Public Comment

With City Council on winter recess and most of the meetings for the year over, I turned on the audiobook version of McKay Coppins’ book Romney: A Reckoning and finished it in 2 ½ days while I put off writing and cleaned the house; which tells you where housing cleaning fell during the months of attending City meetings and writing about them. 

No matter how we view Romney the closing comments from the author center on what I so often consider when I observe and write about our local politics and elected officials. What drives their actions, and where do their actions fit with what they professed to stand for when we voted for them? 

From McCay Coppins: 

“Romney tells me he has been thinking about a question I asked when we first started meeting, I wanted to know if he thought there were any lessons in his story that future political leaders might take…he knows no one emerges from politics free of regret. These days when he speaks to student groups his frequent piece of advice is to not sacrifice their integrity at the altar of ambition. It’s not worth it he tells them. Believe me. 

I once asked him if he would have taken the same lonely principled vote to convict Trump if he had been put in the same position thirty years earlier. He answered, I don’t know the answer to that. I think I recognize now my capacity to rationalize decisions that are in my self-interest and I don’t know that I recognized that to the same degree back then. 

At a moment when courage is in vanishingly short supply in politics it is worth considering what made Romney finally choose to do the right thing instead of the convenient one and whether the phenomenon can be replicated. Romney tells me he thinks the key is to get political leaders to think more deeply and more often about how they’ll be remembered when they are gone. You can rationalize anything when the only thought is how it will play in the next election…” 

As of December 16, Mayor Arreguin and four Berkeley City Councilmembers are running for something. The council terms of Terry Taplin, Ben Bartlett, Sophie Hahn and Susan Wengraf all expire November 30, 2024. Wengraf announced she is retiring. Hahn is running for mayor as are Harrison and Robinson. Bartlett is running for Alameda County Supervisor against eight others. If Bartlett doesn’t make the top two in the primary, he can run to retain his council seat in November. The closing date to declare being a candidate for mayor or city council is August 9, 2023. Arreguin is running for State Senate against four others. Ernesto Falcon dropped out four days ago. 

By the end of Sunday, December 10, 2023, Councilmembers Bartlett, Robinson and Taplin had backpedaled and withdrawn their resolutions from December 7. Bartlett and Robinson called for a ceasefire and Taplin called for an end to hostilities in the Hamas – Israel war. Hahn had sent her email that none of these resolutions “…will ever - appear on a Council Agenda prior to Tuesday’s meeting…I am calling on my Council colleagues to stand firm and refuse to place any resolutions on our Agenda as Urgency Items…” and then called for us to write emails and attend the December 12th council meeting to oppose a resolution. 

While I’ve been staring at this Diary, the number of Palestinian journalists and media workers killed in the Hamas - Israel war has grown to 97.  

I’ve been into records online reading through letters sent to council on the Hamas – Israel war. The emails sent to take no action on a ceasefire resolution far outnumber the emails for a ceasefire resolution. It is the opposite in the people showing up to the council meetings. The vocal in-person attendees support a ceasefire resolution in overwhelming numbers. 

I’ve been thinking about the City of Berkeley’s Land Acknowledgement Statement: 

The City of Berkeley recognizes that the community we live in was built on the territory of xučyun (Huchiun (Hooch-yoon)), the ancestral and unceded land of the Chochenyo (Cho-chen-yo)-speaking Ohlone (Oh-low-nee) people, the ancestors and descendants of the sovereign Verona Band of Alameda County. This land was and continues to be of great importance to all of the Ohlone Tribes and descendants of the Verona Band. As we begin our meeting tonight, we acknowledge and honor the original inhabitants of Berkeley, the documented 5,000-year history of a vibrant community at the West Berkeley Shellmound, and the Ohlone people who continue to reside in the East Bay. We recognize that Berkeley’s residents have and continue to benefit from the use and occupation of this unceded stolen land since the City of Berkeley’s incorporation in 1878. As stewards of the laws regulating the City of Berkeley, it is not only vital that we recognize the history of this land, but also recognize that the Ohlone people are present members of Berkeley and other East Bay communities today. The City of Berkeley will continue to build relationships with the Lisjan Tribe and to create meaningful actions that uphold the intention of this land acknowledgement. 

Would we see Gaza and the Palestinians differently if “the City of Berkeley” was replaced in that Land Acknowledgement Statement with ‘Israel’ and the inhabitants of the land was replaced with Palestinians? That is the Nakba, the catastrophe, the 750,000 Palestinians removed from their homes, their land to create the nation of Israel in 1948. 

History gets complicated overridden with myths, religious beliefs, guilt and fear over the Holocaust, what is erased and revised, and power. History did not start with the horror of October 7, 2023. 

What is not complicated is that all the killing must stop. The genocide must stop. The ethnic cleansing must stop. The liquidation of Gaza must stop. The murder of Palestinians in the West Bank must stop. The killing of Israelis must stop. 

It wasn’t the deaths of over 20,000 Palestinians, of whom more than 7000 were children, that brought Germany and the UK to change their minds to call for a sustainable ceasefire, it was the IDF (Israel Defense Force) shooting and killing on Friday three shirtless unarmed October 7 hostages bearing a white makeshift flag calling in Hebrew for help. 

Masha Gessen still received the literary Hannah Arendt Prize in Germany, but her comparison of Gaza to the Warsaw Ghetto in her article in the New Yorker “In the Shadow of the Holocaust” was viewed as so controversial in Germany that two sponsors withdrew their support of the large ceremony. The literary prize was awarded at a private dinner ceremony as possible venues slipped away. 

Gessen’s article is long and at this time when feelings are so hot over the Hamas - Israel war, it should be at the top of your reading list. https://www.newyorker.com/news/the-weekend-essay/in-the-shadow-of-the-holocaust 

On December 5, 2023 The House of Representatives passed a resolution declaring “anti-Zionism is antisemitism” in a vote of 311 to 14 with 92 Democrats voting present and 95 supporting it. 

The Land Acknowledgement is the work of Councilmember Sophie Hahn. 

The recitation of the Land Acknowledgement has turned into a ritual that carries little with it. There might eventually be a Turtle Island Monument placed on top of the fountain in Civic Center Park. 

When I suggested at a meeting of the Community for a Cultural Civic Center (the group coordinated by John Caner, on restoring the Maudelle Shirek and Veterans Buildings and revitalizing the Civic Center Park) that the Lisjan should have space in the Maudelle Shirek Building that suggestion fell flat. 

I chose to stay home and sign in on Zoom for the Tuesday City Council double header, expecting a late night. The special meeting on the Objective Design Standards for the North Berkeley BART Housing project started at 3 pm followed by the regular meeting at 6 pm with the Annual Appropriations Ordinance (AAO#1 aka the first midyear budget adjustment). 

Of the twenty speakers on non-agenda items at the regular meeting nineteen addressed the Hamas - Israel war. One asked for a dialogue, five opposed a resolution and thirteen asked for a ceasefire. 

In a change from previous meetings, Arreguin allowed forty-five minutes for public comment by in-person attendees on the consent calendar. All but three speakers wrapped their call for a ceasefire into items on the consent calendar (the City Clerk counted 36 commenters). The forty-five minutes ended with a roll call vote on the consent calendar and adjourned at 7:39 pm. The Annual Appropriations Ordinance had been moved to consent without discussion. The City Manager withdrew the item on Berkeley High School staff parking. 

At the 3 pm meeting on the North Berkeley BART Housing project the neighbors requested that Council approve the original objective design standards. They used the word betrayal over and over in describing what happened after all the community meetings including the September 11 open house and what was now before Council for the final vote. There were other speakers who asked council to approve the standards as proposed by staff and the Planning Commission. 

When it comes to the large housing projects the divide is stark between the YIMBYs and like groups that push for maximum density everywhere and neighbors next door to the large projects who want projects which blend into the neighborhood, not towers. 

On September 11, 2023, I attended the presentation and open house with City staff and the project developers North Berkeley Housing Partners on the proposed design for the North Berkeley BART Housing project. There were some people who were unhappy, but I thought the plan looked terrific especially after seeing so many projects at the Design Review Committee which are designed for students with bedrooms without windows. 

The pictures showed an open parklike space in the center, setbacks from the sidewalk for plants and trees, major breaks in the long facades giving the units light and air plus a more pleasing blending into the setting of surrounding single family predominately one-story homes. 

By October 18, when the objective design standards came to the Planning Commission, North Berkeley Housing Partners had a turn-around, with the support of the commission for big boxy buildings with smaller setbacks from the sidewalk and maximizing density. 

Commissioner Alfred Twu suggested the visual breaks through ornamentation. That was set at 5% of the wall on 200 linear feet. The major breaks that guaranteed lots of natural light into living spaces were gone. 

Whatever is built at the North Berkeley BART site will be here for decades. Unlike so many projects, the housing at the BART stations is on public land. The developer is not buying the land. 

Harrison and Hahn made a substitute motion to bring back these separations at least in the market- rate buildings. Wengraf joined. Wengraf’s concern was the setback, the distance from the sidewalk to the ground floor units. They lost. The vote to accept the Planning Department / Planning Commission recommendation with the big boxy buildings with reduced setbacks for maximum density won in an eight to one vote. Harrison abstained. 

Berkeley is on a building binge. I often wonder who is going to occupy all these buildings. California’s population is in decline and given the current stand on immigration it is likely to stay that way. 

Berkeley’s population is bolstered by the ever-increasing UC Berkeley student body. And the elected are pinning their hopes on expansion in West Berkeley into research and development. Those jobs are seen as the kind of work that can’t be done remotely. 

Monday morning was double booked with the Budget and Finance Committee finalizing the Annual Appropriations Ordinance (AAO#1 aka mid-year budget adjustment) and the Health, Life, Enrichment, Equity & Community Committee meeting on two different proposals for the Chess Club. 

Arreguin’s proposal for the AAO#1 looked reasonable, the best outcome given the limitations. There were a few things added, Harrison’s request for $6,000 for mentoring Berkeley youth and violence prevention, Harrison’s request for $450,000 of the TNC tax for traffic calming, $50,000 for a prevailing wage study for the Southside and an increase from $2 million to $3 million for COVID hero pay for City staff working through the pandemic. Harrison and Arreguin approved the amended AAO#1. Kesarwani abstained. 

The Health, Life Enrichment Committee with members Hahn as chair, Humbert and Bartlett blended the two proposals for the Chess Club. Humbert stated he was opposed to any fee reduction and opposed directing the City Manager to do anything. Hahn had to explain to Humbert the difference and use of “refer” and “direct” in the committee recommendation and why a permanent installation was less work and less expensive for the City. 

The recommendation which in the end was approved by all three committee members included a referral for citywide chess and game facilities program, to explore the development of a parklet at or near the Telegraph and Haste intersection and to direct the City Manager to pause additional fees and to achieve an agreement on maintenance and improvements at 2454 Telegraph in exchange for a reduction/waiver of accumulated fees. The fees (penalties) are somewhere between $70,000 and $100,000 for the Chess Club using the open plaza in front of the former Cody’s books to gather to play chess. 

The Telegraph Triangle at the intersection of Dwight and Telegraph keeps coming up in conversations as an alternative site. The Chess Club opposes that site referencing the amount of traffic. 

I took a look at the Telegraph/Dwight Triangle. It was larger than I remembered it, but the thought of sitting there for a couple of hours while traffic whizzes by is definitely very unappealing. Thankfully, it was not listed in the recommendation. 

The Zoning Adjustment Board was the last City meeting of the week on my schedule. I didn’t record what time it ended, but I think it might have been around 7:30 pm, certainly well before 8 pm. I was attending the Citizens for East Shore Parks where I am a board member and glanced at the captions often enough to see that three lone projects all passed on consent. 

The 1287 Gilman to establish a wine bar passed with a continuation to date uncertain, 2573 Shattuck will become a veterinary clinic and 2800 MLK Jr Way will be converted into a duplex. 

2800 MLK Jr Way is not new construction as it is an addition to an existing single-family home and is therefore not subject to the Natural Gas Ban. This is so unfortunate. The project essentially guts the existing family home to turn it into a duplex. It is the perfect time to convert it to 100% electric.  

At the last Berkeley Neighborhoods Council (BNC) we heard the presentation on the Building Emissions Saving Ordinance (BESO) from City staff. I am always frustrated after sitting through these presentations. They never seem to go any further than flowery talk. I’ve heard way too many times how the BESO surveys/assessments at time of sale are going to improve and then the next time it is the same story. 

That was followed with an introduction to the San Pablo Avenue Specific Plan. When someone asked the presenter from the City how this plan fit with San Pablo as an evacuation route, he responded back that San Pablo wasn’t a fire zone so therefore San Pablo wasn’t an evacuation route. 

City staff would do a lot better if they came to BNC better informed. San Pablo is an evacuation and emergency access route plainly visible on the Berkeley City map, which several members posted in the chat. 

Enough for this sitting. There will be more next time, but it might not appear until after the holidays.