News

Cheerful Crowd Celebrates Stadium Grove Tree-Sitters

By Richard Brenneman
Tuesday December 19, 2006

Though the thermometer hovered in the upper 40s and seemed even cooler beneath a mantle of oak leaves and an overcast sky, the crowd that gathered near Memorial Stadium Saturday was anything but cold. -more-


Zoning Board Approves Trader Joe’s Building, Project Foes Planning Lawsuit

By Richard Brenneman
Tuesday December 19, 2006

Rejecting the pleas of angry neighbors and threats of a lawsuit, the Zoning Adjustments Board (ZAB) voted 5-3 early Friday to approve the “Trader Joe’s Building.” -more-


Drayage Demolition Moves Forward; ZAB OKs Bus Yard, Condos

By Richard Brenneman
Tuesday December 19, 2006

A marathon Zoning Adjustments Board (ZAB) session Thursday ended with approvals for two major housing projects, new bus yard, a new home for Freight & Salvage and demolition of the Drayage. -more-


Oakland School Takeover Investigation Gets Key Support

By J. Douglas Allen-Taylor
Tuesday December 19, 2006

Oakland’s newly elected state assemblymember, Sandré Swanson, has proposed setting up a Select Assembly Committee to investigate state takeovers of California schools, and the idea has already gotten support from key legislators from the affected districts. -more-


Army Subpoenas Oakland Journalist in Watada Court Marshal

By Judith Scherr
Tuesday December 19, 2006

Freelance journalist Sarah Olson does not want to testify at First Lt. Ehren Watada’s court marshal in February. At around 8:45 a.m. on Thursday, she received a subpoena from the U.S. Army telling her to do so. -more-


Woodfin Workers Protest Pre-Christmas Suspension

By Judith Scherr
Tuesday December 19, 2006

Woodfin Suites housekeeper Alma Cruz has spoken out at City Council meetings, walked picket lines and talked to co-workers about the need for Emeryville’s Living Wage Law for hotel workers to be enforced. Voters approved the law—Measure C—in November 2005. -more-


Problems With Measure A, Says Former Peralta Counsel

By J. Douglas Allen-Taylor
Tuesday December 19, 2006

The former bond counsel to the Peralta Community College District says that the list of projects in the Peralta’s troubled Measure A bond ballot statement last June may not be specific enough to have qualified the measure under the Proposition 39 requirements under which it was passed. -more-


Curt Flood: 10 Years Later and No Closer To the Hall of Fame

By Bill Fletcher, Jr., New America Media
Tuesday December 19, 2006

2007 marks 10 years since the passing of baseball legend Curt Flood. Many of today’s sports enthusiasts, including those who follow baseball, have little sense of the man and his contributions to the sport of baseball. -more-


Law Students Help Score Win for Immigrants in Supreme Court

By Rene P. Ciria-Cruz, New America Media
Tuesday December 19, 2006

Immigrants whose lives are upended by unfair rules and arbitrary law enforcers should thank the day electrical engineer Jayashri Srikantiah decided to leave Intel to become a lawyer. -more-


Tree Protesters Cited, Banned From Campus

By Richard Brenneman
Friday December 15, 2006

UC Berkeley Campus Police have cited two of the tree-sitters protesting plans to cut down a grove of Oaks for the new Memorial Stadium, including former mayoral candidate Zachary Running Wolf, and served court orders barring them from campus. -more-


Council Adopts New Landmarks Ordinance

By Judith Scherr
Friday December 15, 2006

A number of citizens urged the Berkeley City Council Tuesday not to approve the second reading of the Landmarks Preservation Ordinance, which will make landmarking older structures and sites more difficult. -more-


Preservationists Will Challenge New LPO at Polls

By Richard Brenneman
Friday December 15, 2006

Even before the second and final City Council vote Tuesday establishing a more developer-friendly Berkeley landmark law, opponents were preparing their counterattack. -more-


Kennedy Threatens Lawsuit, Wins Gaia Culture War

By Judith Scherr
Friday December 15, 2006

The city may have dodged one bullet by going along with developer Patrick Kennedy’s notion of how much time to devote to culture at the Gaia Building—Kennedy threatened to sue the city over the question—but by doing so, the city may be running head-on into a lawsuit Kennedy tenant Anna de Leon has promised to file. -more-


Without UNICEF Cards, U.N. Store Shuts its Doors

By Judith Scherr
Friday December 15, 2006

With the Hallmark Card takeover of UNICEF cards, Berkeley’s United Nations Association Center that has carried the popular cards for almost half a century, is shutting its doors tomorrow (Saturday)—hopefully a temporary closure to change the center’s focus, says UNA volunteer Mary Lee Trampleasure. -more-


Judge Allows Oak-to-Ninth Referendum Lawsuit to Proceed

By J. Douglas Allen-Taylor
Friday December 15, 2006

In what can only be considered good news for opponents of the proposed massive Oak to Ninth development in Oakland, a Superior Court judge has tentatively ruled that a lawsuit filed by the Oak to Ninth Referendum Committee can go forward, at least for now. -more-


Peralta Faces Funding Cuts, Federal Investigation

By J. Douglas Allen-Taylor
Friday December 15, 2006

The newly constituted board of directors of the Peralta Community College District acted swiftly to tighten up spending procedures at the four-college district, sending back to district administrators $17 million of a $5 million Measure A bond project authorization request after complaining about details missing from the request papers. -more-


A Telegraph Avenue Holiday Shopping Guide

By Steven Finacom, Special to the Planet
Friday December 15, 2006

Holiday shopping unfinished? Unwilling to make one more trip to a multitude of malls or to … Emeryville? -more-


Police Blotter

By Richard Brenneman
Friday December 15, 2006

Threatened, robbed -more-