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People's Park Development Plan Headed to Regents For Approval
Despite continued public support for the preservation of People's Park, the administration of UC Berkeley will be submitting a development plan for the Park during the March meeting of the UC Regents. Most of the Park will be converted into housing. A sliver of open space will remain as a Memorial to Free Speech, as if to suggest the Free Speech is dead. The UC Berkeley Vice Chancellor told a Daily Cal reporter, “The next steps are being started. We’ll move as quickly as we can.” Along with People's Park, the UC plans to develop over an agricultural research field on Oxford St.
### The UC Regents will meet on March 15-16 at UCSF Mission Bay. During this meeting, the Regents will decide the fate of People's Park. ###
=============
The majority of Berkeley city council has opposed the development of People's Park, including the former Mayor Tom Bates. A public meeting was held last year at city council chambers on the subject of the Telegraph Avenue area. During the meeting, support for People's Park was reaffirmed by a majority of city government and the public.
Community activists, and regular residents support the continuation of People's Park as a park, with no housing. The Park's 50th anniversary approaches in spring of 2019, during which it would be possible to have the space recognized as a California State Park. Under the State Parks system, People's Park can be preserved for its historic value. The land was the site of a 'grass roots' community uprising, a response to the US government's repression of the counter-culture. During this Age of Trump, People's Park can be a symbol of direct action against oppression.
During the 1969 conflict surrounding People's Park, student James Rector was shot in the stomach during the conflict; he passed away shortly after being fired upon. The city of Berkeley was indiscriminately tear-gassed during the protests by helicopters. Governor Ronald Reagan and the UC Regents, with the backing of the Nixon administration, turned the city of Berkeley into a battlefield.
In recent years the University of California has reignited conflict over the Park. In the past half-decade, the People's Park community advisory board was disbanded by the University, many of the Parks trees have been cut down and other landscaping features have been eliminated. UC Berkeley police has repeatedly intimidated participants in gardening efforts. Despite these tactics, the UC has been unable to clear out People's Park, due to ongoing community direct action.
On January 26th, the Daily Cal campus newspaper reported that People's Park is on a list of proposed development sites for UC student housing. The development plan will be submitted for approval at the next regents meeting, which is March 15th and 16th. UC Berkeley Vice Chancellor Carol Christ (a board member of Merrill Lynch) was quoted as saying "The next steps are being started. We’ll move as quickly as we can."
The UC is proposing to build a Memorial to Free Speech next to the housing project, as if to say that Free Speech is dead, a relic of the past. The need for more housing is a valid issue, but People's Park has historical and cultural significance which should not be erased. The UC has several other plots of land to use as alternative housing sites, parcels which are less contentious. Along with various sites the UC already holds administration over, the UC can also look into purchasing the under utilized seminary housing at Holy Hill, or contracting with developers at other sites in the city of Berkeley.
The UC will try to frame an argument for safety via a smear campaign against the Park and its supporters. The UC will try to draw attention to crime in relation to People's Park. However the majority of robberies and assaults on UC managed property have been occurring on the main campus, the northern side in particular, the furthermost away from People's Park.
The UC is ready to submit the development proposal to the board of regents in less than two months. The UC has signaled that not only is it prepared to build over People's Park, but also "next steps are being started". It is likely that the already existing police intimidation of dedicated activists will be increased shortly. The UC may start removing more plants soon, as the worst of the winter storms have ended, and a window of clearer weather will allow UC workers opportune working conditions.
=============
The majority of Berkeley city council has opposed the development of People's Park, including the former Mayor Tom Bates. A public meeting was held last year at city council chambers on the subject of the Telegraph Avenue area. During the meeting, support for People's Park was reaffirmed by a majority of city government and the public.
Community activists, and regular residents support the continuation of People's Park as a park, with no housing. The Park's 50th anniversary approaches in spring of 2019, during which it would be possible to have the space recognized as a California State Park. Under the State Parks system, People's Park can be preserved for its historic value. The land was the site of a 'grass roots' community uprising, a response to the US government's repression of the counter-culture. During this Age of Trump, People's Park can be a symbol of direct action against oppression.
During the 1969 conflict surrounding People's Park, student James Rector was shot in the stomach during the conflict; he passed away shortly after being fired upon. The city of Berkeley was indiscriminately tear-gassed during the protests by helicopters. Governor Ronald Reagan and the UC Regents, with the backing of the Nixon administration, turned the city of Berkeley into a battlefield.
In recent years the University of California has reignited conflict over the Park. In the past half-decade, the People's Park community advisory board was disbanded by the University, many of the Parks trees have been cut down and other landscaping features have been eliminated. UC Berkeley police has repeatedly intimidated participants in gardening efforts. Despite these tactics, the UC has been unable to clear out People's Park, due to ongoing community direct action.
On January 26th, the Daily Cal campus newspaper reported that People's Park is on a list of proposed development sites for UC student housing. The development plan will be submitted for approval at the next regents meeting, which is March 15th and 16th. UC Berkeley Vice Chancellor Carol Christ (a board member of Merrill Lynch) was quoted as saying "The next steps are being started. We’ll move as quickly as we can."
The UC is proposing to build a Memorial to Free Speech next to the housing project, as if to say that Free Speech is dead, a relic of the past. The need for more housing is a valid issue, but People's Park has historical and cultural significance which should not be erased. The UC has several other plots of land to use as alternative housing sites, parcels which are less contentious. Along with various sites the UC already holds administration over, the UC can also look into purchasing the under utilized seminary housing at Holy Hill, or contracting with developers at other sites in the city of Berkeley.
The UC will try to frame an argument for safety via a smear campaign against the Park and its supporters. The UC will try to draw attention to crime in relation to People's Park. However the majority of robberies and assaults on UC managed property have been occurring on the main campus, the northern side in particular, the furthermost away from People's Park.
The UC is ready to submit the development proposal to the board of regents in less than two months. The UC has signaled that not only is it prepared to build over People's Park, but also "next steps are being started". It is likely that the already existing police intimidation of dedicated activists will be increased shortly. The UC may start removing more plants soon, as the worst of the winter storms have ended, and a window of clearer weather will allow UC workers opportune working conditions.
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The UC Regents have No Legal Right to Peoples Park becuz of their own Laws in Imminent Domaine states if Property not Used for Intended Use in 7 Years (47 years by the Community) thenm returnned to Original Owner the OHLONE People. The coming fight for the Park is going to take a Strong Mayor (NOT Areguin) so Support the Current Challenge to Vote Count (UCB Sequoia Voting Machine, Largest Employer cannot be in the hands of) for the City of Berkeley Mayor's Seat. I already proved my 2% was invalid as 3% (atleast currently) and Believe I won as a Hand Recount is in Order. Plus us Tree People have protected the Park the Last Decade and will do it again please support the Trees.
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I am a Berkeley grad -- I have 3 degrees from Cal. How can UC officials contemplate once again building on the hallowed ground called Peoples Park? A 2015 Daily Cal article decries the fact needles were found in the grass and there's trash, blah blah. Then: clean the site up, give it proper maintenance and care, treat it like the important national symbol of justice and civil rights that it is.
WTF IS WRONG WITH YOU, UC??? Can't "UC" see what is plainly right about preserving such a tiny sliver of land in memory of the freedom fighters who gave their lives so that we could breathe free? My Berkeley would never give in to the ugly oppression and arrogant white privilege behind building dorms on the park; my Berkeley understands that the park must be kept as a shrine to the People who fought these injustices.
I am sick with grief at the possibility the World will lose its People's Park. UC officials: do the right thing. Have a conscience. Give a damn. And give me a fucking break.
WTF IS WRONG WITH YOU, UC??? Can't "UC" see what is plainly right about preserving such a tiny sliver of land in memory of the freedom fighters who gave their lives so that we could breathe free? My Berkeley would never give in to the ugly oppression and arrogant white privilege behind building dorms on the park; my Berkeley understands that the park must be kept as a shrine to the People who fought these injustices.
I am sick with grief at the possibility the World will lose its People's Park. UC officials: do the right thing. Have a conscience. Give a damn. And give me a fucking break.
People’s Park 48th Anniversary
48 years ago US imperialism-colonialism was in an all-time crisis. Here in Berkeley there were 3rd world and worker strikes plus ongoing anti-Vietnam war mobilizations. 60% of the windows on UC campus were broken and replaced by plywood. Starting in the summer of 1969 the community was unable to have antiwar events at Provo Park (now Martin Luther King Jr. Park) which have taken place in the past years. The community decided to have antiwar events and make a park on a piece of land where the university has been destroying 53 red shingles homes to build dormitory’s for their students. The SF beat-niks lived there.
48 years ago was somewhat the same as it is now globally. In Vietnam the US military had a tremendous defeat in 1968. President Johnson had withdrawn from the presidential race and Nixon was elected with a program of slaughter by bombing in North Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia. There was tremendous violence by the police toward anti-Vietnam war mobilizations. Many people were killed in riots at Newark, Detroit, and Los Angles. Shotguns were used.
Then on April 20th, 1969, community members came on UC land which is now People’s Park and started a free speech park garden. It caught on. It was the big event of the bay area. Thousands of people showed up on the weekend. Loads and loads of sod (grass) were brought from the California Valley for instant grass. The problem was that Reagan was governor and he had presidential aspirations with the help of UC, FBI and CIA.
Reagan along with Sheriff Madigan, Oakland district attorney Edward Meese and Berkeley Mayor Johnson met and pulled off a covert action that got Reagan elected. After about four weeks of our holding anti-war events and growing plants and grass, UC decided to fenced the park. That happened on May 15th 1969 early in the morning. Around 12 noon, 5000 students and community people gathered and rallied on Sproul steps. They marched down to confront the police and fence makers of the park.
At Telegraph and Haste young community members turned on the fire hydrant which was a normal action of the past. The Alameda Sheriffs were prepared with a wrench to turn the fire hydrant off. The sheriffs and the people around them on the corner at the fire hydrant were pelted by objects from some people in the crowd from across the street.
That confrontation gave the sheriffs an excuse to march down one block away to their vehicles and pick up there shotguns with bird shot and then they started firing on everyone they saw on the street and on top of the buildings. When they ran out of bird shot they turned to buck shots. Buck shots are big enough to kill. There were 150 people that were wounded. 40 people were hospitalized. One was blinded and one died three days later; his name was James Rector.
Those shooting events gave Mayor Johnson an excuse to call an emergency marshal law and in turn Reagan activated the national guard. It was found out later that the national guard members from Sacramento had been notified in advance before the May 15th confrontation.
The National Guard and 2500 soldiers occupied the park, downtown and the Marina which lasted for 21 days. The Berkeley community fought the national guard in peaceful ways. On May 2nd, a mass of 421 of us were arrested and brutalized by the sheriffs out at Santa Rita Jail. Overall, over 3000 were arrested.
Finally after many days of struggle the business community saw there were no business at all in Berkeley because of the police and all of the community were downtown boycotting the businesses. The city stopped the state of emergency.
Reagan and the CIA brought in hard drugs into the south campus area. Starting with the China White and Persian dust. Young people thought it was cocaine and were easily hooked. They were called the Red Rockets and a book by the name of Rag Theater was published where hundreds of them hanged out on Telegraph avenue. They were the children or offspring of the academic antiwar movement. About half of them in the hundreds have died from that drug intervention by the CIA. Hard drugs were used to disable the antiwar movement internationally. The closing of Caffé Mediterraneum here in November, 2016 is part of that CIA project.
Another very important condition that before 1969 or People’s Park young black males could not venture passed Grove street which is now MLK without being molested by the Berkeley police. Berkeley was a sun down town. The park stopped that “Jim Crow” repression.
People’s Park came months after Jackson State where four black-students were killed. Then after People’s Park shootings, killings and repression, four Kent State students were killed on May 1st 1970.
The fence stood up for two and a half years and was attacked hundreds of times by the community. One Christmas 1972 season Nixon and Kissinger ordered a bombing of Hanoi and Haiphong and about 500 Berkeley citizens marched around town boycotting GM cars dealers and found there were no police guarding the fence at People’s Park and in turn went down and tore down the fence — all 500 hundred of them. It’s amazing what you can do with numbers.
On the negative side Reagan used all of this repression against the students and antiwar activists and got elected and was responsible for millions of deaths. And Meese carried on his repression against my kids.
48 years ago US imperialism-colonialism was in an all-time crisis. Here in Berkeley there were 3rd world and worker strikes plus ongoing anti-Vietnam war mobilizations. 60% of the windows on UC campus were broken and replaced by plywood. Starting in the summer of 1969 the community was unable to have antiwar events at Provo Park (now Martin Luther King Jr. Park) which have taken place in the past years. The community decided to have antiwar events and make a park on a piece of land where the university has been destroying 53 red shingles homes to build dormitory’s for their students. The SF beat-niks lived there.
48 years ago was somewhat the same as it is now globally. In Vietnam the US military had a tremendous defeat in 1968. President Johnson had withdrawn from the presidential race and Nixon was elected with a program of slaughter by bombing in North Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia. There was tremendous violence by the police toward anti-Vietnam war mobilizations. Many people were killed in riots at Newark, Detroit, and Los Angles. Shotguns were used.
Then on April 20th, 1969, community members came on UC land which is now People’s Park and started a free speech park garden. It caught on. It was the big event of the bay area. Thousands of people showed up on the weekend. Loads and loads of sod (grass) were brought from the California Valley for instant grass. The problem was that Reagan was governor and he had presidential aspirations with the help of UC, FBI and CIA.
Reagan along with Sheriff Madigan, Oakland district attorney Edward Meese and Berkeley Mayor Johnson met and pulled off a covert action that got Reagan elected. After about four weeks of our holding anti-war events and growing plants and grass, UC decided to fenced the park. That happened on May 15th 1969 early in the morning. Around 12 noon, 5000 students and community people gathered and rallied on Sproul steps. They marched down to confront the police and fence makers of the park.
At Telegraph and Haste young community members turned on the fire hydrant which was a normal action of the past. The Alameda Sheriffs were prepared with a wrench to turn the fire hydrant off. The sheriffs and the people around them on the corner at the fire hydrant were pelted by objects from some people in the crowd from across the street.
That confrontation gave the sheriffs an excuse to march down one block away to their vehicles and pick up there shotguns with bird shot and then they started firing on everyone they saw on the street and on top of the buildings. When they ran out of bird shot they turned to buck shots. Buck shots are big enough to kill. There were 150 people that were wounded. 40 people were hospitalized. One was blinded and one died three days later; his name was James Rector.
Those shooting events gave Mayor Johnson an excuse to call an emergency marshal law and in turn Reagan activated the national guard. It was found out later that the national guard members from Sacramento had been notified in advance before the May 15th confrontation.
The National Guard and 2500 soldiers occupied the park, downtown and the Marina which lasted for 21 days. The Berkeley community fought the national guard in peaceful ways. On May 2nd, a mass of 421 of us were arrested and brutalized by the sheriffs out at Santa Rita Jail. Overall, over 3000 were arrested.
Finally after many days of struggle the business community saw there were no business at all in Berkeley because of the police and all of the community were downtown boycotting the businesses. The city stopped the state of emergency.
Reagan and the CIA brought in hard drugs into the south campus area. Starting with the China White and Persian dust. Young people thought it was cocaine and were easily hooked. They were called the Red Rockets and a book by the name of Rag Theater was published where hundreds of them hanged out on Telegraph avenue. They were the children or offspring of the academic antiwar movement. About half of them in the hundreds have died from that drug intervention by the CIA. Hard drugs were used to disable the antiwar movement internationally. The closing of Caffé Mediterraneum here in November, 2016 is part of that CIA project.
Another very important condition that before 1969 or People’s Park young black males could not venture passed Grove street which is now MLK without being molested by the Berkeley police. Berkeley was a sun down town. The park stopped that “Jim Crow” repression.
People’s Park came months after Jackson State where four black-students were killed. Then after People’s Park shootings, killings and repression, four Kent State students were killed on May 1st 1970.
The fence stood up for two and a half years and was attacked hundreds of times by the community. One Christmas 1972 season Nixon and Kissinger ordered a bombing of Hanoi and Haiphong and about 500 Berkeley citizens marched around town boycotting GM cars dealers and found there were no police guarding the fence at People’s Park and in turn went down and tore down the fence — all 500 hundred of them. It’s amazing what you can do with numbers.
On the negative side Reagan used all of this repression against the students and antiwar activists and got elected and was responsible for millions of deaths. And Meese carried on his repression against my kids.
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