Sunday’s second Berkeley International Food Festival Sunday will celebrate the story of how a West Berkeley neighborhood overcame ethnic, racial and economic boundaries through food. -more-
A popular Albany physician and her two daughters were shot to death by her distraught husband in a secluded Tilden Park parking lot Monday night. He then turned the gun on himself. -more-
If anything, the week got worse. On Tuesday, I wrote a blog about the internet abuse of children, our disassociation from what happens right in front of our faces. I didn't know when I wrote it that I had witnessed the scene of an unimaginable horror the evening before. -more-
A packed council budget hearing at the Tuesday evening City Council meeting brought out people with requests ranging from homeless services to arts to emergency road access. -more-
When Mayor Tom Bates saw the crowd that had assembled at Tuesday’s Berkeley City Council meeting to address the question of development at the former site of Wright’s Garage—a commercial complex proposed by realtor John Gordon near the intersection of College and Ashby avenues and approved March 8 by the Zoning Adjustments Board (ZAB)—he asked why it was on the agenda at all. -more-
City Commissioners Jesse Arreguin and Steve Wollmer had been sent to address the Tuesday City Council meeting by the Rent Board and Housing Advisory Commission. -more-
In response to criticism that his administration has been relatively inactive in its first days, the office of Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums has released a report outlining its accomplishments and activities since the January inauguration. -more-
Chiori Santiago passed away on April 14, 2007 from kidney cancer. She will be missed dearly by her family and extended community of friends and colleagues. Chiori’s life was about sharing her great joy, love and wisdom of the many cultures, people and plants that make up our world. -more-
Only days before major changes in its lines and schedules are scheduled to take place, the AC Transit District has failed to put information signs on its bus stops up along stretches of one of the major streets being affected by the change. -more-
Pursuit of a pair of Oakland robbery suspects ended Wednesday in a Berkeley neighborhood with a bullet-punctuated car and foot chase of one man and the arrest of his woman companion, clad only in her birthday suit. -more-
Alameda County prosecutors have charged a member of UC Berkeley’s national championship 2007 rugby team for a May 5 beating that left another student with a broken jaw and brain injuries. -more-
In addition to the free Universal Breakfasts that Berkeley Unified will be serving children in the city all summer, the city will be treating them to free lunches. -more-
Using language that expressed reluctance, the Berkeley Board of Education unanimously approved a policy reversal to release student information to the military for recruitment to be eligible for federal education grants. -more-
Parents of children at LeConte’s Extended Day Care (EDC) came to the school board meeting Wednesday to protest the program’s move from a bungalow outside the school to a basement inside the building at 2241 Russell St. -more-
A swarm of yellow descended upon the Greek Theater Friday when 700 Berkeley High School (BHS) graduates walked into its pit amidst a ceremony fit for kings. -more-
Berkeley councilmembers’ multi-million dollar wish list of city services and physical improvements is likely to remain just that—a list of projects on paper. -more-
A full year away from the primary elections and with two of the East Bay’s most recognized women politicians interested in running, figuring out the odds on who will succeed termed-out state Sen. Don Perata in the District 9 Senate seat would be difficult under normal circumstances. -more-
Berkeley held its second public workshop on the downtown plan Saturday, a gathering as notable for heated tempers as for innovative visions. -more-
Back in the darker ages of Berkeley City Council history—before Berkeleyans Organizing for Library Defense (SuperBOLD) threatened a lawsuit last year—citizens hoping to speak to their elected officials at the public comment period would fill out a card a clerk would throw into a contraption with cards from all the other hopeful speakers. The city clerk would spin the device and choose 10 cards. -more-
Telegraph Avenue residents will soon be able to shop for groceries at a new Fred’s Market opening up at the former site of Owl Rexall Drugs. -more-
The lawsuits aimed at saving the grove at California Memorial Stadium are consuming a few trees of their own as the blizzard of paperwork continues in the leadup to an eventual courtroom showdown. -more-
It’s not easy getting ahold of King Middle School Principal Kit Pappenheimer, especially in the days before her school closes for the summer. -more-
SB67 Vehicle Speed Contests and Reckless Driving (Sideshow 30-Day Car Confiscation) – Sen. Don Perata (D-Oakland) -more-
Proponents of the proposed solar project at Washington Elementary School are getting ready to celebrate victory after the 7:30 p.m. Berkeley Board of Education meeting Wednesday at Old City Hall, 2134 Martin Luther King Jr. Way. -more-
Police made an arrest Friday in connection with a fiery big-rig collision that killed three UC Berkeley students in 2005, the California Highway Patrol announced. -more-
Landmarks commissioners and citizen planners will meet Wednesday night to decide—for the moment—the role of historic buildings in the new downtown Berkeley plan. -more-
Hal Carlstad, known throughout Berkeley and neighboring communities as a leader in a wide range of progressive social and environmental causes, died Tuesday, June 12 after a long illness. He was 82. -more-
Peralta Community College District Educational Services Vice Chancellor Margaret Haig passed away this week after a brief illness. -more-
Just a bit of weeping and gnashing of teeth accompanied the interrupted consummation of the apparent deal between local politicians and the Berkeley Chamber of Commerce last week. Mayor Bates and some council allies made a vigorous show of enacting new laws aimed at getting untidy people out of shopping districts, seemingly in return for the Chamber Political Action Commitee’s cash contributions to their re-election campaigns, but in the end nothing was enacted except concept statements, and everyone knows the devil’s in the details. -more-
It’s possible that democratic government as we’ve known it is on its way to becoming an endangered species in the United States of America, a richly endowed country that’s only managed to sustain itself for less than a quarter of a millennium so far. In Washington scoundrels of all descriptions, with Albert Gonzales the most prominent but by no means the only example, frolic with impunity in what used to be known as the federal government. While Gonzales has been busy dismantling the Justice Department, his allies have severely damaged the Food and Drug Administration and the Environmental Protection Agency, to name just two victim agencies. What’s remarkable is that no so-called expose by the press or even by congressional committees of the massive mischief of the Bush administration has made much difference. In a May 14 New Yorker piece that became an instant classic, George Packer asked: “Why has it become impossible to admit a mistake in Washington and accept the consequences?” -more-
A giant backyard redwood tree is felled on the summer solstice. Former California Gov. Ronald Reagan once was quoted as saying, “If you’ve seen one redwood tree, you’ve seen them all.” This was back in the 1960s, I believe, when there was a strong environmental movement to save many of the remaining pristine groves of the Coast redwood tree (Sequoia sempervirens) in Northern California from impending cutting. Thousands of acres of prime native habitat dominated by these towering giant trees were eventually saved. Several weeks ago one of my neighbors told me that a landowner several properties down the street had applied for a permit to cut down our local landmark redwood tree, which dominates our block. It is probably over one hundred feet high and is possibly one hundred years old. I called the telephone contact number on the public notice that was posted on the telephone pole and after leaving a couple of messages and waiting a couple of days (this is in Oakland, the city that seemingly has much trouble doing much of anything right and/or in a timely fashion…), and was told that, yes, the owner had applied for a tree-cutting permit because its roots were beginning to affect his duplex’s foundation. -more-
In this, the “Year of Health Care Reform” in California, it’s ironic that the governor in his May Revise would fail to fund a reimbursement rate increase for providers of some of the most cost-effective preventive health care in the state. The cost of such an increase—$24 million—is just a speck of the overall $104 billion state budget—especially compared to the cost of doing nothing. -more-
Although I sent an e-mail to all the Berkeley City Council members and the mayor, opposing the planned bar/restaurant at Ashby and College, it took your June 19 editorial dated to alert me to the stealth disregard of the Neighborhood Commercial Preservation Ordinance that citizens of the Elmwood worked tirelessly to get passed. The variance granted by the Zoning Adjustments Board, specifically so a watering hole can dispense hard liquor in a neighborhood that clearly opposes it, is more of the same that we are getting from the mayor and those who support his vision of asphalting all open spaces and denying the needs for parks and playgrounds in districts that need them. -more-
“Bus Rapid Transit” (BRT) is AC Transit’s plan to take over two lanes of Telegraph Avenue and eliminate up to 315 Berkeley parking spaces for humongous buses traveling from downtown San Leandro to downtown Berkeley. The draft environmental impact report (EIR) for this project, available at the library or from AC Transit, is a real eye-opener and an amusing read. -more-
Over the past year and a half I have learned about the proposal from AC Transit to install a “Bus Rapid Transit” (BRT) program to connect San Leandro to Oakland to Berkeley. We are now near the end of the review period for the environmental impact statement/report (EIS/R) on the project. (You can read the EIS/R at www.actransit.org/news/articledetail.wu?articleid=42622c20.) -more-
Ignore all the diesel smoke and rumbling around AC Transit’s misnamed “Bus Rapid Transit” (BRT) proposal to take over two lanes of Telegraph Avenue, and two striking facts stand clear. -more-
There are few areas in the world more entangled in historical deceit and betrayal than northern Iraq, where the British, the Ottomans, and the Americans have played a deadly game of political chess at the expense of the local Kurds. And now, because of a volatile brew of internal Iraqi and Turkish politics, coupled with the Bush administration’s clandestine war to destabilize and overthrow the Iranian government, the region threatens to explode into a full-scale regional war. -more-
My grandfather, Ellis Allen, Sr. I am told, spoke with a musical French accent, as did his sister, Aunt Isobel, who migrated with other Allen family members to Oakland at the end of the 19th century. I barely remember my grandfather and his accent, not at all, but that information does not now surprise me. My father’s people were from the Louisiana bayou country, St. James Parish, near New Orleans, where French was the predominant settler language for years until “the Americans came” and supplanted it with English. -more-
One of Berkeley’s most important and historic brown shingle homes—with Maybeck connections, too—is currently for sale at 2601 Derby Street. An Open House is scheduled from 2-4:30 p.m. this Sunday, June 24. -more-
We’ve driven past the place dozens of times on the way to the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge, and it’s become a private landmark rather like San Quentin. But last week was the first time we’ve ever managed to get off I-580 and get our feet on the ground at Golden Gate Palms in Richmond. -more-
Ihate code books. Not code as in dot-dash-dot or SLWBT means I love you. I mean the building codes. -more-
One thing history has taught us about major earthquakes: houses that are correctly retrofitted survive intact. -more-
It must have been just about a year ago that a reader wrote to me via The Planet, asking about a row of trees on a street near Ashby and San Pablo. They were blooming—as they are now—and he’d been enjoying them for a long time and wondered what they were. -more-
Michael S. Moore’s acrylic paintings at the Graduate Theological Union are images of landscapes as symbolic order. They are pictures of vast desert landscapes, of large empty spaces along the Nevada-Oregon border as well as of the Colorado plains. It would seem that the canvases are based on watercolors which are shown in display cases below the paintings. -more-
“Father! Father! I hopped off on a cloud ...”—and the figure in a sari (Sarah Meyerhoff), standing on the lawn at the Berkeley Art Center, seems to be sinking, as the voice of her Father, the god Indra (Thomas West), echoes up from the creek below, reassuring her as she descends to earth, in the first scene of Strindberg’s masterpiece, A Dream Play. -more-
Everyone talks about Harry Lime. He’s one of the most charismatic and cynical of movie villains, a cad who plays the people and police for suckers while justifying his crimes with glib insouciance. -more-
The Laurel Summer Solistice Music Festival, inspired by the Fete de la Musique, a solistice celebration initiated in France 25 years ago to bring people into the streets to hear and make music and now a worldwide phenomenon, celebrates its second anniversary this Saturday, 9 a.m.-10 p.m., in Oakland’s Laurel Village district. -more-
One of Berkeley’s most important and historic brown shingle homes—with Maybeck connections, too—is currently for sale at 2601 Derby Street. An Open House is scheduled from 2-4:30 p.m. this Sunday, June 24. -more-
We’ve driven past the place dozens of times on the way to the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge, and it’s become a private landmark rather like San Quentin. But last week was the first time we’ve ever managed to get off I-580 and get our feet on the ground at Golden Gate Palms in Richmond. -more-
Ihate code books. Not code as in dot-dash-dot or SLWBT means I love you. I mean the building codes. -more-
One thing history has taught us about major earthquakes: houses that are correctly retrofitted survive intact. -more-
In black battle dress, a figure hobbles onstage to the unlikely strains of Patsy Cline belting out “Wheel of Fortune” over a big band. As he performs an exhausted striptease—one suited for a locker room—the battle-weary wraith launches into “Now is the winter of our discontent” and finally dons topcoat over white T-shirt: Gloucester, who will one day soon be Richard III. -more-
The Virago Theatre company, resident in Alameda, is currently staging the premieres of two short plays by Bay Area playwrights, The Death of Ayn Rand, by John Byrd (directed by Robert Lundy-Paine) and A Bed of My Own, by well-known Oakland actor and director Robert Hamm (directed by Laura Lundy-Paine) at Rhythmix Cultural Works in Alameda. -more-
It must have been just about a year ago that a reader wrote to me via The Planet, asking about a row of trees on a street near Ashby and San Pablo. They were blooming—as they are now—and he’d been enjoying them for a long time and wondered what they were. -more-
