News

Grant Denied, Ashby BART Plan On Hold

By Richard Brenneman
Friday June 02, 2006
Caltrans last week denied the city of Berkeley’s request for a $120,000 grant to fund a transportation plan to be used in shaping the development of a project that would feature about 300 units of housing over commercial space and parking at the Ashby Bart Station. -more-

Developer Challenges Albany Shore Petition

By Richard Brenneman
Friday June 02, 2006
Stop that initiative or we’ll sue, an attorney for Golden Gate Fields has warned Albany officials. Citizens for the Albany Shoreline (CAS) filed the initiative in question, an attempt to stop shoreline development, with Albany City Clerk Jacqueline Bucholz on May 16. -more-

Council OKs Creek Task Force Recommendations

By Judith Scherr
Friday June 02, 2006
The City Council on Tuesday approved the Creek Task Force (CTF) recommendations that ease current building restrictions, but still would require various permits and environmental analyses to build or remodel near creeks. -more-

Many Fail Exit Exam As Graduation Nears

By Suzanne La Barre
Friday June 02, 2006
Graduation season is fast approaching, but more than 40,000 students statewide, including about 200 in Berkeley, still have not passed the high school exit exam. -more-

Standoff at Nexus Institute Continues, Artists Staying Put

By Richard Brenneman
Friday June 02, 2006
Members of the Nexus Institute were still occupying their rented West Berkeley home Thursday, the day after the deadline had passed for them to leave. -more-

Judge Orders DOD to Expedite ACLU Records Request

By Judith Scherr
Friday June 02, 2006
A federal court judge last week ordered the Department of Defense to expedite a Freedom of Information request made by the ACLU of Northern California on behalf of UC Berkeley Stop the War Coalition and UC Santa Cruz Students Against the War. -more-

DAPAC-LPC Discuss Downtown Architecture

By Suzanne La Barre
Friday June 02, 2006
The Downtown Area Plan Advisory Committee (DAPAC) and the Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) held a joint meeting Wednesday, and the topic du jour was architectural preservation. -more-

Appeal Filed Against Pacific Steel Odor Reduction Permit

By Suzanne La Barre
Friday June 02, 2006
L. A. Wood has filed an appeal to the Zoning Adjustments Board’s (ZAB) decision to modify a use permit that allows Pacific Steel Casting to construct odor pollution reducing facilities. -more-

Hancock’s Opt-Out Recruitment Bill Moves to State Senate

By J. Douglas Allen-Taylor
Friday June 02, 2006
The “opt-out” notification high school military recruiter bill co-sponsored by Bay Area Assemblymembers Loni Hancock and Sally Lieber has moved on to the California State Senate, but solid Republican opposition and lack of full Democratic support mean that the bill continues to have little chance of surviving a possible gubernatorial veto. -more-

Two Men Injured in South Berkeley Drive-by Shooting

By Richard Brenneman
Friday June 02, 2006
Two self-professed gang members were wounded in a drive-by shooting in South Berkeley Monday night—and neither one is talking to police. -more-

Supervisors to Vote on Voting Machine Contract

By J. Douglas Allen-Taylor
Friday June 02, 2006
With Alameda County Supervisors coming down to the wire on a decision for the purchase of a permanent new voting system, local voting activists are hoping for what they call an “interim solution” that will not commit the county past the November elections. -more-

Green Albany Project Celebrates Program’s First Anniversary

By Riya Bhattacharjee
Friday June 02, 2006
Officials from Alameda County, the Albany Chamber of Commerce as well as Albany residents and small businesses got together at the Albany City Hall Tuesday to talk trash. -more-

Summer Activities for Teens

By Elizabeth Hopper
Friday June 02, 2006
Even though the end of the school year is approaching, it’s not too late for local teenagers to find summer activities. -more-

BOCA Helps Immigrants, Others Find a Voice

By Judith Scherr
Friday June 02, 2006
“People think Berkeley is different, that we don’t have undocumented people,” says Belen Pulido-Martinez, organizer with BOCA, Berkeley Organizing Congregations for Action, a nonprofit dedicated to giving voice to people from communities with little power. -more-

Cell Phone Towers Rejected in Residential Area

By Suzanne La Barre
Friday June 02, 2006
About a dozen Berkeley residents filed into Council Chambers last Thursday to urge the Zoning Adjustments Board (ZAB) to reject a proposal for new wireless facilities at a local Catholic church. The board took heed. -more-

Police Blotter

By Richard Brenneman
Friday June 02, 2006
Stuck up -more-

Bancroft Avenue Waterworks A Berkeley garbage truck hit a fire hydrant on Bancroft Avenue below Dana Steet around 7 a.m. Tuesday creating a huge geyser of water that took about 20 minutes to contain. Photograph by Hank Chapot.
Bancroft Avenue Waterworks A Berkeley garbage truck hit a fire hydrant on Bancroft Avenue below Dana Steet around 7 a.m. Tuesday creating a huge geyser of water that took about 20 minutes to contain. Photograph by Hank Chapot.

Editorials

Editorial: Making the Best of a Hard Choice

By Becky O’Malley
Friday June 02, 2006
If you’ve come to this space looking for a recommendation card to take with you to the polls, you’ve come to the wrong place. We—the Publisher and I—still haven’t made up our minds which candidate for governor to choose. Frankly, they both look somewhat unattractive at this point. -more-

Reader Commentaries

Letters to the Editor

Friday June 02, 2006

Commentary: Saving Telegraph: Three Plans Leave Neighbors Outside the Loop

By Sharon Hudson
Friday June 02, 2006
In the wake of the news of the upcoming closing of Cody’s bookstore, people are acting like something that has been happening for over twenty years is suddenly a “crisis.” This is not necessarily good. As useful as “crises” are in finally focusing attention on their causes, it is equally important to focus on controlling their consequences. Crises always energize those with ideological or self-interested agendas, which they advance as panaceas for the problem at hand. -more-

Commentary: Notes on What Telegraph Needs from An Avenue Merchant

By Al Geyer
Friday June 02, 2006
Here are some thoughts on each of the nine items that were part of the Telegraph Avenue assistance package passed on May 23 by the Berkeley City Council: -more-

Commentary: Ron Dellums: The Practical Visionary

By Paul Rockwell
Friday June 02, 2006
Ron Dellums is running for mayor of Oakland at a time when the people of Oakland are desperate for a change in leadership. The Board of Education has lost control of its own schools,the education of our own children. Under its current president, Ignacio De La Fuente, the City Council cannot even protect the safety of its own citizens. The security of life and limb is the first test of government, and De La Fuente has failed the test. He talks tough, he postures. But Oakland now has one of the highest murder rates of any city in the U.S., triple the national average. Our city is the crime capital of California, and entire sections of Oakland live in fear. Forty-six residents have been murdered in three months. -more-

Columnists

Column: The View From Here: The Roots of a Problem: Looking at Oregon Street

By P.M. Price
Friday June 02, 2006
“Spell it!” demanded the young redhead, eyes glaring, hands on narrow hips. -more-

Column: Undercurrents: Two More Innocent Bystanders Die in High Speed Chase

By J. Douglas Allen-Taylor
Friday June 02, 2006
We didn’t do anything about it when it happened the first time and so, perhaps, that is why it has happened again . . . a high-speed police chase, supposedly from an East Oakland “sideshow,” ending in the death of innocent bystanders. Saturday night, it happened on 90th and MacArthur Boulevard. -more-

Column: The Public Eye: Enemy of the People: Al Gore or George Bush?

By Bob Burnett
Friday June 02, 2006
It’s unlikely that the producers of the documentary An Inconvenient Truth thought that they were producing a sequel to Henrik Ibsen’s An Enemy of the People. But it’s impossible to see this 96-minute film about Al Gore’s single-handed fight to educate America about the dangers of global climate change and not wonder how different things would be if he had won in 2000. -more-

About the House: On the Case of House Mold

By Matt Cantor
Friday June 02, 2006
It never ceases to amaze me what madness the media and the legal community have created out of a little thing like mold. -more-

Garden Variety: The Place to Look for Unusual Garden Tools

By Ron Sullivan
Friday June 02, 2006
One of my favorite places to look for—or just look at—esoteric, obscure, clever, or kinky garden tools is Hida Japanese Tools on San Pablo, across from REI and a few doors down from Ashkenaz. -more-

Arts & Entertainment

Arts Calendar

Friday June 02, 2006
FRIDAY, JUNE 2 -more-

World Music Festival This Weekend Along Telegraph

By Ken Bullock, Special to the Planet
Friday June 02, 2006
The Berkeley World Music Weekend is this weekend, Sat. and Sun., from noon-9 p.m., on Telegraph Avenue from Bancroft Way to Parker St., with over two dozen performances, all free. -more-

Looking Inside Barbara Cushman’s World of Collage

By Robert McDonald, Special to the Planet
Friday June 02, 2006
Barbara Cushman is an artist to the very tips of her fingers. The form of her artistry has varied widely and wildly, ranging from cuisine and salad dressing to pottery, jewelry and collage. The key to her successes, however, has always been inventiveness. Having envisioned what she wants to do, she finds a way to achieve it. “Experience has always been my teacher,” she says. As much could be said of her life. -more-

Events Calendar

Berkeley This Week

Friday June 02, 2006