Hopkins Street is a major Fire Evacuation route for 24k people living in the Berkeley hills, and even more living in the city of Kensington who evacuate into Berkeley.

Bike lanes on Hopkins Street can slow Fire Evacuation traffic and Emergency Vehicle responses. As the Paradise fire in 2021 showed us, this can be very dangerous to people seeking to evacuate. It can cost lives. Fire evacuation routes are especially important to vulnerable people who may need to evacuate; about 30% in the Berkeley hills are over age 65, as well as families with small children and disabled people.

Moreover, there is a major flaw in Berkeley’s 2017 Bike plan. It is based on interviews with 660 people; and of these ZERO percent were from hill zip code 94708, ZERO percent, and only 7%, that is, 46 people, were from the hill zip code 94707. The 93% of respondents who were reported on in the Berkeley bike plan were from the Berkeley flat lands. The bike report provided no information on those who were not interviewed, the study’s non-response rate.

On the basis of this study, city staff reported to the Council in a May 2, 2017 memo that 71% of Berkeley people were in favor of bike tracks: “A key survey finding revealed 71% of Berkeley residents fall into the “Interested but Concerned” category of individuals; i.e., they are interested in cycling or cycling more often, but are sensitive to traffic speeds and volumes.”

Now, you are planning to spend millions on bike tracks that can be used by limited numbers of Berkeley residents: mainly those who are able and who live in certain areas, not hilly areas.  

Bike tracks on Hopkins Street is a transportation plan that may negatively affect businesses in the Hopkins Street area as people now come from far and wide to shop there. The Berkeley Terner Institute reports this area as a Possible Opportunity Site for future development. Is that the plan, to have more high rise market rate housing there? If the businesses should fail? 

You recently financed a study to recommend evacuation routes for Berkeley, and according to State law, Berkeley’s Fire Chief must approve your plans. I’m sure that the fire chief will strive to see that Berkeley residents will be safe should fires occur.  

I hope you will vote against bike lanes in order to keep Hopkins Street open for fire evacuation and emergency response vehicles.

Yes, it was an April Fool's joke. No one, as far as I know, is planning to turn the Berkeley Marina into a container ship dock. But as I told author Paul Kamen, it's hard to satirize the Berkeley planning process, which is deep into self-satire these days. I thought Paul's picture of a huge red circle in the middle of the road at the Marina was Paul's clever Photo-Shop construction, but much to my horror, when we drove down to see the sunset last night I discovered that it's really there. It's horrendously ugly, of course. What were they thinking? What's it for? And I never thought I'd be one of the kind of people who are always asking this, but how much did it cost?

I probably seem like I could handle anything, and people probably assume as much when they see me. Thus, I must be exceedingly careful what messes people could unwittingly get me into. They could assume I always carry a few twenty-dollar bills in my wallet in case needed. That's more than I've often had in the bank at the end of the month. With that assumption, someone could ask me to pay a restaurant bill, and would take off before it became time to pay. What if I'm flat broke and I thought the other person was paying? 

A long time ago, I went to a wildlife museum to try to save a baby bird that my wife had rescued. They told me there the bird wasn't indigenous so they couldn't take it. They suggested I take the bird to a rescue place an hour's drive away. I could not do that. When I mentioned I couldn't just drive an hour on a moment's notice, I could have imagined this, but it seemed as though they scoffed. Apparently, since they didn't see any apparent physical defect when I went there, the assumption is that anyone can drive an hour without a problem. 

I have a policy pertaining to driving. I don't do something I can't reasonably, safely do. If I'm in any way impaired, it doesn't matter whether by fatigue, medications of any kind, or even strong emotions, I won't get behind the wheel. Secondly, I have poor stamina due to my sleep apnea. 

People do not make an effort to understand any of this, and instead they assume. I don't know this for fact, but the person at the wildlife museum might have remarked that I cared, "only so much." 

In the past, my wife and I would rent a car and drive from Martinez to Ashland, Oregon to visit her family. Years ago, I was driving on the return trip, and a lot of snow was falling. I didn't catch on time that there was a point at which I needed to stop and either put on snow chains or turn back. But the weather may have been too severe even for chains. I ended up driving in heavy snow atop slush, with no chains on a two-wheel drive Nissan Altima, in a blizzard in the mountains. Fortunately, we were not far behind a snowplow. However, it would have been very easy to spin out and get into a wreck. The four-wheel drive pickups, the only other things on the road, were passing me on the right because they didn't want to be behind me and be involved in a multiple car pile-up. I was just fortunate, and I'm pretty good at controlling a midsize car. But that's the sort of thing a person runs into with few resources when forced to deal with something. In that case, luck played a big part in getting through the situation, and not so much me being some kind of superhero--I'm not. 

In numerous work situations in my past, I've been impaired by the medication and the illness, and made valiant efforts to work jobs despite that. In some instances, I was quite successful. In other instances, too many factors worked against me, and I would quit the job in an inappropriate manner. This wasn't considered mature behavior, and it was attributed by some as caused by not having enough "fortitude." But I just wasn't up for it. I wanted to work, but some of the jobs I obtained were just too demanding for a schizophrenic man on medication. 

I was holding down work, finally, in my early and mid-twenties. I was sabotaged by multiple unfortunate events. My paranoia makes me lean toward the belief that people were intentionally messing with me. I have no evidence to prove or disprove this. 

Around 1990, I finally needed to throw in the towel and obtain SSDI and SSI. I simply needed the income, and my pride had to take a back seat to this. Was it a conspiracy? Was the treatment system finding ways to sabotage my efforts? It doesn't matter. Life is hard. You must do what you can. You must do what is needed. 

If the definition of insanity is doing the same thing and expecting different results, you have to be insane to succeed at writing at any level. However, survival is a completely different matter. While writing is a feather in your cap or a trophy on your shelf, it won't fill your belly or your gas tank. You must have a method of paying the bills. Once that's established, go ahead with being an actor, a model, a singer, a sculptor, or an author. 

At the March 21, 2023 City Council meeting you lashed out at People’s Park supporters, claiming that, as plaintiffs in the CEQA lawsuit against UC’s Housing Project #2, we caused Resources for Community Development to lose $25M.

Your condemnation contained more emotion than fact. Our lawsuit (RG21110142) is under CEQA, a state law. The law regulating HUD funding for the supportive housing at the park is a federal law, the National Historic Preservation Act (NHPA). The only reason Resources for Community Development, the developer of the supportive housing on People’s Park, lost their HUD vouchers is because that federal law was violated (Stanley.W.Toal@hud.gov, Environmental Enforcement Officer, 10/25/2022 email). UC violated that federal law when they began construction (tree cutting) on the supportive housing site on August 3^rd, before completing the environmental review process required by NHPA. The loss of HUD vouchers had nothing to do with our lawsuit!

The Rose Foundation Report documents that there are only, on average, 195 projects each year that require an EIR and only 2% of those go through any litigation. Not really the numbers that could support your and the Governor’s contention that People’s Park advocates are holding housing hostage in CA. 

And that report is conclusive in its finding that CEQA can not be correlated to any significant housing shortage or any negative effect of California’s economic growth. 

In the appeals court decision (A165451) the justices underscore that in no way was the intent of the Legislature to have CEQA’s regulations used as a redlining tool. Nevertheless you, Mayor Arreguin, choose to focus great attention on the pretext that park supporters are promoting redlining. Redlining was based on racist prejudice towards African-Americans. Today we all know that those prejudices were always without merit. The nearly two full pages (35 - 36) in the decision describing the recognition by the city of Berkeley, the University of California, and community groups, of the noise problems that have plagued Southside for so many years, reduce any inference of our prejudice against students to a level rather distinct from redlining. Your use of such hyperbole just to discredit our fair argument about noise impacts is the essence of slander, i.e. intentional mischaracterization to hurt others. 

In May 2018 when Chancellor Christ so daringly announced that People’s Park would the first site on which she was going to begin her housing initiative, she made it clear that she knew that such an undertaking was going to be fraught with problems. Her first attempt at circumventing those obstacles was to offer any developer who would take on Housing Project #2 at People’s Park a Master Developer contract on all 7 or 8 other UC building projects. 

What a deal. The bait was that developer would have to develop People’s Park first. Doesn’t that reveal something about the chancellor’s over zealousness about destroying the park? Yet no developer took the bait. They knew what lay ahead. 

Finally please hear this: We are not asking for the continuation of the status quo at People’s Park! We have offered a vision for a safer and better maintained park that is welcoming to all. Your insistence that Berkeley has to choose between student housing or the park as it is today only makes a true win/win solution less possible. We can have student housing and a replanted, rebuilt People’s Park so long as UC does not insist on building on this National Register of Historic Places site (a distinction for Berkeley that you refuse to acknowledge). 

Jail to the Chief

It's about time a law-breaking president was held to account before a court of law. But I'm not thinking about D. Trump—the ocher ogre. I'm reaching back a little further in history to draw some attention to George W. Bush.

Remember W? The guy who gave us the War on Terror? The guy who told the world "You're either with us or you're against us!" The president whose "Big Lie"—aka "Saddam Hussein's Weapons of Mass Destruction"—was falsely conjured and knowingly deployed to entangle the US for nearly a decade's worth of spilled blood under the banner of Operation Iraq Freedom.

When it comes to invasions, Vlad Putin can't hold a candle—or a cannon—next to Dubya. The first year of the Russia's invasion of Ukraine claimed more than 8,000 civilian lives. But compare that human loss to Bush's "Shock and Awe" bushwhacking of Baghdad and Fallujah. By some estimates, more than half a million Iraqis were killed by US bombs and bullets during the decade-long horror of the unprovoked, unilateral US invasion.

The crime of lying to justify an illegal aggression—that leads to the wanton slaughter of hundreds of thousands of civilians—cries out for condemnation before the International Criminal Court. Trump should ssface a prison sentence for his crimes against the Constitution and George W. Bush should be tried and jailed for his crimes against humanity. 

Tweet Revenge Is Sweet Revenge 

In the aftermath of the announcement that DJT had been indicted for buying the silence of Stormy Daniels, a siren of the X-rated screen, one of the MAGAlord's Always-Trumpers turned to Twitter to tweak Trump's blond temptress by leaving a scurrilous public insult addressed to Daniels. He angrily tapped out the message: "President Trump wouldn't touch you with a 10ft pole." 

Stormy was not at a loss. "True," she tweeted back, "he used a 3-inch one." 

Dealin' with Dylan 

I learned something while watching the superb PBS documentary, "The Movement and the Madman"—a look-back at the massive mobilization that derailed Richard Nixon's plan to threaten a nuclear strike to end the US war on Vietnam. The revelation wasn't tied to Nixon's politics, however. It was tied to the lyrics of Bob Dylan's Vietnam-era anthem, "The Chimes of Freedom." 

The filmmakers not only included lots of historical film footage of the events, they also rounded up a roster of topical songs for the soundtrack (Country Joe and the Fish's "Fixin' to Die Rag" was prominently featured) but the documentary also had a transcription option. At one point, I listened to the first line of Dylan's familiar tune while the lyrics flashed on the screen: "Far between my finished sundown and midnight's broken toll…." 

Looking at the caption, I realized that I had been mishearing the lyrics. For the better part of the past half-century, I thought Dylan was lamenting "Midnight's broken toe." 

Dan Ellsberg Week 

A note from Hanieh Jodat at RootsAction notes that during the past few weeks "widespread heartfelt tributes" followed Kensington-resident Daniel Ellsberg’s public disclosure that he has been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, with a prognosis that he has only three to six months to live. In response, RootsAction has mass-mailed the following message: "To honor and celebrate Dan’s eternal legacy, and his brave contributions to the anti-war movement, we invite you to participate in Daniel Ellsberg Week, April 24 to 30." RootsAction and Defuse Nuclear War will be collaborating on a “week of education and action to honor peacemaking and whistleblowing.” Click here for details. 

Possibilities include: 

• Ask your city council, county commission, town council, or other elected body to issue a proclamation for Daniel Ellsberg Week. (Sample language is here.) 

• Share Dan Ellsberg’s articles, interviews, and videos on the Daniel Ellsberg Week webpage via email and social media. 

• Urge the appropriate local government body or agency to name a street, highway, plaza, square, park, library, or school after Daniel Ellsberg. 

• Organize a virtual or on-the-ground seminar to teach and learn about the vast work of Daniel Ellsberg, including his latest book The Doomsday Machine. 

• Organize a vigil, picket line, or other protests—in honor of Ellsberg and his enduring anti-war, anti-nuclear legacy. 

Councilmember Sophie Hahn reports that a discussion of how to honor Dan Ellsberg will be on the agenda of the upcoming April 13 City Council meeting. 

Wilderness and Race Riots 

The Sierra Club is celebrating President Biden's designation of three new national monuments—Camp Hale-Continental Divide in Colorado, Castner Range in Texas, and Avi Kwa Ame in Nevada. With this accomplished, the Sierra Club is pushing Biden to declare a fourth national monument. But the proposed site is not a natural wonderland: it is a man-made relic of American racism—the site of the 1908 Springfield Race Riot in Illinois. 

The Club argues: "Our monuments must reflect these critical moments in our country's history." Germany, perhaps, could be cited as a model, having preserved death-camps like Auschwitz as reminders of the country's Nazi past. But the Club's rationale for enshrining "a devastating race riot"—in which a white mob lynched Black residents and torched their homes—is a bit unsettling: "Public lands must represent the diverse American experience…. When we look at public lands," the Club argues, "we want all people to see themselves and their stories and feel safe and welcome." 

A Cruiseworthy Note from The Nation 

Senator Bernie Sanders’new book,It’s OK to Be Angry About Capitalism, has shot to the top of Amazon’s bestsellers charts and now holds the #2 spot on the New York Times non-fiction bestseller list. 

Co-written and edited by The Nation’s John Nichols, the book "takes on the billionaire class and speaks blunt truths about our country’s failure to address uncontrolled greed and runaway economic inequality." 

Nichols and Sanders will be on a national speaking tour to spell out the need for radical change. In August, Nichols will join members of the public on a Nation Cruise to Alaskato further expand on the path to securing egalitarian change in America. 

The cruise ship leaves Seattle on August 13 for seven nights at sea. But there's one line in the promo that gives some cause for concern. It reads: "Along the way, the ship will cruise through Puget Sound and the unforgettable Hubbard Glacier.…" 

The Nation's publicists might want to reconsider that final note on the itinerary. As the survivors of the Titanic discovered, you can't "cruise through" a glacier. 

Who Bombed the Pipeline? 

Is the UN Security Council covering up an investigation to identify the parties responsible for blowing up Russia's Nord Stream undersea has pipelines? 

Moscow recently mounted a failed attempt to get the Security Council to approve a formal independent investigation into who was behind last September's sabotage attacks. The Russian-drafted text only won the approval of Russia, China, and Brazil. The remaining 12 council members abstained. It takes nine 'yes' votes for a Security Council motion to pass. 

Biding His Time, Breaking His Vows 

RootsAction, a progressive political action org, is coming down hard on Joe Biden, calling him a failed leader and urging Democrats to look for another candidate to contest the 2024 election. 

Biden's latest outrage involved breaking a solemn promise to address climate chaos by banning future rights to drill for oil and gas on federal land. Biden's decision to renege on his pledge involves opening drilling bids for 73 million acres in the Gulf of Mexico and approving construction of the massive Willow Oil Project on native lands in Alaska. Authorizing these two projects has been called "signing a death warrant for the planet." 

https://youtu.be/eJzwPRpR840 

In response, RootsAction as started a campaign dubbed "Don't Run Joe" (DontRunJoe.org) begging the Dems to say bye-bye to Biden and find the kind of candidate the planet and its people need—someone who is a true Green New Deal progressive. 

The DontRunJoe campaign has drawn up a list of all the swell "if-elected" promises candidate Biden made in 2020—and has failed to keep. Here's a short-list of promises that were not kept: 

• Reduce military spending (dramatically increased instead),• End drilling on federal lands (expanded instead), • Stop separating immigrant families and instead compensate them (not done),• Remove the cap on Social Security taxes exempting incomes over $160,000 (not done), • Make community college free for two years (not done), • Create the healthcare “public option” and lower the age for Medicare (instead Medicare keeps being privatized), • Provide paid sick and family leave (not done, even for railway workers whose threatened strike was outlawed), • Provide high-quality, universal pre-kindergarten for all three- and four-year-olds (not done), • Provide Section 8 housing vouchers to every eligible family so that no one has to pay more than 30% of their income for rental housing (not done),
• Make a $2 trillion investment in clean energy (way beyond what’s included in the “Inflation Reduction Act”), • Provide every city with 100,000 or more residents with high-quality, zero-emissions public transportation (not even mentioned), • Introduce a constitutional amendment to entirely eliminate private dollars from our federal elections. . . .
• Enact legislation to provide voluntary matching public funds for federal candidates receiving small dollar donations. . . .
• Restrict SuperPACs. . . .
• End dark money groups. . . .
• Ban corporate PAC contributions to candidates, and prohibit lobbyist contributions to those who they lobby,• Create automatic voter registration, same-day voter registration, early voting, universal vote-from-home and vote-by-mail options, and an election day holiday (only feebly attempted),• Heavily tax billionaires and corporations (attempted in minor ways, but the pretense that it's been done hurts efforts to do it going forward). • End US participation in the brutal Saudi war on Yemen (not done), 

• Treat Saudi Arabia as a pariah state (instead, the president famously fist-bumped the Crown Prince). 

Lend a Hand to Laura X 

Laura X is a Berkeley treasure—a member of the Free Speech Movement, founder of the World Institute, and a feminist pioneer who founded the Women's Herstory Project (Not a typo: That's her-story, not his-story). 

Recently, the following note went out to Laura's many friends and fans. If you didn't get this in your email, I'd like to share it: 

Laura X is in dire financial condition. She has donated/used her entire trust fund. She has refused to be constrained by financial advisors. It's shocking to me that someone who has been so generous all her life, someone who comes from such staggering wealth, someone as devoted to Womens' issues as Laura, should end up almost penniless. 

What caused the catastrophic financial crunch? A tooth! During a dental office visit to have two teeth extracted, one of the removed teeth vanished. An X-ray subsequently located the errant tooth lodged in one of Laura's lungs, posing an imminent risk to her health. Extensive and expensive surgery was needed, involving costs that continued to mount and were not covered by Medicare. 

A mutual friend adds: "Laura is very open about her situation so if you want further information please contact her directly: laurax@4lx.org. In the meantime, there's a GoFundMe account." 

The Indefatigable Jamie Raskin 

Interviewed by Brian Tyler Cohhen 

The US invasion of Iraq was the most catastrophic blunder in US history.

1. Claims that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction were completely false. The US Intelligence Agency produced false evidence which was later used by General Powell at an emergency session of the United Nations to justify the invasion of Iraq. Senator Byrd. of N. Carolina. impassioned speech, opposing the invasion. was ignored.

2. Prior to the invasion, the US had imposed crippling economic sanctions that resulted in the deaths of thousands of Iraqis, including 500,000 children.

3. Saddam Hussein was not responsible for the 9-11 attacks. 11 of the 19 hijackers were Saudis. Inexplicably, this was ignored by the GW Bush administration and the US media. 

4. The US Jewish lobby vehemently supported the invasion because of Saddam’s support for the Palestinians in Israel. 

5. Over 2 million Iraqis perished in the "shock and awe" invasion unleashed by the US military. Depleted uranium was used extensively, which resulted in hundreds of birth defects. 

6. Paul Bremer, the head of the Coalition Provisional Authority during the invasion, fired Saddam Hussein's highly disciplined Ba'athist army, which, seething with resentment, coalesced into the terror group, ISIS and its affiliates. 

7. Despite massive failures of the US military, from Vietnam to Afghanistan, Congress, both Democrats and Republicans, continue to reward them with record budget increases. 

8. Meanwhile, Julian Assange, who exposed US/UK war crimes, languishes in one of UK's maximum-security prisons awaiting a decision to extradite him to the US, where he faces another jail term of 175 years under the archaic Espionage Act.

Worth Noting:

Very quiet week ahead. City Council is on Spring Recess until April 11. Passover begins April 5 and Easter Sunday is April 9. The April 11 City Council meeting agenda is posted and available for comment. The Berkeley Neighborhoods Council meeting is scheduled for April 15. Check the City website for late announcements and meetings posted on short notice at: https://berkeleyca.gov/

• Monday the Personnel Board meets at 7 pm in person only.
• Tuesday at 5 pm is the final conceptual design meeting for a bike park at the waterfront and it is on ZOOM (NOT in person).
• Friday at 7 pm is a flashlight egg hunt event for 5th – 8th graders at Grove Park.

Sunday, April 2, 2023 – No city meetings listed 

Monday, April 3, 2023 

PERSONNEL BOARD at 7 pm 

In-Person Only: 1301 Shattuck, Live Oak Community Center, Fireside Room 

AGENDA: V. Recommendation to Approve Petition to Modify Unit to Accrete Paramedics, VI. Request for Extension of Temporary Police Accountability Investigator, VII. Recommendation Amending Behavioral Health Clinician Job Classification, VIII. Recommendation Amending the Mental Health Nurse Job Class Specification 

https://berkeleyca.gov/your-government/boards-commissions/personnel-board 

Tuesday, April 4, 2023 

WATERFRONT BIKE PARK COMMUNITY WORKSHOP #3 from 5 – 6 pm 

Videoconference: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/89510233540 

Teleconference: 1-669-444-9171Meeting ID: 895 1023 3540 Passcode: 94710 

AGENDA: Final conceptual design for a bike park at the Berkeley Waterfront 

https://berkeleyca.gov/community-recreation/events/waterfront-bike-park-community-workshop-3 

Wednesday, April 5, 2023 – No city meetings listed 

Thursday, April 6, 2023 - No city meetings listed 

Friday, April 7, 2023  

FLASHLIGHT EGG HUNT from 7 pm – 9 pm 

At 1730 Oregon, Grove Park 

AGENDA: Free event for teens 5th – 8th grade  

https://berkeleyca.gov/community-recreation/events/flashlight-egg-hunt 

Saturday, April 8, 2023 

Sunday, April 9, 2023 

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April 11, 2023 Agenda for CITY COUNCIL Meeting at 6 pm 

A Hybrid Meeting 

In-Person: at 1231 Addison St. in the School District Board Room 

Videoconference: https://cityofberkeley-info.zoomgov.com/j/1606544287 

Teleconference: 1-669-254-5252 or 1-833-568-8864 (toll free) Meeting ID: 160 654 4287 

https://berkeleyca.gov/your-government/city-council/city-council-agendas 

AGENDA on CONSENT: 

1. Minutes
2. Formal bid solicitations and Request for Proposals Scheduled for Possible Issuance After Council Approval on April 11, $120,000 for Mini-Bulk Swimming Pool Chemicals
3. Warhuus, HHCS - Amend Contract #31900273 add $80,000 total $11,490,274 with Bay Area Community Services North County Housing Resource Center
4. Warhuus, HHCS – Contract $249,413 with JSI Research & Training Institute, Inc for Community Health Assessment, Innovation, and Improvement Plan Consultant for HHCS for 5/1/2023 – 5/1/2025
5. Warhuus, HHCS – Contract $175,000 with Easy Does It for Provision of Wheelchair Van Service for Seniors & the Disabled
6. Warhuus, HHCS – Amend Contract #32100126 add $50,000 total $150,000 with Anjanette Scott LLC for Housing Consultant Services and extend to 6/30/2024
7. Kouyoumdjian, HR – Amend Contract #32000224 add $150,000 total $200,000 with Govinvest Labor Costing, Pension & OPEB (Other Post-Employment Benefits) Analysis Software to cover 3 years of subscription
8. Kouyoumdjian, HR – Side Letter of Agreement – SEIU, Local 1021 Community Services & Part-Time Recreation Leaders Association, MOU regarding Hazardous Substance Special Assignment Pay, effective 7/7/2022 employees who are regularly assigned to perform services to actual hours in the field and performing services in the unhoused setting receive a 3% differential
9. Fong, IT – Amend Contract #31900122-1 add $105,000 total $674,300 with Rolling Orange Inc for additional website maintenance and support 3/1/2019 – 6/30/2025
10. Ferris, PRW – Donation $3,400 for Memorial Bench at the Berkeley Marina in memory of Sophia Pritzos
11. Ferris, PRW – Lease Amendment Cazadero Performing Arts Camp for City to disburse up to $400,000 to tenant to implement capital improvements to satisfy City’s obligations under the lease
12. Ferris, PRW – Contract $3,175,000 includes 17% contingency $464,310 with Power Engineering Construction for Timber Pile Replacement Project at Berkeley Marina
13. Ferris, PRW – Amend Contract #10785 add $100,000 total $1,290,000 with West Coast Arborist, Inc for Tree Removal and Pruning Service
14. Louis BPD – Accept Grant Funding $106,014 from Board of State and Community Corrections (BSCC) Officer Wellness and Mental Health Grant Award Program 7/1/2022 – 12/1/2025
15. Peace and Justice Commission – Support 3/21/2023 Day of Action Urging Banks to Divest from Fossil Fuel Businesses
16. Sugar Sweetened Beverage Product Panel of Experts – a. Allocation $3,000,000 over two years to reduce consumption and health impacts of sugar-sweetened beverages, b. Oyekanmi COMPANIAN Report – Allocation $2,000,000 (not $3,000,0000)
17. Arreguin, co-sponsor Bartlett – Support AB 40 – Improving Ambulance Patient Offload Times develops 20 minute statewide standard
18. Arreguin, co-sponsor Taplin, Bartlett – Support AB 1001, relates to behavioral health emergency services
19. Arreguin – Fred Ross Memorial Bench in Cesar Chavez Park
20. Taplin, co-sponsors Arreguin, Bartlett, Harrison – Support AB 1690, Universal Health Care
21. Taplin, co-sponsors Bartlett, Harrison – Support AB 362, Changes real property taxation to the value of the land without regard to buildings, property or other improvements instead of current real property taxation based on appraisal
22. Harrison – Budget referral $54,000 to increase personnel funding for Berkeley Community Media
23. Harrison – Budget referral $100,000 to fund Harold Way Placemaking Project Schematic Design
24. Harrison – Budget referral $147,000 for annual staffing costs for two full-time Social Workers for Social Justice Collaborative
25. Harrison, co-sponsor Bartlett - Budget referral $100,000 to design a comprehensive Berkeley Police Early Intervention and Risk Management System
26. Harrison – Budget referral $579,000 for staffing costs associated with acquisition of and prevention of displacement of multi-family housing related to Empty Hoes Tax and implementation of TOPA
27. Harrison – Relinquishment of Council Office Budget Funds to grant Downtown Berkeley Association $500 for 2274 Shattuck Mural Project serving a municipal public purpose
28. Harrison – Support AB 641 auto dismantlers: catalytic converters expand definition to include individuals illegally in possession of two or more catalytic converters
29. Hahn, co-sponsor Wengraf – Proclaim May as Jewish American Heritage Month
30. Hahn, co-sponsor Taplin - Relinquishment of Council Office Budget Funds to grant to Kala Art Institute $500
31. Hahn, co-sponsors Bartlett, Taplin – Budget referral $250,000 to study Berkeley’s affordable and social housing needs and programmatic and funding opportunities for incomes from below 30% to 120% of AMI
32. Wengraf – Budget referral $30,000 for yield signs at two unmarked intersections at Shasta and Queens and Quail and Queens
33. Wengraf , co-sponsor Hahn, Humbert, Taplin– Budget referral $150,000 for handrails, lights and signage for City Pedestrian Path Network
34. Robinson, co-sponsors Arreguin, Harrison, Hahn – Approval of the Public Bank of the East Bay Viability Study
35. Humbert, co-sponsor Robinson – Budget referral $2,200,000 to fully fund sidewalk repair program add $1,000,000 (above the existing $1,00,000 baseline funding for sidewalk repair)

36. Harrison, co-sponsor Arreguin – Adopt ordinance adding BMC chapter 2.102 to establish a Labor Peace Policy Minimizing Labor/Management Conflict in Berkeley Marina Zone
37. Friedrichsen, Budget Manager – Unfunded Liability Obligations and Unfunded Infrastructure Needs, accept report and provide staff direction
38. Homeless Services Panel of Experts – Recommendation for RV Lot and Waste Management on Streets for RV a. Refer to staff to expediate replacement site for 742 Grayson and develop a waste management plan, b. Radu COMPANIAN Report refer (back to) Homeless Services Panel of Experts
39. Peace and Justice Commission a. Budget referral $150,000 for two health educator positions, b. Radu COMPANIAN Report refer (back to) Peace and Justice Commission

40. Environment and Climate Commission 2023 Work Plan

LAND USE CALENDAR: 

Public Hearings 

469 Kentucky (single family dwelling) 5/23/2023 

WORK SESSIONS & SPECIAL MEETINGS: 

April 18 – Hopkins Corridor Plan,  

May 16 - Fire Facilities Study Report 5/16/2023, Climate Action Plan and Resilience Update, Berkeley Economic Dashboards Update,  

Unscheduled Presentations: 

City Policies for Managing Parking Around BART Stations – check with Garland 

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Kelly Hammargren’s summary on what happened the preceding week can be found in the Berkeley Daily Planet under Activist’s Diary at: www.berkeleydailyplanet.com. 

This meeting list is also posted at: https://www.sustainableberkeleycoalition.com/whats-ahead.html 

If you would like to receive the Activist’s Calendar as soon as it is completed send an email to kellyhammargren@gmail.com. 

If you wish to stop receiving the weekly calendar of city meetings please forward the email you received to kellyhammargren@gmail.com with the request to be removed from the email list. 

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For Online Public Meetings 

CLOSED CAPTIONING, SAVE TRANSCRIPT OVERVIEW, DIRECTIONS and ZOOM SUPPORT LINKS: 

For no extra cost the ZOOM meeting application has as part of their program Closed Captioning (CC). It turns computer voice recognition into a transcript. Accuracy of the Closed Captioning is affected by background noise, the volume and clarity of the speaker, lexicons/wordbook and dialect of the speaker. The transcript will not be perfect, but most of the time reading through it the few words that don't fit, can be deciphered, like Shattuck was transcribed as Shadow in one recent transcript. 

To save a meeting transcript, click on CC for Closed Captioning at the start of the meeting. Then click on the arrow next to CC and select View Full Transcript. You will only see the transcript from the time you activated the CC. 

At the bottom of the transcript column if we, as attendees, are allowed to save the transcript, there will be a button for, "Save Transcript," you can click on the button repeatedly throughout the meeting and it will just overwrite and update the full transcript. Clicking on the "Save Transcript" repeatedly as the meeting is coming to an end is important because once the host ends the meeting, the transcript is gone if you didn't save it. 

– So click often on both "Save Transcript" and on "Save to Folder"--saving it to your computer during the meeting for best results. (These text files are not large.) 

After you have done your last "Save Transcript" and "Save to Folder"--then (after the meeting is over) you can rename the new transcript on your computer, and save it (to re-read it, or to send or share it). Remember, allowing us attendees to save the meeting transcript does not require the public meeting host to save these transcripts (for any public record.) 

Here is the link to ZOOM Support for how to set up Closed Captioning for a meeting or webinar:  

https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/8158738379917#h_01GHWATNVPW5FR304S2SVGXN2X 

Here is the link to ZOOM Support for attendees in how to save Closed Captions Transcripts: 

https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/360060958752-Using-save-captions#h_01F5XW3BGWJAKJFWCHPPZGBD70