Public Comment

RETRACTION REQUESTED 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Regarding Gar Smith’s Feb. 12 commentary about Valentine’s Day roses, specifically the sentence which reads: “Organic Bouquet ... is currently suspected of engaging in poor labor practices ...”  

We have never heard of any such complaints or accusations and, in fact, the company stands for completely the opposite, working every day to promote environmentally and socially responsible practices, including the fact that every farm which supplies Organic Bouquet is certified by one or more: Veriflora, Organic, Fair Trade, Biodynamic. 

I ask Gar Smith and the Daily Planet to please either document and substantiate this accusation, or issue an immediate and full retraction.  

Michael Straus 

Organic Style Ltd and  

Organic Bouquet, Inc. 

EDITOR’S NOTE: After checking sources, the Daily Planet has found no evidence of any irregularities among Organic Bouquet’s suppliers, as alleged in the commentary submission. We regret the error. 

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TRAFFIC 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I am willing to agree that traffic circles slow everyone down. It certainly slows me down, as I can no longer determine the intentions of oncoming traffic. After two close calls I am trying to remember to simply wait until traffic has cleared the intersection. However, other people are not so cautious, and when you are on foot or bicycle, it can get pretty scary when a vehicle behind you swings wide to clear the circle. For real thrills I suggest turning left the recommended way around a circle (on your bike of course), just in time to discover that someone coming from the side is in a hurry and is going the wrong way to make the turn (in their tank, of course). 

Although traffic circles have made my life a lot more dangerous, I’m sure that it is safer for some other people. My real beef with traffic “calming” is that it is a higher priority than basic safety maintenance. We got a little questionnaire asking if we wanted traffic circles on our street. I voted no. A few months later I found out the result of the questionnaire when they tore up the intersection to put in the traffic circle. I am really impressed. It made me wonder if I was still in Berkeley. No public hearings or long drawn-out debates. An actual pro-active response. So did I miss the questionnaire where everyone voted to not do street maintenance? 

The weekend before last my daughter hit road debris from one of the multitudinous potholes northbound on Sacramento street between Ashby and Dwight. She lost control of her bike and slewed perpendicular to traffic into the middle lane, with a car putting on its brakes behind her. When she caught up with me she was sobbing, “Dad, I almost got killed.” Or how about southbound on Sacramento, which has essentially become a gravel road? How about the crack northbound on Seventh street north of Ashby? How about the abandoned railroad tracks off of Seventh street? How come we’re not pro-active on maintenance? It wasn’t that long ago that a person in a wheelchair was killed trying to avoid a broken sidewalk, so you’d think we would have gotten the message that maintenance is a safety issue. Or is the problem that we can no longer do maintenance on major arterials because traffic circles and barriers have made alternative routes almost impassable?  

Robert Clear 

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WAR ON POTHOLES? 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

After the Berkeley City Council has ended the war and brought everybody home, then could we fix some of the potholes? 

Dick Bagwell 

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HOUSING COMMISSION ARTICLE 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Your Feb. 12 article, “Housing Commission Weighs in on Bonus Rules,” claims that “Inclusionary housing by definition reduces potential profits by requiring developers to rent or sell at below market rates to tenants and buyers who couldn’t otherwise afford them.” While this is indeed the common-sense definition, in Berkeley the local and state laws do not accomplish anything of the sort. 

Rents for “inclusionary” housing are based not on market rates for housing in the local community, but on a percentage of “Area Median Income” (AMI) as defined by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. For Berkeley, the relevant area is all of Alameda and Contra Costa counties, and the AMI for 2007 was $83,800 (updated figures for 2008 have not yet been released). The currently allowed rents for “inclusionary” studio, one-, and two-bedroom apartments are $961, $1,160, and $1,375, respectively. A quick check of craigslist.org shows that all of these are in the current market range: today I found around 20 listings for cheaper apartments in each of those categories. Rents for three- and four-bedroom inclusionary units would be below market rate, if there were any, but most of the apartment buildings that received inclusionary-housing density bonuses in recent years don’t have any apartments that large. 

In other words, developers have been getting density bonuses putatively intended to promote affordable housing while building only market-rate apartments. I’m surprised that wasn’t the central topic of the Housing Commission’s discussion. 

Robert Lauriston 

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WHEN THE CIRCUS MOVES ON 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

While the band marches on with the circus in town, thanks for the reminder that there are other important items on the City Council agenda. 

Winston Burton 

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A COMPROMISE 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I nominate City Hall as the site for the antennas. It is tall, doesn’t backup against any residential neighborhoods and has a central location where people come and go but do not linger. 

Constance Wiggins 

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NANCY SKINNER 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Thanks for Becky O’Malley’s recognition of my strong support for my good friend Nancy Skinner, who clearly is the strongest and best qualified of the candidates to succeed Loni Hancock in representing the 14th District in the California Assembly. As she correctly pointed out, my e-mail note was erroneously sent through my corporate rather than my personal e-mail account, an error for which I apologize. It was intended in no way as an endorsement of Nancy by ICF International, and I’ve e-mailed all the recipients of that note to clarify this. Personally, however, I do support Nancy, and invite anyone with questions about this race to get in touch with me or with her campaign at info@nancyskinnerforassembly.com. 

Carole Norris 

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PACIFIC STEEL 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Pacific Steel laid off 60 workers last week, claiming that clients were canceling orders because of concerns about the company’s future, and hinted that the crisis was caused at least partly caused by efforts by the City Council to push them out of Berkeley. 

Isn’t it possible that the major concern with Pacific Steel’s finances involves the eventual completion of the new span of the Bay Bridge? Bridge construction has given Pacific Steel a lot of business, and, once the bridge is finished (whenever that is), Pacific Steel is going to have to work hard to find a project or projects that big. If I were an investor or a client, I might be nervous, too. This, rather than any conflict with the city of Berkeley, may be the major reason for Pacific Steel’s pessimism. 

Dale Jensen 

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ISRAEL-PALESTINE 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I was happy to see the article entitled “Opportunities to Engage With Israel-Palestine” in your Feb. 12 issue, but I was disappointed that it did not highlight one of the most important such opportunities for Berkeley residents this week: a presentation by Joel Kovel scheduled for this Friday, Feb. 15, at 7 p.m. at the Berkeley Fellowship of Unitarian Universalists Hall, 1924 Cedar St. at Bonita, Berkeley. (The event was listed, less prominently in your “Berkeley This Week” calendar—thanks for that.) 

As mentioned in the calendar, Kovel is a longtime activist and a professor at Bard College. But he’s also a former psychiatrist and professor of psychiatry, a former Green Party candidate for the U.S. Senate from New York and for the Green nomination for the presidency, and the author of ten acclaimed books, covering issues from white racism to the environmental crises we face. At the BFUU he will be discussing his latest and most controversial publication, Overcoming Zionism, a profound critique not just of Israel’s policies, but of the moral, philosophical, and cultural foundations they rest on. The book is so powerful that the Zionist lobby launched a campaign to compel the University of Michigan Press to stop distributing it, and they came frighteningly close to succeeding. 

The event will be cosponsored by the International Solidarity Movement and the BFUU Social Justice Committee. Admission is free, but donations will be welcomed. 

Henry Norr 

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GENTRIFICATION 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Thanks to Zelda Bronstein for her Feb. 12 article on Danny Hoch’s Taking Over at Berkeley Rep (“Theater of Gentrification”). Bronstein writes that she was sitting on a $49 seat watching the play about gentrification in Brooklyn. Next door, at Aurora Theatre, I was sitting on a $50 seat watching Satellites, which is another play about gentrification in Brooklyn. 

Bronstein wondered why Hoch didn’t address “...the absence of accountable authority.” Similarly, Aurora’s production concerns itself with the lives of the characters but didn’t address responsibility of governmental authority in gentrification. 

The San Francisco Mime Troupe, which doesn’t charge for their shows, did a lively, politically charged show on gentrification a while back. The two pricey Addison Street shows skirted governmental politics. Does it make you wonder if there’s a connection between the high price of the ticket and what playwrights are willing to risk in the area of assigning public accountability? 

Joe Kempkes 

Oakland