Public Comment

It was another full week and there is plenty to report on what I did attend even though I missed the Cedar Rose Park Renovation, the Solano Business District meeting, the Zero Waste Commission, the Civic Arts Commission, the Environment and Climate Commission, the Police Accountability Board, the Homeless Services Panel of Experts and the Community Health Commission.  

I also missed the April 27 news conference with Councilmember Kate Harrison on the recent decision against the city of Berkeley by a three judge panel (all Republican appointees) on the natural gas ban, but at least the ban is in place for now and I have the video. That is not true for the missed city meetings. https://www.facebook.com/watch/live/?ref=watch_permalink&v=780273733648842 

While the California Restaurant Association that brought the lawsuit (with substantial financing by SoCalGas) claimed they couldn’t cook without gas, Harrison reported that Alice Waters’ Chez Panisse is in renovation to go all electric. https://news.yahoo.com/legendary-chef-alice-waters-absolutely-ready-to-go-electric-on-stoves-215520601.html 

Berkeley Mayor Arreguin was visibly absent from the news conference. In case you are not on his donation list, he is running for State Senate. I heard he was meeting with UC Chancellor Christ. 

The Monday morning Public Safety Committee meeting was over in 36 minutes. The Berkeley Police Department Surveillance Ordinance Policies related to fixed cameras, drones and acquisition reporting were approved with a qualified positive recommendation by Councilmembers Taplin and Wengraf. Councilmember Kesarwani was absent. How long surveillance recordings will be retained was still unsettled. The Police Accountability Board recommended that retention should be less than one year. 

Only Councilmembers Wengraf and Hahn were present at the Monday Agenda and Rules Committee to approve the agenda for the May 9th City Council regular 6 pm meeting. Mayor Arreguin was absent. Hahn asked to move the appointment of Jennifer Louis as Chief of Police off the Consent agenda to Action. Wengraf opposed, and said if there were three councilmembers at the council meeting who wanted to move the appointment of Louis to Action it could be done at the meeting. 

With only two members of the committee present and disagreement over the draft agenda, the rule is the agenda item remains as submitted. That means that the appointment of Jennifer Louis as Chief of Police, an appointment that has brought considerable objection from the community remained on the consent calendar for the May 9th City Council meeting. 

The two back-to-back Tuesday City Council meetings started with a special session on prioritizing referrals from the City Council. This got interesting. Councilmember Hahn went to the item ranked as 17th in priority, “Refer to the Planning Commission and Housing Advisory Commission to Research and Recommend Policies to Prevent Displacement and Gentrification of Berkeley Residents of Color and African Americans.” This was ranked by Council as number 1 in 2019, the year it was referred. Hahn asked why this was on the list, why this; wasn’t done. How is it that a number 1 ranking in 2019 was being recycled as number 17? 

Jordan Klein, Director of the Planning Department threw out excuses: there was the pandemic; there was a joint commission subcommittee that was formed and met once; it was a “meaty project for volunteers to take on, but they didn’t have the momentum behind that and so we made the decision; because that project was never completed, we made the decision to reintroduce it to this ranking process.”  

Hahn pushed back, “[I]t is meaty because it’s big and important and it addresses things that we probably should have addressed a long time ago. I think, you know, at this point when I was growing up in Berkeley, African Americans made up almost 30% of the population and now it’s at 7-8%. So, it just seems like if we keep putting this off, maybe the item becomes moot, because there are no more African American people in Berkeley. So, I would like to suggest that this be moved onto the list of projects that are ongoing. And, that this be picked up and the work be done…” 

So how did the mayor and your councilmember rate displacement and gentrification with a score of 0 as lowest priority and 5 as highest priority? 

Mayor Arreguin, 1; District 1, Kesarwani, 1; District 2, Taplin, 0; District 3. Bartlett,5; District 4,Harrison; 5; District 5, Hahn, 5; District 6,Wengraf, 2; District 7, Robinson, 5; District 8, Humbert , 0. 

It is quite interesting seeing what the mayor and councilmembers placed as priorities. Their individual votes on each referral item starts on page 30 of this meeting document. https://berkeleyca.gov/sites/default/files/documents/2023-04-25%20Special%20Item%2001%202023%20City%20Council%20Referral.pdf 

The referral list gives you a peek into what happens when Council passes something as a referral. It goes onto someone’s to-do list where it can languish for years. There is another list that was referenced by councilmembers which was NOT included. 

At the Disaster and Fire Safety Commission Interim Deputy Fire Chief Keith May reported that there were two lithium battery fires. He explained that scooters left plugged-in after being fully charged can overheat and start fires. Another attendee showed me the picture of one, a house in the 1600 block on Kains. 

The next morning Interim Fire Chief David Sprague gave a presentation to the City Council Budget and Finance Committee on the shortage of fire fighters, the use of voluntary and mandatory overtime and the steps being taken to recruit and train new fire fighters. 

In my question to the committee, I noted that since the Planning Commission is going to be changing zoning, doubling and tripling the density in the southside areal that will probably give us 10 and 12 story buildings. The Fire Department’s ladder trucks only go to the eighth floor, and if some student leaves a scooter plugged in all night and we get a lithium battery fire as reported at the Disaster and Fire Safety Commission, what impact does that have on the existing shortage of tall enough ladders, and what equipment do we need to take care of that? 

Usually, in meetings questions like this are never answered and discussion goes on as if nothing was said. In this case, Mayor Arreguin acknowledged that I had asked two legitimate questions and asked Sprague if the City needed to purchase equipment. 

Here is Sprague’s answer: 

“Yeah, thanks. It’s obviously a question we’ve been thinking about for the last couple of decades as zoning and development has changed in the city. Yeah, essentially, the community is transitioning from a suburban community to an urban metro community. While we’re only ten square miles you know we’re the second densest in the top fifty-one most populated cities in California. So, we’re kind of a unique animal in terms of apparatus. We have basically what we need. There are some new types of ladder trucks that are coming out of Europe that have much higher ladder reach, but they’re not generally available in the United States yet. 

When we’re talking about fighting fires or responding to any type of call and an elevated structure, really above seven floors is our designation for high rise. But really the same principles applied to us, anything above five floors. It’s really about sending a significant number of personnel to those calls, because if you just think about it, if it’s a fire incident report of smoke, we don’t use the elevators. So, we’re transporting equipment up stairs while at the same time people are evacuating. We carry about 50 to 75 pounds of equipment per each person. So that is, you know, by the time you get to the actual incident floor you’re pretty tired, and have to be on breathing air. So we carry those tanks. The tanks last for about 10 to 15 minutes of work. 

And, so essentially, you have to have about 50 to 100 people ( fire fighters) for a kind of standard fire that we would handle with about 30 on the ground floor in a residential unit. You have to have between 50 and 100 for elevated fire, and if it’s anything more significant than a couple of rooms, then you know, you’re looking at several 100 firefighters, and that’s been proven by kind of a standard by departments that run these fires routinely in San Francisco, New York. So, it’s really about personnel. These fires. while they’re low frequency, they’re high risk. 

We have had several high-rise near misses in the last couple of months due to lithium-ion fires. So, it’s very concerning to us. These fires don’t have to be big to cause a lot of problem right? It’s really the smoke movement through these structures that can often-times trap and asphyxiate people…” 

The next night, Thursday, I attended the Zoning Adjustment Board (ZAB) meeting. I shared with the ZAB what I heard from the Interim Fire Chief, the two recent lithium-ion battery fires, and that “ we are putting up these buildings everywhere and we are really not looking at our carrying capacity. And it looks like the buildings that we plan to fill are going to be far ahead of the fire fighters that are able to serve those building. And so I just wanted to put that out there so that all of us are thinking about the impact on the City with all this increasing density and high rises.” 

ZAB Chair Yes Duffy responded with, “[A}s an architect who is familiar with low rise, mid-rise and high-rise buildings, the building code covers these issues quite clearly and I think, and I’m thankful there are engineers working at the national and international level to ensure low rise, mid-rise and high-rise buildings are safe for evacuation. I would like to think in the U.S. we have some of the safest buildings due to our building code.” 

It should be noted that California Assembly Bill 835 introduced by Assembly Member Lee with co-authors Ward and Wiener, and supported by California YIMBY, directs the State Fire Marshal to research and develop standards for “single stairway” multi-family buildings instead of two stairways as is now required. It would reduce building costs and eliminate the space needed for the second stairwell for evacuation of the building in an emergency such as a fire. 

The YIMBYs call the requirement for two stairwells, which take more land, outdated, a hinderance to design, affordability and obsolete in the era of more modern building techniques. 

Alfred Twu wrote a featured opinion for the SF Chronicle supporting single stairwell construction. https://www.sfchronicle.com/opinion/openforum/article/housing-architecture-california-single-stair-17774317.php 

Remember fire escapes from old movies? Anna Connelly invented and patented the first outdoor fire escape in 1887. 

In one article on single stairwells, some cities are allowing single stairwell buildings with up to ten floors. Those buildings are supposed to come with engineering to manage smoke from becoming deadly. Still, imagine, the fire fighters with their 50 to 75 lbs of equipment running up to the 10th floor for the student whose lithium-ion battery hoverboard or scooter caught on fire. And, all that planned upzoning for student housing backs up to Fire Zones 2 and 3. 

As for the nine projects before ZAB, everything passed, except 2900-2920 Shattuck, the ten-story 221 unit State Density Bonus project, which was pulled by city staff, and the meeting didn’t end until after midnight. 

The Clubhouse at Willard Park consumed over two hours of the meeting. There was an even split between those praising the plan and a large clubhouse as necessary for after school recreation and those objecting to size, design and noise. The clubhouse is 3301 square feet, a net increase over the current clubhouse by 2820 square feet. 

Board member Shoshana O’Keefe was the single vote against approval on the grounds that it was not compliant with the law. The setback was 16 feet instead of the required 20 feet and the desire for a larger clubhouse was not a substantial reason for the variance. (O’Keefe holds an inactive CA law license) 

The project at 2555 College a 4-story building with eleven units at the corner of College and Parker has 10 bedrooms with NO windows out of 37. Isiah Stackhouse with Trachtenberg Architects is the architect for the building. In my comment, I was clear that I was not objecting to the size and mass of the building, I was objecting to how it was designed as a livable space with bedrooms with no windows. 

The response was that the project is affordable by design, the rooms feel light and airy, the bedrooms have “large sliding glass windows” (instead of doors) and they have views of the main room windows (if one gets in the right position in the bedroom). The view to the outside from a bedroom with no windows only works for four of the ten bedrooms. The view from the other six bedrooms is another wall. https://berkeleyca.gov/sites/default/files/documents/2023-04-27_ZAB_Item%202_2555%20College_Combined%20Staff%20Report%20and%20Attachments.pdf 

The Zoning Adjustment Board mission is, “Approves or denies permits related to the use and development of the land in Berkeley.” So broadly little to no attention is paid to the livability of the interior. And, thanks to housing laws limiting review, it is up to the architect to be thoughtful in creating livable space. 

I remember the days when looking at plans from Trachtenberg Architects, I could imagine the floor layouts as very livable spaces. Sadly 2555 College could have been designed to give each bedroom a window, but it wasn’t. One of the eleven units is for a very low income household to qualify the project for the State Density Bonus. One has to wonder if the very low income household will get one of the 4 units where every bedroom has a window or one of the units where three out of four bedrooms have no window and all of those bedrooms have a view of a wall. 

Here is what three investors did with an old abandoned school in Pittsburg. And note how they talk over and over about the windows and light. https://www.cnbc.com/2023/04/25/apartment-building-abandoned-high-school-unlocked.html 

You may have seen the February 18th article by Claire Hao in the SF Chronicle that it is estimated San Francisco may have as many as 3900 non-ductile concrete buildings, the kind of buildings that pancaked and collapsed in the Turkey-Syria earthquake that killed over 50,000 people. https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/article/earthquake-building-risk-safety-17782287.php  

Former mayor and current commissioner Shirley Dean on the Disaster and Fire Safety Commission brought up the issue of “building standards” in March to determine to what extent Berkeley is at risk with non-ductile concrete buildings and to make recommendations from the findings. 

At the April commission meeting discussion, Dean asked how the commission might identify the number of buildings at risk. 

Sarah Lana, Emergency Services Manager, who attended to give an update on Disaster Preparedness Efforts, responded that 230 owners of at risk buildings have been notified, but that information would not be made available to the commission or the public. It was not a Fire Department Responsibility. 

Which prompted me to ask, shouldn’t people be notified? We have notifications of asbestos. 

There was no indication of whether the identified at risk non-ductile concrete buildings were commercial or residential or how many people might be affected. 

The commission subcommittee working group with commissioners Dean and Murphy continues their work.  

The 2538 Durant 8-story State Density Bonus project with 83 units approved by ZAB arrives at the expense of an older 4-story residential building with 12 units. In Berkeley there is little reuse of older buildings. Occasionally, a façade is saved, but usually everything is demolished to make way for the new mid-rise or high-rise building. 

I would feel better about losing these older buildings if it was a choice between a non-ductile concrete building and a new building housing more people. California YIMBY always goes for the new, but when it comes to the environment reusing old buildings in new more efficient ways carries the least impact.