Faced with some 60 neighbors opposing telecommunications antennas proposed for a building at Ward Street and Shattuck Avenue—and armed with signs calling for the recall of the mayor and stating “don’t sell us out”—the Berkeley City Council split Tuesday over whether to uphold the Zoning Adjustments Board (ZAB) decision to deny permits for the antennas at 2721 Shattuck Ave. -more-

Scientists from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) joined with officials from two cities and a leading developer Monday to unveil the site of a $135 million biofuel lab. -more-

Although building a second story atop the present animal shelter at 2013 Second St. is on tonight’s (Tuesday) City Council agenda, Councilmember Betty Olds, who served on a now-defunct committee searching for a new shelter, says she’ll ask the council to wait until early next year to make a decision. -more-

When a neighbor of Misti and Amir Hassan glanced out of his window last week, he saw Amir dressed in a cape and holding a rail spike in one hand. Amir peered over the balcony of his apartment and then tossed the spike, which was attached to a long rope, into the yard below. -more-

The PG&E service center at 2111 Martin Luther King Jr. Way, empty for almost two years, was handed over to the Berkeley YMCA on Friday to be developed into a teen center over the next two years. -more-

In April 2006 former Berkeley Police Sgt. Cary Kent pleaded guilty to felony drug possession and grand theft charges stemming from his stealing illicit substances from the locked police evidence vault he was charged to guard. -more-

Does the Marine Recruiting Center in downtown Berkeley have a proper use permit? -more-

A 17,000-square-foot vacant commercial property in downtown Berkeley that most recently housed Barnes & Noble will soon have a new tenant, according to city Economic Development Division Acting Director Michael Caplan. -more-

A dedicated group of six Berkeley citizen planners gathered Monday afternoon to decide how high, how dense and how soon. -more-

A small group of protesters rallied at Frank Ogawa Plaza in front of Oakland City Hall late Monday afternoon as part of a National Day of Protest to Stop Police Brutality, Repression, and the Criminalization of a Generation. -more-

After nearly two years of work, Berkeley planning commissioners Wednesday will finally begin discussions of proposed local rules to govern the application of a controversial state law. -more-

In the wake of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s veto of a bill by Assemblymember Sandré Swanson that would have clarified the procedure for returning local control to the state-operated Oakland Unified School District, Swanson is moving forward with plans for oversight committee hearings for what the assemblymember says is “to study the effectiveness of California’s statutes governing state takeovers of school districts.” -more-

Testimony concluded Monday in the trial of a six-time convicted felon from Berkeley who’s accused of attempting to murder Berkeley police officer Darren Kacalek on May 17, 2005. -more-

The Berkeley school board will vote Wednesday whether to accept the completion of the Derby Field project Wednesday. -more-

Berkeley High’s School Governance Council released a draft earlier this month of their proposal for an advisory program they plan to implement in fall 2008 for Berkeley International High School and Academic Choice students. -more-

Organized by KSFO radio personality Melanie Morgan, chair of Move America Forward, pro-war, anti-Islamic and anti-immigration demonstrators converged on the Berkeley Recruiting Center Wednesday, caravaning into town with their SUVs and Harleys decked out in American flags to face off with Code Pink, the anti-war group that has held vigils in front of the 64 Shattuck Square Marine Recruitment Office for three weeks. -more-

While city insiders point to a number of accomplishments during the 26 years City Attorney Manuela Albuquerque has worked for the city, few tears were being shed Thursday at City Hall in response to the announcement of her November 30 retirement. -more-

The councilmember who called Tuesday night’s town hall meeting in southwest Berkeley said in a postcard sent to some southwest Berkeley property owners that a tax assessment district proposal that was to be under discussion at the meeting had been withdrawn and that discussion should focus instead on ways to make the area cleaner, safer and less congested. -more-

The Downtown Area Plan Advisory Committee members voted 20–0–1 to approve the previously controversial chapter on historic buildings and urban design. -more-

What’s the future of Golden Gate Fields now that its corporate owner is shedding real estate to cover losses on its ailing horse racing business? -more-

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The Oakland city attorney’s office this week announced a stepped-up effort to combat what City Attorney John Russo and Mayor Ron Dellums are calling the “crisis” of predatory lending in Oakland. -more-

Berkeley’s warm water pool users clashed at Wednesday’s disability commission meeting with members of Pools for Berkeley over the idea of a multi-pool complex. -more-

The memorial potluck gathering to commemorate the life of Amir Hassan has been moved to A Taste of Africa, the restaurant at 3015 Shattuck Ave. where the 9-year-old boy was a frequent visitor. -more-

The Bay Area Air Quality Management District released Pacific Steel’s long-awaited health risk assessment report to the public last week and will be accepting comments until Jan. 31. -more-

We encountered many of our Elmwood neighbors at a recent party, most of them grumbling in typically articulate Berkeley style about the big new restaurant cum who-knows-what which is under construction near the corner of Ashby and College. The talk turned to general questions of development and density, and specifically to what might be in store for downtown Berkeley if the University of California gets everything it wants from the official progeny of the advice which is scheduled to be delivered in November by the Downtown Area Plan Advisory Committee. -more-

This week’s editorial is in a more traditional vein than most, and is much shorter than usual. That’s because the message to be conveyed is short and sweet: For those who care about what kind of Berkeley we’ll be passing along to those who come after us, there’s a meeting you’ve really got to attend this Saturday. It’s the last public forum of DAPAC, the Downtown Plan Advisory Committee, which is the slightly illegitimate offspring of the city’s settlement of its lawsuit challenging the environmental impact report on one segment of the University of California’s enormous expansion plans for the next decades. -more-

WEST BERKELEY -more-

It’s clearly battle time over the shape of Berkeley, most imminently over downtown’s height limits, with more battles to follow. Let’s arm ourselves for the upcoming showdown on density, development, and downtown with some basic facts. Where does Berkeley stand, in the spectrum of communities, in terms of people crowding into space? -more-

I very much appreciate the Daily Planet posting the text of the memo I sent to my fellow members of DAPAC regarding downtown land use, building forms and heights. However, it’s a disservice to your readers for Becky O’Malley to suggest that my comments can be summarized by quoting the following single phrase: “We should be calling for as many tall buildings as possible to be built.” -more-

Editors, Daily Planet: -more-

ACTIVISTS -more-

After 45 general meetings and 44 subcommittee meetings over a two-year period, the Downtown Area Plan Advisory Committee (DAPAC) is wrapping up its work of creating a new plan for downtown to replace the current plan adopted in 1990. -more-

Thanks to reporter Riya Bhattacharjee (“All Visitors to Show Photo ID at Berkeley High”) and to parent Ellen Mates (“How To Be a Victim, as Taught by the Berkeley Police and Berkeley High”) for information about ongoing security failures at BHS. Since the school community suffers a virtual “news black out,” never receiving incident information or safety updates from our principal directly, we learn more in the Planet. -more-

America is awakening from the nightmare of the most dangerous and destructive right-wing government in our nation’s history. A majority has seen the failure of conservative policies, and they want a new direction. -more-

The bell for the final round of “Verizon vs the City of Berkeley” will ring this Tuesday evening at 7 p.m. at the final public hearing, Old City Hall, 2134 MLK Jr. Way in Berkeley. -more-

Chinese tallow tree, Triadica sebifera, Sapium sebiferum or Croton sebiferum, is pretty, tough, and dons beautiful leaf colors in autumn. The small rounded kite-shaped leaves have a gentle green color before that, and dance engagingly in the breeze flashing their soft gray undersides, a little like aspen leaves. -more-

Berkeley is in a fiscal crisis. The current budget was balanced only after the council made deep cuts in staff and services. The city has $160 million of unfunded liabilities. Meanwhile, our roads, sewers and drainage system (where there is a drainage system) are in bad shape; it looks as if the coming winter is going to be a wet one—good for the snowpack, bad for deteriorating infrastructure. This past spring, the council nickel and dimed basic services for the homeless, cutting $23,000 out of the respected Quarter Meal program run by Berkeley’s Food and Housing Project—50 percent of the program’s modest budget. -more-

As the nation slowly—in some cases, very slowly, and almost always too slowly—does away with various practices of bias and discrimination in American life, we have begun to develop the phenomenon where members of a group which historically discriminated get extra props for ceasing the doing of something that never should have been done in the first place, while members of the group historically discriminated against get criticism no matter which way they turn. Call it a new twist on the old double standard. -more-

If Berkeley has a heart, it must be located on the 2200 block of Shattuck Avenue between Kittredge St. and Allston Way. This is the site that Berkeley’s founder, Francis Kittredge Shattuck, chose as his homestead. -more-

By Jane Powell -more-

I took it as a Sign when the postcard came to the surface last week as I was attempting to get the paper stack on the office floor into order: a postcard appeared on the surface. I’d probably picked it up at the big fat garden show in the Cow Palace last month. “Gardensia: Archipelago Designs” with a southwest Berkeley address. -more-

After the next big quake, if your phones work, use the phone and not your car! A few tips: -more-

Well, it’s happened! I’ve started a garden. Put up those slam-dancing shoes, shelved all the accouterments of an angry youth; frayed journal full of bad poetry (so bad), conga drums and King Crimson albums (in vinyl, yet!). I’m growing lettuce! -more-

TUESDAY, OCT. 23 -more-

An engaging man, neither young nor old, tries to convince us of mankind’s inability to perform the good, the rational, the self-interested. He takes us through a veritable sideshow hall of mirrors, acting out a reunion with his old school friends who spout banalities. He challenges them, only to be humiliated. -more-

By KEN BULLOCK -more-

Chinese tallow tree, Triadica sebifera, Sapium sebiferum or Croton sebiferum, is pretty, tough, and dons beautiful leaf colors in autumn. The small rounded kite-shaped leaves have a gentle green color before that, and dance engagingly in the breeze flashing their soft gray undersides, a little like aspen leaves. -more-

TUESDAY, OCT. 23 -more-

FRIDAY, OCT. 19 -more-

Beneath a massive red crossbeam spanning two posts like an arch, a young Asian man is telling a bright little girl a story—it could be a bedtime story—about “the all-time number one honeybear” in the mountains of Japan, as low music from a koto player and a cellist flows around and through their words. -more-

“It’s kind of Antigone In Wonderland,” said Erin Merritt, founder of Woman’s Will, the Oakland-based all-female Shakespeare and classics troupe (who nonetheless have staged Brecht-Weill’s Happy End and Oscar Wilde’s The Important of Being Earnest), about its Bay Area premiere of contemporary playwright Mac Wellman’s Antigone, opening this week at the Temescal Arts Center on Tele-graph in North Oak-land. -more-

Sergio Leone is often thought of as an ironic and humorous filmmaker, a mischievous genre deconstructionist. But though his films have plenty of humor and wit and mischief, they also contain great beauty and depth and insight. Though he may have worked most famously in a genre largely considered pulp—the Western—but Leone was one of the great cinematic artists. -more-

If Berkeley has a heart, it must be located on the 2200 block of Shattuck Avenue between Kittredge St. and Allston Way. This is the site that Berkeley’s founder, Francis Kittredge Shattuck, chose as his homestead. -more-

By Jane Powell -more-

I took it as a Sign when the postcard came to the surface last week as I was attempting to get the paper stack on the office floor into order: a postcard appeared on the surface. I’d probably picked it up at the big fat garden show in the Cow Palace last month. “Gardensia: Archipelago Designs” with a southwest Berkeley address. -more-

After the next big quake, if your phones work, use the phone and not your car! A few tips: -more-

Well, it’s happened! I’ve started a garden. Put up those slam-dancing shoes, shelved all the accouterments of an angry youth; frayed journal full of bad poetry (so bad), conga drums and King Crimson albums (in vinyl, yet!). I’m growing lettuce! -more-

FRIDAY, OCT. 19 -more-