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Is the referendum fast becoming the weapon of choice for Berkeley voters to challenge City Council decisions? 

Certainly there’s reason to think so, given that no sooner did signature gatherers delay implementation of a new council-appproved landmarks law than a second campaign was launched to derail the city’s largest ever low-income housing project and a high profile environmental center. 

Gale Garcia, one of the referendum drive’s two principal backers, said she decided to challenge the project “because I think it’s going to bankrupt the town” and because she was outraged at the transfer of the site to non-profit developers for a dollar.  

The referendum seeks to block enforcement of the Jan. 30 council vote that transferred surface rights at the city’s Oxford Street parking lot to a consortium that plans to build a six-story low-income housing project and a high profile center named after Berkeley-born environmentalist David Brower. 

Mayor Tom Bates said the allegations are unfounded, noting that the city retains control of the property, and is gaining an underground garage that will be worth more than the appraised value of the land. 

The mayor said the city has spent comparatively more money on other housing projects. 

Garcia and Barry Wofsy filed papers with City Clerk Pamyla Means to begin circulating petitions calling for a voter referendum on the council’s adoption of Ordinance 6,965. To force a vote, Garcia and Wofsy must gather the signatures of 4,073 registered Berkeley voters and submit them to Means by 5 p.m. March 1. 

If a review by the Alameda County Registrar of Voters determines they’ve met the requirement, implementation of the ordinance—and the transfer of a valuable 1.06-acre piece of property at a key downtown location—will be halted until city voters can say yea or nay to the deal. 

But unlike another referendum already certified for the next citywide election, the battle against the Brower Center doesn’t offer a built-in constituency already mobilized to fight the good fight. 

Backers of a referendum to overturn the council-adopted revision of the city’s Landmarks Preservation Ordinance (LPO) could rely on the 42.8 percent of Berkeley voters who cast ballots in November for Measure J to preserve the city’s existing law, with some minor tweaks added. 

But the project known collectively as the Brower Center is a much harder target, featuring as it does housing for those least able to afford it as well as offices for environmental organizations, as the project has been depicted.  

While the latter promise is less than certain—the developer has acknowledged UC Berkeley could become the major tenant of the office component—affordable housing is a popular cause in Berkeley, an almost universally acknowledged need. 

Coordinating the charge against the referendum is Rob Wrenn, a member of the city’s Transportation Commission and a former planning commissioner. He fired the opening salvo of his campaign in a Feb. 1 email, sent within hours of an email from Means notifying city officials of the referendum drive. 

Dismissing the two referendum proponents as “a landlord” (Garcia) and “another well known Berkeley crackpot” (Wofsy), Wrenn outlines his suggestions for a counter-campaign designed to discourage would-be signatories. 

“I own a duplex in which I reside, an old building which I restored from very poor condition with my own labor,” Garcia responded. “Rob is a neighbor of mine, and knows that this is the extent of my landlord status.” 

She said she doesn’t not oppose affordable housing, but prefers the funds goes to those in need “rather than to developers and consultants.” 

But even Jesse Arreguin, a housing activist and city commissioner who argues for creating affordable housing by restoring existing buildings, says the proposed referendum “is not the right way to express concern about the project.” 

One of Arreguin’s major concerns is that the Garcia/Wofsy referendum could derail support for the other referendum, one he supports along with Garcia. 

“I really don’t think it helps the Landmarks Preservation Ordinance referendum,” he said. 

Garcia was active in the signature campaigns both for Measure J and, after it was rejected by Berkeley voters, and for the pending referendum challenging the council’s revised LPO. 

The city has committed $6,2 million in direct funding to the project, tying up the city’s Housing Trust Fund through 2008 at a time when the Bush administration is calling for drastic cutbacks in funds for housing programs 

And while Bates said the city has not agreed to any funds for the office building, the City Council approved in December an additional $2.2 million in loan guarantees to the project—including $1 million required after eco-retailer Patagonia pulled out of its planned lease of space in the office building component. 

Current total cost estimates for both buildings top $55.2 million and could rise an additional $2 million or more, given current the current inflation in building supplies, city Housing Director Steve Barton warned last month. 

The increases include the replacement of planned sheet metal siding for Oxford Plaza with cheaper stucco. 

Bates noted that the city’s actual land value will increase when the developers complete the underground parking garage they agreed to build to replace the spaces that will be eliminated from the surface lot. 

“So we’re getting a free underground garage that’s worth $2 million more than the land value,” Bates said, “In addition we’re getting a wonderful center devoted to David Brower that will have the highest environmental rating of any building in the city.” 

The decision was prompted by the council’s vote, which transfers the land to the non-profit developers for $1. “I had thought the land had already been transferred, but when I learned that it hadn’t,” Garcia said, she decided to launch the referendum drive. “People are shocked when they hear the land is being given away for a dollar. Most people aren’t aware of it.” 

Construction funding is coming primarily from tax credit financing, which gives lenders hefty tax credits in return for their funds, and through grants, the mayor said. 

“It’s a great opportunity to get low-income family housing in downtown Berkeley,” Bates said. “We haven’t had any in the city since Salvo Island in the 1960s.” 

Garcia said her concerns were reinforced by the Dec. 12 report Steve Barton prepared for the City Council which included admonitions about possible cost overruns for which the city would be the funder of last resort. She underlined a sentence in the report that noted: “It is important to realize that ... there is no guarantee that costs will not rise to unexpected levels after the land transfers and construction begins.”