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Density Bonus, Law School, Southside on Planning Agenda

Tuesday February 12, 2008

Planning Commissioners will weigh in Wednesday on building size rules and get their first look at a three-story building UC Berkeley plans for the courtyard adjacent to its law school. 

Beth Piatnitza, associate director of the university’s capital projects planning staff, will present the plans that call for a building with two floors underground. Also included in the plans is an interior remodeling of some of the existing law school building once known as Boalt Hall. 

Commissioners will also take up once again the recommendations of the Joint Density Bonus Subcommittee, the same proposal taken up by the Housing Advisory Commission last week. 

The proposals govern the requirements for low-cost housing in new projects as well as the rules for creating bonus space that the city must grant in exchange for builders adding to the city’s affordable housing supply. 

The third item on the agenda is a staff report on the draft Southside Plan. 

Commissioner Larry Gurley has been pushing hard to revive the long-delayed plan, and Wednesday night’s presentation is the first since he began his drive to resurrect the plan. 

The proposed plan, a joint effort of the city and UC Berkeley, was handed to the commission eight years ago, but commissioners last dealt with the plan in 2003. 

Wednesday night’s meeting begins at 7 p.m. in the North Berkeley Senior Center, 1901 Hearst Ave. at Martin Luther King Jr. Way.  

—Richard Brenneman