Hundreds of demonstrators flocked to Sproul Plaza at UC Berkeley Monday to protest proposed federal immigration reform and to shore up support for immigrant rights. -more-
With South Berkeley residents complaining of threats against their lives following an appeal hearing in their Small Claims Court “drug house” lawsuit last week, questions are again being raised as to whether such lawsuits should be handled by city officials rather than by neighbors. -more-
After two years of labor strife between employees and Library Director Jackie Griffin—and growing discontent with the director from a citizen’s group—Berkeley’s Board of Library Trustees met Saturday behind closed doors to discuss possible litigation threatened by the library director’s attorney, were she to be terminated. -more-
Proposed development on San Pablo Avenue described by one resident as resembling “someone who squeezed into a pair of pants two sizes too small and is bursting at the seams” was narrowly granted a use permit by the Zoning Adjustments Board Thursday. -more-
Cheryl Chinn received a special delivery Friday: a Tupperware filled to the brim with an oily, murky liquid, and an accompanying note handwritten in marker. -more-
The battle between a developer and neighborhood preservationists in the city’s Sisterna Tract Historic District continues, in part because city staff failed to date a key document. -more-
City landmarks commissioners took up matters concerning construction at UC Berkeley twice Thursday night—once as a pitch about a massive new project at and around Memorial Staduim and again to set a hearing on landmarking the Bevatron. -more-
A crowd gathered Thursday on Bancroft Way outside UC Berkeley’s Boalt Hall School of Law to denounce the United States’ role in torture, the centralization of federal power in the executive branch and Boalt Hall Professor John Yoo, the man protesters condemn as the author of these policies. -more-
Responding to Mayor Tom Bates’s proposal to weaken the city’s landmarks ordinance, Berkeley preservationists say they’ll be taking the issue to the voters. -more-
EDITOR’S NOTE: This is the first in a series of interviews with local elected officials. -more-
Eye check-ups topped the list of “to-do things” for homeless kids attending Berkeley’s “Youth Connect” event at the Youth Emergency Assistance Hostel (YEAH!) on April 3. -more-
Day-glo netting mounted atop galvanized steel pipes along the property line separating a popular Ashby Avenue discount gas station from an unfinished apartment building proves yet again that good fences don’t make good neighbors. -more-
After almost 20 years in education, Hosanna Kitzenberger leaves her job as a reading resource specialist—a position she says has brought her great joy—with a tinge of bitterness. -more-
Ward Street: it’s 6 in the evening, and the roads are sepia tinted, the pavement is wearing a jaded look. It looks like your everyday neighborhood—until you come across house number 2122. -more-
A website dedicated to exposing the supposed mistreatment of Foster Farms’ chickens is under attack for allegedly infringing on intellectual property and defaming the company’s name. -more-
As the words “Beauty is truth, truth beauty—that is all Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know” from Keats’ “Ode on a Grecian Urn” echoded through the UC Berkeley Wada Tower multipurpose room on Wednesday evening, you could see five excited pair of eyes in the last couple of rows. -more-
It’s not secret that California’s public school libraries have plenty of room for improvement. -more-
In Berkeley, when it rains, it floods. -more-
Hungry for a place to shop for food but fearful that the proposed West Berkeley Bowl complex will worsen the area’s already snarled traffic, several dozen nearby people came to the Planning Commission’s Wednesday evening public hearing on the project, held at the North Berkeley Senior Center. -more-
Updating the Creeks Ordinance, the project a task force has been struggling with for about 18 months, is aimed at maintaining the city’s natural waterways and surrounding habitat. -more-
The landscape for California school bonds has changed radically since the Peralta Community College District last asked local voters for money. -more-
The Albany City Council Monday approved creation of a burrowing owl habitat at the base of the Albany Bulb and extended a ban on cannabis clubs for another year. -more-
According to a notice received at our deadline (4:54 p.m. on April 6), and too late to appear in our Berkeley This Week Calendar, a special meeting of the Library Board of Trustees will be held on Saturday, April 8 at 10:15 a.m. at the South Branch Library, 1901 Russell St. The meeting will include a public comment period from 10:15 to 10:35 a.m., followed by a closed session conference with counsel on Anticipated Litigation. For information call 981-6195 (Voice) or 548-1240 (TDD). ` -more-
As he embarks on a fifth career—teaching—while avidly pursuing his fourth—writing—one-time presidential contender Gary Hart came to Berkeley Wednesday to discuss his latest book and talk about the subjects of his first and third careers, religion and po litics. -more-
It’s been an established tradition on these opinion pages that we print almost everything we get that’s borderline literate. We accommodate even those correspondents who are spelling or grammar challenged, bringing their output up to normal print standards for the pleasure of our readers. We do have a few correspondents who, though literate enough, are so obsessed with one topic that they run the risk of boring the audience to death. -more-
In the olden days, back around 1960, I first heard Dylan Thomas’s recording of “A Child’s Christmas in Wales” on one of the Pacifica stations, in the period when they were not afraid to celebrate sectarian holidays like Christmas. -more-
What a sad day. I returned my library book at my local branch, picked up the book I had reserved, and checked it out—all without speaking to a soul, much less a wise librarian. -more-
Steven Donaldson’s commentary piece in this paper (“West Berkeley Bowl: Community Needs vs. Power of the Wealthy”) has unfortunately lowered the discourse on an important community issue through unnecessary personal attack, name calling, and by portraying misinformation and innuendo as truth. We feel it is necessary to offer objective information so that Berkeley citizens are able to make an informed decision. Mr. Donaldson asserts that those expressing their opinions and concerns about the Bowl (which he terms opposition) are “a small cadre of political ideologues” who are “ignoring the needs of the neighborhood, do not care about the working families of the neighborhood,” and are “funded by someone living in the Berkeley hills.” -more-
Although I can appreciate James K. Sayre’s concern over avian mortality resulting from wind turbines, I feel compelled to clarify several assertions made in his recent commentary, “Wind Turbines Will Kill Birds and Bats” (Daily Planet April 4). -more-
EDITOR’S NOTE: The Daily Planet is inviting all candidates for office in Berkeley to contribute regularly to our Commentary pages between now and the election. This is the only submission we have received so far; Mayor Bates’ aide Cisco DeVries says the m ayor will eventually submit a piece on this topic, but can’t do so until later in the month because he’s on vacation. Other candidates are encouraged to submit pieces when they can. -more-
At a March 21, 2006 press conference, when President Bush was pressed as to whether there would be a complete withdrawal of troops during his presidency, he repeated his common mantra, “I can only tell you that I will make decisions on force levels based on what commanders on the ground say.” He went on to admit that it would be up to a future president to decide when and if the troops should be brought home. He is clearly preparing the country for a war with no end. -more-
The other day I heard a Hamas spokesman on BBC insist that their charter does not call for the destruction of Israel. Incredulous, I searched the text of this odious document and found that the phrase, “destruction of Israel,” indeed is not there. Instead, the term that is used is “obliterate,” as in this passage, “Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it.” The method of obliteration is clearly stated as “jihad.” Indeed, nothing in Mein Kampf is any worse than the words of Hamas’ charter, which, among other things, insists that the Jews control the world media, and in fact, the whole world, through their alleged organ of power, the U.N. (how’s that for a fantasy). The Hamas Charter even cites as definitive proof of Jewish nefariousness none other than the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, the long discredited czarist forgery purporting to be the minutes of a Jewish plot for world domination. You can read the whole chilling document for yourself at www.mideastweb.org/hamas.htm. -more-
April is National Poetry Month and I unintentionally celebrated it last week with a visit to Manhattan. -more-
The more scientists learn about non-human cognition, the blurrier the boundary between the human mind and various animal minds seems to become. And I’m not just talking about tool-making, intention-guessing, empathetic chimps. Some remarkable findings have emerged from the study of birds—and not necessarily the kinds of birds you’d expect. -more-
Unless Democrats win control of either the House or the Senate, nothing is going to change in Washington. There will be no meaningful shift in Iraq, ethics, or economic policy until there is real debate on Capitol Hill. The good news is that the Dems have a reasonable shot at winning a majority of House seats. -more-
For our 150th UnderCurrents column, let’s return to an old subject: the failure of the city of Oakland to address the problem of violence in an adult manner (I originally wrote “inability” instead of “failure” but crossed that out; inability means you can’t do something, while failure means you could, but don’t, for whatever reason; I also put “city” with a lower case “c” in order to make the point that we’re not just talking about the people at Ogawa Plaza as a source of this failure—it’s a citywide problem, not a city government problem). -more-
Nature as science or nature as art? There’s no need to choose. Left and right sides of the brain combine their efforts heralding California’s native landscapes and wildlife at the Oakland Museum. The Natural Sciences shine in the comprehensive Permanent Gallery, unique art exhibits and the museum’s multi-tiered outdoor gardens. -more-
Seth Paris Babson (1826–1907) was one of the most eminent Victorian architects on the Pacific coast. A native of Maine, he set sail for San Francisco a year after the discovery of gold in California. Having rounded Cape Horn, Babson arrived in the spring of 1850. -more-
Buying houses is an expensive proposition as anyone who has ever done it can tell you and it doesn’t stop when you pay the closing costs and put your boat in the backyard (you really have a boat?) -more-
Flowerland Nursery is the corner store of local plant shops. Evidently it’s been there for generations: the friendly worker there told me that that the current owner, Bob Wilson, has had it for some 30 years and the previous owners had run it “for, oh, 30 to 40 years” before him. -more-
The following is an excerpt from Richard Schartz’s Earthquake Exodus, 1906: Berkeley Responds to the San Francisco Refugees. This is the third in a series of four installments from the book. The Daily Planet will run the last excerpt on April 18, the centennial of the 1906 quake. -more-
“He was her man/But he done her wrong.” That’s about all for motivation in the lyrics of that old chestnut of popular song, “Frankie and Johnny.” -more-
The more scientists learn about non-human cognition, the blurrier the boundary between the human mind and various animal minds seems to become. And I’m not just talking about tool-making, intention-guessing, empathetic chimps. Some remarkable findings have emerged from the study of birds—and not necessarily the kinds of birds you’d expect. -more-
All too often, films about the mentally ill descend into preciousness, romanticizing the drama and pain of madness. But The Devil and Daniel Johnston, a fascinating documentary opening today (Friday) at Shattuck Cinemas, does not fall into this trap. -more-
“This week, she’s a nun—the one who gets captured by the Japanese!” -more-
Mondays At Moe’s features an unusual pairing of poets this coming Monday at 7 p.m. when Michael Palmer and Douglas Blazek split the bill at the popular reading series on Telegraph Avenue, programmed by Owen Hill. -more-
Nature as science or nature as art? There’s no need to choose. Left and right sides of the brain combine their efforts heralding California’s native landscapes and wildlife at the Oakland Museum. The Natural Sciences shine in the comprehensive Permanent Gallery, unique art exhibits and the museum’s multi-tiered outdoor gardens. -more-
Seth Paris Babson (1826–1907) was one of the most eminent Victorian architects on the Pacific coast. A native of Maine, he set sail for San Francisco a year after the discovery of gold in California. Having rounded Cape Horn, Babson arrived in the spring of 1850. -more-
Buying houses is an expensive proposition as anyone who has ever done it can tell you and it doesn’t stop when you pay the closing costs and put your boat in the backyard (you really have a boat?) -more-
Flowerland Nursery is the corner store of local plant shops. Evidently it’s been there for generations: the friendly worker there told me that that the current owner, Bob Wilson, has had it for some 30 years and the previous owners had run it “for, oh, 30 to 40 years” before him. -more-
