesn’t make today’s crime wave any better, it only makes it seem better. And for Mr. Brown’s purposes, it’s the seeming that is important, as the king said in The Madness Of King George. 

When people imply that he is not paying attention to Oakland’s suddenly-rising violent crime Mr. Brown bristles, often saying—as he did in the Attorney General’s race debate this week held in Oakland by the Alameda County Lawyers Association—that he lives in a high-crime area himself, what he calls “the second toughest crime beat in Oakland.”  

Well, I’ve been to the corner of 27th Street and Telegraph Avenue in Oakland, where Mr. Brown and Ms. Gust have their condominium, and it doesn’t seem like the second roughest neighborhood in Oakland to me. But even if it were, the implications in Mr. Brown’s assertions are strange, as if he were saying that if violent crime weren’t happening on his block, he wouldn’t be quite so involved. That’s not what you want to hear from someone who is supposed to be the mayor of an entire city, with all of the many problems that the mayor himself might not actually have to face. 

This week, the nice people at OakPAC, Oakland’s big business political action committee, were kind enough to send me a campaign brochure for mayoral candidate Ignacio De La Fuente that asks, on the cover, “Who Knows Best What It Takes To Run A City?” Open up the brochure and you get the answer: “California’s Best Mayors Know What It Takes To Run A City.” Next to that is a full-color picture of Mayor Brown. 

If Mr. Brown knows how to run this city, I wish he would go ahead and do it, even with the little time he has left in his term. It’s fine to have a visionary in the family. As my old church deacon used to say, faith without work is dead. And as some of the young people would say today, a visionary who doesn’t put in the work to realize those visions is nothing but a slacker. 

?

The following is an excerpt from Richard Schwartz’s Earthquake Exodus, 1906: Berkeley Responds to the San Francisco Refugees. The Daily Planet will run two more excerpts in the coming weeks. 

The Great Earthquake of 1906 struck a little after 5 a.m. on the warm Wednsday morning of April 18. Hundreds of miles of California coastal towns were monstrously shaken and many suffered major destruction.  

Some cities actually feared the refugees from San Francisco and citizens suggested efforts to stop them from arriving. At a meeting called by San Jose’s Chamber of Commerce, someone suggested that they ask the Southern Pacific Railroad to help them keep refugees away from San Jose. One man insisted that San Jose must look after itself and was not in a position to help others. Another warned, “If they come here, they will eat us out of house and home in three days.” An anxious supervisor reported that 30,000 shaken San Franciscans were walking towards San Jose. 

Though Berkeley was more damaged than its citizens were initially told by their own newspaper, this did not slow down the amazingly rapid response of Berkeley residents, knowing that San Franciscans would surely be arriving as refugees to assess, organize and implement a relief effort. News trickled in from those who had come over on early ferries. People told in hushed voices of the calamity quickly spreading over the city that was burning across the bay. Many Berkeley residents had friends and family over in the stricken city and many others commuted there to work.  

These Berkeley citizens didn’t wait for the government, they didn't wait for money, and they didn't wait for instructions. They assessed the situation, decided on what needed to be done and appointed themselves to do it. This is a remarkable story of generosity and competency. Though injured itself, the Berkeley community thought first of helping those most in need. This is a legacy the city can be proud of one hundred years later and one that was somehow lost to us until this 100th anniversary commemoration.  

The Relief Effort  

Berkeley responded with remarkable speed to help the San Franciscans streaming into town. F. W. Foss, president of the Berkeley Chamber of Commerce, called for a town meeting to decide what could be done to assist the victims. 

The meeting, held the morning of April 18 at the chamber offices in the First National Bank at Shattuck Avenue and Center Street, was packed with concerned Berkeleyans. The attendees quickly set up a citizen relief committee, to be housed at the Mason McDuffie Real Estate office at Shattuck and Center, near the downtown train station. 

This convenient location allowed relief workers to meet the refugees as they stepped off the trains and to provide them with shelter, food, and clothing, along with any medical attention they might need. The Reverend E. L. Parsons, rector at St. Mark’s Church, was made chairman of the Relief Committee. 

Many subcommittees, called departments, were formed to handle health, housing and other tasks. Berkeley residents from all walks of life—church leaders, university professors, veterans, and leaders from the business community, as well as city officials—came forward to head the departments. 

Duncan McDuffie, of Mason McDuffie Real Estate, took charge of the Office Department, which organized a clearing center responsible for receiving the refugees and transporting them to their designated housing. He was also responsible for disseminating information, such as posting notices about the need for housing in Oakland newspapers. Frank Wilson, chairman of the Finance Department, began accepting contributions in cash and provisions. He proceeded to collect approximately $3,000 in the hours just after the earthquake.  

The purpose of the Oriental Department was to care for segregated groups of Chinese and Japanese refugees. This was an era when anti-Asian sentiments ran high, fueled by fear that white citizens would lose their jobs or that Asians would spread contagious diseases. There was even an Anti-Asian League whose presence in Berkeley was condoned. As word arrived that the San Francisco jails had been emptied of prisoners (as it turned out, they were being transferred as the fires devoured the city), a Protection Department was formed to deal with what was described as a “tendency toward lawlessness that follows such great confusion, excitement and disease.” 

Acting Mayor Francis Ferrier, in one of the few other official acts the Berkeley government took, appointed a “committee of safety” to do whatever necessary to maintain order, enforce sanitary regulations (posted in English, German, Spanish, Italian, and other languages), and generally guard the public welfare. 

The heads of the departments formed an executive committee that met twice daily in the first few days after the earthquake. To oversee the citywide effort, the Relief Committee took on the job of supervising the work of local organizations such as churches and fraternal groups. The Relief Committee, in turn, coordinated its tasks with the city and the university through a Town and University Committee (formed by appointment of the mayor). 

All important questions involving the relief efforts were referred to this committee. Its members included UC Berkeley President Benjamin Ide Wheeler, Reverend Parsons, Frank Wilson, and UC history professor Bernard Moses. Little time had been wasted in creating a well-organized relief machinery that did not hesitate to make its own laws and enforce them. Within a week of the quake, Wheeler described, almost jocularly, the situation in Berkeley to President Theodore Roosevelt as “practically a government by vigilance committee.” 

Before the initial Relief Committee meeting on April 18 adjourned, thirty-one households offered to shelter refugees, whether in a spare room or on a shared couch. Guy Chick, a former Berkeley building inspector, volunteered a ten-room house. By 2 a.m. on the morning of April 19, more than three hundred homes were prepared for the displaced San Francisco residents, along with damaged Stiles Hall and the Native Sons’ Hall at 2108 Shattuck Ave. 

With accommodations found for eight hundred refugees, the Housing Department was just reaching its stride. Local real estate firms provided men and rigs to transport refugees to their assigned housing. 

Hundreds of frightened San Francisco refugees spent the first night after the earthquake in the Berkeley hills, suffering through the chilly night without enough provisions rather than take shelter in Berkeley buildings that might be damaged by aftershocks. 

Eleven women reportedly gave birth in the hills that night, with no medical assistance. Nine of them were said to have died. As the sun rose on April 19 over the hills and illuminated the clouds of smoke that had blown east across the bay, the hungry, sleepless refugees staggered down in search of assistance. 

Starting late that morning, a torrent of refugees flooded the town, most of them arriving by train from Oakland. This pace continued all day, making the night of April 19 particularly hectic for relief workers trying to place and feed an estimated seven thousand refugees. Vacant rooms became impossible to find. 

The need was so great that almost every Berkeley household provided accommodations to friends or strangers from San Francisco. UC professors took in homeless San Franciscans, and even fraternity and sorority members gave up their lodging for use by the refugees. Everyone was instructed to keep the refugees inside rather than let them loiter in front of houses and other buildings.  

On April 18 at City Council Chambers, the public is invited to a 3:30 p.m. ceremony at which Richard Schwartz will present Mayor Bates with a Certificate of Honor to the citizens of Berkeley from San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom. Also, following the ceremony, BAHA will sponsor a lecture on the 1906 Berkeley Earthquake Relief effort and the book at the Berkeley City Club at 7:30 that night. Contact BAHA for tickets, at 841-2242. 

Photo from the book Earthquake Exodus, 1906 

with permission from the author, Richard Schwartz. (Blue and Gold, 1908.) 

The main refugee camp at UC Berkeley’s California Field, now the site of the Hearst Gymnasium.

If you’re a fan of Bob Dylan, you’ll remember his anti-boxing song, “Who Killed Davey Moore?” This song ponders the death of world featherweight champion Moore, who died of head injuries incurred in a bout on March 21, 1963. 

Dylan repeatedly asks, “Who killed Davey Moore? Why an’ what’s the reason for?” 

He repeats the haunting refrain as he considers the perspectives of the participants: referee, crowd, managers, gamblers, reporters, and the other boxer. 

I remembered this song, because I’ve been thinking about Tom Fox. 

Who killed Tom Fox? Why and what’s the reason for? 

Tom Fox was a 54-year-old Virginia Quaker whose body was found in Iraq on Friday, March 10. Tom died from gunshot wounds to his head and chest. His hands had been tied and there were cuts on his body and bruises on his head. 

Tom Fox had been in Iraq since October 2004 as a member of Christian Peacemaker Teams. He’d worked on three projects: helping families of incarcerated Iraqis, escorting shipments of medicine to clinics and hospitals, and helping form Islamic Peacemaker Teams. Tom was kidnapped, along with three other Christian Peacemaker workers, on Nov. 26. 

Who killed Tom Fox? Why and what’s the reason for? 

As a Quaker, I take Tom Fox’s death personally. Even though I didn’t know Tom, I have friends who did. Quakers are a relatively small group in the US, roughly 100,000, and there are few degrees of separation between us. 

When I first heard that he had been captured, I was surprised that he was in Iraq at all. Before and during the invasion, Quakers had an active presence in Iraq-providing humanitarian assistance through the American Friends Service Committee, but one by one all those folks left as the situation became increasingly dangerous. I figured that Tom had a calling and felt he had to honor it by joining the Christian Peacemaker Teams in Iraq, regardless of the danger. 

Who killed Tom Fox? Why and what’s the reason for? 

For those of you who are not Quakers this may seem like craziness. But, within the history of the Society of Friends-the formal name for Quakers-it’s totally consistent. 

Since our beginning, in 1651, Quakers have had two characteristics that frequently get us in trouble: we believe that if you call yourself a Christian you should follow the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. And, we believe that God speaks directly to believers. 

Quakers note that Jesus was a pacifist. So we all try, in our own way, to be pacifists. Actually, all Christians used to be pacifists, but this changed in 313 A.D. when the bureaucracy of the Christian church reached an accommodation with the Roman Emperor Constantine: only priests had to be pacifists and only Christians could be in the Roman army. 

Quakers also believe that Jesus taught that God speaks directly to individuals, sometimes calls them to take individual action. That’s what Tom Fox believed; that’s why he was in Iraq. 

Who killed Tom Fox? Why and what’s the reason for? 

Tom’s Iraq blog is his sad and informative legacy. His last entry was written the day before he was abducted, Why are we here? “If I understand the message of God, his response to that question is that we are to take part in the creation of the Peaceable Realm of God … As I survey the landscape here in Iraq, dehumanization seems to be the operative means of relating to each other … We are here to root out all aspects of dehumanization that exists within us. We are here to stand with those being dehumanized by oppressors and stand firm against that dehumanization. We are here to stop people, including ourselves, from dehumanizing any of God’s children, no matter how much they dehumanize their own souls.” 

Tom told his friends that if he was captured or killed they should not take revenge on those responsible. 

Who killed Tom Fox? Why and what’s the reason for? 

Out here on the radical fringe of Christianity, there are those of us who believe that there are worse things than being killed standing up for what you believe in. We feel that it’s better to honor our personal integrity, our relationship with the divine, than to play it safe. 

Out here on the edge, there are those of us who believe that Jesus didn’t suffer just one time all those years ago up on a lonely cross. We feel that Jesus dies in every generation, whenever good folks stand up for righteousness. This Jesus perished in the Holocaust and in the collapse of the Twin Towers. This Jesus expired when Tom Fox was tortured and shot. This Jesus dies over and over until human kind gets that we have to learn to live together in peace and justice. 

That’s why Tom Fox died. That’s the reason for. 

Bob Burnett is a Berkeley writer and Quaker activist. He can be reached at bobburnett@comcast.net. 

›

I told my parents not to see the movie Brokeback Mountain. “You won’t like it,” I said. 

“Why not?” asked my mother. 

“Because...” 

“Because it’s about gay cowboys?” 

“Let me put it this way,” I said. “You should see Brokeback Mountain. It would be good for you, but there’s some stuff in there that might make you uncomfortable. Maybe you could close your eyes and put your fingers in your ears.” 

“What kind of stuff?” asked Mom. 

“I don’t want to get into too much detail with you, but there’s sex in the film. Sex between men. Someday you and I can watch it together on DVD, but not with Dad. It might upset him.” 

“I think your father and I should see it,” said Mom. “Broaden our horizons. Find out what all the fuss is about.” 

“Okay,” I said. “But don’t say I didn’t warn you.” 

I thought my concerns were well-founded. I’ve only watched a few movies with my parents because we have different tastes and perspectives. I’ve felt embarrassed in their presence when anyone on the big screen kisses for more than a few seconds. If the embrace progresses past first base my parents giggle like preteens. At third base my father tends to swear under his breath and if the actors reach home plate, Edna and Dewey squirm in their seats. The last movie I watched with them was Best in Show. Even that was problematic, and it was, for the most part, about dogs. 

Sometime within the last five or six years our child-parent roles have reversed. I want to protect Edna and Dewey from subject matter that I imagine will disturb them. Just as they once shielded me from ideas and issues they thought I was too young to understand, I want to keep them away from stuff I deem heart attack-inducing to 80-year-old Republicans. 

Last week my mother called and told me she and my father had gone to see Brokeback against my advice. “Oh boy,” I said. “How’d you make out?” 

“Well,” explained mom. “We went to the mall for the Early Bird Dinner Special and it was very good. Then we said what the hell, we might as well find out what we’re missing. So we got two senior citizen tickets and went to see it. 

“And?” 

“I loved it!” 

“You loved it?” 

“Yes, it was beautiful. The scenery was magnificent, the acting wonderful. And the story—well it explained a lot of things for me. Those men were in love, no question about it.” 

“And Dad?” 

“Your father loved it too! Let me put him on. He can tell you himself.” 

My dad got on the line. 

“I’ll make this quick,” he said, “because it’s long distance. We shouldn’t be talking on the phone on a Tuesday. Your mother gets everything screwed up. It’s the weekends when it’s free, not weekdays.”  

“Tell me what you thought of the movie, Dad.” 

“You know, it’s hard for me to understand how two guys could turn out that way. Genes or something, I suppose. I didn’t like watching some of it, but they really did care for one another, and that’s what’s important. It was about love and they couldn’t express it, and it made their lives hell.” 

“Yes,” I said. 

“And another thing...” 

“What?” 

“You underestimate your mother and me.” 

“How’s that?” I said. 

“Don’t tell us what movies we can and can’t go to. We’re old enough to see any damn flick we want.” 

“Okay,” I said. “What’re you seeing next?” 

“Hustle and Flow. But we’ll discuss it with you on the weekend when we won’t get charged for the call. 

I’ve never heard anyone call Jews lovable. The Irish are lovable, and the Italians. The French are admired for their savoir faire, the English for their gentility—still, “some of my best friends are Jews.”  

I like Jews for their robust righteousness, their survivor strength, their combativeness, their intellectual curiosity—they dig for ultimate causes. In my experience, Jews are caring and generally abhor violence. They don’t rejoice in the misfortunes of others, even their adversaries. They don’t proselytize or poach on other faiths. They prize scholarship and family. They appreciate humor, even at their own expense. From civil rights to social justice, Jews are in the forefront. 

I didn’t start out liking Jews. I grew up in a non-Jewish neighborhood, on the outskirts of a small town founded by the Romans in the foothills of the Carpathian Mountains. Czernowitz, which had a significant Jewish population, had changed hands often (Ottoman Empire, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Romania, Moldova, the Soviet Union) and is now in Ukraine. 

I first saw the cost of being Jewish as a 4-year-old, after viewing a military parade. The parade was quite marvelous, with all the pomp that a Romanian Royal garrison with an Austrian Imperial tradition could provide--flamboyant uniforms, flashing sabers, and priests carrying icons and incense. Walking home, my neighbor asked, “What will you be when you grow up?” Still under the spell of the colorful procession, I said, “I will be a captain in the king’s army.” She gently squeezed my hand and said, “You can’t. To become an officer you have to venerate the Holy Mother of God.” I was devastated. Years later, as I received my commission as an officer in the U.S. Army combat infantry, I flashed on this incident. 

Along with the neighborhood kids, I absorbed the local prejudices. My parents never corrected this perception, even though they certainly didn’t share it. It was like sex—one simply didn’t talk about it. I was not pleased with being Jewish, which only seemed to close doors.  

In 1940 the Germans came. The stakes were suddenly much higher. Good relations with our non-Jewish neighbors were critical. I vividly remember an incident with my goat who, fond of flowers and weeds, grazed outside. Some folks started throwing stones at her and calling her a Jewish goat. We had to bring her inside. Being Jewish was perilous. Jews took extraordinary risks to survive. 

By the time of my Bar Mitzvah, I had come to see Jews as bright and energetic people who repeatedly demonstrate resilience and accomplishment after centuries of oppression and subjugation. I developed an appreciation for my “comrades,” who have had a positive impact in so many areas. And other people were not excluded from having those universal qualities that I appreciate in Jews. 

I’m bothered by the bigoted hostility toward Jews. Even Jews themselves can buy into negative stereotyping about Jews and sometimes engage in perplexing, seemingly anti-Semitic behavior. In a sense, prejudice against Jews is an indicator of a general malaise in the world—akin to the proverbial canary in a coal mine.  

Especially troublesome is a pervasive double standard when it comes to Jews. People are quick to rise to the defense of others when they perceive even a slight injustice, but are strangely quiet when a negative or hostile remark is made about Jews. Joseph Conrad wondered, why one man can steal a horse while another must not even look at a halter?  

There is a twinge of pride when a Jew is elevated to the Supreme Court, wins a Nobel Prize, or receives some other distinction. It’s not a celebration—just a little bit of satisfaction that such a miniscule minority can excel in an enormous range of human endeavors. 

These thoughts were triggered sitting around the dinner table with very good friends, people I care much about—one Lutheran, two Jews, three Catholics. My liking Jews does not prevent me from liking other people just as much. Without my noticing it, perhaps they have all become Jewish..

FRIDAY, MARCH 31 

THEATER 

Berkeley Rep “Culture Clash’s Zorro in Hell” at 8 p.m. in the Roda Theater. Tickets are $45-$59. Runs through April 16. 647-2949.  

Masquers Playhouse “Relative Values” by Noel Coward. Fri. and Sat. at 8 p.m. at 105 Park Place, Point Richmond, through May 6. Tickets are $15. 232-4031. www.masquers.org 

Shotgun Players “Bright Ideas” Thurs.-Sun. at 8 p.m. at the Ashby Stage, 1901 Ashby Ave. to April 23. Tickets are $15-$30. 841-6500. www.shotgunplayers.org 

FILM 

The Enchanting World of Jacques Demy “Bay of Angels” at 7 p.m. and “Model Shop” at 8:35 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808.  

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Mark Klett and Rebecca Solnit describe “After the Ruins, 1906 and 2006: Rephotographing the San Francisco Earthquake and Fire” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852.  

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Duamuxa, worker’s songs from the countryside to the factory, in celebration of Cesar Chavez’ birthday at 8 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Cost is $8-$12. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

Jazz From Finland with drummer Andre Sumelius in trio with Jussi Kannaste, saxophone, and John Shifflet, bass, at 8 p.m. at Da Silva Ukulele Co., 2547 Eighth St. Donation $10. Sponsored by The Jazz House, 415-846-9432. 

Karen Wells, Madeline Prager, and John Burke perform Mozart, Brahms and Shostakovish at 8 p.m. at Giorgi Gallery, 2911 Claremont Ave. Cost is $12. 848-1228. 

“Dangerous Beauty” Hip-hop, modern, African and jazz dance, with spoken word and rap performed by Destiny Arts Youth Performance Company at 7:30 p.m. at Malonga Casquelourde Center for the Arts, 1428 Alice St., Oakland. Tickets are $6-$20. 597-1619. 

ACL/Nac1, underground hip hop, at 8:30 p.m. at Epic Arts, 1923 Ashby Ave. Cost is $5-$10. 644-2204.  

Hurricane Sam & The Hotshots at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island. Cost is $7. 841-JAZZ.  

Slammin’ with Keith Terry at 9 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $13-$15. 525-5054.  

Chojo Jacques at 8 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave., at Dwight. 548-5198.  

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

Scott Amendola’s “Monk Trio” at 9 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810.  

The Ni Project at 7:30 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344.  

Godstomper, Crime Desire, Bafabegiya at 8 p.m. at 924 Gilman St. Cost is $7. 525-9926. 

The Regiment at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

SATURDAY, APRIL 1 

CHILDREN 

Los Amiguitos de La Peña with Juanita Ulloa & Ginny Morgan, songs from Mexico and Latin America, at 10:30 a.m. at La Peña. Cost is $4 for adults, $3 for children. 849-2568.  

EXHIBITIONS 

“Inside Out” Detail in Dress from 1850 to the Jazz Age opens at Lacis Museum of Lace and Textiles, 2982 Adeline St. Open Mon.-Sat. noon to 6 p.m. 843-7178. 

“Cultural Encounters” travel photographs of Canada, China and Turkey by members of the Berkeley Camera Club. Reception at 1 p.m. at the San Pablo Arts Gallery, 13831 San Pablo Ave., San Pablo. 215-3204. 

“Aftershock! Voices from the 1906 Earthquake and Fire” with artifacts and photographs, opens at the Oakland Museum of California, 10th and Oak St. Cost is $5-$8. 238-2200. 

Pastels by Leslie Firestone at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave., through April 30. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

“Modulations of Light” color photographs by Sidney J.P. Hollister. Reception at 6 p.m. at Photolab Gallery, 2235 Fifth St. 644-1400.  

FILM 

The Enchanting World of Jacques Demy “The Umbrellas of Cherbourg” at 6:30 p.m., “Jacquot” at 8:30 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808.  

READINGS AND LECTURES 

“Creating an Illustrated Field Guide for the Sierra Nevada” with John (Jack) Muir Laws at 10:30 a.m. at the Oakland Museum of California, 10th and Oak St. Cost is $5-$8. 238-2200. 

Sarah Waters introduces her novel “The Night Watch” at 7 p.m. at Cody’s Books on Fourth St. 559-9500. 

Bay Area Poets Coalition Open Reading at 3 p.m. at Strawberry Creek Lodge, 1320 Addison St. Park on street. 527-9905. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

The Novello Quartet celebrates Mozart’s 250th birthday at 8 p.m. at Trinity Chapel, 2320 Dana St., between Durant and Bancroft. Tickets are $8-$12. 549-3864. 

Pacific Boychoir sings Bach at 7:30 p.m. at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Oakland. Tickets are $15-$20. 452-4722.  

“Dangerous Beauty” Hip-hop, modern, African and jazz dance, with spoken word and rap performed by Destiny Arts Youth Performance Company at 7:30 p.m. at Malonga Casquelourde Center for the Arts, 1428 Alice St., Oakland. Tickets are $6-$20. 597-1619. 

New Praise Choir performs at the 97th Anniversary of the Philip Temple CME Church at 5 p.m. at 3233 Adeline St. 655-6527. 

Duct Tape Mafia in a benefit for the Africa Educational Trust at 6:30 p.m. at Oakland Metro, 201 Broadway, Oakland. Tickets are $10. For all ages. www.oaklandmetro.org 

Berkeley Broadway Singers “April in Paris” at 8 p.m. at St. Ambrose Church, 1145 Gilman St. at Cornell. Free, donations appreciated. 604-5732. 

The Mixers, classic rock, ska/reggae, blues, at 10 p.m. at The Ivy Room, 858 San Pablo Ave. Cost is $7. 524-9220.  

Eddie Palmieri and His Septet at 8 p.m. at Zellerbach Hall , UC Campus. Tickets are $22-$42. 642-9988.  

The Venezuelan Music Project at 8:30 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Tickets are $12-$14. 849-2568.  

Mad and Eddie Duran Trio at 9 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810.  

The Edlos. a capella, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $18.50-$19.50. 548-1761.  

Braziu at 9 p.m. at Shattuck Down Low, 2284 Shattuck Ave. Cost is $10-$12. 548-1159.  

Grapefruit Ed with Pickin Trix at 9:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $10-$12. 525-5054.  

The Ravines, folk rock, at 8 p.m. at Spuds Pizza, 3290 Adeline St. Cost is $7. 558-0881. 

The D Sides and Cowpokes for Peace at 7:30 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344.  

Sol Rebelz, The Attick, Illadapted at 9 p.m. at Blakes on Telegraph. Cost is $8-$10. 848-0886.  

The People, Blue Bone Express at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $7. 841-2082.  

Jewdriver, Until the Fall, The Shemps at 8 p.m. at 924 Gilman St. Cost is $6. 525-9926. 

Hip Bones, instrumental jazz eith funk and rock, at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Mel Sharpe’s Big Money in Gumbo Band at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island. Cost is $7. 841-JAZZ.  

SUNDAY, APRIL 2 

CHILDREN  

“Eggstravaganza” Celebrate spring with an egg decorating contest, egg games and activities from 1 to 4 p.m. at the Oakland Museum of California, 10th and Oak St. Cost is $5-$8. 238-2200. 

EXHIBITIONS 

“Wild Things” with watercolor artist Rita Sklar. Reception at 2 p.m. at Tilden Nature Center, Tilden Park. 525-2233. 

Jeanne Dunning “Study After Untitled” Guided tour at 2 p.m. at Berkeley Art Museum, 642-0808. 

FILM 

The Enchanting World of Jacques Demy “the Young Girls of Rochefort” at 3 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

“Houses and Housings: Portability in Jewish Faith and Culture” with Henry Shreibman in conjunction with the current exhibit at the Magnes Museum, at 2 p.m. at the BRJCC, 1414 Walnut St. 848-0237. 

“Tails of Devotion: A Look at the Bond Between People and Their Pets” at 4 p.m. at Cody’s Books on Fourth St. 559-9500. 

Poetry Flash with Greg Hewett and Ted Mathys at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. Donation $2. 845-7852.  

MUSIC AND DANCE 

BUSD Performing Arts Showcase from 1 to 4 p.m. at Berkeley Community Theater, Allston Way between MLK and Milvia. 644-8772. 

Golden Gate Boys Choir and Bellringers at 4 p.m. at St. Ambrose Church, 1145 Gilman St. at Cornell. Tickets are $5-$10. 887-4311. www.ggbc.org 

San Francisco City Chorus performs Handel’s “Israel in Egypt” at 3 p.m. at First Congregational Church of Berkeley, 2345 Channing Way. Tickets are $13-$20. 415-701-7664.  

Sor Ensemble performs chamber music by Shostakovich at 4 p.m. at the Crowden Music Center, 1475 Rose St. at Sacramento. Tickets are $12, free for children. www.crowden.org 

San Francisco Choral Artists “Wisdom of the Ages: Sages and Seers” at 4 p.m. at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, 114 Montecito Ave., Oakland. Tickets are $18-$25. 415-979-5779. 

Berkeley Broadway Singers “April in Paris” at 4 p.m. at St. Augustine’s Church, 400 Alcatraz Ave. Free, donations appreciated. 604-5732. 

Leslie Hassberg sings Women Singer-Songwriters of the 60s and 70s, at 4 p.m. at Berkeley Fellowship, 1924 Cedar at Bonita. Cost is $12-$15.  

“Dangerous Beauty” Hip-hop, modern, African and jazz dance, with spoken word and rap performed by Destiny Arts Youth Performance Company at 3 p.m. at Malonga Casquelourde Center for the Arts, 1428 Alice St., Oakland. Tickets are $6-$20. 597-1619. 

Brentano String Quartet, with Hsin-Yun Huang, viola, at 3 p.m. at Hertz Hall, UC Campus. Pre-concert talk with Mark Steinberg at 2 p.m. Tickets are $42, available from 642-9988.  

Twang Cafe, americana, at 7:30 p.m. at Epic Arts, 1923 Ashby Ave. Cost is $5-$10. 644-2204.  

Bandworks from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. with 17 youth bands at Ashkenaz. Cost is $5. 525-5054. 

Houston Jones at 11 a.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

Vocal Sauce at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $5. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

Americana Unplugged bluegrass and oldtime music showcase at 5 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Pierre Bensuan, French-Algerian guitar, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $21.50-$22.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Variety Show with Raum, Ula, a shadow puppet show and short films at 3 p.m. at 924 Gilman St. Cost is $4. 525-9926. 

MONDAY, APRIL 3 

THEATER 

Shotgun Theater Lab: muwumpin presents “Frankie & Johnny” Mon. and Tues. to April 18 at 8 p.m. at the Ashby Stage, 1901 Ashby Ave. Tickets are $10. 841-6500. www.shotgunplayers.org 

FILM 

United Nations Association Film Festival “Statement of Hope and Courage” 6:30 p.m.at Pacific Film Archive, UC Campus. Tickets are $8-$10. 849-1752. 

“Stupid Cupid” at 9:30 p.m. at the Parkway Theater in Oakland. Director Chris Housh and several cast members will be present. Cost is $5. 593-9069. 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Actors Reading Writers, short stories by Penelope Lively and W. Somerset Maugham at 7:30 p.m. at the Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant Ave. Free. 

Poetry Express with KC Frogge and guest Frank Anthony at 7 p.m. at Priya Restaurant, 2072 San Pablo Ave. berkeleypoetryexpress@yahoo.com 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Berkeley Contemporary Chamber Players at 8 p.m. at Hertz Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $3-$7. 642-4864. 

Trovatore, traditional Italian music, at 7 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave., at Dwight. 548-5198.  

Zilberella Monday at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $5. 841-JAZZ.  

TUESDAY, APRIL 4 

THEATER 

Shotgun Theater Lab: muwumpin presents “Frankie & Johnny” Mon. and Tues. to April 18 at 8 p.m. at the Ashby Stage, 1901 Ashby Ave. Tickets are $10. 841-6500.  

EXHIBITIONS 

“American Mythology: The Monstrous and the Marvelous” Works by 22 artists on the idea of the mythic, opens at 4 p.m. at the Worth Ryder Gallery, UC Campus, College and Bancroft. 

“Nude Photographic Work” by Dana Davis opens the Bade Museum, Pacific School of Religion, 1798 Scenic Ave., and runs through June 29. 

FILM 

Vantage Points: New Docu- 

mentaries by Women “The Tailenders” at 7:30 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808.  

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Kevin Phillips on “American Theocracy: Oil, Preachers, and Borrowed Money: America’s Coming Catastrophe” at 7:30 p.m. at First Congregational Church, 2345 Channing Way. Seating opens at 6:30 p.m. on a first-come, first-served basis. 

Mimi Koehl author of “Wave-Swept Shore: The Rigors of Life on a Rocky Coast,” with photographs by Anne Wertheim at 5:30 p.m. at University Press Books, 2430 Bancroft Way. 548-0585.  

Freight and Salvage Open Mic at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $4.50$5.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Bandworks with five teen and adult bands at 7:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $5. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Ellen Hoffman and Singers’ Open Mic at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $5. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

PhilipsMarine Duo at 7 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave., at Dwight. 548-5198.  

Karen Blixt at 8 and 10 p.m. at Yoshi’s at Jack London Square. Cost is $6-$10. 238-9200. www.yoshis.com 

Jazzschool Tuesdays, a weekly showcase of up-and-coming ensembles from Berkeley Jazzschool at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 5 

THEATER 

The Marsh Berkeley “Faulty Intellegence”satirical songs by Roy Zimmerman, Wed.-Thurs. at 7 p.m. at 2118 Allston Way, through April 27. Tickets are $15-$22. www.themarsh.org 

FILM 

Film 50: History of Cinema “Au Hasard Balthazar” at 3 p.m. and Video: Recent and Strange at 7:30 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Berkeley Treasures “A Conversation with John Toki,” ceramic sculptor, at 7:30 p.m. at Berkeley Art Center, 1275 Walnut St. in Live Oak Park. 644-6893. 

“Creativity is a Muscle” A beginner’s guide to community-based arts with Mat Schwarzman at noon at California College of the Arts, Center for Art in Public Life, 5275 Broadway. 

“Veterans of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade” with photographer Richard Bermack at 7 p.m. at the BRJCC, 1414 Walnut St. Suggested donation $5. 848-0237. 

Theodore Roszak will speak about his book “World Beware: American Triumphalism in an Age of Terror” at 1 p.m. at the Albany Senior Center, 846 Masonic. 524-9122. 

Gary Hart looks at “God and Caesar in America: An Essay on Religion and Politcs” at 12:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com  

David Edmonds introduces “Rousseau’s Dog” 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 

The Movement Spring 2006 Showcase at 8 p.m. at Julia Morgan Center for the Arts, 2640 College Ave. Also on Thurs. Tickets are $8. 925-798-1300. 

Wednesday Noon Concert, with the Copland and Beethoven Quartets at Hertz Hall, UC Campus. Free. 642-4864. http://music.berkeley.edu 

Whiskey Brothers Old Time and Bluegrass at 9 p.m. at Albatross, 1822 San Pablo Ave. 843-2473. www.albatrosspub.com 

Calvin Keys Trio at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $5. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

Ned Boynton Trio with Jules Broussard on sax, at 8 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810.  

Edessa at 8:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Balkan dance lesson at 7:30 p.m. Cost is $9. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

3 Strikez and guests at 9 p.m. at Blakes on Telegraph. Cost is $8-$10. 848-0886. www.blakesontelegraph.com 

Neurohumors, improvisational music, at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277.

“I get goosebumps listening to that music,” Howard Wiley said. “Anything you do that gives you goosebumps—that experience is good.” 

Saxophonist Wiley was talking about the spirituals and field shouts of prisoners in Louisiana’s Angola State Prison—and the musical sounds from his own background—that brought him to create his “Angola State Project,” commissioned works that set these songs for an unusual sextet plus two vocalists that he will lead at the premiere this Tuesday at Intersection For The Arts, 446 Valencia St., near 16th Street, in San Francisco’s Mission District.  

Wiley, a Berkeley native and Berkeley High alumnus who has been attracting national attention as a player, credited his writer friend, John Atkinson (who wrote the notes for Wiley’s CD) with getting him to hear the Angola inmates’ music. 

“He hounded me to listen to it, so I came home one day from the airport, picked up an album at Down Home Music in El Cerrito, and listened to ‘Rise And Fly.’” Wiley said. “It was something I’d never heard before. It had that intangible something I got in listening to Coltrane or Mahalia Jackson, but not nearly so refined. You could call it transcedant spirituality.”  

Wiley explained how the Project unfolded. 

“My friend made a trip down there and came back with a recording, emailing me two tracks,” he said. “That solidified it for me. I made him mail me all the pictures and documentation of the trip. I wanted to present it in some way, do this music justice—take it to the next level.”  

Angola State Prison is a self-sufficient, enclosed, working prison plantation, part of a three-prison farm system that includes the more notorious Parchman Farm. Pioneer music ethnographer Alan Lomax made field recordings there in the middle of last century. The tradition endures—and captivated Wiley. 

“When somebody entraps you like what these guys did ... I’d be listening to The Pure Hard Messengers, a quartet doing ‘The Keys To The City,’ and I’d think, ‘Man! Prisoners? In jail, struggling to find the key?’” Wiley said. “I was listening more and more, breaking down and analysing what these untrained musicians, these singers could do—so many inflections, so much personality ... It’s so powerful, moving; weird seven bar, two and three bar phrases in odd meters—it’s like the intro to ‘A Love Supreme.’” 

The Intersection commission—Wiley’s first commission—came through Kevin Chan. 

“He deals with pre-jazz, with the development of American music, and is familiar with Angola,” Wiley said. “The commission made it possible for me to compose two pieces.” 

Rob Woodworth of The Jazz House, where Wiley played and jammed when it was on Adeline Street, and since, is co-producing the project.  

Wiley’s band will feature his saxophone playing (tenor and soprano), trumpet, two acoustic basses, a cello, drums and two singers. ”One opera, one scat,” Wiley explained. “It’s very odd instrumentation with a very unique sound, reflecting the influences we’ll bring to it, to add our experience and interpretation. Those harmonies strike a chord, undeniable when it hits that chord, like when Coltrane did.” 

Wiley said he first heard that “intangible something” in the music at the churches his grandmother and mother took him to, Star of Bethel and Triumph Church of God and Christ, both in Oakland. 

“Every Sunday for 16 years,” he said, “I had a choice—and I decided to bypass the belt and go. It was the source of my inspiration. I played, learned in A flat—not the new jazz keys. There was one sister there, I loved to go and hear her sing; she sounded just like Mahalia. then I caught that thing again in Bird, in Coltrane playing ‘Blues Attributed To Sidney Bechet’ and in late Billie Holiday ... and Ornette Coleman’s ‘Lonely Woman,’ where I couldn’t hear the form and didn’t know what’s going on ... 

“Now I’ve picked those who embody that something, to add some vibe and flavor to the Project. We can’t just sit and play patterns ... where’s the inspiration? That’s what music is.” 

Howard Wiley and The Angola Project performs April 4, 8 p.m. and 10 p.m., at the Intersection For The Arts, 446 Valencia St., San Francisco. $12-20. For more information, see www.theintersection.org.

The Jazz House, homeless this past year and a half since losing their lease on Adeline Street, is coming back to Berkeley tonight (Friday) at 8 p.m. with a show by young Finnish drummer Andre Sumelius, with his countryman, saxophonist Jussi Kannaste, and bassist John Shifflett, at Da Silva’s Ukelele Shop, 2547 Eighth St., co-produced by Berkeley Arts Festival. Sumelius won the Finnish Grammy for his 2001 album Kira.  

“Andre plays straight-ahead jazz,” said Rob Woolworth. “He first met local players right after he moved here, jamming with Howard Wiley and Dana Stephens at The Jazz House. He fit right in. Steve Da Silva’s Ukelele Shop has mostly featured intimate, world music-type shows, like house parties. It should be perfect for Andre’s trio.” 

André Sumelius trio performs March 31, 8 p.m., at DaSilva Ukulele Company, 2547 8th St., No. 28, Berkeley. Tickets $10. For more information, see www.thejazzhouse.org. 

›

Jacques Demy has taken a lot of hits over the years. He was a man who attempted to make movies for everyone, yet he was never what people wanted him to be. He wasn’t political enough, wasn’t edgy enough, wasn’t rebellious enough. 

But his critics were often missing the point. Demy did not aspire to be political, edgy or rebellious. He did not attempt to portray characters burdened with the world’s problems. He didn’t look for timely themes, didn’t try to capture a moment in history. Demy was more concerned with the timeless themes of love, happiness and heartache; he merely wanted to show people swept up in the joy and agony of love.  

Pacific Film Archive is seeking to rectify these misconceptions with “The Enchanting World of Jacques Demy,” a series of five of his films, as well as Jacquot, a documentary about the director made by his wife, filmmaker Agnes Varda. The series began Thursday and runs through Sunday.  

Demy’s first film, Lola, was greeted with praise by his contemporaries. Lola embodied so much of what the French New Wave embraced: young French people in modern, realistic locales, facing real-life dilemmas, sprinkled with references to American movies and culture. 

The New Wave was about aesthetics and attitude; its characters shared a certain disaffection with or alienation from their surroundings. Demy’s work shares the referential nature of the New Wave; his films are steeped in Hollywood lore and mannerisms, but he doesn’t share the New Wave’s alienation and rebelliousness. For while Demy’s characters may become restless and disenchanted with their surroundings, all it takes is a little affection from the opposite sex to rekindle their excitement with the world—much too bourgeois for the New Wave. 

Lola’s male lead, Roland (Marc Michel), is lost and wandering through life, as are his counterparts in such New Wave classics as Francois Truffaut’s 400 Blows and Jean-Luc Godard’s Breathless and Band of Outsiders. But there is no grand meaning or sociological statement behind Roland’s predicament—he’s just lazy. And lonely. He wanders from job to job and cafe to cafe, but he’s not looking for a religion, a political cause, or for fulfillment through work. Nor is he searching for identity, really. He is simply looking for love. And yes, it is through companionship that he hopes to find meaning and fulfillment, but this is almost an afterthought; Roland more or less just wants to be happy. 

Though Lola has all the trappings of the New Wave, it is at odds with the movement in that its story is at its root a simple one. Demy is not trying to make a grand statement, he is only trying to make a movie about love lost, found and lost again. 

Demy was also at odds with the political motivations of the Left Bank school of thought, of which Varda was a cornerstone. Once again, somewhat by chance, he had become associated with a school of filmmaking to whose tenets he did not adhere, and this misunderstanding of his work and his aspirations again led to criticism. His films are not about politics; they are about love, romance, dreams and failure, all wrapped up in a layer of escapism.  

And this informs one of the central premises behind Demy’s work: that pain and loss go down better with a layer of frosting. His films are light, fluffy confections of infectious music, swirling emotions and bright, lovely faces surrounded by bright, lovely colors. 

The actors in Demy’s films are young, beautiful and full of dreams and longing, and it is difficult not to fall for them. The women—from Anouk Aimée’s Lola to Catherine Deneuve’s Genevieve to Ellen Farner’s Madeleine and even Annie Dupéroux’s precocious 14-year-old Cécile—are without fail lovely and engaging and easily draw empathy from the audience. 

Unlike Godard’s heroines, who often have a certain detached aura, Demy’s women have more in common with the flushed-faced excitable young belles of Hollywood’s heyday. Demy’s actresses evince the fresh, bubbly wholesomeness of the Hollywood starlets of the ‘40s and ‘50s while managing to convey much of the moodiness, sultriness and complexity of America’s leading ladies of the ‘20s and ‘30s. 

The men likewise are compelling, though Roland at times seems a bit too bland to be fully engaging. Guy on the other hand, in The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, with his gentle, soulful eyes and all-around good-guy qualities, is a sympathetic character from the start. 

In 1967 Demy pursued Gene Kelly as star and choreographer for The Young Girls of Rochefort. Kelly, already in his mid-50s, was well past his song-and-dance prime and was working primarily as a director. Bringing him back in front of the camera in a French musical may have seemed like an odd decision at the time, but it was a perfectly logical extension of Demy’s work. Demy was a great admirer of Hollywood’s golden age of musicals, and Kelly especially embodied much of the creative spirit Demy sought for his films.  

Check out Kelly’s musicals of the late ‘40s and early ‘50s and you can see the influence they had on Demy. Kelly was fascinated with dreams and fantasy, placing in each of his great films extended show-stopping dream sequences full of color, dance and romance. On The Town features a balletic demonstration of love and longing; An American in Paris shows the whirlwind of emotions of a couple in love amid the joy and glamor of Gay Paree; and Singin’ in the Rain features an episodic sequence filled with bright, splashy colors as his Don Lockwood character goes from rags to riches to lovelorn in 10 minutes of highly stylized fantasy.  

There is a satisfying thread that runs through the PFA series. Umbrellas, strong on its own merits, is all the more engaging when you have seen Lola, which gives you the full import of the character of Roland—his wandering spirit, his lost love, and all the pain and shiftlessness that leads him to Genevieve and to the profession of diamond-selling. (You’ll have to rent Lola though; it screened at PFA on Thursday.) And Model Shop likewise gives the audience a chance to follow up on Lola’s title character, catching up with her after she has left France and made her way to Los Angeles.  

To see these films together makes clear what so many of Demy’s critics missed: that he was in fact a filmmaker of great originality and integrity. He may not have been the director some wanted him to be, but he stayed true to his vision, making simple, emotional movies about simple, emotional people, regardless of the politics, trends and preferences of his era. 

The Enchanting World of  

Jacques Demy 

Bay of Angels 

Friday, 7 p.m. 

Model Shop 

Friday, 8:45 p.m. 

The Umbrellas of Cherbourg  

Saturday, 6:30 p.m. 

Jacquot 

Saturday, 8:30 p.m. 

The Young Girls of Rochefort 

Sunday, 3 p.m.  

Pacific Film Archive, 2575 Bancroft Way.  

642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu.r

The following is an excerpt from Richard Schwartz’s Earthquake Exodus, 1906: Berkeley Responds to the San Francisco Refugees. The Daily Planet will run two more excerpts in the coming weeks. 

The Great Earthquake of 1906 struck a little after 5 a.m. on the warm Wednsday morning of April 18. Hundreds of miles of California coastal towns were monstrously shaken and many suffered major destruction.  

Some cities actually feared the refugees from San Francisco and citizens suggested efforts to stop them from arriving. At a meeting called by San Jose’s Chamber of Commerce, someone suggested that they ask the Southern Pacific Railroad to help them keep refugees away from San Jose. One man insisted that San Jose must look after itself and was not in a position to help others. Another warned, “If they come here, they will eat us out of house and home in three days.” An anxious supervisor reported that 30,000 shaken San Franciscans were walking towards San Jose. 

Though Berkeley was more damaged than its citizens were initially told by their own newspaper, this did not slow down the amazingly rapid response of Berkeley residents, knowing that San Franciscans would surely be arriving as refugees to assess, organize and implement a relief effort. News trickled in from those who had come over on early ferries. People told in hushed voices of the calamity quickly spreading over the city that was burning across the bay. Many Berkeley residents had friends and family over in the stricken city and many others commuted there to work.  

These Berkeley citizens didn’t wait for the government, they didn't wait for money, and they didn't wait for instructions. They assessed the situation, decided on what needed to be done and appointed themselves to do it. This is a remarkable story of generosity and competency. Though injured itself, the Berkeley community thought first of helping those most in need. This is a legacy the city can be proud of one hundred years later and one that was somehow lost to us until this 100th anniversary commemoration.  

The Relief Effort  

Berkeley responded with remarkable speed to help the San Franciscans streaming into town. F. W. Foss, president of the Berkeley Chamber of Commerce, called for a town meeting to decide what could be done to assist the victims. 

The meeting, held the morning of April 18 at the chamber offices in the First National Bank at Shattuck Avenue and Center Street, was packed with concerned Berkeleyans. The attendees quickly set up a citizen relief committee, to be housed at the Mason McDuffie Real Estate office at Shattuck and Center, near the downtown train station. 

This convenient location allowed relief workers to meet the refugees as they stepped off the trains and to provide them with shelter, food, and clothing, along with any medical attention they might need. The Reverend E. L. Parsons, rector at St. Mark’s Church, was made chairman of the Relief Committee. 

Many subcommittees, called departments, were formed to handle health, housing and other tasks. Berkeley residents from all walks of life—church leaders, university professors, veterans, and leaders from the business community, as well as city officials—came forward to head the departments. 

Duncan McDuffie, of Mason McDuffie Real Estate, took charge of the Office Department, which organized a clearing center responsible for receiving the refugees and transporting them to their designated housing. He was also responsible for disseminating information, such as posting notices about the need for housing in Oakland newspapers. Frank Wilson, chairman of the Finance Department, began accepting contributions in cash and provisions. He proceeded to collect approximately $3,000 in the hours just after the earthquake.  

The purpose of the Oriental Department was to care for segregated groups of Chinese and Japanese refugees. This was an era when anti-Asian sentiments ran high, fueled by fear that white citizens would lose their jobs or that Asians would spread contagious diseases. There was even an Anti-Asian League whose presence in Berkeley was condoned. As word arrived that the San Francisco jails had been emptied of prisoners (as it turned out, they were being transferred as the fires devoured the city), a Protection Department was formed to deal with what was described as a “tendency toward lawlessness that follows such great confusion, excitement and disease.” 

Acting Mayor Francis Ferrier, in one of the few other official acts the Berkeley government took, appointed a “committee of safety” to do whatever necessary to maintain order, enforce sanitary regulations (posted in English, German, Spanish, Italian, and other languages), and generally guard the public welfare. 

The heads of the departments formed an executive committee that met twice daily in the first few days after the earthquake. To oversee the citywide effort, the Relief Committee took on the job of supervising the work of local organizations such as churches and fraternal groups. The Relief Committee, in turn, coordinated its tasks with the city and the university through a Town and University Committee (formed by appointment of the mayor). 

All important questions involving the relief efforts were referred to this committee. Its members included UC Berkeley President Benjamin Ide Wheeler, Reverend Parsons, Frank Wilson, and UC history professor Bernard Moses. Little time had been wasted in creating a well-organized relief machinery that did not hesitate to make its own laws and enforce them. Within a week of the quake, Wheeler described, almost jocularly, the situation in Berkeley to President Theodore Roosevelt as “practically a government by vigilance committee.” 

Before the initial Relief Committee meeting on April 18 adjourned, thirty-one households offered to shelter refugees, whether in a spare room or on a shared couch. Guy Chick, a former Berkeley building inspector, volunteered a ten-room house. By 2 a.m. on the morning of April 19, more than three hundred homes were prepared for the displaced San Francisco residents, along with damaged Stiles Hall and the Native Sons’ Hall at 2108 Shattuck Ave. 

With accommodations found for eight hundred refugees, the Housing Department was just reaching its stride. Local real estate firms provided men and rigs to transport refugees to their assigned housing. 

Hundreds of frightened San Francisco refugees spent the first night after the earthquake in the Berkeley hills, suffering through the chilly night without enough provisions rather than take shelter in Berkeley buildings that might be damaged by aftershocks. 

Eleven women reportedly gave birth in the hills that night, with no medical assistance. Nine of them were said to have died. As the sun rose on April 19 over the hills and illuminated the clouds of smoke that had blown east across the bay, the hungry, sleepless refugees staggered down in search of assistance. 

Starting late that morning, a torrent of refugees flooded the town, most of them arriving by train from Oakland. This pace continued all day, making the night of April 19 particularly hectic for relief workers trying to place and feed an estimated seven thousand refugees. Vacant rooms became impossible to find. 

The need was so great that almost every Berkeley household provided accommodations to friends or strangers from San Francisco. UC professors took in homeless San Franciscans, and even fraternity and sorority members gave up their lodging for use by the refugees. Everyone was instructed to keep the refugees inside rather than let them loiter in front of houses and other buildings.  

On April 18 at City Council Chambers, the public is invited to a 3:30 p.m. ceremony at which Richard Schwartz will present Mayor Bates with a Certificate of Honor to the citizens of Berkeley from San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom. Also, following the ceremony, BAHA will sponsor a lecture on the 1906 Berkeley Earthquake Relief effort and the book at the Berkeley City Club at 7:30 that night. Contact BAHA for tickets, at 841-2242. 

Photo from the book Earthquake Exodus, 1906 

with permission from the author, Richard Schwartz. (Blue and Gold, 1908.) 

The main refugee camp at UC Berkeley’s California Field, now the site of the Hearst Gymnasium.

FRIDAY, MARCH 31 

City Commons Club Noon Luncheon with Sally Baker, producer of “Wee Poets” Luncheon at 11:45 a.m. for $13.50, speech at 12:30 p.m., at the Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant St. 526-2925.  

“Preparing Our Communities for the End of Cheap Oil” A presentation by the Post Carbon Institute at 7:30 p.m. at Laney College Forum, 900 Fallon St., Oakland. Cost is $10. Day-long conference on Sat. at Humanist Hall, 390 27th St. http://bayarea.relocalize.net, www.postcarbo.org 

Arts and Crafts Cooperative of Berkeley Gallery Spring Seconds Sale from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. at 1652 Shattuck Ave. 843-2527. 

Historical & Current Times Book Group meets on Thursdays from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Albany Library, 1249 Marin Ave. 548-4517. 

Berkeley Chess School classes for students in grades 1-8 from 5 to 7 p.m. at 1581 LeRoy Ave., room 17. 843-0150. 

Berkeley Chess Club meets Fridays at 8 p.m. at the East Bay Chess Club, 1940 Virginia St. Players at all levels are welcome. 845-1041. 

Women in Black Vigil, from noon to 1 p.m. at UC Berkeley, Bancroft at Telegraph. wibberkeley@yahoo.com 548-6310, 845-1143. 

Meditation, Peace Vigil and Dialogue, gather at noon on the grass close to the West Entrance to UC Berkeley, on Oxford St. near University Ave. People of all traditions are welcome to join us. Sponsored by the Buddhist Peace Fellowship. 655-6169. www.bpf.org 

SATURDAY, APRIL 1 

Kid’s Garden Club for ages 7-12 to explore the world of gardening, from 2 to 4 p.m. at Tilden Nature Area, Tilden Park. Cost is $6-$8, registration required. 636-1684. 

Women on Common Ground Hike Meet at 1:30 p.m. at the Bear Creek Staging Area, Briones Regional Park. Hike is four miles with some hills. RSVP to 925-862-2601. 

Free Compost at the Farmers’ Market from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. at Center St. at Martin Luther King, Jr. Way. Bring your own container, two buckets are suggested or large garbage bags. Backyard amateur gardeners only. Sponsored by the Ecology Center. 548-3333. 

Container Gardening and Design with Gail Yelland at 10 a.m. at Magic Gardens Landscape Nursery, 729 Heinz Ave. 644-2351. 

Mt. Wanda Wildflower Walk in the hills where John Muir took his daughters. Meet at 9 a.m. in the Park and Ride lot at the corner of Alhambra Ave. and Franklin Canyon Rd., Martinez. Wear walking shoes and bring water. 925-228-8860. 

Sick Plant Clinic UC plant pathologist Dr. Robert Raabe, UC entomologist Dr. Nick Mills, and their team of experts will diagnose what ails your plants from 9 a.m. to noon at the UC Botanical Garden, 200 Centennial Dr. 643-2755.  

Sun and Earth Day Hands-on activities for families from noon to 5 p.m. at Chabot Space & Science Center, 10000 Skyline Blvd., Oakland. Cost is $9-$13. 336-7300. www.cahbotspace.org  

Bike Helmet Safety Day Purchase a helmet for $7, and from 10 a.m. to noon toddlers can get fitted, decorate their new helmets, and participate in a toddler rodeo at Habitot Children’s Museum, 2065 Kittredge St. 647-1111. www.habitot.org  

“And Still I Rise ...” A soul gathering and benefit for the people of New Orleans with music, poetry, dancing and film at 6 p.m. at Berkeley Unitarian Universalist Fellowship, 1924 Cedar St. at Bonita. Donations $15 and up. 415-864-2321. 

Progressive Democrats of the East Bay meets to discuss clean money and electoral reform at 12:30 p.m. at Temescal Library, 5205 Telegraph. 636-4149. www.pdeastbay.org 

Berkeley Progressive Convention Coalition Planning meeting at 2 p.m. at Berkeley Fellowship Hall, Cedar and Bonita St. 540-1975. 

Arts and Crafts Cooperative Gallery Spring Seconds Sale from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Sat. and Sun. at 1652 Shattuck Ave. 843-2527. 

East Bay Atheists Berkeley meets at 2 p.m. at Berkeley Public Library, 2090 Kittredge, 3rd floor meeting room. We will watch a video of Sam Harris speaking on his book, “The End of Faith.” 222-7580. 

Kids Day at Studio Rasa from 10:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. with movement, yoga and dance classes, at 933 Parker St. Cost is $10. 843-2787. www.studiorasa.org 

Free Craniosacral Self Care Techniques with Dr. Raleigh Duncan from 11:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. at Elephant Pharmacy, 1607 Shattuck Ave.  

Protest Rally at Berkeley Honda Shattuck and Parker every Thurs. at 4:30 to 6 p.m. and Sat. from 1 to 2 p.m. until the labor dispute is settled.  

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

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. 

Car Wash Benefit for Options Recovery Services of Berkeley, held every Sat. from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Lutheran Church, 1744 University Ave. 666-9552. 

SUNDAY, APRIL 2 

Spring Forward Walk to mark the start of Daylight Savings Time at 10 a.m. at the Tilden Nature Center, Tilden Park. 525-2233. 

El Cerrito Historical Society with guest speaker Richard Schwartz on his new book “Earthquake Exodus, 1906” at 2 p.m. at the El Cerrito Senior Center, 6510 Stockton Ave., just behind the El Cerrito Library. www.elcerritowire.com/history 

97th Anniversary of Philip Temple CME Church, with a talk by Rev. Charles Haynes at 3 p.m. at 3233 Adeline St. 655-6527. 

Hands-On Bicycle Clinic on bicycle safety inspections from 10 to 11 a.m. at REI, 1338 San Pablo Ave. Free. 527-4140. 

Lake Merritt Neighbors Organized for Peace Peace walk around the lake every Sun. Meet at 3 p.m. at the colonnade at the NE end of the lake. 763-8712. lmno4p.org 

“Are You Good Enough to be Published?” a workshop with Alan Rinzler at 3 p.m. at Cody’s Books on Telegraph Ave. 845-7852.  

Tibetan Buddhism with Bob Byrne on “Deepening Meditation” at 6 p.m. at the Tibetan Nyingma Institute, 1815 Highland Pl. 843-6812. www.nyingmainstitute.com  

Ancient Tools for Successful Living at 10:30 a.m., and the following three Sun. in April at 5272 Foothill Blvd. at Fairfax, Oakland. Cost is $8-$20. 533-5306. 

Chabad of Berkeley honoring Rabbi Yehuda Ferris at 5:30 p.m. at the ASUC Building, Pauley Ballroom, UC Campus. Tickets are $125. 540-5824.  

MONDAY, APRIL 3 

“Youth Connect” To help connect transitional age youth to services and other experiential activities from 2 to 8 p.m. at the Lutheran Church of the Cross, 1744 University Ave., at McGee.  

Berkeley School Volunteers Training workshop for volunteers interested in helping the public schools, from 3 to 4:30 p.m. at 1835 Allston Way. 644-8833. 

United Nations Association Film Festival “Statement of Hope and Courage” 6:30 p.m. at Pacific Film Archive, UC Campus. Tickets are $8-$10. 849-1752. unaeastbay@sbcglobal.net 

“Perspectives on Berkeley: Past and Present” Chuck Wollenberg’s Berkeley history class begins at 7 p.m. at the Berkeley Public Library, 2090 Kittredge St., and continues on Mon. evenings through May 22. Free. 981-6150. 

National Organization for Women Oakland/East Bay Chapter meets to discuss options for senior housing at 6 p.m. at the Oakland YWCA, 1515 Webster St. 287-8948. 

Green Business Discussion with green business leaders at 7 p.m. at the Albany Community Center, 1249 Marin Ave. Free. 848-9358. www.fivecreeks.org 

“Healing from Sexual Abuse” with author Carolyn Lehman at 7:30 p.m. at Black Oak Books, 1491 Shattuck Ave. 486-0698. www.blackoakbooks.com 

Neuropathic Treatment for Allergies and Hayfever at 7:30 p.m. at Elephant Pharmacy, 1607 Shattuck Ave. 549-9200. 

“How to Expand Your Mind- Body Connection” at 5:30 pm. in the Rose Room at Mercy Retirement Center, 3431 Foothill Blvd., Oakland. Cost is $30 or $120 for the entire series. 534-8547, ext. 666. 

Introduction to Meditation at 6:45 p.m. at the Bay Zen Center, 315 Alcatraz near College Ave. Cost is $10. 596-3087. www.bayzen.org 

Sing-A-Long from 10 to 11 a.m. at the Albany Senior Center, 846 Masonic Ave. 524-9122.  

Beginning Bridge Lessons at 11:10 a.m. at the Albany Senior Center, 846 Masonic Ave. Cost is $1. 524-9122. 

McGee Avenue Toastmasters meets at 7:30 p.m. at McGee Ave Baptist Church, 1640 Stuart St. 501-7005. 

Berkeley CopWatch organizational meeting at 8 p.m. at 2022 Blake St. Join us to work on current issues around police misconduct. Volunteers needed. For information call 548-0425. 

TUESDAY, APRIL 4 

“Rafting the Colorado” A photo journey with Steve Miller at 7 p.m. at REI, 1338 San Pablo Ave. Free. 527-4140. 

“American Theocracy: Oil, Preachers, and Borrowed Money: America’s Coming Catastrophe” with author Kevin Phillips at 7:30 p.m. at First Congregational Church, 2345 Channing Way.  

Discussion Salon on “Taxes and Investing” at 7 p.m. at the BRJCC, 1414 Walnut St. at Rose. Please bring snacks to share, no peanuts please. 

Stress Less Seminar at 6:30 p.m. at New Moon Opportunities, 378 Jayne Ave., Oakland Free, but registration required. 465-2524. 

Free Guitar and Music Lessons for Teachers Beginners at 7 p.m. and Intermediate at 8 p.m. at Marin Elementary School, 1001 Santa Fe Ave., Albany. Sponsored by Guitars in the Classroom. 848-9463. 

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. 

Free Handbuilding Ceramics Class 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. at St. John’s Senior Center, 2727 College Ave. Also, Mon. noon to 4 p.m. at the South Berkeley Senior Center. Materials and firing charges not included. 525-5497. 

Berkeley Camera Club meets at 7:30 p.m., at the Northbrae Community Church, 941 The Alameda. Share your digital images, slides and prints and learn what other photographers are doing. Monthly field trips. 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. We offer ongoing classes in exercise and creative arts, and always welcome new members over 50. 845-6830. 

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 5 

Berkeley Path Wanderers Association walk to explore the churches of North Berkeley. Meet at 10 a.m. at the large redwood in front of Live Oak Park Theater, 1301 Shattuck at Berryman. Bring water and a snack. 524-2383. www.berkeleypaths.org 

Great Decisions Foreign Policy Association Lecture with Darren Zook on “China and India” at 10 a.m. at the Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant Ave. Cost is $40 for the eight lecture series. 526-2925. 

$390 Million Bond Measure for Peralta Community College District with Tom Smith, Chief Financial Officer for the Peralta Community College at 12:30 p.m. at the Albany Library, 1247 Marin Ave. Sponsored by the League of Women Voters. http://lwvbae.org 

Chiapas Support Committee Report from Zapatista Territory at 7:30 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Cost is $5-$15 sliding scale. 849-2568.  

“What I Have Learned About U.S. Foreign Policy: War Against the Third World” A compilation of documentaries about CIA covert operations at 7:30 p.m. at Humanist Hall, 390 27th St., Oakland. Donation of $5 accepted. 

American Red Cross Blood Drive from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. at Publisher’s Group West, 1700 Fourth St. To schedule an appointment call 1-800-GIVELIFE. www.BeADonor.com 

“The Spanish Civil War—the First Battle in the War of Globalization” with Richard Bermack at 7 p.m. at Berkeley Richmond Jewish Community Center, 1414 Walnut St. 848-0237. www.brjcc.org 

Bookmark Nonfiction Group meets to discuss George Lakoff’s “Don’t Think of an Elephant” at 6:30 p.m. at Bookmark Bookstore, 721 Washington St., Oakland. 444-0473. 

“Awaken Your Strongest Self” with Neil Fiore, psychologist and hypnotist at 5 p.m. at Pharmaca, 1744 Solano Ave. 527-8929. 

Breema Open House at 6 p.m. at 6201 Florio St., Oakland. 428-1234. www.breema.com 

The Berkeley Lawn Bowling Club provides free instruction every Wed. and Sat. at 10:30 a.m. at 2270 Acton 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. Everyone is welcome, wear comfortable shoes and a warm hat. 548-9840. 

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.  

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 

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. at the Berkeley BART Station, corner of Shattuck and Center. www.geocities. 

com/vigil4peace/vigil 

THURSDAY, APRIL 6 

“Sir, No Sir!” A preview screening benefit for Iraq Veterans Against the War, at 7 p.m. at Grand Lake Theater, 3200 Grand Lake Ave. Tickets are $8-$10. 415-255-7296, ext. 244. 

“Building with Nature” with Leslie Freudenheim at 7:30 p.m. at Builders Booksource, 1817 Fourth St.  

Historical & Current Times Book Group meets on Thursdays from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Albany Library, 1249 Marin Ave. 548-4517. 

“Model Citizen Canine” A lecture on teaching your dog good behavior at 7:30 p.m. at Borders Books in Emeryville. 644-0729. www.openpaw.org 

Natural Solutions for Digestion at 1 p.m. at Elephant Pharmacy, 1607 Shattuck Ave. 549-9200. 

Healthy Eating Habits Seminar at 6:30 p.m. at New Moon Opportunities, 378 Jayne St. Free, but registration required. 465-2524. 

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 

ONGOING 

Free Tax Help—United Way’s Earn it! Keep It! Save It! program provides free filing assistance to households that earned less than $38,000 in 2005. To find a free tax site near you, call 800-358-8832.  

Bringing Back the Natives Garden Tour is seeking volunteers who will spend a morning or afternoon greeting tour participants and answering questions at the free native plant garden tour, featuring sixty-four gardens located throughout Alameda and Contra Costa counties on Sunday, May 7, 2006. Volunteers can select the garden they would like to spend time at by visiting the “Preview the 2006 Gardens” section at www.BringingBackTheNatives.net 

Public Art Opportunities Request for Entries The City of Berkeley is looking for artists for the 2006 Civic Center Art Competition and Exhibition. Entries are due April 18. For details contact the Civic Arts Program, 981-7533. 

Artwork for the Corporation Yard Gates Request for Proposals Applications are due April 3. For details call the Civic Arts Program at 981-7533. 

Albany Library Free Drop-in Homework Help for students in third through fifth grades, Mon. - Thurs. from 3 to 5:30 p.m. Emphasis is placed on math and writing skills. No registration is required. 526-3720, ext. 17. 

Find a Loving Animal Companion at the Berkeley-East Bay Humane Society Adoption Center (open from 11 a.m. - 7 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday). 2700 Ninth St. 845-7735. www.berkeleyhumane.org  

Medical Care for Your Pet at the Berkeley East Bay Humane Society low-cost veterinary clinic. 2700 Ninth St. For appointments call 845-3633. www.berkeleyhumane.org 

CITY MEETINGS 

Creeks Task Force meets Mon. April 3, at 7 p.m. the North Berkeley Senior Center. Erin Dando, 981-7410. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/planning/landuse/Creeks/ 

Peace and Justice Commission meets Mon., April 3, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Manuel Hector, 981-5510. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/peaceandjustice 

Commission on the Status of Women meets Wed., April 5, at 7:30 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Tasha Tervelon, 981-5190. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/women 

Planning Commission meets Wed., April 5, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Janet Homrighausen, 981-7484. www.ci.berkeley. ca.us/commissions/planning 

Housing Advisory Commission meets Thurs., April 6, at 7:30 p.m., at the South Berkeley Senior Center. Oscar Sung, 981-5400. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/housing 

Landmarks Preservation Commission meets Thurs. April 6, at 7:30 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Gisele Sorensen, 981-7419. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/landmarks 

Public Works Commission meets Thurs., April 6, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Jeff Egeberg, 981-6406. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/publicworks 

Zoning Adjustments Board meets Thurs., April 6, at 7 p.m., in City Council Chambers. Mark Rhoades, 981-7410. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/zoning   

?

Over the years I’ve probably been asked how I inspect a house or what am I looking for at least a thousand times. It’s a valid question. I guess it’s like saying “How do you inspect a square kilometer of desert?” 

How do you decide what to look at and what to disregard and how, in a fixed frame of time do you arrive at the end and say anything of substance. Again, a valid question and sometimes troubling because no matter how much you see or what you have learned, there is bound to be more that you do not know. Therefore, one needs a methodology, a series of habits, some set protocols and perhaps a set of tools with which to carry those protocols out. 

Although there is great truth in what I have just said, there is a missing piece as is often true for mysterious trades like medicine and lawnmower repair. For me, the truth to my job is that I have to find a place where I can see a whole bunch of stuff and sit down and look. That’s right. I find a spot where I can see a wall or the underside of the house, or maybe the whole house and I look. 

If you sit in the woods very quietly in one place for a long time, you are going to begin to notice all sorts of things that would surely escape your notice when tromping along from one fiefdom to another. After a while you might start to notice the many sounds and perhaps eventually identify some of them. You might start to see that a line of ants were working their way from their hill to a tree-stump and back again. 

Inspecting a house, when done properly is a bit like this. It creates problems too because people sometimes come up to me and say, “How much longer is this going to take?” and I have to say, “When is the grasshopper going to lay its eggs in the tall grass?” my epicanthic folds hidden beneath the shadow of my muslin hood. 

This thing is mysterious, goshdarnit, and I refuse to be deterred by things like efficiency. Actually, this sort of unprejudiced seeing is very efficient, especially when I’ve seen something of importance that would have been missed in a hurried examination of the premises. 

The reason this works is that there is a great deal of “noise” when looking at houses. There’s so much raw data that you have to let your mind sit and filter out all the extraneous stuff at its own pace. 

Invariably, within a short while, the naturally curious mind will begin to weed out all the obvious stuff and start to notice that there are tiny holes in the joists under the floor (beetles?) or the fact that the cripple studs (the ones that hold up the joists) are all hanging off the edge of the foundation sill on one side. 

The best place to show this to people is from across the street from the house we’re looking at. 

If your vision is fair, you can probably make out relatively small cracks and all sorts of irregularities from this sort of distance but better, you can see things that are almost certainly missed when one is close to the house. I’ve often done this with clients when I noticed something that requires this distance and want to give them a treat. 

I invite them to cross the street with me and look back at the house. I ask them to look at everything and tell me what they see. They start with the color (that they HATE), the cultured stone veneer that they also hate (cultured, my inverse perspective!), the rocks on the roof (rocks on the roof?!) and then they say it. “Hey, the whole house is … sort of ... tilted to one side.” 

That’s when I hand out the junior inspector badge, the decoder ring and teach them the secret handshake. 

It didn’t take a professional to figure out that the house was wracked or tilted. It just took a few minutes of attentive seeing (which we all know is not the same as looking). 

Even the seller of the house may have been unaware. I swear to Joshua when I say that I saw a house about a month ago that had this very condition and the owner was completely unaware until I showed it to her. She recently left me a message saying that she is now seeing it and seeing it and seeing it. 

She walks by a doorway and sees that it’s a parallelogram but certainly not a rectangle. She notices the cracks and separations that had previously been filtered out by the busy brain (and this is a very bright woman). 

What it takes is a little extra time to stop and look. Now there is clearly more to it than that but this is my rule number one. The other part is to get your inverse perspective over to all the places where important things can be seen. 

So crawling under the house is important (if it’s a house you want to inspect), Getting into the attic and bringing your lunch, climbing on the roof and spending some special moments with the clouds and the shingle. This really works. Believe me. 

After a while you’ll start to learn all the other stuff but if you don’t get a look at every facet of the house from every perspective, you are destined to miss something and, conversely, if you don’t, it doesn’t matter how many gadgets you have or how sharp your visual acuity, you’re going to miss something. 

Another thing about this process is that it provides a lot of great raw data for the back-of-the-head, long-range, subconscious thinking stuff. After you’ve looking a lot at every angle and in every place around the house, lights tend to come on (yes, in your head). 

The illusory elements start to coalesce if you’ve given them enough material around which to form their germs. 

It has often been the case for me that it was only in the third hour (or later) of an inspection that some really important aspect began to come together. This might be a general issue regarding the manner of construction or it might be the fact that there had been a fire in the house some years ago and it took seeing a lot of little facts to bring it out. 

Again, the important thing is that one simply looks slowly and attentively to many aspects and lets the information slowly emerge. 

Now you’ll have to add some construction experience in order to use this method professionally but the next time you’re working with someone like me (or your auto mechanic) you can do what attentive clients have been doing to me for years.  

Just as I’m fully saddled upon my high horse pontificating about the dangers of dryer lint, my attentive client will point over my horse’s left ear and say “We’ll yes, but what about that hole in the side of the house?” 

Thank goodness, I’ve trained myself to control that blush response. 

Persistent readers may have noticed, in this and other writings in this and other publications (I refer specifically to my every-other-Tuesday back page column on the trees of Berkeley in the Daily Planet), that I have definite opinions and strong feelings about, of all things, the treatment of trees. 

I come by those honestly, through study and experience. I’ve recommended Plant Amnesty, a funny and accomplished gang based in Seattle, for some pointers on what—and what not—to do to trees in your care, but that’s not where I first learned about caring for them.  

There’s a resource closer to home than Seattle where you can learn about the principles of good pruning, and its people have gone way beyond my skills and knowledge. You can also hire many of these folks to work on your trees; visit the website below. I suggest watching while they work, if you can. There’s much to learn that way. You can learn in other ways from this new school too.  

In the 1980s, I took landscape horticulture classes up at Merritt College. I’ve had a number of brushes with academia, and this was absolutely my best experience of it. One really good part was meeting Dennis Makishima there. 

Already an accomplished professional arborist, he was taking an arboriculture class because he wanted to learn more about productive fruit trees. While he was doing that, he was teaching the rest of us about Japanese-style pruning. I think he couldn’t help it; he’s a born teacher.  

I lucked out and got to spend some time as Dennis’ apprentice. He took several of us on, at various stages and for various times, as he was expanding his own practice and later taking months off to study with a bonsai master in Japan. 

It soon became clear that there were more people eager to learn than he could handle that way, so he and several of his students founded the Merritt College Bonsai and Aesthetic Pruning Club. 

The two branches of the club, with some overlapping membership, meet periodically to learn and discuss trees, but a lot of the teaching goes on in classes that Dennis’ first few tiers of students teach at Merritt, and in their work on trees in local public gardens, communities, and institutions. That started with the refurbishing of the Japanese Friendship Garden at Lake Merritt, and expanded all around the Bay Area.  

One major accomplishment of the group is the bonsai garden, also at Lake Merritt, built and gardened largely through their volunteer work. Every volunteer job they do is also an occasion to pass on their knowledge, via talk and hands-on practice.  

Club members also teach Saturday classes at Merritt, for a modest fee—usually under $30. That’s a good place to start. It’s an investment in your trees, in your land and even property values, in your community. 

The hort department will throw its annual plant fair on Saturday, April 22, and that’s a good place to get acquainted with the pruning club. If you want to hire someone from this powerhouse group, there’s a list on their website.  

Merritt College Bonsai and  

Aesthetic Pruning Club 

www.aestheticpruning.org 

Fee class registration, call 436-2413  

Plant Amnesty 

www.plantamnesty.org 

TUESDAY, MARCH 28 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

“Tell it on Tuesday” Story- 

telling with Lauren Crux, Kate Frankle, and others at 7:30 p.m. at Julia Morgan Theater, 2640 College Ave. Tickets are $8-$12 sliding scale. www.juliamorgan.org 

Rosalind Wiseman gives parenting advice in “Queen Bee Moms & Kingpin Dads” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Sw amp Coolers at 8:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Dance lesson at 8 p.m. Cost is $9. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Larry Vuckovich, solo jazz piano at 8 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810. 

Ellen Hoffman Trio and Singers’ Open Mic at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Wa y. 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.  

Jazzschool Tuesdays, a weekly showcase of up-and-coming ensembles from Berkeley Jazzschool at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 84 8-8277. 

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 29 

EXHIBITIONS 

Alex Rosmarin “Small Scale Compositions” Reception at 7 p.m. at Artbeat Salon and Gallery, 1887 Solano Ave. 527-3100. 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Debra Dean introduces her new novel “The Madonnas of Leningrad” 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 

Music for the Spirit with Ron McKean on harpsichord at 12:15 p.m. at First Presbyterian Church of Oakland, 2619 Broadway. 444-3555. 

Berkeley Symphony Orchestra with Garrick Ohlsson, piano, at 8 p.m. at Zellerbach Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $10-$54. 841-2800. www.berkeleysymphony.org 

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

Ned Boynton Trio at 8 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810.  

Blue Roots at 9 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $9. 525-5054.  

Five & Dime Jazz, The Great Auk at 8:30 p.m. at Epic Arts, 1923 Ashby Ave. Cost is $5-$10. 644-2204.  

Orquestra Bakan at 9:30 p.m. at Shattuck Down Low, 2284 Shattuck Ave. Salsa dance lessons at 8 p.m. Cost is $5-$10. 548-1159.  

Sol Spectrum at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Tret Fure at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $17.50-$18.50. 548-1761.  

THURSDAY, MARCH 30 

FILM 

The Enchanting World of Jacques Demy “Lola” at 7:30 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berk eley.edu 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Tom Tomorrow introduces his first compilation of cartoons “Hell in a Handbasket: Dispatches From the Country Formerly Known as America” at 7:30 p.m. at Cody’s Books. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com  

Betty Lucas, life coach, in troduces “Many Roads to Love” at 7 p.m. at A Great Good Place for Books, 6120 La Salle Ave., Oakland, 339-8210.  

Word Beat Reading Series with Phillip Deitch and Susan Birkeland at 7 p.m. at Mediterraneum Caffe, 2475 Telegraph Ave. 526-5985. 

MUSIC AND DAN CE 

Children’s Choral Festival at 12:30 p.m. at Regents’ Theater, Holy Names University. Free. 436-1234. 

Ladysmith Black Mambazo, music of Zulu mine and factory workers, at 8 p.m. at Zellerbach Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $22-$46. 642-9988.  

Ellis Paul a t 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $19.50-$20.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Adam Blankman and his Trio at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $5. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

Travis Jones & Friends at 7 p.m. at Caf fe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave., at Dwight. 548-5198.  

Michael Bluestein Duo at 8 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810.  

Selector with Black Edgars Musicbox at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

FRIDAY, MARCH 31 

THEATER 

Berkeley Rep “Culture Clash’s Zorro in Hell” at 8 p.m. in the Roda Theater. Tickets are $45-$59. Runs through April 16. 647-2949. www.berkeleyrep.org 

Masquers Playhouse “Relative Values” by Noel Coward. Fri. and Sat. at 8 p.m. at 105 Park Place, Point Richmond, through May 6. Tickets are $15. 232-4031. www.masquers.org 

Shotgun Players “Bright Ideas” Thurs.-Sun. at 8 p.m. at the Ashby Stage, 1901 Ashby Ave. to April 23. Tickets are $15-$30. 841-6500. www.shotgunplayers.org 

FILM 

The Enchanting World of Jacques Demy “Bay of Angels” at 7 p.m. and “Model Shop” at 8:35 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Mark Klett and Rebecca Solnit describe “After the Ruins, 1906 and 2006: Rephotographing the San Francisco Earthquake and Fire” at 7:30 p.m. a t Cody’s Books. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com  

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Duamuxa, worker’s songs from the countryside to the factory, in celebration of Cesar Chavez’ birthday at 8 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Cost is $8-$12. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

Jazz From Fi nland with drummer Andre Sumelius in trio with Jussi Kannaste, saxophone, and John Shifflet, bass, at 8 p.m. at Da Silva Ukulele Co., 2547 Eighth St. Donation $10. Sponsored by The Jazz House, 415-846-9432. 

Karen Wells, Madeline Prager, and John Burke per form Mozart, Brahms and Shostakovish at 8 p.m. at Giorgi Gallery, 2911 Claremont Ave. Cost is $12. 848-1228. 

“Dangerous Beauty” Hip-hop, modern, African and jazz dance, with spoken word and rap performed by Destiny Arts Youth Performance Company at 7:30 p.m. at Malonga Casquelourde Center for the Arts, 1428 Alice St., Oakland. Tickets are $6-$20. 597-1619. 

ACL/Nac1, underground hip hop, at 8:30 p.m. at Epic Arts, 1923 Ashby Ave. Cost is $5-$10. 644-2204.  

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

Slammin’ with Keith Terry at 9 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $13-$15. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Chojo Jacques at 8 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave., at Dwight. 548-5198.  

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

Scott Amendola’s “Monk Trio” at 9 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810.  

The Ni Project at 7:30 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcaf e.net 

Godstomper, Crime Desire, Bafabegiya 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. 

The Regiment at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

SATURDAY, APRIL 1 

EXHIBITIONS 

“Inside Out” Detail i n Dress from 1850 to the Jazz Age opens at Lacis Museum of Lace and Textiles, 2982 Adeline St. Open Mon.-Sat. noon to 6 p.m. 843-7178. 

“Cultural Encounters” travel photographs of Canada, China and Turkey by members of the Berkeley Camera Club. Reception at 1 p.m. at the San Pablo Arts Gallery, 13831 San Pablo Ave., San Pablo. 215-3204. 

“Aftershock! Voices from the 1906 Earthquake and Fire” with artifacts and photographs, opens at the Oakland Museum of California, 10th and Oak St. Cost is $5-$8. 238-2200. 

Pastels by Leslie Firestone at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave., through April 30. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

“Modulations of Light” color photographs by Sidney J.P. Hollister. Reception at 6 p.m. at Photolab Gallery, 2235 Fifth St. 644-1400. www.photolabo ratory.com  

FILM 

The Enchanting World of Jacques Demy “The Umbrellas of Cherbourg” at 6:30 p.m., “Jacquot” at 8:30 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

“Creating an Illustrated Field Guid e for the Sierra Nevada” with John (Jack) Muir Laws at 10:30 a.m. at the Oakland Museum of California, 10th and Oak St. Cost is $5-$8. 238-2200. 

Sarah Waters introduces her novel “The Night Watch” at 7 p.m. at Cody’s Books on Fourth St. 559-9500. 

Bay Area Poets Coalition Open Reading at 3 p.m. at Strawberry Creek Lodge, 1320 Addison St. Park on street. 527-9905. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

The Novello Quartet celebrates Mozart’s 250th birthday at 8 p.m. at Trinity Chapel, 2320 Dana St., between Durant and Bancroft. T ickets are $8-$12. 549-3864. 

Pacific Boychoir sings Bach at 7:30 p.m. at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Oakland. Tickets are $15-$20. 452-4722. www.pacificboychoir.org 

“Dangerous Beauty” Hip-hop, modern, African and jazz dance, with spoken word and rap performed by Destiny Arts Youth Performance Company at 7:30 p.m. at Malonga Casquelourde Center for the Arts, 1428 Alice St., Oakland. Tickets are $6-$20. 597-1619. 

New Praise Choir performs at the 97th Anniversary of the Pholip Temple CME Church at 5 p.m. at 3233 Adeline St. 655-6527. 

Duct Tape Mafia in a benefit for the Africa Educational Trust at 6:30 p.m. at Oakland Metro, 201 Broadway, Oakland. Tickets are $10. For all ages. www.oaklandmetro.org 

Berkeley Broadway Singers “April in Paris” at 8 p.m. at St. Ambrose Church, 1145 Gilman St. at Cornell. Free, donations appreciated. 604-5732. 

The Mixers, classic rock, ska/reggae, blues, at 10 p.m. at The Ivy Room, 858 San Pablo Ave. Cost is $7. 524-9220. www.ivyroom.com 

Eddie Palmieri and His Septet at 8 p.m. at Zellerbach Hall , UC Campus. Tickets are $22-$42. 642-9988. www.calperfs.berkeley.edu 

The Venezuelan Music Project at 8:30 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Tickets are $12-$14. 849-2568. www.lapena.org  

Mad and Eddie Duran Trio at 9 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810.  

The Edlos. a capella, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $18.50-$19.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Braziu at 9 p.m. at Shattuck Down Low, 2284 Shattuck Ave. Cost is $10-$12. 548-1159.  

Grapefruit Ed with Pickin Trix at 9:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $10-$12. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

The Ravines, folk rock, at 8 p.m. at Spuds Pizza, 3290 Adeline St. Cost is $7. 558-0881. 

The D Sides and Cowpokes for Peace at 7:30 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

The People, Blue Bone Express at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $7. 841-2082. www.starryploughpub.com 

Jewdriver, Until the Fall, The Shemps at 8 p.m. at 924 Gilman St. Cost is $6. 525-9926. 

Mel Sharpe’s Big Money in Gumbo Band at 8 p.m. at An na’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $7. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

SUNDAY, APRIL 2 

CHILDREN  

“Eggstravaganza” Celebrate spring with an egg decorating contest, egg games and activities from 1 to 4 p.m. at the Oakland Museum of California, 10 th and Oak St. Cost is $5-$8. 238-2200. 

EXHIBITIONS 

Jeanne Dunning “Study After Untitled” Guided tour at 2 p.m. at Berkeley Art Museum, 642-0808. 

FILM 

The Enchanting World of Jacques Demy “the Young Girls of Rochefort” at 3 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archiv e. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

“Houses and Housings: Portability in Jewish Faith and Culture” with Henry Shreibman in conjunction with the current exhibit at the Magnes Museum, at 2 p.m. at the BRJCC, 1414 Walnut St. 848-0237. 

“Tails of Devotion: A Look at the Bond Between People and Their Pets” at 4 p.m. at Cody’s Books on Fourth St. 559-9500. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

BUSD Performing Arts Showcase from 1 to 4 p.m. at Berkeley Community Theater, Allston Way between MLK an d Milvia. 644-8772. 

Golden Gate Boys Choir and Bellringers at 4 p.m. at St. Ambrose Church, 1145 Gilman St. at Cornell. Tickets are $5-$10. 887-4311. www.ggbc.org 

San Francisco City Chorus performs Handel’s “Israel in Egypt” at 3 p.m. at First COngregational Church of Berkeley, 2345 Channing Way. Tickets are $13-$20. 415-701-7664. www.sfcitychorus.org 

Sor Ensemble performs chamber music by Shostakovich at 4 p.m. at the Crowden Music Center, 1475 Rose St. at Sacramento. Tickets are $12, free for children. www.crowden.org 

San Francisco Choral Artists “Wisdom of the Ages: Sages and Seers” at 4 p.m. at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, 114 Montecito Ave., Oakland. Tickets are $18-$25. 415-979-5779. www.sfca.org 

Berkeley Broadway Singers “April in Paris” at 4 p.m. at St. Augustine’s Church, 400 Alcatraz Ave. between College and Telegraph. Free, donations appreciated. 604-5732. 

Leslie Hassberg sings Women Singer-Songwriters of the 60s and 70s, at 4 p.m. at Berkeley Fellowship of Unitarian Universalists, 1924 Cedar at Bonita. Cost is $12-$15.  

“Dangerous Beauty” Hip-hop, modern, African and jazz dance, with spoken word and rap performed by Destiny Arts Youth Performance Company at 3 p.m. at Malonga Casquelourde Center for the Arts, 1428 Alice St., Oakland. Tickets a re $6-$20. 597-1619. 

Brentano String Quartet, with Hsin-Yun Huang, viola, at 3 p.m. at Hertz Hall, UC Campus. Pre-concert talk with Mark Steinberg at 2 p.m. Tickets are $42, available from 642-9988. www.calperfs.berkeley.edu 

Twang Cafe, americana, at 7:30 p.m. at Epic Arts, 1923 Ashby Ave. Cost is $5-$10. 644-2204.  

Bandworks from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. with 17 youth bands at 6 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $5. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Houston Jones at 11 a.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nom adcafe.net 

Vocal Sauce at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $5. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

Pierre Bensuan, French-Algerian guitar, at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $21.50-$22.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Va riety Show with Raum, Ula, a shadow puppet show and short films at 3 p.m. at 924 Gilman St., an all-ages, member-run, no alcohol, no drugs, no violence club. Cost is $4. 525-9926. 

MONDAY, APRIL 3 

THEATER 

Shotgun Theater Lab: muwumpin presents “Frankie & J ohnny” Mon. and Tues. to April 18 at 8 p.m. at the Ashby Stage, 1901 Ashby Ave. Tickets are $10. 841-6500. www.shotgunplayers.org 

FILM 

United Nations Association Film Festival “Statement of Hope and Courage” at Pacific Film Archive, UC Campus. Tickets are $8-$10. 849-1752. 

“Stupid Cupid” at 9:30 p.m. at the Parkway Theater in Oakland. Director Chris Housh and several cast members will be present. Cost is $5. 593-9069. 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Actors Reading Writers, short stories by Penelope Lively and W. So merset Maugham at 7:30 p.m. at the Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant Ave. Free. 

Poetry Express with KC Frogge and guest Frank Anthony at 7 p.m. at Priya Restaurant, 2072 San Pablo Ave. berkeleypoetryexpress@yahoo.com 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Berkeley Contemporary Ch amber Players at 8 p.m. at Hertz Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $3-$7. 642-4864. 

Trovatore, traditional Italian music, at 7 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave., at Dwight. 548-5198.  

Zilberella Monday at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $5. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

,›

“We’re free and clear, Willy. Did you hear me? Free and clear!” 

“The problem with most productions of Death of a Salesman,” opined a theater-savvy friend, “is that it’s become an instant American classic—just add water and stir! With all those expectations of immediate gratification, there’s not much room to maneuver.” 

On my way into the Altarena Playhouse’s intimate theater, I saw the setup was for in-the-round . . . a tough way to present a show that’s all over the map, in a different sense. Another challenge to maneuvering: half the audience always at your back. 

If there’s something that typifies most productions of Arthur Miller’s most famous play, it’s either slippage—a lack of focus—or too much focus, exclusively on the lead role, or on some social or psychological conception of What It All Means, leaving out the rest of this problematic text that’s at once intimate and sprawling. 

“Miller almost titled this enduring play—In His Head—and that is where I hope to take you this evening,” writes director Sue Trigg in her program notes, “into the inner workings . . . of his lost hopes, his delusions and a family that has to lie to live up to both . . . to avoid being labeled by society as failures.” 

Most productions are thick with an emotional haze emanating from brooding characters: an off-balance suicidal Willy, unwittingly playing the sycophant, the martinet, the fool, and Biff, his Golden Boy gone bad, simmmering with resentment, on the verge of his next explosion.  

Perhaps because of her background of training at LAMDA, one of Britain’s finest theater schools, director Trigg dwells less on the psycho-sociological backstory than on the very rapid changes the script demands of an ensemble working closely together, in tight, almost musical timing. 

Willy’s constant reveries are immediately juxtaposed with the rather banal events that lead up to the climax of his tragedy—of obsolescence and self-deception, of wanting to be loved, for any reason or none at all. It was Miller’s innovation, a dramatic movement that is less cinematic than an adaptation of the techniques of storytelling he mastered as a scriptwriter for radio. 

The Altarena players perfectly articulate these often lightning-fast changes of mood and tone, and even, seemingly, narrative direction, and the rest falls into place. It’s the most coherent production of Death of a Salesman I can remember seeing—and one of the few that leaves room for the contrapuntal humor and irony necessary to make the play qualify for what it is always claimed to be: a tragic play. 

There’s a great deal that’s problematic, as well as brilliant, about Miller’s masterpiece: the utter banality of the lives portrayed and the manner in which Miller often portrays them, which seems at times to contradict the lofty claims made for it as a stage complement of that elusive creature, the Great American Novel. 

There’s also a good deal of explaining that salts the raw tableaux of personal, professional and familial dysfunctionality. Orson Welles once complained that Miller wrote like a moralizing professor. Indeed, many productions telegraph a certain fussiness of mounting, or a sense of grim solemnity, of admiration of a verdigris-stained monument that stands for self-evident truths.  

The Altarena production is both refreshing and thought-provoking. Images and perceptions loom out of the web of complicated interchanges as if they’re new and previously unperceived. It’s the true representation of a complex set of relationships—that of a man who’s failing, of a family fallen apart—and of a society pushing on, while pushing off its stragglers. 

The cast of 13 acquits itself very well, especially its principals. Chris Chapman is a Willy whose moods have come loose and can turn on a dime to show his wandering mind. Chris Ratti’s Biff is more hang-dog, self-deprecating and even whimsical than resentful, making his explosiveness more telling. 

David Koppel is a sanguine Happy, the “philandering bum” of a brother, always supportive and in denial. Koppel, the sole Equity actor in the cast, provides solid support in a crucial role. The brothers must play themselves as teenagers in Willy’s wayward recollections, and do so very well. Elinor Bell is admirable as Linda, the wife and mother of the Loman clan, a role that’s difficult, demanding great discretion. 

Stephen Steiner gives Willy’s neighbor, foil, and benefactor Charlie a light touch. Charlie and his son, Bernard (hazed by the Loman boys; well-portrayed by Eric O’Kelly), are the only two characters who are both successful and decent, as well as sympathetic and insightful.  

And Jonathan Ferro does justice to Willy’s boss, scion of the company’s founder, Howard Wagner, often portrayed as a nouveau-riche buffoon but here more as thoughtless, self-absorbed, and unable to handle Willy’s troubles and capriciousness. As Willy’s fabled brother and “super-ego” Ben, Steve Schwartz is ideal, an insouciant and prepossessingly self-dramatizing apparition. 

Willy’s constant clutching at Ben, begging him to stay and talk of their father, whom Willy barely recalls, only results in the “news” that he played flute, which Yahui Cathy Yang performs as well, linking and shading the tumbling vignettes in this rapidly shifting tragedy of the disparity between what’s outside and within. Death of a Salesman is playing its final two weekends on High Street, on the island of Alameda—a fine tribute to Arthur Miller, following his death last year. 

For more information, see www.altarena.org or call 523-1553.

The Bush-Cheney regime may represent a radical break with this nation’s traditions in many areas, but in making torture a central weapon in its “war on terror,” the current administration is simply building on a body of theory and practice that goes back more than half a century. 

That, at least, is the conclusion suggested by two new books on the modern history of American torture. 

A Question of Torture, by historian Alfred W. McCoy, traces the influence of “mind control” research conducted by and for the CIA in the 1950s in shaping the interrogation techniques used by American agents and allies ever since. 

Truth, Torture, and the American Way, by lawyer and human-rights advocate Jennifer K. Harbury, highlights parallels in the practices of U.S. government operatives and their local “assets” in the current conflict and in the civil wars that wracked Central America in the 1980s and early 1990s. 

While both books summarize the Bush administration’s record of brutality toward detainees, neither author offers new revelations in this area. As McCoy puts it, “There is no longer any need, well into the war on terror, to ask whether the United States has engaged in the systematic torture of suspected terrorists.” 

(If you are not already acquainted with the evidence, the best source remains Mark Danner’s 2004 compendium, Torture and Truth: America, Abu Ghraib, and the War on Terror, supplemented by the new evidence that appear regularly on the Web sites of such organizations as Human Rights Watch, Human Rights First, Amnesty International, and the American Civil Liberties Union.) 

The heart of McCoy’s book is his account of what he calls “a veritable Manhattan Project of the mind” coordinated by the CIA and carried out by behavioral scientists at leading universities and hospitals in the years 1950-1962. Some of the most lurid aspects of this research—such as the government’s experiments with LSD as a truth serum—have been reported before. 

But previous accounts have paid little attention to the real fruits of the program: the CIA and its academic front men made two discoveries that soon became the basis of the U.S. approach to the handling of enemy captives. The first was the devastating effect on the human personality of sensory disorientation, implemented through simple tools such as hoods, bright lights, and loud music. 

The second was the power of pain caused simply by forcing prisoners into unnatural positions for long periods of time. (McCoy and his sources call this “self-inflicted pain,” though I find that term misleading.) 

Together, the author argues, these discoveries amounted to “a major scientific turning point … the first real revolution in the cruel science of pain in more than three centuries.” 

Practically, they provided the conceptual foundation for a new approach he sums up as “psychological torture”—a way of delivering “a hammer-blow to the fundamentals of personal identity,” as he puts it, without breaking bones or spilling blood. 

CIA operatives translated these scientific insights into a set of procedures elaborated in a 1963 CIA manual, which in turn served as the basis for textbooks used later in CIA and U.S. military programs—including the infamous School of the Americas—where friendly locals from around the world were taught the techniques of counterinsurgency. 

In one of the most interesting sections of the book, McCoy shows that even as the U.S. government adopted a series of treaties and laws ostensibly outlawing torture, presidents from Reagan to Clinton insisted on language and “reservations” designed to provide subtle legal cover for the CIA-discovered approach. And as even a casual glance at accounts emerging from Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo suggests, these techniques have emerged in the 21st century as essential components in the George W. Bush administration’s handling of detainees. 

At times McCoy leans so heavily on his thesis that he seems to imply that “no-touch” torture has completely replaced physical pain in the American interrogators’ arsenal. He admits, however—and supplies plenty of confirming evidence from Vietnam, the Philippines, Latin America, and now Afghanistan and Iraq—that “under actual field conditions, the CIA’s psychological paradigm … was often supplemented by conventional physical tactics,” such as beating, burning, and electric shock. 

“With the physical thus compounding the psychological,” he writes in a passage that perhaps undermines his argument but matches the facts at hand, “medieval and modern methods sometimes seemed indistinguishable.” 

That’s an analysis I’m sure Harbury would accept. Compared to McCoy’s, her book is based less on documentary sources and more on the testimony of victims, and in the picture that emerges, there’s no doubt that old-fashioned physical torture plays a central role. 

Perhaps that’s because most of her examples come from Central America’s “dirty wars,” which make the current conflict look like a Sunday-school picnic. (Some 200,000 people were murdered or forcibly “disappeared” in Guatemala alone.) 

There’s plenty of evidence, though, that physical abuse has also been a common feature in the war on terror, even though the documented beatings and killings seem to have had less impact on American public opinion than the sexual humiliation practiced by Lynndie England and her friends. 

(Neither Harbury nor McCoy has much to say about the sexual dynamics that figure so centrally in the modern history of torture, nor about the ways the CIA—with help from Israel—has tried to “refine” its techniques to take advantage of specifically Muslim cultural sensitivities.) 

Many of the stories Harbury tells—including those of her late husband Everardo, a Guatemalan resistance leader kidnapped, tortured, and finally murdered by a team whose leader was on the CIA payroll, and of Sister Dianna Ortiz, a United States-born nun gang-raped and burned in 111 places—have been told before, including in Harbury’s previous books. But these horrifying reports—and the dozen other individual stories told in less detail here—bear retelling for the light they shed on the current situation, especially because nearly all the victims have testified that North Americans were directly involved in their ordeals. 

A Harvard-trained lawyer, Harbury also includes a useful summary of U.S. and international law on torture. On the one hand, she demonstrates the breadth and depth of legal strictures against the practice; on the other hand, she outlines the loopholes that have long ensured the CIA “de facto impunity for crimes against humanity.” 

Both Harbury and McCoy end their books with chapters making the case, in effect, that torture “doesn’t pay.” For one thing, they argue, history shows that it rarely produces useful information. Both authors devote special attention to demolishing the “ticking bomb” argument—the contention, regularly advanced by torture proponents (from Harvard’s Alan Dershowitz to Fox’s “24”) that it’s an effective and even necessary answer to terrorism. 

Both authors also remind us of torture’s many costs: its lasting physical and psychological effects on victims and their families, its corrupting influence on the men and women who carry it out, and the corrosive cultural effects it tends to have on the societies that experience it. On this score evidence McCoy presents from the Philippines is every bit as wrenching as Harbury’s from Central America. 

Neither author offers any advice on building a movement to force our government to abandon torture. All they do is give us a better appreciation of what we’re up against. The rest is up to us. 

Henry Norr was arrested in San Francisco on March 20 for taking part in civil disobedience, organized by a new Bay Area group called Act Against Torture (www.actagainsttorture.org), to protest torture, indefinite detention, and the war in Iraq. 

A QUESTION OF TORTURE: CIA Interrogation from the Cold War to the War on Terror 

By Alfred W. McCoy 

Metropolitan Books, 292 pages, $25 

TRUTH, TORTURE, AND THE AMERICAN WAY: The History and Consequences of U.S. Involvement in Torture 

By Jennifer K. Harbury 

Beacon Press, 227 pages, $14

Frederick Crews’ latest book, Follies of the Wise: Dissenting Essays, will be published next week by Shoemaker & Hoard. 

Crews joined the UC Berkeley English Department in 1958 and retired as its chair in 1994. In the mid-’60s he shared the widespread ass umption that Freudian psychoanalytic theory was a valid account of human motivation, and he was one of the first academics to apply that theory systematically to the study of literature. 

But he soon developed misgivings, and he gradually came to regard F reudianism as a seductive pseudoscience that manufactures the “evidence” it purports to explain.  

Crews has continued to advance that point of view for several decades now, but it was his 1993 essay “The Unknown Freud,” triggering the most intense and voluminous controversy ever seen in the New York Review of Books, that made his name a household word. But he was already briefly famous in 1963 for his bestselling satire The Pooh Perplex, and a generation of students in the ‘70s and ‘80s, including many at Berkeley, knew him from his witty composition text The Random House Handbook. 

Crews’ change of heart about psychoanalysis convinced him that his loyalty shouldn’t belong to any theory but rather to empirical standards and the skeptical point of view. In the past dozen years he has brought that attitude to the study of various public enthusiasms, from the recovered memory craze, Rorschach tests, and belief in alien abductions to theosophy and “intelligent design” creationism. These, along with psychoan alysis in its latest guises, are among the Follies of the Wise skewered in his new collection of essays. 

Crews is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In Berkeley, he won a Distinguished Teaching Award and was named a Faculty Research L ecturer. On retiring, he was given the Berkeley Citation, and just recently he has been honored as a Berkeley Fellow. He lives in Berkeley with his wife of 46 years, Elizabeth Crews, a photographer who was born and raised here. They have two daughters and four grandchildren—some as close as El Cerrito, others as distant as Mexico. 

Crews is an avid skier, hiker, swimmer, motorcyclist, and runner who continues to compete in road races at age 73. 

Jake Fuchs: The essays collected in your new book discuss a wide assortment of “follies.” You bring to all these a skepticism that those who enjoy your work consider both acute and fair. Your detractors might prefer the adjectives “grouchy” and “obsessed.” There some particular urgency about these various topics, some of which seem pretty silly, that makes them worth your trouble and the attention of your readers? 

Frederick Crews: I don’t have any agenda when it comes to topics. Some get suggested by editors, others by people who send me books that might appeal t o my disposition. When I do lock onto a theme, I usually find that, however strange the beliefs in question may be, there are sophisticated academics who “fellow travel” with them for turf-conscious reasons of their own. That’s what really engages me: the abdication of common sense by people who have been given every opportunity to educate themselves in rational principles, but who consider rationality itself to be old hat. 

JF: One conclusion that can be drawn from your book is that it’s hard to keep a w ise folly down. Freud, for example, still matters to millions, despite decades of sharp criticism. And creationism, you suggest in one essay, is thriving after receiving the cosmetic treatment known as intelligent design. Do you think any real progress ha s been made in helping people to ... well, think? 

FC: Many of my fellow skeptics are utopians who look forward to a heaven-on-earth from which all illusions have been banished. My hunch, on the contrary, is that we’re heading into a world of economic and demographic dislocations, strife over dwindling natural resources, increased superstition and sectarian conflict, and vulnerability to horrendous catastrophes, some of which will be our own fault. I’m embarrassed for my species, which has made a great me ss but can’t seem to take responsibility for the enormous destruction that’s already well under way. But while I’m still here, I’d like to continue to speak up for values that I regard as universally human and “planetary.” 

JF: Let’s go into your past a b it and perhaps relate it to the present. In Follies of the Wise, you describe yourself as having been an “antiwar spokesman” during the Vietnam era. Were you a radical? Any misgivings about your activities then? Do you think they may have had a part in le ading your university or the academy in general down unfortunate paths? 

FC: Circa 1968, I was co-chair of Berkeley’s Faculty Peace Committee, and my advocacy of draft resistance made me susceptible to the same prosecution that was brought against Dr. Spo ck. We were both on the masthead of a militant organization called “Resist.” But I was a minor figure, nationally, and was accordingly left to speechify without hindrance.  

Yes, I thought of myself as a radical in the ‘60s, but when even moderate Republicans joined the antiwar cause around 1970, I felt that my activism wasn’t needed anymore. Since then I’ve been a garden-variety liberal, with no advice to offer except, of course, the obvious suggestion that “wars of choice” are stupid and profoundly un-American.  

I did worry, in the ‘60s, about advocating draft resistance when I myself was beyond draft age—but 55,000 Americans and about a million Vietnamese were being slaughtered for no reason, so some scruples had to be overridden. As for the universi ties and UCB in particular, I always opposed academic disruption and violence. In fact, that’s exactly where I parted company with the New Left. 

JF: More recently, I’ve heard you characterized in academic circles as a right-winger. Any comment? 

FC: That perception is a by-product of the “theory wars” that brought us deconstruction, poststructuralism, and the newer forms of psychoanalysis. By warning, right away, that those movements were anti-empirical, I marked myself in some circles as an opponent of the political causes that the gurus of “theory” imagined they were serving. Only now are some of their successors beginning to realize that when you disrespect evidence and reason, you render yourself politically irrelevant–indeed, ridiculous. And you also become incapable of responding to those who disagree with you except by name calling. 

JF: You began your career as a literary scholar; then, as a writer, if not as a teacher, you moved into other fields. However, the two most recent essays in Follies of the Wise are about Kafka and Melville and the criticism concerning them. Does this mark a return to your primal academic scene?  

FC: Both of those literary subjects were proposed by the New York Review. By now I do feel more comfortable analyzing trends and movements than trying to say something new about classic authors. The amount of reading that needs to be done for each new project is daunting. But I don’t agree that my “other fields” stand altogether apart from literary criticism. The so-called interdisciplinarity of academic criticism from the seventies until now has been shallow and vapid. Thus, when I continue to write about the circular nature of, say, Lacanian psychoanalytic theory, I’m not turning my back on the literature departments but trying to show them how they’ve strayed from the ground rules of sincere investigation. Literary study is in broad disrepute now, and I’m trying to put my finger on the reason. 

JF: Let’s talk about your athletic endeavors. You’ve had 25 first-place finis hes in races since turning 70. How do you account for that? 

FC: It’s longevity, not talent. The other mobile septuagenarians tend not to show up, and when they do, some of them wander off the course. 

JF: And the motorcycle? Isn’t it getting to be time to dismount for good? 

FC: I ride for one reason only, to find parking spaces in Berkeley. But it’s also a source of amusement, because, with my helmet on, I’m completely invisible to my academic colleagues. There is something very satisfying about that.  

FOLLIES OF THE WISE:  

DISSENTING ESSAYS 

By Frederick Crews 

Shoemaker & Hoard, 416 pages, $26 

n

In the 1950s, Albert Camus famously wrote, “There is but one truly philosophical problem, and that is suicide. Judging whether life is or is not worth living amounts to answering the fundamental question of philosophy.”  

The answer to this question, he admitted, changes constantly throughout life, depending on what is happening to a person. Such as? Even traumatic suffering —physical (pain of terminal illness), psychological (discrimination and persecution), or economic (hunger and homelessness)—doesn’t necessarily lead to suicide. Nevertheless, fiction tends to stick to these immediate triggers rather than to tackle any broad philosophical speculation.  

Suicide to end physical suffering or to achieve what we now call “death with dignity” seldom occurs in fiction. The only example I can think of is the syphilitic son in Ibsen’s Ghosts, who demands that his mother help him die before he sinks into dementia. The more frequent cause is psychic shock, as when Ophelia’s lover rejects her, then kills her father. 

Classic literature and drama, fantasizing historical figures, emphasized suicide for honor. The great general fell on his sword, cheating his victorious enemy of the opportunity to torture and dismember him, then festoon the town gates with his body parts. Slightly lesser people might also choose a suicide of honor, like the wife in Shakespeare’s poem “The Rape of Lucretia,” whose suicide regains both her and her husband’s honor.  

The suicide of remorse seems more human, though sometimes it is corrupted by petty emotions like plain old jealousy. Shakespeare’s Othello, declaiming “Say that I loved, not wisely, but too well,” sounds like the despairing drunk on the late-night news who shoots his ex-wife, his children, and himself “because I love her.” Contrast that with the pitiable suicide of Lady Macbeth, tortured by her role in turning her husband into a killing machine. 

Arthur Miller’s All My Sons gave us an even broader example of suicidal remorse, in the factory owner who faces up to the fact that his profiteering on making faulty parts caused the death of untold numbers of soldiers, and, indirectly, that of his own son. One suicide in modern fiction takes the remorse of an innocent ordinary person to a level worthy of the great Greek tragedies. 

In William Styron’s Sophie’s Choice, Sophie accompanies her mad lover into suicide as the only way to atone for the sin she committed—against her will—in the Nazi death camp. 

Fictional suicide also recognizes the more common tribulations of ordinary, middle-class people. Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina, Flaubert’s Emma Bovary, and Kate Chopin’s Edna Pontellier (The Awakening) were three well-married women, who, having won the best place open to them, struggled to get out of it. Yet, each stepped off the narrow path of conformity only to find herself on the edge of an abyss she could not bridge. Ditto for Edith Wharton’s Lily Bart (House of Mirth), who defeats her own best efforts even to achieve a rich, unhappy marriage. Their solutions?—a speeding train, arsenic, a late-night swim seaward, an overdose. 

When I first read these four novels, I was impatient with these women. I wanted them to live up to their aspirations, shape up, hang in there, march “to the beat of a different drummer” on “the road less taken.” And so on. In other words—I was young. 

Some 20th century fiction gives us the suicide of honor as understood (and misunderstood) by more humble characters. One of these is the suicide of Little Jude Fawley, the son of Thomas Hardy’s Jude the Obscure. Jude, the father, doesn’t even know of his son’s existence until Jude Jr. lands (from Australia) on Jude and Susan’s doorstep. After Little Jude’s arrival, Susan gives birth to two more children, while the family sinks deeper and deeper into poverty, to the very edge of homelessness. 

When Jude learns that Susan is pregnant yet again, he is astonished at these hapless adults, who don’t seem to know any more than he does about how or why they keep acquiring more mouths to feed. But he loves them, and wants them to survive, so he “solves” their problem by killing the two infants and himself, because, as his suicide note says, “we were too many.” 

When I first read Jude the Obscure I experienced a shock of recognition. All his life, my father (who never read novels) told, over and over again, the story of his arrival with his mother from Italy to join the father he hardly remembered, in a rocky mountain mining town that was worse than what they had left. Less than a year after his arrival, he came home from school one day to find his mother lying in bed with a new-born infant. 

My father burst into tears of outrage and despair: “We don’t even have enough to eat, and you go out and buy a baby!” In all the critical and psychological writings on the “pathology” of “strange” Little Jude, I have never read anything about the trauma suffered‚ throughout history, world-wide—by countless impoverished children, battered by irrational forces of nature and socio/economic abuses that no one can or will explain to them. 

Another obscure immigrant is the middle-aged father of Willa Cather’s My Antonia. In Bohemia, Mr. Shimerda had been a respected artisan, a reader, a musician, an honorable, amiable man who not only married the coarse, mean servant girl he had impregnated (instead of just paying her off, as she and everyone else would have preferred) but allowed her to nag him into going to America where their children (three or four of them by then) might have better chances. In a sod hut on the bleak plains of Nebraska, Mr. Shimerda’s violin sits mute in its case. 

No one has any use for his music or his craftsman skills or his love of poetry, and he has neither the skills nor the capital for farming. He has nothing but his beloved daughter. Antonía combines the physical endurance of her mother with the sensitivity of her father; she might just make it in this raw, unforgiving country—if no useless burden weighs her down. As the second ruthless Nebraska winter closes in on them, he cleans and dresses himself for burial, then quietly goes out to the barn and shoots himself. 

Mr. Shimerda’s death punctures the myth of the hardy pioneer, heroically taming the land, while incidentally driving out or killing indigenous people. His is the bitter reality for many in the masses of poor castoffs who made up the second wave (1840-1920) from Europe, the simultaneous waves from Asia—and far too many in the repeated waves that continue to cross and recross our southern border.  

Unlike the death of Little Jude, Mr. Shimerda’s suicide succeeds as a heroic sacrifice. In later years, as Antonía endures and prospers, she feels “closer to him, all the time” inspired by the spirit of her father—not hindered by the burden of this loving but depressed, displaced parent. But, if Shimerda’s suicide is Antonía’s gain, Cather seems to say, his death is our incalculable loss—how to measure the cost to a country that, until very recently had little use for a poor immigrant who played the violin but couldn’t last three hours behind a horse-driven plow? (My grandfather, I was told, had a fine singing voice and played many instruments, but I never heard them; by the time I was born, all music in him had been suffocated by silicosis.) 

I searched my memory in vain for a “suicide bomber” in fiction, a character who chooses death as part of what s/he believes is a purposeful social, political, or religious act of violence—an “honorable” murder/suicide. Even the martyrs in our religious myths are non-violent. (Samson? By the time he pulled down the Philistine temple, he didn’t have much of a life to throw away.) 

Maybe I was being too literal about protest suicide? An act of violence committed by a character who has about a 2 percent chance of escaping alive is actually a protest suicide. Richard Wright’s Bigger Thomas (Native Son) may not know consciously that his murder of a white woman is a murder/suicide protest against racism, but Wright made sure that we readers know it. 

Russell Banks’ fictionalized John Brown (Cloudsplitter) challenges the standard image of Brown as a madman and forces us to ask ourselves, who is mad, the people who find slave-owning tolerable, or the man driven to become a violent, live-or-die instrument of God’s judgment on this horror? 

Getting back to Camus, his play The Just Assassins gives us a young ill-suited would-be assassin of the Russian Tsar. He and his idealistic allies know that none of them are unlikely to survive this “just” and “necessary” act. And, speaking of pre-revolutionary Russia, the novels of Turgenev (Fathers and Sons, Rudin, On the Eve, Virgin Soil) give us portraits of suicide-bombers-in-the-making, who come close to a profile of present-day suicide bombers. 

According to non-fiction being written about these people, they are young, highly educated, accomplished members of the privileged classes; the women among them often have been gang-raped by foreign occupiers. Some are Arabs born in Europe, who feel segregated, shut out of positions equal to their training. The word “honor” occurs frequently in their suicide notes to family (as it did in notes by Japanese Kamikaze pilots during World War II).  

In other words, they resemble the ancient literary tradition of suicide by members of the leadership class, to retain or regain honor against a foreign enemy—like the defeated general or the violated Lucretia. They are educated and idealistic like Camus’ home-grown Just Assassins and our own American Weathermen of the 1960-70s. However, unlike those privileged white Americans (whose idealism held a component of deluded arrogance), these mostly non-western terrorists feel humiliated, dominated, and despised by an alien people, as Wright’s Bigger Thomas did. 

Somewhere, some fiction writer is probing the souls of these current suicidal warriors, stripping away layers of stereotype to show us a deeper reality than we can get in the horrors of the daily news. Maybe someone like Camus, who, while he completely rejected revolutionary violence (incurring the wrath of Sartre and the intellectual French Left) managed to portray the complete humanity and self-sacrificial “honor” of his “Just Assassins.” 

s

When Europeans came to the Berkeley area in 1772 they encountered the Native Americans known today as the Ohlones. Anthropologists speculate that several waves of immigration preceded them, and linguistic evidence suggests that they arrived here around 500 A.D. 

The 18th-century Spanish explorers and missionaries estimated that approximately 2,500 Ohlones lived along the edge of the bay between north Oakland and Martinez. In the 1960s UC Professor Sherburne Cook placed their number at between 3,000 and 4,500. From time to time archaeologists discover new evidence or reinterpret old evidence, and estimates of the Native American population and their length of residence change.  

However, new information doesn’t seem to alter our basic understanding of the Ohlones. Like many Native American Californians, they were hunter-gatherers. Acorns, berries, fish and game supplied them with food. Reeds supplied the material for their huts and canoes and for the skillfully woven baskets they used for storage. They were not agricultural people, and their needs did not require writing. Their way of life appears to have been unchanged for over a millennium.  

Some people today admire the Ohlones as proto-environmentalists who lived in harmony with nature, not harming the land, or killing off other species, or fighting destructive wars. They are not the first to have been charmed by the Ohlone way of life. It even cast a spell on that ruthless old pirate, Sir Francis Drake. 

John Collier summarized Drake’s description of the coastal tribes of Northern California as follows: “Arcadian people . . . whose natures could hardly be told save through the language of music; peoples joyously hospitable who seemed as free as birds, whose speech and colors were like the warbling and plumage of birds.” 

In 1772, when Fr. Juan Crespi saw the East Bay’s Native Americans for the first time, he wrote, “We found a village of heathen, very fair and bearded, who did not know what to do they were so happy to see us.” 

Fifty years later Spanish soldiers cleared them out of the East Bay, moving them to Mission Dolores in San Francisco. There the law of unintended consequences began to operate and the Ohlones were stricken by epidemics: measles in 1827, small pox in 1833, and cholera in 1834. 

After Mexico secularized the missions, many of the surviving Ohlones drifted south to Monterey, and a few returned to the East Bay. They did not fare well under American rule. Their numbers continued to decline, and eventually the Bureau of Indian Affairs declared the Ohlone tribe to be extinct because it had ceased to function as a genuine tribal organization. 

People of Ohlone descent in Northern California have petitioned for reversal of this decision, negotiated with museums for reburial of ancestral bones and artifacts, and taken sides—for and against—the beatification of Father Serra. 

Signs of Ancient Days 

In the greater Berkeley area there were once a number of Ohlone villages—at the intersection of Hearst and Fourth Street in Berkeley, at Claremont and Telegraph Avenue in Oakland, and at Shellmound Street and Ohlone Way in Emeryville. There may also have been a village on the University campus, near the faculty club, and another at Mortar Rock Park in North Berkeley.  

Actual signs of the ancient Ohlones can still be seen in three places. First, at Indian Rock Park visitors can find (in Trish Hawthorne’s words) “smooth cylindrical holes ... made by generations of Indian women as they ground the acorns which were the basis of their diet.” 

Next, in Emeryville near the multiplex movie theater, a mini-park has been created around the little hillock which is all that remains of an old shellmound. (Shell mounds are important signs of long-term residence. In Richmond there was one which is said to have been 30 feet high, 460 feet long, and 250 feet wide.) Finally, at Oakland’s California Museum there is a permanent display of Ohlone artifacts.  

Songs and Stories, Hopes and Dreams 

Although Native Americans in California tended to live in isolated groups, they did have a recognizably consistent culture, and what they had in common seems more important in defining it than incidental differences from place to place. As Robert Pearsall wrote, “It was chiefly in the works of the imagination that they came together, for magic and literature skipped easily across all their painstaking boundaries.” The same may be said of their music. 

Some early Native American songs were recorded on wax cylinders by anthropologists at the beginning of the twentieth century. In 1997 the Franciscan Order released “Mission Music: A 200-Year Anthology,” a CD that includes two of these cylinders; both recordings have a strange, spectral sound, as though ghosts are singing somewhere down the street, just out of view. Some contemporary choral groups, such as the Choir of Angels, include ancient Native American songs in their repertoires (along with the beautiful baroque masses written by Franciscan composers and performed so famously by mission choirs). Though not specifically Ohlone, these do evoke the sounds of Native American culture. 

When Theodore Kroeber went to Monterey in 1901 to interview Ohlones, Maria Viviana Soto (1823-1916) sang an old tribal song for him. Its words, a spectacular image, are now one of the best known of the surviving Ohlone poems:  

See! I am dancing! 

On the rim of the world I am dancing! 

Kroeber heard several versions of their creation myth. One of the richest (reprinted in Theodora Kroeber’s Almost Ancestors) begins, “In the beginning there was no land, no light, only darkness and the vast waters of Outer Ocean where Earth-Maker and Great-Grandfather were afloat in their canoe.” 

It proceeds, as does Genesis, to the creation of day and night, land and water, and all living things, including people: “Earth-Maker took soft clay and formed the figure of a man and of a woman, then many men and women, which he dried in the sun and into which he breathed life: they were the First People.” 

“The Beginning of the World,” the version of the creation myth given him by Maria Viviana Soto, appears to be incomplete or mis-remembered. It substitutes Coyote, Eagle and Hummingbird for the Earth Maker and Great-Grandfather, and sounds more like the story of Noah than the creation of Adam and Eve. It begins: 

“When this world was finished, the Eagle, the Hummingbird, and Coyote were standing on the top of Pico Blanco [north of Big Sur]. When the water rose to their feet, the Eagle, carrying the Hummingbird and Coyote, flew to the Sierra de Gabilan [near Fremont]. There they stood until the water went down. Then the Eagle sent Coyote down the mountain to see if the world was dry. Coyote came back and said, ‘The whole world is dry.’ The Eagle said to him, ‘Go and look in the river. See what there is there.’ Coyote came back and said, ‘There is a beautiful girl.’ The Eagle said, ‘She will be your wife in order that people may be raised again.’” 

Then the story loses coherence, becoming briefly a naughty tale about Coyote’s ignorance of how to beget children, and ending with a trick played on him by his pregnant wife: 

“So she ran to the ocean. Coyote was close to her. Just as he was going to take hold of her, she threw herself into the water and the waves came up between them as she turned into a shrimp. Coyote, diving after her, struck only the sand. He said, ‘I wanted to clasp my wife but took hold of the sand. My wife is gone.’”  

The Native Americans created stories to explain the geography of the world around them. Charles Marinovich, a knowledgeable local historian and skillful researcher, found one about the bay’s origin in a rare book, Dr. Platon Vallejo’s Memoirs of the Vallejos (1915). Vallejo attributed it to Suisun Indians. 

They believed, he said, that long ago “the Central Valley was an immense deep freshwater sea that was divided from the ocean by a narrow barrier of hills and mountains. The sun stole an Indian princess and “as he rose in the sky, he stumbled and his arm pushed through the barrier and created the Straits of Yulupa, which we call the Golden Gate.” He dropped the girl, and “she rests where she fell, the legendary sleeping princess of Mount Tamalpais.” 

The myths of each tribe of Native Americans assured them that they lived at the center of the universe and that their gods meant well by them in this life and beyond. Many of the Native Americans—and the Ohlones may have shared some form of this—believed that after death their spirits were called to walk along a trail to the island of the dead, somewhere inland, in the middle of a river. A bridge reached from the land of the living to the shore of the island, and once the spirit crossed the bridge, it would be reunited with its dead friends and relatives. 

In Earth Abides, the novel in which George Stewart imagined the collapse of our civilization after a devastating plague, a small band of survivors here in Berkeley are the hope of mankind’s future. At the novel’s end, Stewart left them living the way the Ohlones did before the Spanish came. Maybe, while he was writing it, Stewart heard Coyote laughing in the hills.,

TUESDAY, MARCH 28 

“Circling the Globe—More Than a Dream,” with Bryan and Audrey Gillette at 7 p.m. at REI, 1338 San Pablo Ave. 527-4140. 

National Nutrition Month Cooking Demonstration with Michael Bauce on sautéeing greens, from 3:30 to 5:30 p.m. at the Farmers’ Market, Derby St. at MLK. 548-3333. www.ecologycenter.org 

Berkeley High School Site Council meets at 4:30 p.m. in the Conference Room. 525-0124. 

Teen Babysitting Class at 4 p.m. at Bananas, 5232 Claremont Ave. To register call 658-7853. www.bananasinc.org  

Raging Grannies of the East Bay invites new folks to come join us the 2nd and 4th Tues, of each month, from 2:30 to 4:30 p.m. to sing (any voice will do), help plan our next gig, or write outrageously political lyrics to old familiar tunes, and have fun at Berkeley Gray Panthers office, 1403 Addison St., in Andronico’s mall. 548-9696. 

Berkeley PC Users Group meets at 7 p.m. at 1145 Walnut St. near Eunice. 

Stress Less Seminar at 6:30 p.m. at New Moon Opportunities, 378 Jayne Ave., Oakland Free, but registration required. 465-2524. 

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. In case of questionable weather, call around 8 a.m. 215-7672, 524-9992. 

Free Handbuilding Ceramics Class 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. at St. John’s Senior Center, 2727 College Ave. Also, Mon. noon to 4 p.m. at the South Berkeley Senior Center. Materials and firing charges not included. 525-5497. 

Brainstormer Weekly Pub Quiz every Tuesday from 7:30 to 9:30 p.m. at Pyramid Alehouse Brewery, 901 Gilman St. 528-9880.  

Berkeley Camera Club meets at 7:30 p.m., at the Northbrae Community Church, 941 The Alameda. Share your digital images, slides and prints and learn what other photographers are doing. Monthly field trips. 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. We offer ongoing classes in exercise and creative arts, and always welcome new members over 50. 845-6830. 

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 29  

Great Decisions Foreign Policy Association Lecture “Human Rights in an Age of Terrorism” with Allan Solomonow, Director, American Friends Service Committee, at 10 a.m. at the Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant Ave. Cost is $40 for the eight lecture series. 526-2925. 

Total Solar Eclipse A live webcast from Turkey from 1:15 to 3:15 a.m. at Chabot Space and Science Center, 10000 Skyline Blvd. Tickets are $5-$8. 336-7373.  

Oakland Unified’s Annual Science Fair from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. at Chabot Space and Science Center, 10000 Skyline Blvd. Cost is $9-$13. 336-7300.  

Warriors Basketball Benefit for Habitat for Humanity at 7:30 p.m. at Oakland Arena, 7000 Coliseum Way. Discounted tickets available for $25 or $30, with $5 going to support the Habitat affiliate of your choice. 1-800-980-5434. www.bayareahabitat.org 

Early Childhood Education Workshop at 6:30 p.m. at the California Ballroom, 1736 Franklin St., Oakland. Sponsored by the Alameda County Office of Education. Free, but registration requested. 670-3175. 

“Empowering Yourself, Empowering Your Parents” with Donna Robbins at 7 p.m. at the North Berkeley Senior Center. 848-1960, ext. 246. 

Bayswater Book Club meets to discuss “The New Media Monopoly” by Ben H. Bagdikian, at 6:30 p.m. at Barnes and Noble Coffee Shop, El Cerrito Plaza. 433-2911. 

Walk Berkeley for Seniors meets every Wednesday at 9:30 a.m. at the Sea Breeze Market, just west of the I-80 overpass. Everyone is welcome, wear comfortable shoes and a warm hat. Heavy rain cancels. 548-9840. 

The Berkeley Lawn Bowling Club provides free instruction every Wed. and Sat. at 10:30 a.m. at 2270 Acton St. 841-2174.  

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 the Berkeley BART Station, corner of Shattuck and Center. Sing for Peace at 6:30 p.m. followed by Peace Walk at 7 p.m. www.geocities.com/ 

vigil4peace/vigil 

THURSDAY, MARCH 30 

Artists With Heart Fundraiser for the homeless children at the Children’s Learning Center at Ursula Sherman Village. Reception with KQED’s Josh Kornbluth, live music and food donations from the East Bay’s top restaurants and art sale at 7 p.m. at First Congregational Church, 2345 Channing Way. Tickets are $100. 235-6502. 

“Harvest of Shame” Edward R. Murrow’s 1960 documentary on farmerworkers, will be shown in honor of Cesar Chavez Day at 7 p.m. at the Ecology Center, 2530 San Pablo Ave. Bring seat cushions and snacks. 548-2220. 

The Berkeley Retired Teachers Association, (CRTA Div. 49), holds its annual general meeting at 1 p.m. at the Northbrae Community Church, 841 The Alameda. The featured speaker will be Peggy Plett, Deputy CEO of the California State Teachers Retirement System, Benefits and Services. 

“9/11 The Myth and The Reality” A talk by David Ray Griffin at 7 p.m. at Grand Lake Theater, 3200 Grand Ave., Oakland. Tickets are $10. 496-2700. www.pdeastbay.org/ 

f911MythReality 

Living with Threes and Fours at 7 p.m. at Bananas, 5232 Claremont Ave. To register call 658-7853. www.bananasinc.org  

Oakland Unified’s Annual Science Fair from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. at Chabot Space and Science Center, 10000 Skyline Blvd. Cost is $9-$13. 336-7300.  

Berkeley Public Library’s Teen Readers meets to discuss Douglas Adam’s “The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy” at 4 p.m. at the Claremont Branch Library, 2940 Benvenue Ave. at Ashby. 

“Understanding Senior Care Options” Learn about residential care facilities and how to find the right one, residents rights when living in a residential care home, and other services, from noon to 2 p.m. at East Oakland Senior Center, 9255 Edes Ave. at 98th St., Oakland. 638-6878, ext. 103. 

Ask a Union Mechanic every Thursday, 4:30 tp 6 p.m. at Parker and Shattuck, until the strike is settled. They will offer advice on all makes of car. 

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 

FRIDAY, MARCH 31 

City Commons Club Noon Luncheon with Sally Baker, producer of “Wee Poets” Luncheon at 11:45 a.m. for $13.50, speech at 12:30 p.m., at the Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant St. 526-2925.  

“Preparing Our Communities for the End of Cheap Oil” A presentation by the Post Carbon Institute at 7:30 p.m. at Laney College Forum, 900 Fallon St., Oakland. Cost is $10. Day-long conference on Sat. at Humanist Hall, 390 27th St. http://bayarea.relocalize.net, www.postcarbo.org 

Arts and Crafts Cooperative of Berkeley Gallery Spring Seconds Sale from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. at 1652 Shattuck Ave. 843-2527. 

Historical & Current Times Book Group meets on Thursdays from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Albany Library, 1249 Marin Ave. 548-4517. 

Berkeley Chess School classes for students in grades 1-8 from 5 to 7 p.m. at 1581 LeRoy Ave., room 17. 843-0150. 

Berkeley Chess Club meets Fridays at 8 p.m. at the East Bay Chess Club, 1940 Virginia St. Players at all levels are welcome. 845-1041. 

Women in Black Vigil, from noon to 1 p.m. at UC Berkeley, Bancroft at Telegraph. wibberkeley@yahoo.com 548-6310, 845-1143. 

Meditation, Peace Vigil and Dialogue, gather at noon on the grass close to the West Entrance to UC Berkeley, on Oxford St. near University Ave. People of all traditions are welcome to join us. Sponsored by the Buddhist Peace Fellowship. 655-6169. www.bpf.org 

SATURDAY, APRIL 1 

Free Compost at the Farmers’ Market from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. at Center St. at Martin Luther King, Jr. Way. Bring your own container, two buckets are suggested or large garbage bags. Backyard amateur gardeners only. Sponsored by the Ecology Center. 548-3333. 

Container Gardening and Design with Gail Yelland at 10 a.m. at Magic Gardens Landscape Nursery, 729 Heinz Ave. 644-2351. 

Mt. Wanda Wildflower Walk in the hills where John Muir took his daughters. Meet at 9 a.m. in the Park and Ride lot at the corner of Alhambra Ave. and Franklin Canyon Rd., Martinez. Wear walking shoes and bring water. 925-228-8860. 

Sick Plant Clinic UC plant pathologist Dr. Robert Raabe, UC entomologist Dr. Nick Mills, and their team of experts will diagnose what ails your plants from 9 a.m. to noon at the UC Botanical Garden, 200 Centennial Dr. 643-2755.  

“And Still I Rise ...” A soul gathering and benefit for the people of New Orleans with music, poetry, dancing and film at 6 p.m. at Berkeley Unitarian Universalist Fellowship, 1924 Cedar St. at Bonita. Donations $15 and up. 415-864-2321. 

Progressive Democrats of the East Bay meets to discuss clean money and electoral reform at 12:30 p.m. at Temescal Library, 5205 Telegraph. 636-4149. www.pdeastbay.org 

Arts and Crafts Cooperative Gallery Spring Seconds Sale from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Sat. and Sun. at 1652 Shattuck Ave. 843-2527. 

East Bay Atheists Berkeley meets at 2 p.m. at Berkeley Public Library, 2090 Kittredge, 3rd floor meeting room. We will watch a video of Sam Harris speaking on his book, “The End of Faith.” 222-7580. 

Kids Day at Studio Rasa from 10:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. with movement, yoga and dance classes, at 933 Parker St. Cost is $10. 843-2787. www.studiorasa.org 

Free Craniosacral Self Care Techniques with Dr. Raleigh Duncan from 11:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. at Elephant Pharmacy, 1607 Shattuck Ave.  

Protest Rally at Berkeley Honda Shattuck and Parker every Thurs. at 4:30 to 6 p.m. and Sat. from 1 to 2 p.m. until the labor dispute is settled.  

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

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. 

Car Wash Benefit for Options Recovery Services of Berkeley, held every Sat. from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Lutheran Church, 1744 University Ave. 666-9552. 

SUNDAY, APRIL 2 

El Cerrito Historical Society with guest speaker Richard Schwartz on his new book “Earthquake Exodus, 1906” at 2 p.m. at the El Cerrito Senior Center, 6510 Stockton Ave., just behind the El Cerrito Library. www.elcerritowire.com/history 

97th Anniversary of Philip Temple CME Church, with a talk by Rev. Charles Haynes at 3 p.m. at 3233 Adeline St. 655-6527. 

Hands-On Bicycle Clinic on bicycle safety inspections from 10 to 11 a.m. at REI, 1338 San Pablo Ave. Free. 527-4140. 

Lake Merritt Neighbors Organized for Peace Peace walk around the lake every Sun. Meet at 3 p.m. at the colonnade at the NE end of the lake. 763-8712. lmno4p.org 

“Are You Good Enough to be Published?” a workshop with Alan Rinzler at 3 p.m. at Cody’s Books on Telegraph Ave. 845-7852. www.codysbooks.com  

Tibetan Buddhism with Bob Byrne on “Deepening Meditation” at 6 p.m. at the Tibetan Nyingma Institute, 1815 Highland Pl. 843-6812. www.nyingmainstitute.com  

Ancient Tools for Successful Living at 10:30 a.m., and the following three Sun. in April at 5272 Foothill Blvd. at Fairfax, Oakland. Cost is $8-$20. 533-5306. 

MONDAY, APRIL 3 

United Nations Association Film Festival “Statement of Hope and Courage” at Pacific Film Archive, UC Campus. Tickets are $8-$10. 849-1752. unaeastbay@sbcglobal.net 

Green Business Discussion with green business leaders at 7 p.m. at the Albany Community Center, 1249 Marin Ave. Free. 848-9358. www.fivecreeks.org 

“Connect” To help connect transitional age youth to services and other experiential activities from 2 to 8 p.m. at the Lutheran Church of the Cross, 1744 University Ave., at McGee.  

“Healing from Sexual Abuse” with author Carolyn Lehman at 7:30 p.m. at Black Oak Book. 486-0698. www.blackoakbooks.com 

“How to Expand Your Mind- Body Connection” at 5:30 pm. in the Rose Room at Mercy Retirement Center, 3431 Foothill Blvd., Oakland. Cost is $30 or $120 for the entire series. 534-8547, ext. 666. 

Introduction to Meditation at 6:45 p.m. at the Bay Zen Center, 315 Alcatraz near College Ave. Cost is $10. 596-3087. www.bayzen.org 

Sing-A-Long from 10 to 11 a.m. at the Albany Senior Center, 846 Masonic Ave. 524-9122.  

Beginning Bridge Lessons at 11:10 a.m. at the Albany Senior Center, 846 Masonic Ave. Cost is $1. 524-9122. 

McGee Avenue Toastmasters meets on the first and third Mondays of the month at 7:30 p.m. at McGee Ave Baptist Church, 1640 Stuart St. 501-7005. 

Berkeley CopWatch organizational meeting at 8 p.m. at 2022 Blake St. Join us to work on current issues around police misconduct. Volunteers needed. For information call 548-0425. 

ONGOING 

Free Tax Help—United Way’s Earn it! Keep It! Save It! program provides free filing assistance to households that earned less than $38,000 in 2005. To find a free tax site near you, call 800-358-8832 or visit www.EarnitKeepitSaveit.org 

Bringing Back the Natives Garden Tour is seeking volunteers who will spend a morning or afternoon greeting tour participants and answering questions at the free native plant garden tour, featuring sixty-four gardens located throughout Alameda and Contra Costa counties on Sunday, May 7, 2006. Volunteers can select the garden they would like to spend time at by visiting the “Preview the 2006 Gardens” section at www.BringingBackTheNatives.net 

Public Art Opportunities Request for Entries The City of Berkeley is looking for artists for the 2006 Civic Center Art Competition and Exhibition. Entries are due April 18. For details contact the Civic Arts Program, 981-7533. 

Artwork for the Corporation Yard Gates Request for Proposals Applications are due April 3. For details call the Civic Arts Program at 981-7533. 

Proposal for a Mural in Tribute to Maudelle Shirek in Old City Hall. Artists are requested to submit proposals by March 31. For details contact the Civic Arts Program, 981-7533. 

Albany Library Free Drop-in Homework Help for students in third through fifth grades, Mon. - Thurs. from 3 to 5:30 p.m. Emphasis is placed on math and writing skills. No registration is required. 526-3720, ext. 17. 

Find a Loving Animal Companion at the Berkeley-East Bay Humane Society Adoption Center (open from 11 a.m. - 7 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday). 2700 Ninth St. 845-7735. www.berkeleyhumane.org  

Medical Care for Your Pet at the Berkeley East Bay Humane Society low-cost veterinary clinic. 2700 Ninth St. For appointments call 845-3633. www.berkeleyhumane.org 

CITY MEETINGS 

Creeks Task Force meets Mon. April 3, at 7 p.m. the North Berkeley Senior Center. Erin Dando, 981-7410. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/planning/landuse/Creeks/default.html 

Peace and Justice Commission meets Mon., April 3, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Manuel Hector, 981-5510. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/peaceandjustice 

Commission on the Status of Women meets Wed., April 5, at 7:30 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Tasha Tervelon, 981-5190. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/women 

Planning Commission meets Wed., April 5, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Janet Homrighausen, 981-7484. www.ci.berkeley. ca.us/commissions/planning 

Housing Advisory Commission meets Thurs., April 6, at 7:30 p.m., at the South Berkeley Senior Center. Oscar Sung, 981-5400. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/housing 

Landmarks Preservation Commission meets Thurs. April 6, at 7:30 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Gisele Sorensen, 981-7419. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/landmarks 

Public Works Commission meets Thurs., April 6, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Jeff Egeberg, 981-6406. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/publicworks 

Zoning Adjustments Board meets Thurs., April 6, at 7 p.m., in City Council Chambers. Mark Rhoades, 981-7410. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/commissions/zoning   

A couple of weeks ago I got an e-mail message from Susan Schwartz, president of Friends of Five Creeks, about a recent sighting: two pairs of steelhead that had followed Codornices Creek in from the Bay, as far upstream as Masonic Avenue, where they appeared to be attempting to spawn. 

They were good-sized fish, 24 inches long, with the classic silvery coloration of this ocean-going variety of rainbow trout. The females were trying to dig redds—depressions in the streambed—for their eggs. Unfortunately, concrete rubble, which is all the steelhead had to work with, is not the best substrate for spawning. But you have to give them credit for making the effort. 

Emma Gutzler, Restoration Coordinator for the Urban Creeks Council, was there with her videocamera, and you can see a short clip of the event on UCC’s web site (www.urbancreeks.org/steelheadCodornicesMar06.mpg), or on Friends of Five Creeks’ site (www.fivecreeks.org). 

Gutzler says this was the first documented sighting of spawning steelhead this far up Codornices. “Everybody knew we had resident rainbow trout there,” she says. 

But the largest trout recorded in a fish survey last fall were only nine inches long; the two-footers were definitely not there before the winter rains. They hung around for at least three days, after which a new bout of rain increased the turbidity of the creek and discouraged fishwatchers.  

What’s the difference between a steelhead and a regular rainbow? 

They belong to the same species, Oncorhynchus mykiss, but the taxonomy below the species level is fiendishly complicated. The basic distinction, though, is that steelhead, like their salmon relatives, spawn in freshwater and mature at sea. Fish that divide their time between fresh and salt water are called diadromous. Steelhead and 13 other California species, including sturgeon, striped bass, and some lampreys, are anadromous. 

Catadromous fish, like the eels of eastern North America and Europe, mature in streams and rivers and breed at sea—in the Sargasso Sea, in the case of the eels. California, as luck would have it, has none of these interesting and tasty fish. 

But we do have a half-dozen discrete populations of steelhead that are classified as evolutionarily significant units (ESUs, in conservation parlance). They’re all in the subspecies O. m. irideus, but each group is genetically distinctive enough to be treated separately for management purposes, although there’s apparently some gene flow among them. 

From north to south, steelhead ESUs have been described for the Klamath Mountains, the North Coast, the Central Valley, the Central Coast, the South/Central Coast, and the South Coast. Some of these populations are further divided into winter and summer runs, based on the timing of spawning. The steelhead in Codornices likely belonged to the Central Coast stock, all winter-spawners with an historic range from the Russian River to Aptos Creek in Santa Cruz County.  

Unlike Pacific salmon, steelhead may spawn more than once in their lives—up to four times if their luck holds. The mature males that accompany the females upstream meet competition from smaller precocial males called jacks that have spend only a few months at sea, and even smaller parr males that have never left their natal stream. 

The little guys, collectively known as sneakers, will try to fertilize the female’s eggs while the mature male guarding her is distracted. Schwartz and Gutzman said the steelhead in Codornices attracted smaller trout; they may have been sneakers, or they may have been looking for a snack. One fish’s progeny can be another’s protein. 

The whole steelhead-rainbow business is fraught with irony. Thanks to introductions, non-migratory rainbows are now found in previously troutless streams and lakes all over California, and on every continent except Antarctica. You can fish for rainbows in Hawaii, in Tasmania, on the Indian Ocean island of Reunion. But habitat loss—from urbanization, dams, diversions, flood control projects, agriculture—has brought the anadromous steelhead to the brink of extinction. 

The Central Coast population declined by 85 percent between 1960 and 1997, when it was finally listed as threatened by the National Marine Fisheries Service, and UC Davis biologist Peter Moyle says there must have been significant losses even before 1960 due to all the “insults to watersheds” over the previous 150 years. 

Creek activists have done heroic work in Codornices Creek and elsewhere to help the steelhead recover. As Schwartz says: “Nature will come back if we just open the door.”  

Volunteers have been restoring habitat along the creek for 15 years, and CALFED and the State Water Resources Control Board have funded a Codornices Creek Watershed Restoration Action Plan with steelhead in mind.  

It was something of a shock, then, when NMFS deleted Codornices and most of the Bay’s other tributaries from the critical habitat designated for the Central Coast steelhead last September. Only Alameda Creek made the final cut. 

UCC Executive Director Steve Donnelly responded to the proposed changes in March: “The conservation biology logic of wiping dozens of watersheds, including those which we have labored to revitalize over the past 20 years, from the scheme for recovering Central California Coast steelhead escapes us completely. When did ‘putting all your eggs in one basket’ make conservation biology sense?” 

The agency was unswayed. Its final rule described Codornices as having “low habitat quantity and quality, low restoration potential, no unique attributes, and small [steelhead] population size.” 

That also went for other East Bay streams, from Pinole to Suisun Bay, and for Sonoma and Marin watersheds. 

Critical habitat may be a moot issue if Richard Pombo’s hatchet job on the Endangered Species Act makes it through the Senate, of course. But it’s played a vital part in constraining destructive development on federal land, or where federal funding or permitting is involved.  

In any case, those steelhead didn’t know or care that the feds had written off their creek. It still smelled right to them. The door had been opened, and they came on in.  

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