Backers of a failed initiative to save Berkeley’s Landmarks Preservation Ordinance (LPO) will learn next week if they can block a rival ordinance—at least until voters have their say. -more-

Four die-hard protesters, shaken but not stirred, ended 2006 encamped among the branches of a grove of grand old trees threatened by the city’s biggest developer. -more-

Berkeley developers clocked up big wins in 2006, defeating a ballot measure designed to save Berkeley’s Landmark Preser-vation Ordinance and winning approval of projects destined to change the city’s face. -more-

Enhanced fire and police protection, housing development, safeguards for creeks and an advisory measure to impeach President George Walker Bush are among the accomplishments City Councilmembers cite for 2006. -more-

While several local long-term labor disputes ended happily for workers in 2006—Berkeley Honda, Alta Bates/Summit and Claremont Resort & Spa employees signed contracts after protracted struggles—workers at the Shattuck Cinema, Doubletree Hotel, UC Berkeley and the Woodfin Suite Hotel will continue to fight for better pay, benefits and working conditions in 2007. -more-

New Yorkers, bless their hearts, love to believe that what happens in their city is unique—that they’re somehow exempt from the inexorable laws that govern the universe. The truth is that often bad things happen elsewhere first, but eventually even New York is vulnerable. The elegant writer Adam Gopnik has a piece in this week’s New Yorker magazine’s Talk of the Town section which highlights the grim homogenization which other parts of the country have already undergone, but is just now taking over in Gotham City. He spent several past years in Paris, so he’s now looking at New York with a fresh eye, and he doesn’t like much of what he sees. -more-