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As one might suspect, members of the liberal-progressive council faction took issue with some of the statements Mayor Shirley Dean made in her State of the City address. 

“She’s trying to take credit for 

accomplishments that belong to the whole council,” said Councilmember Dona Spring. “She talked about schools. The whole council is trying to work cooperatively with the schools.” 

Spring took issue with Dean’s proposal for the city to help the schools maintain their property. 

“It’s impractical. We don’t have the money to do that,” she said. “We can’t even take care of our parks.” 

Spring disagreed with Dean’s proposal to pass apartment-retrofitting costs through to tenants. 

“Property owners are reaping profits from vacancy decontrol,” she said. “The profits should go into (retrofitting).” 

The Black Repertory Theater should not be held up as a possible anchor for the South Berkeley business community, Spring said, pointing to management problems at the Black Rep as well as criticisms of the theater for not including the community on its board of directors. 

The councilmember countered Dean’s assertion that Berkeley is perceived as anti-business. 

“That’s a convenient stereotype,” Spring said. “We’ve bent over backwards for the Bayer Corporation and Urban Ore and we’ve given money to downtown year after year.” 

Councilmember Kriss Worthington, also a member of the liberal-progressive faction, took issue with Dean’s attack on council opposition to the ferry network. He underscored that the council majority opposed the network, which would take funds from other transportation projects, but not ferries in general. 

Spring noted that there were things in the mayor’s talk that she appreciated. 

“I liked her inspirational message,” she said, “trying to get people to strive for the highest goal and her talk about teamwork. It was very positive.”