Berkeley Symphony Music Director Joseph Young Leads the Orchestra in Its First Live Performance Since February 2020 at Bruns Amphitheater, Wednesday August 4th at 7:30 and Conducts a Symphony Ensemble in the third Free Berkeley Symphony Live! At the Plaza.

For its first live performance before an audience in almost a year and a half, the Berkeley Symphony Orchestra will be conducted by music director Joseph Young in a diverse program featuring selections from the classical repertoire alongside contemporary compositions by Gabriela Lena Frank, Brian Raphael Nabors and Jesse Montgomery, at Bruns Amphitheater, overlooking the Siesta Valley in Orinda, home of California Shakespeare, with actors from Cal Shakes joining the Symphony to speak passages from Goethe's drama 'Egmont' for the Beethoven orchestral piece it inspired--Wednesday, August 4th at 7:30 pm. Gates open at 6. Preconcert dining available. -more-

I trust you will represent the interests of your constituents and not those of for-profit developers, who care only about their profit margin and who will not build affordable, energy-efficient housing for that reason unless required by law to do so. -more-

Why are Berkeley citizens so upset about the proposed settlement agreement between the City and UC Berkeley? Reasons are many, but three stand out:

1. Secrecy:

Like the flawed 2005 deal that it is designed to replace, the current "settlement" was reached in secret, and debated among council members in secret. Critical though it is to our future, we are faced with a done deal, with no public review whatsoever. This violates open government laws and is a betrayal of multiple promises that the mistakes of 2005 would not be repeated this time around.

2. Dollars:

The law exempts UC from local property and other taxes. However, the courts have held that cities may seek reimbursement for goods and services provided by them to the University, like fire and police protection, emergency medical care, etc. In 2003, Berkeley's net UC generated expenses were independently calculated at $11,374,100 per year.[1] But in 2005, the city agreed that the University needed to pay only $1.2 million in yearly reimbursement. Current payments under the 2005 deal are reported at $1.8 million, an increase which accounts for only half of the 49.5% inflation which has actually occurred since 2003.[2] In real dollar terms U.C. currently pays less today than it agreed to pay in 2005.

And a lot more than simple inflation has happened since 2005. The big issue has been the expansion of the Berkeley campus from an estimated 31,800 students in 2005 to 40,955 in 2018, and with a further projected increase to 50,000.[3] The impact on the City's university-related costs should be obvious, with the Economic & Planning Systems, Inc. (EPS) analysis putting them at $21,415,000 (net of all receipts) as of 2018, or nearly double what they were in 2003.

Early reports were that UC under the 2021 settlement would pay the City $4.1 million/year in current dollars, with an inflation adjuster, or a total of $82 million over a 16-year term. Proponents proudly say this is double what was agreed to in 2005. But when the 2005 payment is adjusted for inflation and for the added costs of a near doubling of the student body, it is obvious that the new deal is as bad as the old. Indeed, it is worse. The annual subsidy by Berkeley taxpayers to UC as of 2003 was $11,374,000.[4] Using 2018 numbers as the base line, (they are the only ones publicly available), the annual subsidy will increase from $17,315,000 in Year 1 to $26,976,206 in Year 16, or a total of $349,108,399 over the life of the agreement.[5]

Things are worse yet when we consider the non-money parts of the settlement.

3. An Illusory Agreement:

Because of the City's passion for secrecy, we did not learn all the details until July 27, when the Mayors office released a fully executed and "final" settlement document. Skeptics' fears prove justified. For example, only $2.8 million of the advertised $4.1 million will go to the City's general fund. The rest is earmarked for special projects that must be (a) within a half mile of the campus, and (b) jointly negotiated with UC.

It also turns out that that the City has agreed to permanently withdraw from current litigation involving UC's Long Range Development Plan ("LRDP") and must support all UC expansion projects now in the works. Not only must it accept current expansion plans, but "poison pill" provisions prevent the City from enforcing the limits set by the LRDP. Should UC choose to expand beyond the 50,000 students forecast by the LRDP, or to build beyond the limits of the LRDP, Berkeley's only remedy would be to withdraw entirely from the Agreement, and to lose the promised compensation for fire, police, medical and other services provided by it to UC. Settlement Agreement (copy upon request), paragraphs 6.3, 7.3 and 7.4.

While most of UC's promises are illusory, the City's are very real. They threaten decades-long efforts to preserve what makes for a quality life in Berkeley, including adequate infrastructure, affordable housing (especially for young families), a healthy environment (clean air, uncongested streets, green spaces), and a balanced relationship with the University. There are no meaningful caps on student and staff totals, and no requirement to mitigate the housing crisis that results in large part to ever increasing UC demand.[6] There is no relief for local taxpayers' who must continue to subsidize tens of millions in costs that under the law should be borne by the State as a whole.

In short, our mayor and his captive Council have secretly agreed to a deal that will bring irreversible and long-term harm to us all. They should rescind their approval, explain their conduct, and allow us the input to which we are entitled under the law. -more-

I have been thinking more about how to encourage owners to renovate the uninhabited housing that is currently in Berkeley, especially since President Biden announced he would not extend the eviction moratorium beyond this weekend. -more-

Tom Joyce of the Washington Examiner refers to the Vice President as [President Biden's] "Harris Mistake." And here is another bit of bigoted terminology from history: "The Jewish Question." -more-

Our young people weren’t around when Berkeley was engulfed in massive wildfires, first in 1923 and again in 1991. Over 650 houses were reduced to ash in the 1923 fire, which started northeast of UCB and raged down the narrow, densely built up streets below Wildcat Canyon Road all the way to Shattuck and Hearst Streets. Fire equipment struggled to get through the twisting, switchback streets at a time when fewer cars were parked in front of the houses.

In 1991, 3,354 houses and 456 apartments were destroyed, and 25 people died. The fire raged down from Grizzly Peak, engulfing Hiller Highlands, Vicente and Alvarado, crossed Highway 24 to Roble Road and on to El Camino Real and Hillcrest, and across to consume upper Rockridge all the way to Broadway. Fire crews were again unable to progress along many of the narrow, car-clogged roads above the Claremont Hotel. Some who died were in their cars trying to snake their way to safety.

Senate Bill 9 exempts ‘very high hazard areas’ in incorporated areas from mandatory banning of R-1 houses in favor of 8- to 14-unit apartments, but Berkeley’s fires started in unincorporated areas, and swallowed up vast swaths of ‘high hazard areas’ and even non-hazard areas like Rockridge, in which SB-9 and 10 encourages dense apartment building.

PLEASE urge our state lawmakes to VOTE NO ON SB 9 & 1 -more-

Editor's Note: The latest issue of the Pepper Spray Times is now available.

You can view it absolutely free of charge by clicking here . You can print it out to give to your friends.

Grace Underpressure has been producing it for many years now, even before the Berkeley Daily Planet started distributing it, most of the time without being paid, and now we'd like you to show your appreciation by using the button below to send her money.

This is a Very Good Deal. Go for it! -more-

The tech support department points out that the best sentence in the excellent op-ed on the COB's deal with UCB is the last one in the last footnote. In case you missed it:

"There is ample evidence that much recent construction as well as the movement to abolish single family zoning (R-1 zoning) in Berkeley are driven primarily by the demand for short term student housing, rather than by any real desire to provide affordable housing to families wanting to live here over the long term."

Well, yes. And not only that, what still hasn't been adequately reported on is that it's not just in Berkeley, it's all over the country, but especially in college town. On the front page of today's New York Times there's a story about Charlottesville, home of the University of VIrginia, that could be about Berkeley. I've heard simllar tales about Bloomington (Indiana U.), Gainesville (U.of Florida) and several others. What's being built in most of these towns is indeed not affordable housing for families, but luxury dorms for well-off students who spurn the old three-in-a-room proletarian dwellings with cafeterias and shared baths which their predecessors tolerated. -more-

Wherever I go, it seems as though a body of rumors precedes me. People talk. They judge. They don't necessarily have the facts, nor do they very often try to see things from my perspective. -more-

On July 29, 2021, President Joe Biden announced that federal workers and contractors will be required to attest they’ve been vaccinated against the coronavirus or else face mandatory masking, weekly testing, distancing. and other new rules. President Biden also said he is "asking the Defense Department to look into how and when they will add COVID-19 to the list of vaccinations our armed forces must get."

At this point in time, we don’t have the time to coax vaccine holdouts to get vaccinated. It might have been feasible back when the vaccines were first approved for emergency use by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). By now the vaccines’ safety and effectiveness have been proven again and again over time, yet resistance remains. And we continue to hear that persistent education about the vaccines’ importance will eventually overcome resistance. It hasn't. If the unvaccinated aren’t convinced by now about the lifesaving benefits of vaccination, they just haven’t been listening or are listening to the wrong sources. -more-

Street Art for the Sake of Clean Water

A talented team of artists and activists recently took the campaign against Big Carbon to the streets—specifically to the first block of Fresno Street to the south of Solano Avenue. This Albany intersection now sports a colorful two-lane proclamation of resistance to the Line 3 Pipeline.

If built, Line 3 would open North America's oil-stained floodgates to a daily surge of nearly a million barrels of Canadian tar sands. Line 3 would drive this toxic slurry all the way from Alberta to Wisconsin—across wild wetlands and the sacred treaty territory of the Anishinaabe peoples—before plowing through the headwaters of the Mississippi to a terminus on the shore of Lake Superior. And here's a Bonus Bonehead Blunder: Line 3 would be built by Enbridge, the firm responsible for the biggest inland oil spill in US history.

The Indigenous communities in the projected path of this costly and unnecessary project are waging a brave and determined nonviolent resistance to block the pipeline and protect their ancestral lands. They have succeeded in holding the project at bay for nearly five years.

For more details on this epic struggle, check out the Stop Line 3 link.

And, if you have a chance, take a stroll off Solano to check out the message that now adorns the pavement alongside the nearby Chase bank: "Defund Line 3: For the Love of Water." -more-