A five-year-old city skateboard park that was to cost $200,000 and ended up costing four times that amount today is splitting at the seams. -more-

A small but dedicated crowd turned up to mark the 40th anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King’s assassination by reading aloud his “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” at the downtown Berkeley Public Library on Friday. The event coincided with the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) Youth Council’s National Day of Nonviolence, started nine years ago by the organization’s former director Jamal Bryant to encourage youth to fight against community violence. -more-

A U.S. District Court judge has ruled that the Oakland Police Department’s street strip-search policies are generally constitutional—though portions of it are not—but trials in individual cases must be held before the court can determine whether constitutional rights have actually been violated. -more-

Demolition of the strip mall at the corner of University Avenue and Martin Luther King Jr. Way will begin June 1, said developer Chris Hudson. Some preliminary dismantling of the building is already visible. -more-

The Berkeley Board of Education will discuss a report recommending adaptive re-use of the Berkeley High School Old Gym on Wednesday. -more-

Berkeley-based Disability Rights Advocates settled a seven-year-old lawsuit with the state Department of Education Friday. In the settlement the state agreed to study the pass rate for special education students on the California High School Exit Exam. -more-

Former 16th District Assemblymember Wilma Chan has filed a complaint with the California Fair Political Practices Commission (FPPC) against 14th District Assemblymember Loni Hancock—Chan’s opponent in the race to succeed termed-out 9th District State Senator Don Perata—charging that Hancock has illegally used her assemblymember officeholder account to pay a campaign staff member. -more-

The state agriculture department’s plan to eradicate the light brown apple moth (LBAM) “is like the 9-11 terrorist policy applied to agriculture,” Miguel Altieri, UC Berkeley professor of agroecology and an entomologist, told the Planet Monday. -more-

A federal decision on a plan to create a new North Richmond reservation for a landless tribe of Pomos who want to build a casino is months away, a federal official said Monday. -more-

Berkeley Planning Commissioners face back-to-back meetings this week where they’ll juggle two political hot potatoes on succeeding nights. -more-

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The either/or alternatives of Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) vs. no-project is a false choice. But before I suggest another choice let us step back and look at the goal of BRT and what we can learn from the current BRT dry run. -more-

This is a people-friendly, eco-friendly plan to increase riders and decrease congestion and pollution. It will save millions for transit improvements. -more-

Even though AC Transit began planning for Bus Rapid Transit 18 years ago, in Berkeley we’re still only about half way to deciding whether to build such a system in south Berkeley along with neighbor cities Oakland and San Leandro. -more-

The architect Frank Lloyd Wright is supposed to have said that the right angle is a fascist symbol. That observation may be apocryphal, but it well applies to some of the newer buildings on Berkeley’s commercial corridors, big square apartment complexes that dwarf adjacent residential properties. Currently, the boxes are creeping north along San Pablo Avenue and threatening to change the character of West Berkeley. -more-

When figures like $16 billion and $8 billion and $5 billion are tossed about on a regular basis it’s fair for a person to wonder how Gov. Schwarzenegger’s budget proposal for next year affects the average citizen. What can I do, one might ask, about a gaping deficit of billions of dollars, and why should I care? -more-

In my young adulthood, I fought valiantly against the notion that I would be disabled, unable to work, and dependent on the medical establishment and on public benefits. I tried exceedingly hard to work at jobs, at first by quitting prescribed medication against medical advice, and then tried to work while taking these medications which I had little choice but to take. -more-

The City of Oakland will honor the legacy of Paul Robeson—one of the giant figures in American history—with an April 9 City Hall reception on the 110th anniversary of his birth. -more-

The Berkeley Zoning Adjustments Board (ZAB) will consider an expansion permit for Jupiter Restaurant on Thursday. -more-

Joe and I spent the other afternoon moving dirt and reshaping the malva rosa by the garage, to allow some sun on the pile we were making. This isn’t the first time we’ve radically reshaped the thing, and it won’t be the last. Except for the fact that it’s so inherently bewildering, I’d call this plant the ideal first thing to learn pruning with: it’s woody but soft; it puts out lots and lots of branches to choose from, and it can take a severe pruning and recover. -more-