Public Comment

EMPTY LOT 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Dorothy Snodgrass would, I hope, be interested to know the history of the “blight” at the corner of Haste and Telegraph; a building which once served hundreds of low-income tenants was deliberately burned, so deliberately that the tenants in the affected wing were warned ahead of time. If the “moderate” majority on the City Council hadn’t prevailed, we would now have a low-income apartment building honoring Bob Sparks. The current council can’t seem to find a way to replicate the 77 units of affordable housing that once stood at that corner, and offered shelter to hundreds by the week or by the day, whatever they could afford. Even the word “affordable,” once a useful way to describe such housing, has been re-defined out of useful existence. Doing nothing about the crucial replacement of such housing is a clear statement of values, for which I hope people hold the council accountable. But we citizens, including Snodgrass, whose letters I thoroughly enjoy, need to learn and remember our local history, or we run the risk of replacing buildings which served a crucial need with market-rate housing that further exacerbates the housing crisis for the poor. 

Carol Denney 

• 

HILDEGARDE FLANNER 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Phil McArdle’s article on Hildegarde Flanner sent me to my bookshelf to make sure I still had At the Gentle Mercy of Plants re-issued in 1986 shortly before Flanner’s death, by John Daniels, (Santa Barbara) publisher of many fine books. 

Immediately after I had enjoyed this book of poems and essays, including “Wildfire: Berkeley 1923,” I read that essay and a couple of poems on one of the regular readings I did at that time on KPFA. I loved the writing, but wasn’t really sure who Hildegarde Flanner was—I tended to confuse her with her sister Janet, who wrote more regularly for the New Yorker. 

A few years later, when the Oakland hills went up in flames, I called Susan Stone at KPFA, suggesting this might be a good time for a repeat reading of this exquisite piece, and brought her my copy, which she read on the air. (The Lake Tahoe fire reminds us again of our recurring catastrophes which Flanner took rather philosophically.) 

Still, I went on not knowing much about Hildegarde Flanner. I learned so much from the way Phil laid out so clearly the main facts about this wonderful writer, who wrote few pages, but made every word count. I was also delighted by the mention of Janet Lewis, another fine writer who made no big splash, but in terms of literature really counted. Maybe a piece on Lewis soon? to reassure older readers that good work is not forgotten, and to introduce young readers to good writers who get drowned out by noisy promotion of their more prolific and flashy inferiors. 

The articles by Phil McArdle are invaluable. Thank you. 

Dorothy Bryant 

• 

DOWNTOWN PLAN 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Tuesday’s article on the draft historic preservation element of the emerging Downtown Plan (“Preservationists Win Round in Downtown Plan Debate”) may have set a new Daily Planet standard for relating the sizzle but ignoring the steak. The real and unreported story—obscured by the detailed recounting of trivial editing disagreements among DAPAC members—is about how much progress has been made in one of Berkeley’s longest-running arguments: the relationship between preservation and development in Berkeley. 

The actual historic preservation draft submitted to the DAPAC makes a solid case for preserving the historic character of our downtown, focusing especially on the “core” frontages on Shattuck from University to Durant as a potential formal historic district. But it is just as vigorous in supporting “sensitive” in-fill development in the downtown—even to the extent of proposing that we actively seek out opportunities to “intensify” some landmark buildings themselves with taller and denser adaptive re-uses. As the report stated, “Downtown should not be frozen in time. . . . We should not only (a) protect Downtown’s historic character but also (b) accommodate a substantial amount of sustainable new development. We can, we should, do both.” 

This basic both-and approach was gratefully embraced in principle by all DAPAC members who spoke—really making for a milestone in the history of the committee, who saw the report’s “generous and inclusive spirit” to be a model worthy of emulation for the entire final DAPAC report. Compared to that headline accomplishment—which the Planet reporter apparently failed to notice—the “disagreements” at the meeting were insignificant. They focused mainly on editorial concerns—for example, not whether “urban design” issues need to be included in the report, but simply if they’re best addressed in a separate chapter rather than in parts of multiple chapters. A few open policy issues do remain, but the principle has been established for maintaining downtown Berkeley as both an historic and a still-evolving district. 

Yes, the “preservationists” won a round—for which the city should be thankful. And they did so by recognizing that responsible preservation not only grudgingly accommodates change, but also embraces it. Thanks to this well-crafted document, more of us should proudly say that we are all preservationists now. 

Alan Tobey 

• 

FACTS AND OPINION 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

What fun it is to mix facts and opinions! 

Writers can make any sort of claim in a letter to the editor without providing a shred of evidence and it will be printed right along side empirically verifiable fact. Example: In his letter to your publication of June 26, Michael P. Hardesty asserts, “The fact is that guns are used in self-defense millions of times every year in the United States.” That was million with an “s” at the end. By pluralizing million we’re talking about at least two of them. That comes out to an average of 5,479 incidents every day in which an American uses a gun in self defense. That’s 228 times an hour. Remember two million would be the minimum so these are conservative figures. 

Two can play at that game Mr. Hardesty. Here’s mine: There are literally billions of unverified claims made within printed letters to editors in America every day. 

I betchya mine’s closer to the truth. 

Richard Hourula 

• 

NET NEUTRALITY 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

As a U.S. citizen, as a student, as a teacher, as a voter, as a person concerned about small, independent, local, community websites: We need to stop the corporate take over of the Internet! This is not an issue in France, Germany, Japan, England, nor in Mexico, Argentina, Nigeria or South Africa. It is exclusive to Corporate America: AT&T, Comcast, etc., who want to charge high rates for website speeds! Right now, under net neutrality, all sites in America get the same speed. The Internet could soon look like expensive cable TV and be denied to millions of students who cannot afford skyrocketing rates. Everyone, stop the corporate takeover of our Internet. The Internet is the new space of enlightenment and global commerce that we need to maintain free, neutral, and independent of corporate greed. Net neutrality is essential to free speech, equal opportunity and economic innovation in America. Since the FCC removed this basic protection in 2005, the top executives of phone and cable companies have stated their intention to become the Internet’s gatekeepers and to discriminate against Web sites that do not pay their added tolls. 

This fundamental change would end the open Internet as we know it. It would damage my ability to connect with others, share information and participate in our 21st century democracy and economy. The FCC must ensure that broadband providers do not block, interfere with or discriminate against any lawful Internet traffic based on its ownership, source or destination. 

Adam Shellhorse 

• 

ELMWOOD DISTRICT 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

I became engrossed in the June 26 Berkeley City Council meeting, especially when residents and the Elmwood Merchants’ Association spoke against the Wright’s Garage project. Although I have commented in your pages about my position on the issue, I feel it is imperative to address one issue that arose during the testimonies, and to suggest an immediate solution to the probable confusion by the city attorney.  

The insistence by the city’s attorney that Kitchen Democracy’s survey was a valid barometer as evidence residents of District 8 support the project needs to be addressed. I appeal to the attorney, and especially to members of the council, to read the survey. It was a broad survey about the Elmwood in general, with no specific information about the Wright’s Garage project. The conclusion arrived at was the position of Councilmember Wozniak, an interpretation of the replies to the survey that is highly suspect. In fact, it appears that the elaborate setup was a scheme to win approval of the project from the start. The attorney’s continued insistence on its validity, even after Councilmember Worthington’s astute rebuff, is both egregious and curious; it begs the question as to whether a conflict of interest issue exists. Even after the merchants’ association and residents of the Elmwood spoke, unequivocally, against the project, the attorney continued to minimize their significant relevance. Perhaps the attorney was not aware that her comments actually misled council members. 

Therefore, it is clear that the council needs to be informed directly by residents of the Elmwood District, not through councilmembers who support the project, and not through an attorney who has difficulty with reality. At least one councilmember relied on the attorney’s answers for insight into the issue. The merchants’ association needs to submit its petition to the council directly, showing that the vast majority of merchants oppose the project. And citizens of the Elmwood need to get up their own petition, perhaps have the signing as an on-going activity through the week and on weekends at the four corners of Ashby and College. Volunteers could create the need for enlightenment.  

In an ideal world, councilmembers would give residents and merchants one more week to secure signatures for their petitions.  

Such overwhelming evidence should convince the council, and inform the city’s attorney, once and for all.  

R.J. Schwendinger 

• 

GUNS 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

In voicing my whole-hearted support of Andrew Ritchie’s demand that the Old West Gun Room in El Cerrito be permanently removed from our community, I run the risk of being labeled as someone with a mind “taken to its reductio ad absurdum.” (In the eloquent words of your reader, Michael P. Hardesty.) So be it, Mike. 

And I must not overlook Deborah Cloudwalker’s letter espousing her novel theory that carrying guns in self-defense is the only thing that can “equalize a small, weak woman against a large strong man.” She forgot to add the words “carrying a gun.” I would remind Deborah that not all small, weak women consider guns an appropriate means of defense—only women with small, weak minds! 

Please continue your campaign to shut down the Old West Gun Room, Mr. Ritchie. You have the support of all those angry and frustrated by the easy accessibility of guns. 

Dorothy Snodgrass 

• 

BE WELL INFORMED 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Whatever your position on gun issues, it is best to be well informed. Those who advocate gun control may not be aware that state and federal law already give everyone the right to use deadly force in defense against “grievous bodily injury.” However in states like ours, as Deborah pointed out, citizens are overwhelmingly prevented from carrying guns in public places, so that they usually cannot use these effective weapons outside their own home. In her editorial, Becky O’Malley argues that it could be dangerous if one reacts too quickly to perceived assault. Very true, and that is why, in every state where individuals are allowed to carry concealed weapons, they must go through a rigorous training program and obtain a permit to do so. Those who own and carry guns usually have studied the gun laws quite thoroughly, and they realize, as they are taught in concealed weapons classes as well as classes on combat use of handguns, that to make a mistake and squeeze the trigger too easily is to end up charged with murder. It is an extremely serious thing to use a gun in self-defense, something that should only be done “in the gravest extreme,” to quote the title of one book on the subject. As we have found in the many places where carrying a concealed gun is more readily permitted than here (and by the way, it is permitted here, but not very readily), citizens trained to carry guns can actually be trusted to do so.  

Finally, Becky misses the point that I believe Deborah was making it isn’t the carrying and use of guns for self-defense that deters criminals. Rather it is the fear of armed citizens that deters criminals. If laws provided everyone the right to carry guns in the streets, and in Oakland and Berkeley not a single citizen chose to enact that right, violent crime would still drop steeply, simply because of the fear that had now been introduced in criminal’s minds, “the person I hit on might have the means to kill me." That criminals tend to pick on those who look more vulnerable, demonstrates that they look to avoid danger to themselves in their commission of crime. Doubt it? Talk to criminals.  

To those who use the phrase “gun nut,” I’d suggest you meet some of those you caricature but don’t know. Go to a shooting range or gun shop and talk to people. Go to rural areas and meet those who’ve grown up with hunting and guns. Find out that some of those who own guns are doctors, social workers, schoolteachers, psychologists, nannies, dog walkers, and women who’ve been assaulted or raped. You’re free to form your own position on guns, but be well informed.  

David Knauer 

Oakland 

• 

SUMMER IN SOUTH BERKELEY 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Around 11 a.m. this morning I received a call from a neighbor, alerting me that there had been a shooting event shortly before, on the 1600 block of Russell Street. It sounded like they came from around the parking lot of an apartment complex. I walked over to the Rosewood Apartments, the parking lot for which is directly west of the structure, and partially wraps around. There is a flight of stairs leading up to the first floor, with a wood fence behind it. There I counted three fresh bullet holes, lightly circled in crayon. There were two other, larger bullet holes in the fence, which appeared to be older. The cut-through left by those rounds had been painted over. Beyond the Rosewood parking lot is another apartment building and its backyard. There is a chain-link fence at the back, overlooking Lenora Moore’s residence of 1610 Oregon St. 

I took photos of the damaged wood fence, and a woman came up the entrance and greeted me. I asked her if she was the press, since she carried a substantial camera and what looked like a bag for gear. She answered “No, I’m a nurse. Are you Mary Lou?” That made it seem that she was entering an apartment to see to a tenant. I asked her if anyone was injured. She said no, she was really just there in more of a social worker capacity. So an apartment was shot into, it seemed. 

The backyard of the next-door apartment building was clear. No one hanging out; no bullet casings, had any been left from that location. I heard that shots were fired into a separate apartment residence around the 1614 Oregon address. It is at the back of the property. Bullets came through the walls of the bathroom and lodged in the walls of the closet. The family who lives there was home at the time, but no one was in the bathroom. Otherwise, I am told they could easily have been killed. Someone connected with the property told me that rounds retrieved were heavy-duty, jacketed bullets that are armor-piercing. Great. 

A sole officer was sitting in a Crime Scene BPD van out in front of 1612 Oregon. Officer (Detective?) Vargas told me that no one had been injured, no one apprehended. No one was willing to admit that they had seen anything. 

I guess that makes it now, officially, summer. 

Sam Herbert 

• 

BUS RAPID TRANSIT 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

Roy Nakadegawa (letters, June 26) missed the whole point of my June 22 commentary about AC Transit’s misnamed Bus “Rapid” Transit (BRT) lane grab: 

AC Transit has already captured most of the speed enhancements realistically available to buses in the Telegraph Ave./BART corridor. Its new 1/1R “Rapid Bus” route, inaugurated on June 24, alternates fast express buses with local buses. 

It also allows buses to prolong green lights until they clear intersections. As with San Pablo Avenue’s successful 72/72R route, these benefits come with no negative impacts. 

But building the whole BRT package—which means seizing two lanes of Telegraph for bus-only use—would add only tiny further speed benefits. And those would be offset by larger detriments: snarling Telegraph’s remaining traffic, and diverting through-traffic into neighborhoods. 

If you want a bus faster than Rapid Bus, just add simple “proof-of-payment” boarding: Let riders buy tickets from retailers, board quickly, and cancel their own tickets onboard. No bus-only lanes, “stations,” or trouble-prone ticket vending machines (like BART’s) required. 

BRT apologists keep defending this $400 million boondoggle with theoretical, or system-wide, claims that are irrelevant to Berkeley. And indeed, while BRT is great technology where properly sited, there’s no defense for AC Transit’s proposed route. 

It would hug the BART tracks for its entire length. That’s idiotically redundant route planning, which would be allowed in no other city. 

Roy claims time savings that AC Transit has never predicted. They estimate more like five minutes on a long trip. 

And he cites theoretical figures about “mass transit” (presumably including electrified rail) producing less pollution and CO2 “per passenger mile” (an important detail) than cars. Yet as even he concedes, AC Transit’s own environmental study shows negligible energy or pollution savings from this project. 

Why? Because buses only save energy and pollution when they’re full. On Telegraph, AC Transit is evidently proposing to run mostly-empty buses most of the day, to collect federal and regional subsidies. 

That’s an absurd Rube Goldberg scheme that’s neutral for the environment, only marginally better for transit riders, bad for South Berkeley, and awful for taxpayers. Consider the real benefits that $400 million could buy on a better-patronized route, and it’s bad for everyone. 

Let this wasteful proposed Emperor’s New Bus stop here. 

Michael Katz 

• 

TOO EXPENSIVE 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

A cost-benefit analysis suggests that the AC Transit Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) proposal is far too expensive for the modest gains in travel time and passenger increase. 

AC Transit estimates that the total cost for Bus Rapid Transit will be between $310 million and $400 million. For this amount of money, we would see: 

• A reduction in peak-period travel time from downtown Oakland to downtown Berkeley of 5 to 7 minutes (from 26 minutes without BRT to 19 to 21 minutes with BRT). 

• A reduction in peak-period travel time from downtown Oakland to downtown San Leandro of 6 to 10 minutes (from 36 minutes without BRT to 26 to 30 minutes with BRT). 

In his recent letter to the Daily Planet arguing in favor of BRT, Roy Nakadegawa unfortunately compared the current travel times between the points listed above with the estimated travel times under BRT. It is more useful—and more accurate—to use the comparison times that AC Transit has provided with and without BRT on its website (as I’ve done above) because those times include the enhancements, such as traffic signal manipulation and fewer stops, that will be in place even if the full BRT project is not implemented.  

AC Transit also estimates that over an 18-year period to the year 2025, BRT would increase the average weekday riders by 12,000 to 21,180 passengers (from 28,050 riders without BRT to between 40,050 and 49,230 passengers with BRT).  

These seem like very modest gains for so much money—coupled with the extraordinary inconveniences and traffic delays caused by just a single lane in each direction for autos on Telegraph, the heavy increase of traffic likely on neighborhood streets, the loss of parking spaces on Telegraph, and what seems to be almost no net reduction in greenhouse gas emissions.  

In addition, the University of California will open this fall a new 1,000 car parking facility on College Avenue between Channing Way and Haste that will feed huge numbers on cars onto College, which is already a severe bottleneck during rush hours, and onto Telegraph with its proposed single-lane-in-each-direction for cars. 

The costs of BRT clearly seem to outweigh its limited advantages. 

Bob Laird 

• 

LONELIER THAN EVER 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

My childhood was spent on a dairy farm in Los Angeles County. Telephones were still luxuries. It was a big deal when we got a four-party line (yes! four households shared the same line). Phone bandwidth was expensive. Only the wealthy had private lines. On Sundays friends and neighbors would drop in on each other unannounced. In those days, existence had a more tangible personal feel to it. 

Phones became cheap; and the Internet made communication faster and even cheaper. Today we send messages everywhere on Earth at a moment’s notice. But, are we closer now than the neighbors who knocked at each other’s doors on Sunday for a visit? Are we getting more “free time” by flooding each other with more e-mail and cell phone messages? I don’t think so. In fact, I suspect that we are now lonelier and more confused. We think we’re more connected—but spend more time skimming massive quantities of messages and images coming to our computers screens, cell phones, iPod headsets, televisions, and radios everywhere. Less and less time do we spend face-to-face with each other. 

Americ Azevedo 

• 

PREJUDICE 

Editors, Daily Planet: 

An anti-immigration rally took place in Jackson, Miss. to castigate Trent Lott for his moderate stance on the immigration debate. It seems the only people not assimilating in the current debate are the “whites only” crowd. How many Mexicans, blacks, Latinos and tolerant whites do you think were at this Mississippi social? The current debate is not about illegal immigrants, amnesty and speaking English, it is about prejudice and discrimination. 

Why are Americans so blind to this fact and why do they so easily feed into the hatred of a vocal and ignorant fringe element of society?  

Is today’s immigration frenzy any different than the racial unrest of the ’50s and early ’60s, except in that brown skin has been substituted for black skin. The ugly scourge of racism is still very much alive and well in America.  

Ron Lowe 

Grass Valley