News

Posted Sun., March 9—We were out at Lafayette Reservoir a couple of weeks ago, looking for the bald eagle that wasn’t there. But there was a fair amount of butterfly action: a probable echo blue, some small hyperactive orange jobs, and three or four mourning cloaks, sparring or courting—it’s hard to tell with butterflies. -more-

Oakland joined a fast-growing collaboration of cities, organizations, legislators and citizens on Tuesday looking for political and legal means to force the state to back off from plans for aerial spraying of pesticide over parts of Northern California to eradicate the Light Brown Apple Moth (LBAM). -more-

The draft city Climate Action Plan presented to Berkeley planning commissioners Wednesday night resembles another document in their possession: the proposed new Downtown Area Plan. -more-

Margaret Lowry—removed from her position as Willard Middle School vice principal—was placed on special assignment Tuesday with Berkeley Unified School District’s central staff. -more-

The administration of Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums hit the trifecta on Tuesday, winning City Council passage of two major initiatives and claiming victory in contract arbitration with the powerful Oakland Police Officers Association police union. -more-

While candidates decided whether or not to put their toes in the water of several Oakland City Council and Oakland School Board races, announced candidates in the hotly contested state seats of Senate District 9 and Assembly District 14 continued to raise war chests for the June 3 election. -more-

The Berkeley Zoning Adjustments Board (ZAB) gave nods to three big projects last week, which propose to add a restaurant downtown, build a bio fuels station in South Berkeley and permit a child care center for Pixar employees in West Berkeley. -more-

A San Leandro man was fatally shot Monday night on California Street, just seven blocks north of the scene of another murder eight days earlier. -more-

Registered Nurses at Alta Bates Summit Medical Center have voted to call for a 10-day strike, along with nurses at 10 other Sutter Health facilities. -more-

The San Francisco Bay Guardian won a $15.6 million judgment Wednesday against the San Francisco Weekly and its parent company, the 16-paper Village Voice Media, for predatory business practices—but the Guardian’s not counting the big bills yet, says Executive Editor Tim Redmond. -more-

The menace of layoffs at Bay Area News Group [BANG] newspapers—which now include the Contra Costa Times, the West County Times, the Berkeley Voice, the East Bay Daily News and the Oakland Tribune, among others—has passed for the moment. -more-

A San Francisco jury found the San Francisco Weekly and its corporate parent guilty Wednesday of illegal predatory pricing and awarded us $6.39 million. -more-

The Berkeley Unified School district will be sending out possible layoff notices to its certified staff by March 15 in the face of the proposed $4.6 billion state education budget cut crisis, district officials confirmed Monday. -more-

More than 50 seniors, parents with toddlers and teenage moms crammed inside a Berkeley Unified School District conference room Tuesday to voice their support for the LifeLong Health Center at 2031 Sixth St. -more-

What venerable UC Berkeley tradition, having fallen onto hard times, has its fans hoping that it’s on the verge of a comeback? -more-

Posted Wed., March 5—A San Francisco jury this afternoon found the San Francisco Weekly and its corporate parent guilty of illegal predatory pricing and awarded us $6.39 million. -more-

Posted Wed., March 5—A San Leandro man was fatally shot Monday night on California Street, just seven blocks north from the scene of another murder eight days earlier. -more-

Posted Wed., March 5—On Tuesday, Oakland joined a growing movement to force the state, through political and legal means, to back off from plans for the aerial spraying of a pesticide over parts of Northern California intended to eradicate the Light Brown Apple Moth (LBAM). -more-

Crammed into two standing-room-only buses, planning commissioners, city staff, business owners and interested citizens set out for a five-hour tour of West Berkeley Saturday. -more-

Willard Middle School Vice Principal Margaret Lowry—under investigation by the Berkeley Board of Education for improper conduct involving two special education students—has been removed from her position and will be replaced by Thomas Orput, vice principal of the Berkeley Adult School. -more-

Berkeley’s facing neither layoffs nor program cuts in the next fiscal year, but without taxpayers ponying up to pay for them, there will be no new services, City Manager Phil Kamlarz told the City Council last week. -more-

With the full Oakland City Council scheduled to vote on Mayor Ron Dellums’ police recruitment augmentation plan at its regular 7 p.m. meeting today (Tuesday), maneuvering over the final shape of the plan continued through the weekend. -more-

A diverse representation of Oakland interests came out Monday morning in support of Mayor Ron Dellums’ industrial zoning plan, asking that the City Council make no changes in the proposal. -more-

There is still hope for Berkeley Iceland. And it comes in the form of Tom Killilea and his non-profit Save Berkeley Iceland. -more-

Berkeley’s Fair Campaign Practices Commission decided Thursday that Business for Better Government, the Berkeley Chamber of Commerce Political Action Committee, must file campaign contribution statements for 2004 and 2006 retroactively with the city. -more-

In December 2007, State Superintendent Jack O’Connell came to Oakland to announce that he was turning over two more areas of control to the state-operated Oakland Unified School District: personnel and facilities management. -more-

Tuesday’s City Council meeting, which was mainly devoted to a discussion of the light brown apple moth, ended in a surprise finale, with an 11:30 p.m. vote to extend the meeting until midnight falling short of the needed two-thirds approval. The council had been in session since 5 p.m. -more-

The four dozen protesters picketing the downtown Marine Recruiting Center early Friday morning had a different message than the anti-Iraq War/anti-military recruiting demonstrators seen there almost daily since September. -more-

The Berkeley High School Girls Basketball team won the North Coast Section Division I Championship for the second year in a row on Saturday at the Oracle Arena. -more-

Berkeley’s Planning Commission meets Wednesday night to focus on a single issue, the city’s Draft Climate Action Plan. -more-