Soaring construction costs and tight money have forced the developers of the two David Brower Center projects to alter their plans, while forcing the city to up its direct subsidy of the project to $6.2 million. 

But the changes won’t delay construction, now scheduled to begin in March or April and leaving the city without a popular parking lot probably until work is completed 22 months later, said the project’s builder, John Clawson of Equity Community Builders 

The two most visible project changes will involve replacement of costly metals by less expensive materials. 

While the design of the six-story affordable housing building dubbed Oxford Plaza remains the same, the originally planned metal siding will be replaced with stucco. 

City Housing Director Steve Barton said that while the stucco will be an adequate material for the housing, “metal would’ve been more striking, and the center of the downtown is a good place for striking architecture.” 

And metal awnings for the ground floor retail spaces of Oxford Plaza and the companion David Brower Center office and retail center will also change, with canvas replacing metal, said Clawson. 

“I didn’t feel the changes were significant in view of the incredible cost pressures,” said Bob Allen, the architect who chairs the city’s Design Review Committee. 

Some DRC members were dismayed at the switch of sidings for the housing project, and one member complained it would be “just another stucco box.” 

In their resolution approving the alterations, the committee urged the City Council to encourage project developers to reverse the changes if possible. 

A major culprit in the construction inflation is China, which is in the midst of a major building boom that has sent prices of concrete and steel soaring. 

“For the last three or four years, costs have been going up 10 to 15 percent a year, where 5 to 6 percent was typical,” Allen said. “I’ve got projects where I’m fighting these costs.” 

“Overall constructions costs in the Bay Area have gone up 15 to 20 percent,” said Clawson. 

The project consists of two buildings which will rise at the site of the city’s Oxford Lot, the ground-level pay parking facility on Fulton between Allston Way and Kittredge Street. 

That facility, a favorite of movie-goers and shoppers, will close when construction begins in March or April and will be reincarnated as an underground lot 22 months later when construction is complete—though “there’s a possibility we may be able to reopen the lot sooner,” Clawson said. 

Oxford Plaza will offer 97 housing units, all priced at rates affordable to low-income tenants and families in a 55,000-square-foot building with ground floor retail space and a central courtyard. Tenants will have access to 41 parking spaces. 

The companion David Brower Center features 31,700 square feet of office space, a 7,000-square-foot conference center, a restaurant and 8,500 square feet for retail sales. 

The underground lot, which will be the first phases of construction, will offer 97 spaces. 

The office building is designed to meet the highest, or “platinum,” rating conferred by the U.S. Green Building Council, and the office building won’t offer any parking spaces in line with the philosophies of the environmental organizations which are the center’s primary tenant base. 

Still, Clawson has acknowledged that nothing would preclude the lease of up to half of the spaces to downtown Berkeley’s biggest and fastest-growing tenant, UC Berkeley and the remainder to non-environmental groups—although many environmental organizations have signed letters of intent to move into the building. 

But the project has been attended by conflict, in part because it has consumed the city’s Housing Trust Fund, leaving no revenues for other projects. 

The latest blow came when the largest tenant, eco-retailer Patagonia, backed out, leaving the city council no choice but to sign as guarantor of the $1 million in estimated lost revenues. 

That million was part of the $2.2 million in additional loans approved by the City Council last month, and brings the city’s total loan guarantees for the project to $4.7 million. 

The most recent cost estimate for the two projects has reached $55.2 million, up from the previous estimate of $44.7 million—a 24 percent increase. 

While Clawson said the council’s decision to up the ante will provide all the needed funding, Barton adds a caveat. 

“That’s true in the sense of a scenario in which everything works out the way we hope, but a consultant who looked at the project said costs could increase by as much as a couple of million dollars more,” he said.

Foes of the new Landmarks Preservation Ordinance have the signatures they need to block the law from taking effect, said Laurie Bright, the man doing the counting. 

“As it stands now, we’ve got more than enough,” he said. 

“We’ll have to wait and see,” said Mayor Tom Bates, the principal author of the measure Bright’s allies are trying to block 

After the defeat of Measure J in November—an initiative designed to save the city’s current landmarks law—the Berkeley City Council adopted a rival ordinance by Bates and Councilmember Laurie Capitelli. 

“My personal feeling is that it’s an excellent ordinance,” said Bates. “The council and commissioners worked on it for six years and they came up with an excellent ordinance by making some good compromises.”  

Critics like Bright, one of the two sponsors of Measure J, said the council ordinance could allow for a massive wave of new development that would destroy the character of the neighborhoods, especially in the Berkeley flats. 

Bates and Capitelli said the new law is needed because the existing ordinance is used as a weapon of last resort against worthwhile developments. 

“I think they can put their law away,” said Bright. “We’ll be in the city clerk’s office Thursday afternoon with bells on and petitions in hand.” 

“We’ll wait and see,” said the mayor. “My experience is that they have to have at least 10 to 15 percent more signatures that the number required” because of errors and signatures by those unqualified to sign. 

Foes of the new law are using a provision of the city election code that allows citizens to block enactment of new legislation through the referendum process. 

Under that law, opponents of any new law passed by the council can block enactment if they gather signatures of eligible voters totaling at least 10 percent of the turnout in the last general election with a mayor’s race. 

The referendum committee, chaired by Austene Hall and Julie Dickinson, needs 4100 valid signers, the figure drawn from the election in November in which Bates was reelected and Measure J defeated. 

“We have them, but we’re going to keep going,” Bright said. “The reason we have them is because of the tremendous efforts of our volunteers who had to work straight through the holidays, even giving up their families briefly. Some even took off work,” he said. 

Enforcement of the law halts until the signatures are validated, and if the magic number is attained, the issue then goes to the next general or special election, where voters will be asked to say yes or no to the Bates/Capitelli ordinance. 

“I’m a patient man,” said the mayor. 

Bright said that once the referendum is certified, organizers will form a committee and begin actively campaigning for a no vote. 

“I intend to let people everyone know that we have a good law, and they should support it,” said the mayor. 

Enactment 

Meanwhile, members of the city planning staff are bracing for the changes that will take effect if the effort of Bright and his allies fails. 

City Planning and Development Director Dan Marks said his staff is racing to prepare for the law to take effect—which will be the same day referendum supporters will turn in their signatures. 

“There are a whole lot of changes in procedures and administration we’ll have to figure out if it takes effect,” he said. 

Planning staff has already drawn up a tentative list of historic architecture consultants whose services will be needed for the most controversial provision of the mayor’s ordinance—the Request for Determination, or RFD. 

Under that procedure, a property owner will be able to demand a decision by the Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) either to landmark the property or decline. If the LPC fails to act, the owner will have a two-year exemption from any further landmarking efforts during which to pursue development. 

The LPC will act based on reports prepared by architectural consultants drawn from a pre-approved list whose members have been accepted by the commission. 

Landmarks commissioner Lesley Emmington said Marks presented a list to commissioners at Thursday’s meeting which featured only two Berkeley architects, one of them—Burton Edwards—being an LPC member. 

When the law takes effect, commissioners will have two meetings to act on proposals, and on lists of properties for which development permits have been sought. 

“If the law goes into effect, we’ll bring them the first list in February,” said Marks. “We’re going to have to make sure the commission looks at them closely.” 

“If someone asks the commission for an RFD, I guess we’ll have to cross that bridge when we come to it. It will be an awkward time, but startups of new ordinances are always awkward.”

Spaceship Earth, that 175-ton sculpture that made an aborted effort to land in Berkeley, has died a premature death in Georgia, giving headline writers and bloggers everywhere endless occasions for schadenfreude. 

The opus, a monument to Berkeley-born environmentalist David Brower, was waved away in Berkeley as too massive and both environmentally and politically insensitive. 

Commissioned by the late PowerBar millionaire Brian Maxwell and spouse Jennifer, the million-dollar creation was championed by Mayor Tom Bates, a friend of both Brower and the Maxwells. 

Commissioned to devise a suitable monument to the environmentalist, Finno-American sculptor Eino created a life-size bronze Brower astride a 15-foot globe crafted form 350,000 pounds of blue Brazilian quartzite adorned with the planet’s islands and continents in bronze bas relief. 

The Maxwells first tried to get San Francisco to take the Brower-bedecked orb, but a San Francisco Arts Commission committee rejected the work, labeling it “extremely grand and flamboyant,” devoid of “sensitivity to environmental issues.” 

That latter point may reflect on the fact that the stone is gouged from the earth of a fast-vanishing rain forest. 

Rebuffed, the Maxwells redirected their pitch across the bay, where they found willing ears in the Berkeley mayor’s office. 

“It’s a gem,” said Bates at the time. “I’d be very proud to have it here in the city of David Brower.” 

But the city had already given its blessing to one monument — the still-to-be-built David Brower Center on Oxford Street — and members of the Civic Arts Commission greeted the would-be gift with somewhat less enthusiasm than the Trojans once greeted a certain equine sculpture. 

“How would you like to have a 350,000-pound political football tossed in your lap?” said then-Commissioner Bonnie Hughes. 

Then there was the figure of Brower himself, a bronze marching across the North America with his right arm outstretched in a gesture eerily reminiscent of a similar hand-thrusting very popular in Germany during the 1930s. 

Complained one citizen to Berkeley’s Civic Arts Commission, “Oh great, that’s just what we need—another white man dominating the globe.” 

On a split vote, commisioners gave their reluctant approval after Eino and the Maxwells agreed to move Brower from globe-trodding stance to a more contemplative pose, sitting to one side away from the sphere, contemplating its majesties. 

But even then, the commission couldn’t find a single neighborhood in the city willing to house the 15-foot sculpture, its pedestal and a newly benched Brower. 

The city’s waterfront commission also panned the piece, and the thumbs of UC Berkeley officials and the East Bay Regional Parks District turning similarly downward. 

Frustrated, Jennifer Maxwell—her spouse had died after the work was commissioned—accepted an invitation from Kennesaw State University in suburban Atlanta, Ga., where students and faculty had been awed by a presentation Eino had made earlier when he thought his piece was still San Francisco-bound. 

So the artwork—1,426 pieces of bronze and a collection of polished blue stone wedges—was trucked to Georgia and assembled on the campus, with the Brower figure back on top. 

To add to the grandiosity of the moment, the university added a time capsule, “sealed for 1,000 years” and, according to the university’s website, containing “articles, essays, and answers to the question, ‘What can we do to save Planet Earth?’” 

So the massive creation was finally assembled under the gaze of a live web camera outside the KSU Social Sciences building, where it was unveiled three months ago to great fanfare. 

And then Wednesday it all fell apart, burying the bronze Brower in blue debris, his arm reaching plaintively skyward like a bombing victim trapped in rubble. 

“Kind of ironic,” university employee Mary-Ellizabeth Watson told the Atlanta Jorunal-Constitution.  

Indeed. 

Headline writers had a ball, peppering newsprint and weblogs with their witticisms.  

• “Fragile Earth collapses in irony,” declared the Metro, Britain’s equivalent of USA Today. 

• “The parlous state of the world,” headlined the blog secrets & lies. 

• “Earth-Shattering” read the head in the Winston-Salem Journal. 

• “Ever Get the Feeling the World is Falling Apart?” asked the blog Yippee-Ki-Yay! 

• “Iron ‘e’” declared blogger Joe Givens. 

• “Talk About Atlas Shrugging,” trumpeted the Compass, blog of the Sierra Club—an organization which once numbered Brower among its leading luminaries (he later quit and founded the rival Earth Island Institute). 

• And leave it to the London Times to declare, “End of the world as we know it as Earth sculpture collapses.” 

Meanwhile, Eino told the Georgia paper he’s ready to put his sculptural Humpty Dumpty together again, and the Georgia Bureau of Investigation told the Journal-Constitution they’re working to see if foul play was involved. 

Maybe, however, it was just a foul ball.

Dan Sicular, spokesperson for an unincorporated group of football fans calling themselves “Save Tightwad Hill!”, announced late Monday that attorney Susan Brandt Hawley has filed in California Superior Court in Alameda County on their behalf to require the UC Regents to comply with the California Environmental Quality Act by doing adequate study and mitigation of the proposed UC Berkeley Memorial Stadium expansion. Their petition charges that “substantial new seating approved on the east side of the stadium would restrict views and thereby substantially alter the use of the unique cultural landscape known as Tightwad Hill.” It says that the hill “is located 100 feet above the stadium and provides panoramic views of the football field” and that “generations of football fans since the mid-1920s” have gathered there to watch Cal Bear games.  

This suit is the fourth to be filed against the stadium expansion project and its companion Student Athlete High Performance training center.  

The City of Berkeley, the Panoramic Hill Association and the California Oaks Foundation will be in court with UC on Thursday seeking to delay the start of construction and the destruction of the oak grove on the site of the center.

The City of Oakland put several of its many moods and faces on full display for the inauguration of its 48th mayor on Monday, with a rowdy City Council reorganization meeting that ended in spirited boos and catcalls from the audience, an onstage, interfaith, hand-holding prayer featuring representatives of many of the city’s widely diverse ethnic and religious communities, and ending with the usual and expected rousing and uplifting speech by the new mayor himself, Ron Dellums. 

The three and a half hours of ceremonies, including the swearing in of newly elected City Auditor and members of City Council and Oakland Unified school board, took place before a packed, downstairs-and-balcony audience at the downtown Paramount Theater. 

Dellums actually took office a week ago due to a quirk in Oakland’s City Charter, which allows the new mayor to take office on the first Monday of the new year following the election. Since the first Monday of this year fell on a holiday—Jan. 1—and the city would have been left without a mayor until this week’s scheduled inaugural, the city attorney’s office advised Dellums to take office in a private swearing-in last week. Dellums repeated his swearing-in for the public at Monday’s Paramount Theater event. 

With the soaring rhetoric with which he has become synonymous through four decades of public life, Dellums invoked the grandeur and importance of the moment, both for himself, personally, and for the city as a whole in his inaugural address. 

“When I first decided to run for mayor of Oakland, many people came up to me and asked me why I was doing it,” he said. “Why, at the end of your career, do you want to worry about fixing potholes and putting up street signs? And it made me think that if this is what people believe is the role of the mayor of Oakland, no wonder the city is in trouble.” In contrast, Dellums recalled words given to him recently by a woman in a local supermarket. “She told me that all of your globetrotting, all of your work in D.C., has only prepared you for your work in Oakland. She told me, ‘this is your greatest moment.’” He added that “you have asked me to run this city, and I accept it with great humility.” 

As he did during last year’s election campaign, Dellums said he was declining to set specific policy goals for his new administration. 

“It would be easy to give you one or two targets and then, at the end of four years, all you would have to do to determine my success would be to see if I had met them,” Dellums said. Calling that pathway a “cop out,” the new mayor noted that “we cannot afford the luxury of focusing on only one or two issues. We have to attack all of them, simultaneously.” 

He said that as a first job, he was “reading every word” of the reports of the various task forces he set up over the summer to draw up policy recommendations for all aspects of Oakland life. 

The absence of setting a handful of specific policy goals seemed to be a pointed reference to the policies of Dellums’ immediate predecessor in the office, Jerry Brown, who set four specific goals for his first administration in 1999-bringing 10,000 new residents downtown, reducing crime, improving education, and sponsoring the arts. Brown cut that list down to three when he was re-elected in 2002, dropping arts sponsorship as one of his goals. 

Brown was conspicuously absent from the inaugural ceremonies. A seating plan for the stage handed out to the media listed his name sitting on the dais next to Dellums, but with a question mark behind it. 

Another local politician conspicuously absent was State Senator Don Perata, who represents Oakland in the legislature. Perata once had aspirations for mayor himself, and supported De La Fuente in last summer’s election. Other local politicians were well in attendance, however, including both former 16th Assemblymember Wilma Chan and her successor, Sandré Swanson. Oakland Congressmember Barbara Lee, who succeeded Dellums in Congress, introduced Dellums at Monday’s events. 

Meanwhile, the only specific target Dellums set was a familiar one from his campaign, health care for all Oakland citizens currently uninsured. 

“Everybody in Oakland should have the right to a healthy life,” Dellums said. “We can no longer afford not to have universal health care. We know at the federal level that Congressmembers like Barbara Lee and Sheila Jackson Lee are fighting for that. We also know that the issue has begun to percolate on the state level. But we need it in Oakland, and I am going to fight for it. And if we end up not having enough money to implement that idea, then put me on a plane to Washington, or to see Bill Gates, and I will find the money.” 

Dellums also made one reference to Oakland’s crushing violent crime wave, tying it together with the mounting movement to end the war in Iraq that was escalated by the recent Democratic takeover of Congress. “As we attempt to bring peace abroad,” he said, “let us strive to bring peace to the streets of Oakland.” 

In the place of invoking more specific policy goals, however, Dellums stressed the invocation of a new era in Oakland politics, saying that his overall goal was to set up Oakland as a “model city, anchored in a vibrant economy with healthy, well-educated, well-trained citizens. We want a city that works for everybody. We need to delight in our diversity, not be paralyzed by parochialism.” 

But it was parochialism and partisan, personal politics that were on open display shortly before Dellums’ unity-invoking speech, when members of the City Council held a special meeting on the inaugural stage to re-elect Ignacio De La Fuente to the presidency of the Council. 

The election of De La Fuente to the presidency has added significance this year because De La Fuente, a political foe of Dellums, is in a powerful position to block Dellums’ initiatives going before the Council. 

In recent weeks, there had been rumors throughout Oakland that De La Fuente might receive a stiff challenge for the presidency from Councilmember Jane Brunner, or that one of his Council allies--Larry Reid or Henry Chang--might get his support to take the office. But the possible Brunner challenge never surfaced and though another veteran Councilmember, Nancy Nadel, received a nomination for the presidency from the floor from community activist James Vann, no Councilmember placed her name in nomination. Instead, in a surprise move that seemed to signal a break in the longtime De La Fuente-Larry Reid alliance, Councilmember Desley Brooks--a longtime De La Fuente opponent--nominated Reid for Council president. De La Fuente easily beat Reid for the position, and a defiant-sounding Reid later said that “no one should presume that the Council presidency is a lifetime position. I had earlier wanted to run for mayor of Oakland, but when Mr. De La Fuente stepped forward, I demonstrated my support for him by declining to run, myself. I had hoped that he would reciprocate.” Apparently signalling that he would no longer be a De La Fuente ally on the Council, Reid concluded by pledging his support to Dellums and saying “to my colleagues [on the Council], I think you are going to see a different Larry Reid. Larry Reid’s got a different attitude.” 

Reid’s announcement of independence may signal a shuffling of alliances on Council. While outgoing mayor Jerry Brown never tried to cultivate a reliable block of Council votes of his own, Council is now expected to divide along a rough line between De La Fuente (and his political mentor, Don Perata) and Ron Dellums. 

De La Fuente’s election led to prolonged jeering from the crowd that distrupted the Council meeting and only could be halted when Dellums stood up and admonished people that “even if we disagree, we have to allow others to be able to speak. We have to send a signal to our children, who are settling their arguments through violence in the streets, that we as adults can adopt a more civil way to settle our disputes.” 

Oakland’s inaugural events will continue throughout the week. 

Berkeley’s Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) weighed in on the side of the tree-in protesters at Memorial Stadium Thursday, urging the preservation of a grove threatened by university building plans. 

Commissioners voted unanimously to send a letter to UC Berkeley officials urging preservation of the stand of trees marked for destruction to make way for a gym along the stadium’s western wall. 

Meanwhile, former mayoral candidate Zachary Running Wolf is back in the branches, perched even higher in a towering redwood from which he had been banished Dec. 13 by a seven-day stay-away order served by campus cops. 

“They served another stay-away order Saturday, and that’s the sixth or seventh time they’ve done it,” said Running Wolf. 

The latest to be ticketed was Jess Walsh, one of the first to join Running Wolf after he climbed into the branches on Big Game Saturday, Dec. 2. 

“Now we’ve got six people up,” said Doug Buckwald, who has been coordinating ground support for the arboreal activists. 

“Zachary (Running Wolf) went up very early this morning, about three o’clock. It’s the same tree he was in before, but he’s even higher. He’s got the penthouse suite, with all the comforts of home.” 

Meanwhile, UC officials and their lawyers are preparing for a court hearing Thursday in Oakland on efforts to delay university plans to launch the first phase of a construction program budgeted at more than a third of a million dollars. 

The City of Berkeley, the Panoramic Hill Association and the California Oaks Foundation are each seeking to delay the start of construction of a four-story, 132,500-square-foot Student Athlete High Performance Center at the site of the grove. 

The actions charge that the project—along with planned renovation of the stadium—violates the California Environmental Quality Act and state law governing construction on and adjacent to earthquake faults. 

The LPC’s objections are based on federal, state and city ordinances governing designated landmarks. 

The stadium and nearby grounds were named a city landmark this summer and added to the National Register of Historic Places in the fall. The stadium is also a state landmark. 

But the LPC’s motion Thursday night was also based on impacts to another landmark, Piedmont Avenue—known as Gayley Way on campus. 

The roadway is a city landmark, and its landscape and setting were designed by America’s preeminent landscape architect, Frederick Law Olmsted, whose best-known creation is New York City’s Central Park. 

“We are urging the university to respect the grove because of its significance to Piedmont and because it is important to preserve as a retention of the rustic landscape that reflects the original condition of the site as Olmsted found it,” said Landmarks Commissioner Lesley Emmington. 

Attorneys are scheduled to meet Tuesday afternoon with an Alameda County Superior Court judge to discuss consolidating all three legal challenges into a single case. 

A hearing on a motion to grant an order blocking further work on the gym project until the issue is resolved is scheduled for Thursday afternoon in Dept. 140 of Alameda County Superior Court, 600 Washington St. in Oakland. 

“We want everybody to show up for the hearing,” said Buckwald. “We want people to know how the community feels.”

For the Berkeley Unified School District, 2006 was a very good year.  

Measure A, the school parcel tax which renews two existing school measures—Berkeley School Excellence Project (BSEP) and Measure B—won by a large margin in the Nov. 7 election, ensuring that the current level of school funding in Berkeley will be extended by 10 more years. 

Both BSEP and Measure B, which expire in June, provide the Berkeley Unified School District with $19.6 million annually, which primarily pays for 30 percent of Berkeley’s classroom teachers and all elementary and middle school libraries and music programs as well as school site funds. 

Class size reduction, music and art, and site enrichment programs which have been authorized and reaffirmed by Berkeley voters since 1986 will be funded by 90 percent of Measure A. 

Had it failed, the schools would have lost 25 percent of their budget, which would have meant the elimination of 30 percent of the teachers, libraries, and the music program among others. 

Although a majority of Berkeley voters came forward to show their support for Measure A, there were those, such as the Council of Neighborhood Associations, the Berkeley Alliance of Neighborhood Associations and Berkeleyans Against Soaring Taxes, which fought to defeat it. 

“Measure A’s victory will help us to focus on narrowing the achievement gap instead of having to focus on budget issues,” School Superintendent Michele Lawrence told the Planet last week. 

School board member Nancy Riddle, CFO of Monster Cable Products, and a strong supporter of Measure A, captured the most votes in the school board elections in November and is currently serving her second term.  

Karen Hemphill came in second place in the school board elections, making her Berkeley’s first African-American school board director in eight years. Previously a member of Berkeley’s Civic Arts Commission and the Commission on the Status of Women, Hemphill is an assistant to the city manager in Emeryville. 

Incumbent Shirley Issel, a clinical social worker by profession, also won one of the three seats that were up for grabs in the November elections. This will be Issel’s ninth year on the board.  

November also saw the farewell of Berkeley school board president Terry Doran. A teacher and administrator, Doran served in the Berkeley Unified School District since 1966. 

While serving as school board president, Doran was involved with the school district’s Construction Advisory Oversight Committee and worked with the mayor and City Council on the warm water pool and South Campus. 

At his farewell ceremony on Nov. 15, Doran said that his retirement did not spell the end of his public service. 

“I am really not ready to run away,” he said. “Some people go to retirement homes, others go on long vacations. But I am not there just yet. Land use is one of the most exciting and contentious areas of concern in the city and it’s the direction I would like to go in.” 

Doran was named as the permanent replacement for former ZAB commissioner Raudel Wilson earlier this month. 

December also saw the swearing in of school board members Joaquin Rivera as president and John Selawsky as vice president of the board. 

Out-of-district students 

The question of how to deal with out-of-district students in the Berkeley public schools—which became a major issue this school board election season—still lingers on in the new year. 

While the school district has ensured Berkeley parents that new positions will support a more careful registration process and that routine checks on students— including home visits when necessary to contact parents or verify residence—will be carried out vigorously, skeptics continue to argue that this is not enough.  

Re-registration—the process of re-enrolling students when they enter Berkeley High School—is a method some school board members think could help enforce the residency requirement for registration in Berkeley public schools. 

Speaking to the Planet in October, school superintendent Michele Lawrence said that if the school board voted for re-registration, the process could be introduced as early as spring. 

School food upgrade 

Berkeley also attracted quite a bit of attention in the national media last year because of BUSD’s revamped nutritional services, courtesy of Berkeley’s “Renegade Lunch Lady” Chef Ann Cooper. 

Cooper, who did away with the pre-packaged heat-and-serve frozen lunches that Berkeley public school kids got little more than a year ago, started a revolution by introducing “made from scratch” nutrient-based lunches, such as rotini with fresh tomato sauce, roast herb chicken or tofu, fresh fruit and low-fat milk. 

Funded by a three-year financial grant from the Chez Panisse Foundation last October to rebuild the nutrition services in the schools, Cooper met a lot of obstacles in Berkeley—from fussy fourth-grade kids to a limited budget—but continued in her mission to feed healthy food to 4,000 hungry children on a staff of 53 and a budget of $3.50 for two meals every day. 

B-Tech 

B-Tech, or Berkeley Alternative High School, as it was formerly known, has also been the subject of much attention this past year. 

With a revamped system, a new principal and new staff who care about the students, attendance has increased in this school once known as the “dumping grounds,” “pre-prison,” and “a place for bad kids.” 

Suspensions have also gone down and for the first time in its history, a group of 16 seniors and juniors from the school got the opportunity to fly to Atlanta, Ga., to participate in the four-day 18th Annual Fall Black College Tour. 

Racial discrimination suit 

In October, there was a bit of bad news for the BUSD. The Pacific Legal Foundation (PLF) sued the Berkeley Unified School District for the second time, charging it with violating California’s Proposition 209 by racially discriminating among students during placements at elementary schools and at programs at Berkeley High. 

School district officials, however, said they would not change their policies. 

“The judge has currently given an extension on the case and the school district’s lawyer is currently preparing the paperwork. We are confident that we will prevail,” said Lawrence. 

To reaffirm its commitment to integration, the school board passed a resolution in November supporting Brown v. Board of Education and the Seattle, Wash., and Louisville, Ky., public school integration plans, both of which have been challenged by Sacramento-based non-profit PLF. 

Student slain 

Berkeley High School students ended 2006 mourning the loss of fellow-student Yonas Mehari. Yonas, 17, his mother Regbe Baharengasi, 50 and sister Winta Mehari, 28, were killed by gunfire in their Keller Plaza Apartment complex in North Oakland on Thanksgiving Day.  

Yonas, a member of the BHS varsity soccer team and an excellent student, had started the Ethiopian Eritrean Students Union at Berkeley High, something his friends have pledged to carry on even after his death. 

The Berkeley Unified School District was back in session on Monday after winter break. Elementary, middle and Berkeley High School students started classes Monday.  

The first school board meeting for 2007 will be held on Jan. 17 at the Old City Hall Chambers, 2134 Martin Luther King Jr. Way, 7:30 p.m. 

Other matters 

At the school board meeting on Dec. 13, the board approved a recommendation to establish the Office of Evaluation and Assessment to help in the development of the new tax measure, specifically Measure A.  

Three new positions—director of evaluation and assessment, data technician and program assistant—will constitute this new office to help the district evaluate educational programs effectively. 

The annual costs of the three new positions—approximately $270,000—had been calculated while developing the plan that served as the basis for the funding model for Measure A. 

The board also approved the out-of-state travel request for the recruitment of minority teachers and counselors to Atlanta, Ga., and Washington, DC, from Feb. 11 to Feb. 17. 

This is the first time the board has gone out of state for recruitment efforts. The disproportionate discipline rates and academic gaps between African American and white students have often been attributed to the shortage of African American teachers in BUSD. Retirement has also impacted the population of African American teachers in the district, with 10 retiring in the past year. 

Although BUSD has a 36 percent minority student population, only 14 percent of its teachers are minorities. The group will visit six black colleges, including Spelman and Clark Atlanta in Atlanta, and Howard and Morgan State in DC. 

The board also received information on the average daily attendance summaries.  

Student enrollment for October 2006 totaled 8,924, with an absence rate of 6.8 percent. This cost the district $ 323,667 (in lost revenue), compared to an absence rate of 5.03 percent, with a loss of $239,647 in September. 

Each student absence amounts to $31.86 per day in lost revenue for the district. Since 1997, school districts can no longer claim any absences, including excused absences, for apportionment attendance.

Second Derby Field Community Meeting 

The Berkeley Unified School District will be holding the second of two community meetings to discuss the Closed Derby Street option for the Derby Street Athletic Field on Thursday, 7-9 p.m., at the Berkeley Technical Academy, 2701 Martin Luther King Jr. Way. 

The meeting will include: 

• An open floor public comment session regarding the Closed Derby Street Plan. 

• A review of public comments from Dec. 7. 

• Further presentation of the “Curvy Derby” Plan. The creators of the Curvy Derby Plan will make a 15-minute presentation, sharing more details of their proposed plan. 

• Discussion of the goals and desired outcomes for these meetings. 

• Discussion on whether this process will allow for the possibility of changing the EIR preferred plan to one of the open street plans. 

• Discussion on how the information collected in these meetings will get to the Board of Education. The information from these meetings will be put into a document that will go before the Board at a February or March meeting. 

The mayor and city manager's offices have been looking at the proposed plan and will comment on what would be needed if the street were to remain open (with the Curvy Derby Plan) as opposed to what is needed for the Closed Derby Plan. 

Berkeley Family Diversity School/ LGBT Inclusion Strategy Meeting 

The Berkeley Unified School District Parent Outreach Office, district parents and Our Family Coalition will be holding its second Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Inclusion meeting today (Tuesday) at Berkeley B-Tech, 2701 Martin Luther King Jr. Way at 6 p.m. 

The discussion will inform people about how Berkeley Public Schools are working to be welcoming to all families, including those headed by LGBT people.  

Administrators, staff, parents/caregivers and others will discuss ways to integrate LGBT and general family diversity curriculum into schools, how to make schools safer and more inclusive, how to work with the parent community and how to incorporate these issues into overall anti-bullying work.  

At the first meeting, the importance for LGBT and heterosexual parents/caregivers to participate in conversations about these important issues was discussed. 

For more info call Judy at (415) 981-1960.  

The Zoning Adjustments Board returns to session on Thursday to hear requests by Verizon Wireless and Nextel Communications for use permits to construct a new wireless telecommunications facility that will host eighteen cell phone antennas and related equipment atop the UC Storage building at 2721 Shattuck Ave. 

Local residents have opposed the facility, citing concerns related to health, parking, and loading docks. Some neighbors fear that the radio frequency produced by telecom antennae could cause cancer and interfere with medical devices. The item was remanded back to ZAB from the City Council. 

Nextel and Verizon, the applicants of the proposed project, have argued in letters to ZAB that the companies need the antennas in order to fill “holes” in their system. 

According to the Telecommunications Act of 1996, local governments are prohibited from rejecting wireless facilities based on health concerns as long as the stations conform to Federal Communication standards. 

Other matters 

East Bay Iceland will once again appear in front of the ZAB, on Thursday, to request the installation of a temporary outdoor refrigeration system on the southern side of the property. Board members had asked the rink to return with a report which shows considerable reduction in the amount of noise generated by the system. 

The board will also hear a request for a use permit by Timothy Carter to demolish an existing dwelling and build a two-unit building with three stories, average height of 32 feet 5 inches, floor area of 4,432 square feet, and two parking spaces on a 4,996 square foot lot.  

At the Dec. 14 meeting, ZAB members had concerns about the proposed building towering over the neighboring buildings on the east and had asked the owner to scale it down.  

The Trader Joe’s Project which had been approved in concept at the Dec. 14 meeting will come up once again on Thursday for further discussion. 

The board will also hear: 

• Request for a use permit to increase alcohol service at Ethiopian Restaurant, 2953-2955 Telegraph Ave., by adding service of distilled spirits to existing service of beer and wine, and by increasing operating hours from 8 a.m. to midnight daily to 8 a.m. to 2 a.m. daily. 

• Request for a use permit to expand the kitchen and interior seating area of the Missouri Lounge at 2600 San Pablo Ave., add outdoor seating, reconfigure and reduce the required parking, and expand alcohol service to new seating areas. 

• Request for a use permit for the conversion of an existing commercial building (The Wright’s Garage Building) into a multi-tenant commercial building at 2629-2635 Ashby Ave. 

• Appeal of an administrative use permit to construct a fence over six feet in height along the rear property line at 635 Spruce St. 

• Request for a use permit to construct a two-story 944-square-foot addition to an existing single-family dwelling at 8 Panoramic Place. 

• Request for a use permit for a full service restaurant with beverage service of beer and wine with prepared food; including the retail sales of beer and wine at In and Out Deli, 2012 Shattuck Ave., and to extend hours of operation from 8 a.m. to midnight. 

• Request for an use permit to construct a 2,529-square-foot single-family dwelling, a 399-square-foot accessory dwelling unit, and a 483-square-foot garage on an 8,157-square-foot vacant lot at 156 Vicente Road.

A Few Prominent Businesses Abandoned Berkeley in 2006 

If Cody’s Books and Radston’s Office Plus cited poor sales and an expensive lease as respective reasons to close down their much-loved stores in Berkeley in 2006, there were others such as PowerBar and Clif Bar who felt the need to leave the city in order to grow. 

Andy Ross, owner and president of Cody’s Books Inc., announced in May that he was closing down the chain’s oldest store, on Telegraph Avenue, on July 10 with a heavy heart. 

Ross blamed big chain and Internet booksellers and a lack of help from the city.  

In a statement Ross informed people of the 15-year sales decline in the south-of-campus area, which he said had led to Cody’s Telegraph Avenue, doing only one-third of the business it did in 1990.  

He noted that the company’s attempt to keep the Telegraph store open had caused a loss of over $1 million. 

“Cody’s is an idea, not a building. That idea will endure in our other stores on Fourth Street and in San Francisco,” Ross said in his announcement. 

For many Bekeleyans, the closing of Cody’s Books signaled the end of an era. Long-time patrons remembered the 1960s when Cody’s was part of the great anti-war movement that had its roots in Berkeley and how in 1989, the store had been bombed for carrying Salman Rushdie’s controversial novel The Satanic Verses. 

In September, a Tokyo-based company,Yohan, Inc., purchased the two remaining Cody’s bookstores on Fourth Street in Berkeley and Stockton Street in San Francisco. 

Radstons Office Plus, which celebrated its 98th birthday in 2006, also closed the doors to its 1950 Shattuck Avenue retail store on July 14.  

Diane Griffin, president and third- generation owner of the stationery store, had told the Planet in June that it was difficult to point a finger in any particular direction for the store’s closure. 

“Let’s just say that it’s all things Berkeley, topped off with the fact that our lease ran out,” she said. “We just couldn’t afford to pay the prohibitive increase in rent any more, as there wasn’t enough profit out of our downtown retail store. I hope both my father and grandfather who ran the business before me are looking down and understanding the decision we had to take.” 

Speaking to the Planet at that time, Mayor Tom Bates had said that while he was sorry to see Radston’s leave Berkeley, he was looking forward to positive changes such as condos, boutique hotels and jazz clubs that would help make Downtown more attractive. 

Currently, Radston’s is focusing more on its core delivery business in Hercules, which accounts for 90 percent of the company’s sales and caters to public institutions and small- to medium-sized, independently owned businesses. 

Another big loss for Berkeley last year was Nestle USA’s decision to move its PowerBar business from Berkeley to Glendale. 

The move, however, received mixed responses from the community. While city officials said that they’d rather that the business had stayed in Berkeley, there were those who greeted the news jubilantly. 

Ever since it was first installed in December 1997, PowerBar’s controversial 26-foot-wide sign atop their downtown office on Shattuck Avenue had been a source of constant complaints from residents who called it an eyesore. 

PowerBar spokesperson Vanessa Wager told the Planet that it was not space constraints but the need to be close to its headquarters that had initiated the move. 

Not long after PowerBar’s move to Glendale, rival company Clif Bar announced in August that it would be moving its Berkeley headquarters to Alameda after the company’s current lease expired in July 2008. 

The need to expand its facility was stated as the main reason for leaving its West Berkeley site. Berkeley residents were sorry to hear about the loss of this green company, as Clif Bar had been known for its all-natural and organic energy snacks for athletes (such as Clif Bar, Clif Shot and Luna) and its environment-friendly approach. 

The proposed site for Clif Bar’s new facility in Alameda is a waterfront location at the Navy’s former Fleet Industrial Supply Center across the estuary from Jack London Square, which is part of the 777-acre Alameda Landing Project. 

In an interview to the Planet in August, chief of staff to the mayor, Cisco De Vries, said that while the City would have wanted both PowerBar and Clif Bar to stay, citizens should not get alarmed by the moves. 

“A lot of companies are interested in moving into downtown Berkeley. The mayor’s office gets calls from interested parties all the time,” he said.

Planning Commissioners will vote Wednesday on a last, crucial legal step to transform what was once the site of one of Berkeley’s more notorious brothels into a 15-unit condo complex. 

The new building is clad in copper that reflected sunlight with blinding intensity on Monday afternoon, though oxidation should eventually turn it a duller turquoise green. 

From 1977 to 2001, 2628 Telegraph Ave. was the home of the Golden Gypsy Massage Parlor, where clients were treated to more than simple back rubs. 

Then Berkeley Police received two letters, one from a client who was frustrated he couldn’t get a real rubdown and a second from the wife of another client—reportedly from a well-known Berkeley family—who had hired a private eye to catch her philandering spouse en flagrante delicto. 

Detectives investigated, leading to a July 30, 2001 raid that ended with 20 arrests and the seizure of $273,000 in cash from the parlor and the home of the couple who owned it. The Zoning Adjustments Board voted five months later to shutter the place as a public nuisance. 

Two years later, ZAB approved use permits to allow construction of a four-story building at the site, located at the corner of Telegraph and Carleton Street, and the construction is nearly complete. 

Planning Commission approval of a condominium map is a necessary step before units can be sold. 

One-bedroom units are currently listed to start in ”the high $300,000s,” with two-bedroom units starting in “the mid-$400,000s,” according to the project website, 2628telegraph.com. 

One item commissioners won’t have to deal with is dogs, and the ongoing dispute over the Milo Foundation’s adoption facilities in the Solano Avenue neighborhood. 

Commissioners will also consider a staff report on the impact of the Association of Bay Area Government’s upcoming Housing Needs Assessment, a crucial document used in determining the city’s obligation to build more new housing. 

The other major item that is up for action is a set of zoning ordinance amendments designed to speed up and simplify the process of enforcing permit violations and making public nuisance declarations against properties. 

The meeting is scheduled for 7 p.m. in the North Berkeley Senior Center, 1901 Hearst Ave. and Martin Luther King Jr. Way.

Donning gas masks to protest against emissions from Pacific Steel Casting, risking arrest to save the People’s Park free box, organizing the city’s first ever international food festival and cooking up civic participation through a website were some of the ways in which Berkeleyans took control in 2006. 

Pacific Steel 

Entire families, with toddlers in arms, turned up in front of the West Berkeley- based steel foundry in November to rally against Pacific Steel—the third largest foundry of its kind in the country—and demanded an answer to when emissions of the noxious fumes would stop. 

Innumerable protests and three lawsuits later— one by the Bay Area Air Quality Management District against PSC—community members were informed earlier this month that the City of Berkeley had requested an extension of time for public review of the emissions inventory report. 

The Air District along with District 4 councilmember Linda Maio—in whose district PSC is located—will hold a community meeting on Feb. 7 where questions about emissions will be answered. 

While some West Berkeley residents would be glad to send the steel foundry packing off to somewhere else, there are those who would like to see it clean up its act and stay. 

People’s Park 

People’s Park free-box users sued the City of Berkeley in June for not holding to its 1994 agreement with UC Berkeley, which stated that a free-box, in which people put clothing and other items for others to pick up, must remain in People’s Park. 

The UC Berkeley Police Department tore down each free box that advocates built in the last year. 

UC Berkeley is accelerating efforts to clean up the park and make it drug and alcohol free. In November, the university unveiled its plans to bulldoze the berms (mounds) on either side of the park’s Community Garden to allow police officers to patrol the park better. 

But once again it was the people of Berkeley who prevailed, and their protests made university officials scrap the plans. However, the university is going ahead with its plan to hire a landscape design team that will help beautify this plot of land. 

The Wishing Well 

Currently the only free box in the city exists in the form of the 35-year-old recycling box on the sidewalk parking strip of the 1700 block of Channing Way.  

Known as the Wishing Well to local residents, this box was seen as an encroachment by the City of Berkeley and well on its way to being demolished in 2006 until neighbors stepped in to save it. 

Bateman Mall 

The Bateman Mall has been restored, but nothing has been done to fix the drainage problem. It was last reported in the Daily Planet on Nov. 28 that one of the neighbors had removed the rotting grass on the mall to solve the strong stench and the drainage issue, but neighbors told the Planet on Monday that nothing has been done to fix the problem permanently. 

It was also reported to the Planet that there has been “no apparent activity to fix the drainage problems, with the exception of several trips by city personnel to view the construction errors and take some measurements.” 

Willard Park declared rat-free 

Parents of children who were scared away by rodents at the Willard Park Tot Lot were relieved when the city decided to clean out the park in March. Neighbors complained that large quantities of food and human waste had contributed to a dramatic increase in rats. 

The city at first had decided to bait the rats, but health concerns limited the rat control efforts to trapping only. 

Kitchen Democracy 

For those who find it difficult to keep up with civic issues affecting Berkeleyans daily, help came in the form of kitchendemocracy.com. The husband-and-wife duo of Robert Vogel and Simona Carini promised to bring City Hall to you, courtesy of the Internet. 

Today the website is used by councilmembers, ZAB commissioners, Berkeley voters and even the curious Cal undergrad. A website that is probably the first of its kind, KD might just go on to become the Craigslist for Municipal Government in the near future. 

The naked guy dies in jail 

Andrew Martinez, who as a 19-year-old UC Berkeley undergraduate created a splash in the national media for getting suspended from the university for attending class in little more than a pair of sandals and a backpack in 1992, died in his Santa Clara County jail cell in May, leaving friends, family and community members shocked. 

The untimely death of 33-year-old Martinez caused people to question the American legal system, specifically the Santa Clara County Jail system, which had housed Martinez in solitary confinement even though he had been mentally disturbed. 

Ruby Harmon turns 100 

Berkeley resident Ruby Harmon celebrated her centennial birthday in May.  

Her amazing journey through life as a social worker and BUSD volunteer was celebrated by friends at the Trinity United Methodist Church. Although Ruby is unable to speak today, her memories of the Civil Rights movement in Louisiana, the segregated school system and the integration that followed thereafter live on in transcriptions. 

BAM curator quits over exhibit dispute 

Chris Gilbert—who served as a curator at the Berkeley Art Museum since September 2005—resigned in May because of rising conflicts with museum administrators over his controversial project “Now Time: Media Along the Path of the Bolivarian Process.”  

Peter Selz, founding director of the Berkeley Art Museum and a former curator of New York’s Museum of Modern Art, expressed shock over Gilbert’s resignation in May. 

When the Planet asked Connie Lewellen, BMA chief curator, to comment about the reasons for resignation stated in his e-mail in May, she said, “Chris couldn’t do the program as he wanted and therefore he wanted to resign.” 

Gilbert told the Planet that his decision to leave had started from an argument over a text panel for the ‘Now Time’ exhibit. “Their plan was to replace the phrase ‘in solidarity with revolutionary Venezuela’ with a phrase like ‘concerning revolutionary Venezuela,’ for another phrase describing a relation that would not be explicitly one of solidarity,” he said. 

Berkeley remembers the Waving Man 

Residents of South Berkeley and the Berkeley NAACP Youth & College Division found a way to remember the legacy of Mr. Charles, Berkeley’s “Waving Man,” in March.  

For 30 years, Mr. Charles stood on the busy intersection of Martin Luther King Jr. Way and Oregon to smile and wave hello to morning commuters, an act which earned him the title “Waving Man” and made him the “face of Berkeley” worldwide. 

On the morning of March 22, Mr. Charles’ 96th Birthday, a group of people stood at this very same intersection and greeted people just like Mr. Charles had and helped to make the world a happier place. 

First International Food Festival lands in Berkeley 

West Berkeley played host to the city’s inaugural International Food Festival in May. Organized by the West Berkeley Neighborhood Development Corporation and the City of Berkeley, the festival celebrated diversity in the city by bringing together Indian, Fijian, Filipino, Spanish, Mexican, Middle Eastern, Turkish, Lebanese, Jamaican and many more ethnicities in one place. 

Bleak future for Berkeley’s Sea Scouts 

The U.S. Supreme Court refused to review a ruling that allows the City of Berkeley to deny the Sea Scouts a free dock at the Marina because of discrimination against gays and atheists.  

The 74-year-old Sea Scouts are bound to the policies of their parent body, the Boy Scouts of America, which mandates that gays and atheists be excluded from the organization. 

Ever since the city began charging the Sea Scouts for the berth at the Marina, Sea Scouts’ Boat Skipper Evans has been paying $500 a month, something he said was gradually becoming a problem economically. 

Pole to head 

A Thursday afternoon fracas between two 36-year-olds in People’s Park took a violent turn when one of the pair picked up a long wooden pole and clouted the other over the head. 

Officers arrived in time to slap handcuffs on the attacker and summon paramedics to rush the victim to Alta Bates Hospital for treatment of lacerations to his cheek and nose, according to a statement by UC Berkeley Police Chief Victoria L. Harrison. 

Gun to head 

As one teenage gangbanger held a pistol to their victim’s head, three cohorts rifled through his pockets during a brazen robbery near Wellman Hall on the UC Berkeley Campus Sunday night. 

A quick response by campus police ended with arrests of all four teens identified as the robbers by the 34-year-old victim. 

The heist happened at 7:32 p.m. on Wickson Road just south of the building, according to a report by campus police. The robbery victim wasn’t hurt during the crime, police said.

From just the smell of their breath or the look on their faces, Karl Smith could tell which of his students at Dejean Middle School in West Contra Costa County were doing poorly in school. 

“There were a number of students I’d have in a week who were visibly not well, and you just can’t learn if you’re sick,” said Smith, who recently quit his job at the Richmond school where he had taught English as a second language to immigrant children for almost 10 years. He said some of his students had teeth so rotten it interfered with their ability to form English words properly. 

Nationwide studies show that 45 million people in the United States have no health insurance. In California, about 6.6 million are uninsured. On Monday, California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger unveiled his much-anticipated health care plan. The $2 billion in tax money that now goes to hospitals will shift to buy insurance for some of the state’s neediest. 

The governor might have borrowed provisions from health care plans enacted by Vermont and Massachusetts last year that promised expanded health care coverage to their residents, or he might have drawn upon some of the provisions of the AllKids plan Illinois finalized, that would provide health care for all children in the state. 

The uninsured in the immigrant community are watching closely, especially Latinos for whom the problem is more common. In California, nearly 32 percent of Latinos are uninsured. And almost 20 percent of the state’s uninsured are children, the majority of them of Hispanic descent. 

Among the undocumented, not having insurance is more complicated than simply a matter of money. Many simply don’t seek treatment because they fear they could be deported if their illegal status becomes known. 

Many of Smith’s students were children of undocumented Latinos, so public health care programs such as Medi-Cal and Healthy Kids were unavailable to them. And because private health insurance is too pricey, often the only health care facilities they could go to are community clinics. But though these clinics never ask clients about their legal status, not every immigrant knows this and they would understandably be scared to ask. 

Often, fear of being reported “keeps them from going to community clinics,” said Fremont resident Agha Saeed, national chairman of the American Muslim Alliance. “For minor illnesses, they self-medicate. Some (undocumented Muslims) seek free advice from doctors while attending prayer services in mosques. 

“But I know people with high blood-pressure or poor vision who are too scared to seek treatment because they do not want to call attention upon themselves,” Saeed said. 

Study after study has shown that the longer the less educated and less affluent immigrant stay in the U.S., the more likely he or she was to report declining health. 

“Many folks won’t show up at our clinics until they are in dire straits,” observed Jane Garcia, chief executive officer at the Clinica de la Raza Health Project in Oakland. La Raza offers multi-service, low-cost health care to anyone who needs it. 

Racial and ethnic minorities tend not to practice preventative health care says Andres Tapia, chief diversity officer at Hewitt Associates, a global, multi-services human resources firm, which works with health management. As a result, third and fourth generation Asians and Latino immigrants, more often than whites, wait until they are in a health crisis before they visit emergency rooms. 

Disputing the myth that newer, undocumented immigrants are clogging up emergency rooms, a new study suggests that undocumented people use them far less than legal immigrants and Americans. According to researchers at Mexico’s National Population Council and the University of California, only 9.8 percent of Mexican adult migrants living in the U.S. 10 years or less visited an emergency room in the past year. That’s less than half the rate among people born in the U.S. 

“Communities with the lowest [emergency department] use tended to have a higher percentage of Hispanics and non-citizens than communities with high ED use,” said the study’s author, Peter Cunningham, a senior fellow at the Center for Studying Health System Change in Washington, D.C. 

By moving the burden on to individuals for their own health care, the governor is recognizing preventative care as the most important aspect of staying healthy. 

“Preventative health care requires the belief that what I do today can prevent a health problem tomorrow,” Tapia said. “But unfortunately, with many Latinos and Asians, there’s a strong sense of external control, a sense of que sera, sera.” 

Wade Rose, vice president of External and Government Relations at Catholic Health Service West, believes that “the American psyche defining health care as an individual’s responsibility” is wrong. Health care is “a societal problem” he says, and Americans “should come together as a society and come to a [collective] decision to take care of members of our society.” 

As he puts it, “Are we our brother’s keeper? The answer is yes.”  

Viji Sundaram is health care editor at New America Media.

Froilan Chan-Liongco didn’t hear the explosion that incinerated his clothes and left him with second and third degree burns on the lower part of his body. As a welder at Romic Environmental Technologies’ hazardous waste recycling facility in East Palo Alto for 16 years, he’d seen his fair share of chemical fires at work, but this one caught him by surprise. 

After months of recovery, Chan-Liongco feels burned in more ways than one. Suddenly, the 64-year-old Filipino immigrant—who resigned because of the company’s handling of the incident—finds himself working with protesters he was once told to ignore by company managers. 

For the past 15 years, Romic has been embroiled in a fists-up fight with residents of East Palo Alto, who claim the company has been polluting their community with toxic waste and avoiding closure of its plant by holding regulatory agencies at bay. 

One of those agencies, the Department of Toxic Substances Control (DTSC), slapped Romic with 28 violations from 1999 to 2004—everything from mislabeling chemicals to storing them in unauthorized places—resulting in a 2005 settlement of $849,500 in penalties. Another, the California Occupational Safety and Health Administration (CalOSHA), discovered 57 violations at the plant from 1988 to 2004, totaling $163,360 in fines. 

Incredibly, Romic’s DTSC permit expired in 1991; despite some extensions, it has been operating with a provisional permit for the last 11 years. Community members who oppose the plant believe that in Chan-Liongco, they’ve found the smoking gun whose testimony could shut it down for good. 

After years of mounting pressure from local community groups, the DTSC is finally investigating whether or not to approve Romic’s operating permit. Chan-Loingco’s accident is one of the factors the agency will consider in its deliberations. 

High tech’s dirty laundry 

Underneath the controversy over Romic is a larger story about one of Silicon Valley’s least-talked-about exports: toxic waste. Romic specializes in industrial recycling of liquid waste—solvents, inks, acids and other dangerous chemicals that are involved in the production of computer parts. The importation of this waste into their community has East Palo Alto residents worried, and many believe it is no coincidence that Romic’s plant is allowed to continue operating, despite multiple safety violations, in an area whose residents are 97 percent people of color. 

“There is a blind eye cast upon how businesses operate in communities like ours,” says Annie Loya, an organizer for Youth United for Community Action, an environmental justice organization based in East Palo Alto. 

At a time when some teenagers are busy Myspacing themselves into cybercomas, the East Palo Alto youth at YUCA spend their evenings sifting through almost unintelligible state regulatory reports. They are battle-tested organizers topped off with teenage swagger—an underestimated, yet effective, combination. They have been at it for over 12 years, and have waged an effective campaign, drawing other community organizations, legislators (most recently U.S. Rep. Anna Eshoo) and environmental advocates into their fight. 

Loya, 22, has worked with the group since she was 13. She says the chemicals Romic works with are polluting the city and increasing the risk of cancer and asthma. When her group conducted their own health survey of over 700 East Palo Alto residents, they found that one out of every four 13-to-21-year-old had asthma, and found cancer rates for all ages to be well above the rest of San Mateo County. 

Tragedy of errors 

Sixty-four-year-old Chan-Liongco has trouble sitting for long periods of time since his injury. He shifts in his seat in his Union City apartment as he tells the story of Tank 104. 

Romic has over 100 tanks containing mostly flammable or combustible liquid, according to Chan-Liongco’s OSHA report. Tank 104, which had previously contained solvent-contaminated wastewater, ignited as he was cutting a hole on the top. He had conducted all the required safety precautions, he says, but there was one reading that had raised his suspicion before the accident. 

“I went to our safety manager to see what I should do. He said to just go ahead, that it was safe,” Chan-Liongco says. According to the OSHA report, Chan-Liongco then climbed back up on top of the 26-foot-high, 12,000 gallon steel tanker to begin his work. 

As soon as Chan-Liongco brought his lit torch to the tank, the explosion rocked him back. He was trapped, strapped by his harness to the tank itself. 

“I felt my body burning, and saw my work clothes burned off,” says Chan-Liongco. Another Romic employee rushed to shut off the oxygen and acetylene valves. Chan-Liongco says he heard a number of workers yelling to call 911. But an unexpected accident turned even more bizarre, Chan-Liongco says, when his manager decided not to call 911. 

Chan-Liongco says he went to the locker room, where another worker gave him some underwear and he put on his street clothes. According to Chan-Liongco, his manager instructed him to wait in the lobby, where he sat for close to two hours. 

“I remember how long the time was because I couldn’t really even sit because of the pain, and wanted to go to the hospital already,” says Chan-Liongco. 

In a phone interview, Mary Kilgo, the plant’s director of operations, denied that Chan-Loingco waited in the Romic lobby at all, saying that “he must have meant the hospital lobby,” and that he was taken to the hospital immediately. 

When asked why he thinks Romic did not call 911, or at least request an ambulance, Chan-Liongco pauses, leans forward and says, “I think they were trying to cover their ... you know.” 

A plant safety manager eventually drove Chan-Liongco to Stanford Medical Center, which does not have a burn unit. Unable to receive treatment there, Chan-Liongco was put on morphine and an ambulance took him to Santa Clara Valley Medical Center. 

According to OSHA compliance officer Vajie Motiafard, Romic should have known which hospital to go to, because they’d made the same mistake two years earlier, when another employee was burned on his legs and left arm while cleaning a tanker. 

In all, from the time of the incident, it took over six hours for Chan-Liongco to receive the needed medical attention. 

The aftermath 

As soon as Chan-Loingco got home from his 11-day hospital stay, he started looking for legal assistance. He eventually found Alex Bravo of Sacramento and Bert Vega of Vallejo, both Tagalog-speaking attorneys. Together, they are filing a willful-misconduct claim against Romic. Chan-Liongco returned to the East Palo Alto plant one last time in August, to submit his resignation letter. 

In November 2006, Chan-Liongco got a call from YUCA organizers. “I remember seeing the protesters outside, but we were always told to not pay attention to them and drive right by them,” says Chan-Liongco. Now, those same protestors are his staunchest allies. 

YUCA—which is also working in partnership with Indian elders in Arizona to combat another Romic facility—had been stepping up its fight against the East Palo Alto plant even before talking to Chan-Loingco. In the late-night hours of June 6, a Romic tanker had a chemical leak that produced a vapor made up of 15 different chemicals. Police told residents to stay indoors within a half-mile perimeter surrounding the plant. Romic claims the release did not affect residents, but community members, many of whom said they saw a large plume spanning over 200 yards coming from the facility, complained of headaches and skin, ear, and throat irritations after the release. 

The June leak, coupled with the Chan-Liongco incident, does not bode well for Romic. The East Palo Alto City Council, once a defender of the plant because of the tax revenue it brought in, recently voted unanimously to oppose Romic’s permit to operate. Another East Palo Alto councilmember, Ruben Abrica, has tried to meet with Romic’s client companies to raise money to relocate the waste company. 

“When the day comes, we can all pitch in, get trucks and help them move out,” Abrica says. 

Angela Blanchette, spokeswoman for the DTSC, has been very busy lately as community groups like YUCA begin to target the regulatory agency’s lack of action. Once of YUCA’s most recent tactics was to send the DTSC office a “Deny the Permit” teddy bear handmade by a YUCA member’s mother. The DTSC told YUCA organizers that it will release a new timeline for the permit decision at the end of January. For now, Blanchette said, the permit decision “is temporarily on hold in order to conduct the investigations required that may have an impact on the decision.” 

Chan-Loingco is still recuperating from his injuries, and will have his hands full with the lawyers, courts and regulatory agencies over the next year. While his newfound activism seems to have given him some peace, one cannot help but wonder, as he lifts his shirt to show his wounds: What if the DTSC had conducted its investigations earlier, sometime over the 15 years since the last permit expired? Would Chan-Loingco have these burns? Would the residents of East Palo Alto have been exposed to a chemical plume in their neighborhood in June? And will voices of those like Chan-Loingco and his YUCA allies finally be heard, or will the lowest-income parts of Silicon Valley continue to be the dumping ground for high tech’s dirtiest secrets? 

Raj Jayadev is the editor of Silicon Valley De-bug, a collective of writers, artists workers and activists in San Jose.

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. 

Meanwhile, results of a city attorney’s investigation into the winning campaign will be revealed next Thursday, the same day the new law will take effect unless backers of an electoral referendum on the new law can gathered the needed signatures. 

In the most hotly contested issue in November’s election, Berkeley voters rejected Measure J, a preservationist-backed initiative to save the city’s existing LPO, by a 57-43 margin, after a bitter campaign in which supporters were heavily outspent by a developer-funded campaign by the Chamber of Commerce’s Political Action Committee, Business for Better Government (BBG). 

But the controversy lingers, and the city attorney’s office is trying to find out who funded the extensive, expensive telephone poll conducted in July that asked prospective voters about arguments that would lead them to vote against the initiative.  

So far, no one has admitted to bankrolling the poll, ordered by a San Francisco firm which has worked for Assemblymember Loni Hancock, a former Berkeley mayor and spouse of Mayor Tom Bates, a co-sponsor of the council’s ordinance. 

Results of the city attorney’s investigation looking into the poll and other complaints stemming from the November election will be released Thursday, as the new LPO takes effects, unless ... 

On Dec. 12, the day councilmembers voted 6-2 to adopt the new law, opponents filed papers to force a public referendum, triggering a 30-day period to gather the 4,100 signatures needed to force an up or down vote during the next general or special election. 

If they get the needed signatures—something campaign activist Laurie Bright says “is a better than 50-50 chance”—Berkeley’s election law would block enactment of the new LPO until voters could decide. The law bars calling a special election on the issue, but the question could be included in a special election forced by another issue. 

Otherwise the vote would occur at the next regularly scheduled election. 

Controversial features 

The Nov. 7 vote defeating Measure J paved the way for City Council approval of a rival ordinance drafted by Mayor Tom Bates and City Council colleague Laurie Capitelli—a law backed by developers who contend the existing law has led to needless and costly delays caused by battles with project foes who use landmarking petitions as weapons of last resort. 

One key feature of the council’s measure particularly alarmed preservationists, the creation of a new bureaucratic procedure called the request for determination (RFD). 

Praised by developers, the RFD allowed a property owner to file an application with the city seeking a ruling from the Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC), the council-appointed body which oversees the LPO and rules on landmarking requests. 

Unless the LPC declared that the property qualified as either a landmark or a structure of merit, the two classes of landmarking provided in both versions of the ordinance, the developer would be granted a two-year “safe harbor” period during which the property would be exempt from landmarking efforts. 

Preservationists fear the RFD will allow developers to plot projects without alerting the community, then announce them after they have secured the two-year exemption; developers said they needed the exemption to be able to avoid costly delays from landmarking petitions filed after they’d already commenced critical stages of the development process.  

Councilmembers approved the Bates/Capitelli ordinance July 11, and were scheduled to take the second and final vote during a special meeting two weeks later. 

Instead, Bates pulled the vote off the calendar after preservationists Bright and Roger Marquis petitioned the city clerk to gather signatures for a ballot initiative to preserve the existing LPO, making minor corrections to ensure conformity with changes in state law. 

Before the scheduled second vote and after word had spread of a possible initiative drive, someone spent tens of thousands of dollars on an extensive telephone poll targeting Berkeley residents with questions about specific arguments that could entice them into a no vote on a measure to keep the city’s existing landmark law. 

Many of those issues ended up in BBG’s campaign mailers.  

Callers from Communications Center Incorporated, a polling firm with bases in Spokane, Wash., and Lakeland, Fla., saturated the city with an extensive list of questions prepared by David Binder Research, the San Francisco pollster whose clients have included Hancock, Willie Brown and Gavin Newsom among others. 

Just who bankrolled the calls remains a mystery, and no spending reports were ever filed despite state and city laws mandating the filing of all election-related expenses. 

After complaints were lodged with the city’s Fair Campaign Practices Commission, Deputy City Attorney Kristy van Herick began an investigation, the results of which will be mailed to the FCPC a week in advance of its next meeting Jan. 18. 

Even without adding in the expense of a poll that could have cost upwards of $50,000, the Chamber’s PAC outspent Measure J supporters by as much as four to one. Most of the funds came from developers, although one of the most controversial, Patrick Kennedy, said he gave he gave $5,000 on the condition none of it went to opposing Measure J. 

The biggest bucks came from developers, and from retired software executive A. George Battle, who gave BBG $14,000 four days before the election. 

Referendum  

For preservationists, defeat at the polls was a lost battle, not an end to a political war, even when, following the certification of the election returns, councilmembers voted Dec. 12 to approve the mayor’s ordinance—which had been altered shortly before the meeting to include a provision making the law an all-or-nothing measure. 

That legal move blocked any effort to challenge only portions of the law such as the RFD, and forced an up-or-down vote. 

Responding to the news of the referendum, Capitelli said, “Well God bless ‘em. I would hope people would stop and think before signing.” Cisco De Vries, chief of staff for the vacationing Mayor Tom Bates, said, “It’s kind of like that movie Groundhog Day, where the same things happen over and over again.” 

But Bright said Wednesday that community members are responding positively to the 15 to 20 signature-gatherers who can be found throughout the city at any given moment. 

“Despite starting out with one-and-a-half hands tied behind our backs, we’re fairly optimistic,” he said. “We’re trying to get everything right this time, and we’re staying in constant touch with each other.” 

Bright said campaigners are applying lessons learned from the Measure J defeat. 

“We did very poorly in the council districts where very popular councilmembers were strongly opposed to the measure, for instance in district 5 and 8,” the political bases of Capitelli and Gordon Wozniak. “We thought we could get people to vote around their council people, but we were wrong.” 

Instead, the signature gatherers are concentrated on the Berkeley flatlands, home of the strongest Measure J support. Two of those districts, 4 and 7, are home to Dona Spring and Kriss Worthington, critics of the Bates/Capitelli law. Two other districts targeted by the petitioners are 2 and 3, home to Darryl Moore and Max Anderson, who voted for the Mayor’s measure. 

“We’re bolstering the areas where we have the most supporters because they are the people who are the most affected by neighborhood demolitions and overbuilding,” he said.

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. 

Their symbolic gesture highlights UC Berkeley’s dominant role as both builder and destroyer—creator of massive, tax-exempt edifices and destroyer both of old buildings and of a fragile consensus. 

The latest battle in the ongoing struggle between an increasingly overtaxed and understaffed city government and an university seen by some as imperial and sometimes imperious erupted over the university’s plans to embark on a massive expansion plan in the southeast quadrant of the main campus. 

Among eight projects planned for the area are a major reconstruction of California Memorial Stadium, adding high, luxury skyboxes and new seating to an aging structure built in one of the most hazardous places possible—directly over the Bay Area’s hottest earthquake fault in a wildfire hazard area served by narrow, aging roads. 

To build the first of those projects—a 132,500-square-foot, four-story high tech gym and office complex—university officials plan to demolish the city’s last remaining grove of flatland coastal live oaks, which triggered the protesters’ arboreal ascent and a trio of lawsuits. 

And, as if to dramatize the conflict, the Hayward Fault ended the year with a swarm of spasms of its own, most originating from deep beneath the surface and centered scarcely a mile from the stadium.  

But the Southeast Campus Integrated Projects (SCIP) isn’t the only source of conflict with the city. Immediately adjacent to the SCIP sites is Bowles Hall, a venerable residential hall the university wants to turn into posh living quarters for corporate executives taking classes at a new executive education center planned by the Haas School of Business. 

More rooms would be provided in a second new structure, and a third building would house classrooms and office space for the program. 

Another controversy centers on the university’s plans to add more than 800,000 square feet of new uses outside campus in the heart of downtown Berkeley—the central focus of the committee now working to formulate a new downtown plan for the city. 

(A fourth controversy over university development plans is underway outside Berkeley’s city limits, where the university has temporarily shelved plans to develop a two-million-square-foot complex of corporate and academic research facilities planned for the school’s Richmond Field Station. For more on this project, see the article on East Bay development elsewhere in this issue.) 

Downtown dreams 

The university’s plans for downtown Berkeley—first unveiled in the Long Range Development Plan (LRDP) for 2020—sparked outrage and a lawsuit by the city that ultimately led to the settlement that mandated the current downtown planning effort. 

The two major sites of planned projects are the block bounded by Oxford, Addison and Center Streets and Shattuck Avenue and the old state Department of Health Services (DHS) high-rise two blocks to the north. 

Plans for two of the university’s major Center Street projects took major leaps forward in 2006. 

Carpenter & Co., the Massachusetts firm chosen by the university to develop a hotel and meeting center, is moving on plans for a 19-story hotel at the corner of Shattuck and Center. That building will house both hotel rooms and condos, as well as meeting facilities and underground parking. 

The university’s Berkeley Art Museum/Pacific Film Archive capped the year with a public introduction of Toyo Ito, the innovative Japanese architect chosen by the museum to design the building that will fill the eastern end of the block. 

Unlike the museum complex, which remains under university ownership, the hotel and condos are considered a private development—and thus a source of substantial new revenue for city, county and state tax coffers. 

Even without the new projects, the university remains a major property owner in downtown area. 

Under California law, the university pays no property taxes on sites it owns, and the owners of space leased to the university pay no taxes on whatever portion of the site is used by the school for academic purposes. 

However, spaces the university leases to private interests—often corporations working on university-related research projects—do pay a fee equivalent to the property tax that would be otherwise assessed. 

The precise impacts of the 800,000 square feet of proposed university expansion downtown will depend in part on the amount of space that yields revenue to the city. Settlement of the LRDP lawsuit bars any further action by the city to collect through the courts. 

DAPAC 

Another condition of the settlement is playing out on the second floor of the North Berkeley Senior Center, where members of the Downtown Area Plan Advisory Committee (DAPAC) are formulating their recommendations for the new plan mandated in the LRDP accord. 

The committee is charged by the City Council with submitting a draft plan no later than November 2007, or the university will deduct $15,000 for every month of delay from the university’s settlement-mandated $1.2 million annual payment to compensate the city for some of the impacts caused the expansion program. The university has also agreed to pay for half of the costs—up to $250,000—for conducting an environmental impact report on the new plan.  

Some of the funds are paying the salary of Matt Taecker, the principal planner hired by the city to work on the plan. 

Of the commission’s 21 voting members, three were picked by the Planning Commission from its own ranks and each city councilmember picked two. 

Chair Will Travis, one of the two picks of Mayor Tom Bates, tried to keep a tight rein on members, but got off on the wrong foot when he invited UC to name four non-voting representatives to sit on DAPAC without asking the committee. 

A small rebellion followed, and a confrontation with member Patti Dacey—one of his ongoing sources of agita. After admitting he’d goofed, Travis accepted the committee’s compromise number of three. 

Travis also lost a battle to block a move by Planning Commission Chair Helen Burke to create a DAPAC subcommittee to focus on Center Street, and the block between Shattuck and Oxford that will house a university museum/film archive and the university-backed hotel. 

When it came time for a vote, only Travis and DAPAC member Dororthy Walker opposed. Walker is a retired UC Berkeley executive. 

One of the important issues the committee must confront is the role of preservation in the new plan—a battle Taecker recently told preservationists they had already won. 

More controversy is sure to dog the committee during the year to come. 

SCIP and not 

While the city’s settlement of the LRDP lawsuit blocked any future legal challenges to most university projects, the agreement specifically excluded the Memorial Stadium area. 

So the city could sue with impunity when elected and appointed officials became increasingly anxious at the scope of the projects included in the SCIP environmental impact report (EIR). 

In addition to the gym—or Student Athlete High Performance Center—the university plans to build a 911-car underground parking lot northwest of the stadium and build a 186,000-square-foot “connection building” integrating faculty offices and meeting rooms for the Boalt Hall, the university’s law school, and the Haas School of Business. 

A major issue yet to be resolved is whether the gym is structurally detached from Memorial Stadium, a question of both engineering and law. Critics note that the university’s EIR didn’t distinguish it from the stadium, in which case the addition would be barred by the Alquist-Priolo Act, which bars new building on or within 50 feet of active faults. 

That same law bans renovations to affected buildings if they exceed half of the structure’s value. Project critics say that figure should be based on the stadium’s existing value, while the university insists that the basis should be replacement cost—two numbers that could vary by eight or nine figures. 

The law also poses legal issues for Bowles Hall, which earlier studies have indicated intersects two separate “traces” of the Hayward Fault.  

Major changes are also proposed to the Gayley Road streetscape, a city landmark and the creation of Frederick Law Olmsted, America’s premiere landscape architect and the designer of New York City’s Central Park. 

The Bowles Hall project wasn’t included in the SCIP EIR, though critics, including Berkeley Planning and Development Director Dan Marks, have charged that the project should have been included with the others because California law bars “piecemealing” of major development projects. 

City officials say they’re worried about traffic congestion that will arise both from construction itself, from an expanded events calendar at the stadium and from the other new buildings nearby. 

But the biggest concerns involve public safety in the event of an earthquake or wildfire. A disaster during a major event would overtax limited city emergency services and cut off residents who live on Panoramic Hill above the stadium. 

The Panoramic Hill Association filed one of the suits challenging the decision by UC Regents to approve the SCIP projects. A third was filed by the California Oaks Foundation, which challenges the proposed chainsawing of the grove. 

A court hearing on the actions has been set for Thursday.

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. 

The Zoning Adjustments Board—which approves permits—ended the year with preliminary approvals for the highly contested project dubbed the Trader Joe’s building, a five-story condo project at 2701 Shattuck Ave., the new West Berkeley bus maintenance facility for the Berkeley Unified School District and the demolition of the Drayage, once a thriving if illegal live/work center for innovative West Berkeley artists. 

The year also witnessed approvals of: 

• a new Berkeley Bowl at 920 Heinz Ave. in West Berkeley, a project which had divided residents and businesses in the area. Construction, though, hasn’t begun. 

• a 171-unit housing-over-commercial project that will occupy a block of West Berkeley at 700 University Ave. and lead to the demolition of a once-landmarked building that now houses Celia’s Mexican Restaurant. City councilmembers overturned a structure of merit designation for the building, clearing the way for demolition. 

That decision also dooms the building housing Brennan’s Irish Pub, a West Berkeley institution slated to occupy a landmarked railroad station that will remain at the lot’s northwestern corner. 

• the Berkeley Unified School District’s plans for an enhanced bus maintenance center, along with offices and classrooms, at 1325 Sixth St. at the corner of Gilman St. 

Though Mayor Tom Bates had asked the district to include commercial space on the Gilman Street edge of the project to enhance commercial uses on that stretch of freeway accessible roadway, the district said they had none to spare. 

• an unopposed ZAB vote to approve a new four story 95,771 square foot mini-storage building at 1120 Second St. 

• a City Council vote to uphold, over an appeal by neighbors, ZAB’s approval of a 30-unit, five-story residential-over-commercial project at 1201 San Pablo Ave.  

Another hotly contested project opened for business, the Library Gardens apartments, located between the Berkeley Public Library and Berkeley High School in the heart of downtown. Construction had commenced with a sledgehammer blow from Bates that began the demolition of a popular downtown parking structure. 

Downtown will lose more parking—at least temporarily—in the coming year when construction begins at the David Brower Center and housing complex planned for the city’s Oxford Street Parking lot. 

A final and equally contested project opened at the end of the year, the new Hills Fire Station at the intersection of Shasta Road and Park Gate at the summit of the Berkeley Hills, built at the cost of nearly $1,000 a square foot. 

Previews, others actions 

Several major projects were previewed for city officials and regulatory bodies, though the formal permit process hasn’t begun. 

Two are in West Berkeley and another would add a collection of upscale residences to the ground of a landmarked mansion in the hills. 

Doug Herst, the former owner of Peerless Lighting, proposes a 5.5-acre project that would cover much of two square blocks in West Berkeley and feature a signature biotech building, condos, live/work spaces for artists and spaces for “incubating” business start-ups. 

The city has already adopted one of Herst’s proposals—a new definition of “artist” expanded to include creators of high tech and digital works. 

Preliminary designs for a “green” condo complex at 2747 San Pablo Ave., presented to ZAB at their last meeting of the year, won nearly unanimous praise, both for the building’s environmentally sensitive and resource-conserving design and for a design ZAB members said reflected a rare sensitivity to neighboring residences. 

Representatives of a Southern California developer told the Landmarks Preservation Commission they plan to build seven luxury homes on the grounds of the landmarked Spring Estate at 1960 San Antonio. The mansion would be refurbished, but another landmarked structure would be demolished. 

ZAB declared two liquor stores public nuisances after neighbors and police complained. The board imposed limited hours and other conditions on Black & White Liquors at 3027 Adeline St., and the City Council upheld ZAB’s decision to order the closure of Dwight Way Liquor at 2440 Sacramento St., both because of sales to minor and other operational issues and because of conflicting statements about who actually owned the business. 

Ashby BART 

Perhaps the greatest controversy erupted over the City Council’s decision late in 2005 to grant ex post facto approval to an application for a CalTrans grant to formulate plans for what was then labeled a massive housing complex atop the Ashby BART station’s western parking lot. 

Though the application specified a minimum of 300 units—far larger than any other private housing project in the city—project consultant Ed Church said the figure was based on an erroneous calculation of the developable area of the site. 

Outraged neighbors and supporters of the Berkeley Flea Market—which is held on the lot every weekend—raised a ruckus, leading the council to disavow their earlier action and support creation of a task force by the South Berkeley Neighborhood Development Corporation (SBNDC), the non-profit picked as the official developer. 

More confrontations followed, and Mayor Tom Bates, neighborhood City Councilmember Max Anderson and Church retreated somewhat, saying he 300-unit figure was based on an errononeous conception of the available lot area. 

CalTrans, bombarded with complaints from neighbors, rejected the grant application, and Bates said he suggested expanding the area for development to the length of Adeline from Shattuck to Martin Luther King Jr. Way. 

Councilmembers voted a $40,000 to fund a task force picked by Church and SBNDC to develop proposals. But by the year’s end, the task force was in limbo after challenges were raised about private meetings the group had held private meetings without public notice, and whether the panel was governed by the Brown Act, which regulates public meetings in California. 

A polarized neighborhood is waiting to see what happens next. 

Artists banished 

2006 also brought an end to two Berkeley havens for artists, the Nexus Collective and gallery and the Drayage. 

The last artists were evicted from Nexus in August following a legal confrontation that pitted a pair of honored non-profits in courtroom combat. The Drayage community was gone even before the year started. 

For 31 years, Nexus had provided a home to a collection of artists and artisans who created works in its studios and displayed them in its gallery, both housed in a collection of buildings owned by the Berkeley East Bay Humane Society at 651 Addison St. 

The fracas arose from the humane society’s need to expand it facilities, and its choice to evict its long-time tenant. A move to landmark two of the buildings, one a brick structure and the other a metal shop building resulted in a decision by the Landmarks Preservation Commission to designate the former and reject the latter. 

But that didn’t stop the humane society, which pressed ahead. Costly litigation only left the artists poorer, and led many to sever their ties even before the eviction became final. 

The last of the artists was evicted in August. 

When the year started, the Drayage was already vacant following eviction orders from the city and protracted negotiations between the owner and angry tenants. 

A former warehouse illegally but innovatively transformed into an imaginative collection of live/work spaces, shops and studios next to the Union Pacific tracks in South Berkeley, the Drayage provided a unique space and a strong sense of community. 

In the end, developer Chris Hudson and Evan McDonald created a limited liability corporation to develop the site and won approval of demolition during ZAB’s last meeting of the year. 

Two similar buildings had already vanished a few years earlier, leaving Berkeley with ever-fewer spaces for working artists. 

Another collective, the Crucible at 1036 Ashby Ave., was forced to move to Oakland after run-ins with city officials in 2002, and the artists who inhabited the live/work spaces in another former warehouse at 2750 Adeline St. were evicted after a sale in 2001.  

Artists in one of the last remaining sizeable live/work buildings at 800 Heinz Ave. ended the year worried about a proposed development next door at 740 Heinz that could shadow much of the building from the natural light the artists say is crucial for their work. 

Plans for that project, proposed by Wareham Development, are still pending. 

Trader Joe’s 

With their year-end approval of the Hudson/McDonald project, now known as the Trader Joe’s building, ZAB set the stage for an inevitable appeal by neighbors, who have threatened legal action if they can’t win a change in the plans for a project that will be 148 new apartments and a trendy market for the heavily traveled intersection of University Avenue and Martin Luther King Jr. Way. 

The developers scored a major coup by landing Trader Joe’s as their principal tenant, ensuring an outpouring of support. 

Strangely for Berkeley, the aggressively non-union chain owned by a German big box retailer which once belonged to the Hitler Youth (albeit membership was compulsory for boys at the time) boasts a following verging on the fanatical. 

Neighbors objected to the size of the project, along with the threat of vanished parking and increased congestion on already crowded neighborhood streets. 

But barring a court ruling to the contrary the project once known as the Kragen Auto Parts project after a current tenant of the mini-mall that now occupies the site seems a foregone conclusion.

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. 

Still, the city’s $300 million budget wasn’t enough to fund all that the citizens and their representatives would have liked and so the 2007 wish lists are lengthy. 

District 6 Councilmember Betty Olds has worked to get a new fire station in her district since she came to office in 1992. Nov. 11, the modern Shasta Road station finally opened, but not without concern on the part of the fire-conscious city. This station, as the others in Berkeley, faces periodic “brownouts,” temporary, rotating closures due to insufficient funding. 

“The firehouse opening was a great thing,” Olds said. “But one of the things I had hoped to do [in 2006] was to have the firehouses open all year.” 

The council will discuss full funding for fire protection when it considers its budget in February. 

Another budget question will be renewing police and social services the council added to Telegraph Avenue and Downtown in July, after the highly-publicized closure of Cody’s on Telegraph. 

Police and social services for the Telegraph-Downtown area were cut several years ago. Making the funding a permanent part of the budget will be a priority for Councilmembers Kriss Worthington and Dona Spring. 

Worthington underscored that it’s not simply additional funding that is important, but a commitment to community-Involved policing, where officers who patrol specific locations get to know people who live in or frequent the area. 

Cody’s Telegraph closure (the store’s remaining stores on Fourth Street and San Francisco were sold in September to Tokyo-based businessman Hiroshi Kagawa) caused the council to take a hard look at the Telegraph commercial corridor.  

The council provided for new cleaning machines and, more important, supported changes in the permitting process which, when approved, will facilitate locating new businesses on the Avenue and allow restaurants to stay open late into the evening. The council will vote on the permit changes this month or next. 

Worthington said he hopes that in the new year the city manager will agree with the 70 merchants who petitioned to allow evening parking in yellow zones on Telegraph. 

Housing is a big issue for many councilmembers. Worthington wants to see what he calls “truly affordable housing” built—housing for families earning $20,000-to-$30,000 annually. He said it was a victory for the council to place $1 million (a loan from the city’s general fund) last year in the Housing Trust Fund for low-income housing. 

Both Councilmembers Linda Maio and Laurie Capitelli point to housing and retail to be built at 1100 Harrison St. as a success. A developer proposed a project that neighbors said was too massive for the area. Capitelli mediated a compromise that he says was a major accomplishment of 2006. 

“Having been a developer in the past, I understood the process,” Capitelli said, explaining that he was able to broker a compromise that minimized the loss of profit for the developer and maximized the reduction of the impact the project would have on neighbors. 

Councilmember Max Anderson lauded another neighborhood compromise proposed in 2006: “Curvy Derby.” For about a decade, the school district has wanted to build a regulation-size baseball field on its property at Martin Luther King Way and Derby Street. But that would entail closing Derby between Milvia Street and Martin Luther King, something farmers’ market aficionados object to —the Ecology Center Farmers’ Market uses the street each Tuesday.  

Last year, however, a group of citizens designed a compromise: reconfiguring Derby to form an arc half way up the block to Milvia. A corner of the baseball diamond would fit squarely in that curvature.  

“After 10 years, it looks like it’s on its way,” Anderson said. The first phase of the project, which is not controversial, is underway—developing new sports fields for the Martin Luther King-Derby-Milvia-Carlton Street block as it is currently configured. 

“I’m hoping over time that we can reach the same sort of consensus on the Ashby BART site,” Anderson said, referring to a proposed housing/retail development that caused an outcry a year ago by neighbors left out of the loop.  

Anderson said he has “slowed the process down” and was “hoping some of the good will can spill over from Curvy Derby.” 

Councilmember Spring points to complex land-use issues where she has had success, such as setting up a multi-commission task force to create an ordinance for applying state density bonus requirements (extra height permitted for developers who include low-income units in a project). 

But sometimes council accomplishments come small, such as when Spring helped save the 40-year-old Channing Way freebox known as the Wishing Well that the city said illegally-encroached on the sidewalk.  

“People come to Berkeley to live because of amenities like this,” nearby resident John Lynch told the Daily Planet in June. “It is a great way to care for the local community.” 

Spring and Councilmember Darryl Moore have worked to better regulate the overabundant Southwest Berkeley liquor stores that attract loitering and criminal activity. While the regulations are still in the works, Moore points to success in shutting down Dwight Way Liquors. “It took eight-to-10 years to get it resolved,” he said.  

Two other important laws passed in 2006. One, a revision of the Creeks Ordinance, designed to protect the city’s waterways, regulates where people can build near creeks and culverts. The other, a revision of the Landmarks Preservation Ordinance, makes it easier for property owners to demolish older structures. Signatures are being gathered for a referendum on this ordinance.  

While new issues confront the council regularly, old problems that persist will be addressed in 2007.  

Perhaps one of the most difficult to resolve is violence among young people.  

2006 saw three violent deaths among teens and young adults. In February, Juan Carlos Ramos, a Contra Costa College student, was stabbed to death at a teen house party on Contra Costa Avenue and in the same month, 24-year-old Keith Stephens was shot and killed on Carrison Street. In September, Wayne Drummond, 23, died of a gunshot wound to the torso he likely received somewhere in the Telegraph Avenue area near campus. 

One way to address youth violence is giving young people a safe place to go. Moore said he is working on a youth center, something that was proposed years ago. “It’s moving slower than I would have liked,” he said. 

Worthington is hoping that Berkeley will finally adopt a “sunshine” ordinance—“one with teeth,” he said. The law would expand community access to public information and facilitate the public’s participation in city government. A workshop on the ordinance is slated for February. 

Maio would like to find a way to fund the city’s crumbling storm drain system and permanently avoid the flooding Berkeley saw in early 2006. “We are not able to really control [flooding] without major investment in our storm system infrastructure, but I intend to make that a priority in my current term,” Maio said. 

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. 

Win at Honda  

It takes a community to build a labor movement, according to Harry Brill, retired University of Massachusetts sociology professor and one of the founders of the Berkeley Labor and Community Coalition. 

The community-worker coalition formed as the Berkeley Honda Labor and Community Coalition, but dropped Honda from its name after the 10-month struggle ended with a win for the workers, members of Machinist Local 1546 and Teamster Local 78. 

Trouble began in June 2005 when new owners refused to rehire about half the Honda workforce and downgraded health insurance and pensions.  

Outraged, customers joined workers, activists like Brill, members of St. Joseph the Worker Church’s Social Justice Committee, the East Bay Labor Committee for Peace & Justice, public officials and others for daily pickets and twice-weekly rallies. The machinists brought in a 15-foot inflatable rat that became a community icon over the months it took for the workers to win back their jobs and benefits.  

Most effective, said Brill in an interview last week, was the community-organized boycott and its support by a unanimous City Council. “We reduced business on the service end by 70 percent,” Brill said, adding that the union would have been unable to sustain the effort on its own.  

Victory was declared in April with the community members ending the boycott and encouraging Berkeley Honda patronage. 

Claremont Win 

Another victory had been feted by workers and community members the month before the Honda worker’s victory. The dispute at the Claremont Resort & Spa, the majestic 92-year hotel that straddles the Oakland-Berkeley border, spanned more than four years and affected some 400 hospitality workers. Unionized food-service and hotel employees were working without a contract and spa workers were fighting for the right to organize. 

As with the Honda dealership, sustained outside support was key. “There was a lot of community support and political support,” Wei-Ling Huber, president of Unite HERE, the Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Union Local 2850, told the Daily Planet last week. 

Over the years, picketers included City Councilmembers Max Anderson, Dona Spring, Maudelle Shirek, Kriss Worthington, Mayor Tom Bates and former Mayor Shirley Dean. 

“It was an enormous victory for our union,” Huber said, noting negotiated phased-in raises will eventually bring worker pay up to the area union standard. A key element of the union victory was the unionization of about 130 spa workers. 

One of the difficulties in negotiations was getting hotel management to provide health benefits for employees—particularly spa workers—working less than a 40-hour week. These employees “do not work 40 hours, but they are expected to be available,” Huber said. 

Doubletree Hotel Transition 

Local 2850 is also involved in labor issues at the Doubletree Hotel, bought last year from Boykin Lodging by the Canadian-based Westmont Hospitality Group, which took over running the 378-room hotel at the Berkeley Marina in September. 

First unionized six years ago after a year-long struggle that included a City Council-initiated boycott, Doubletree workers had been without a contract since January 2006. When Westmont took over, workers negotiated what Huber calls a “transition contract,” with the new owners. Workers got raises retroactive to January, but “we continue to have challenges in this industry,” Huber said.  

The union is now in negotiations with the new owners for a multi-year contract. Sticking points are raises, health benefits and an improved grievance process. The hotel and workers will be back at the bargaining table this month. 

“We’re thinking of doing public actions if we don’t get the issues resolved,” Huber said. 

Shattuck Cinema In Negotiations 

While the hospitality industry becomes increasingly unionized, a movie-theater union is rare. In June, however, workers at the Shattuck Cinema, one of 56 Landmark Theaters, voted overwhelmingly to establish a union. One other Landmark Theater —the one in Cambridge, Mass.—is unionized. 

But neither has successfully negotiated labor contracts. 

“It’s a slow and tedious process,” said Hargitt Gill, organizer with the Industrial Workers of the World, better known as the Wobblies. 

Soon after the union was voted in, the company voluntarily raised wages. Eligibility for partially-employer-paid benefits continues to be an issue, as is the question of the theater becoming a union shop, where every worker must belong to the union.  

If negotiations are not successful, “we will be increasing the pressure, asking for the community to help us put more pressure on Landmark,” Gill said. 

Woodfin Workers Want Living Wage 

Emeryville’s Woodfin Suite Hotel is not unionized, but the workers there have wage and work guarantees under that city’s Measure C, a limited living wage ordinance that applies only to hotel workers. 

The Berkeley Labor and Community Coalition, Unite HERE 2850, the Alameda County Central Labor Committee and a number of other unions and organizations have joined the organizing efforts of the Oakland-based nonprofit, East Bay Alliance for a Sustainable Economy, to support the workers’ demand that the hotel implement Measure C, which, among other requirements, says that housekeepers must be paid one and one-half times their regular salary for each day they clean in excess of 5,000 square feet. (While the hotel says it is complying with the measure, the organizers say the hotel is not in compliance.) 

On Dec. 15 hotel management told some 24 workers there were problems with their Social Security numbers, distributed checks for two weeks advance pay, and told the workers they should fix the Social Security problem within two weeks, or not return to work at all. 

While hotel management said it was being generous by giving workers time to regularize their paper work, workers argued that the company was harassing them for demanding implementation of Measure C. 

The courts agreed that the workers should not be dismissed. On Dec. 21 Alameda County Superior Court Judge Ronald Sabraw granted workers a temporary restraining order, requiring the hotel to either keep employees on paid administrative leave or put them back to work. The order is in effect until Jan. 23. 

University Custodians Call for Equity 

UC Berkeley custodians, members of American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Local 3299, are also facing unresolved labor issues 

According to the union, a five-year UC Berkeley janitor earns about $12 an hour, while custodians working for five years at the nearby Peralta Community Colleges get $18.30 per hour.  

Speaking to the Daily Planet last week, AFSCME Communications Director William Schlitz pointed to the “executive pay scandal,” where it was discovered last year that the university was paying some of its administrators hundreds of thousands of dollars above their salary.  

“That’s a slap in the face for the custodians,” Schlitz said, promising to raise the level of public awareness of the custodian pay question. “2006 is just the start,” he said. 

Alta Bates/Summit Signs Contract 

Over at Alta Bates/Summit Hospital, part of Sutter Health, SEIU United Healthcare West hospital workers were victorious in February after working for two years without a contract. 

At issue was appropriate staffing levels and training, according to SEIU UHW Vice President John Borsos.  

During the protracted negotiations Alta Bates workers staged a walkout, but much of the pressure was put on Sutter to settle through a nine-week strike that ended in November 2005 at the California Pacific Medical Center in San Francisco, also a Sutter Health hospital. 

City Gets Involved 

Looking to the future, the council passed a resolution in June, calling on Berkeley Bowl management to support the workers’ right to organize at the to-be-built West Berkeley Bowl.  

Councilmember Dona Spring said last week she hopes the council will pass a similar resolution to support unionizing the Trader Joe’s, which just got permits to build at Martin Luther King Jr. Way and University Avenue. None of the more-than-200 Trader Joe’s stores are currently unionized. 

The City Council has gotten involved in workplace issues because of the “fundamental issue of the quality of life in the city,” said Councilmember Kriss Worthington, often among picketers or speakers at labor rallies. 

Sociologist Brill summed it up: “Part of building a democratic society is building a democratic workplace,” he said. 

2006 was not the year that California or Berkeley checked the power the purse has to skew elections. 

“Clean money”—public financing of elections—was soundly defeated on the state level, with 74 percent of the voters opposing Proposition 89. Berkeley voters bucked the trend, supporting the measure with 64.6 percent of the votes. The measure lost in Alameda County, winning only Emeryville and Albany in addition to Berkeley. 

Locally, the Berkeley City Council torpedoed public financing of elections when it refused in June to place the issue on the November ballot. 

In doing so, the council majority tossed aside the Fair Campaign Practices Commission’s recommendation to let voters weigh in on whether to underwrite the mayor and council races with public money. The council went on to nix a compromise proposal that would have addressed public financing only for the mayor’s race.  

Clean money advocate Sam Ferguson, now a Yale Law School student, worked on the 2006 public financing proposal and had previously tried in 2004 to bring clean money to the city through Measure H, which was defeated by Berkeley voters at the ballot box. 

Considering the Nov. 7 election contributions, Ferguson said election reform is needed in Berkeley more than ever. 

The District 7 campaign turned into a “political arms race,” Ferguson said, noting that challenger George Beier outspent incumbent Councilmember Kriss Worthington by more than two-to-one. Beier spent about $100,000 of which about $45,000 came from his personal wealth—Worthington raised and spent about $45,000. 

“We need to get a grip on this spending before it gets out of control,” Ferguson said, calling public financing of elections “such an obvious reform.” 

Along with Councilmembers Kriss Worthington and Dona Spring, Councilmember Darryl Moore has been a consistent supporter of public financing of elections. “I’m disappointed that Berkeley did not put it on the ballot,” he said in an interview last week, noting that public financing levels the electoral playing field. 

“People of color do not have the same kind of income,” said Moore, who is African American. 

Mayor Tom Bates, vacationing in India, said last year that he did not want to support public financing for the November ballot, for fear that if voters rejected it, as they had in 2004, it would be close to impossible to bring it back in the future. 

But Councilmember Laurie Capitelli told the Daily Planet last week that he thinks clean money might not be a valid local issue. 

“I’m not as concerned about the impact of money on elected officials locally because of what we have in place—fairly severe limits on contributions,” he said, referring to the $250 cap on contributions to local candidates by individuals. 

Capitelli said he is more concerned about the cost to the city of public financing. Funding for the mayor-council race, according to the draft measure that did not get on the ballot, would have cost the city about $500,000. For the mayor’s race alone, it would have cost the city about $300,000. 

Longtime clean-money advocate Jesse Townley said believing that spending caps for individual contributors is sufficient is “wishful thinking.” Townley contended that contributors bundle contributions through spouses and business partners. He said he thinks local developers have bought influence and skewed development in Berkeley to favor their interests, rather than those of the neighborhoods. 

“Whether it’s at the local or state or national level, big money muscles in—they want influence,” he said, adding that new local laws should address the influence of political action committees, given the role the Chamber of Commerce PAC played in the November elections. 

The chamber raised about $100,000 to defeat Measure J, the Landmarks Preservation ballot measure, to support Bates and to attempt to defeat Spring and Worthington.  

“Voters should be able to evaluate candidates based on their stances, not based on hit pieces,” Townley said, referring to the negative propaganda produced by the Chamber and the Beier campaigns. “This is no way to run a democracy,” he said, adding that he will be conferring with others about next steps to take to bring clean money to Berkeley elections.

2006 was not a good year for Berkeley cops or for those who monitor them. 

The city’s 30-year public police complaint hearings have been shut down since September, significant particularly in a year in which Berkeley police have had to face the conviction of Cary Kent, an almost 20-year officer who stole drug evidence, the arrest of another officer for allegedly shooting his service revolver while drunk off duty and the investigation of a third officer for possible criminal activities. 

Those who monitor the police—especially Berkeley’s Copwatch—also reproach the city agency responsible for police accountability, the Police Review Commission (PRC), contending that it has not stood up to insist on a public discussion of police misconduct.  

“The PRC has not had one substantive discussion of the facts of the Cary Kent case,” said Andrea Prichett of Copwatch. “The first press release on the case was in January [2006] and nothing’s happened in that year.” 

Closed hearings 

One blow that has helped in the crippling of Berkeley’s citizen complaint process was the Aug. 31 California Supreme Court decision in Copley Press v. San Diego County. 

Because of the ruling in that case and that case’s similarity to a Berkeley Police Association lawsuit against the city, both concluding that officer discipline is confidential and cannot be aired in public, the city attorney shut down the PRC public police complaint hearings in mid September. 

Unlike Berkeley, after a brief suspension of its hearing process to assess the impact of Copley Press, Oakland’s Citizen’s Police Review Board is continuing to hear citizen complaints against the police. The process, however, has moved behind closed doors. 

Berkeley’s city attorney, however, recommended not resuming hearings locally until Oakland Superior Court has ruled on the BPA lawsuit. In November the city went to court to argue that its hearing process should be affected neither by Copley Press nor by the BPA lawsuit: the Berkeley PRC either sustains a citizen’s complaint or does not, but is not responsible for disciplining officers, City Attorney Manuela Albuquerque argued in court. The Northern California American Civil Liberties Union filed a friend of the court brief supporting the city’s position. 

The BPA countered that a police officer’s right to privacy is violated when the officer is “forced” to respond publicly to a civilian complaint. The judge will rule by February.  

In the meantime, hearing officers continue to investigate complaints, but the commission does not hold hearings on them.  

And, on advice from the city attorney, the commission has put on hold discussions on the Kent case.  

“We’re waiting to hear from the judge on the lawsuit,” said Sharon Kidd, Police Review Commission chair and member of a subcommittee that had planned to examine the Kent case, but which ceased its work in conjunction with the suspension of complaint hearings. 

Kidd said she disagrees with the decision to halt commission discussion of the Kent case. “It’s a criminal matter of public record—the commission made the decision,” she said. “The city attorney wanted us to put everything on the back burner.” 

Copwatch’s Prichett argued, however, that if the commission won’t take up its responsibilities, the City Council should step in—and that councilmembers have been derelict in their responsibilities. “When the PRC breaks down, it is the responsibility of the City Council members to personally attend the meetings,” Prichett said. 

Officer Malfeasance  

Early in the year, the police department suffered a blow when veteran Kent pleaded guilty to stealing drug evidence from a locked vault, which he was charged to oversee.  

Police reports showed that 286 envelopes with drug evidence had been tampered with. In addition to methamphetamine and heroin, the drugs Kent was convicted of taking, the tampered envelopes contained Tylenol with codeine, cocaine—powder and rock—unidentified pills, liquid morphine, vicodin, marijuana, ecstasy and more. Kent pleaded guilty in July to felony charges of grand theft and felony possession of heroin and methamphetamine and is serving a one-year home detention sentence in Contra Costa County. 

Over the year since the case first came to light, Copwatch repeatedly called for a public discussion of the case. They said too many questions had gone unanswered: Was Kent selling the drugs? Should he have been charged for impersonating a police officer when he bought drugs from an informant after he had resigned from the force? Was he the only officer involved? Why was his home not searched? 

Other Officers in Trouble 

Further impugning the department’s reputation was the incident of officer Sean Derry who in September was arrested by San Francisco Police after he allegedly shot his service revolver outside his San Francisco home while inebriated. Derry was placed on paid administrative leave immediately after his arrest and will remain so until his case is adjudicated in San Francisco. 

A third incident reported by various media, including the Daily Planet —all using anonymous sources—involves an officer said to be under investigation for allegedly stealing evidence. Like Derry, he has also been on paid administrative leave since August. The Daily Planet is not using his name since it appears that he has not been charged with a crime. 

In an interview Tuesday, Chief Doug Hambleton said press reports misrepresented the facts in the case of the unnamed officer. “Somebody made some wild speculations,” he said, adding that when the investigation is complete, he will clarify facts in the case. 

PRC Chair Kidd said the commission had not been briefed on either the Derry incident or the second one. “Hopefully, we’ll get more information on that from the chief’s report” at the next commission meeting, she said. 

BPD Makes Changes 

Asked what the department has done over the year to correct the situation that made it possible for Kent to steal drug evidence, Hambleton said he has tightened up the procedures in the evidence room. 

“The lieutenant in charge of the unit is paying a whole lot more attention to what’s going on,” he said. 

The department has also discussed the need to recognize colleagues who may be using drugs. “We’re paying a lot more attention to that,” Hambleton said, adding in defense of the department, “People don’t come in accusing Berkeley officers of planting drugs or beating people up. The vast majority are fine, outstanding officers who serve the community.” 

The Cary Kent case was “a pretty unusual circumstance,” Hambleton said. 

Drug theft by police from evidence rooms, however, is not that unusual. In April, the Daily Planet interviewed Joseph McNamara, a retired 15-year San Jose police chief who was quoted saying: “The police property room has been a special problem for a number of years ... Many departments have suffered the theft of drugs by sworn and non-sworn personnel.”  

One more tool to help police reorganize evidence storage procedures are recommendations prepared by the Commission on Peace Officer Standards and Training and submitted to the chief in October. The PRC was slated to discuss the 12-page report at its November meeting, but did not, according to PRC Officer Victoria Urbi. It will likely be on the commission agenda at its next meeting. 

Urbi has cancelled the first PRC meeting of the year, Jan. 10. The commission is slated to meet Jan. 24, 7 p.m., North Berkeley Senior Center, 1901 Hearst Ave.

One of the four tree-sitters protesting the planned demolition of a grove of Coastal Live Oaks at the UC Berkeley Campus landed in new accommodations Wednesday—City Jail. 

The arrest came one day after the Memorial Stadium “tree-in” entered its second month. 

Ariel DeHaviland, 25, was booked on suspicion of trespassing and for violating an order to leave campus and stay away for seven days, said UCPD Capt. Guillermo Beckford. 

Section 626.6 of the California Penal Code allows campus police, acting on the orders of the chancellor or a designated subordinate, to arrest anyone who is “committing any act likely to interfere with the peaceful conduct of the activities of the campus or facility, or has entered the campus or facility for the purpose of committing any such act.” 

If convicted, he could face a maxium of a $500 fine and six months in County Jail. 

DeHaviland isn’t the first tree-sitter cited by campus police, but he is the first to refuse the stay-away order. 

Zachary Running Wolf, the former mayoral candidate, began the protest in the pre-dawn hours of “Big Game” day Dec. 2, and he was soon joined by others. He was the first protester cited after he left his arboreal perch to attend a meeting with faculty. 

Two compatriots have also been cited after coming down from the branches, but DeHaviland is the first to refuse the order to leave. 

Protesters oppose the proposal to demolish the last remaining native oak grove in the Berkeley flatlands. 

UC officials plan to fell the trees to make way for a 132,500-square-foot gym along the stadium’s western wall. That project is currently on hold pending a court hearing Thursday. 

Meanwhile, supporters of the tree-sitters will be holding a Spiral Dance Saturday starting at 2 p.m.

For some East Bay developers, 2006 was the year of the environmentalist. 

Anxious and stricken neighbors, joined by environmentalists, health care professionals, union members and community organizers, have emerged as a new force in the battle over development in Richmond. 

Enlisting the support of two key members of the state Assembly, they halted—at least for now—two major waterfront developments, forced a change in regulatory oversight and helped propel one of their own into the mayor’s office in November. 

Their compatriots in Albany scored a similar coup, blocking—again, at least for now—a major waterfront mall. 

Richmond projects 

In Richmond, a state-authorized Community Advisory Group (CAG) is evolving into a significant force, bankrolled in part by the very developers who had opposed its creation. One of its members, Richmond Progressive Alliance activist and Green Party member Gayle McLaughlin was elected mayor in November. 

For a city that only this year recovered from a crippling deficit that had forced extensive layoffs of city workers and service cutbacks, Richmond ended the year on a confident note, approving the first crucial step in the largest public works project in its history—a $104.9 million Civic Center renovation. 

A month earlier the City Council upheld the environmental impact report (EIR) for the 330-unit, five-story Point Richmond Shores condo project, despite fierce opposition from neighbors who contend the project’s design will mar a significant piece of shoreline and add too much density to a sensitive area. 

Planning commissioners had rejected the document, but a bare council majority gave the crucial authorization. 

The developers—Toll Brothers—have agreed to hold a design charette with neighbors, who have said in response that the move gives them little power. The project is being built on land that had been owned by the city.  

Two major Richmond projects remain on hold—a 1331-unit condo and apartment complex and a neighboring two-million-square-foot corporate academic research park. 

Both were at least temporarily derailed because of efforts of activists alarmed that projects were planned on a site contaminated by a century of chemical manufacturing with heavy metals, organic poisons and other toxic compounds. 

Cleanup efforts had been conducted under the auspices of the San Francisco Bay Area Regional Water Quality Control Board, but activists—like Sherry Padgett, who works adjacent to the sites, UC Berkeley professor Claudia Carr, who lives nearby, and Ethel Dotson, who grew up in the segregated Seaport Village housing next to the site—demanded a change. 

Padgett and Dotson have both been stricken with cancers, which they suspect may have been triggered by exposure to toxins from the sites. 

Demonstrations, aggressive questioning and the enlistment of support from other activists like McLaughlin and well-connected San Francisco attorney Peter Weiner were given a powerful boost by the actions of Assemblymembers Loni Hancock and Cindy Montanez and, finally, a resolution from a previously reluctant Richmond City Council. 

Early in 2005, the state handed jurisdiction over to the state Department of Toxic Substances Control (DTSC), which is well staffed by experts in the science of toxic substances while the water board lacks even a single toxicologist on its staff.  

DTSC regulations allow residents to create a CAG to share concerns with the agency, and the activists jumped at the opportunity with Dotson taking the lead in circulating petitions calling for establishing a group, initially focused on Campus Bay, the proposed site of the residences. 

When the CAG formed, Padgett and Dotson both joined, and the group is chaired by environmentalist Whitney Dotson, Ethel’s brother. 

Since the CAG’s first meeting in June 2005, the group has expanded its focus to include the university’s Richmond Field Station adjacent to Campus Bay on the northwest, and then to other sites in southern Richmond. 

During the past year, the CAG pressured the DTSC to conduct more extensive testing of the two key sites and adjacent properties, resulting in discovery of wider contamination and the revelation that groundwater had been contaminated with radioactive particles. 

Other CAG accomplishments included forcing the posting of signs near the sites warning of the dangers, and the ending of two programs that brought school age youth onto potentially hazardous areas of the sites. 

Plans for both of the major developments remain on hold, and the group is asking more questions about other sites slated for development in a city where the economic boom created by World War II has left an enduring toxic legacy. 

As the newly elected mayor of Richmond, McLaughlin’s environmentalism can be expected to play an increasing role in city developmental politics, since—unlike Berkeley—it is the mayor who makes appointments to city commissions and committees, subject to approval by the full council. 

Albany de-malled? 

Meanwhile, Albany voters, deprived by errors and a court ruling of a chance to vote directly on the issue, elected two candidates opposed to what would have become the largest development in that city’s recent history. 

The City Council’s selection of a third project critic as mayor gives opponents a solid majority on the new council. 

Though Los Angeles developer and Republican fund-raiser Rick Caruso had officially dropped his proposal for a trendy waterfront mall in July, after the 3-2 council majority refused to commit to his project before they had seen an EIR, critics suggested he was only waiting until the election to see if supporters were elected to the two open seats. 

A coalition of environmental groups had circulated petitions for a ballot measure restricting waterfront development and setting up a civic process to plan for acceptable projects on the largest expanse of relatively undeveloped land in the city, the property owned by Golden Gate Fields and its parent, Magna Entertainment Corp. 

After gathering signatures from a fourth of Albany’s registered voters, initiative backers were halted by a court ruling in July that petition backers had failed to give proper legal notice before circulating the petition. 

With no time left to circulate a new petition, the focus of the battle became the City Council election, where project critics Marge Atkinson and Joanne Wile ran as the Save Our Shoreline team against Caryl O’Keefe and Francesco Papalia, who had voiced a willingness to consider the project as submitted. 

Papalia’s own conflicting stances on Prop. 90—he praised it during a candidate’s forum, but later signed an opposition endorsement after his position became an issue—helped earn him a last-place finish, while O’Keefe was narrowly defeated. 

That the project’s would-be developer was a Republican Southern California mall magnate whose fundraising prowess for his party’s Presidential ticket had earned him the sobriquet of “Bush Ranger” (also Australian slang for an Outback bandit) probably didn’t help. 

Magna, meanwhile, is pushing forward with plans to build a new $250 million racetrack 53 miles to the northeast in Dixon, a project contested by a group of local residents there who are gathering signatures for a ballot initiative opposing the project. 

Casino plans 

Plans by Native American bands backed by corporate casino interests to build two new Richmond casinos—one, featuring a mall, hotel and entertainment complex inside the city limits, and the other a sleepless gambling parlor in unincorporated North Richmond—continue to advance. 

Meanwhile, the East Bay’s only functioning tribal casino, barred from installing conventional slot machines, is rolling in cash from another form of paydirt—electronic bingo machines which play at a pace nearly as fast as the more traditional slots. 

Casino San Pablo’s payments to the city have quadrupled since the machines were installed, and hit more than $10 million for the year. 

One threat to the bonanza enriching the city and the Lytton Rancheria band of Pomo tribespeople is looming in the form of possible revisions to national tribal gaming regulations that could force a slowdown in play—a proposal strongly resisted by tribes limited to the bingo machines because they haven’t been able to quality for slot machines. 

Of the two current pending proposals for full scale casinos—one in Richmond at Point Molate and the other along Parkway in North Richmond—the latter, dubbed the Sugar Bowl, has moved farthest along the regulatory approval route. 

The first step is federal approval of the tribes taking the sites into trust as reservations, followed by approvals by the National Indian Gaming Commission and the state of gambling compacts that set the terms on casino size and the number of games allowed. 

The Richmond City Council in November approved a $335 million, 20-year pact to provide municipal services to the Scott’s Valley Pomos if their plans for the Sugar Bowl casino are approved. 

The city already has a similar $350 million agreement with Upstream Point Molate LLC, which has put together a proposal to build on city-owned property that once served as a U.S. Navy refueling station. 

Upstream, created by Berkeley developer James Levine, has partnered with the Guidiville band of Pomos, former Defense-Secretary-turned-Washington-lobbyist William Cohen and Harrah’s Entertainment, the world’s leading gambling corporation. 

One unknown in the Point Molate equation is the pending sale of Harrah’s, which will become final later this month unless the firm can find someone willing to pay more than the $17.1 billion offered Dec. 19 by two private equity firms.

Richmond Mayor-elect Gayle McLaughlin, the upset winner in a three-way race, becomes the nation’s first Green Party mayor in a city with a population greater than 100,000 in ceremonies Tuesday night. 

Presiding over the event, which includes the swearing in of four city councilmembers, will be the incumbent McLaughlin defeated, Irma Anderson. 

The inaugural begins at 6:30 p.m. in council chambers in temporary city hall quarters at 1401 Marina Way South. 

McLaughlin won the office Nov. 7 with 7,343 votes, narrowly topping Anderson’s 7,101. A third contestant, Gary Bell, trailed Anderson by more than 2,082 votes. 

Taking oaths for the four council seats are incumbents Jim Rogers and Maria T. Viramontes and newcomer Ludmyrna Lopez, the top three candidates in a field of six running for four-year terms. 

Incumbent Richard Griffin finished in last place. 

Also taking the oath will be Tony K. Thurmond, appointed to the council in July 2005 after the resignation of Mindell Penn. Thurmond ran unopposed for a seat that will be eliminated in two years when the council is reduced from nine members to seven. 

Lopez, a political newcomer, won with the support of RichPAC, the chamber of commerce political action committee and a strong opponent of many of McLaughlin’s ideas. 

The Berkeley-born son of immigrants, Lopez is assistant administrative chief of finance and operations for San Francisco’s Department of Child Support Services. 

Before moving back West she had worked in the federal Environmental Protection Agency programs for cleaning up and developing contaminated property—issues of deep concern in Richmond, and to McLaughlin, who has actively worked for stricter oversight of contaminated shoreline development sites at Campus Bay and UC Berkeley’s Richmond Field Station. 

McLaughlin invited two speakers to the ceremony, Green Party activist and former San Francisco County Board of Supervisors member Matt Gonzalez and Van Jones, executive Director of the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights in San Francisco.

One of the biggest East Bay political stories of 2006—the proposed sale of the Oakland Unified School District downtown properties—was reported first in the Berkeley Daily Planet. 

“The California Superintendent for Public Instruction is close to a decision concerning the disposal of 9.47 acres of midtown properties owned by the Oakland Unified School District,” the Planet reported on May 15. 

“The properties include the Paul Robeson Administration Building, La Escuelita Elementary, Dewey High School, Met West High School, and the Yuk Yau Child Development Center. The OUSD administration midtown property is in the middle of some of the hottest pieces of publicly owned real estate in Oakland. It sits next to Lake Merritt Channel, the waterway that connects Lake Merritt with the estuary, which Oakland voters granted money to open up as public land in the 2002 Measure DD bond vote. An announcement could be made by the OUSD administrator to trustees as early as this week. Sale or long-term lease of the properties could set off a political firestorm in Oakland, if true.” 

The Planet reports set off a political firestorm in Oakland that lasted through much of the year.  

In mid-June, the Planet reported the OUSD state administrator Randy Ward said that a letter of intent could be signed as early as Monday, June 12, and that Ward’s office would then schedule “public hearings to review options, receive input and discuss the possibility of selling property at fair market value.” 

Three days later, the Planet reported that after months of secret negotiations, State Superintendent Jack O’Connell had signed a letter of intent to negotiate the sale of the downtown properties with an east coast development partnership that included black-owned real estate company UrbanAmerica and TerraMark, a company owned by old school, deep pockets New York real estate and investment firm Fisher Brothers. 

In the next week, the Planet had reported that OUSD Administrator Randy Ward was now proposing borrowing $35 million from the state—the remainder of the district’s $100 million line of credit that had originally led to the state takeover in 2003—to finance the move of the district’s administrative headquarters from the Paul Robeson Building to Carter Middle School in North Oakland, remedying problems in the district’s financial software, and re-establishing a 2 percent reserve fund. 

Members of the district’s advisory board of trustees reported their opposition to borrowing the remainder of the funds, objecting that this would put the district further in debt and make it more difficult to keep the district solvent once local control was re-established. 

The proposed sale of the OUSD properties, coupled with Ward’s announced intention to put OUSD deeper in debt, put a sudden spark into the long-simmering movement to return local control to the Oakland schools. 

In late June, Randy Ward announced his decision to quit his post at Oakland Unified, taking on the position of San Diego County Superintendent. The Planet later reported a story first broken in the East Bay Express that Ward’s resignation grew directly out of his opposition to the proposed land sale. 

Meanwhile, the week before Ward’s surprise resignation announcement, the district advisory board began to mount public pressure for a return to local control of the Oakland schools, unanimously passing a resolution requesting the state superintendent to “direct the State Administrator to immediately work with the Oakland Board of Education to develop and execute an orderly governance transition process, including, but not limited to the Board of Education’s search for a Superintendent, beginning January 30, 2007, and its selection of a Superintendent by July 1, 2007.” 

A month later, the Planet reported that a coalition of district education and political leaders had met that at OUSD headquarters to plot strategies for a return to local control, as well as to try to delay the proposed sale of the OUSD properties. In the same story, OUSD announced a plan for three public hearings on the proposed land sale. 

At the first public hearing in July, the Planet reported that TerraMark/ UrbanAmerica officials unveiled their plan for five high-rise luxury towers for the OUSD properties in a mixed residential-commercial development, including a proposal for an artificial waterfall coming off one of the buildings. The proposal was almost universally opposed by a packed audience at the hearing. OUSD facilities staff analysis showed that the district could net as little as $25 million on the land sale, a figure considerably lower than had been advertised. 

In late July, the Planet published a news analysis of the TerraMark/ UrbanAmerica proposal, concluding that the proposal had not met several requirements which had been originally advertised in the district’s request for proposals, including provisions for affordable housing for teachers and construction of a multi-grade school complex to replace the five schools currently on the property site. 

Shortly afterwards, political pressure against the proposed land sale began to mount, with six members of the Oakland City Council signing a proclamation calling on the state superintendent to delay the sale until the terms could be renegotiated and the deal received school board approval. The Planet later reported that the two remaining City Councilmembers joined to make Council opposition to the immediate sale unanimous. 

In August, the Planet completed an investigation of the events in the state legislature that led to the 2003 takeover of the Oakland schools. A key revelation was that provisions allowing the sale of the OUSD properties was taken out and put back in several times during the time the OUSD takeover legislation went through the Assembly and Senate, indicating that the sale of the property may have been an important reason for the takeover. 

In August, the district held the second of its three public hearings on the proposed sale, with opposition centering around the schools which would be displaced by the sale. State Assemblymember Wilma Chan, who co-sponsored the original state takeover legislation that included the land sale provisions, called for a delay in the proposed sale negotiations until more information about the proposed sale was made public. 

In September, the Planet reported that the OUSD board of trustees proposed that instead of selling the downtown property, the district build a “new, permanent, state of the art education center” on the site. 

Also in September, representatives of the state superintendent’s office and the TerraMark/UrbanAmerica development team said they had agreed to extend negotiations on the sale past the original Sept. 15 deadline. Neither party has issued any further statements about the proposed land deal since that time. 

A month later, however, incoming Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums announced his opposition to the proposed OUSD property sale, confirming that he had earlier met privately with Superintendent O’Connell to voice that opposition. And in December, newly-elected State Assemblymember Sandré Swanson announced the introduction of a bill to immediately return most levels of local control to the Oakland schools, as well as his request for a select committee to investigate state takeovers of local school districts in California.

The four-college Peralta Community College District began the year in the last stages of construction of the newly-named Berkeley City College, with controversy over its last series of construction bonds, and with plans to present a new set of facilities bonds. The year ended with Berkeley City College built, occupied, and with controversy swirling over district bond measures. 

A month-by-month review of how the Daily Planet covered the Peralta Community College District in 2006 follows. 

January 

District officials announced that Vista College would have a new name when it opened its new, $65 million campus in downtown Berkeley later this year: Berkeley City College. The name change came at the request of the Vista administration, after a year-long survey of students and faculty groups at the college, as well as in the three communities served by Vista. 

February 

In a renewal of a testy debate over Measure E bond expenditures that went throughout 2005, Peralta trustees narrowly (4-3) approved a $2.3 million contract to construct 1,400 new bleachers, put in additional lights, and revamp toilet facilities at the Laney College Stadium.  

In another carryover from a contentious debate that consumed trustees in 2005, a chancellor’s office report concluded that the controversial District Office of International Affairs was not spending “lavishly” on foreign meals, accommodations, and travel, rebuking charges that had been leveled by Trustee Marcie Hodge. 

Hodge had used publicity of her criticisms of the International Affairs Office and its director, Jacob Ng, to fuel her campaign for the District 6 Oakland City Council seat against incumbent Desley Brooks, and her complaints led to a shouting match between trustees at one 2005 trustee meeting, as well as a later censure of Hodge by fellow trustees. 

When the chancellor’s report was released, Hodge told the Planet that “questions still remain” about the International Affairs Office, but on the night that the report was formally presented to trustees, Hodge sat silent and asked no questions, and the controversy died.  

Also in February, trustees authorized a new $390 million facilities bond measure to be put before area voters in the June election. The measure drew criticism from one trustee—Nicky Gonzalez Yuen—who complained of lack of detail in the list of bond projects, and said he feared that it would become a “$390 million slush fund.” 

March 

Following a request from the State Community College Chancellor’s office as well as from representatives from Compton, 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 how that administrative takeover would take place. The move was intended to forestall the closure of Compton College following the loss of its accreditation.  

April 

Trustees were told this month that construction of the new Berkeley City College in downtown Berkeley is 85 percent complete with a tentative opening date scheduled for mid-July. 

May 

Chancellor Elihu Harris announced this month that Peralta was temporarily stepping back from its attempts to rescue the Compton Community College District after Southern California districts indicated they would be available to provide administrative oversight. 

But the Compton controversy spilled over into another local issue, with both the Peralta trustee president and the president of the Peralta Federation of Teachers severely criticizing the Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges, the statewide organization that revoked Compton’s accreditation and had threatened to revoke Peralta’s. Peralta officials joined the California Federation of Teachers and the California Community College Academic Senate in calling for changes in the commission and its methods of accrediting state community colleges. 

The district released one piece of bad news in May, announcing that due to budget cuts, the Laney College Children’s Center was closing its infant and toddler day care program effective the end of the 2005-06 school year. Laney students with children at the center, as well as Laney faculty members, complained that the notice had not come in time for parents to make other arrangements, and said the closure would have a devastating effect upon student-parents who might have to drop out of school because they had no other place to take care of their children. 

But the district received good news in May when a federal civil jury in Oakland ruled against a lawsuit brought against the district by former Vista president John Garmon, rejecting Garmon’s claims of reverse discrimination, gender discrimination, and retaliation when the college failed to renew his contract in 2004. 

June 

Peralta’s $390 million facilities bond measure—Measure A—was passed overwhelmingly by voters in the June election. 

July 

Trustees quickly followed up on the Measure A victory, approving a new five-year construction plan that committed $137.8 million of the Measure A Peralta facilities bond money. 

August 

The race for the Area 7 Peralta trustee seat began heating up, with community college bond consultant Abel Guillen providing a stiff challenge to incumbent Alona Clifton. Clifton’s campaign ran into trouble when the candidate was forced to file a year’s worth of delinquent, semi-annual campaign finance disclosure reports with the Alameda County Registrar’s Office only days after a newly-formed citizens group had filed a complaint over the issue with the California Fair Political Practices Commission. 

Late in the month, with hallways and classrooms still filled with construction tools and rubble and workers only taking a short break to make way for brief speeches and a hurried open house public tour, Peralta cut the ribbon on the new Berkeley City College campus a day before fall semester classes were scheduled to begin. 

September 

Interim Vista College President Judy Walters was named the first president of the new Berkeley City College, but only by one vote among Peralta trustees (4-3). 

October 

Peralta’s Measure A and the 2005 abortive Peralta lands development deals surfaced as the key issues in the Area 7 trustee race, with challenger Abel Guillen charging that Peralta had no comprehensive plan for spending the bond measure money, and criticizing the plan—later dropped—for Oakland developer Alan Dones to produce a development plan for Peralta and Laney College property. 

November 

Reports of trustee candidate Guillen’s charges about the Peralta bond money had raised significant questions about exactly what plan Peralta had to spend the Measure A funds. A Planet investigation revealed considerable confusion over whether or not trustees committed themselves to a specific list of bond projects when it approved the Measure A bond language in February. 

Meanwhile, Guillen defeated Clifton in the November election, replacing her as the Area 7 Peralta trustee. 

December 

The controversy over the Measure A bond money continued, with Laney College faculty members meeting with Peralta General Services Director Sadiq Ikharo to clarify how much of the bond money was actually being committed to Laney. After reports in the Daily Planet of significant errors in the list of Measure A projects posted on the district’s website, the list was pulled with no explanation. 

The Planet reported that Peralta appeared to be out of compliance with the formation of a Measure A citizen oversight committee, which was supposed to be in place 60 days following the certification of the bond election. Meanwhile, the Planet also reported that the former bond counsel to the Peralta Community College District believes the list of projects in the Measure A bond ballot statement last June might not have been specific enough to have qualified the measure under the Proposition 39 requirements under which it was passed, leaving the bond measure vulnerable to lawsuit. 

In its first meeting following the election of trustee Bill Withrow to the board presidency and the swearing in of new trustee Abel Guillen, Peralta trustees narrowly (on a 4-3 vote) sent 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. 

Meanwhile, the Planet reported a story published in the East Bay Express that a federal grand jury investigating corruption in Oakland politics has now expanded that investigation to look into Oakland developer Alan Dones’ dealings with Peralta. 

A month ago, proponents and opponents of a nearly eight-year dispute over playing field construction at East Campus met and came to an agreement on a single plan: the Curvy Derby plan.  

East Campus neighbors Susi Marzuola and Peter Waller are the masterminds behind the Curvy Derby Plan. This plan brings hope of a compromise, in sharp contrast to the previous two plans (Open Derby Plan and Closed Derby Plan).  

“There is a desire to keep Derby open and build a baseball field,” said Marzuola. “The Curvy Derby Plan is better than the Open Street and the Closed Street plans in my opinion. It’s a compromise.”  

Neighbors of East Campus who had concerns that the Farmers Market would be relocated and thus not properly accommodated and lively supported the Open Street Plan. Berkeley High School students and playing field advocates who had concerns that the Open Street Plan wouldn’t fully accommodate a regulation-size baseball field supported the Closed Street Plan.  

“From my standpoint, if this works better for the community and works for the high school athletes, then our major goal is to give the high school athletes another place to play and thus free up San Pablo Park—it works for us,” said Doug Fielding, chairman of the Association of Field Users, who previously supported the Closed Street Plan.  

The Curvy Derby Plan takes out a few trees and some playing space from the King Childcare Development Center (King CDC) across the street from Iceland and curves Derby Street through that space. 

\ Additionally, the plan reduces the width of the 1900 block of Carleton Street. These two measures allow the regulation-size baseball field to be accommodated within the space. Under the Closed Street Plan, parts of King CDC are cut out to accommodate a fire lane, but under the Curvy Derby Plan that space would be used instead to curve the road and keep it open.  

The Curvy Derby Plan provides more parking spaces and more open green space than the Closed or Open Street plans. While cost estimates have not been provided, Marzuola estimates that “the open street is least expensive,” but that the Curvy Derby plan will be likely less than or equal to the cost of the Closed Street plan. Many in the community are seeking compromise and are thrilled with the new plan.  

“It’s not just baseball,” said Kristin Glenchur, Berkeley High School (BHS) Athletic Director. “There are a lot of sports that could use this field. “The Curvy Derby field appears to meet all of the needs of the student athletes, and as long as it does that, we can support the Curvy Derby plan.”  

The plan provides a regulation-size baseball field with 300’ baselines and a place for bleachers, a batting cage, and dugouts. It includes a 300’ by 180’ multi-purpose field that can be used for a variety of sports, including soccer, rugby, field hockey, football, etc. There will also be one basketball court. Additionally, this plan does not close Derby and keeps the Farmers’ Market at its current location.  

According to official crowd estimates, attendance was at 47 people. The overwhelming majority supported the Curvy Derby Plan. It was reported, by Berkeley Unified School District Public Information Officer Mark Coplan, that two audience members still favpred the Closed Street plan.  

Mayor Tom Bates signed on as a proponent of the Curvy Derby and pledged to work with the community and the School Board to get playing fields on the East Campus site. 

“He’s strongly in favor of the plan,” said Cisco DeVries, chief of staff for Mayor Bates. “His perspective is that this plan has the ability to bridge all differences. It keeps the Farmers’ Market in place and allows a baseball field to be built. It’s not perfect, but the concept is really sound and something we can move forward with.”  

One clear thing emerged from the meeting: a sense of urgency to provide the best quality playing fields that met everyone’s needs.  

“Baseball has been very important throughout my life and right now it is at its peak,” said Geoff Mahley, BHS baseball team. “It would mean a lot to me if I could play on a decent field in what might be the last time I play competitive baseball. Many were concerned with what they call “improper noticing” of the meeting. They felt that BUSD didn’t do enough to get the word out about the meeting.  

“We emailed all previous parties involved in the Derby Street discussions,” said Coplan, defending the BUSD. “We posted notices all around the site. We published an op-ed in the Daily Planet. I feel that the people raising these concerns want more people lobbying their position. If that’s the case, they should bring their people.”  

Coplan informed this reporter that he had talked with B-Tech, previously called Berkeley Alternative High School, and King CDC and informed them of the meeting as well.  

“Their biggest concern is infringing on the space they already have,” explained Coplan. “This plan gives them a whole new green space. They have direct access to the field. As for B-Tech, while the Principal thinks the Closed Street Plan would allow them to put more buildings on the Derby Street side of the facility, he trusts the board will make the best decision for them.”  

The board plans to hear additional comments on the Closed Street project at their Jan. 11 meeting. If there are no furthur comments on that plan, they will proceed to hear a presentation on the Curvy Derby Plan from Marzuola.  

Berkeley Councilmember Max Anderson, whose district includes East Campus, said, “I have been very concerned about this issue. I am pleased to see us come to this place in a process, where up until now, people have been really frustrated. I hope, that here tonight, we can finish what we have to say about the closed Derby plan, and come together in agreement with a compromise plan called ‘Curvy Derby’ which we should thank Susi Marzuola and Peter Waller for creating.”

Grounds for arrest 

Officers are looking for the man who hurled hot coffee into the face of a clerk at the Holiday Express on Christmas Eve, reports Berkeley police spokesperson Officer Ed Galvan. 

The suspect, a registered guest at the hotel, threw the coffee about 1 p.m. on the 24th to punctuate a dispute. 

Berkeley Fire Department paramedics treated the injured man at the scene. The inhospitable guest is being sought for arrest on one count of assault with a deadly weapon. 

Lotion commotion 

The objects thrown in the second Christmas Eve imbroglio caused no harm. 

The items—four bottles of body lotion shoplifted from the shelves of the Walgreen’s at 2187 Shattuck Ave—were hurled in a confrontation with a security guard after the booster left the store just before 6 p.m. 

The frustrated, and presumably chafed, thief then fled. 

Blackberryed 

A pair of grinches in black sweatshirts used the old I’ve-gotta-gun-in-my-pocket ploy to steal Christmas cheer along with a Blackberry data device and a wallet from a 47-year-old Berkeley woman on Christmas day. 

The perfidious pair approached the woman as she was walking near the corner of 63rd and California streets just after 2:30. After the crime they hoofed it south. 

Telegraph robbery 

A clutch of as many as five bandits, headed by a felonious fellow armed with a chromed semi-automatic pistol and clad in a purple hoodie, robbed an 18-year-old Hercules man of his cell phone as he stood outside Larry Blake’s restaurant in the 2300 block of Telegraph Avenue just before 11 p.m. on the 28th. 

Officer Galvan said the victim delayed calling police until he had traveled to the other side of town, and the suspects were long gone before officers arrived. 

Campus rat pack 

A 38-year-old man was hurled to the ground, where he was beaten and robbed by a gang of three bandits who attacked him as he crossed the Star of David bridge on the UC Berkeley Campus  

Dec. 30. 

According to campus police, one suspect grabbed the man by the arm and hurled him to the ground, where a second held him down as another robber rifled his pockets. 

When the man tried to resist, the rat packers punched him in the face, then fled with his valuables. 

The victim, who was not seriously injured, called police several minutes later, but the rat pack was long gone by the time they arrived. 

Octogenarian resists 

An 81-year-old Pennsylvania man successful battled off the bandit who shoved him to the ground at a gas station in the 1500 block of University Avenue just before 6 p.m. on the 30th. 

“The guy went for his wallet, and he fought him off,” said Officer Galvan. 

The suspect, a darkly clad man in his 20s, was gone by the time officers arrived.

Apartment fires—one caused by a forgotten pan, the other by a forgotten cigarette—ruined the holiday plans of several Berkeley residents, reports Berkeley Fire Marshal Gil Dong. 

A family who lives in an apartment in the 1400 block of 8th Street got a very rude awakening at 3:17 Christmas morning. 

Oil in a frying pan left on a hot stove had caught fire, and the flames spread through the kitchen, causing an estimated $12,000 in damage before firefighters extinguished them. 

The family was forced to spend the holiday away from home. 

The second fire came at 9:46 p.m. on New Year’s Eve, when a cigarette left on a mattress in an apartment in the 3200 block of Adeline Street set the bed ablaze. 

Automatic sprinklers contained the resulting flames, but not before they’d done an estimated $10,000 in damage and sent the apartment’s lone occupant to the emergency room for treatment of smoke inhalation, Dong said.

It was a crushingly hot summer day in Chicago. The kind of day that Chicagoans believe only they are privy to. The kind of day where the sidewalks exhale hot air, steps are uncertain, thinking woozy.  

This oppressive heat had been blanketing the city for days. The city, not living up to its nickname, offered up not even the slightest breeze. Air conditioning was still a rarity, and the dorm provided no relief from the stifling heat. I was dispirited because I couldn’t do anything useful, least of all study. But it was examination time at the university and I had papers due. 

Visiting friends was the only activity I could think of, and so I ambled down 57th Street and into my friend Mort’s apartment. (Those days you could still leave your door open—but that’s another story.) Mort was a few years older, had his Ph.D. and was now in law school.  

The room I entered was just as hot as the outside. Mort was working at a large table, drenched in sweat, a white shirt hanging behind him on a chair. “Mort, what are you doing?” I asked. “I’m working on a paper,” he said. I was stunned. “But,” I protested, “it’s so hot!” Glancing up from his paper, Mort said, “so what?”  

I was dumbfounded. In a flash, my worldview toppled. It hadn’t occurred to me that it could be that hot and one could still think, still work, still be useful. And yet it was so obvious. It was hot, yes. But the work could be done. One could be uncomfortable—even in the extreme—and still work. Why be hung up by the heat? So what?  

These two words energized me and continue to resonate today, more than half a century later. Others, of course, have used the phrase, sometimes in a different context. Jesse Choper, former Dean of Boalt Hall, marshalled so what? skillfully as he challenged students in and out of class to think about the foundation of their arguments. I cannot count the times I ask so what? when I encounter an obstacle or an uncomfortable situation. And invariably the obstacle melts away, or becomes manageable. The problem is there to be dealt with, not to be celebrated. 

All of us have likely had similar experiences, where a single word or phrase—spoken or written by friend or stranger—has had a dramatic and lasting impact on us. What is the source of that power? Is it the inherent truthfulness of the words? The authority or charisma of the person making the utterance? Our relationship with that person? Our need at the time for counsel, and our openness to receiving such wisdom?  

Another such occasion came when my cousin, Ben, family patriarch and eminent psychiatrist in Santa Barbara, saw me distressed after a relationship ended. He said, don’t you know that you only keep that which you set free? This saying has helped me to deal with loss. Its power has not diminished over the decades.  

Whether spoken by a person, read in a book, heard in a movie—or even carved in stone—a phrase that’s rebuffed as trivial by one person can provide great illumination to another. “Don’t take counsel from your fears” was inscribed on a building at the University of Chicago; recalling that quotation has been valuable in stressful situations and often guided me to take effective action.  

I’m fortunate to have had a number of such experiences that triggered insightful and productive changes. Meaningful words may come from ancient wisdom or be constructed on the spot. I’m no longer surprised when I encounter words that trigger deep changes in the flow of life. I cherish these words—and those messengers who, intentionally or not, pass them on.

From here it looks like a triumph of “Framing”—that’s the name given by my old friend George Lakoff to a political technique which is part of what we used to call “marketing” in the software industry. I’m referring to the iconic image of the new speaker of the House on the podium surrounded by small children. There were a few cynical cluck-clucks in the Planet newsroom, but in the living rooms of parents and grandparents across the country it brought tears to not a few eyes. An early version of same was Ronald Reagan shown against a background of American flags, but the framing of Nancy Pelosi was much better: dynamic and heartwarming, all at the same time.  

We don’t watch much television, but we happened to catch the McNeil-Lehrer news hour segment on Pelosi last week because one of our granddaughters was rumored to be part of it. And she was there, in all of her 4-year-old glory, in leotard with tutu, for all of 30 seconds, as one of the students at a dance school headed by the woman who ran against Pelosi as a Green candidate back in November. In order to catch this precious moment, we viewed the whole piece, which included lots of footage chosen to show Pelosi’s roots in Baltimore, where her father and brother had both been mayors.  

It couldn’t have been a more ideal picture of Pelosi if it were a paid political advertisement. The setting was Old Back East Urban: gritty brick row houses, corner grocery stores, kids playing in the street in front of stoops, old guys sitting around on benches reminiscing. It could have been The Hill in St. Louis, which I knew as a child, or South Philadelphia, or the Lower East Side of New York City—in other words, any of those places where Democrats once ruled, and where they delivered what local folks needed to get ahead as immigrants in a tough environment.  

A woman I know who lived in Baltimore for a while remembers that Nancy’s father, Tommy D’Alesandro, Jr., was thought of not only as the mayor, but as the “Boss” who ran the “Democratic Machine.” Those were terms used, mostly by members of the White-Anglo-Saxon-Protestant former ruling class, to disparage political organizations run by upstart immigrants who learned how to work the system on behalf of countrymen. Rose Kennedy’s father and John Kennedy’s grandfather, “Honey Fitz” Fitzgerald, was an Irish version in Boston. Often, though not always, Bosses and Machines had cryptic or open ties to organized crime, but D’Alesandro padre was known for standing up to the muscle boys.  

New York Times columnist David Brooks, who may be a member of the WASP ruling class or may just act like one hoping to fool us, had a snidely stupid column last week equating Nancy Pelosi with George W. Bush as just another rich kid. Berkeley blogger Brad de Long deftly refuted that one by running photos of childhood homes of both—with the Bush mansion on the shores of something-or-other looking way more impressive than Albemarle Street in Baltimore. It is true that husband Paul Pelosi has made a sizable fortune for the family with his investments, though nothing on the scale of a Bill Gates or a Larry Ellison, but Nancy was not born with a silver spoon in her mouth. 

(DeLong quoted a colleague’s take on the ever-more-unattractive Brooks in another context: “David Brooks? You’re using a tenured Harvard statistician to refute David Brooks?! You don’t use a tenured statistician, you use a fly-swatter!”) 

The interesting thing about Pelosi is that she is, relatively speaking, an old woman—that is to say she’s my age. That means she’s just about old enough to remember real Democrats, Roosevelt and Truman Democrats, who sincerely believed that it was the government’s job to take care of people who couldn’t take care of themselves. Unlike, for example, Hillary Clinton or Rahm Emmanuel or any of the other neo-Democrats who do their best to wiggle out of that responsibility. Pelosi hagiography says that as a child she worked in the office where her father’s constituents came to seek help, and it’s probably a true story.  

Emmanuel, in his role as chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, did his best to make sure that the Democrats fielded centrist candidates who looked as much like Republicans as possible last November, but luckily he failed. Jerry McNerney is the best local example of the triumph of the Real Democrats, since he beat a DCCC entry in the primary before going on to win his House seat. Most of the newly elected Democrats supported ending the Iraq War right away, and Pelosi seems to be carrying the ball for them. East Bay people are cheered to see that she’s advised by our own George Miller, another legacy Democrat who can remember Real Democrats. If Nancy hangs in there, she just might be able to reclaim the Democratic heritage of being the people’s party.  

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.  

Here’s how he describes what worries him and others who’ve loved the city: “It is the sense that the city’s recovery has come at the cost of a part of its identity: that New York is safer and richer but less like itself, an old lover who has gone for a face-lift and come out looking like no one in particular. The wrinkles are gone, but so is the face. This transformation is one you see on every street corner in Manhattan, and now in Brooklyn, too, where another local toy store or smoked-fish emporium disappears and another bank branch or mall store opens. For the first time in Manhattan’s history, it has no bohemian frontier. Another bookstore closes, another theatre becomes a condo, another soulful place becomes a sealed residence. These are small things, but they are the small things that the city’s soul clings to.” 

That’s where cities and small towns too, all over America, have gone—or, perhaps an even worse alternative, they’ve become ghost towns, without even the boring bank branches and mall stores to support Main Street. It’s happened in Berkeley—where bookstores are closing and being sold to foreign chains, where the Fine Arts theater has been displaced by condos-in-waiting, where non-union mall stores like Trader Joe’s are valued more highly by politicians than Fred’s Market down the street, a pedestrian-oriented family business known for feeding poor people out the back door, or Andronico’s, a small Bay Area chain, also family-owned, with union employees. Berkeley’s erstwhile bohemian frontiers, Telegraph Avenue and West Berkeley, are coveted as sites for even more mall stores. Bruce Brugman in the Bay Guardian of the early seventies warned about the Manhattan-ization of San Francisco, but now we’re seeing the Berkeley-ization of Manhattan.  

We happened to run into a couple of the kind of small business people who were the soul of the old Berkeley over the holidays. They had various theories about what’s happened here, based on their own experience, and when you put their ideas together a picture emerges. One, a skilled craftsman, used to have his shop on Shattuck, back in the days when there was a viable department store, a music store, a kitchenwares store and other businesses that attracted a variety of customers who then patronized his own shop, which he’s now moved to a neighborhood location. He thought the trouble with downtown Berkeley is that it’s no longer a destination—that during the day it’s mostly the kind of mall fast food places which appeal to Southern California-bred undergraduates, plus a few cheap bookstores. The arts venues bring in a different crowd at night, but patrons are not there to shop, just to be entertained, and perhaps to have dinner at the two or three interesting restaurants which stay open after 9:30.  

The other one, a bookseller, agreed with the diagnosis of what’s lacking downtown, but added his own more sinister spin. He begged us to have the Planet investigate who’s bought up all the commercial rental property downtown, because he strongly suspects that investors are keeping rents there high on purpose to drive out small businesses to make room for University of California expansion. This pattern can be observed in New York too, especially in the neighborhoods adjacent to Columbia and NYU.  

Such an investigation is a great idea, but very difficult, because such properties are typically held by faceless real estate investment trusts where it’s hard to identify the principals. The Planet has outted one business school professor who’s the international financial muscle behind a number of the most egregious projects, but there are probably others like him. And there’s no quick way of finding out which local politicians have serious financial ties to property ownership, though developers have been observed doing modest favors for relatives of some Berkeley councilmembers.  

Realtor-councilmember Laurie Capitelli’s current push to limit the term of service of experienced land use commissioners, coupled with the council’s recent revision of the Landmarks Preservation Ordinance, could add up to a drastic emasculation of Berkeley’s traditional land use control structure which has kept the city livable for the past 25 years. Our city is on the cusp of the kind of change which has the potential for shaping its destiny for years to come. Gopnik sees the same dynamic in New York: “…. what we want the city to look like in 2030 will depend on the rules we make now. Aggressive policies for housing, especially low-income housing; a reasonable process of review to help neighborhoods remain neighborhoods; less passive welcome to every form of monster store; more support for tenants and small merchants—all of these things are worth arguing for, and legislating for, too.” We agree—those things are worth arguing for in Berkeley, too. Let’s make it a New Year’s resolution. 

UC ATHLETIC FACILITY 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I hope that the various lawsuits against the proposed addition of yet another athletic facility to be built where the oak trees stand will be successful. The Hayward Fault is warning us. It appears that the football coach, Jeff Tedford, an individual whose salary thus far exceeds that of distinguished professors on the faculty, has stated that his ill-conceived project would attract better football players to Berkeley. Is that what higher education is about? The University of Chicago went from being a fine school to a university of world renown when its chancellor, R.M. Hutchins, banned intercollegiate football from the campus. 

Peter Selz 

Professor Emeritus 

UC Berkeley 

• 

ETHICS 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Democrat leaders are so concerned about House ethics that they are going to vote on new ethics rules as one of their first priorities. What hypocrites! What about the ethics of pretending to be against a war and then consistently voting to fund that war to the tune of half-a-trillion dollars? What about the ethics or failing to even consider impeachment of the president who initiated that illegal and immoral war and who has made torture U.S. policy? Failing to end the war by cutting off funding immediately and beginning to impeach Bush is highly unethical. 

To learn more about impeaching Bush see worldcantwait.org. 

Kenneth J. Theisen 

Oakland 

• 

‘STUPID LETTERS’ 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Dan Knapp and David Altschul had two of the stupidest letters I’ve ever read published and it was good editorial judgment to let one follow the other. Knapp’s premise that it is reactionary to oppose strong government is absurd because the state itself is the most conservative, unproductive and parasitic fossil in existence. As libertarians we do not want to conserve the New Dealish status quo. Even “conservatives” have better things to do than pick up liberals trash. 

Altschul is deliberately misrepresenting Jimmy Carter’s views and is projecting when he calls the former president a liar. Carter has begun a long overdue national dialogue and the hysterical Israeli apologists are besides themselves. Frankly they are out of their minds and they have my most insincere pity. 

Kris Martinsen 

• 

AN OPEN MIND 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Message to David Altschul: Would you please open your mind and stop repeating all your prejudiced blanket statements about Arab people, and maybe look into some more unbiased sources of information? 

Vivian Warkentin 

• 

PROMISED LAND 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

In his denunciation of former president Jimmy Carter, David Altschul says that Carter “ignores 80 years of homicidal Arab violence against Jews in the land promised them.” David, a quick question: Promised them by whom? 

Joanna Graham 

• 

DEADLY LEADERS 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

The celebration of the murder of Saddam Hussein is understandable, but, if we consider numbers, hasn’t President Bush been responsible for far more human deaths than Hussein was, if truth be told? 

Gerta Farber 

• 

HOUSING  

EMERGENCY? 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Is Berkeley having a hidden housing emergency? 

During the past two Berkeley Housing Authority meetings, Berkeley City Manager Phil Kamlarz and Housing Director Steve Barton airily told a largely passive City Council that they were going to, in effect, subject people with disabilities, the elderly, disabled veterans (and politically active Section 8 advocates) to a harsh form of discriminatory treatment. Kamlarz and Barton are punishing those Section 8 tenants who live in studio and one-bedroom apartments with sudden huge HUD rent hikes. Since the Rent Stabilization law went into effect, These highly vulnerable people arguably are now the most discriminated against rental population in Berkeley’s history. 

Barton admitted to the City Council that he and Kamlarz are not asking for financial rental relief for these at risk tenants, rather, they have apparently chosen to only request HUD waiver assistance with expensive units that have two or more bedrooms.  

This egregious action could effectively put a significant number of disabled and elderly tenants on the streets.  

Meanwhile, Barton and Kamlarz directed what Kamlarz characterized as Berkeley’s “deep pockets” to go to developer’s projects that unbelievably use HUD funds to build more expensive buildings. Wells Fargo’s representatives made sure to come down from Oregon to get their share of the booty for one of these buildings. The usual suspects on the City Council enthusiastically welcomed these HUD buildings, at the same time; there is supposedly no money to keep many long time Berkeley residents housed. 

Also, Berkeley hired an outside consulting firm that came up with the astounding conclusion that a person living in a one-bedroom unit only pays $10 on utilities per month. The council was aghast. The council asked Barton if his staff could come up with the correct numbers. Barton declared that it might be expensive to have city staff figure out the correct utilities amount, even though the correct utilities amount might help Section 8 tenants stay in their homes. 

Housing advocates are beginning to see no other choice than to begin building the foundation for a massive class Action discrimination lawsuit against the City of Berkeley and its officials. 

Vita Viola 

Save BHA and Section 8@yahoo.com 

• 

TIMBER! 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Does anybody besides Richard Brenneman and Judith Scherr write for this paper? Didn’t Mr. Brenneman write for the Berkeley Barb? Sure sounds like it. Ho, Ho, Ho Chi Minh, NLF Is Going to Win. TIMBER! Go Bears!  

Matthew Shoemaker 

• 

BIGOTED EDITORIAL 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

What a bigoted sounding editorial (Dec. 22)! Many acts of personal charity don’t require membership in a formal organization, and if you do want to join one there are lots of secular humanitarian organizations which don’t ask about your religious beliefs (or lack thereof). There is no particular benefit in organizing a humanitarian group that is only open to atheists. In fact, I suspect that most atheists are still pretty much in the closet. Historically it has been, and in some places still is, a dangerous philosophy to profess. 

I am an atheist, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t want my life to have meaning. If there is no god to provide meaning, then you have to provide your own. For me, and I suspect for many other atheists, that means striving to make the world a better place. 

A burden of atheism is that there is no revealed source for what makes the world a better place, or what actions are ethical. You have to figure it out. The risk associated with theism is that what is ethical or correct is often taken as given, and not subject to debate. Unfortunately, it sometimes can be, as Dawkins noted, dangerously lethal nonsense. 

Robert Clear 

• 

‘WORDS OF MY  

PERFECT TEACHER’ 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

It’s always interesting to see what a critic has to say about a film, what perspective one takes. “Words of My Perfect Teacher” (reviewed in the Daily Planet, Dec. 22) was second best in the 2004 Himalaya Film Festival. So far we have screened more than 200 film and documentaries. Below is the comment of the jury of three Himalayan-oriented filmmakers/anthropologists: 

Jury Comment: Words of My Perfect Teacher is a fantastic, warm and humoristic film. It is inventive in the sense that it has a new way of telling a story. I have seen many ethnographic-documentary films on the Himalayan region. Some are very good and some are very bad. Some repeat a genre and never invent a new language in the way of telling a story. Words of My Perfect Teacher has in my opinion a beautiful and very lively freshness and the filmmaker has been able to create a deep relation with the people involved in the film. This is Varan principle number one, and it has personal rhythm which is rarely found in ethnographic filmmaking and yet it reveals a lot of ethnographic knowledge about what is actually going on between master and pupils. I think many anthropologista will think this film is too smart —and in a way it is true, but smart in a warm and kind way. There is a lot of humor, and a lot of reflection upon what Tibetan Buddhism does with Westerners! And that is an interesting angle to look upon that relation. 

Glenn Mitrasing 

Himalayan Festival Director 

• 

BUS PASSES 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

The Alameda-Contra Costa District shold fight the pliticians in both Sacramento and Washington, D.C. for more funding so they can lower the price of the bus pass for both seniors and the disabled. It is a shame that both groups had to pay $20 a month for a bus pass.Using the bus is their only transportation. The majority of them don’t own cars and do not drive.  

Because of the price of the bus pass, both the seniors and the disabled had to make some choices on whether to buy a bus pass every month or buy food. I don’t think that the transit district understands that their decision can have terrible impacts on these groups. I understand that they had to balance the budget with less money. But they shouldn’t balance it on the backs of these two groups. 

Both the majority of the seniors and the disabled have been dedicated passengers. Beause of their use of the bus instead of cars, they are doing both Alameda and Contra Costa counties a favor by sparing the air. For their help in sparing the air, I would hope that the Alameda-Contra Costa Transit District show some balance by lowering the price of the bus pass for both seniors and the disabled.  

Billy Trice, Jr. 

Oakland

The mayor’s new “Landmarks Preservation Ordinance,” which is more like a Demolition Ordinance, is deeply flawed and should be repealed by the referendum process. 

The property tax problem 

After much thought about the new ordinance, I believe that the crux of it is the provision allowing developers to demolish old buildings when they have no plans to replace them, essentially clear-cutting the land for possible future use.  

It is mainly parts of south and west Berkeley developers wish to denude, areas with warehouses and older commercial buildings, many of which are excellent candidates for adaptive reuse. The mayor’s ordinance allows developers to hire an “expert” to declare a building non-historic and destroy it even though there is no replacement project in the works.  

Why should people care? Well, why did almost 80 percent of the citizens who went to the polls vote for Measure A, the school bond, in the last election? Because they wanted tax money for our schools, for our teachers and classrooms. When a site is cleansed of buildings, it is cleansed of Special Assessment property taxes (what Measure A provided for), which are based upon the square feet of the structures on the site. No buildings—no taxes for our schools. 

But developers build shiny new buildings to increase the tax base, right? Wrong, sometimes. I think it’s now evident to most people that the real estate market is undergoing a major shift, and that construction of massive condo boxes might not be a wise choice at this time.  

Two sites which had functional commercial buildings of 1920s vintage have recently been leveled by developers who do not seem to be proceeding with their plans for condos. My bet is that neither project will be built, and that the owners of both sites will enjoy a very large tax break for the foreseeable future. To view the blighted vacant lots left after demolition, see 1122 University Ave. and 2041-2067 Center St. 

The Drayage Building is poised to become the third such site. People may remember the eviction of 30 artists in 2005 for “code violations” despite two decades of the Fire Department and the Building Department finding no violations upon inspection of the building. The new owners have just received approval for demolition, even though they have no permits pending for construction, and have revealed no plans to build something new.  

The bogus code violations the Drayage Building was cited for pertained to its residential usage. It is perfectly serviceable as a warehouse. Since it is five feet from an underground jet fuel pipeline designated a hazardous facility, the lot is not really suitable for much else but warehouse space. I would be very surprised if anything is built to replace it.  

With just two sites cleared thus far, the tax losses are already in the tens of thousands of dollars per year. If the mayor’s ordinance becomes law, the tax losses will soon rise to hundreds of thousands per year, probably for many years—until the next real estate boom begins. 

Meanness and misfeasance 

While there are many problems with the ordinance, my number two reason why it needs to be repealed is the misfeasance and just plain meanness behind the process. The mayor and his five City Council yes-persons broke the rules to put citizens in the position of gathering signatures between Dec. 14 and Jan. 11, over the holidays when all the students are gone, in the coldest, darkest month of the year. 

Ordinances are supposed to be read twice by the City Council before adoption. The public then has only 30 days to get signatures to repeal a bad ordinance. Last minute changes cobbled together meant that the “second reading” of the ordinance on Dec. 12 was really a first reading. Had councilmembers waited until the next meeting to adopt it, as they should have, the signature period would have been in January to February. I believe that sheer meanness overcame any sense of responsibility to the people of Berkeley. 

This is illegal, of course—but the mayor’s team doesn’t care. Our only recourse is to sue. But judges don’t like to rule against charter cities, which means they don’t like to rule against the City Council, so lawsuits by citizens are likely to fail, even when there is misconduct on the part of officials. 

I hope the people of Berkeley will see through the mayor’s ordinance, and sign the referendum petition to repeal it. We have only two days left. Petitions can be signed in front of many grocery stores, at Anna’s Jazz Island at 2120 Allston Way in the evenings, and of course at Laurie Bright’s D & L Engine Repair at 2626 San Pablo Ave. Please, neighbors, run, don’t walk, to preserve our town. 

Gale Garcia is a Berkeley activist.

Jimmy Carter’s Palestine Peace Not Apartheid paints a disturbing picture: of a state, Israel, that has consistently violated international law in its pursuit of territorial expansion at the expense of an indigenous population. A life-long friend of the Israeli people and the mediator of Israel’s peace agreement with Egypt, Carter is like a wise elder statesman who performs an intervention and tells an alcoholic in no uncertain terms, “It’s time to end this addiction, for your own benefit as well as for your family and friends.” Only in this case, the addiction is not to alcohol, but to colonization. 

Based on personal experience, I can verify that the overall narrative and factual account of the book is not only accurate, it is of vital importance for all Americans to understand given the ways in which this systematic and willful oppression and dispossession of an entire people reverberates into the international arena. 

Treating Palestinians as human beings of equal worth to Israelis, much less telling the whole truth about Israel’s destructive policies, is nearly taboo in the United States. When presidential candidate Howard Dean had the temerity in 2003 to propose that the United States be “even-handed” in its dealings with the two nations, he was furiously rebuked by a broad cross-section of Democratic Party leaders, including then-Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. The influence of the pro-Israel lobby is undeniable, documented, and at odds with the best interests of Americans, Palestinians, and yes, even Israelis and Jews around the world. The United States sends billions in military aid to Israel every year, which is used to fund the occupation and confiscation of Palestinian land in the West Bank. Thus, American taxpayers pay for Israel to oppress Palestinians, which inflames hatred against Israelis and Americans, and stokes anti-Jewish sentiment worldwide. How on Earth could that be a good thing? But the American Israel Public Affairs Committee and its cohorts, including the Christian Zionists, have succeeded in creating a climate of fear, self-censorship, and near-uncritical support for Israel. In this context, Carter’s book is truly remarkable, a profile in courage writ large. 

My extensive travels throughout the Holy Land in the summer of 2005 confirm that President Carter is telling a painful truth. When I was in a small Palestinian town adjacent to Bethlehem, the birthplace of Jesus, I witnessed the Israeli military bulldozing a Palestinian man’s home. Why was it demolished? For one reason: to build a road that is only accessible to Israeli colonizers (euphemistically known as “settlers”). The man and his family were not suspected of any form of undesirable activity. The Israeli government simply chose to steal their land. 

This incident encapsulates the crux of the problems described in Carter’s book: colonization, ethnic cleansing, and apartheid. On one hand, he tells us, Israel for the past 39 years has willfully and flagrantly violated the Fourth Geneva Convention (to which it is a signatory) that “forbids an occupying power from transferring any parts of its civilian population into territories seized by military force.” Over 400,000 Israeli colonizers now live in occupied East Jerusalem and the West Bank (seized in the 1967 war), taking an enormous bite out of the 22 percent of British mandatory Palestine that the Palestine Liberation Organization has claimed as its state since 1988. 

On the other hand, many Israeli colonizers live, work, or drive on stolen land. Bulldozing homes is ethnic cleansing, a deliberate attempt to make life so miserable for Palestinians that they have no choice but to emigrate. Israel has instituted numerous obstacles to normal life, such as movement barriers internal to Palestine that prohibit most citizens from traveling from one Palestinian city to another. In fact, many Palestinian women have given “birth” to stillborn babies at these movement barriers because they are denied the ability to travel to a hospital. Israel’s plan to force Palestinians to flee their homeland is working—thousands emigrate every year as they lose their land, their livelihoods, and their communities. 

Finally, all of this constitutes apartheid (literally, “apartness” in Afrikaans) because in the West Bank, Israel has constructed an entirely separate set of exclusive facilities, public works, and roads for its colonizers, such that they live inside armed garrisons, completely separated from Palestinians. Israeli colonizers are provided up to 17 times more water access than Palestinians, and are able to comfortably fill swimming pools whereas Palestinians scrounge for enough to drink and cook. Israel’s apartheid is based on only slightly different criteria than it was in South Africa—in this case, Jewish vs. non-Jewish as opposed to white vs. non-white—but otherwise, the injustice is almost the same. Actually, it’s worse if one considers the extent of the land theft, exacerbated by Israel’s recent construction of an illegal wall/barrier inside the West Bank that has taken over 80 percent of the farmland of villages such as Bil’in. 

I have personally met and spoken to numerous Israeli colonizers, and for the most extreme among them, Palestinians are barely recognizable as human beings if at all. According to these colonizers, all Palestinians are inferior to Jews and “they are all terrorists” no matter how obvious it is that Palestinian violence is a desperate response of a small minority of Palestinians to the oppression under which they live. For these colonizers, Palestinians should have no rights of any kind. Many prominent leaders of the colonizers openly advocate ethic cleansing (“transfer”) and propose that every last Palestinian be shipped off to Jordan. Former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, who President Bush named a “man of peace,” called the Oslo peace agreement of the 1990s “national suicide” and stated, “Everybody has to move, run, and grab as many hilltops as they can to enlarge the settlements because everything we take now will stay ours_ Everything we don’t grab will go to them.” 

Carter’s overarching point is that successive Israeli governments have consistently undermined and frustrated every serious attempt to resolve the conflict by allowing their policies to be controlled and guided by the ideology and practice of colonization. For example, during Clinton’s administration and the Oslo accords, there was a 90 percent growth rate in illegal Israeli colonies in the occupied territories. 

Carter’s account is both a personal reflection on his involvement in the Arab-Israeli conflict—before, during, and after his presidency—and a detailed analysis of the current state of affairs. His writing is generally dry and descriptive, with occasional wry humor, and is rarely inspirational, emotional, or moving in its use of language. What is important about Carter’s treatment is the way in which he tells us the truth, bit by bit, about just how bad things have gotten. 

There is hope: Carter details a variety of possible peace frameworks, such as the Arab League peace plan, to which every Arab government is a signatory. The plan calls for fully normalized relations with Israel in exchange for a return to the 1967 borders and a mutually agreed, just solution for refugees. Another possible two-state solution to the conflict is the Geneva Initiative, an unofficial agreement signed by numerous high-profile Palestinian and Israeli negotiators but never seriously considered by any Israeli government (Sharon rejected it out of hand, and current Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has indicated no interest).  

As an introduction to the conflict, Carter’s book is light on context and historical background. For instance, the founding of the state of Israel, which Palestinians describe as “Al Naqba” (The Catastrophe) because it led to roughly 700,000 refugees being prohibited from returning to their homes, is barely mentioned. (See historians Mark Tessler, Charles Smith, or Ilan Pappe.) Further, little attention is paid to grassroots peace movements or their significance. Carter also does not mention the less severe, though still systematic and deplorable discrimination against Palestinians inside pre-1967 Israel. What Carter successfully provides is a thorough and accessible political exploration of what is necessary to achieve a two-state solution to the conflict, and what’s standing in the way. 

Carter’s conclusion—that the primary obstacle to peace is Israel’s unending colonial project—is a profoundly unsettling one. And his analysis is quite similar to that of many Israelis who have devoted their lives to peace and justice, such as Nobel Peace Prize nominee Jeff Halper of the Israeli Committee Against Home Demolitions, who recently published an even more pointed critique of Israel’s policies entitled “The Problem with Israel” (see www.icahd.org). Will Americans finally wake up to the truth and push the U.S. government to change its foreign policy to stop financing the occupation and compel Israel to implement one of the above-mentioned plans for peace, justice, and reconciliation? If such a thing happens, Carter will be rightly acknowledged as the best friend Israelis ever had, even as many attack and denigrate him now for exposing an inconvenient truth about Israel’s addiction to colonization. 

Matthew Taylor is a fifth-year Peace and Conflict Studies student at UC Berkeley, editor of PeacePower magazine (www.calpeacepower.org), and Jewish.

PARKING ISSUES 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Here’s some solace for the holidays for those who traditionally lament Berkeley’s parking situation. The week before Christmas I drove down to Oakland for a meeting. I would have taken the BART but I ran late and so hopped in a car. Joy of joys there was a vacant, standard one hour meter on the 2200 block of Franklin where my meeting was to take place. I threw in my five quarters and skipped off smiling. When I returned 59 minutes later here was a friendly uniformed meter man standing by my car talking with another fellow on the sidewalk. A bright ticket envelope held in place by my windshield wiper blew gently in the breeze. “But I paid the meter and it’s just running out now,” I protested to Meterman. With a bashful smile he responded, “No that’s not it” and pointed at the signpost not 10 feet from where we stood. It said “No parking 4-6 p.m.” The time was 4:25 p.m. In old-fashion marketing parlance that’s probably called a “bait and switch.” The enticing meter gave me no clues as to what I was going to be buying. “You’ve got to read the signs,” said my parking cop friend. Of course Berkeley has some “no-parking” lanes for traffic 4-6 p.m. too. But the ones I know-of are meterless. My foray into the murder capital of the area left me unscathed, if a bit fleeced. I have to be thankful that I was saved by the city and so I’ve already contributed my $48.25 to Oaktown for the holidays. Is that tax deductible? Honestly, I think they owe me my $1.25 back. There is a moral to this story for the meter challenged, like myself. When you see one of these metal polls and it reminds you of interactions with something black and white, check to see if its tail is in the air and never forget that you might get skunked.  

Marc Sapir 

• 

A DREAM 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

This is a true dream story: It came to me around 2:30 a.m. on Dec. 23 at home. Prior to that date I had written no letters of protest or spoken with anyone regarding the UC Regents proposal to locate the UC Athletic Training Facility on the site of a grove of trees. I had considered sending letters to newspapers, and city, university, and state elected officials with some kind of protest, but until this dream I actually did nothing. 

The dream was presented to me as a fully thought-out and detailed report. I woke up and grabbed my ready-to-go dream writing kit (handily placed paper, pencil, and a book to write against) and spontaneously wrote the entire dream. 

Begin the dream: The new UC Athletic Training Center and offices goes on the southwest corner of the campus under the existing athletic practice field at Bancroft and Oxford streets. The relocated athletic practice field goes on top, the new A.T. Center and offices go below. The parking (much less than the 900 proposed for the A.T. Center) goes below and/or in a new expanded parking structure on the existing surface lot and the old bank building between Bancroft and Durant. That site can also take additional uses that relate to the training center such as offices, guest athlete dorms, and expanded student and faculty housing. Possibly tie that southward extension to the redesigned training center with a sky-bridge (or a tunnel). Cover the redesigned practice field (at Oxford and Bancroft) with a (movable) glass or plastic atrium cover. Open up Center Street for the sub-level creek, and add a pedestrian under crossing that serves the campus and the new A.T. Center, and possibly a sub-level shuttle bus link. Enhance BART and AC Transit with a Eco-Pass, especially for users of the new facilities by the public, UC Staff, and students; upgrade passes to nearly mandatory status. End of dream. 

An afterthought: Link the UC Coliseum to the north campus with a tunnel under Piedmont at Stadium Rim Road for pedestrians, bikes, and maybe shuttle busses, but for heaven’s sake, miss the trees. 

Ken Norwood 

• 

SPRING OFFERS NO FACTS 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

It seems that Councilmember Spring just can’t afford the time to add facts to her statements. She claims that Raudel Wilson’s recent participation in the district elections was “set up by the chamber” but she offers no proof to this allegation. Yes, the chamber endorsed Mr. Wilson. But the chamber also endorsed Mayor Bates and Gordon Wozniak. Did the chamber “set them up” too? 

Also, to accuse a man for wanting to provide better and affordable living conditions for his family, is a low blow, even for Ms. Spring. Again, is there such a thing as a sore winner? Councilmember Spring needs to move on with taking care of the city’s business, as she was re-elected to do. 

Richard Hom 

• 

A FEW COLUMN IDEAS 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Thank you for Susan Parker’s article on “Christmas in Las Vegas: Part One.” Please, please, please, don’t let there be a part two. Do I really care that Susan had to wait in line? Do I care if she finds some sort of small nugget of Christmas joy to hold onto in the thick of all this line waiting? May I suggest more compelling article ideas for Susan Parker:  

“How I Started My Car this Morning.” 

“Sunday Night Between 8:15 and 8:20 in My Kitchen: Part 3.” 

“Paper Bags.” 

Sander Douglas 

Oakland 

• 

GOOD WISHES  

FOR THE PLANET 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

One of the few positive features of our public lives during 2006 has been the continued existence of the Berkeley Daily Planet. While newspapers deteriorate and disappear as sources of information, the Planet continues to offer actual news and opinion, allowing readers to talk back to it and to each other. Thanks to all the staff and volunteers, and may you prosper in the New Year. 

Dorothy Bryant 

• 

WHAT ABOUT THE ANIMALS? 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

The Dec. 19-21 edition reported on the Zoning Board progress on Trader Joe’s, Drayage, Bus Yard, and Condos. What about Berkeley’s animals? 

A bond measure was passed four years ago because voter’s recognized the need for a new city shelter. Where is it? 

The ideal situation is one building, housing Animal Control, Berkeley East Bay Humane Society, and Fix our Ferals. These three organizations work cooperatively and have succeeded in significantly minimizing euthanasia, increasing adoptions, and lowering population by neutering. This is done on a shoestring budget, by hard working staff, and devoted volunteers. 

It is embarrassing and shameful that Berkeley, a city of intelligent and compassionate people, has such limited animal facilities, especially when compared to the San Francisco SPCA, Oakland SPCA, and ARF in Walnut Creek--virtual palaces by comparison. 

Dogs and cats are in kennels and cages due to limited space. Caged animals have increased stress which can delay socialization and adoption. The shelters must devote time and energy for fund raisers and shoring up out- dated buildings that have leaked and flooded in winter rain, time and energy better spent on animal care and public education. 

Some City Council members are vocal in their support but no action has occurred. Who or what is holding up the wishes of Berkeley voters and the well being of our animals? 

Carole Gill 

• 

DR. MOHAMMED YUNUS’ PROJECT 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Dr. Mohammed Yunus’ micro-credit project in Bangladesh has become a darling of the West, up to the point of winning for Dr. Yunus a Nobel Prize. However, one should be aware that there is a contrarian view from NGO’s and others on the ground. One can find it by Googling the relevant terms and searching for thorns among the roses. Just to relate a couple of points made by those skeptics:. 

1) The commentary implies that loans are made to the most needy people. In fact, they are made to people with houses and other collateral. 2) Loans may be made mostly to women, but it is naive to assume that in South Asian society women necessarily keep control of the money. 3) It may be that in some cases loans are made to groups of women. According to reports, in Muslim Bangladesh men are taking additional wives in order to maximize their borrowing. In many cases, the business they set up is--guess what—moneylending! This is the traditional best path to economic advancement in rural South Asia. They take the money and re-lend it at higher rates of interest, creating wealth for one family and impoverishing their neighbors. 

The suggestion by some is that the women who receive loans are not so much the agents of new businesses as they are Grameen’s agents for the collection of interest. 

Mark Tatz 

Oakland 

• 

DEBATING USE OF ‘NIGGER’ 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Regarding J. Douglas Allen-Taylor’s “Debating the Use of the Word ‘Nigger’ ”: 

The word “nigger” was never uttered in the racist family in which I grew up, and still, at age 79, I find it difficult to even write those six letters. I never doubted or even questioned, however, that my parent’s substitute Yiddish word, “shwartza” was always used with contempt. 

To this day, I am still grieved and embarrassed to recall an event which painfully illustrates the power and the destiny of such racism; not only in my family, but blindly tolerated in my schoolroom as well. Even as a young California mother, on a trip back to my old home in Ohio, with my husband and two children, we took photos of the old house, but never spoke to the elderly black man on the porch—with my children a witness to this inhumanity. Sometimes silence is the loudest obscenity of all. 

Such intolerances were finally an important part of the painful dissolution of our marriage. My children and I have grown up together, with a rainbow of friends and partners—an invaluable reeducation, even resulting in miracles such as my black daughter-in-law and grandchild. 

I have encountered many racists along the way, the most painful being senior family members unwilling to accept my inter-racial family. Unlike Michael Richards, most such bigots I have known have been extremely careful to substitute society’s codes for words like “nigger.” What’s missing in Allen-Taylor’s discussions of such terms, is society’s unfortunate need for such obscenities. These six letters, if omitted, would simply be replaced by other profanities. 

Just as sexual pornography, like it or not, can fill a human need, other obscenities can also have importance in our imperfect world. Just as such words as “nigger” have been recognized by courts as evidence of certain racist crimes, we all hear them as an aid in judging the values of others. Bruising words like “nigger” may even be used in lieu of bruising actions. Our constantly evolving language, ugly or beautiful, is, after all, an imperative indication of our feelings and passions, as well as our values. 

Gerta Farber 

• 

BLACK-AND-WHITE THINKING 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Becky O’Malley of the Berkeley Daily Planet can hardly make a case in defense of religion (“Humans Still Missing Peace at Home,” Dec. 22) with arguments like, “There are no soup kitchens run by militant atheist organizations that I’m aware of. I don’t know of any kind of charitable programs organized by anti-religious people....” This kind of black-and-white view ignores the vast middle of secular organizations: Food Not Bombs, Doctors without Borders, UNICEF, Oxfam, the Grameen Bank, et cetera, et cetera. “Good works” are not the exclusive property of the religious. 

C. A. Gilbert 

• 

GLOBAL WARMING 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I recently went to a lecture on global warming. One of the lecturer’s comments was that high temperatures that currently occur only a few times a year, will become common summer temperatures in the next few decades. Furthermore, data from the last 30 years showed that the increase in the highest temperatures was significantly larger than the increase in the average temperatures. If you live in a city with a peak summer temperature of 110 degrees now, in a few decades this may be a common summer temperature, and the peak may go to 120 degrees. 

The data on major storms was more ambivalent, as the feedback between the factors driving them is less well understood. While the lecturer was willing to predict that temperatures would increase, he was only willing to state that a major increase in storm severity was possible. 

The changes in climate are not happening uniformly across the country. Washington D. C., perhaps unfortunately, has shown no significant change over the last 30 years. The entire southern portion of the United States has significantly warmed. So what does this mean for our society? Many people have migrated to the south because of its warmer climate. When its climate becomes inhospitable will many then migrate back north? And if the south becomes too hot, what about Mexico and Central America? If they do migrate north, where will they settle? 

If the editor and many letter writers to the Daily Planet have their way, it won’t be Berkeley. 

Berkeley is already a dense city, and the anti-growth proponents apparently figure we have done our bit. Further growth in Berkeley is viewed as unjustified. From this perspective, growth in Berkeley is driven only by cynical or near-sighted self-interest. There is only one issue - the character of the pro- and anti- people. The developers get rich and we get screwed. If we let them get bigger buildings in the commercial areas they will want to build elsewhere too. The developers are cynically clever too, as witness their including a Trader Joe’s with the apartments planned for University Avenue. But even a benefit like this can be cast in terms of character issues, as only the rich in the hills benefit because then they can drive to it and buy their “...pseudo-ethnic specialties and cheap wine...". 

I feel really screwed. I am not associated with the developer, I’m not rich, I don’t live in the hills, I don’t have a car so I can’t drive to the proposed Trader Joe’s, and if I do bike there instead of Emeryville, I’ll probably still buy the same stuff: cheap cereal, toilet paper and facial tissue, bread, and other basics. Dang, no pseudo-ethnic specialties, and no concern about the impact of the built environment on global warming. 

Robert Clear 

• 

CITY COMMISSIONS 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

In a thinly veiled attempt to undercut and reverse Berkeley’s traditional progressive political agenda, the Berkeley City Council will consider a proposal on Jan.16 designed to remove—and bar future—citizen volunteers from the City of Berkeley’s 40 citizen commissions and boards. 

Berkeley City Councilmemeber Laurie Capitelli is the measure’s initiating sponsor. Mr. Capitelli’s proposal would bar Berkeley citizens from serving on more than one city commission. Current policy allows for a citizen to serve on two or three commissions simultaneously if a citizen is prepared to devote the necessary time and energy. 

Mr. Capitelli’s proposal is an attempt to target progressive commissioners on Berkeley’s 40 commissions and boards by preventing progressive-leaning citizens from providing their experience, expertise and public policy recommendations. 

Berkeley’s commission system is the foundation of the city’s public policy discussions and decisions. Traditionally, commission policy recommendations are forwarded to the City Council for consideration and/or action. 

If Mr. Capitelli is so concerned about citizen volunteers serving on more than one city commission, as he purports to claim, he should apply his concern to his own commission appointees. Instead, Mr. Capitelli is attempting to unilaterally force his own personal appointee policy down the throats of his fellow City Councilmembers. 

Mr. Capitelli should stick to worrying about his own 40 commission appointments and let his eight fellow Councilmember colleagues appoint the citizen volunteers they wish to the commissions they see fit (without Mr. Capitelli’s interference). 

I urge Berkeley voters to phone their respective councilmembers to voice their concern about Mr. Capitelli’s anti-democratic proposal. The proposal will be considered by the City Council at its next regular council meeting on Tuesday, Jan. 16. 

Chris Kavanagh 

• 

HELP THE LESS FORTUNATE 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

How should we live so that those who are less fortunate than us are included in our actions? We come from many nations in the world but all of us have the same basic wants. We need food and shelter, of course, but all of us, rich and poor alike, want respect from others. The general attitude in our society is that the poor are guilty of some sin: they are lazy or distracted or unwilling to learn English. We feel that they do not deserve the respect we give to full human beings. I think it is high time that we take care of others? needs and share our comforts with those who are less fortunate. Let us treat them with the utmost respect. We might save our money and time fixing societal breakdown later if we can improvise small local ways to help our less fortunate neighbors now. 

Romila Khanna 

• 

KILL CONSERVATISM? 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Now that liberals won a great victory in the November elections, Bob Burnett says it’s time for the winners to “sink the conservative ideology that has dominated American politics for 25 years.” (“Killing Conservatism,” Daily Planet, Dec. 12). But the ten-part ideology he describes, starting with “Government is bad,” is reactionary, not conservative. Reactionaries dislike government and liberals with equal fervor. Conservatives may not always like government, but they recognize its importance and generally work to improve it, just as liberals do. 

Economist Paul Krugman exposed the reactionary fiscal policy they call “Starving the Beast,” where the beast is government, which reactionaries want to eliminate. Under Bush/Cheney/Rove starving the beast destroys government by creating huge deficits, spending money we don’t have on things we don’t need like war in Iraq, and cutting taxes for corporations and for the rich at the same time. Who among us has not suffered from the induced poverty of governmental entities under this regime? Who among us has not seen the anguished letters from true conservatives bemoaning the reactionary agenda and saying they regret that they can no longer vote for candidates who call themselves conservative, but who once they win office pursue radical change at the expense of cherished institutions and values? 

Reactionaries have cloaked themselves in conservative rhetoric and the media has bought the imagery. Liberals have bought it too, but if they want to win in the future I think they have to start figuring out how to help the real conservatives separate themselves from the reactionaries. This will allow conservatives to pursue their true calling, which is akin to pruning and weeding the garden that the liberals lay out and plant. 

The optimal situation is for liberals and conservatives to work together to make government strong, fair, and efficient, to do well the things that government does best. This will isolate the reactionaries and greatly facilitate their removal from elected office. 

Dan Knapp 

Richmond 

• 

JIMMY CARTER IS A LIAR 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I am unable to reconcile the Carter Center’s mission statement with the founder’s recent book. 

Mr. Carter ignores centuries of history, in Hebron and elsewhere. He ignores 80 years of homicidal Arab violence against Jews in the land promised them. He lies about events he did not witness. 

He endorses the ongoing anti-Jewish terrorism embodied in the Hamas Charter and the PLO Covenant. 

I would be grateful if the Carter Center would help me understand how this promotes their declared purpose.  

I would be grateful to know the center’s position about a person who charges money to tell lies that support, among other practices, the training of children to believe that becoming suicide bombers is the greatest future to which they can aspire.  

David Altschul 

• 

GEORGE BUSH 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I think that it’s about time we stopped poking fun at George Bush. His supporters are folks who believe in equal rights for the handicapped. Bush is capable in many areas. He clears brush. He can dress himself. He does speak...so long as you don’t confuse him with questions. He can bathe himself. And he likes to wear a uniform. It’s unreasonable to expect him to wear it in dangerous situations.  

It’s a tribute to our country that such a man can become our president.  

And he was even re-elected. 

Harry Gans 

• 

WHAT IF THINGS SPRANG 

FROM THE BAY AREA (AGAIN)? 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

What if our great East Bay born-and-bred composer leaders, Peter Apfelbaum and Butch Morris, long New York- and Planet-acclaimed, were to direct an orchestra of an individual musicians from every United Nations country to open the U.N. General Assembly every year? Once proposed as: 

Let’s move the United Nations to Camp Cazadero, 

New York has had it too long. 

Put the Security Council in the redwoods of Sonoma, 

Have ‘em debate it in song. 

Slip Fidel and Daniel through the mouth of the Russian, 

We’ll party with love, and by Jove, 

We seek and we’ll hide ‘em, 

The light that’ll guide ‘em is the burning of Bohemian Grove. 

And to close the session annually, have our great improvisational vocalists, Rhiannon, Linda Tilley, So-Vo-So, lead a circle of delegates in such wondrous on-the-spot land’s end created sounds as we have grown to celebrate over the past five years from noon to midnight on Dec. 30 at “Sing For Your Life” at the First Congressional Church of Oakland. (Green language, or the language of the birds, is the avion ability to confer with the initiated, and mystically vice versa.) 

Arnie Passman 

• 

FOOD AND DRUG ADMINISTRATION 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently announced its approval of meat and dairy products from cloned animals amidst widespread concern among scientists and food safety advocates. Despite recent consumer opinion polls showing that most Americans do not want food from cloned animals, cloned milk may soon be sold, unlabeled, in grocery stores across the country, and cloned meat will be next. Scientists say that clones may be inherently unhealthy, with potentially harmful consequences for animal foods derived from clones. Moreover, animal cloning is a cruel technology that results in needless animal suffering. 

The first cloned mammal was the famed sheep Dolly. But after the hype, few followed the story of Dolly’s demise. Just 6 years old when euthanized (sheep of Dolly’s breed generally live to 11 or 12), Dolly suffered from arthritis and lung disease usually seen in much older animals. Sadly, Dolly is not unique among clones. Leading cloning scientists say clones are likely to carry genetic abnormalities, and the lead scientist responsible for creating Dolly has warned that even small imbalances in a clone’s hormone, protein or fat levels could compromise the safety of its milk or meat. 

It appears that once again the FDA has seemingly ignored scientific and public concerns and fast-tracked a decision for the benefit of a handful of cloning companies. It’s time for FDA to put the health and welfare of Americans over corporate profits. 

Cynthia Johnson 

• 

ENDGAME IN IRAQ 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

The American public are generally ignorant, uneducated, and politically behind the curve by several years, but they finally got the message about Iraq, as evidenced by the mid-term elections and recent polls. They are prepared for a new message.  

What the Congress should say: To be fiscally responsible, we must protect Social Security and Medicare, revive education, and rebuild the military for the needs of long term security. We cannot afford to continue our presence in Iraq at a cost of two billion dollars per week. Therefore we will authorize sufficient funds to bring the troops home, and no more. 

What the White House should say: Our job is done. Saddam is gone, and replaced by a democratically elected government. Without being in the shadow of U.S. troops, the Iraqi forces will have greater legitimacy and authority, and through their own internal intelligence will be more able to identify and eradicate terrorists who infiltrate from neighboring states. 

What the State Department should say to Saudi Arabia: The partitioning of Iraq is inevitable. Ethnic cleansing has begun as Shiite militias are routing Sunnis from Shia territory. Saudi Arabia should assure the safe relocation of Sunni families, and if necessary, we will pay you under the table to do that.  

The cost of humanitarian resettlement is far less than that of our military presence. Three small stable Iraqi states are less threatening than a large volatile one, and the serious threats to the U.S. are Iran and North Korea. In each case, the U.S. should assist in the development of nuclear power, with full inspection. Even a surreptitious venture into nuclear arms is not necessarily dire, if the U.S. protects its borders and rigorously inspects ships and containers. But the U.S. should make it clear, unilaterally, that if a vehicle appears on an Iranian or North Korean launch pad with the capability of reaching Israel, Europe, or the U.S., it will be destroyed. 

Jerry Landis 

• 

LESSONS OF VIETNAM 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Holidays are a good time to reflect on what went down over the last year, last four years under Bush-Republican domination. Symptomatic of the malaise that enveloped the United States over the past four years is the current quandary President Bush finds himself in; what to do next about Iraq. Dude, his decision to invade Iraq was made in an instant, and he had no problem convincing Congress and the entire nation that it would be a cakewalk. 

Yet, now, the “decider” has put off his decision on the fate of Iraq until next year. Almost four years of war and George W. doesn’t know what to do! 

More than likely we will stay the course to nowhere, and add more troops to a disintegrating theater. More troops in Iraq is like throwing good money after bad. Didn’t the current batch of politicians learn anything from Vietnam? 

Ron Lowe 

Grass Valley

For the year in Editorial Cartoons see the pdf's of pages 14 and 15, available on our web site.

The articles and letters printed recently on housing in the Berkeley Daily Planet reflect misunderstanding and confusion about the need to plan for housing locally and region-wide, the state-driven Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA) process, and the state mandated role of the Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG) in this planning process. 

Housing is being planned for, because even with slower growth in cities like Berkeley, the region continues to experience a severe housing shortage. Bay Area forecasts indicate that by 2015, the Bay Area will grow an economy that will need to support almost 634,000 new residents—4,200 of them are expected to live in Berkeley. Planning for housing needed now and in the future is a necessary, ongoing step to address the affordable housing challenge.  

ABAG, as the regional planning agency and council of governments representing the Bay Area, works with cities and counties to develop a process to distribute regional housing need, so that local governments can identify appropriate housing sites and policies to meet their state-mandated housing goals. ABAG itself does not impose mandates, quotas, or penalties on cities and counties for failing to reach housing goals.  

The statewide housing needs process that is part of the confusion is facilitated as follows: Housing Element Law (Gov. Code Secs. 65580 et seq) requires ABAG and other councils of governments to create a methodology for allocating the region’s housing need. In the Bay Area, the regional housing need is determined by the state Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD) and ABAG through consultation. Regional need reflects the number of housing units needed for a range of income levels--from very low to above moderate income. Housing Element Law then requires that each city and county revise the housing element in its general plan to accommodate the housing allocation they receive, and to submit the revised housing elements to HCD for certification. This Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA) process is done every seven years.  

In preparation for the (2007-2014) RHNA cycle, ABAG established a Housing Methodology Committee in May 2006, composed of elected and appointed officials and stakeholder groups from throughout the region, including San Francisco, Oakland, and Berkeley. The participation and insight of the city and county representatives have been critical in determining the resulting 2007-2014 Draft Regional Housing Needs Allocation Methodology (Draft RHNA Methodology). The draft was released for public review and comment on Nov. 17, with its 60-day comment period ending on Jan. 18, 2007. This draft RHNA Methodology was designed to distribute housing need throughout Bay Area cities and counties and proposes to locate housing predominantly in urban areas and along transit corridors. It is important to remember that housing numbers have not yet been assigned for the next (2007-2014) RHNA cycle, but in the draft RHNA Methodology numbers from the past RHNA cycle were used as examples to calculate how the draft methodology would work.  

While many are reviewing and commenting on this approach, the consensus is that the draft RHNA Methodology responds to the region-wide call for less suburban sprawl, reduced freeway congestion, and other environmental considerations, such as cleaner air. Helping sustain the Bay Area for current and future residents is the basic aim and encouraging transit oriented development is just one way to maximize land use.  

Many kinds of development and housing are needed to balance the jobs and housing in each community. Bottom line, Berkeley and all our Bay Area cities and counties make their own local land use decisions. These include identifying appropriate housing sites and policies necessary to build the housing needed by families and single residents. ABAG’s ongoing role and continuing interest is to help cities and counties address growth challenges collaboratively, strategically, and in the most desirable way for the Bay Area’s cities and counties.  

The draft RHNA Methodology can be downloaded from the Regional Housing Needs section of the ABAG website at www.abag.ca.gov/planning/housingneeds, or requested by phone at (510) 464-7950.  

Kathleen Cha is senior communications officer for the Association of Bay Area Governments. 

As the Planet has reported, the project at 1885 University Ave. was tentatively approved by the Zoning Adjustments Board (ZAB) at its Dec. 14 meeting and is scheduled for a final vote on Jan. 11 (note there will be no further public hearing). Had I stayed on ZAB, the project would not have been approved as currently proposed, but my council member dismissed me and saw fit to appoint a pro-development person to the board, who found the project more to his liking than I ever had. 

I do not question Mr. Wozniak’s right under existing law to remove me from ZAB. I do wonder whether the current law is a wise one; essentially it means that Berkeley Commissioners must be rubber stamps for the council members who appoint them. They are effectively prevented from exercising their own independent judgment in the interest of the city as a whole. 

If ZAB is neutralized, who is left to objectively analyze developer proposals? Certainly not the planning department which is funded by permit and other fees paid by the developers themselves. 

Trader Joe’s is a classic example; it is 20,000 square feet larger, and has 25 more apartments than allowed by our zoning laws and the state Density Bonus law. The developer proposed Trader Joe’s as the anchor tenant for this development only after the neighborhood had derailed the original monster project. He evidently felt (correctly, it seems) that a popular tenant on the ground floor would cause the public to overlook all the other defects. 

City planning staff worked hand-in-hand with the developer, and supplied a lot of creative thinking. For example, the Trader Joe proposal was called a “modification” of the earlier, rejected project. This allowed ZAB to ignore the more stringent, neighborhood oriented rules that have come into effect in the meantime. It is another sad example of how our city’s zoning law is twisted and shaped to deliver larger and larger buildings—which may be what staff believes in, developers profit from, but which is not what the citizens want.  

If the Trader Joe’s project had been subject to existing zoning laws, it would be a project with 82 units, 16 of those affordable. If the state Density Bonus law were applied the project would go to 111 units with 16 affordable units reserved for very low income households. Instead, ZAB has allowed the developer to reduce the required open space by 75 percent, and has relaxed the affordability requirement. Final result: ZAB approved a project with 148 units, with 19 supposedly “affordable” units, of which only half are reserved for very low income families.  

On Nov. 19 I asked planning staff to answer a number of questions. I also asked how the project had gotten so close to approval without any of the information we would normally expect for a proposal of this size. The answers were not forthcoming and three weeks later I was dismissed from the board. I include some of my questions here so you can judge their validity for yourself. 

1. Total Size: Where are the base project calculations for this project? At this time none had been provided. Instead it was left to ZAB itself to discover that the project involved five stories, rather than the three that would have been allowed without a use permit, and that total units exceeded both state and local limits. 

2. Commercial Space. The project includes a cafe, which would normally entail added parking requirements. So far as we can tell, no added parking has been reserved for use by cafe employees and customers. 

3. Setbacks: Why has staff approved reduced set backs along Berkeley Way? The impact on the neighborhood is already too great. Why make the situation worse?  

4. Open Space: Are we going to lower our current standards by 75 percent? How does this make a project “green” to build to the sidewalk? And once having waived the open space requirement for this development, how would the city be justified in imposing it on competing projects? 

5. Nearby Residences: The traffic barrier should be placed in the C1 zone between existing residences and the development—not in a place which separates existing homes from their neighbors. If this requires the entrance to be moved further east, so be it. 

I find it interesting that planning and most of the elected officials consider me to be anti-development. This simply is not true. I am only asking questions which any conscientious commissioner should ask before any project is approved. For example: 

1. What is the project being built for? More student housing? Or are the room sizes big enough for families? Doesn’t the city need a standard? 

2. How does the project affect shadows, light, air quality, views, etc. in the surrounding neighborhood?  

3. How are the increased traffic problems to be resolved? Use reasonable and up to date traffic studies to reveal potential problems and solutions. 

4. What are the detriments/positives this project brings to our city and neighborhoods? 

In most cases, development problems can be mitigated if the planning staff would work with the citizens of Berkeley and the developers. Instead, staff appears to be at the beck and call of the promoters, and avoids the need to mitigate by ignoring detriments entirely. 

If the above principles had been applied to the Trader Joe’s project, Berkeley would have gotten a development the neighborhood could have agreed to. Now the project will be appealed to the city council, where it will probably be approved. The result will at best be unhappy citizens and at worse yet another lawsuit. In the end, Berkeley may lose Trader Joe’s because those who are supposed to know better approved a project that is unlikely to survive the courts. 

If you want a Trader Joe’s at this location, but within a reasonably sized building, you should write to ZAB and the City Council telling them that you want and support a legal project that will be a positive addition to our city.  

Dean Metzger is former member of the Zoning Adjustments Board. 

Washington, D.C.: On Jan. 4 at 1:44 p.m. (EST), Nancy Pelosi was sworn in as the first female speaker of the House of Representatives. Besides the historic significance, what difference will this make in American politics? A lot, I believe. 

First a disclaimer: I’m a long-time supporter of Ms. Pelosi and, therefore, not impartial. That said, I believe Nancy Pelosi is the best thing to happen to American politics in many years. 

First of all, Speaker Pelosi is a woman and it’s important that a woman ascended to the third-highest political position in the United States. After 150 years of struggle, American women achieved the right to vote in 1920, but it’s only been in the last few years that significant numbers of women were elected to Congress. Nancy Pelosi told her House colleagues: “By electing me speaker, you have brought [all women] closer to the ideal of equality that is America’s heritage and America’s hope.” But, it’s not simply a symbolic gesture. Having a mother and grandmother as speaker of the House sounds a different political tone; one that adds heart to the Democratic vision for America. Pelosi’s speeches resounded with words like “hope” and “compassion,” as well as phrases such as, “We’re here to build a future for our children.” 

Nonetheless, electing Ms. Pelosi as speaker would be an empty gesture if she did not have other qualifications. The dictionary defines a politician as either an office holder “who is more concerned about winning favor or retaining power than about maintaining principles” or “a person who exhibits great wisdom and ability in directing the affairs of a government or in dealing with important public issues.” Speaker Pelosi is a politician in the latter sense: a person with both wisdom and ability. She’s been involved in politics for most of her life, coming from a political family, and representing her congressional district for 19 years. Nonetheless, her experience hasn’t rendered her cynical and self-serving. Ms. Pelosi remains convinced that politics can be a force for good, given proper leadership. 

And, Nancy Pelosi is a leader. She didn’t get to be speaker of the House simply because she is a woman and a skilled politician. She won this honor because Democratic members of Congress recognized that she has distinctive leadership qualities. Will Rogers famously quipped, “I belong to no organized party. I am a Democrat.” During the last two decades, rank-and-file Democrats have grown painfully aware of the lack of organization in their party; joked that managing Dems was like herding cats. Nonetheless, in her four-year tenure as House minority leader, Ms. Pelosi effectively led Democrats: organized opposition to Bush’s plan to privatize Social Security, galvanized resistance to the occupation of Iraq by appointing Congressman John Murtha as the Democratic point person, and engineered the Democratic victory in the Nov. 7 election. Speaker Pelosi is smart and tenacious, while gracious; but above all, focused. She understands that Democrats will not be successful opposing a rigidly ideological, lame duck president unless they stay unified and on message. She’s managed to unite the Dems. Now, her message is beginning to emerge: “The American people rejected an open-ended obligation to a war without end,” “the American people told [Congress] they expected us to work together for fiscal responsibility, with the highest ethical standards and with civility and bipartisanship,” and Democrats envision “America as a just and good place, as a fair and efficient society, as a source of opportunity for all.” 

Not that her job as speaker will be easy. In the next few months, Speaker Pelosi will be under pressure from factions within the Democratic Party to do many different things: bring U.S. troops home from Iraq, impeach President Bush, roll back tax cuts, and change our policy in the Middle East, to mention only a few. Rather than resort to factional infighting, Democratic partisans should trust Ms. Pelosi to stay focused and move the Democratic agenda through the House. 

Speaker Pelosi doesn’t trust George Bush and believes his administration to be self-serving and incompetent. Moreover, she’s convinced that the administration’s handling of Iraq and Homeland Security have made America less safe, and weakened our struggle against terrorism. Nonetheless, she’s confident that it’s possible to secure America and protect our Constitution. 

After 25 years of conservatism, and six disastrous years of the Bush administration, America has spun wildly off course. Nancy Pelosi won’t rectify this overnight: too much damage has been done. What she will do is to serve as the focal point for a disciplined, tenacious opposition. She’ll bring attention to the big issues facing the United States. And, Speaker Pelosi will appeal to our patriotism: ask all Americans, as she asked the House of Representatives: “Let us all stand together to move our country forward, seeking common ground for the common good.” “Let us focus on a future that is not enslaved by the past.” And, “Let us build a future for our children.” 

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

It was going to be a long night. I was spending some time during the holidays with my friend Karen and a group of people I barely knew, including two hard-of-hearing 91-year-olds. There was a lot of shouting and repetition at the dinner table.  

“How do you and Suzy know one another?” asked Julie, the female half of the almost-centenarians. 

“We met in Aspen,” said Karen. It sounded more glamorous than it really was. 

“At a writing conference,” I added. “Can somebody pass me the peas, please?” 

“Suzy was in a class with a man I thought I knew, so I asked her about him.” 

“Did you know him?” asked someone at the far end of the table. 

“I thought so, but I wasn’t sure. It was his profile, and the way he chewed gum that got my attention. I asked Suzy to find out his name, and report back to me.” 

“And?” 

“Where’s the gravy?” I asked. 

“Oh, I knew him all right. Had an affair with him 20 years ago in Mexico.” 

“Mexico!” shouted 91-year-old John. “I’ve been there!” 

“You have?” asked Karen politely. 

“What hotel did you stay in?” asked John.  

“John,” lectured the woman across the table from him. “There’s a lot of hotels in Mexico.” 

“I know that,” said John, “but you never know, you know what I’m saying?” 

“I’m not sure,” said the woman. 

“What he’s saying,” said Julie, John’s wife, “is that he wants to know if he’s met Karen before.” She paused. “In Mexico.” 

We all looked at Karen. She smiled. “I don’t think we’ve met before, John. I’d remember you.” 

“And I’d remember you,” said John. He winked.  

Karen laughed. “As I was saying, I re-met this guy in Aspen and—” 

“These mushrooms are very good,” interrupted Julie. “John, aren’t these mushrooms good? Here, try some.” 

“I don’t like mushrooms, you know that,” said John. “But in Mexico—” 

“We’ve got mushrooms in our backyard—” said Julie. 

“In Asp—” said Karen. 

“-and the squirrels eat them,” continued Julie. 

“The squirrels?” asked John. 

“Yes, the squirrels,” said Julie, smiling. “You heard me. The squirrels eat them but I don’t think I could eat them, you know what I’m saying?” 

“Maybe not,” said Karen. “In Aspe—” 

“In Mexico—” interrupted John. 

“Forget Mexico,” said Julie. “My grandfather was in the Russian secret police.” 

“The what?” asked John. 

“The secret police,” said Julie  

“Will someone please pass me the mushrooms?” I asked. 

“… and the army,” continued Julie. “It was all the same thing back then. He didn’t have a choice. If they said you had to go, you went. So they told him to go and he went.” 

“Where?” asked the man sitting next to me. 

“Into the forest,” answered Julie. 

“Into the forest?” 

“Yes. They told him to go into the forest, to visit a house where some people lived. And he was scared because he didn’t know why he was being sent there but in those days when they told you to go—” 

“You went,” finished John. 

“That’s right,” said Julie. “They told him to go so he went and when he got there he opened the door and—” 

“And what?” asked Karen. 

“Every one of the family members was sitting around the dinner table and—” 

“And?”  

“They were all dead!” 

“Dead?” shouted the person at the end of the table. 

“Dead as doornails,” said Julie, shaking her head.  

“Why?” asked several people in unison. 

Julie looked slowly around the table at each one of us before she replied. We all leaned in forward so that we could hear her answer. “Mushrooms!” she said in a dramatic whisper. 

“Don’t bother passing me the mushrooms,” I said. “I’ve changed my mind.” 

John turned to Karen. “Where did you say you stayed in Mexico?” 

Picture a winter’s day 30 years ago. Even in lousy weather you couldn’t wait to get outside. Explore the neighborhood, build a fort, climb a tree, head down to the pond for crawdads; you knew the limits of your adventures but they extended beyond your door. On weekends, family outings ventured into the hills or along the coast and lasted an entire day. Hiking, wildlife viewing, building castles in the sand, being outdoors in nature, giving free reign to your imagination. 

Today, our children’s lives, as well as our own, experience nature through technology, in software or through television nature programs. We know facts about global warming, the rain forest and Galapagos tortoises, but are unfamiliar with wildlife around us. Our lives cycle with little non-programmed time; parents fear unsupervised play and emphasis leans toward academic achievement. Today’s children are isolated from nature. 

In Lost Child in the Woods—Saving Our Children from Nature Deficit Disorder, Richard Louv equates non-contact with the natural world to the withholding of oxygen and links this deficit to ADD, childhood obesity and depression. Doug Gibson of the San Elijo Lagoon Conservancy states, “Children develop love of nature by seeing it, smelling it, touching it”. He echoes the concerns of many—children may never develop that love of nature that drives people to fight to protect it. 

Studies have shown that the natural environment has far-reaching effects on the health of all ages, physical, psychological and cognitive, while fostering a positive environmental ethic. Who can gaze at an arrow of pelicans grazing the ocean without a sense of wonder, imagining their capture of a meal? Who can linger beneath towering cathedral redwoods without a profound sense of peace? 

It’s time to return to nature, alone, in groups, with the kids—as close as your backyard, neighborhood, or regional park. As far as the West Marin Coast and forests. There’s no time like the present. Don’t wait for the “right” day, don’t pencil in your outing between noon and 1 p.m. Give yourself time to observe, absorb the rhythms of life. Prolong the day with a thermos, snacks, a meal. 

With over 95,000 acres, 65 regional parks and 1,150 miles of trails, there’s always wilderness nearby. You can’t go wrong supporting an organization dedicated to protecting and restoring parkland and preserving critical wildlife habitat. On your own or through a naturalist-led activity, you’ll find more choices than days in a year. 

Where better to renew your acquaintance with nature than at Tilden Regional Park, at Berkeley’s backdoor? Use the Visitor Center’s exhibit telling the story of Wildcat Creek Watershed to take an imaginary walk through a land shaped by water, through native stream, woodland and chaparral. Outdoors, experience these communities and their denizens firsthand. The Jewel Lake Trail, a multi-generational crowd-pleaser, carries you by trail and boardwalk over marsh and through a jungle of foliage to a small lake, home to raccoons, ducks, turtles and a wonderful Great Blue Heron. Every weekend naturalists lead activities highlighting evergreens, slugs, salamanders, owls and newts. 

Robert Sibley Volcanic Reserve offers a geologic treasure box—volcanic dikes, mudflows and lava flows. At the Visitor Center, pick up a self-guided tour of Round Top. Walk past the cross-section of a great volcano observing the folding of rock formations resulting from uplifting and erosion. On broad trails marvel at seasonal adaptations among coyote bush, wild current, snowberry, big leaf maple and madrone. 

In Alameda, Crab Cove Visitor Center makes estuary and bay learning fun. Interactive displays peak your curiosity, leaving you hungering for more. Microscopic organisms, crab “innards,” mud flat dwellers, barnacles, anemones, an 800-gallon aquarium and the Old Wharf classroom make the park’s mission clear: marine and shore life are interdependent and worth preserving. Take your wonder outdoors to the Marine Protected Area to explore tidal pools and mudflats. 

Exquisite bay vistas, windswept bluffs, eucalyptus forests, pebble beaches and rare coastal prairie all thrive at Point Pinole creating habitat for wildlife. Within the forests, deer, owls, hawks and migrating Monarch butterflies; in the salt marshes song sparrows and harvest mice. On 12-miles of mostly level trails across 2,300 acres changes in scenery are subtle; look for patterns on eucalyptus trunks and mud flats. Pick a bench to look out across the bay or a narrow trail to explore the shore. Naturalists focus on over-wintering birds and Monarchs for activities through January. 

Point Reyes National Seashore speaks to the believer in all of us. Believers in the importance of preserving open space. So many options exist within this expanse, your head will spin. Select one and take time to get the sense of the land, feel its cadence. Consider the links that connect all living things and the ethics of our treatment of nature. 

Winter in Point Reyes means whales and elephant seals. At the Elephant Seal Overlook, elephant seals’ natural behaviors are both amazing and comical. Huge males with Durante proboscises stake out their claim before females arrive to give birth. Watch males contest dominance and mother-pup interactions. Even with eyes closed the spectacle grabs your attention—males trumpeting and pups crying. On weekends and holidays trained docents man the cliff with spotting scopes and Elephant Seal 101 data. 

Though the Lighthouse is the ideal whale-watching locale, bird-lovers are also impressed. In the cypress trees roost songbirds, warblers and grosbeaks. Soaring through thermals are hawks, turkey vultures, ravens, Peregrine falcons and common murres. Nearby Chimney Rock also offers whale-watching vantage points and blossoms with wildflowers in spring. 

The Tule Elk Preserve out to Tomales Point is home to over 500 elk on 2,600 acres of open grassland and coastal scrub. Commanding vistas are breathtaking—a cerulean Pacific Ocean, Tomales Bay and Hog Island, corrugated coastline. You’ll be transported to Scotland in the blink of an eye. 

At Drake’s Estero, a one-mile walk through a deserted Christmas tree farm brings you to a footbridge over brackish waters. Here shorebirds, herons, egrets, hawks and osprey forage for food. At low tide, the exposed mudflats come to life, while the largest Point Reyes’ harbor seal breeding site lingers nearby. 

In you’re still unconvinced of the power of nature and vision, visit Muir Woods National Monument. In 1905, William Kent secured almost 300 acres of old-growth forest in the name of America’s foremost conservationist. Over one hundred years later, we walk beneath these giants, humbled by their peace. Winter brings fungi and banana slugs to the forest floor and Coho salmon to Redwood Creek. Follow trails past named redwood groves, illustrated kiosks and ecology talks. Venture away and discover a Muir Woods all your own. 

Relish the sunshine but bring on the rain and cold. Sharpen your senses, juice up those creative brain cells; salute the natural world. Recognize what’s worth preserving. Batteries not included.  

East Bay Regional Parks 

Naturalist activities published bi-monthly in Regional In Nature and on-line. Many require advance registration. 

www.ebparks.org. 

Point Reyes National Seashore 

Ranger-guided programs are offered each weekend, check web-site for schedule. 

(415) 464-5100, www.nps.gov/pore.  

Muir Woods National Monument 

Mill Valley. (415) 388-2596, www.nps.gov/muwo.  

Photograph by Marta Yamamoto 

I went trolling through my photo files, looking for a good shot of a willow for this column. It took forever to find one—and as you can see, it’s not a beauty shot, but a short horrow show, a big tree split by last year’s windstorms. I found lots of other willows, but always lurking in foreground corners of something more spectacular: fall color on a big-leaf maple, or a sway of gray pines across a creekbed.  

I take willows for granted, true, and I blame my spoiled urban existence for that. Willows —the genus Salix—in general are among the most useful species in the world. 

A traveler seeking water in the western plains or the California foothills would scan for a line of willows in an arroyo, because they’re a sure indicator of surface water. Under their low shade, a cool drink and a cool place to drink it: a pre-twentieth century roadside rest.  

Someone looking to make a basket to hold water, to cook acorn porridge in, would seek out a stand of willows and might have coppiced it the year before, to make long straight shoots for weaving. She’d have to work fast, get the supple twigs peeled the day she picked them so the bark didn’t stick.  

Maybe she’d cut a few inches of bark and slide it from its twig whole, in a cylinder, and add a notch near one end to make a whistle for the kids. When they gave her a headache with an hour of incessant whistle-blowing, she could chew on a slice of the inner bark for that too. Willow is the original source of salicylic acid, which the original Herr Bayer modified into acetylsalicylic acid—aspirin.  

Urban life has its willow markers too. The weeping willow, Salix babylonica, (or Salix babylonica ‘Pendula’), is a cultural marker of peaceful and gracious parks, and of a certain step from utilitarian to decorative homes, in the form of Grandmother’s Blue Willow china. I know I’m not the only one who made up stories about the people on the arched bridge, the stream, the distant and different pavilion. All concealed by mashed potatoes and peas and a slice of roast beef, to be revealed slowly before dessert. 

Like the imaginary scene on the plate, weeping willow originated in China, where it was an early cultivar of a native Chinese species. I guess the association was just too strong, though, for Linnaeus and his colleagues: “By the waters of Babylon we sat and wept for thee, O Jerusalem!” That sad trope gets the weeping willow onto gravestones, too, as a stylized silhouette, an emblem of mourning for the departed.  

Our local willows—arroyo willow (S. lasiolepis) and red willow (S. laevigata) are among the most common—have no end of usefulness too. Willows make lots of a rooting hormone, indolebutyric acid, in all their tissues. This makes then champion rooters; you can stick a hank of willow twigs in the damp ground along a streambank and count on several of them to take root and grow there. I’ve seen willow fences striking roots even in desert gardens, nipping a share of the irrigation water from the squash and beans. Wattle-and-daub walls have been known to do the same, turning a simple shelter into a live house. 

Restorationists use willow to stabilize streambanks against the destructive rush of winter flood rains, and the willows that grow are streambank natives anyway so it’s all as natural as possible. Water stays clear, soil stays in place for other plants to colonize, and the ubiquitous black phoebe (or maybe a willow flycatcher) comes along to perch on a willow branch: voila! Ecosystem! 

There’s another use for that rooting habit, even closer to home. Willow water, made by soaking mashed-up willow sprigs overnight, is a great aid for getting cuttings of other plants to root too. It doesn’t keep well, so don’t try to make a season’s supply. And don’t go denuding the willows in the parks for this, either; wild species do nosh on tender willow shoots. Trust me: you don’t want to find a posse of indignant raccoons with headaches at your door with torches and pitchforks. 

Ron Sullivan is a former professional gardener and arborist. Her “Green Neighbors” column appears every other Tuesday in the Berkeley Daily Planet, alternating with Joe Eaton’s “Wild Neighbors” column. Her “Garden Variety” column appears every Friday in the Planet’s East Bay Home & Real Estate section.  

Photograph By Ron Sullivan.  

A big split in a big willow near Jewel Lake in Tilden Park. Willows generally have brittle wood, though their twigs are supple.

Each year Dispatches From the Edge gives its annual IDBIAART (I Don’t Believe I Am Actually Reading This) Awards for the past year. The following are the Awards for 2006. 

Marching Together with Our Allies Award goes to the Bush administration for refusing to allow any U.S. military personnel to attend British inquests on the deaths of United Kingdom soldiers from “friendly-fire” in Iraq. In the latest incident, Lance Corporal Matthew Hull was killed when a U.S. pilot attacked a British convoy near Basra. The White House refused to allow the pilot to attend the inquest. 

British Justice Minister Harriet Harman told the Daily Mail “The families want to know how their loved ones were killed. They have got that right.” Harman went on to say that the “special relationship” between the United States and Britain “demands honesty and openness. They are our allies in Iraq and should respect the grief of the families and not hide from the court. If any of our soldiers were involved in American friendly-fire deaths we would expect them to attend hearings.” 

Harman dressed down the American ambassador over the Bush administration’s stonewalling of the inquest request. She apparently did so without clearing it with Prime Minister Tony Blair—“fresh evidence of the crumbling authority of the PM,” notes the Mail. 

The Justice Ministry had guaranteed that there would be no legal or financial sanctions against the U.S. pilot, but the White House refused to release the name of the airman or allow him to attend the inquest. 

Oxfordshire Coroner Andrew Walker, who conducted the inquiry, strongly supported Harman’s demand for an American presence. Walker also conducted the inquest on two Royal Air Force pilots shot down by a U.S. Patriot missile during the 2003 invasion of Iraq, and he found that U.S. Marines had committed an “unlawful killing” when they gunned down British reporter Terry Lloyd during the invasion. 

Hull’s widow, Susan Hull, said, “The people who are left behind want some answers.”  

They are not likely to get them from this White House. 

Lt. William Calley Award goes to Avigdor Lieberman, Israeli Knesset member, leader of the right wing, racist Yiseral Beiteinu Party (Israel is Our Home) and newly appointed Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Strategic Affairs. Lieberman advocates the death penalty for Knesset members who talk with Hamas members, urges the destruction of all commercial centers, gas stations and banks in the occupied territories, and calls for expelling all Israeli-Arabs who do not take a loyalty oath to the state of Israel.  

Lieberman’s party has 11 seats in the Knesset, and Hebrew University political scientist Ze’ev Sternhell says he “is perhaps the most dangerous politician in the history of the state of Israel.” 

Asked what he thought should be done with the 10,000 Palestinians presently held without charge by Israeli authorities, he said that all of them should be taken to the Red Sea and drowned—and he, Avigdor Lieberman, would provide the buses to transport them. 

Honor Among Thieves Award goes to Ahmed Chalabi, the shady Iraqi exile who fed now-disgraced New York Times investigative reporter Judith Miller phony information about Iraq’s non-existent weapons of mass destruction and pressured the U.S. to dissolve the Iraqi army and dismiss all members of the Baath Party.  

Asked by the New York Times Magazine why Iraq is now such a disaster, Chalabi replied “The Americans sold us out” and “The real culprit in all this is [Paul] Wolfowitz,” the neo-conservative former assistant secretary of defense and now president of the World Bank.  

What should the Americans have done? According to Chalabi, turn Iraq over to him and cleric Muktada al-Sadr.  

Adam Smith Privatization Award goes to the U.S. Coast Guard for turning over its $17 billion modernization program—lock, stock and barrel—to Lockheed Martin, the world’s biggest arms company, and Northrop Grumman. The two companies turned out ships with hull cracks—a bad idea if you want to use them in the water—cutters whose engines don’t work, an Eagle Eye unmanned air vehicle that crashes, and radios that are not water proofed. The companies also produced a long-range High Altitude Endurance Unmanned Air Vehicle for use in Alaska.  

Unfortunately, the craft can’t operate in bad weather. Who would have thought that would be a problem in Alaska? 

While the Coast Guard easily won the award this year, word in the industry is that the Homeland Security Department will make a strong run at the crown next year. It has handed the Boeing Corporation $7 billion to plan, supervise and execute a strategy to tighten U.S. borders to stop illegal immigration. 

There is a possibility, however, that through a little inter-service cooperation, both organizations might share the award next year. For instance, Coast Guard cutters could be transferred to the deserts of the South Texas border region, where they are unlikely to sink.  

Historical Insight Award goes to George W. Bush for comments during his March visit to Pakistan. Asked by journalists if Pakistan would get the same nuclear technology deal that the White House had just signed with India, Bush replied, “I explained that Pakistan and India are different countries with different needs and different histories.” 

Apparently the Pakistanis had no idea this was the case. 

Bush’s award means that the President has won this laurel two years running. Last year he was the hands down winner when he told the Brazilian press: “Wow! Brazil is big.” 

Great Moments in Literature Award goes to the American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG) which gave its annual journalism award to Michael Crichton for State of Fear, his novel debunking global warming.  

The book has come under heavy fire from climate experts—Stanford climatologist Stephen H. Schneider called it “demonstrably garbage”—although it was praised by the former chair of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, James Inhofe (R-OK). Inhofe, recently replaced as chair by Barbara Boxer (D-CA), calls global warming “the greatest hoax ever perpetuated on the American people.” 

Oklahoma is a long way from the coast. 

AAGP Communications Director Larry Nation admitted that Crichton was not a journalist, and that State of Fear was fiction, but maintained the science fiction book “has the absolute ring of truth.”  

Rudyard Kipling Award to Brigadier General Edward Butler, commander of British forces in Afghanistan. Speaking about the recent upsurge in fighting, Butler said, “We knew it was going to be a tough fight. The Afghan has fighting in his blood.” 

The commander was speaking from Helmand Province, which Britain has occupied, on and off, for just short of 200 years. 

Hearts and Minds Award to the Third Battalion, Eighth U.S. Marine Regiment, in Ramadi, Iraq. A poster in the unit’s headquarters reads: “Be polite, be professional and have a plan to kill everyone you meet.”  

The runner up in this category was a slogan for a unit T-shirt in the same regiment: “Kilo Company: Killed more people than cancer.” 

Real Historical Insight Award (posthumous) to T.E. Lawrence for his 1919 dispatch from Iraq: 

“We have been led into a trap from which it will be hard to escape with dignity and honor. We have been tricked into it by a withholding of information. The Baghdad communiqués are belated, insincere, incomplete. Things have been far worse that we have been told. Our administration more bloody and inefficient than the public knows. We are today not far from disaster.” 

Lifetime Achievement Award to Stew Albert (Dec. 4, 1939-Jan. 30, 2006) for his courage and intelligence in the battle to end oppression. In the long fight ahead, he will be missed. Slan lan avic, Minstrel Stew. This harp shall praise thee. May we meet again in Tara’s hall.

Late in the summer of 1864, shortly after his combined federal armies of the West entered Georgia’s largest and most important city, General William Sherman sent a telegram to President Abraham Lincoln with a brief message included. “Atlanta is ours,” Mr. Sherman said, “and fairly won.” 

Something similar could be said by Ron Dellums, who became the new mayor of the City of Oakland this week by virtue of his victory in the elections last June. Those elections were fairly fought, with no taint or hint of scandal concerning their outcome, the citizens of Oakland having come together—uncoerced—and decided upon their own, by majority vote, that Mr. Dellums is their choice to lead the city over the next four years. Such was also the case with Jerry Brown four years ago. 

Mr. Brown has come in for considerable criticism and first- and second-guessing since then—within this column as much as anyplace in and out of Oakland—but that has been almost solely in response to his actions and activities, or lack thereof, during his tenure as mayor. What has been forgotten in recent years is that Mr. Brown came into office with a considerable portion of goodwill, and was given ample time and space to either prove or disprove his abilities and desires. 

In December 2000, for example, I wrote in defense of Mr. Brown’s hiring of his old friend Jacques Barzaghi in the old “Oakland Unwrapped” column (the forerunner of “UnderCurrents”), saying that “by all accounts, Jacques Barzaghi plays an important role in Jerry Brown’s life as friend and confidant, and I don’t see anything wrong with public officials bringing such folk into their administrations.” 

This was written at the beginning of the Barzaghi sexual harassment scandal, some days after the investigation began into the charges that Mr. Barzaghi had verbally assaulted and demeaned a female city employee during an official trip to the presidential inaugural in Mexico City. Even then, a year into Mr. Brown’s first administration, he was still being given considerable leeway. If Mr. Brown’s soul was lost—to broadly paraphrase the old spiritual we used to sing in the black Baptist church—it was nobody’s fault but his. 

Mr. Dellums deserves that same opportunity. 

He comes into the mayorship with his own ideas and plans, but also with considerable, pressing problems left over from the outgoing Brown Administration. Everybody is providing advice, including Mr. Brown who, according to the report on the NBC11 website, providing Mr. Dellums with a plan to fight Oakland’s soaring crime rate. 

According to NBC11, “The plan, drafted by consultants from New York, recommends that the Oakland Police Department set up geographic zones in the city. Each zone would be overseen by a captain.” 

“This way,” the television quoted the outgoing mayor as saying, “you get one top person totally responsible 24 hours a day for crime and the work against crime and the protection of citizens. I think if implemented this will drive down the murder rate It will put police where the criminals are and will match police deployment with criminal activity." 

And all the time, it was that simple. Where were these New York consultants, all these past eight years? 

Meanwhile, what the Dellums administration can only hope for is that it is not pushed into reckless action by pressure built up from the anxieties and unfulfilled promises of the Brown Administration. What Oaklanders—and residents of the surrounding communities so dependent, economically and culturally, on Oakland—need is patience. 

The danger will be to immediately use the city’s murder rate as an indicator of how successful—or unsuccessfull—Mr. Dellums is in pulling us up from the street horror of the Brown years. 

On Thursday morning, the Tribune reported the city’s first homicide of 2007, a man found dead on the street on 89th Avenue, with the paper noting that “Oakland’s first homicide in 2006 happened Jan. 9 and the final tally was 148.” What possible bearing can the date of Oakland’s first homicide of 2006 have on the date of its first homicide of 2007, other than for our good friends at the Tribune to make the not-so-subtle point that this year’s first occurred almost a week earlier last year’s and, by inference, perhaps that means we are in for a bloodier year than last? 155? 175? How long will it be before the papers begin publishing their comparative charts, as if this were a sports contest, and the number of bodies in the Alameda County morgue were somehow analogous to the number of points scored by Kobe Bryant, or home runs hit by Barry Bonds? 

The problem with this statistics-based approach to judging the return of health and safety to our city is twofold. 

The first is that some of the actions which would eventually lead to permanent violence reduction in the long-term may actually cause a spike in violence in the short-term. One of these we have discussed before: open-air drug markets. These are some of the immediate sources of Oakland’s most horrific instances of murder, violence, and crime. Oakland’s open-air drug streets and corners are controlled by a complex array of drug gangs operating under various forms of hierarchy, alliances, and territorial boundaries. When these alliances are stable, there is a lessening of territorial disputes and attempts to take over each other’s turf, thus a lessening of drug-related shootings, thus a lowering of the city’s murder rate. But when police come in a break up some of the more lucrative drug-dealing areas, groups can converge from different factions and different parts of the city to try to fill the vacuum, sometimes resulting in bloody turf wars. The more effective the police are in shutting off these outlets, the more the profits of the drug gangs are squeezed, the more violent become their wars over the remaining profit centers. The danger is that in responding to persistent public calls to lower the murder rate, police are tempted to let things be, and allow many of the long-term, open-air drug dealing to go on unmolested. Perhaps it is this type of thinking which has allowed some open-air drug centers to operate in some of the darker and poorer areas of the city, seemingly unimpeded by police, since the years the crack trade began. 

The other danger to using the homicide rate as our immediate measure of success in city safety is that a serious, adult attack on the long-term causes of Oakland’s crime and violence is not going to have any immediate, measurable effect, not, at least, one that can be put down in a graph on the front page of the Tribune or the East Bay Express. In the last 20 years—coinciding with the rise of the crack trade and the continued erosion of the city’s industrial workplace base—many of neighborhoods and communities have witnessed an enromous period of uncertainty and disruption that have gone virtually ignored by the various city administrations of those times. Pile that on top of the unresolved and swept-under problems of the two centuries previous and you are left with an enormous reservoir of problems that are not going to be resolved with a clever six or seven month program typed into a computer by New York consultants. 

And the problem of crime and violence is only one of Oakland’s present difficulties. There are myriad more. 

Does this make the task hopeless? Impossible? Hardly. But it’s not the sort of task that’s going to be finished in a day. Or a month. Or even a single mayoral administration, no matter how bright and promising it may appear at its offset. 

The administration of the City of Oakland is Ron Dellums’, for the next four years, at least, and fairly won. 

What he needs now is a little space. And some help. 

I’m always afraid to start talking about the practice of home inspection, fearing that it will seem self-serving but hey, I can serve myself! Actually, I think this sort of discussion is valuable and I wouldn’t try to waste your time if it weren’t. I never fail in my awareness that a column becomes birdcage liner pretty darned quick when it doesn’t provide something of worth. 

About 20 percent of the inspections I do involve condominiums and inspecting condos always involves a frustrating and complex problem. What do we do about the other parts of the property that my client isn’t actually buying (or are they?). The tricky thing about this particular nut and the cracking thereof is that while my client may be presented with the other parts as being completely protected against all evil and nastiness, it ain’t necessarily going to work out that way. 

Let me start out by saying when I will do the inside of a condo and be satisfied with this as a complete process. First, I want the condo to be one of many. Let’s say more than 30 and never less than eight as an absolute minimum. Why, you may rightly ask (you’re so smart)? Because as a condo owner, you will generally be financially responsible for a percentage of all maintenance, repair and improvement costs and if you are buying a condo that has only four units, that’s usually going to be 25 percent (although uneven percentage splits are not uncommon). 

Twenty-five percent of the cost of a foundation, a roof or a major pest clearance can still be a great deal of money and it might be nice to have some sense of what’s coming at the point at which you buy. 

On the other hand, if you’re buying into a building or community of 100 units, a 1 percent responsibility isn’t all that great, although a roof job for a very large building can be a whole lot of money. 

So it’s important to consider, in choosing to inspect (or to not inspect) the other parts of the building, whether you may end up bearing some of the costs for a range of repairs that were never discussed during the sale process. 

Let me take a second to clarify, in brief, what I inspect when I do solely the interior of a condo. This is the standard form, by the way, and your realtor may be accustomed to this as the common method (although they may be quite open to an alternative). An interior inspection inspects only those parts that are inside the unit and include the kitchen, baths, usually one interior electrical panel, the force of the shower, the loose toilet, a cracked or stuck window, and so forth. 

The parts that aren’t included are the roof, the exterior of the building, the foundation, the main electrical, water and gas connections, the site, the crawlspace (is it wet?), etc. The unseen items can make up quite a list, although the Home Owner’s Association (HOA) is, as a general rule, financially responsible for all of these components. 

Another reason to inspect all of the building, as opposed to the interior of your unit alone, is that this particular building happens to be older. Now old, in and of itself, isn’t a bad thing. I’m old and I’m great, but old buildings have problems that modern buildings don’t. They’re more apt to be damaged in an earthquake, unless retrofitting has already been done and done well (I see a lot of poorly done retrofits). They’re more likely to have unsafe wiring, worn out heating equipment and bad roofing.  

By the way, the age of a building is also an issue that I’d use as a basis for whether I’d be willing to do an “interior-only” inspection. 

While you may be only a 3 percent owner in your building, this array of issues might still be important to you (and should be). This isn’t to say that the HOA won’t pay for the things it’s responsible for, but the first thing you, as a buyer, should be determining is: what’s the state of the building I’m considering buying into and putting my body inside of. Is it safe? Will it need major upgrading? Will I have to push to get 25 other folks to bring it up to a reasonable state of safety?  

You may have great success in all these things but it’s fair and reasonable to know that this is what’s on the slate for you to do as opposed to moving into a building that has a clean bill of health and will prove fairly trouble free.  

I don’t feel as though it’s my job to dissuade a buyer from taking on a range of real or potential problems. The property might be a terrific deal and just right for them, all troubles included. The important thing is that the buyer have the chance to see what they’re taking on. Although it may appear that condo ownership is trouble-free, it’s not quite so. I think condo ownership is a great choice for many but it’s not absolution from all care of the home. 

While I like to have the chance to inspect the rest of the building, I must admit that one of the things that will ease my concerns about building issues in general is the presence of a nice big cash reserve held by the HOA. Most HOAs maintain several thousand dollars (obviously varying hugely with size and condition) for the repair and maintenance of the building.  

Some HOAs have very little in reserve and this should always be cause for some discussion regarding the “what-ifs” of home ownership. What if there’s a fire? What is unit C floods unit A because a hose burst on Ms. Friedan’s washing machine and ruined Ms. Steinem’s nice oak floors below? These are the sorts of things that reserves are designed to pay for in addition to the more obvious roofing, painting and so forth. As any homeowner will tell you, there’s always something to pay for when you own a house (or 10 units). 

Knowledge is power and it’s always nice to have a little more power, especially when you’re making a large investment. If you’re buying a condo, an inspection is a darned good idea and spending a bit more to see what the building is like may be wise too. 

Talk to your home inspector when you’re getting ready to do this. Chances are that for an extra hundred or two, you can find out what sort of building you’re moving into. Remember, that other stuff can matter a lot. 

Got a question about home repairs and inspections? Send them to Matt Cantor at mgcantor@pacbell.net.

Oh boy, did I get a great Yule present. Joe gave me a copy of the new edition of Lester Rowntree’s classic Hardy Californians. If no one gave you one, remedy that immediately. 

It’s worth having even if you’ve got a copy of the first edition on your shelf. Additional material by Lester B. Rowntree and Judith Larner Lowry would be worth the book’s price, and there a handy concordance appended that lists the current taxonomic names of the plants in the original, many of which have been reclassified since its publication in 1936. The California Academy of Sciences has collected lots of Rowntree’s personal notes, an invaluable resource these writers present handsomely to the rest of us. 

I just missed Lester Rowntree by a couple of California years. I keep meeting interesting people who knew her personally. I’m just a tad bitter that I never had the chance to meet her myself before she died—at the age of 100—in 1979.  

Her friends and students tell me she was the character a reader meets in her books. This is a very engaging character indeed: knowledgeable, witty, practical, independent in mind and habits, perceptive, and unreservedly in love with the land and the plants she encountered.  

And physically tough. She rambled all over California’s wildlands, over the Sierra and through the deserts, in one of those great clunky old 1930s coupes with running boards—passenger seat removed to make room for her equipment—or on foot, sometimes with a burro named Skimpy to caddy. 

These impedimenta were mostly plant presses, reference books, samples and seeds and storage for them, film holders and big box cameras. She herself required little: a homemade bedroll and garden tools, and presumably a change of clothing, a pot or two, and a stash of beans and raisins. No tent; in bad weather she tucked up in the car. Otherwise, she liked her world first-hand and immediate: 

“The best places of all were in the high mountains, where I knew no one was camping above me. I used to love sleeping at the edge of the snow banks during thaw time to watch the alpines open with the rising sun.” 

The book’s title is utilitarian: Hardy Californians are plants that will thrive in gardens that get seriously cold in winter. The phrase contradicts the idea then prevalent that all California plants were semitropical or at least tender.  

“Hardy” and “tender” mean something particular to gardeners that their common usage doesn’t convey. Much as “theory” does not mean “wild guess” to scientists – it means a tested explanation for concrete facts—“hardy” means “cold-tolerant” and “tender” means the opposite. The toughest plant on Earth might be a shoreline shrub who endures gales, salt spray, and annual drought, but has never faced deep freezes and is therefore tender.  

Rowntree’s voice is frank and forward in her book, and her first-person style makes the acquaintance with our native plants even more a pleasure. She includes growing advice that needs very little modification for us here and now’ to summarize: Know where your plants come from and how they grow there, to know what they’ll like.  

Read it yourself. It’s a good introduction to brilliant and hardy Californians, in both senses. 

Hardy Californians: A Woman’s Life with Native Plants. Lester Rowntree.  

(New, expanded edition).  

University of California Press, 2006,  

ISBN-13 978-0-520-25051-2. 

$19,95 

TUESDAY, JAN. 9 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Vikram Chandra reads from his new book “Sacred Games” at 7 p.m. at Cody’s Books on Fourth St. 559-9500. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Yuliyan Yordanov, Balkan folk dance, at 7 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 $6. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

Mark Erelli at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $17.50-$18.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Debbie Poryes & Friends at 7 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave., at Dwight. 548-5198.  

Buster Williams “Something More” at 8 and 10 p.m. at Yoshi’s at Jack London Square. Cost is $10-$18. 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, JAN. 10 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Nomadic Rambles Storytelling, hosted by Ed Silberman at 7 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344.  

Berkeley Poetry Slam with host Charles Ellik at 8:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $5-$7. 841-2082  

MUSIC AND DANCE 

The Crucible’s Fire Ballet “Romeo and Juliet” Wed. - Sat. at 8:30 p.m. at 1260 7th St., Oakland, through Jan. 20. Tickets are $30-$55. 444-0919. 

Trovatore, traditional Italian music at 7 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave., at Dwight. 548-5198.  

Ed Johnson & Novo Tempo Trio at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $8. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

Cumbiamba Eneye, Aluna at 8:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $15. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Julio Bravo, salsa, at 9:30 p.m. at Shattuck Down Low, 2284 Shattuck Ave. Salsa lessons at 8 p.m. Cost is $5-$10. 548-1159.  

Paul Manousos at 8:30 p.m. at the Uptown Nightclub, 1928 Telegraph, Oakland. Cost is $5. 451-8100.  

Kleptograss with Eric Thompson, Laurie Lewis, Tom Rozum, Scott Nygaard and Paul Shelasky at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $18.50-$19.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Ezra Gale Trio at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Frank Gambale Natural High Trio at 8 and 10 p.m. at Yoshi’s at Jack London Square. Cost is $12-$20. 238-9200. www.yoshis.com 

THURSDAY, JAN. 11 

EXHIBITIONS 

Art to Action on Berkeley Creeks Photographs Opening reception at 5 p.m. at River of Words Gallery, Sawtooth Building, 2547 8th St., #13B. 848-9358. 

“Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Philosophy of Non-Violence” Books, posters, speechs and other items on display in honor of King’s birthday at te Oakland Public Library, Rockridge Branch, 5366 College Ave. 597-5017. 

“La Raza Uprising” Photographs by Francisco J. Dominguez. Reception at 6 p.m. at The Asian Resource Gallery, 310 8th St. and Harrison, Oakland.  

New Works by Vaugh Hovanessian on display through Jan. at Rooz Cafe, 4252 Piedmont Ave., Oakland. 547-5399. 

FILM 

A Theater Near You “Army of Shadows” at 7:30 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

“A Legacy of Beauty: The Life and Work of Julia Morgan” presentation by Mark Wilson at 7:30 p.m. at Chapel of the Chimes. Sponsored by Oakland Heritage Alliance. Donation $8-$10. 763-9218. www.oaklandheritage.org  

“The Art of Gaman” Lecture by Delphine Hirasuna on the arts and crafts of Japanese Americans detained in WWII internment camps, at 1 p.m. at the Oakland Museum of California, 10th and Oak Sts, Oakland. 238-2200. 

Bocalicious Spoken Word at 7 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

Vendela Vida reads from “Let the Northern Lights Erase Your Name” at 7 p.m. at Cody’s Books on Fourth St. 559-9500. www.codysbooks.com 

Rachel Sarah reads from “Single Mom Seeking Playdates, Blind Dates and Other Dispatches from the Dating World” at 7:30 p.m. at East Bay Jewish Community Center, 1414 Walnut St. Sponsored by Black Oak Books. 486-0698. www.balckoakbooks.com 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Rebecca Riots at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $18.50-$19.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Fourtet with Kasey Knudsen 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 Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave., at Dwight. 548-5198.  

Go Go Fightmaster, Doublestroke at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $6. 841-2082. www.starryploughpub.com 

Fun with Finnoula at 9:30 p.m. at Beckett’s Irish Pub, 2271 Shattuck Ave. 647-1790. www.beckettsirishpub.com 

Selector: Machine Love at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Frank Gambale Natural High Trio at 8 and 10 p.m. at Yoshi’s at Jack London Square. Cost is $12-$20. 238-9200. www.yoshis.com 

FRIDAY, JAN. 12 

THEATER 

Azeem’s “Rude Boy” at 8 p.m. at The Marsh Berkeley, 2120 Allston Way and runs Thurs.-Sat. through Jan. 27. Tickets are $15-$22. 800-838-3006. 

Rough and Tumble “43 Plays for 43 Presidents” Thurs.-Sat. at 8 p.m. at La Val’s Subterranean Theater, 1834 Eucid Ave. through Jan. 27. Tickets are $15-$20. 499-0356. www.randt.org 

Shotgun Players “The Forest War” Thurs.-Sun. at 8 p.m. at the Ashby Stage, 1901 Ashby Ave., through Jan 14. Sliding scale $15-$30. 841-6500. www.shotgunplayers.org 

Starlight Circle Players “Dead Men Tell No Tales” A piratical musical at 8 p.m. Fri.-Sun., through Jan. 21, at Berkeley Fellowship of Unitarian Universalists, 1924 Cedar St. at Bonita. Tickets are $10-$25. 647-5268. 

FILM 

The Lubitsch Touch “Lady Windermere’s Fan” with Bruce Loeb on piano at 7 p.m., and “The Shop Around the Corner” at 8:45 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Poetry Flash presents Sandra M. Gilbert reading from “Belongings” and Willa Schenberg reading from “Storytelling in Cambodia” at 7:30 p.m. at Black Oak Books, 1491 Shattuck Ave. 486-0698. www.blackoakbooks.com 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

The Crucible’s Fire Ballet “Romeo and Juliet” Wed. - Sat. at 8:30 p.m. at 1260 7th St., Oakland, through Jan. 20. Tickets are $30-$55. 444-0919. www.thecrucible.org 

Ras Midas & Root Awakening in a MLK Day Reggae Celebration at 9:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $13-$15. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Dan Zemelman Quartet, original and traditional jazz 8 p.m. at the Hillside Club, 2286 Cedar St. Cost is $15 at the door. www.hillsideclub.org 

Julian Pollack, pianist, at 8 p.m. at the Jazzschool. Cost is $12-$15. 845-5373. www.jazzschool.com 

E.W. Wainwright Tribute to Max Roach at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $12. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

Atmos Trio, jazz, at 8 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave., at Dwight. 548-5198.  

Rebecca Riots at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $18.50-$19.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Rebecca Griffin Quartet at 9 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810.  

The Nomadics, jazz, at 7:30 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

Victor Krummenacher, Jonathan Segel, Mia & Jonah at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $7. 841-2082. www.starryploughpub.com 

Arnocorps, Judgement Day, Cookie Mongoloid at 8 p.m. at 924 Gilman St., an all-ages, member-run, no alcohol, no drugs, no violence club. Cost is $5. 525-9926. 

Low Red Land at 9:30 p.m. at Beckett’s Irish Pub, 2271 Shattuck Ave. 647-1790. www.beckettsirishpub.com 

Sunhouse at 9 p.m. at Shattuck Down Low, 2284 Shattuck Ave. Cost is $5-$8. 548-1159.  

Wayward Monks at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Gerald Albright at Yoshi’s at Jack London Square, through Sun. Cost is $22-$26. 238-9200. www.yoshis.com 

SATURDAY, JAN. 13 

CHILDREN  

Storytelling Worshop on “Abuela” by Arthur Dorros, for ages 7-10 at 2 p.m. in the Story Room, Berkeley Public Library, 2090 Kittredge St. 981-6224. 

Andy Z at 11 a.m. at Studio Grow, 1235 10th St., at Gilman. Cost is $7. 526-9888. 

EXHIBITIONS 

“Can We Spare Some Change? - A Change in Attitude” Paintings by Milton Bowens. Exhibition Closing Reception at 6:30 p.m. at African American Museum and Library, 659 14th St. Oakland. 637-0200. 

“New Beginnings” The art of Vesta Kirby and others opens with a reception at 6 p.m. at Expressions Gallery, 2035 Ashby Ave. Gallery hours are Wed.-Sat. noon to 5 p.m. 644-4930. 

Deborah Muse “Paintings and Quilts” Reception for the artist at 4 p.m. at La Peña, 3105 Shattuck Ave. Exhibition runs to Feb. 24. 849-2568. 

“Passages and Packages: Messages of Our Mothers” opens at 7 p.m. at Rock Paper Scissors, 492 23rd St., Oakland. www.weekendwakeup.com 

“Fire in the Heart” Paintings by Foad Satterfield influenced by African art. Reception at 4 p.m. at the Community Gallery, Alta Bates Summit Medical Center, 2450 Ashby Ave. Exhibition runs through March 2. 204-1667. 

“Watercolors of Oakland” by Alan Leon Reception at 2 p.m. at Oakland Public Library, Lakeview Branch, 550 El Embarcadero, Oakland. 238-7344. 

FILM 

“Dodes Ka-den” Akira Kurosawa’s 1970 film of Tokyo slum dwellers, at 3:30 p.m. at Berkeley Public Library, Third flr. Community Room, 2090 Kittredge St. 981-6139. 

A Theater Near You “Le cercle rouge” at 5:30 p.m. and “Army of Shadows” at 8:20 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

“Storytelling in Cambodia” with Willa Schneberg at 4 p.m. at Eastwind Books of Berkeley, 2066 University Ave. 548-2350. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

“The Dream of a King” Music, song and stories with Diane Ferlatte in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. at 2 p.m. at Oakland Museum of California, 1000 Oak St. 238-2220. www.museumca.org 

Berkeley Symphony “Hold On” Music by Stravinsky, Sibelius, Locke and Wilson, with George Thomson conducting, at 8 p.m. at Zellerbach Hall, UC Campus. Tickets are $10-$56. 841-2800. www.berkeleysymphony.org 

Musica Pacifica performs “Jácaras!” The Spanish Baroque and the New World at 8 p.m. at St. John’s Presbyterian Church, 2727 College at Garber. Tickets are $10- $25. 528-1725 or www.sfems.org 

The KTO Project at 8 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Cost is $15. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

Lloyd Gregory Quintet at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $12. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

Beausoleil with Michael Doucet at 9 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cajun dance lesson at 8 p.m. Cost is $18-$20. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com  

Moment’s Notice Improv music, dance and theater at 8 p.m. at Western Sky Studio, 2525 8th St. Ticets are $8-$10. 847-1119. 

Capricornicopia II at 8:30 p.m. at the Uptown Nightclub, 1928 Telegraph, Oakland. Cost is $5. 451-8100. www.uptownnightclub.com 

Atmos Trio, jazz, at 7:30 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

Jinx Jones Trio at 8 p.m. at Jupiter. 848-8277. 

Steve Seskin, Craig Carothers & Don Henry at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $18.50-$19.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Maya Kronfeld Trio at 9 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810.  

Beep with Michael Coleman Jazz Trio at 9 p.m. at Albatross, 1822 San Pablo Ave. Cost is $3. 843-2473. www.albatrosspub.com 

Aoedbe, folk, at 8 p.m. at Spuds Pizza, 3290 Adeline St. Cost is $7. 558-0881. 

El Capitan Axton Kincaid, Robber Barons at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. All ages show. Cost is $7. 841-2082. www.starryploughpub.com 

Lucky Stiffs, Nothington, Those Unknown at 8 p.m. at 924 Gilman St., an all-ages, member-run, no alcohol, no drugs, no violence club. Cost is $5. 525-9926. 

Gerald Albright at Yoshi’s at Jack London Square, through Sun. Cost is $22-$26. 238-9200. www.yoshis.com 

SUNDAY, JAN. 14 

CHILDREN 

“Life at the Little Farm” A puppet show and sing along for the whole family at 11 a.m. at Tilden Nature Center, Tilden Park. 525-2233. 

EXHIBITIONS 

Benicia Gantner “Recent Work” and Charles Labelle “Bldgs Entered, 1997-2007” Exhibitions open at the Traywick Gallery, 895 Colusa Ave. and run through March 31. Gallery hours are Thurs.-Sat. 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. by appointment. 527-1214. 

FILM 

The Lubitsch Touch “Ninotchka” at 3 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Sandy Florian and Arielle Greenberg, poets, at 7:30 p.m. at Pegasus Books Downtown, 2349 Shattuck Ave. 649-1320. 

Ross King describes “The Judgment of Paris: The Revolutionary Decade That Gave the World Impressionism” at 4 p.m. at Cody’s Books on Fourth St. 559-9500. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Oak, Ash & Thorn, a capella at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $18.50-$19.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Ben Adams Quintet at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $10. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

Richter Scales & Roshambo, a capella, at 7:30 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Cost is $8-$10. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

Lavay Smith and Her Red Hot Skillet Lickers at 4:30 at the Jazzschool. Cost is $18. 845-5373. www.jazzschool.com 

SoVoSo at 7 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810.  

Diablo’s Dust at 11 a.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

Gerald Albright at Yoshi’s at Jack London Square, through Sun. Cost is $22-$26. 238-9200. www.yoshis.com 

MONDAY, JAN. 15 

FILM 

“The Mind is a Liar and a Whore” A new film by Antero Alli at 7 p.m. at the Gaia Arts Center, 2118 Allston Way. Cost is $10. 464-4640. 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Bill Berkson and Lyn Hejinian read from their new poems at 7:30 p.m. at Moe’s Books, 2476 Telegraph Ave. 849-2087. 

PlayGround Six emerging playwrights debut new works at 8 p.m. at Berkeley Repertory Theater, 2025 Addison St. Tickets are $18. 415-704-3177. www.PlayGround-sf.org 

Poetry Express Annual “Other People’s Poety Night” at 7 p.m. at Priya Restaurant, 2072 San Pablo Ave. berkeleypoetryexpress@yahoo.com 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Tribute to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. with a youth talent show from 2 to 5 p.m. at Malonga Casquelourd Center for the Arts, 1428 Alice St., Oakland. 238-7217. 

Blue Monday Jam at 7:30 p.m. at the Uptown Nightclub, 1928 Telegraph, Oakland. Cost is $5. 451-8100. www.uptownnightclub.com 

Greg Pratt &La Wanda Ultan, blues, jazz, country folk, at 7 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave., at Dwight. 548-5198.  

The Robert Stewart Experience, A Dedication to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. at Yoshi’s at Jack London Square. 238-9200. www.yoshis.com  

The Berkeley Daily Planet lists local community and arts events in our calendars on a space available basis. Preference is given to local non-profits.  

As we run week-long calendars, we appreciate receiving the information at least two weeks in advance.  

Please send the title of event, date and time, location, cost and telephone number/website in the body of an email, not as an attachment, to calendar@berkeleydailyplanet.com

‘THE FOREST WAR’ 

The Shotgun Players’ presentation of “The Forest War,” written and directed by Mark Jackson, extended through Jan. 28 at the Ashby Stage. The play starts at 8 p.m. and tickets are sold on a sliding scale, $15-$30. 1901 Ashby Ave. 841-6500. www.shotgunplayers.org. 

‘SPARE SOME CHANGE’ CLOSING RECEPTION 

A closing reception for “Can We Spare Some Change? — A Change in Attitude,” paintings by Milton Bowens, will be held at 6:30 p.m. Saturday at the African American Museum and Library, 659 14 St., Oakland. 637-0200. 

‘FIRE IN THE HEART’ 

“Fire in the Heart,” an exhibit of paintings by Foad Satterfield influenced by African art, runs through March 2 at the Community Gallery at Alta Bates Medical Center. A reception will be held at 4 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 13. 2450 Ashby Ave., Berkeley. 204-1667. 

PARAMOUNT CLASSICS 

Oakland’s  

Paramount Theater will screen the  

classic film noir Double Indemnity (1944), directed by Billy Wilder and starring Barbara Stanwyck and Fred MacMurray, at 8 p.m. Friday, Jan. 12 as part of its “Movie Classics” series. For just $8, the Paramount offers a full program that includes vintage cartoons, trailers and newsreels, as well as Dec-O-Win, a prize give-away game. Patrons are invited to show up as much as an hour ahead of showtime to stroll through the restored Art Deco theaters lavish lobbies and mezzanine and to enjoy a cocktail at the downstairs bar. 2025 Broadway, Oakland. 465-6400. www.paramounttheatre.com.

Wesley K. Robinson died on Dec. 27 at the age of 80. Wes was a key figure in the East Bay arts scene over the past 35 years for his promotion of music and theater events. Wes was renowned for focusing on the freshness and originality of the music and passion of its artists rather than the commercial appeal. 

Wes was born in Port Arthur Texas, and came with his mother to Alameda at the beginning of the Depression. He was a star basketball player at Alameda High, and went on to play for UCLA under the Wooden era, where he was the sole black player on an otherwise all-white basketball team. 

Wes will be most remembered for his contribution to the Bay Area music scene, promoting events and musicians in the jazz, punk and metal music genres. He started promoting music after returning from New York, where he was involved in a jazz cafe and met many influential jazz musicians. Wes often told stories about being in New York and starting a coffee house there. This was when John Coltrane had broken through but was going through a big transition, playing a free style that was very controversial. Pharoah Saunders was playing with ‘Trane, and Wes suggested that he call himself Pharoah, as his real name was Farrell, and people pronounced it like that anyway. 

Returning home from New York, Wes started a “speakeasy” in a loft in downtown Oakland that, like its New York counterparts quickly ran afoul of the city officials. Wes then went on to host jazz events in many venues, including the Jazz Symposium, which ran for several years and featured well-known musicians such as Sonny Simmons and Alice Coltrane. As jazz’s popularity grew during the ’70s, Wes managed a popular band, the Hoodoo, and produced the UC Berkeley Jazz Festival for two years, while studying for a master’s degree there. 

In the early ’70s, Wes produced and directed plays in the East Bay, including Slaveship by Leroi Jones, Edward Albee’s Death of Bessie Smith, and What Have You Done for Me Lately. 

Frustrated by the increasing commerciality of jazz, in 1975 Wes’ interests moved on to the punk music scene which was just starting in the Bay Area. Searching for a venue to produce regular shows, Wes happened upon Ruthie’s Inn, a small club in Berkeley, that became instrumental in supporting the East Bay punk scene and eventually spawned a thriving thrash/metal scene from 1983-1987. Many bands played their first gigs at this club, which helped pave the way and supported an incredibly vibrant community of social misfits and serious musicians who had something to say—a great venue that has established itself in the annals of punk and metal history. 

Wes was responsible for providing this venerable niteclub to the second wave of new and established punk bands from Bad Brains, Dead Kennedy’s, Social Distortion, Bad Religion, Flipper, MDC and DOA to Code of Honor, Verbal Abuse, Fang, Special Forces, DRI and many others. Later on, this eventually segued into a weekly ritual that showcased such seminal thrash/metal bands as Metallica, Slayer, and Exodus. At the time of his death, Wes was working on a documentary called “Remembering Ruthie’s Inn” (to be completed by a dedicated and devoted group of volunteers). 

Wes was preceded in death by his parents, Wesley Sr. and Effie Robinson, sister Durell, and great-grandson Julian Donnelly. Wes leaves to cherish his memory his four children, Durelle Ali (Stan) of Berkeley, Michael Robinson (Reggie) and Amiri Robinson (Anita) of New York, and Naima Robinson (Armon) of Richmond; grandchildren Amanda Donnelly, Tariq Ali (Lisa), and Talia and Amira Brown; great-grandchildren Pilar Donnelly and Lauren Donnelly-Board; former wives Mira Talbott-Pope and Maj-Britt Mobrand; cousins Donald Julian, and Gregory, Dennis and Geoffrey Pete; friends; and his huge family in the East Bay and San Francisco punk and metal music community. 

Wes will be cremated at the Chapel of the Chimes in Oakland. A memorial service, to which all are invited, will be held on Saturday, Jan. 13, 3 p.m., at Geoffrey’s Inner Circle, 410 14th St. in Oakland. For more information, please call 384-4988. 

The stage for 43 Plays for 43 Presidents, Rough & Tumble’s show at LaVal’s Subterranean, is dressed a little like a quiz show, with a “Quotation” sign that lights up when somebody says something that a real player in history actually, originally said—and in fact the audience gets a little of the feel of being packed into an old-fashioned TV studio for a live broadcast show, in the days when there wasn’t much difference between show genres—games and quizzes being mixed together with comic and variety acts. 

And in practice, that’s pretty much what Rough & Tumble’s up to in this brisk, humorous entertainment. Cliff Mayotte, cofounder and artistic director, who presided over the production, notes that the 43 “short and distinct” plays, one for each chief exec, rely on “a relatively short attention span for narrative,” and a vaudevillized performing style, making the rather “bitty” sketches more than blackouts; the whole thing, with all its pitch and yaw, flows together—it runs, it plays. 

The actors, numbered One through Five, being Joshua Pollock, Norman Gee, Stewart Evan Smith, Louise Chegwidden and Arwen Anderson, are up to this ludic spirit and troupe through the roll call of who held the highest office. 

They juggle roles, play in turn narrator and chorus (besides candidates and presidents) and question each other—and, at times, the audience. The effect shifts around as quickly as the plays for each administration turn over, from farce (even burlesque) to occasional bittersweet irony. It’s a skeptical overview of American political life, but upbeat and savvy, though more a relating and acting-out of entertaining trivia than any particular critical scan. 

In the spirit of shows like that old daytime chestnut, Queen for a Day, the action really begins with a struggle over costumery—not a crown, but a blazer, with Old Glory on the back and bunting running down its lapels, as emblems of office. All the running and wrestling for it is preceded by the mythic original assumption of the title “In The Beginning,” by the only reluctant prez, The Father of His Country himself, to the tune of fife and drum, and intoning of an appropriately altered (or sampled?) reading of the first chapters of Genesis, to indicate where The Republic believes it truly issued from. 

There are British and French serpents in the Garden of the Enlightenment, however, and the various Founding Fathers who try on the presidential blazer in succession would concur with the view of God Almighty, “who peered back through history with 20th Century cynicism—weltschmerz that finds its simplest expression in the words of John Adams (as the “Quotation” sign lights up), “Let me have my farm, my family and goose quills.” 

“The history of our Revolution will be one continous lie from one end to another.” As the chorus swills Sam Adams and chortles, Ben Franklin roasts Jefferson in a men’s club get-together of the Founders, shamelessly quoting and promoting himself, books, inventions and all, and coming off like an Early American Henny Youngman (“How about that Napoleon? He’s got some kind of complex!”). A quick turnover has cue cards (to a Star-Spangled choir) detailing what happened to Madison when he chose the French serpent over the British: “And the English burned his house.” (Not a word about American plans to forcibly annex Canada.) 

The North and The South, wearing baseball caps, quarrel over slavery ... bilious and badmouthed Andrew Jackson points out how he’s not like his hoity-toity predecessors, but is “more like you!” (the audience)—and as an afterthought on Indians: “Kick ‘em out!”). Old Hickory also steers sycophantic O.K. (Old Kinderhook) Van Buren into office, and a national banking system., followed by “Tippicanoe and Tyler Too!” cheerleaders with pom-poms, who usher in the legend of the old Indian Fighter, red campaign balloons becoming Native American heads popping as he scalps them, while a narrator runs through his career as defender of Manifest Destiny, up to the rainy-day delivery of the longest inaugural address in history, followed by his death from pneumonia a month later, unsaved by the Indian snake remedies he requested—and his veep, Tyler—never elected to office—making jokes as the burst balloons are swept out. 

And so it goes, through the line of august office-holders, up to Watergate, Iran-Contra and the Fox that was Clinton versus the Hedgehog that’s George W. U.S. Grant, in reality a fascinating sensibility (and part-saviour of Noh theater), comes in for the usual razzing, just as Jimmy Carter is uncritically, if wryly, valorized, as usual. The sex life of a few White House residents is played up, FDR and Bill Clinton in particular, but not the greatest roué of them all, JFK. There’s audience participation, including a volunteer inaugurated, donning blazer and trivia-quizzed—though not reelected. 

Rough & Tumble, an Oakland-based troupe of a baker’s dozen in years, like many small companies doesn’t regularly stage productions—though their actors and director are familiar enough to Berkeley theatergoers. They’re a downhome group in every sense, skilled at their craft and sharing it and the fun they obviously have doing it. 

The run at LaVal’s is a good excuse to see their stuff. It’s upbeat and fast-paced, just comic and thoughtful enough. The name of the troupe that originally cowrote it, the Neo-Futurists of Chicago, makes it sound like avant-garde performance—but it’s less Neo-Futurist than it is Chicago in style—a Second City, Compass Players-style breezy improv-generated string of comic sketches, meant for a diverting evening. 

43 PLAYS FOR 43 PRESIDENTS 

8 p.m. Thursdays-Saturdays through Jan. 27 at LaVal's Subterranean Theatre. $15-20. 1834 Euclid Ave. www.randt.org.

Picture a winter’s day 30 years ago. Even in lousy weather you couldn’t wait to get outside. Explore the neighborhood, build a fort, climb a tree, head down to the pond for crawdads; you knew the limits of your adventures but they extended beyond your door. On weekends, family outings ventured into the hills or along the coast and lasted an entire day. Hiking, wildlife viewing, building castles in the sand, being outdoors in nature, giving free reign to your imagination. 

Today, our children’s lives, as well as our own, experience nature through technology, in software or through television nature programs. We know facts about global warming, the rain forest and Galapagos tortoises, but are unfamiliar with wildlife around us. Our lives cycle with little non-programmed time; parents fear unsupervised play and emphasis leans toward academic achievement. Today’s children are isolated from nature. 

In Lost Child in the Woods—Saving Our Children from Nature Deficit Disorder, Richard Louv equates non-contact with the natural world to the withholding of oxygen and links this deficit to ADD, childhood obesity and depression. Doug Gibson of the San Elijo Lagoon Conservancy states, “Children develop love of nature by seeing it, smelling it, touching it”. He echoes the concerns of many—children may never develop that love of nature that drives people to fight to protect it. 

Studies have shown that the natural environment has far-reaching effects on the health of all ages, physical, psychological and cognitive, while fostering a positive environmental ethic. Who can gaze at an arrow of pelicans grazing the ocean without a sense of wonder, imagining their capture of a meal? Who can linger beneath towering cathedral redwoods without a profound sense of peace? 

It’s time to return to nature, alone, in groups, with the kids—as close as your backyard, neighborhood, or regional park. As far as the West Marin Coast and forests. There’s no time like the present. Don’t wait for the “right” day, don’t pencil in your outing between noon and 1 p.m. Give yourself time to observe, absorb the rhythms of life. Prolong the day with a thermos, snacks, a meal. 

With over 95,000 acres, 65 regional parks and 1,150 miles of trails, there’s always wilderness nearby. You can’t go wrong supporting an organization dedicated to protecting and restoring parkland and preserving critical wildlife habitat. On your own or through a naturalist-led activity, you’ll find more choices than days in a year. 

Where better to renew your acquaintance with nature than at Tilden Regional Park, at Berkeley’s backdoor? Use the Visitor Center’s exhibit telling the story of Wildcat Creek Watershed to take an imaginary walk through a land shaped by water, through native stream, woodland and chaparral. Outdoors, experience these communities and their denizens firsthand. The Jewel Lake Trail, a multi-generational crowd-pleaser, carries you by trail and boardwalk over marsh and through a jungle of foliage to a small lake, home to raccoons, ducks, turtles and a wonderful Great Blue Heron. Every weekend naturalists lead activities highlighting evergreens, slugs, salamanders, owls and newts. 

Robert Sibley Volcanic Reserve offers a geologic treasure box—volcanic dikes, mudflows and lava flows. At the Visitor Center, pick up a self-guided tour of Round Top. Walk past the cross-section of a great volcano observing the folding of rock formations resulting from uplifting and erosion. On broad trails marvel at seasonal adaptations among coyote bush, wild current, snowberry, big leaf maple and madrone. 

In Alameda, Crab Cove Visitor Center makes estuary and bay learning fun. Interactive displays peak your curiosity, leaving you hungering for more. Microscopic organisms, crab “innards,” mud flat dwellers, barnacles, anemones, an 800-gallon aquarium and the Old Wharf classroom make the park’s mission clear: marine and shore life are interdependent and worth preserving. Take your wonder outdoors to the Marine Protected Area to explore tidal pools and mudflats. 

Exquisite bay vistas, windswept bluffs, eucalyptus forests, pebble beaches and rare coastal prairie all thrive at Point Pinole creating habitat for wildlife. Within the forests, deer, owls, hawks and migrating Monarch butterflies; in the salt marshes song sparrows and harvest mice. On 12-miles of mostly level trails across 2,300 acres changes in scenery are subtle; look for patterns on eucalyptus trunks and mud flats. Pick a bench to look out across the bay or a narrow trail to explore the shore. Naturalists focus on over-wintering birds and Monarchs for activities through January. 

Point Reyes National Seashore speaks to the believer in all of us. Believers in the importance of preserving open space. So many options exist within this expanse, your head will spin. Select one and take time to get the sense of the land, feel its cadence. Consider the links that connect all living things and the ethics of our treatment of nature. 

Winter in Point Reyes means whales and elephant seals. At the Elephant Seal Overlook, elephant seals’ natural behaviors are both amazing and comical. Huge males with Durante proboscises stake out their claim before females arrive to give birth. Watch males contest dominance and mother-pup interactions. Even with eyes closed the spectacle grabs your attention—males trumpeting and pups crying. On weekends and holidays trained docents man the cliff with spotting scopes and Elephant Seal 101 data. 

Though the Lighthouse is the ideal whale-watching locale, bird-lovers are also impressed. In the cypress trees roost songbirds, warblers and grosbeaks. Soaring through thermals are hawks, turkey vultures, ravens, Peregrine falcons and common murres. Nearby Chimney Rock also offers whale-watching vantage points and blossoms with wildflowers in spring. 

The Tule Elk Preserve out to Tomales Point is home to over 500 elk on 2,600 acres of open grassland and coastal scrub. Commanding vistas are breathtaking—a cerulean Pacific Ocean, Tomales Bay and Hog Island, corrugated coastline. You’ll be transported to Scotland in the blink of an eye. 

At Drake’s Estero, a one-mile walk through a deserted Christmas tree farm brings you to a footbridge over brackish waters. Here shorebirds, herons, egrets, hawks and osprey forage for food. At low tide, the exposed mudflats come to life, while the largest Point Reyes’ harbor seal breeding site lingers nearby. 

In you’re still unconvinced of the power of nature and vision, visit Muir Woods National Monument. In 1905, William Kent secured almost 300 acres of old-growth forest in the name of America’s foremost conservationist. Over one hundred years later, we walk beneath these giants, humbled by their peace. Winter brings fungi and banana slugs to the forest floor and Coho salmon to Redwood Creek. Follow trails past named redwood groves, illustrated kiosks and ecology talks. Venture away and discover a Muir Woods all your own. 

Relish the sunshine but bring on the rain and cold. Sharpen your senses, juice up those creative brain cells; salute the natural world. Recognize what’s worth preserving. Batteries not included.  

East Bay Regional Parks 

Naturalist activities published bi-monthly in Regional In Nature and on-line. Many require advance registration. 

www.ebparks.org. 

Point Reyes National Seashore 

Ranger-guided programs are offered each weekend, check web-site for schedule. 

(415) 464-5100, www.nps.gov/pore.  

Muir Woods National Monument 

Mill Valley. (415) 388-2596, www.nps.gov/muwo.  

Photograph by Marta Yamamoto 

I went trolling through my photo files, looking for a good shot of a willow for this column. It took forever to find one—and as you can see, it’s not a beauty shot, but a short horrow show, a big tree split by last year’s windstorms. I found lots of other willows, but always lurking in foreground corners of something more spectacular: fall color on a big-leaf maple, or a sway of gray pines across a creekbed.  

I take willows for granted, true, and I blame my spoiled urban existence for that. Willows —the genus Salix—in general are among the most useful species in the world. 

A traveler seeking water in the western plains or the California foothills would scan for a line of willows in an arroyo, because they’re a sure indicator of surface water. Under their low shade, a cool drink and a cool place to drink it: a pre-twentieth century roadside rest.  

Someone looking to make a basket to hold water, to cook acorn porridge in, would seek out a stand of willows and might have coppiced it the year before, to make long straight shoots for weaving. She’d have to work fast, get the supple twigs peeled the day she picked them so the bark didn’t stick.  

Maybe she’d cut a few inches of bark and slide it from its twig whole, in a cylinder, and add a notch near one end to make a whistle for the kids. When they gave her a headache with an hour of incessant whistle-blowing, she could chew on a slice of the inner bark for that too. Willow is the original source of salicylic acid, which the original Herr Bayer modified into acetylsalicylic acid—aspirin.  

Urban life has its willow markers too. The weeping willow, Salix babylonica, (or Salix babylonica ‘Pendula’), is a cultural marker of peaceful and gracious parks, and of a certain step from utilitarian to decorative homes, in the form of Grandmother’s Blue Willow china. I know I’m not the only one who made up stories about the people on the arched bridge, the stream, the distant and different pavilion. All concealed by mashed potatoes and peas and a slice of roast beef, to be revealed slowly before dessert. 

Like the imaginary scene on the plate, weeping willow originated in China, where it was an early cultivar of a native Chinese species. I guess the association was just too strong, though, for Linnaeus and his colleagues: “By the waters of Babylon we sat and wept for thee, O Jerusalem!” That sad trope gets the weeping willow onto gravestones, too, as a stylized silhouette, an emblem of mourning for the departed.  

Our local willows—arroyo willow (S. lasiolepis) and red willow (S. laevigata) are among the most common—have no end of usefulness too. Willows make lots of a rooting hormone, indolebutyric acid, in all their tissues. This makes then champion rooters; you can stick a hank of willow twigs in the damp ground along a streambank and count on several of them to take root and grow there. I’ve seen willow fences striking roots even in desert gardens, nipping a share of the irrigation water from the squash and beans. Wattle-and-daub walls have been known to do the same, turning a simple shelter into a live house. 

Restorationists use willow to stabilize streambanks against the destructive rush of winter flood rains, and the willows that grow are streambank natives anyway so it’s all as natural as possible. Water stays clear, soil stays in place for other plants to colonize, and the ubiquitous black phoebe (or maybe a willow flycatcher) comes along to perch on a willow branch: voila! Ecosystem! 

There’s another use for that rooting habit, even closer to home. Willow water, made by soaking mashed-up willow sprigs overnight, is a great aid for getting cuttings of other plants to root too. It doesn’t keep well, so don’t try to make a season’s supply. And don’t go denuding the willows in the parks for this, either; wild species do nosh on tender willow shoots. Trust me: you don’t want to find a posse of indignant raccoons with headaches at your door with torches and pitchforks. 

Ron Sullivan is a former professional gardener and arborist. Her “Green Neighbors” column appears every other Tuesday in the Berkeley Daily Planet, alternating with Joe Eaton’s “Wild Neighbors” column. Her “Garden Variety” column appears every Friday in the Planet’s East Bay Home & Real Estate section.  

Photograph By Ron Sullivan.  

A big split in a big willow near Jewel Lake in Tilden Park. Willows generally have brittle wood, though their twigs are supple.

TUESDAY, JAN. 9 

“Stop the Violence - Share the Dream” to honor Dr. Martin Luther King Jr at noon at 300 Lakeside Drive, Second Floor Auditorium. 464-7139. 

Berkeley High School Governance Council meets at 4:15 p.m. in the Community Theater Lobby. Agenda items include Update on UC approved courses, Maintenance and Safety Plans and Attendance Policy. 644-4803. 

Why You Need A Durable Power of Attorney for Health Care at 1:15 p.m. at the North Berkeley Senior Center, 1901 Hearst Ave. 981-5190. 

Opportunities Abounding Public Forum on Arts Education Explore ideas on creating equitable classrooms sponsored by Alliance for Arts Learning Leadership, Alameda County Office of Education at 6 p.m. at the Chapel of the Chimes, 4499 Piedmont Ave., Oakland RSVP appreciated. www.artISeducation.org 

“How to be Healthy through Holistic Therapy” with Su Jok, a therapy that uses stimulation of acupuncture points on the hand and foot to bring symptom relief, at 7 p.m. at El Cerrito Library, 6510 Stockton Ave., El Cerrito. Free, all welcome. 526-7512.  

Red Cross Blood Drive from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Port of Oakland, 530 Water St. To scheduale an appointment go to www.BeADonor.com (code PORT) 

Navigating with National Geographic Learn how to use a GPS with National Geographic mapping software at 7 p.m. at REI, 1338 San Pablo Ave. 527-4140. 

Family Storytime at 7 p.m. at the Kensington Library, 61 Arlington Ave. 524-3043. 

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, JAN. 10  

Oakland Celebrates the Dream in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s 78th Birthday at 11:30 a.m. in Frank Ogawa Plaza, 14th St. and Broadway. 444-2489. 

Shoreline Restoration and Celebration of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Life for middle and high school students from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at MLK Jr. Regional Shoreline. Registration required. 704-4030. 

Volunteer in the Native Plant Nursery Help us reach our goal to plant 10,000 native wetland plants at Martin Luther King Jr. Shoreline Park this winter. From 1 to 3 p.m. RSVP requested. 452-9261 ext. 109. www.savesfbay.org/bayevents  

Poetry Writing Workshop, led by Linda Elkin, at 7 p.m. at the Albany Library, 1247 Marin Ave. 526-3720, ext. 17.  

Financial Topics and You: College Funding at 6 p.m. at the Oakland Public Library, 125 14th St., Oakland. 238-3134. 

Julia Morgan School for Girls Admissions Information Meeting at 7 p.m. on the campus of Mills College, Oakland. For information and to register call 632-6000, ext. 125. 

The Culture of Japan at 1:15 p.m. at the North Berkeley Senior Center, 1901 Hearst Ave. 981-5190. 

Avalanche Safety Lecture with Dick Penniman at 6 p.m. at REI, 1338 San Pablo Ave. Cost is $20. 527-4140. 

New to DVD “Quinceanera” at 7 p.m. at the JCCEB, 1414 Walnut St. 848-0237. 

Walk Berkeley for Seniors at 9:30 a.m. at the Sea Breeze Market, just west of the I-80 overpass. 548-9840. 

THURSDAY, JAN. 11 

Storytime for Babies & Toddlers at 10:30 a.m. Kensington Library, 61 Arlington Ave. 524-3043. 

World of Plants Tours at 1:30 p.m. at the UC Botanical Garden, 200 Centennial Drive. Cost is $5. 643-2755. 

FRIDAY, JAN. 12 

Impeachment Banner Fridays at 6:45 to 8 a.m. on the Berkeley Pedestrian bridge between Seabreeze Market and the Berkeley Aquatic Park, ongoing on Fridays until impeachment is realized. www. Impeachbush-cheney.com 

City Commons Club Noon Luncheon with Dr. Warren Winklstein, “Science and the Heavy Hand of Government” Luncheon at 11:45 a.m. for $14, speech at 12:30 p.m., at the Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant St. For information and reservations call 526-2925.  

“China Blue” Screening of the documentary which won the Amnesty International Human Rights Award, at 7:30 p.m. with post-film discussion with director Micha Peled, at The College Preparatory School Buttner Auditorium at 6100 Broadway, at Brookside, Oakland. 658-5202. 

“Wind Over Water” A documentary on the offshore wind farm proposal for Cape Cod, and “Out of Balance” the impact on climate change of ExxonMobil, at 7:30 p.m. at Humanist Hall, 390 27th St., Oakland. Donation of $5 acccepted. www.HumanistHall.net 

Circle Dancing, simple folk dancing with instruction at 7:30 p.m. at Finnish Brotherhood Hall, 1970 Chestnut St at University. Donation of $5 requested. 528-4253. www.circledancing.com 

“Problems and Decisions” Learn about how indecision casues stress at 7 p.m. the Berkeley Dianetics Center, 63 Shattuck Square. 280-4690. 

SATURDAY, JAN. 13 

African American Health Expo with free health screenings, healthy cooking demonstrations, information on services for youth and seniors, and more, from 8:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. at Oakland Mariott City Center, 1001 Broadway, Oakland. 763-7270. www.babuf.org 

Mini-Farmers in Tilden A farm exploration program, from 10 to 11 a.m. for ages 4-6 years, accompanied by an adult. We will explore the Little Farm, care for animals, do crafts and farm chores. Wear boots and dress to get dirty! Fee is $6-$8. Registration required. 636-1684. 

“Bare Root Roses for Bay Area Gardens” with Sandy Morrill at 4 p.m. at Mrs. Dalloways Books, 2904 College Ave. 704-8222. 

Nature on an Urban Fringe Explore the Berkeley Meadow of the Eastshore State Park on a 2.5 mile hike from 2 to 4:30 p.m. For information and meeting place call 525-2233. 

Solo Sierrans Bike Trip at the Marina Join us for an easy 4 mile round trip bike ride on a paved trail. All levels of riders welcome. Meet at 1 p.m. in front of Emeryville Clipper Club, 5 Captain Dr., Emeryville. RSVP to 923-1094. 

Vegetarian Cooking Class “Healthful Resolutions” from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at First Unitarian Church of Oakland, 685 14th St. at Castro. Cost is $45, plus $5 materials fee. To register call 531-2665. www.compassionatecooks.com 

Great War Society East Bay Chapter meets to discuss “Alsace-Lorraine, 1914-18” by Robert Denison at 10:30 a.m. at 640 Arlington Ave. 527-7118. 

“How to Avoid Sabotaging Your Financial Success” from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.at Piedmont Adult School, 800 Magnolia Ave., Piedmont. Cost is $40. To regiser call 595-8173. www.piedmontadultschool.org 

Seminar on Osteoarthritis of the Knee at 9:45 p.m. at Mercy Retirement & Care Center, 3431 Foothill Boulevard, Oakland. Free. 534-8540. 

“Weigh to Be” Understanding your metabolism at 10 a.m. at Elephant Pahrmacy, 1607 Shattuck Ave. 549-9200. 

Studio Rasa Open House with drop-in classes and live music at 933 Parker St. Cost is $20 for the day. 843-2787. www.studiorasa.org 

Berkeley Bears Girls Fast Pitch Softball Tryouts, Sat. and Sun. at Clayton Valley High School in Concord. For details call 682-3759. www.berkeleybearssoftball.com  

The Berkeley Lawn Bowling Club provides free instruction every Wed. and Sat. at 10:30 a.m. at 2270 Acton St. 841-2174.  

Petite Pooches Playgroup for small dogs from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m., one block north of Solano on Ensenada at Talbot. 524-2459. 

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 

Around the World Tour of Plants at 1:30 p.m. at UC Botanical Garden, 200 Centennial Drive. 643-2755.  

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, JAN. 14 

“An Evening with Barbara Becnel” Anti-death penalty activist at Green Sunday at 5 p.m. at Niebyl-Proctor Library, 6501 Telegraph Ave at 65th, Oakland.  

“Open Garden” Join the Little Farm gardener for composting, planting, watering and reaping the rewards of our work, from 2 to 4 p.m. at Tilden Nature Area, Tilden Park. Cancelled only by heavy rain. 525-2233.  

“Life at the Little Farm” A puppet show and sing along for the whole family at 11 a.m. at Tilden Nature Center, Tilden Park. 525-2233. 

Winter Wildlife Hike Join naturalist Tara Reinertson to look for winter birds and explore the pebble beaches and salt marshes of Pt. Pinole, from 2 to 4 p.m. For meeting place call 525-2233. 

El Cerrito Historical Society Annual Meeting with speaker Wayne Westover, retired Contra Costa County Superior Court judge. Pot luck lunch at 1 p.m. at the El Cerrito Senior Center, located behind the El Cerrito Library, 6510 Stockton Ave., El Cerrito. 526-7507. 

Balinese Dance for Children begins at 11 a.m. at Ashkenaz Community Center, 1317 San Pablo Ave. Cost is $7 per class. 237-6849. 

Free Garden Tours at Regional Parks Botanic Garden in Tilden Park Sat. and Sun. at 2 p.m. Call to confirm. 841-8732. www.nativeplants.org 

Lake Merritt Neighbors Organized for Peace Meet at 3 p.m. at the colonnade at the NE end of the lake. 763-8712.  

Tibetan Buddhism with Jack Petranker on “Motivation to Change” at 6 p.m. at the Tibetan Nyingma Institute, 1815 Highland Pl. 843-6812.  

MONDAY, JAN. 15 

“A Day On, Not Off” A guided walk along the shoreline with opportunity to help with planting and restoration at 8:30 a.m. at the Martin Luther King, Jr. Regional Shoreline, Garretson Point off Edgewater Drive, Oakland. 521-6887.  

Embracing the Dream Father and Son Breakfast at 9 a.m. at the Eastside Club, McAfee Coliseum, 7000 Coliseum Way, Oakland. Cost is $20, with opportunities to sponosr a young man For information call 633-5133. 

“Make the Dream Real” at 10 a.m. at Taylor Memorial Methodist Church, 1188 12th St. at Adeline, Oakland. 652-5530. 

Tribute to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. with a youth talent show from 2 to 5 p.m. at Malonga Casquelourd Center for the Arts, 1428 Alice St., Oakland. 238-7217. 

Celebrate Martin Luther King Day with activities from 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. at Habitot Children’s Museum, 2065 Kittredge. Cost is $6 per child, $5 per adult. 647-1111. 

Berkeley CopWatch organizational meeting at 8 p.m. at 2022 Blake St. Join us to work on current issues around police misconduct. 548-0425. 

CITY MEETINGS 

Homeless Commission meets Wed., Jan. 10, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Jane Micallef, 981-5426.  

Housing Advisory Commission meets Wed. Jan. 10 at 7:30 p.m., at the South Berkeley Senior Center. Oscar Sung, 981-5400.  

School Board meets Wed. Jan. 10, at 7:30 p.m., in the City Council Chambers. Mark Coplan 644-6320. 

Planning Commission meets Wed., Jan. 10, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. 981-7484. 

Police Review Commission meets Wed., Jan. 10, at the South Berkeley Senior Center. 981-4950.  

Commission on Early Childhood Education meets Thurs. Jan. 11, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. 981-5428. 

West Berkeley Project Area Commission meets Thurs., Jan. 11, at 7 p.m., at the West Berkeley Senior Center. Iris Starr, 981-7520.  

Zoning Adjustments Board meets Thurs., Jan. 11, at 7 p.m., in City Council Chambers. 981-7410.  

FRIDAY, JAN. 5 

THEATER 

Azeem’s “Rude Boy” at 8 p.m. at The Marsh Berkeley, 2120 Allston Way and runs Thurs.-Sat. through Jan. 27. Tickets are $15-$22. 800-838-3006. 

Rough and Tumble “43 Plays for 43 Presidents” Thurs.-Sat. at 8 p.m. at La Val’s Subterranean Theater, 1834 Eucid Ave. through Jan. 27. Tickets are $15-$20. 499-0356. www.randt.org 

Shotgun Players “The Forest War” Thurs.-Sun. at 8 p.m. at the Ashby Stage, 1901 Ashby Ave., through Jan 14. Sliding scale $15-$30. 841-6500. www.shotgunplayers.org 

“We’ve Come Undone” Written and performed by Kayhan Hirani, monologues inspired by stories from Arab, Muslim, American and South Asian communities, at 7:30 p.m. at Revolution Books, 2425 Channing Way. Free, donations accepted. 384-1816. 

EXHIBITIONS 

Deborah Muse “Paintings and Quilts” opens at La Peña, 3105 Shattuck Ave. and runs to Feb. 24. 849-2568. 

Don Clausen Oil Paintings Abstract and Portaits at Alta Galleria, 2980 College Ave., #4. Runs through Feb. 4. 421-1255. 

“Looking Through the Children’s Eyes” Mixed media works by JoeSam. Opening reception at 5:30 p.m. at Joyce Gordon Gallery, 406 14th St., Oakland. Runs through Jan. 30. 465-8928. 

“A Deluxe Autonomy: Piedmont’s First 100 Years” on display in the Oakland History Room on the second floor of Oakland’s Main Library, 125-14th St. 238-3222. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Salvadora Galan sings ancient Spanish popular songs at 9 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Cost is $12. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

Ric Alexander, jazz saxophonist and his band at 5 p.m. at Oakland Museum of California, 10th and Oak Sts. 238-2200 

Lady Bianca Taste of the Blues at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $10. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

2007 West Coast Open Human Beatbox Battle at 9 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $10. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Tribute to Ornette Coleman at Free Jazz Fridays at 8 p.m. at 1510 8th St. Performance Space, Oakland. Cost is $5-$15. 415-846-9432. 

Houston Jones, roots, rock, Americana at 8 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave., at Dwight. 548-5198.  

Camogie, with Robin Flower, Libby McLaren, Mary McLaughlin and Danny Carnahan at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $18.50-$19.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Beep at 9 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810.  

Grace Woods and Katie Cajigas at 7:30 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

Temple of Roots, Jesse Brewster Band, The Tranchermen at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $5. 841-2082. www.starryploughpub.com 

Acts of Sedition, Dangers, First to Leave, Bluegill at 8 p.m. at 924 Gilman St., an all-ages, member-run, no alcohol, no drugs, no violence club. Cost is $5. 525-9926. 

The Skin Divers at 9:30 p.m. at Beckett’s Irish Pub, 2271 Shattuck Ave. 647-1790. www.beckettsirishpub.com 

Zoe & Dave Ellis at 9 p.m. at Shattuck Down Low, 2284 Shattuck Ave. Cost is $5-$7. 548-1159.  

Mark Hummel’s Blues Harmonica Blow-Out at 8 and 10 p.m. at Yoshi’s at Jack London Square, through Sun. Cost is $22-$30. 238-9200. www.yoshis.com 

SATURDAY, JAN. 6 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Bay Area Poets Coalition open reading from 3 to 5 p.m. at Strawberyy Creek Lodge, dining hall, 1320 Addison St. Park on street, not in lodge lot. 527-9905. 

Saul Landau, author and filmmaker at 7:30 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center, 3105 Shattuck Ave. Cost is $7-$10. 849-2568. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Goyamoon at 8 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center. Cost is $10. 849-2568. www.lapena.org 

Rim Shot at 8:30 p.m. at the Uptown Nightclub, 1928 Telegraph, Oakland. Cost is $7-$10. 451-8100. www.uptownnightclub.com 

Babtunde Lea & Friends at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $12. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

Thompson’s String Ticklers and The Knee Knockers in a Breakin’ up Xmas Square Dance at 7 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $12, $5 for ages 5-18, free for 5 and under. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com  

Sotaque Baiano, Brazilian, at 8 p.m. at Shattuck Down Low, 2284 Shattuck Ave. Cost is $5-$10. 548-1159. www.shattuckdownlow.com 

Katherine Peck and Michael Burles at 7:30 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

Roy Rogers & Norton Buffalo at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $24.50-$25.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Macy Blackman Quartet at 9 p.m. at Downtown. 649-3810.  

Elliot Baker, folk rock, at 8 p.m. at Spuds Pizza, 3290 Adeline St. Cost is $7. 558-0881. 

The Pine Needles, The Bittersweets, Amber Rubarth at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. All ages show. Cost is $8. 841-2082. www.starryploughpub.com 

Only in Dreams, Point Taken, Lionheart, Break Cadence at 8 p.m. at 924 Gilman St., an all-ages, member-run, no alcohol, no drugs, no violence club. Cost is $5. 525-9926. 

SUNDAY, JAN. 7 

EXHIBITIONS 

“Interventions” Works by Tony Bellaver, Barbara Foster and Scott Serata. Opening reception at 2 p.m. at Berkeley Art Center, 1275 Walnut St. in Live Oak Park. Exhibit runs to Feb. 10. 644-6893. 

“Fire in the Heart” Paintings by Foad Satterfield influenced by African art opens at the Community Gallery, Alta Bates Summit Medical Center, 2450 Ashby Ave., and runs through March 2. 204-1667. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

The Bobs, a cappella at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $24.50-$25.50. 548-1761. www.freightandsalvage.org 

Mo’Fone! at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $10. 841-JAZZ. www.AnnasJazzIsland.com 

Don Neely’s Royal Society Jazz Orchestra, vintage ‘20s and ‘30s dancing, at 5 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $20. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com 

Philips Marine Duo at 11 a.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344. www.nomadcafe.net 

“Voices of the Heart” Turkish and Latino songs, at 4 p.m. at The Breema Clinic, 6201 Florio St., Oakland, at College and Claremont. 428-1234. 

MONDAY, JAN. 8 

EXHIBITIONS 

“Dellums’ Inaugural Week Exhibit of Oakalnd Artists” with student work from local Oakland schools and works by local Latino artists on display at the Oakland Public Library, César Chávez Branch, 3301 East 12th St., Oakland. 535-5620. 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Phyllis Whetstone Taper will read from her novel “On Kelsey Creek” and talk about life in the 1920s Lake County at 7 p.m. at Kensington Library, 61 Arlington Ave. 524-3043. 

Jean Lamour and David Applefield at 7 p.m. at Moe’s Books, 2476 Telegraph Ave. 849-2087. 

Leonard Pitt, Berkeley author and chocolate aficionado, will speak about his new book, “A Small Moment of Great Illumination - Searching for Valentine Greatrakes the Master Healer” at 7:30 p.m. at the Hillside Club, 2286 Cedar St. www.hillsideclub.org  

Actors Reading Writers “Transplants” works by John Candeleria and Firoozeh Dumas at 7:30 p.m. at Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant Ave.  

Poetry Express with Jeanne Lupton at 7 p.m. at Priya Restaurant, 2072 San Pablo Ave. berkeleypoetryexpress@yahoo.com 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Blue Monday Jam at 7:30 p.m. at the Uptown Nightclub, 1928 Telegraph, Oakland. Cost is $5. 451-8100. www.uptownnightclub.com 

Parlor Tango at 7 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave., at Dwight. 548-5198.  

Buster Williams “Something More” at 8 and 10 p.m. at Yoshi’s at Jack London Square. Cost is $10-$18. 238-9200. www.yoshis.com  

TUESDAY, JAN. 9 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Vikram Chandra reads from his new book “Sacred Games” at 7 p.m. at Cody’s Books on Fourth St. 559-9500. 

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Yuliyan Yordanov, Balkan folk dance, at 7 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 $6. 841-JAZZ.  

Mark Erelli at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $17.50-$18.50. 548-1761.  

Debbie Poryes & Friends at 7 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave., at Dwight. 548-5198.  

Buster Williams “Something More” at 8 and 10 p.m. at Yoshi’s at Jack London Square. Cost is $10-$18. 238-9200.  

WEDNESDAY, JAN. 10 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

Nomadic Rambles Storytelling, hosted by Ed Silberman at 7 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344.  

Berkeley Poetry Slam with host Charles Ellik at 8:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $5-$7. 841-2082  

MUSIC AND DANCE 

The Crucible’s Fire Ballet “Romeo and Juliet” Wed. - Sat. at 8:30 p.m. at 1260 7th St., Oakland, through Jan. 20. Tickets are $30-$55. 444-0919. 

Trovatore, traditional Italian music at 7 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave., at Dwight. 548-5198.  

Ed Johnson & Novo Tempo Trio at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $8. 841-JAZZ.  

Cumbiamba Eneye, Aluna at 8:30 p.m. at Ashkenaz. Cost is $15. 525-5054.  

Julio Bravo, salsa, at 9:30 p.m. at Shattuck Down Low, 2284 Shattuck Ave. Salsa lessons at 8 p.m. Cost is $5-$10. 548-1159.  

Paul Manousos at 8:30 p.m. at the Uptown Nightclub, 1928 Telegraph, Oakland. Cost is $5. 451-8100.  

Kleptograss with Eric Thompson, Laurie Lewis, Tom Rozum, Scott Nygaard and Paul Shelasky at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $18.50-$19.50. 548-1761.  

Frank Gambale Natural High Trio at 8 and 10 p.m. at Yoshi’s at Jack London Square. Cost is $12-$20. 238-9200. w 

THURSDAY, JAN. 11 

EXHIBITIONS 

Art to Action on Berkeley Creeks Photographs Opening reception at 5 p.m. at River of Words Gallery, Sawtooth Building, 2547 8th St., #13B. 848-9358. 

“Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Philosophy of Non-Violence” Books, posters, speechs and other items on display in honor of King’s birthday at te Oakland Public Library, Rockridge Branch, 5366 College Ave. 597-5017. 

“La Raza Uprising” Photographs by Francisco J. Dominguez. Reception at 6 p.m. at The Asian Resource Gallery, 310 8th St. and Harrison, Oakland.  

FILM 

A Theater Near You “Army of Shadows” at 7:30 p.m. at the Pacific Film Archive. Cost is $4-$8. 642-0808. www.bampfa.berkeley.edu 

READINGS AND LECTURES 

“A Legacy of Beauty: The Life and Work of Julia Morgan” presentation by Mark Wilson at 7:30 p.m. at Chapel of the Chimes. Sponsored by Oakland Heritage Alliance. Donation $8-$10. 763-9218. www.oaklandheritage.org  

“The Art of Gaman” Lecture by Delphine Hirasuna on the arts and crafts of Japanese Americans detained in WWII internment camps, at 1 p.m. at the Oakland Museum of California, 10th and Oak Sts, Oakland. 238-2200. 

Bocalicious Spoken Word at 7 p.m. at Nomad Cafe, 6500 Shattuck Ave. 595-5344.  

Vendela Vida reads from “Let the Northern Lights Erase Your Name” at 7 p.m. at Cody’s Books on Fourth St. 559-9500. 

Rachel Sarah reads from “Single Mom Seeking Playdates, Blind Dates and Other Dispatches from the Dating World” at 7:30 p.m. at East Bay Jewish Community Center, 1414 Walnut St. Sponsored by Black Oak Books. 486-0698.  

MUSIC AND DANCE 

Rebecca Riots at 8 p.m. at Freight and Salvage. Cost is $18.50-$19.50. 548-1761.  

Fourtet with Kasey Knudsen at 8 p.m. at Anna’s Jazz Island, 2120 Allston Way. Cost is $5. 841-JAZZ.  

Travis Jones & Friends at 7 p.m. at Caffe Trieste, 2500 San Pablo Ave., at Dwight. 548-5198.  

Go Go Fightmaster, Doublestroke at 9:30 p.m. at The Starry Plough. Cost is $6. 841-2082. 

Fun with Finnoula at 9:30 p.m. at Beckett’s Irish Pub, 2271 Shattuck Ave. 647-1790.  

Frank Gambale Natural High Trio at 8 and 10 p.m. at Yoshi’s at Jack London Square. Cost is $12-$20. 238-9200.

NEW SHOW AT BERKELEY ART CENTER 

An opening reception will be held at 2 p.m. Sunday for an exhibition of works by Tony Bellaver, Barbara Foster and Scott Serata at the Berkeley Art Center. The show runs through Feb. 10. 1275 Walnut St., in Live Oak Park.644-6893.  

HOLIDAY SQUARE DANCE AT ASHKENAZ 

Thompson’s String Ticklers and The Knee Knockers will be the featured performers at Ashkenaz’s “Breakin’ Up X-Mas Square Dance” at 7 p.m. Saturday. Admission is $12 for adults, $5 for ages 5-18, and free for children under the age of 5. 1317 San Pablo Ave. 525-5054. www.ashkenaz.com.  

A ‘FIRE BALLET’ VERSION OF ‘ROMEO AND JULIET’ 

The Crucible will stage its “fire ballet” production of Romeo and Juliet at 8:30 p.m. Wednesdays-Saturdays through Jan. 20. 1260 Seventh St., Oakland. $30-$55. 444-0919. 

HITCHCOCK CLASSICS IN EL CERRITO 

The newly refurbished Cerrito Theater in El Cerrito will kick off a series of four classic Alfred Hitchcock thrillers this weekend with Vertigo (1958), the seminal classic starring Jimmy Stewart filmed on the steep streets of San Francisco. The film shows at 9 p.m. Friday, 5 p.m. Saturday and at 5 p.m. Sunday. Later films in the series include Rear Window (1954), North by Northwest (1959), and Psycho (1960), starring Anthony Perkins as Norman Bates and Janet Leigh as a woman on the run after stealing money from her employer. 10070 San Pablo Ave., El Cerrito. www.picturepubpizza.com.

Based on a novel by Somerset Maugham, The Painted Veil, opening today at the Albany Twin, tells a mannered and melodramatic tale. The actors are great—Edward Norton and Naomi Watts deliver fine performances as a couple navigating the difficult terrain of both their young marriage and of cholera-ravaged rural China—but it’s just not enough to carry the weight of a burdensome drama. 

Watts plays a spoiled and rather petulant young woman who finds herself married, almost against her will, to Norton’s considerate if dull and overly studious young scientist. When her infidelity threatens their fragile marriage he vengefully drags her—over the longest and most arduous route possible—to China, where he is to contribute his knowledge and skill to lessening the impact of a cholera epidemic.  

What follows is an intriguing micro/macro staging of themes as the two resist, resent and finally come to respect each other, the drama unfolding against a backdrop of British colonialism in which the two cultures find themselves in precisely the same predicament.  

It is a story with great promise and great intentions, but it just doesn’t come off. Aside from the tediously Eurocentric perspective, the trouble is that the enormity of the epidemic, as well as the increasingly relevant themes of Western imperialism and occupation, render the domestic portion of the drama trite and uninteresting. In the context of a never-ending “war on terror” and a disastrous occupation of Iraq, the problems of two little people just don’t amount to a hill of beans, to paraphrase another, more successful geopolitical melodrama. In fact, Casablanca is an instructive example in this case. Michael Curtiz’s 1942 film solved this dilemma by making its characters larger than life and with emotions to match. The Painted Veil by contrast keeps its characters small and thus they are overwhelmed by the international political drama that is intended as their backdrop. 

The Maugham novel was written in 1925 as part of the then-popular Westerners Adrift In The Orient genre. Though director John Curran and screenwriter Ron Nyswaner made changes to the story, leavening some of its bleakness with greater understanding between characters and cultures, they curiously retained much of the novel’s chauvinism. While the action concerns cultures getting to know and appreciate one another, the construction of the film itself still sees the Chinese merely as picturesque background material, and indeed much of the understanding the cultures need to come to involves the silly natives simply learning to appreciate the intelligence and integrity of their white savior. Likewise, the domestic plot covers the same ground, with Watt’s selfish young hussy eventually being made to comprehend and bow down to the Great Man that is her husband. Sure, both the husband and Westerners in general are presented as flawed and fallible, but in the end the message is clear: Daddy knows best. 

The film hits a few other snags along the way. Too much of Curran’s direction seems borrowed from the Merchant-Ivory playbook of costume drama adaptation, a school of filmmaking capable of reaching great artistic heights but which in lesser hands revels in overwrought staging, with a tendency to lean too heavily on clothing and set design to establish tone.  

But the most damning flaw comes in the clichéd final scene, when Watts runs into a former lover on the street. The whole scene is ludicrous, seeking to wrap up the film with one of those ubiquitous bookend sequences that place the protagonist right back where she began. The full-circle conclusion is a valid device of course, but it is frequently abused in so many simplistic mainstream productions, and here it is handled clumsily. The gratuitous encounter only undermines the film’s aspirations toward artistry, confirming the triteness of its design. And to top it off, once she finishes the conversation, Watts turns to walk away while the camera pulls back to over-emphasize the symbolism as she steps across the streetcar tracks, leaving behind a former life and a former self and crossing over to a higher plane.  

After two hours of tedium, we’re hard-pressed to care. 

THE PAINTED VEIL 

Directed by John Curran. Written by Ron Nyswaner. Based on the novel by Somerset Maugham. Starring Edward Norton, Naomi Watts and Liev Schreiber. Rated PG-13. 125 minutes. Playing at the Albany Twin. 

Photograph: Naomi Watts and Edward Norton play a young couple navigating the difficult terrain of a troubled marriage against a backdrop of cholera-ravaged China.

The dawn of a new year, as I reflect on the stage performances of 2006 ... if the old holiday adage is true, that good things come in small packages, it’s particularly true of theater in the East Bay. Last year held a few welcome surprises, and they were mostly on the boards trod by small companies. 

Incredibly, there are more than 400 theater companies and projects in the Bay Area, maybe five or six times the number 20 years ago or so. With such a wealth of ever-changing productions, it means a greater range of styles and material to choose from than ever—and that no single spectator or reviewer can even begin to keep track of, much less see, all of it. 

That also means just what the past year’s experience has borne out: any time a spectator feels jaded that the possibilities of the local stage have been plumbed, she or he will be proven wrong—very likely by some unassuming show dropped in on in some unexpected venue. Nobody, in any sense, has seen it all. 

A couple of cases in point: approaching Alameda’s Altarena Playhouse production of Death of a Salesman, I wondered how much even a venerable community theater could mine from a much-produced and discussed postwar classic, a difficult play even for the greatest of professionals. But Sue Trigg’s direction and a good ensemble brought out lyrical and wryly humorous elements, seldom seen in stagings of Miller plays, in an integral performance, a triumph by any standards.  

And fledgling Ten Red Hen put on a poor mouth production of a big commercial (and usually hi-tech) musical as The 99 Cent Miss Saigon at the Willard School Metal Shop. By playing it straight, as they flaunted “cheap” production values, Ten Red Hen somehow registered a critique of the play’s view of the war in Vietnam, and an unlikely venue became a lively cabaret. Their Clown Blue debuts in March. 

Some smaller companies consolidated their gains in experience, setting new horizons for the future. TheatreFIRST, with their excellent production values and international, socially thematic focus, made themselves the only resident troupe in downtown Oakland in their Old Oakland Theatre on 9th off Broadway. Shotgun Players, who found a home at Ashby Stage, produced an important theater lab series on offnights and, with their past three shows (Ragnarok, Love Is a Dream House in Lorin and The Forest War), including their first commissions, seem to be developing a kind of broadly populist house style of storytelling. And Stan Spenger, founder of Subterranean Shakespeare, put on a lively Richard III at the Berkeley Art Center. He also showed a good hand with Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler for Actors Ensemble, who elected him president of the Berkeley community troupe. 

Community theater has been thriving, not only with Actors Ensemble and Altarena, but with the splendid, mostly amateur Masquers of Pt. Richmond and the more semi-pro Contra Costa Civic, both celebrating many decades of playing. 

An unusual community project realized onstage, the medieval Islamic fable about human stewardship of the world, Island of Animals, brought director, adaptor and scholar Hafiz Karmali from Paris for a joint production with a truly diverse cast, by Fremont’s Afghan Alliance and Golden Thread, the vigorous and important producer of the ReOrient play festival and other cultural events concerning Middle Eastern identity. Occasionally, Golden Thread has joined forces with Oakland’s Darvag, playing in both English and Farsi, for audiences of all ages and cultures. 

Central Works continued in its years of excellence at the Berkeley City Club, a revival of cofounder Gary Graves’ Andromache showing some of the dense theatricality of its Racinean inspiration. Fledgling Ragged Wing staged its second show with The Snow Queen, and will be opening its own physical-style version of The Tempest later this month. 

Some smaller companies, like Oakland’s Eastenders, with their one-act festivals on themes like “100 Years of Political Theater” and “Sex Acts,” and brand-new Arclight, have produced shows in San Francisco—and other memorable performances have been passing through, like Russian actor-director Oleg Liptsin’s stylized show of Beckett’s Happy Days that Antares Ensemble produced, or SF’s Exit Theater in-residence troupe Mugwumpin’s riffing off “Frankie & Johnnie” at Shotgun’s Lab. Woman’s Will staged all-female Shakespeare in the parks and Brecht-Weill’s Happy End at Luka’s Taproom. 

Small opera companies put on several of the most energetically theatrical shows, with Berkeley Opera’s brilliantly staged premiere of Clark Suprynowicz’s Chrysalis—with a wry libretto about a cosmetics exec and her in-the-mirror doppelganger by Berkeley playwright John O’Keefe—and Oakland Opera Theater’s two innovative stagings (Anthony Davis’ extraordinary “X”--the life of Malcolm X, to be reprised this spring—and Philip Glass’ Les Enfants Terribles, Cocteau’s tale of incest (reset in French Indochina) coming first to mind.  

The Marsh in the Gaia Buiding downtown proved itself much more than a venue for solo performance, as its stage saw a profusion of improvisation, works-in-progress, family shows and its founder’s own compound of poetry, choral music, dance and narrative—a kind of personal re-creation myth, Aphrodisia. 

Excellence played in bigger, more established venues, too. Aurora—which started small, in the City Club—staged a fine Master Builder, with founder Barbara Oliver directing James Carpenter and Lauren Grace in an exciting revival of Ibsen’s ironic anatomy of middle class illusions. 

At Berkeley Rep, Glass Menagerie, tinged with the bittersweet Tennessee Williams’ sometimes Chaplinesque comedy, was topped by Rita Moreno’s triumphant break from typecasting as an exotic in her portrayal of Southern Belle-manque Amanda with true Pirandellian humor. CalPerformances featured international touring shows, notably Ratan Thiyyam’s stage poem of the Indian Army occupation of his native Manipur, while the UC performing arts departments produced an ambitious, ongoing new program of diverse contemporary works.  

And to touch again on Arthur Miller, Berkeley’s Joy Carlin scored a hit, directing a splendid cast in a strangely funny late Miller morality play of sorts, The Ride Down Mt. Morgan, at the SF Playhouse, near Union Square. 

With this wealth of performance and more, whether you catch a musical outdoors at Woodminster or an interclub competition of conjurors and mentalists at the Oakland Magic Circle, the truth strikes home, from the threat a great director once made of returning to the audience—just to be a spectator again: “that’s the greatest profession in the world!” 

Contributed photo : One of the best of 2006: Berkeley Opera staged the premiere of Clark Suprynowicz’s Chrysalis, a wry libretto about a cosmetics exec and her in-the-mirror doppelganger by Berkeley playwright John O’Keefe.

“Don’t switch the groove up at the beginning of the solo,” says Oakland saxophonist Howard Wiley across the studio to his drummer, Sly Randolph, then counts out a cue for the rest of the ensemble of singers and instrumentalists. 

The drums roll mordantly like a New Orleans funeral march, two basses (Devon Hoff and David Ewell) strike up, two violins (Yedua Caesar and Vivian McBride) sound mournfully, and soprano Janine Anderson comes in singing high, melismatic notes as Wiley intones on tenor below her—and the recording of “Trouble of the World” for the CD of Howard Wiley and the Angola Project gets back on track on the Friday before New Year’s at Coast Recorders, Mission Street, San Francisco.  

The CD of Howard Wiley and the Angola Project—inspired by field shouts and spirituals from Angola State Penitentiary, Louisiana—will be released Feb. 1 on Wiley’s own label, High Cotton Productions. 

“We’re looking for promotion and distribution,” said Rob Woodworth of the Jazz House, formerly on Adeline Street in Berkeley, where he met Howard Wiley a few years ago. 

“Howard would come in very late, after his gigs, to the Tuesday night jam sessions and blow the doors off,” Woodworth said. “I had to find out who this guy was, what he was all about.”  

Woodworth now works with Wiley, helping with business and promotion for the Angola Project, and Howard continues to play for jazz house events, recently improvising with a dancer for a Free Jazz Friday in Woodworth’s series near West Oakland BART (www.thejazzhouse.org). 

Wiley’s Angola Project began two years ago, when his old friend Daniel Atkinson, who had been looking into the music from Angola Penitentiary, “cornered me,” as Howard puts it, and made him listen to the field recordings. 

“I didn’t want to listen,” he said, “Who would want to listen to prison music, I mean the subjects that come to mind. But Daniel played ‘Rise and Fly,’ and it was music from the soul, the kind of songs I’d only read about, from slavery, sharecropping, chain-gangs, but kept alive, and has the same thing that attracted me to Coltrane playing ‘A Love Supreme.’ It’s out of Blues and church music, but so different. I compare it to food, what my mother puts in her pies: is it the cinnamon, what is it? But it’s got it.”  

Now the group’s starting up again after a glitch. Howard clowns around bawdily for a minute, getting the players and singers giggling—an onstage habit, too—then sketches in a little more of what he wants. Gradually, over a few takes, the number fills out, more body’s added by those taking part. Danny Armstrong joins in, making a muted trombone talk eloquently as Janine’s voice spirals up to the ceiling. 

“Danny just retired from the Postal Service,” says scat singer Lauren Benedict, in the booth between numbers. He also plays with singer LaVay Smith and other popular Bay Area groups. “He’s up on a level with any trombonist in the country,” Howard will say later. 

Armstrong isn’t the only local luminary in the session. Vocalist Faye Carol is back in the corner, scatting to “Trouble of the World,” singing, “Soon will be done/Trouble of the world/Trouble of the world/Coming home to see my God.” 

And as the group was setting up for the number, a man in a hat briskly exited down the corridor, carrying a saxophone case—David Murray, long a national figure in jazz, who Howard met when the World Saxophone Quartet played a tribute to the Grateful Dead at the Great American Music Hall in San Francisco. 

“He did a talk later, when the East Side Arts Alliance in Oakland opened their new space, then played afterwards, and I played with him,” Wiley said. “A fellow Bay Area saxophonist. I knew he’d gone to school with my uncle and my father, and when I mentioned it, he said, ‘I know your people!’ He laid down some extremely powerful and passionate tracks. David Murray and Faye Carol listen to them from the ’70s or last week at the studio—timeless.” 

The Angola Project debuted live some months back at the Mission District’s Intersection for the Arts, with a cellist instead of violins. The next live appearance will be at Jazz At Pearl’s in North Beach, Feb. 23 and 24. This summer, Howard and Daniel will be taking a trip south, back to Angola. 

“The Project is ever-evolving,” says Howard, “Always expanding more and more ...” 

Daniel’s in the booth, talking about the harsh conditions at Angola, “a model prison farm!”—and about Howard, up and running all day, usually on “a couple little instant pancakes ... but I don’t think he’s eaten at all today.” The videographer documenting the whole process scurries up and down a ladder, adjusting lights. Howard looks askance at Anderson and nods, and she starts up “Trouble of the World” again, really warbling it out, as the basses pick up, and the violins play pizzacato under a low, sassing trombone solo. Howard purses his lips, arching his eyebrows, listening, then he and his superb trumpeter, Geechi Taylor, join in as the old spiritual (”I heard it first by Mahalia Jackson”) really takes off. 

For more information on Howard Wiley and the Angola Project, see www.howardwiley.com

I’m always afraid to start talking about the practice of home inspection, fearing that it will seem self-serving but hey, I can serve myself! Actually, I think this sort of discussion is valuable and I wouldn’t try to waste your time if it weren’t. I never fail in my awareness that a column becomes birdcage liner pretty darned quick when it doesn’t provide something of worth. 

About 20 percent of the inspections I do involve condominiums and inspecting condos always involves a frustrating and complex problem. What do we do about the other parts of the property that my client isn’t actually buying (or are they?). The tricky thing about this particular nut and the cracking thereof is that while my client may be presented with the other parts as being completely protected against all evil and nastiness, it ain’t necessarily going to work out that way. 

Let me start out by saying when I will do the inside of a condo and be satisfied with this as a complete process. First, I want the condo to be one of many. Let’s say more than 30 and never less than eight as an absolute minimum. Why, you may rightly ask (you’re so smart)? Because as a condo owner, you will generally be financially responsible for a percentage of all maintenance, repair and improvement costs and if you are buying a condo that has only four units, that’s usually going to be 25 percent (although uneven percentage splits are not uncommon). 

Twenty-five percent of the cost of a foundation, a roof or a major pest clearance can still be a great deal of money and it might be nice to have some sense of what’s coming at the point at which you buy. 

On the other hand, if you’re buying into a building or community of 100 units, a 1 percent responsibility isn’t all that great, although a roof job for a very large building can be a whole lot of money. 

So it’s important to consider, in choosing to inspect (or to not inspect) the other parts of the building, whether you may end up bearing some of the costs for a range of repairs that were never discussed during the sale process. 

Let me take a second to clarify, in brief, what I inspect when I do solely the interior of a condo. This is the standard form, by the way, and your realtor may be accustomed to this as the common method (although they may be quite open to an alternative). An interior inspection inspects only those parts that are inside the unit and include the kitchen, baths, usually one interior electrical panel, the force of the shower, the loose toilet, a cracked or stuck window, and so forth. 

The parts that aren’t included are the roof, the exterior of the building, the foundation, the main electrical, water and gas connections, the site, the crawlspace (is it wet?), etc. The unseen items can make up quite a list, although the Home Owner’s Association (HOA) is, as a general rule, financially responsible for all of these components. 

Another reason to inspect all of the building, as opposed to the interior of your unit alone, is that this particular building happens to be older. Now old, in and of itself, isn’t a bad thing. I’m old and I’m great, but old buildings have problems that modern buildings don’t. They’re more apt to be damaged in an earthquake, unless retrofitting has already been done and done well (I see a lot of poorly done retrofits). They’re more likely to have unsafe wiring, worn out heating equipment and bad roofing.  

By the way, the age of a building is also an issue that I’d use as a basis for whether I’d be willing to do an “interior-only” inspection. 

While you may be only a 3 percent owner in your building, this array of issues might still be important to you (and should be). This isn’t to say that the HOA won’t pay for the things it’s responsible for, but the first thing you, as a buyer, should be determining is: what’s the state of the building I’m considering buying into and putting my body inside of. Is it safe? Will it need major upgrading? Will I have to push to get 25 other folks to bring it up to a reasonable state of safety?  

You may have great success in all these things but it’s fair and reasonable to know that this is what’s on the slate for you to do as opposed to moving into a building that has a clean bill of health and will prove fairly trouble free.  

I don’t feel as though it’s my job to dissuade a buyer from taking on a range of real or potential problems. The property might be a terrific deal and just right for them, all troubles included. The important thing is that the buyer have the chance to see what they’re taking on. Although it may appear that condo ownership is trouble-free, it’s not quite so. I think condo ownership is a great choice for many but it’s not absolution from all care of the home. 

While I like to have the chance to inspect the rest of the building, I must admit that one of the things that will ease my concerns about building issues in general is the presence of a nice big cash reserve held by the HOA. Most HOAs maintain several thousand dollars (obviously varying hugely with size and condition) for the repair and maintenance of the building.  

Some HOAs have very little in reserve and this should always be cause for some discussion regarding the “what-ifs” of home ownership. What if there’s a fire? What is unit C floods unit A because a hose burst on Ms. Friedan’s washing machine and ruined Ms. Steinem’s nice oak floors below? These are the sorts of things that reserves are designed to pay for in addition to the more obvious roofing, painting and so forth. As any homeowner will tell you, there’s always something to pay for when you own a house (or 10 units). 

Knowledge is power and it’s always nice to have a little more power, especially when you’re making a large investment. If you’re buying a condo, an inspection is a darned good idea and spending a bit more to see what the building is like may be wise too. 

Talk to your home inspector when you’re getting ready to do this. Chances are that for an extra hundred or two, you can find out what sort of building you’re moving into. Remember, that other stuff can matter a lot. 

Got a question about home repairs and inspections? Send them to Matt Cantor at mgcantor@pacbell.net.

Oh boy, did I get a great Yule present. Joe gave me a copy of the new edition of Lester Rowntree’s classic Hardy Californians. If no one gave you one, remedy that immediately. 

It’s worth having even if you’ve got a copy of the first edition on your shelf. Additional material by Lester B. Rowntree and Judith Larner Lowry would be worth the book’s price, and there a handy concordance appended that lists the current taxonomic names of the plants in the original, many of which have been reclassified since its publication in 1936. The California Academy of Sciences has collected lots of Rowntree’s personal notes, an invaluable resource these writers present handsomely to the rest of us. 

I just missed Lester Rowntree by a couple of California years. I keep meeting interesting people who knew her personally. I’m just a tad bitter that I never had the chance to meet her myself before she died—at the age of 100—in 1979.  

Her friends and students tell me she was the character a reader meets in her books. This is a very engaging character indeed: knowledgeable, witty, practical, independent in mind and habits, perceptive, and unreservedly in love with the land and the plants she encountered.  

And physically tough. She rambled all over California’s wildlands, over the Sierra and through the deserts, in one of those great clunky old 1930s coupes with running boards—passenger seat removed to make room for her equipment—or on foot, sometimes with a burro named Skimpy to caddy. 

These impedimenta were mostly plant presses, reference books, samples and seeds and storage for them, film holders and big box cameras. She herself required little: a homemade bedroll and garden tools, and presumably a change of clothing, a pot or two, and a stash of beans and raisins. No tent; in bad weather she tucked up in the car. Otherwise, she liked her world first-hand and immediate: 

“The best places of all were in the high mountains, where I knew no one was camping above me. I used to love sleeping at the edge of the snow banks during thaw time to watch the alpines open with the rising sun.” 

The book’s title is utilitarian: Hardy Californians are plants that will thrive in gardens that get seriously cold in winter. The phrase contradicts the idea then prevalent that all California plants were semitropical or at least tender.  

“Hardy” and “tender” mean something particular to gardeners that their common usage doesn’t convey. Much as “theory” does not mean “wild guess” to scientists – it means a tested explanation for concrete facts—“hardy” means “cold-tolerant” and “tender” means the opposite. The toughest plant on Earth might be a shoreline shrub who endures gales, salt spray, and annual drought, but has never faced deep freezes and is therefore tender.  

Rowntree’s voice is frank and forward in her book, and her first-person style makes the acquaintance with our native plants even more a pleasure. She includes growing advice that needs very little modification for us here and now’ to summarize: Know where your plants come from and how they grow there, to know what they’ll like.  

Read it yourself. It’s a good introduction to brilliant and hardy Californians, in both senses. 

Hardy Californians: A Woman’s Life with Native Plants. Lester Rowntree.  

(New, expanded edition).  

University of California Press, 2006,  

ISBN-13 978-0-520-25051-2. 

$19,95 

FRIDAY, JAN. 5 

Impeachment Banner Fridays at 6:45 to 8 a.m. on the Berkeley Pedestrian bridge between Seabreeze Market and the Berkeley Aquatic Park, ongoing on Fridays until impeachment is realized. www. Impeachbush-cheney.com 

Report on Lebanon with Dr. Paul Larudee on his visits during the summer of 2006, at 7 p.m. at St. Joseph the Worker Church, 1640 Addison St. Free. 845-4740. 

“Who Killed the Electric Car?” A documentary and presentation by the Sierra Club at 7:30 p.m. at Humanist Hall, 390 27th St., Oakland. Donation of $5 acccepted. www.HumanistHall.net 

Red Cross Blood Drive from noon to 6 p.m. at MLK Student Union, UC Campus. To schedule an appointment go to www.BeADonor.com (code UCB) 

Circle Dancing, simple folk dancing with instruction at 7:30 p.m. at Finnish Brotherhood Hall, 1970 Chestnut St at University. Donation of $5 requested. 528-4253. www.circledancing.com 

SATURDAY, JAN. 6 

Save the Oaks Spiral Dance led by Reclaiming Collective, to celebrate the tree-sitters’ one month anniversary defending the trees, at 2 p.m. at the oak grove just below Memorial Stadium on Piedmont Ave., north of Bancroft Ave. and International House. 548-3113. www.SaveOaks.com 

Sick Plant Clinic Dr. Robert Raabe, plant pathologist, and Dr. Nick Mills, entomologist, will diagnose plant illnesses and recommend remedies. Bring a piece of the plant in a securely sealed container. A zipperlock bag is ideal. From 9 a.m. to noon at Botanical Garden, 200 Centennial Dr. 643-2755. 

Code Pink Bake Sale from 2 to 5 p.m. at the top of Solano Ave. Money raised will help fund activists against the war working in Washington D.C. 524-2776. 

Help “Save The Bay” Plant Natives from 9 a.m. to noon at Martin Luther King, Jr. Regional Shoreline, Oakland. RSVP requested. 452-9261 ext. 109. www.savesfbay.org  

French Broom Removal Help remove this invasive plant from our parks, from 9:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. at Redwood Regional Park, Oakland. We provide tools. Meet at Skyline Gate staging area, 8500 Skyline Blvd. Oakland. 925-756-0195. www.ebparks.org 

“Slug and Salamander Sleuths” Investigate the slippery lives of these creatures through story, song, nature walk, and craft, from 3 to 4:30 p.m. at Tilden Nature Area, Tilden Park. 636-1684. 

Kid’s Garden Club for ages 6-9 to explore the world of gardening, from 2 to 4 p.m. at Tilden Nature Area, Tilden Park. Dress to get dirty. Cost is $6-$8, registration required. 636-1684. 

“The Mosque of Paris: A Forgotten Resistance” Documentary film and presentation on how the Muslim community of Paris saved Jews in Nazi-occupied France. Discussion with Dr. Annette Herskovits who survived the the Holocaust as a child in France. At 7 p.m. at Berkeley UU Fellowship Hall, 1924 Cedar at Bonita. Sponsored by the UU Social Justice Committee. 528-5403. 

“Cuba and Latin America, Adelante!” Interview with author and filmmaker Saul Landau by Casa Cuba’s Karen Lee Wald, at 7:30 p.m. at La Peña Cultural Center, 3105 Shattuck Ave. Cost is $7-$10 sliding scale. 636-1684. 

Movies that Matter “The Last Temptation of Christ” at 6:30 p.m. at Neumayer Residence, 565 Bellevue St. at Perkins, Oakland. Free. 451-3009. http://joyfulharmony.org  

Freedom from Tobacco Quit Smoking Class from 9:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. and runs for six Saturdays. Option of free acupuncture included. For information call 981-5330. quitnow@ci.berkeley.ca.us 

Sickle Cell Presentation and Discussion at 3 p.m. at the African American Museum and Library, 659 14th St., Oakland, in conjunction with the “Can We Spare Some Change? - A Change in Attitude” Exhibition. 637-0200. 

Sunset Walk in Emeryville Meet at 3:30 p.,m. behind Chevy’s Restaurant at the small parking lot for an hour walk through the Marina. Rain cancels. Wheelchair accessible. 234-8949. 

Luna Kids Dance Open House from 1 to 3 p.m. at Julia Morgan Center for the Arts, Studio C, 2640 College Ave. 644-3629. 

The Berkeley Lawn Bowling Club provides free instruction at 10:30 a.m. at 2270 Acton St. 841-2174.  

Petite Pooches Playgroup for small dogs from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m., one block north of Solano on Ensenada at Talbot. 524-2459. 

SUNDAY, JAN. 7 

“Hoot with Winter Owls” Learn the night-time calls of owls that inhabit Tilden’s forests and discover fact, fiction and fables about owls at 11 a.m. at Tilden Nature Area, Tilden Park. 636-1684. 

“Open Garden” Join the Little Farm gardener for composting, planting, watering and reaping the rewards of our work, from 2 to 4 p.m. at Tilden Nature Area, Tilden Park. Cancelled only by heavy rain. 525-2233. www.ebparks.org 

“Newt Hunt” Every winter, newts return to our freshwater ponds to breed. Catch a glimpse of the incredible mating behavior of newts from 2 to 4 p.m. at Tilden Nature Area, Tilden Park. 636-1684. 

“Sausal Creek Canyons Hike” Join a challenging one-way hike through Sausal Creek canyons and green hillsides to reach gorgeous bay views from 10 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. We will return to our starting place by bus. Bring snacks, water, layered clothing, good hiking boots, sun or rain gear as necessary, and bus fare. Reservations required. 415-255-3233. www.greenbelt.org 

Lake Merritt Neighbors Organized for Peace at 3 p.m. at the colonnade at the NE end of the lake. 763-8712. lmno4p.org 

Tibetan Buddhism with Sylvia Gretchen on “Timeless Advice from the Tibetan Tradition” at 6 p.m. at the Tibetan Nyingma Institute, 1815 Highland Pl. 843-6812.  

MONDAY, JAN. 8  

National Organization for Women Oakland/East Bay Chapter meets at 6 p.m. at the Oakland YWCA, 1515 Webster St. The speaker will be Robin Nanni, president of Local 535 Service Employees International Union. 287-8948. 

Berkeley CopWatch organizational meeting at 8 p.m. at 2022 Blake St.548-0425. 

TUESDAY, JAN. 9 

“Stop the Violence - Share the Dream” to honor Dr. Martin Luther King Jr at noon at 300 Lakeside Drive, Second Floor Auditorium. 464-7139. 

Berkeley High School Governance Council meets at 4:15 p.m. in the Community Theater Lobby. Agenda items include Update on UC approved courses, Maintenance and Safety Plans and Attendance Policy. 644-4803. 

Why You Need A Durable Power of Attorney for Health Care at 1:15 p.m. at the North Berkeley Senior Center, 1901 Hearst Ave. 981-5190. 

Opportunities Abounding Public Forum on Arts Education Explore ideas on creating equitable classrooms sponsored by Alliance for Arts Learning Leadership, Alameda County Office of Education at 6 p.m. at the Chapel of the Chimes, 4499 Piedmont Ave., Oakland RSVP appreciated. www.artISeducation.org 

“How to be Healthy through Holistic Therapy” with Su Jok, a therapy that uses stimulation of acupuncture points on the hand and foot to bring symptom relief, at 7 p.m. at El Cerrito Library, 6510 Stockton Ave., El Cerrito. Free, all welcome. 526-7512.  

Red Cross Blood Drive from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Port of Oakland, 530 Water St. To scheduale an appointment go to www.BeADonor.com (code PORT) 

Navigating with National Geographic Learn how to use a GPS with National Geographic mapping software at 7 p.m. at REI, 1338 San Pablo Ave. 527-4140. 

Family Storytime at 7 p.m. at the Kensington Library, 61 Arlington Ave. 524-3043. 

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, JAN. 10  

Oakland Celebrates the Dream in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s 78th Birthday at 11:30 a.m. in Frank Ogawa Plaza, 14th St. and Broadway. 444-2489. 

Shoreline Restoration and Celebration of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Life for middle and high school students from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at MLK Jr. Regional Shoreline. Registration required. 704-4030. 

Volunteer in the Native Plant Nursery Help us reach our goal to plant 10,000 native wetland plants at Martin Luther King Jr. Shoreline Park this winter. From 1 to 3 p.m. RSVP requested. 452-9261 ext. 109. www.savesfbay.org/bayevents  

Poetry Writing Workshop, led by Linda Elkin, at 7 p.m. at the Albany Library, 1247 Marin Ave. 526-3720, ext. 17.  

Financial Topics and You: College Funding at 6 p.m. at the Oakland Public Library, 125 14th St., Oakland. 238-3134. 

Julia Morgan School for Girls Admissions Information Meeting at 7 p.m. on the campus of Mills College, Oakland. For information and to register call 632-6000, ext. 125. 

The Culture of Japan at 1:15 p.m. at the North Berkeley Senior Center, 1901 Hearst Ave. 981-5190. 

Avalanche Safety Lecture with Dick Penniman at 6 p.m. at REI, 1338 San Pablo Ave. Cost is $20. 527-4140. 

New to DVD “Quinceanera” at 7 p.m. at the JCCEB, 1414 Walnut St. 848-0237. 

Walk Berkeley for Seniors 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. 

THURSDAY, JAN. 11 

Storytime for Babies & Toddlers at 10:30 a.m. Kensington Library, 61 Arlington Ave. 524-3043. 

World of Plants Tours at 1:30 p.m. at the UC Botanical Garden, 200 Centennial Drive. Cost is $5. 643-2755. 

ONGOING 

Peace Action West, a local non-profit which promotes peace and justice, is looking for volunteers to do data entry, stuff envelopes and other tasks. Located across from the Berkeley Bowl. 849-2272, ext. 104. 

Magnes Museum Docent Training Open to all interested in Jewish art and history. Classes begin Jan. 18th. cultural.arts@sbcglobal.net 

CITY MEETINGS 

Housing Advisory Commission meets Mon., Jan. 8, at 7:30 p.m., at the South Berkeley Senior Center. 981-5400. 

Peace and Justice Commission meets Mon., Jan. 8, at 7 p.m., at the North Berkeley Senior Center. Manuel Hector, 981-5510.  

School Board meets Wed. Jan. 10, at 7:30 p.m., in the City Council Chambers. Mark Coplan 644-6320.