The big green buses that travel on San Pablo Avenue from downtown Oakland to the Hilltop Mall are precursors of what nine East Bay communities are eyeing as the wave of the future. -more-
For more than 20 years fire safety has had a low priority in the Berkeley City Council, particularly for the hill area, where there is the greatest danger that a firestorm like the one in 1991 might develop. In the 1980s the city even considered closing the only fire station in the hill area, which is also the only one east of the Hayward Fault. Over this period while the total number of city employees was rapidly increasing the number of firefighters was being steadily decreased. Even in the year right after the 1991 fire disaster in Oakland and Berkeley, the Berkeley Fire Department was forced to make a further cut in personnel. Because of these cuts it is now only possible to have three firefighters assigned to each engine company, which is far less effective than the standard number of four. -more-
For seven out of the eight track and field squads competing at Saturday’s league qualifying meet, “EBAL” stood for East Bay Athletic League. For the ambitious Berkeley High girls squad, however, that anagram could have stood for its minimalist approach to the meet: that is, “Eke By At Least.” -more-
A community advisory committee was unable to offer any solid recommendations to help the Berkeley Unified School District with its financial crisis, and the main culprit was time. -more-
Mr. Jeffrey M. Hannan expresses his feelings best in his opening paragraph (Perspective on teachers’ union, May 5) in which he details his 30-35 hours of work in a period of three days: In contrast to Mr. Hannan, we are all wimps who are “ignorantly giving in to the manufactured battle of the BFT leadership.” Mr. Hannan’s well thought out, “reasoned” approach on the situation paralleled that of board member Shirley Issel, whose quiet, detached, analytical scolding is first-rate rhetoric, but to those of us in the trenches, brings to mind Luther’s words, “the whore, Reason.” -more-
As the 2000 season winds down, the pace has been picking up for the Berkeley High girls varsity crew, which competed in its first race in two weeks at Oakland Estuary Sunday, in a tri-meet with Pacific and Serra/Notre Dame/Mercy, a combined squad. -more-
Who ordered the rain? -more-
Mr. Walter Wood says (Perspective, May 1) that our quality of life will suffer if 30 units of affordable housing replace an empty paint store in his neighborhood. He accuses of Berkeley of building housing developments that are “too large, too dense, too detrimental and too numerous.” -more-
I am writing to support the comments made by Councilmember Armstrong (Perspective, May 1). I too believe that Berkeley is a unique community with unusual resources and profound complexity. I would like to see our paper celebrate our diversity and our triumphs. I know there is a lot of political infighting. I believe that is one of the reasons that our schools are in such poor shape. A community such as ours, with the amount of brilliant people, both adults and school age children, should be able to produce a scholastic system that functions far better than the model we currently have. At the same time, I would like to read about our efforts at improvement. Bad news is so very easy to access. The Berkeley Planet can perhaps help us define ourselves in a format different from the usual barrage we have been accustomed to turning off! -more-
The Virginia-based Whitaker Foundation has awarded $15 million to the two-year-old Department of Bioengineering at UC Berkeley, boosting work on biomedical advances to diagnose and treat disease and prolong healthy life. -more-
I refer to the Perspective by L.A. Wood in the April 27 edition of the Daily Planet. Wood tries to build a case that folks on the UCB campus should be concerned about past radionuclide releases on the Central Campus, originating from Department of Energy research activities. When discussing the Melvin Calvin labs, he maintains that “Environmental reports from the mid-’70’s document releases of hundreds of curies of tritium annually in that area of the Central Campus.” I have recently reviewed the 1970-1980 Radioactive Effluent Monitoring Reports from the Berkeley Lab which have been provided to the City of Berkeley’s independent reviewer (Bernd Franke, IFEU). These reports show that less than 6.6 curies of tritium was released from the Calvin Lab over these 11 years, with less than 25 millicuries in the period 1974-1980 - maybe a factor of 1,000 less than Wood’s claim. Maybe Wood misread these reports, or maybe he has other reports I don’t know about. If so, he should bring copies to the Department of Energy so everybody can discuss the same information. -more-
Formed in 1996, and producing about four shows a year, Berkeley’s indigenous Impact Theater specializes in affordable original plays that speak to a younger generation that may have grown up on television, movies and music, without experiencing much live theater. -more-
Providing health, nutritious, organic food to children in the Berkeley public schools is a noble and worthy goal, but it’s also a costly one, the school board was reminded this week. -more-
Anyone strolling past a school playground roundabout lunchtime is quite familiar with the great debates that permeate early school life: -more-
The opinion piece by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) scientist Howard Matis (May 2) is not accurate regarding what occurred at the Alameda County Board of Education meeting (April 25) when they agreed to review their decision to advise parents and schools about the radioactive contamination at the Lawrence Hall of Science (LHS) museum. -more-
The St. Mary’s High track team continued its leisurely stroll through the Alameda-Contra Costa Athletic League schedule on Thursday afternoon, taking first place in 10 of 14 events on both the boys’ and girls’ sides to win the respective meets, 123-43 and 128-53, over its closest competition, El Cerrito. The Panthers’ effort also yielded comfortable victories over Albany and Salesian at the quad-meet. -more-
Rotarians will gather on the USS Hornet on Saturday night to do what they do best – raise money to help people around the world. -more-
Having already addressed its void in the frontcourt with the spring signing of Gabriel Hughes and Saulius Kuzminskas, the Cal men’s basketball team went to work on the backcourt Friday, announcing the signing of Alhambra High guard Michael Lawson. -more-
An armed robbery was reported about 11 p.m. Thursday by a woman who was accosted by a gunman as she sat in her car in the 2300 block of Woolsey Street. -more-
Berkeley High track and field coach Darrell Hampton couldn’t decide which was more important between today’s East Bay Athletic League qualifiers and the Sacramento Meet of Champions. So he’s bringing his ’Jackets to both. -more-
A bomb threat at 7:30 p.m. Thursday forced the occupants of a drug rehabilitation program on Scenic Avenue to evacuate the building they occupy. -more-
Scores of Berkeleyans will travel to Sacramento on Monday for a rally promoting an increase on state spending for public schools. -more-
SAN FRANCISCO – As part of its “Absurdist Season 2000,” San Francisco’s iconoclastic Exit Theater, located in the heart of the Tenderloin, opened the world premiere Tuesday of East Bay playwright/actor Dan Carbone’s energetic but disappointing farce “Salvador Dali Talks to the Animals in the Heaven on Top of Heaven.” -more-
OK, so maybe predicting a win over league punching bag Granada doesn’t exactly make Berkeley High boys volleyball coach Justin Caraway Nostradamus. But after seeing the way his ’Jackets dominated the Matadors in a four-game victory at Donahue Gym on Thursday, the coach’s more presumptuous prophecy of picking up a postseason bid is beginning to look less and less crazy. -more-
“...The window is busted, and the landlord ain’t home/And Butch joined the army, yeah that’s where he’s been/And the jackhammer’s diggin’ up the sidewalks again...” -more-
Albert Lau’s letter in your May 4th edition misses the point. TransAction proposes to construct a new development, which will contain not only much needed housing for downtown, but also replacement of the existing parking, plus additional parking. We are very aware that the interim disruption is a major inconvenience for downtown visitors, and are working hard to put programs in place to mitigate the inconvenience. The existing structure is incapable of supporting additional weight load. We cannot simply build apartments on top of the existing structure, but rather must build a new structure as a platform for new housing. The city and DBA (Downtown Berkeley Association) were very concerned about the county’s courthouse plan, because that plan did not provide for a re-creation of the existing parking. TransAction’s proposal does provide for the recreation of the existing parking. Thus, but for the temporary, but very real, inconvenience, the downtown and the city will be better off with the new development. -more-
Berkeley High pitcher Lillia Bermeo allowed just two hits and one earned run in five innings in a fantastic outing against East Bay Athletic League rival Monte Vista on Thursday. But thanks to her own squad’s offense, she couldn’t have pitched a complete game if she wanted to. -more-
A 22-year-old Oakland man was arrested Monday evening in connection with a strong-arm robbery on Prospect Avenue at Dwight Way. -more-
Yesterday afternoon (Tuesday), our neighborhood experienced a crisis when one of my neighbors could not find his 6-year-old child who had been playing in the backyard of their home. The incident ended on a happy note when, an hour and a half later, the child returned from a trip to the grocery store with his mother. It turned out to have been a matter of missed communications between the parents. Nonetheless, the response of the police in that hour and a half made me proud to live in a city like Berkeley that can call on the incredible professionalism of its police force in an emergency. -more-
Three weeks after hiring Santa Clara’s Caren Horstmeyer to replace Marianne Stanley as head coach, the Cal women’s basketball program has named two assistant coaches for the 2000-2001 season. -more-
Bayer Corporation’s Berkeley site is the first in North America to meet one of the most rigorous international environmental standards in the world, company officials announced this week. -more-
As part of Berkeley’s Earth Day events, hundreds of people joined the pledge to take specific steps to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. These pledges now total more than 2 million pounds of carbon dioxide and other gases that will be taken out of our atmosphere. That was a good beginning, but we all have a way to go. Greenhouse gases are causing the earth to warm. As the earth warms unusual climate events happen, as evidenced by massive flooding and devastating mudslides in some parts of the world and severe droughts and raging fires in others. The rain forests are in distress and island nations, existing as they do at sea level, watch in horror as the oceans warm and rise a little more each year. Severe climatic changes represent a real threat to our way of life and to the world’s water and food supplies. -more-
A 10-year-old boy allegedly brandished a pocket knife at a 9-year-old girl in the hallway of LeConte Elementary School on April 26. The girl’s mother reported the incident on Tuesday of this week. -more-
The Berkeley-Albany YMCA will host its 60th Annual Community Prayer Breakfast on Tuesday morning at H’s Lordships Restaurant at the Berkeley Marina. -more-
The sculpture of an eagle, worth $800 according to its owner, was stolen from the front yard of a home in the 2800 block of Webster Street. -more-
The recent resolution passed by the Alameda County Board of Education seems to have caught Lawrence Hall of Science and Lawrence Berkeley National Lab officials off-guard, in its straightforward, no-nonsense advisory to Alameda County schools to suspend field trips to the Lawrence Hall of Science. Children could be put in danger, the Board of Education advised, by radiation releases in the form of tritium from the stack of the National Tritium Labeling Facility, located adjacent to the Hall of Science. -more-
SAN FRANCISCO – San Francisco’s unusual and innovative Word for Word theater company takes classic and contemporary works of fiction – not drama – and performs them on stage as theater pieces. -more-
The St. Mary’s baseball team has been hearing the stories about Piedmont High pitcher Matt Shartsis all year, but until Wednesday afternoon, it was all second-hand information. -more-
Your March 27 article “Downtown Apartments in the Works (by Marilyn Claessens) illustrated perfectly greed exhibited by a developer and lack of thorough consideration by Berkeley’s city government. -more-
The Berkeley High boys volleyball team kicks off a three-game season of sorts this evening, hosting East Bay Athletic League rival Granada in its 2000 home finale at Donahue Gym. The 5 p.m. showdown marks the first of three must-win game for the Yellowjackets, who hope to contend for an at-large berth at North Coast Section, if they can win at least two out of the next three, against the Matadors, Foothill and California High. -more-
The public will get the opportunity to walk around Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory this weekend during the site’s first open house since the fall of 1997. -more-
It has come to my attention that the Berkeley school board is about to consider the placing of a maintenance parcel tax on the fall ballot. Meanwhile, our teachers are campaigning for an equitable salary schedule, our parents and students are supporting well-developed programs to prevent retentions, and our high school campus seems to be under siege. All of these issues are of immediate concern to our community. It seems that they must first be solved before we embark on other less significant projects. -more-
I still protest the oversized antenna tower in McKinley Street. -more-
A federal appeals court in San Francisco has upheld a lower court ruling that allowed the merger of Alta Bates and Summit medical centers. -more-
I want to thank you for your excellent coverage of the Berkeley Arts Festival and to respond to Polly Armstrong’s May 1 Perspective piece. I, too, question the attack on the manager’s report. It is the report that should be scrutinized not the kind of paper it is printed on. -more-
The big new traveling exhibition now at UC’s Berkeley Art Museum, “China: Fifty Years inside the People’s Republic,” is in the first place a sweeping range of documentation, and is co-sponsored by the School of Journalism, where the dean is Orville Schell, a China specialist. But it is displayed in an art museum and the photographs are mostly grouped by the individual photographers, so we are invited to consider them as works of art, as visual expressions that go beyond normal reportage. -more-
You could say that the Berkeley High softball team got a “victry” against Amador Valley on Tuesday afternoon. That is, the ’Jackets may well have scored a victory, if they hadn’t been missing an “o.” -more-
Plans by the historic Claremont Hotel to add 90 additional guest rooms have ignited a reaction from neighborhood groups concerned about increased traffic. -more-
I was disheartened to read Monday’s opinion article, “Affordable Housing Projects Threatening to Metastasize.” Mr. Walter Wood’s misrepresentation of affordable housing development is based on uninformed assumptions. -more-
Alameda-Contra Costa Athletic League golf powerhouse Alameda already had the league’s lone North Coast Section team berth secured going into Monday’s ACCAL championship tournament at the Chuck Corica Golf Complex. But with three at-large individual berths up for grabs, the afternoon was hardly meaningless for the second-place St. Mary’s boys golf team. -more-
Rick Young has been doing some long-term parking – without the benefit of an automobile. -more-
Sometimes the “field” part of track and field can be overlooked in favor of the more glamorous sprint and hurdles events. But without star thrower Kamaiya Warren, who virtually guarantees the Panthers two first-place finishes in every dual meet, St. Mary’s High’s ultra-successful girls track team would not be the same high-scoring threat to the NCS title it figures to be later this month. -more-
The Berkeley Unified School District should examine an alternative option for the East Campus playing fields project. -more-
Representatives from the city, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the Shorebird Nature Center broke ground Saturday on an energy-efficient, straw-bale, 860-square-foot building. -more-
A major earthquake along the Hayward Fault could force the closure of UC Berkeley for a year, resulting in the loss of 8,900 jobs, $680 million in personal income and $861 million in sales during that period. -more-
After much sound and fury, the Alameda County Education Board saw through the tactics of the “Committee to Minimize Toxic Waste” and gave the Lawrence Hall of Science a clean bill of health. The Superintendent of Public Schools announced on the county web page that she will send her son to the Hall during the summer. -more-
Berkeley’s Shotgun Players opened an intriguing and often mystifying production of English feminist playwright Caryl Churchill’s dark, dense, difficult, and at times gruesome play “The Skriker” Saturday at Julia Morgan Theater. -more-
The Berkeley High girls sprint relay team’s weekend trip to Philadelphia for the prestigious Penn Relays was plenty educational. But even in the heart of American Revolutionary history, with the city’s abundance of historical landmarks, it was the actual track meet that proved to be most enlightening. -more-
He’s the pet at Fire Station No. 5 and the firefighters love him, but he’s a lot more than a cheery pal who rides the truck with his buddies. Dylan is a disaster search dog, trained to find people trapped under rubble. -more-
More than five years ago I was approached by the first director of a proposed “Berkeley Free Folk Festival” and asked to recommend potential workshop spaces for the event, which I was happy to do. I explained the necessity of using fully accessible locations, since the event was to be partially funded by public money, to a self-appointed director whose initial response was, “People in wheelchairs don’t play the guitar.” -more-
For 83 percent of the Berkeley High boys golf team, the 2000 season ended with Monday’s eight-place finish at the East Bay Athletic League championship tournament at Oakridge Golf Course. -more-
A 63-year-old man was attacked and beaten on the street around 8 p.m. Sunday in the 1300 block of Channing Way. -more-
It was a most unusual day indeed. -more-
Two burglaries Wednesday took place in small cottages here in Berkeley. -more-
