The sobering report recently released by the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) found that "the world is likely to surpass its ambitious climate target — limiting warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) above preindustrial temperatures — by the early 2030s. Beyond that threshold, scientists have found, climate disasters will become so extreme that people will not be able to adapt." 

Climate change is the major culprit while some of the problems stem from El Niño, which causes temperatures to rise. El Niño may subside next year, bringing somewhat cooler conditions. When it does, it could bring even worse disasters than this year’s El Niño because climate change will have continued to warm the planet all the while. 

It has long been known that humans impact our atmosphere severely and our unrelenting production of carbon dioxide (and other greenhouse gases) increase the effects of the naturally occurring "greenhouse effect" that keeps our planet habitable. The more CO₂ we pump into our atmosphere, the warmer the atmosphere gets. This is a scientific fact based on decades of scientific study. The main cause of the increase in global average temperatures in recent history is not because of any natural cycle -- although natural cycles do exist -- it is because of man. 

While humans cannot prevent El Niño, they could have done something about climate change. Anything that would have reduced greenhouse gasses would have helped. While much of the world has taken steps to cut human emissions, experts continue to say that progress has been too slow to stop or reverse global warming.  

As a result, all of humanity with suffer slow, painful, untimely deaths, increasing global temperatures will cause sea levels to rise and will produce more intense weather and changes in precipitation patterns, changes in crop yields, glacier melting, extinction of species and the spread of disease.  

The effects of climate change are happening now before our eyes. A severe and prolonged heat wave is occurring around much of the country where temperatures exceeded 100 degrees Fahrenheit this past weekend: Sacramento 107 degrees; Las Vegas 107 degrees; El Paso 106 degrees; Phoenix 118 degrees. Areas in New York and Vermont just saw as much rain in a day as is typical for all of July. Part of the Midwest is in a severe drought. Wildfire smoke recently blanketed the Midwest and Northeast giving U.S. cities at times the worst air quality in the world. 

Our efforts to combat climate change have been too little, too late, and no brilliant energy breakthrough technology is around the corner that will save us from impending climate doom. Unfortunately, we lacked the political will to combat climate change and now must live with the terrible consequences. 

While we’re sitting in Berkeley with temperatures in the comfortable 70’s, it’s been big news the last couple of weeks that the planet just finished the hottest June ever recorded and July 4th was the hottest recorded day on earth.

As I write the heat domes in the U.S. South including Texas are moving into California, New York City and the surrounding area are under flood warnings (this is not the floods in Vermont and the Hudson Valley that started the week), the Minneapolis air quality index is in the unhealthy zone greater than 150 from Canadian wildfires now numbering somewhere around 900, the ocean temperature off Florida reached 98.1° and Farmers Insurance pulled out of Florida. Iowa meteorologist Chris Gloninger made the news after quitting his job in Des Moines, Iowa, over death threats for his coverage of climate change in the weather reports, and Ari Melber on his MSNBC show The Beat asked Bill Nye the Science Guy if this is the new normal.

Bill Nye gave Melber the same answer Michael Mann gave Thom Hartmann some weeks ago. There is no normal. Normal implies stability.

On a heating planet there is no new normal except that it is going to get worse. 

Gaia Vince in her book Nomad Century: How Climate Migration Will Reshape Our World called fire, heat, drought and flood the “Four Horsemen of the Anthropocene”, the driving forces of the future. Before diving into climate migration, Vince described that we are on track to hit 3 - 4°C of warming by 2100 (with mitigation. It could be worse without) and what that will bring. We are at 1.2°C of warming now and will likely blow by 1.5°C by 2030. Her description is pretty bleak , with food shortages, crop failures, large swathes of the planet as unlivable all or much of the year, including the tropics, Europe, much of Australia, South America, Africa, Asia and the U.S. That leaves as livable areas Patagonia, Canada, Siberia and northern Scandinavia. 

I couldn’t help but think about Councilmember Bartlett’s measure on the June 27th consent calendar, Berkeley Food Utility and Access Resilience Measure (FARM). FARM was written to protect Berkeley’s food supply and prepare for future food shortages. Part of the discussion at the Health, Life Enrichment, Equity, & Community Committee was how Emeryville is getting the jump on Berkeley with lab grown meats and synthesized foods. I kept wondering how all these lab grown foods will affect the gut biome, and then how soon the crisis will arrive. FARM passed as a referral to the City Manager. 

Vince compares our damage to the planet in the span of just the recent 20 years to the asteroid that crashed into the Yucatan Peninsula 66 million years, yago killing off plants, animals and non-avian dinosaurs. Birds survived. 

We (our species) have done so much damage to the planet in such a short period of time that there has been no opportunity for the other species to evolve, except maybe the viruses, bacteria and fungi which have evolved to evade medical treatments like antibiotics and antivirals. Birds may have survived the asteroid from space, but I’m not sure they will survive us. 

While I was reading the last chapter of Nomad Century with the glowing benefits migrants bring, I glanced at the news banner on my phone, “The Dutch government collapsed after the parties in the ruling coalition failed to resolve a dispute about how to handle migration.” That was July 7. The Prime Minister Mark Rutte resigned though he will stay on as a “caretaker government” until a new administration is elected. 

Jeff Goodell author of The Heat Will Kill You First: Life and Death on a Scorched Planet said this in a Democracy Now interview, “We have not at all come close to grasping the scale and scope of the crisis we are facing.” 

Berkeley, which still has a place of influence, is operating as if it is 1990. 

Moving on to Berkeley, just exactly what has our City government been up to since I last wrote besides supporting the release 1.3 million tons of nuclear waste water from the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant meltdown into the Pacific Ocean where it will wash up onto our shores? Ben Bartlett called it, “a sin against nature.” Sophie Hahn said nothing, but maintained support for the resolution. 

Kate Harrison wrote the Resolution for the July 11, 2023 City Council meeting: to oppose Japan’s Planned Discharge of Wastewater from Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant into the Pacific Ocean, with the action to send copies of the resolution to oppose the release of nuclear waste water to Secretary Blinken, Senator Feinstein, Senator Padilla and Representative Lee. 

It was close to 9 pm when the vote on the consent calendar was taken. Terry Taplin said that after public comment, he changed his mind and would support the resolution. That was not enough. Mayor Arreguin, and Councilmembers Rashi Kesarwani, Susan Wengraf, Rigel Robinson, and Mark Humbert all abstained from supporting the resolution, which meant the resolution lost, leaving Berkeley as essentially supporting dumping nuclear waste water into the Pacific Ocean. 

Before the other big item of the evening, the Auditor’s report on hiring and retention of City staff, the Council had to get through the discussion of Sophie Hahn’s Resolution on dedicating time at council meetings for the City of Berkeley unions to make comments. Mark Humbert blocked moving the item to consent. Humbert’s issue: If unions had a block of time then so should students. 

I am often surprised by people who should know better, like council members and council appointees, of how little they know about the public face of our city government, how things work or what decisions / actions have been taken or are up for a vote. 

I shouldn’t be surprised. Both Arreguin and Wengraf have confessed of late as to not reading the documents for the Agenda and Rules Committee on which they sit. They also have failed to demand that the City Manager submit reports in time for publication in the Agenda and Rules packet. 

The news media who showed up with their video cameras for the July 11 council meeting were there for the vote on entheogenic/psychedelic plants and fungi for personal use. They missed what should have been the stories, the vote on the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant and the City Manager’s response to the audit on staff hiring and retention. 

The resolution to de-prioritize enforcement on entheogenic/psychedelic plants and fungi for personal use was moved from action to consent and passed with little fanfare. 

Humbert received a polite smackdown for insisting that if City unions have time so should students. There is a City/UC/Student Relations Committee (four council members, two UC members, two undergraduate and two graduate students) which has existed for seven years. Robinson also described what Humbert suggested as “othering” of students. Harrison described the importance of line staff and a place for comment. Kesarwani and Wengraf as usual needed clarification/explanations. Humbert withdrew his objection and the resolution passed. 

It took until 9:50 pm to get to the Auditor’s Report on “Staff Shortages: City Services Constrained by Staff Retention Challenges and Delayed Hiring.” Translation, more people are leaving Berkeley jobs than are being hired. Over half of the employees surveyed reported looking for another job in the previous year and the hiring process is now at 7.7 months. 

Berkeley’s vacancy rate at 19% is second to Vallejo’s at 28%. San Francisco’s is 9%. Berkeley’s Human Resources Department (HR) had the highest vacancy rate at 45%. Not mentioned was that the former manager of HR, LaTanya Bellow, was promoted to Deputy City Manager. 

The full report (60 pages), the auditor’s presentation and the City Manager’s response are under item 31 in the July 11 city council agenda. https://berkeleyca.gov/city-council-regular-meeting-eagenda-july-11-2023 

The Employer of Choice Initiative mentioned in the blistering response to the audit from union representative Andrea Mullarkey, was covered in the Activist’s Diary for the week ending March 5, published March 12, 2023. https://www.berkeleydailyplanet.com/issue/2023-03-12/article/50212?headline=A-Berkeley-Activist-s-Diary-Week-Ending-March-5 : 

“I am Andrea Mullarkey, a member leader with SEIU. I’m also a librarian. I’m here first to acknowledge the work that went into this audit and to appreciate the elevation of worker voice and how clearly the audit report delineates the problems…already we can hear the City Manager and administration downplaying the findings and making excuses for the circumstances we’re in and blaming others for the problems me and my coworkers were experiencing. 

I also hear we are hyping up our Employer of Choice Initiative and I can tell you from my first-hand experience these problems existed before the pandemic...they were not caused by it and have not been resolved since...I can also tell you from first-hand experience that any suggestion of the amount of legislation you all are taking is a problem, that is a distraction…The City Manager has already taken steps to limit the amount of progressive work you do and I have no doubt she’ll seize on this one piece of the audit finding to drive her agenda further, and I’m here to say it’s not appropriate. 

As members in a progressive union, we are not interested in seeing you slow down the work you’re doing to advance racial equity, economic equity, and more progressive advances within Berkeley. The other thing I can tell you is that rather than dealing with the structural problems at the crux of this audit, the City Manager has invested in an expensive Employer of Choice initiative. No amount of free food or motivational speakers are going to solve the kind of alienation workers are experiencing. 

City Managers refuse to confer with us, or bargain in bad faith with us about our pay and benefits, or when they contract out our work and refused to address the gaping holes and broken structure in our HR Departments, all of which led to grievances which pile up one upon the other. I have literally filed three grievances this week about people not getting paid…And, instead of spending $1,000,000 on the Employers of Choice Initiative, this should be invested through programs and workers that provide them. It’s insulting to workers who could’ve provided this information all along and we have been voicing these concerns in every available menu. 

If nothing else is clear from this audit, surely you can see that workers are dissatisfied…A pervasive belief that management doesn’t care about our well-being and we’re thinking about leaving should ring alarm bells for you. When lack of transparency is an alarm bell we repeat, the answer is not lack of consultants…We are the workers who deliver the services and we’re overworked and excluded from the decision…It is increasing clear that we can’t survive in our jobs and you deserve better…I thank the auditor for this truth telling work for workers and with workers on behalf of the public we serve, and now it’s your opportunity and responsibility to address the mismanagement that led to it.” 

At 10:41 pm after Mullarkey and other city employees commented on the audit and before the City Manager gave her response, the mayor announced council would not take up the adoption of the Civic Center Phase II Design Concept. 

Someone came by handing out a printout of the City Manager’s response ,which was soon on the BUSD room video screens with the City Manager talking through it. One comment to me was, “What was that?” And, that really describes the City Manager’s defensive posturing. 

I missed the entire community meeting on the African American Holistic Center (AAHC), however, even though the meeting was officially over, the meeting room was still full when I arrived for the Parks, Recreation and Waterfront Commission. The AAHC will be 6000 square feet as the community requested and a completely new building on the Alcatraz site. There will be more meetings with at least one in August. 

The Parks, Recreation and Waterfront Commission (PRW) passed the “Parks, Recreation & Waterfront Commission Report & Recommendation to City Council Regarding Berkeley Waterfront Area Specific Plan.” The Commission Report calls the Keyser Marston study (the consultants hired by the City) a “marketing plan” for “revenue” and that as such should not be used for waterfront area planning. 

The Commission recommendations are certainly an improvement over the consultants hired with a price tag of over $1,000,000, but as someone who worries about the impact of our species and our pets on biodiversity, I would have liked the presence of stronger language with specific areas of habitat protections. 

If Berkeley is going to operate like the environment, biodiversity, and climate actually matter, then everything picked up must realign to specific protections and planning around nature rather than profit. 

Item 9 on the PRW agenda and item 19 on the July 25 City Council agenda are the authorization to amend the existing repayment of the State Division of Boating and Waterways loan of $5,500,000 for the D and E Dock Replacement Project with an internal loan to the Marina Fund from the Worker’s Compensation Fund and to charge the Marina Fund interest for the internal loan. Charging one city entity/cost center (the Marina) to shift city funds from another entity/cost center (worker’s comp funds) smacks of one more way to break the Marina/Waterfront and insist all that marketing and revenue generation is necessary leaving trampling over open space and nature with development as just the cost of doing business. 

Before the extended 4th of July holiday the Mayor and Council voted on all the tax increases and the update to the Fiscal Year 2024 Budget 

All of us who own property are going to be paying more to get our garbage, recyclables and compostables (green bin) picked up. The new fees will increase every year for the next five years though Harrison inserted the language (approved unanimously by Council) to review rates and alternatives in two years. 

If you want to save money on garbage pickup, switch to a smaller size container (20 gallons is the smallest). There is nothing we can do to alleviate the increases on the other fees like the clean stormwater fee and street lighting assessment. The results of all the increases will appear on the property tax statements when they arrive this fall. 

Berkeley is on a biennial budget, which means the 2024 budget is tweaking and adjusting what was passed last June in 2022. Streets, street signals, consultants for a street parcel tax, a study on fees for development in the southside, adding a Police Accountability Board Investigator for police misconduct investigations, early intervention in police misconduct, and a study of Universal Income Pilot were all funded.  

The 2020 Reparations Now street mural on Ellis which was painted over following a complaint was restored with Councilmember Bartlett initiating the measure with a $1000 contribution from his office funds. Councilmembers Harrison, Robinson, Hahn, Kesarwani and Humbert all contributed. The three who did not contribute were Arreguin, Taplin and Wengraf. 

Berkeley’s Health Officer, Dr. Hernandez resigned to take a job in Santa Cruz. 

 

 

 

The Future: Connected Homes Filled with Disconnected Families
The corporados behind the introduction of the "Xfinity 10G network" are filling the airways with radio spots promoting the adoption of wireless communications technologies that (unlike existing copper-wire networks) bathe human customers—and all noncustomers within range of the high-intensity transmitters—in an invisible, vibrating tide of electromagnetic frequencies (EMFs) 24 hours a day, every minute of the day. 

But while the marvel of wireless transmission comes with troublesome side-effects that can harm human health, the social impacts are also disturbing. A recent radio ad promoting Xfinity's 10G networks proudly proclaims that, thanks to the latest levels of connectivity, "The Future Starts Now." 

The radio spots then proceed to paint a picture of Xfinity's ideal family of the future—where someone is "streaming a movie in their room, while some else is watching a video in the basement, and someone else is 'TikToking' in the kitchen." 

So this is the family of the future: Segregated, compartmentalized, isolated, living separate lives under the same roof and becoming more connected to their glowing screens as they become more distanced and disconnected from one another. Can't say they didn't warn us. 

Stark Stats from Mama-Jo
Mother Jones magazine is offering a real steal of a deal for new subscribers: six issues of the prizewinning bimonthly for $10 or "the price of a pizza." The offer comes in the form of a mini-mag sent in the mail. All 16 pages are busting with eye-popping references to stories the magazine has broken. Scoops like the following:
• "The hidden costs of US gun violence add up to $229 billion a year";
• "Your veggie burger may contain an EPA-registered air pollutant"; 

• "Two-thirds of US companies pay no income tax";
• "There are 100 CEOs who've amassed more retirement savings than 41% of all American combined";
• "59% of registered voters say mainstream corporate media is 'a major threat to democracy'"
• "2/3 of US companies pay no federal income tax";
• "Exxon Mobil, the world's largest oil company, knew global warming was real as early as 1981—but has spent tens of millions of dollars funding think tank research to promote climate denial";
• "Hot weather increases the risk of early childbirth, which in turn is linked to worse health and developmental outcomes for children." 

Suffering from Asthma? Plant More Female Trees!
Today, allergies affect more than 30% of adults and 40% of kids in the US. According to one 2012 study, pollen levels are expected to double by 2040. Pollen-producing male trees predominate in today's urban settings and most parks and backyards are surrounded by stands of male-only trees—all owing to a single USDA recommendation that was handed down in 1949. The USDA ruled that male trees were considered easier to maintain while female trees were "messy"—a reference to the produce falling from fruit-bearing trees. 

Completely banning female forests—a practice that has been called "botanical sexism"—has meant that, without female trees nearby, there was nowhere for the male pollen to settle but inside the noses, throats, and lungs of millions of sneezing humans and wildlife. The annual pollen problem (which guarantees a windfall for the antihistamine industry) would suffer if gender-mixed or fully female forests were encouraged. 

 

The Claritin company (part of the powerful global Bayer empire) has taken the first step toward rendering "gender justice" by funding the country's first female woodland at Forest Hill Park in Richmond, Virginia—"one of the worst cities for allergies." The Claritin folks (who make their profits off the sale of treatments for "allergy relief") have started the Claritin DiversiTree campaign "to help restore botanical balance, one female tree at a time." The proposition looks like a cosmetic operation designed to generate good will rather than to achieve botanical diversity. If the DiversiTree program were to succeed, Claritin would be putting itself out of business. 

Faux Fox News: Arrested Developments
What's up between Fox News and Special News Media? On July 9, an online newsflash appearing to belong to Fox News announced the arrests of Joe Biden and his son, Hunter. The visual posting showed Fox anchor Jon Scott alongside a photo of an unshaven, handcuffed, T-shirt-wearing Hunter Biden being lead away by a police offer while another clearly fraudulent paste-job appeared to show the senior Biden on his knees while another cop clamped the president's hands behind his neck. 

Adding to the mystery, the Special News Media's online homepage seems devoted to a series of short videos showing how to make Middle Eastern pastries. 

Fashion Plates 

KLASYK: Classy Kay 

RGAMFN: Ragamuffin 

TESTHLA: On a Tesla 

SUM NERV: Some Nerve 

EATSUKI: And munch mochi 

FIATSLG: Let There Be Slugs? 

NOTNAR: Not an Assault Rifle? 

ORKIDS: Orchids (or Kids from Oregon?) 

PAW FUND: Donate to an Animal Shelter today 

UAW658: Member of an Autoworkers Union in Ohio 

TAJGLAM: Taj is in the Glam biz and drives a big pink Jeep 

Bumper Snickers 

"We Still Have Each Other" 

"Don't make me release the flying monkeys" 

"Every time a Christian defends Trump an angel loses its lunch" 

"Men should be glad women want equality and not revenge" 

"The future ain't what it used to be." — Yogi Berra 

"Renewable, Multi-Origami, Solar Bicycle Mobil Home." "No Trespassing." (Two signs posted on a sidewalk shelter assembled by the unhoused owner of several bicycles lashed together to form a movable home.) 

Insurance Giants Cut Losses While Profiting Off Global Warming
Allstate, State Farm and Farmers Insurance Group have all elected to drop home, auto, and other insurance policies for customers in California and other states wracked by extreme weather. 

We've all read the dire (and drier) news: July 3 was the hottest day experienced on our planet in 125,000 years. And that record was broken again the very next day. But Robert Weissman, president of Public Citizen, exposes another reason we Earth-dwellers have reason to be steamed. As Weissman recently wrote: "Farmers has invested massively in fossil fuels. And its affiliated company, Zurich Insurance Group in Switzerland, is a major insurer of the oil and gas industries — the very industries that have brought us to the brink of climate catastrophe in the first place!" 

The Zurich insurance firm currently boasts a market value of $71 billion which, as Weissman points out, is "more than the combined gross domestic products of the world’s 42 poorest countries — the citizens of which will suffer far more from climate chaos than will [Zurich's] corporate executives lounging about in lodges in the Swiss Alps." 

Public Citizen has whipped up an online letter to Farmers' executives. It concludes by stating: 

"Your myopic pursuit of short-term profits by propping up dirty energy is actually undermining your own market—not to mention putting all of humanity and our entire planet in peril." 

Rep. Katie Porter Hosts a Game of JeoparDOD
Mister Chairman, I yield the podium to the honorable gentlewoman from California, Wizard of the White Board and current Senate candidate, Katie Porter: 

"Each year, Congress and defense lobbyists play a game. Defense lobbyists push for more spending than is necessary, and lawmakers—too afraid to look weak on defense—give in. It’s the taxpayers who lose. 

"In yesterday’s Oversight Committee Hearing I turned that game around on Department of Defense (DOD) officials with a game called “JeoparDOD." 

"The answers to these questions are troubling. Here are a few of them: 

• Which President allowed defense spending to grow by $100 billion in four years?
Who is Donald Trump 

• What program is $183 billion dollars over budget and ten years behind schedule?
What is the F-35 program 

• What has the Department of Defense failed to pass for years?
What is an audit
• What percentage of DOD’s assets can it not account for? 

What is 61% 

"Look, if my kids couldn’t tell me where 61% of their allowance had gone, I wouldn’t give them more allowance. Our military isn’t benefiting from this lack of financial oversight. Just one group is: Big Defense Contractors. 

Defense contractors and corporations' pockets are being padded thanks to their influence in politics. In fact, defense contractors spent $101 million on lobbying in just the first three quarters of 2022. 

"As a champion of oversight, I’m going to keep pushing against leaders in both parties to make sure taxpayer dollars aren’t handouts to private defense contractors." 

Watch the proceedings here: 

--- 

Subsidies for the Rich; Subsistence for the Poor
The Coalition on Human Needs is outraged by the House GOPsters' efforts to cut funding for tracking down super-rich tax cheats while creating a tax plan that shifts more that $1 trillion to the wealthiest Americans, large corporations, and foreign investors. 

At the same time, the House Appropriations Committee has moved to clip hundreds of millions of dollars from the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children along with other cuts that "will cause real harm to millions of people with low incomes, people with disabilities, children, and vulnerable communities." 

Meanwhile, the House pushed for increasing the Pentagon's budget to $886 billion—with half of the loot being passed on to rich and powerful military contractors. 

The Institute for Policy Studies points out that trimming the Pentagon's annual windfall by a mere 10% could repurpose enough cash to fund "10.95 million housing units for one year, 8.45 million Head Start slots for low-income children, or low-income health care for 32.04 million children or 18.64 million adults." 

When It Comes to Bombs, Biden Blows It
Win Without War has called Joe Biden’s call to ship cluster bombs to Ukraine "a devastating error." 

The reason is as clear as a child with an amputated arm. When cluster munitions are used, as many as 94% of weapons' casualties are civilians—and 40% of the victims are children. That’s what prompted more than 100 countries to sign an international treaty banning cluster bombs. The US, Russia, and Ukraine have refused to sign the treaty. 

As Win Without War notes, "When Russia used cluster bombs in Ukraine last year, the Biden administration said it was a 'potential war crime' and emphatically declared at the UN that cluster bombs have 'no place on the battlefield.' But now the Biden administration is supplying these very weapons."  

An act of Congress could have blocked this transfer of cluster bombs. Reps. Sara Jacobs and Ilhan Omar co-authored an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act that would have halted stop the provision of US cluster bombs. Unfortunately, the amendment was not adopted and these horrific weapons have already begun to arrive in Ukraine. 

Needed: Pork Chops from the Pentagon's Pigs
The Pentagon’s proposed budget for 2024 is a whopping $886 billion—$28 billion more than the Pentagon's 2023 budget. Meanwhile, almost all other federal spending remains frozen for the next two years as a result of the Republican Party’s cold-hearted brinkmanship over the looming debt ceiling. 

For a bit of perspective, let's note that the $28 billion increase is twice that of the entire budget of the Environmental Protection Agency. The Pentagon will be receiving more money than the Departments of Education, Health and Human Services, Justice, State, and Transportation combined. 

The US already spends more on our military than the next nine countries combined—and that includes China and Russia. Washington actually spends 10 times what Russia spends on its military. 

But saying the Pentagon "spent" this money is misleading. The better word would be "misspent." The Pentagon was caught trying to suppress a damning report that revealed more than $100 billion of the defense budget was lost to "waste." 

The Department of Defense has yet to pass an audit. In its most recent fiscal accounting the Pentagon could only account for only 39% of its $3.5 trillion in assets. 

Washington's habit of pouring so much money into the military's missiles and muzzles means increasingly less money is available to provide healthcare, housing and education, let alone addressing the damage wrought by collapsing infrastructure and the compounding devastation of climate chaos. 

In response, Representatives Barbara Lee and Mark Pocan introduced an amendment to the Pentagon budget that would cut $100 billion from weapons and waste and redirect that money to priority human needs. 

Tell Congress to Pass the Lee/Pocan amendment to cut $100 billion from the Pentagon’s massively bloated budget. Click now to add your name. 

One Last Action: Tell the Senate to "Drop Elliot Abrams"
On July 13, CODEPINK sent out a Dread Alert that President Biden had nominated the notorious right-wing meddler Elliott Abrams to a key advisory committee on diplomacy. "Abrams knows absolutely nothing about diplomacy," CODEPINK responded, pointing to Abrams' long history of "lying and making policy that led to the death and suffering of innocent people from Guatemala to Iraq. He embraces militarism, covers up for gross human rights abuses, and has a history of supporting authoritarian regimes." 

CODEPINK offers the following rap sheet on Abrams' criminal record: 

• In the 1980s, he defended the infamous Guatemalan General Efraín Ríos Montt, whose violent crackdown on the indigenous Mayan people of Guatemala was so brutal that it was classified as genocide by the United Nations. 

• He denied that the Salvadoran military was responsible for the devastating El Mozote massacre where, in 1981, a US-trained battalion murdered more than 500 civilians, slitting the throats of children along the way. 

• He is vehemently anti-Palestinian and shamelessly supports Israel. He repeatedly undercut any US pressure on Israel to stop the building of settlements. 

• In 1991, Abrams pled guilty to withholding information from Congress related to his involvement in the Iran-Contra scandal, the secret and illegal scam in the 1980s to siphon profits from Iranian weapons sales to support the right-wing Contra rebels trying to overthrow the Sandinista government. 

• Abrams was a key supporter of the disastrous invasion of Iraq. In 1998, he submitted a letter to President Clinton encouraging him to depose Saddam Hussein. 

• Abrams championed the US overthrow of Muammar Gaddafi. 

• Abrams’ opposition to the Iran Nuclear Deal is epitomized by his attempts to encourage Israel to bomb Iran’s nuclear sites before negotiations became too serious. 

• In January 2019, Abrams was appointed to be the US Special Representative for Venezuela, and used his position to support an attempted coup, quash diplomatic talks, and increase brutal sanctions, even during the pandemic. 

"So...," CODEPINK concludes, "would you hire [Abrams] for a job that requires the applicant to be diplomatic? We sure as hell wouldn't. The Senate approving his appointment would be a disaster for peace and justice. 

Tell your Senators to vote NO on his appointment! 

 

I've lost count of how many times the city of Berkeley has destroyed our traffic circle garden. The most recent was on of June 30 when I went out and stopped the subcontractors (a group of Spanish speaking laborers) from scrapping to the wet, swampy, mud the garden our community has worked so hard to create. Ironically, just a few weeks previously a neighbor asked on the local neighborhood email list: "I have no idea who is responsible for the wildflowers that are growing in the round about but thank you! It has never looked better." 

The photos below show what it looked like after the city sent out a crew to "weed" it on June 30. I stopped them before they killed every one of the bee and butterfly plants we'd carefully planted, tended to, and nourished for the past several years. The viability of bees and butterflies is more than an issue of aesthetics. The health of such creatures are a signal and a warning of our own health and long term survival.  

Linda Franklin served on the city's circle task force, so you'd think they'd reach out to her before destroying what so many of us have worked so hard on, spending substantial sums of money and uncountable hours... but no, it's all burn it to the ground in our town. Hopefully this will not happen yet again. Linda and I spoke with Mr Griffin this morning and he swore we would be contacted before another city worker was sent out to destroy what so many of us worked so hard to create.

Many of my readers probably know what it is like to go through a psychotic episode. It is hell. It is not only hell on the psychotic person, but also on family and anyone else who is trying to help a psychotic person get into treatment.

People probably wish they could wave a magic wand and get a relative or close person into treatment, whether voluntary or not. Just get meds into the person, any method that works. People have put medication into a relative's food. There are probably odder methods that can be thought up.

A psychotic person's belief system is usually fully out of sync with reality when their illness is in the severe stages. I'm aware of all of this because I have been psychotic.

I've been hospitalized four or five times in psych wards, and all but the first were relapses due to going off medication against medical advice--wherein I needed to be medicated to get a grasp of reality and get the psychosis under control.

Coming back to reality was good. The extreme disconnection from normal mental function had prevented me from interacting with anyone and it had made me exceedingly disabled. In some instances, I posed a danger--caused by disconnection from reality. How would it be if you believed that you could fly at will and you planned to get into a ten-thousand-pound speeding truck to prove it? Not to mention, psychosis is a harrowing thing to go through--and that's a vast understatement. 

When ill, I anticipated a major change for the better because I believed I was going to get something on which I was fixated. Upon returning to truth, I had the realization that it wasn't going to happen. This was disappointing. But the disappointment and facing the emotional pain inherent in my situation, included a release. And it included reaching acceptance. This doesn't encapsulate the problem. 

The deeper problem is where my brain has a biochemical malfunction that is about ninety percent responsible for me getting sick. But part of coming back is where I've accepted that what I'd hoped for wasn't going to happen--whatever it was at the time. The realization is important. 

Part of getting well on a long-term basis includes learning mindfulness in which you don't "cling" as heavily. The Four Noble Truths of Buddha: Number 2: "Suffering is caused by clinging." If you can't let go of something that life refuses to give you, you're stuck. If your mind refuses to release an unrealistic pipe dream, most likely you are headed the wrong way. 

You can pay now, or you can pay later. If you hang on too tightly to a person place or thing that you can't have, you will get sick. "Normal people" not subject to mental illness, find other ways to create problems for themselves and other people. Normal people could be just as insistent on getting something they can't have, but it doesn't cause a relapse of psychosis or mood swings. Non mentally ill people are just as capable of creating a nuisance, but it will be an "appropriate" nuisance, one that isn't condemned. 

Mindfulness is therapeutic, along with medication and not instead of it. Mindfulness can be the magic wedge that allows you to voluntarily take prescribed medication. 

I am still susceptible to illusions, and I continue to need medication to maintain a semblance of normal. But my practices of mindfulness have yielded the capacity to let go. Please note this is not the equivalent of giving up. You should never give up on life. And if you're in the middle of trying to accomplish something realistically attainable, maybe postpone getting sick until after you pass the finish line. 

People are very condemnatory. Social norms are narrowing, and we live in a culture of non-permission. Society frowns on people who are after something they can't have. That's not good or evil; that's just how it is. You can say society is unfair, but at the end of the day, we must comply with the applicable part of society (e.g., courts, police, candy stores, doctors) insists that we do. 

You could paint me as a disgruntled "normal, lazy, shameful" person but that's just not accurate. You should have seen me in '96, in '90, or at the beginning of the eighties. It is a biological condition and not a character deficiency. 

This is not to claim that I've had fabulous character. I try to do the right thing, that's all I can say. Bad character doesn't cause mental illness. Good character doesn't cause health. 

Mindfulness also helps combat anosognosia. When I emotionally reached acceptance of my illness and became emotionally okay that I have a condition requiring treatment, this greatly reduces susceptibility to lack of insight about the condition. This accepting attitude comes from years of practicing mindfulness.  

 

Jack Bragen writes and lives in Martinez, California.  

 

On Monday, July 24 at 6:00 PM, the hearing on the appeal, filed by more than 100 people who live around Willard Park objecting to the replacement building and the variance granted by the Zoning Adjustment Board will be heard by the City Council. This special meeting will be held on Monday, July 24 at 6 pm at the “West Campus “ 1231 Addison Street. People can attend in person or on Zoom. This appeal is the only item on the agenda for this meeting. 

If you are not aware of the history of this project, here is a brief outline. The Parks and Recreation Department decided that some T1 Park Bond funds should be used to enhance recreation facilities for this southside neighborhood. The first planning session was held just before Covid. Most neighbors were not notified and did not attend. The Parks and Recreation staff took the recommendations of the people who attended this meeting as the basis for their plan for the project. When neighbors learned of the project, approximately two years ago, they worked to have their suggestions and concerns taken into account. They have attended countless meetings, both in person and on Zoom, and have tried to meet with Parks and Recreation staff and their city council representatives, all to no avail. Councilmembers Ben Bartlett and Kate Harrison did come to Willard Park for a tour and to hear about concerns about the project. 

The existing clubhouse is approximately 875 square feet, including the fenced in front terrace. The current plan is to construct a community center in its place with a footprint of at least 3200 square feet. This project will require the removal of seven mature 30 foot trees and a large concrete plaza that is heavily used, particularly when the grass in the park is wet. The current clubhouse is the base for the children’s after school program and for the children’s summer program. The rationale for the increase in size is given as being needed in order to expand the number of children it can serve from 45 to 60. As it is now designed, the new building will include two large public rooms that can be combined into one, a full kitchen, three bathrooms, an office, a storage room and other areas needed to support a facility of this size. The budget for this project (which also includes relocating and rebuilding the public bathroom for other park users) is $7M.  

At the Zoning Adjustments Board (ZAB), the city staff requested and received a variance to reduce the required setback between the back side of this community center building to the residential buildings immediately behind it from 20 feet to 16 feet.  

The neighbors' position is that the replacement for the existing Clubhouse is too large for our small park. They are in favor of replacing and updating the Clubhouse, but the replacement structure needs to be in keeping with the function of serving children in the afterschool program and the summer program. The city now describes it as a “Community Center”, not a “Clubhouse”. The city has refused a request to install view “story” poles that would let park users understand just how large the replacement building would be and the number of trees that will be cut down. City staff has not complied with Measure L (1986) which restricts the amount of open space that can be removed from a park without a vote of the citizens of Berkeley. The City has not done a CEQA evaluation which is required when one structure is replaced by another that has a different function. Previous presentations by Parks and Rec staff have proposed the opportunity for private parties to rent out the Community Center for private events. Finally, neighbors have requested meetings with the successive city council representatives for this district but have been refused. 

The appeal challenges the variance to reduce the required setback on the south side of the building from 20 feet to 16 feet. The Zoning Adjustments Board approved the variance without any reason other than the fact that they want to approve the Community Center. This reason is not legally sufficient for a variance. 

The neighbors think that the replacement building is too large, and would change the use of the building from Clubhouse to Community Center. Willard is a small park that is heavily used and enjoyed by families, Cal students, dog walkers, tennis players, yoga and Tai-Chi practitioners and neighbors of all ages. The park, with a popular tot-lot, expansive open space and trees works well. Neighbors are trying to protect the children’s programs and their outdoor play area. Neighbors are concerned that the proposed larger community center with the possibility of private event rentals would overwhelm the current park and the neighborhood. 

Everyone who is interested in preserving Willard Park as a park that works for the southside community is invited to come to the hearing on the appeal on July 24 at 6 pm at 1231 Addison Street.  

he recent report by The Center for Policy and Research, titled "American Torturers: FBI and CIA Abuses at Dark Sites and Guantánamo," sheds light on the horrifying experiences endured by Abu Zubaydah since 2002. Through 40 haunting drawings, he vividly illustrates the inhumane treatment inflicted upon him. 

The United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention has issued a call for Abu Zubaydah's immediate release, emphasizing the urgency of addressing the injustice he has suffered. Holding an individual without charge for an extended period violates human rights and undermines principles of justice and due process. 

We must acknowledge the findings presented by Mark Denbeaux, Abu Zubaydah's attorney, and CIA whistleblower John Kiriakou. Their revelations exposed the deeply flawed and morally reprehensible practices of the Bush-era torture program. It is disheartening that Kiriakou remains the only official to face consequences while the broader system that allowed and perpetuated such abuses largely remains untouched. 

As a nation that proclaims to champion human rights and the rule of law, it is our responsibility to confront these crimes, hold the responsible parties accountable. 

I urge you, to order the immediate release Abu Zubaydah from GITMO and compensate him for decades pf appalling abuse.

Carrie-Ann Matheson, San Francisco Opera Center Artistic Director, indicates that as part of Merola Opera’s training responsibilities for young singers, care must be taken to give them support in singing roles that often call for women to be abused and even die at the hands of men. In fact, too many operas sport exactly this scenario. Given how prevalent sexual abuse against women is present in our contemporary American society, the challenge today is to dramatise the issue of sexual violence by males against women not just as something in opera librettos from the Baroque to the present, but also as an issue still all too present today in society. Thus, with the #Me Too movement in mind, Carrie-Ann Matheson decided to have Merola Opera take on Benjamin Britten’s controversial opera The Rape of Lucretia. 

Set in Rome during the reign of the Etruscan Tarquins around 500 BCE, The Rape of Lucretia contrasts the rowdy masculine arrogance of Roman generals and the gentle world of three women — Lucretia, the loving wife of Collatinus, and her two attendants-confidantes, Bianca and Lucia. Based on the play Le Viol de Lucrece by French writer André Obey, with an English translation by librettist Ronald Duncan, Benjamin Britten’s The Rape of Lucretia offers a searing indictment of male violence against women. 

Carrie-Ann Matheson put together a carefully chosen team to mount this opera. German director Jan Essinger was selected to stage this production, and Judith Yan was chosen to be its conductor. In addition, the Scenic Designer was Sonja Fūstl, Costume Designer was Christine Crookk, Lighting Designer was David Robertson, and in an effort to ensure that the singers would be comfortably supported in performing this opera’s often violent material, Maya Herbsman was chosen as Intimacy Director. 

This was indeed a praiseworthy project. And, happily, I can report that Merola Opera has risen admirably to this task, not only with a production that does not shy away from the extreme violence of male sexual abuse against women, but also by showing a woman, Lucretia, who refuses to submit passively to this male violence, who instead fights back against it at every moment in this horrific tale. Further, by offering a post-performance discussion on Saturday, July 15, Merola Opera gave the production team and singers, and even the audience, an opportunity to address the issues of sexual violence against women. However, neither in interviews by Carrie-Ann Matheson nor in Saturday’s post-performance discussion, was there any acknowledgment of the groundbreaking work in this area by French philosopher Catherine Clément’s 1979 book L’Opéra ou la Défaite des Femmes (Opera or the Undoing of Women.). To my mind, credit was definitely due to Catherine Clément; and it was unfortunately lacking in the American perspective offered here. 

In The Rape of Lucretia, Benjamin Britten employs a framing structure in which two singers, one male and one female, assume the role of a male and female chorus who comment upon the actions portrayed by the opera’s protagonists. This device is similar to the use of choruses in ancient Greek tragedy. In this Merola Opera production of The Rape of Lucretia, the role of the male chorus was robustly sung by tenor Chance Jonas-O’Toole, and the female chorus was sensitively performed by soprano Caroline Corrales. As this opera opens, the two choruses summarise the sordid, corrupt and licentious reign of the Tarquins, Emperor Tarquinius Superbus and his son, Tarquinius Sextus, referred to as The Prince of Rome. Further, in a highly questionable move, Britten and his librettist overlay their story with a Christian perspective that is anachronistic for a tale that is set 500 years before the birth of Christ. Both here in the opera’s Prologue and also in its ending, the Christian perspective seems wrongfully forced. 

Following the Prologue, the scene shifts to a Roman army camp just outside Rome where the Romans await a battle against Greeks. It is night, and the Romans are drinking heavily and discussing their bet of the night before, a bet that involved a surprise return to Rome to check on whether their wives were faithful in their husbands’ absence. Only Collatinus’s wife, Lucretia, was found to be faithful, so he won the bet. But this also produced jealousy on the part of the losers, especially Tarquinius and Junius. Indeed, so incensed is Tarquinius that when the others have retired to their tents for the night, Tarquinius abruptly mounts his horse and rides to Rome to challenge the chastity of Lucretia. In this Merola production, Collatinus was sensitively sung by bass-baritone James McCarthy, Tarquinius was pridefully sung by baritone Samuel Kidd, and Junius was judiciously sung by baritone Cameron Rolling. 

Now the scene shifts to Lucretia’s house in Rome, where she, Bianca and Lucia sit peacefully at their spinning wheels. The three women engage in a lovely spinning song, accompanied by flute and harp. However, in director Jan Essinger’s staging of this scene, there are no spinning wheels and instead the women anachronistically light a series of small electric lamps. This was an unwelcome mistake in an otherwise splendid production, although an even greater staging mistake occurs near the end of this opera, which will be dealt with later. In general, Britten’s music for this scene of female domesticity offers a gentle, peaceful contrast to the belligerent music of the male generals’ camp. Lucretia sings of missing her beloved husband Collatinus and laments his being called away to battle. In the role of Lucretia, mezzo-soprano Natalie Lewis sang beautifully, displaying her impressive range and coloration. As the ageing Bianca, Lucretia’s lifelong nurse, mezzo-soprano Simona Genga was excellent; and as Lucia, soprano Olivia Prendergast was a pert, bright-voiced young attendant to Lucretia. 

When Tarquinius arrives unannounced, Lucretia is alarmed but is obliged to grant him hospitality, since he claims his horse is lame. The women show Tarquinius to a room where he can spend the night, then the household retires. During the night, when the women are asleep, Tarquinius slips into Lucretia’s bedroom intent on seducing her. When Lucretia refuses his advances, he forcibly rapes her, though she fights him off as best she can, only to be overcome by male force. Director Jan Essinger indicated in the post-performance discussion on Saturday that the production team felt it was important to not show Lucretia passively submitting to male sexual violence, but instead physically putting up a fight against this aggressive attack. I laud this decision. Moreover, although in other stagings the actual rape is not seen but heard only in an orchestral interlude, 

I found it far more powerful to have the very physical violence of the rape seen as well as heard in the music. 

The next morning, after Tarquinius has ridden away, Lucretia summons Lucia to send for Collatinus. When he arrives, Lucretia sorrowfully informs him, accompanied by cor anglais and strings, of what Tarquinius did to her during the night. Collatinus tries to comfort her, but in her distress Lucretia stabs herself, dying in her husband’s arms. At this point, as all the living protagonists and the male and female chorus sing of this tragedy, director Jan Essinger inexplicably causes all the furniture in Lucretia’s house to levitate. When I asked him in the post-performance discussion why he did this, he replied that they wished to show somehow that this world was upside down, topsy-turvy, and torn apart. Nonetheless, I found this bit of staging gratuitous and even annoying. Likewise, Britten’s attempt to tack onto the ending of this opera a message of Christian redemption through Jesus Christ struck me as wrongheadedly anachronistic and unwelcome in a story set in pagan times 500 years before the birth of Christ. Finally, I should note the excellent conducting of Britten’s score by Judith Yan, who pointed out in the post-performance discussion that it is far more difficult and demanding to conduct a small chamber orchestra of 14 instrumentalists than to conduct an orchestra of 70 or so. Both Judith Yan and the Merola Orchestra rose beautifully to this challenge.

Worth Noting:

Council did not get to the agenda item on the plan for the Civic Center at the Tuesday July 11 Council meeting. Mayor Arreguin said the Civic Center Plan would be rescheduled before Council goes on summer recess (July 26 – September 11). Expect the presentation and vote on July 25 at 4 pm, but keep checking the City website. https://berkeleyca.gov/

If you are driving to a meeting at the North Berkeley Senior Center allow lots of extra time to find parking.

• Monday:
  • At 10:30 am the Public Safety Committee meets in the hybrid format on police response.
  • At 7 pm the Housing Advisory Commission meets in person on Fair Access to Housing.
• Tuesday:
  • At 6 pm the City Council meets in the hybrid format on the Ashby BART housing development and public parking at both stations. A total of 950 parking spaces will be removed to build housing.
• Wednesday:
  • At 1:30 pm the Commission on Aging meets in person.
  • At 2 pm the FITES Committee meets in the hybrid format on reconfiguring University, Oxford and Fulton for the 51B bus and bicycles.
  • At 6 pm there is a community meeting online on the Santa Fe Park Plan.
  • At 6 pm the Civic Arts Commission meets in person.
  • At 6 pm the Environment and Climate Commission meets in person.
  • At 6:30 pm the HWCAC meets in person.
  • At 7 pm the Commission on Labor meets in person on Labor Bill of Rights.
• Thursday:
  • At 6:30 pm the FCPC / OGC meets in person with an open government complaint, public meeting procedures, public comment and meeting transcripts on the agenda.
  • At 7 pm the DRC meets in person on the final review of one project (38 bedrooms have no windows).
  • At 7 pm the Mental Health Commission meets in person – full agenda.
  • At 7 pm the Rent Board meets in the hybrid format and receives report on evictions.
• Saturday: From 11 am – 7 pm at the Downtown Berkeley Plaza there will be live music, mural painting, vendors and food trucks to celebrate the arts.

The appeal of the Community Center in Willard Park is July 24.



The July 25 Regular City Council meeting agenda is available for comment. Item 38 is the Fixed Automated License Plate Readers (ALPRS). Use link or check list of agenda items at the end of the calendar. https://berkeleyca.gov/your-government/city-council/city-council-agendas

Directions with links to ZOOM support for activating Closed Captioning and Save Transcript are at the bottom of this calendar. 

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BERKELEY PUBLIC MEETINGS AND CIVIC EVENTS 

Sunday, July 16, 2023 - no city meetings, events listed 

Monday, July 17, 2023 

PUBLIC SAFETY POLICY COMMITTEE at 10:30 am 

A Hybrid Meeting 

In-Person: at 2180 Milvia, 6th Floor, Redwood Room 

Videoconference: https://cityofberkeley-info.zoomgov.com/j/1616975543 

Teleconference: 1-669-254-5252 or 1-833-568-8864 (toll free)  

Meeting ID: 161 697 5543 

AGENDA: 1. Audit recommendation Status - Data Analysis of CoB Police Response. 

https://berkeleyca.gov/your-government/city-council/council-committees/policy-committee-public-safety 

HOUSING ADVISORY COMMISSION (HAC) at 7 pm 

In-Person: at 2939 Ellis, South Berkeley Senior Center 

AGENDA: 6. Presentation on Fair Access and Transparency for Rental Housing Applications Ordinance, 7. Discussion and possible action on Fair Access and Transparency, 8. Presentation by civic arts Commission on Artist Housing Initiatives, 9. Discussion and possible action to collaborate with the Disaster and Fire Safety Commission on Housing and Wildfire Risk, 11. Update on Affordable Housing Requirements Economic Feasibility Analysis. 

https://berkeleyca.gov/your-government/boards-commissions/housing-advisory-commission 

Tuesday, July 18, 2023 

CITY COUNCIL Special 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/1616390973 

Teleconference: 1-669-254-5252 or 1-833-568-8864 (toll free)  

Meeting ID: 161 639 0973 

AGENDA: 1. Ashby BART Station Transit Oriented Development (14 pages), 2. City Policies for Managing Parking Around BART Stations (4 pages) Ashby BART current 535 spaces will decrease to 85 maximum, North Berkeley BART current 700 spaces decrease to 200 spaces 80 of which auxiliary lots (offsite). 

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

Wednesday, July 19, 2023 

FACILITIES, INFRASTRUCTURE, TRANSPORTATION, ENVIRONMENT & SUSTAINABILITY (FITES) at 2 pm  

A Hybrid Meeting 

In-Person: at 2180 Milvia, 6th Floor, Redwood Room 

Videoconference: https://cityofberkeley-info.zoomgov.com/j/1618670126 

Teleconference: 1-669-254-5252 or 1-833-568-8864 (toll free)  

Meeting ID: 161 867 0126 

AGENDA: 51B Bus Rapid Transit improvements $300,000 in total for consulting costs refer to FY 2025 – 2026 budget process, $150,000 for corridor studies along University from Seawall to Oxford and along Oxford and Fulton from Virginia to Durant, $150,000 for analysis of 4-way intersections for ADA improvements, width of curb cuts, signals, bulb-outs and safety improvements. 

https://berkeleyca.gov/your-government/city-council/council-committees/policy-committee-facilities-infrastructure-transportation-environment-sustainability 

SANTA FE TRACKBED TO PARK CONVERSION COMMUNITY MEETING from 6 – 8 pm 

Videoconference: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/86557638538 (register) 

Teleconference: 1-669-444-9171  

Meeting ID: 865 5763 8538 Passcode: 516869 

AGENDA: Join for Updates, funding, schedule, design and potential uses at currently unprogrammed area of block 1 (between Blake and Ward). 

https://berkeleyca.gov/your-government/our-work/capital-projects/santa-fe-trackbed-park-conversion 

COMMISSION on AGING at 1:30 pm 

In-Person: at 1901 Hearst, North Berkeley Senior Center 

AGENDA: Presentations: Overview on Citywide Community Health Assessment, Update on Aging Services Division. 

https://berkeleyca.gov/your-government/boards-commissions/commission-aging 

CIVIC ARTS COMMISSION at 6 pm 

In-Person: at 1901 Russell, Tarea Hall Pittman South Branch Public Library 

AGENDA: 7. Presentations, Discussion & Action items. a) CA Theater Consortium plans for ground floor theater space at 2113 Kittredge, b) Utility Box Mural inventory and assessment, c) WorkPlan, d) Public Comment Guidelines from Commissioner Manual, e) Public Art on Private Development quarterly Report, f) FY 2024 Civic Arts Grant-Funded Festivals and quarterly report. 

https://berkeleyca.gov/your-government/boards-commissions/civic-arts-commission 

COMMISSION on LABOR at 7 pm 

In-Person: at 2939 Ellis, South Berkeley Senior Center 

AGENDA: 2. Updates to City of Berkley Labor Bill of Rights, 3. Subcommittee appointments. 

https://berkeleyca.gov/your-government/boards-commissions/commission-labor 

ENVIRONMENT and CLIMATE COMMISSION at 6 pm 

In-Person: at 1901 Hearst, North Berkeley Senior Center 

AGENDA: 6. Update from Staff a. Solar + Storage, 7. Presentation: Principles of Community Engagement (Valerie Nguyen), 8. Letter to Council Transportation Division Staffing, 10. Workplan a. Transportation Public Space Reallocation Subcommittee, b. Native Plants and Pest Reduction Subcommittee, c. Electrification Subcommittee. 

https://berkeleyca.gov/your-government/boards-commissions/environment-and-climate-commission 

HUMAN WELFARE and COMMUNITY ACTION COMMISSION (HWCAC) at 6:30 pm 

In-Person: at 2800 Park, San Pablo Park Community Center 

AGENDA: 6. Election of Low-Income Representatives, 7. HWCAC Bylaws, 8. Review J-Sei program and financial records, 9. Hopkins Corridor, 10. Appointments to HWCAC, 11. Hybrid meetings. 

https://berkeleyca.gov/your-government/boards-commissions/human-welfare-and-community-action-commission 

Thursday, July 20, 2023 

 

DESIGN REVIEW COMMITTEE at 7 pm 

In-Person: at 1901 Hearst, North Berkeley Senior Center, Gooseberry Room 

AGENDA: 1752 Shattuck at Francisco – Final Design Review – to construct a 7-story mixed use building with 72 residential apartments (38 bedrooms have no windows) with 1210 sq ft commercial space, 28 bicycle spaces. 

https://berkeleyca.gov/your-government/boards-commissions/design-review-committee 

FAIR CAMPAIGN PRACTICES COMMISSION (FCPC) / OPEN GOVERNMENT COMMISSION (OGC) at 6:30 pm 

In-Person: at 1901 Hearst, North Berkeley Senior Center, Aspen Room 

AGENDA FCPC: 6. Report from subcommittee on contribution limits, FCPC WorkPlan, 

AGENDA OGC: 9. OGC Complaint from Jim McGrath, 10. Discussion and possible action on Subcommittee report reviewing City Council policies and practices related to public comment access and public participation, 11. OGC WorkPlan, 12. Commission meeting procedures, adding agenda items, agenda item order and Brown Act considerations. 

https://berkeleyca.gov/your-government/boards-commissions/fair-campaign-practices-commission 

MENTAL HEALTH COMMISSION at 7 pm 

In-Person: at 1901 Hearst, North Berkeley Senior Center, 

AGENDA: 3. SCU update, 4. Proposal for Early Intervention in Psychosis Program, 5. Mental Health Commission’s role regarding the policy of police sweeps of homeless folks, 6. Motion to establish subcommittee on Governor’s plan for “Transformation of Behavioral Health Services, 7. Caseload statistics, 8. Recording Mental Health Commission Meetings and Posting Them, 9. Subcommittee reports, 10. Community Health Records. 

https://berkeleyca.gov/your-government/boards-commissions/mental-health-commission 

RENT STABILIZATION BOARD at 7 pm 

A Hybrid Meeting 

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

Videoconference: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/81315510979?pwd=LytGV2RZUDNrNVl4NHRJWkhHcVhSUT09 

Teleconference: 1-669-900-6833 

Meeting ID: 813 1551 0979 

AGENDA: 6. Presentation: Eviction Defense Center (EDC) and East Bay Community Law Center (EBCLC) update on Berkeley eviction trends and data during the Eviction Moratorium Transition, 8. Appeal (will not be heard before 7:30 pm) Case No. T-5986 and T-5987 (1619 Walnut Street Units A & B). 

https://rentboard.berkeleyca.gov/elected-rent-board/rent-board-meetings 

Friday, July 21, 2023 - no city meetings, events listed 

Saturday, July 22, 2023 

FRONT ROW ARTS FESTIVAL from 11 am – 7 pm 

In-Person: at Downtown Berkeley Plaza 

AGENDA: Celebrating the Arts in Downtown Berkeley, live music, food trucks, vendors, live music, mural painting. 

https://www.downtownberkeley.com/frontrowfestival/ 

Sunday, July 23, 2023 - no city meetings, events listed 

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July 25, 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/1606074224 

Teleconference: 1-669-254-5252 or 1-833-568-8864 (toll free)  

Meeting ID: 160 607 4224  

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

AGENDA on CONSENT: 

 

1. 2nd reading Zoning Ordinance Amendments to Title 23 to conform to State Law and make non-substantive technical edits
2. Minutes for Approval
3. Designate Voting Delegate (Taplin) and Alternate (Humbert) at League of California Cities Annual Conference on 9/22/2023
4. Hollander, Economic Development – Contract to distribute 1/12 Berkeley Transient Occupancy Tax (Hotel Tax) not to exceed $3,500,000 with Convention and Visitor’s Bureau, d.b.a. Visit Berkeley for 7/1/2023 – 6/30/2027
5. Hollander, Economic Development – Contracts Turtle Island Monument in Civic Center Park 7/1/2023 – 3/30/2025, 1. Scott Parsons - $236,000 for fabrication of three new stone medallions, boulders for mounting and purchase granite base stone for mounting five bronze turtles, 2. Artworks Foundry - $350,000 for fabrication of large central bronze turtle sculpture
6. Radu, City Manager’s Office – Amend Contract # 117596-1 add $35,000 total $102,218 with Animal Fix Clinic (formerly Fix Our Ferals) for Spay and Neuter Services and extend to 7/25/2026
7. Oyekanmi, Finance – Bid Solicitations $885,000, FY 2023 Retaining Wall and Storm Drain Improvement
8. Sprague, Fire Department and Louis, BPD – Expand Contract add $50,000 total $300,000 with Cooke and Associates for Applicant Background Investigations 8/1/2023 – 7/31/2026
9. Warhuus, HHCS – Amend 10 Contracts for Mental Health Services Act (MHSA), Community Services and Supports (CSS) and Prevention and Early Intervention (PEI) funded through MHSA, CSS and PEI and extend to 6/30/2026, 1. CSS #108800-1 add $46,941 total $325,678 with Bay Area Hearing Voices Network, 2. CSS #31900132 add $100,000 per year total $700,000 with Building Opportunities for Self-Sufficiency (BOSS), 3. CSS #32200130 add $491,933 per year total $2,459,665 with Alameda County Behavioral Health Care Services, 4. CSS #32000117 add $626,616 per year for 3 years total $5,286,488 with Insight Housing (formerly Berkeley Food and Housing Project), 5. CSS #32000094 add $132,046 per year for 3 years with Youth Spirit Artworks and $78,000 (from Measure P) for FY 2024 for Tiny House Village total $1,211,230, 6. PEI #32000240 add $401,369 total $2,598,334 with BUSD, 7. PEI #088999-1 add $32,046 per year total $448,860 with Center for Independent Living, 8. PEI #052129-1 add $100,000 per year total $815,150 with Pacific Center for Human Growth, 9 PEI #32200146 add $100,000 per year total $475,000 with ONTRACK, 10. PEI #3200111 add $100,000 per year total $500,000 with East Bay Sanctuary Covenant
10. Warhuus, HHCS – Amend Contract #32300138 add $93,027 total $163,934 with California Mental Health Services Authority (CalMHSA) to execute a Participation Agreement for FY 2024 for the Prevention and Early Intervention Statewide Project thru 6/30/2024
11. Warhuus, HHCS – Contract $100,000 with 2 Plus 1 Housing Resolution services for Harriet Tubman Terrace Tenant Advocate for HHCS 7/15/2023 – 7/15/2024
12. Warhuus, HHCS – Resolution approving Mental Health Services Act Three Year Expenditure Plan FY 2024 - 2026
13. Warhuus, HHCS – Reserve $1,500,000 in Predevelopment Funds in Affordable Housing Mitigation Fee funds to BRIDGE Housing or its affiliate related to development of affordable Housing at North Berkeley BART
14. Aram Kouyoumdjian, HR – Establish Classification and Salary Range Deputy Police Chief annual salary range $200,000 - $260,000
15. Aram Kouyoumdjian, HR – Salary Range Adjustment for Public Employees Union (PEU) – Local 1, increase base salary Senior Building Maintenance Supervisor by 9.30%, Senior Equipment Supervisor by 13%, Senior Publics Works Supervisor by 8.53% and Senior Solid Wast Supervisor by 8.53% effective 1/1/2023
16. Fong, IT – Contract $325,000 with opportunity to extend thru FY 2025 total $370,000 for Piggyback Contract with SmartWave for City Facility Managed WiFi throughout City of Berkeley facilities
17. Ferris, Parks – Side Letter Agreement with Hornblower sublease rent payments at Doubletree Hotel at Waterfront
18. Ferris, Parks – Amend Contract #32200183 add $79,000 total $1,179,000 with Western Water Features, Inc for renovations at King Swim Center
19. Ferris, Parks – Amendment to existing $5,500,000 loan for D and E Dock Project in Berkeley Marina (4 alternatives) or internal loan with terms (charging interest to Marina fund) to use terms defined by City Manager.
20. Klein, Planning – Accept Grant $497,042 from Governor’s Office of Planning and Research to Create a New Environmental Justice Element, Update the General Disaster Preparedness & Safety Element, and Develop Community-Driven Climate and Resilience Metric 4/31/2023 – 1/31/2026
21. Garland, Public Works – Agreement with AC Transit to Provide Funding for Transit Shelter Maintenance $110,000 over 5 years
22. Garland, Public Works – Amend Contract add $50,000 total $100,000 with Benefit Resource, Inc. for Third-Party Administrator of Employee Commute Benefit Program and extend to 2/28/2025
23. Garland, Public Works – Amend Contract #32000128 add $500,000 total $1,200,000 with WSP USA Environment & Infrastructure, Inc. (formerly Wood Environment & Infrastructure Solutions, Inc.) for on-call environmental consulting services extend to 12/30/2026
24. Garland, Public Works – Amend contract #32000145 add $200,000 total $478,698 with Zonar Systems for Global Positioning System Telematics Program and extend to 6/30/2026
25. Garland, Public Works – Amend Contract #32100070 add $75,272 total $189,848 with Urban Ore, Inc. for Salvage Operations at CoB Transfer Station and extend to 6/30/2025
26. Garland, Public Works – Contract $300,000 with R & S Erection of Richmond, Inc. for on-call roll up door and gate maintenance and replacement 8/1/2023 – 7/31/2026
27. Garland, Public Works – Contract $1,900,000 with Wood Rogers, Inc. for Stormwater Master Plan
28. Garland, Public Works – Contract $300,000 with Disability Access Consultants (DAC) for up to 3 years for on-call American with Disabilities Act consulting for CoB Compliance Program
29. Garland, Public Works – Audit Status Report Underfunded Mandate: Resources, Strategic Plan, and Communication Needed to Continue Progress towards the Year 2020 Zero Waste Goal
30. Garland, Public Works – Audit Status Report Zero Waste Activities Will Help Align Service Levels with Billing and Ensure Customer Equity
31. Mental Health Commission – Resolution Adopt a City-Wide “Care First, Jails Last” Policy
32. Taplin, co-sponsor Harrison – Young Lives Matter Foundation Walk for Peace: Relinquishment Council Office Budget Funds
33. Barlett, co-sponsors Arreguin, Hahn, Harrison – Resolution proclaim the first week of August as Berkeley Farmer’s Market Week
34. Wengraf, co-sponsor Harrison, Hahn, Arreguin – Commemoration of the 100th Anniversary of the 1923 Berkeley Fire: Relinquishment Council Office Budget Funds
35. Robinson, co-sponsors Hahn, Humbert, Arreguin – Support Unionization of Peet’s Coffee Workers

AGENDA on ACTION: 

 

 

36. Amendments to Title 23 Relating to ADU to conform to State Law and respond to guidance from California Department of Housing and Community Development
37. Warhuus, HHCS – Adopt Affordable Housing framework for North Berkeley BART Station Area
38. a. Louis, BPD – Surveillance Ordinance items related to Fixed Automated License Plate Readers (ALPRs), b. Police Accountability Board - response to BPD proposed Surveillance Ordinance
39. Louis, BPD – AB 488, 2022 Annual Military Equipment Report
40. Arreguin, co-sponsor Harrison – Waivers for Woolsey Gardens Affordable Housing Project at 3120 – 3130 Shattuck, waives requirement that purchasers have a yearly gross income limited to no more than 44% of the cost of the unit at the time of sale and adds one unit instead of paying .44 unit in lieu fee

++++++++++++++++++ 

 

LAND USE CALENDAR PUBLIC HEARINGS: 

 

• 2720 Hillegass Avenue - Willard Park (Construct Community Center) 7/24/2023
• 705 Euclid Avenue (new single family dwelling) 9/26/2023
• 3000 Shattuck Avenue (Construct 10-story mixed-use building) – 9/26/2023
• 1598 University Avenue (Construct 8-story mixed-use building) 10/3/2023

WORK SESSIONS & SPECIAL MEETINGS: 

 

 

• July 18 (WS) - Ashby BART Transit Oriented Development (TOD), and City Policies for Managing Parking Around BART Stations
• July 24 ZAB Appeal 2720 Hillegass – Willard Park Clubhouse
• September 26 ZAB Appeals 3000 Shattuck and 705 Euclid new single-family dwelling

. 

 

Unscheduled Presentations – Workshops and Special Meetings:  

 

• Dispatch Needs Assessment Presentation (rescheduled from July 11 to September 19 at 4 pm)
• Draft Waterfront Specific Plan (at 4 pm) – rescheduled from July 25 to October 2023
• Fire Department Standards of Coverage & Community Risk Assessment June 13 presentation cancelled, report is worth reading (to be rescheduled) (didn’t have quorum)
• Re-imagining Public Safety Update (November 2023)

. 

 

* * * * * 

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:
.
ZOOM has as part of the program -(for no extra cost)- Closed Captioning (CC). It turns computer voice recognition into a text transcript. Accuracy of the Closed Captioning is affected by background noise and other factors, The CC transcript will not be perfect, but most of the time reading through it the few odd words, can be deciphered--for example "Shattuck" was transcribed as Shadow in one recent transcript. 

 

For the us, the online attendee, the full transcript is only available from the time the attendee activates Closed Captioning. But if Closed Captioning is activated and you sit through a meeting and then remember 10 minutes before it is over to click on CC then go to the arrow/carrot next to CC for the menu and click on Show Full Transcript you will only get the last 10 minutes, not the full transcript – So click often on both Save Transcript and on Save to Folder during the meeting for best results. 

 

When you click on Show Full Transcript it will allow you to scroll up and down, so if want to go back and see what was said earlier you can do that during the meeting while the transcript is running. 

 

At the bottom of the transcript when we as attendees are allowed to save 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. 

 

Near the end of the meeting, after you click on "Save Transcript," click on "Save to Folder." The meeting transcript will show up (as a download to your desktop) in a separate box as a text file. (These text files are not large.) After you have done your last Save Transcript and Save to Folder (after the meeting is over) you can rename the new transcript folder on your computer, and save it (re-read or send or share it). 

 

Remember, allowing us attendees to save the meeting transcript does not require the public meeting host to save the transcript (for 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: 

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