The city of Berkeley will consider more stringent requirements for building and inspecting outdoor balconies after finding severe dry rot in the joists of a balcony that collapsed last week, killing six people and injuring seven others, city officials announced today. -more-

A week after the tragic balcony collapse at 2020 Kittredge, City of Berkeley staff have concluded their analysis of the incident. Among other observations, City inspectors noted that the deck joist ends protruding from the exterior wall appeared to be severely dry rotted. -more-

I understand that in spite of repeated appeals to you to cancel consideration of certifying the FEI R for 2211 Harold Way, the item remains on your agenda with the notation that it is to be discussed no earlier than 8:00 pm on June 25, 2015. I personally know how time consuming and difficult your job is, as I have walked in your shoes back when the Zoning Adjustments Board was called the Board of Adjustments. I thank you for your willingness to do it. -more-

I am writing to tell you of my strenuous objection to the scheduling of a Council meeting on June 25 to consider significant community benefits that will be required of Downtown building projects over 75 feet. One of those buildings, 2211 Harold Way is not only the largest single building proposed to be constructed in Berkeley, it would be the tallest building (194 feet) in our Downtown, and, as such, has generated considerable interest, to say the least. As you know, 2211 Harold Way is currently under active consideration by both the Zoning Adjustments Board and Landmarks Preservation Commission. -more-

-more-

The Berkeley Neighborhoods Council (BNC), like people everywhere, is deeply concerned about the balcony collapse that occurred on June 16 at 2020 Kittredge Street. Our City must immediately address the problems that have been revealed regarding the safety of balconies, even in fairly recently constructed buildings, whether rental or for sale. Prevention of the re-occurrence of such problems must become a priority for Berkeley. It is an act of respect toward those who lost their lives and their grieving families. -more-

He's been the developers' guy all the way, all along, he says.

Berkeley Council exempts Rhoades project from new community benefits formula

As soon as Pope Francis issued his Encyclical Letter on Climate Change, Republicans belittled it. Catholic presidential candidate Jeb Bush suggested the Pope was out of line: “I think religion ought to be about making us better as people, less about things [that] end up getting into the political realm.” It’s classic GOP position: they want Americans to go to church but believe US politics has nothing to do with Christian morality. -more-

Closing out their 3-week Beethoven festival, San Francisco Symphony gave the first of three concert performances of Beethoven’s only opera, Fidelio, on Thursday evening, June 25, at Davies Hall. With Music Director Michael Tilson Thomas leading the orchestra, this Fidelio featured Swedish soprano Nina Stemme as Leonore, the wife who, disguised as a young man (named Fidelio) saves the life of her unjustly imprisoned husband, Florestan. This opera caused Beethoven much labor. He first presented a Fidelio in three acts in 1805, then he offered a much revised two act version under the title Leonore in 1806, and revised it yet again before eventually settling on a final two act version (once more as Fidelio) in 1814. -more-

On Saturday, June 20, San Francisco Symphony recreated the famous marathon concert given by Beethoven on December 22, 1808, at Vienna’s Theater-an-der-Wien. In this Akademie, or public as opposed to courtly concert, which lasted well over four hours, Beethoven presented the first performances of his 5^th and 6^th Symphonies, his 4^th Piano Concerto, his Fantasy for Piano (Opus 77), and his Choral Fantasy (Opus 80), as well as his previously performed concert aria “Ah! perfido,” plus three movements from his already ill-received C major Mass. As Jacob Reichardt wrote in a letter, “There we sat from 6:30 till 10:30 in the most bitter cold, and found by experience that one might have too much of a good thing.” -more-

On Saturday evening June 13, San Francisco Opera presented the World Première of a new opera commissioned by General Director David Gockley – Italian composer Marco Tutino’s La Ciociara (Two Women). Based on the 1958 novel of the same title by Alberto Moravia, this opera, with a libretto by Luca Rossi, Marco Tutino, and Fabio Ceresa, recounts the trials and tribulations of a widowed World War II mother and her teenage daughter who flee Rome because of allied bom-bardments but find no haven from the war in the mountain villages of the region known as La Ciociara. From this same novel a 1960 film starring Sophia Loren was directed by Vittorio De Sica with a screenplay by Cesare Zavattini. (Sophia Loren won the Academy’s Best Actress Award in 1962 for her performance in the film known in English as Two Women, thereby becoming the first artist to win an American Oscar for a foreign-language film.) -more-