Public Outreach Committee, March 18, 2024

[Loni Hancock]

Public Outreach Minutes

Goal: To restore the Maudelle Shirek City Hall and Veteran’s Buildings for use by future generations of Berkeley people, and reverse the current process of demolition by neglect.

The plan:

- Increase public awareness of the heritage buildings and their deteriorating condition.

- Build support for a stand-alone bond measure for earthquake stabilization in 2026 or 2028.

- Get City Council and City Administration to in crease ownership and responsibility for the buildings.

After discussion, the Committee concluded that the best chance to save and reuse the Maudelle Shirek City Hall is for the Council Chambers to return when the current lease with the BUSD expires. This would return revenue to the City that can be put toward maintenance and renovation, allow expansion that would increase earthquake stabilization, and provide additional office space. Tom Bates will explore the idea with the mayor, and Lisa Bullwinkel will explore the idea with Councilmember Hahn, and Kate Harrison. After this initial feedback, the Committee will reach out to other Council members and Civic leaders. John Caner and Loni Hancock will find out how many other leases the City may have, and if money can be saved by relocating these offices to the Maudelle Shirek City Hall. John will also contact Eleanor Hollander about setting a Council Workshop to discuss these issues.

It was suggested that we tie the stability of the Maudelle Shirek City Hall to the stability of the culvert running near it. The Buildings could also house expanded learning opportunities such as expanded Library lending and High School interns at Berkeley Community Media

The upcoming city elections also provide an opportunity to brief candidates on the vision and work of the 4Cs as well as the consultant studies and subsequent Council actions. We will ask candidates to respond to a brief written questionnaire which will go on our website and to our mailing list. Arlene Silk will use the questionnaire being drafted by BAHA as the basis of a draft questionnaire for us. Arlene will also contact the National Trust for Historic Preservation regarding placing the Maudelle Shirek City Hall on their “Endangered” list, and any additional advice they may have regarding funding and preservation campaigns. John Caner will include questions about the Civic Center Project at the Downtown Berkeley Association candidates’ night on April 24 5-7pm. John will also try and set up tours of the heritage buildings for candidates and their staff.

Many ideas were thrown out regarding Public Information and Engagement, including:

- Farmers’ Market information booth with leaflets and postcards. Email sign-up to get more information.

- A large Banner on the front of the Maudelle Shirek City Hall (and maybe also the Veterans’ Building) saying something like “WILL YOU MISS ME WHEN IM GONE“. 

- Lawn Signs - WILL YOU MISS ME…” or “WHO NEEDS OLD BUILDINGS?” or whatever we choose….

- Postcards with the slogan and informational bullet points that can be handed out or sent to given to friends.

- An email with photos that can be forwarded to friends. 

- update our Website, sharpen the message and include the website address and QR code on printed material.

- Articles in the local press: The Berkeley Times, Berkeleyside, etc., and organizational newsletters.

Lisa Bullwinkel and Winston Burton are looking into costs and organizing related to the Banners.

Creatives(!): Writers and techies are needed to work on printed materials, news articles, website enhancement and other aspects of Public Outreach and Engagement. Please step up!

[KENNETH STEIN]

Dear Loni,

Thanks very much for your timely note.  I am writing ask you (and the Committee) to do whatever is necessary to get the City to provide the best possible disability access to the Maudelle Shirek Old City Hall; to give disability access the major attention that it deserves … Especially inasmuch as a historic lack of disability access is one of the main reasons for this project. As long as it is being done, it really needs to be done right.

And particularly … to help ensure that there is adequate funding obtained and set aside to hire a qualified disability access consultant, ideally a certified CASP Specialist, and to do whatever else is needed to help ensure that the particular disability access challenges of this historic structure will be adequately addressed. 

To just leave it to the City Of Berkeley’s Codes and Inspections Department would be a great mistake, if for no other reason than that the federal and state disability access laws are a floor and not a ceiling. 

I am saying all of this now to help prevent the City Of Berkeley from falling into the same trap that the City of San Francisco fell into when they remodeled their City Hall, and did a terrible job of it, and it ended up costing them millions of dollars more than it should have, than if they had it done it right the first time around. 

Whenever I have brought this up about the Berkeley City Hall project to date, I have always gotten either a pat on the head or more often no response at all. 

And so I am writing to ask you particularly to make sure these important issues are addressed as they should be, and not as something taken  for granted, or as an afterthought. 

Especially being the birthplace of the now worldwide Independent Living Disability Rights Movement, clearly Berkeley deserves the best. 

Thank you very much for your kind attention to these concerns. I know that you know that I know what I am talking about.

Sincerely yours,

– Ken Stein

 Program Administrator, ADA Compliance Office / Mayor's Office on Disability, City and County of San Francisco, 2002 – 2013.

Access Advisor Emiritus, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, 2013-Present.

Manager, ADA Technical Assistance Unit / ADA Technical Assistance Specialist, Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund (DREDF), Berkeley.  Manager of National US Department of Justice ADA Information Hotline, 1993–2002. 

Commissioner/Chair, City of Berkeley Landmarks Preservation Commission, 1983-89.  

Organizer / Chair, Friends of Old City Hall, which successfully urged the City of Berkeley to obtain funding for and to undertake preservation of the Old City Hall cupola, roof, and ornamentation, completed in 1989. 

On Mar 24, 2024, at 3:33 PM, Loni Hancock <loni.h...@comcast.net> wrote:

Public Outreach Minutes

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[Steven F]

Thank you Loni, this is a good list and I appreciate the group working on it.

Three follow-up thoughts:

(1) a simple postcard might be developed and printed, maybe with a photo and slogan on one side, and website / contact information on the other. Something that many people could easily carry around and hand out. 

(2)  one of the challenges in working with the City on this is that we now have a whole generation of City staff who have no experience with the Shirek Building or the Veterans Building. If they think of them at all, it's probably in terms of extra workload they might bring about. We might want to talk about ways of outreach to City staff (including Council Aides) of the benefits of bringing these buildings back into full public use;

(3a) Berkeley has something like 40 commissions?...that's more than 350 local residents who are engaged enough to volunteer time for a monthly Commissioner role and interest in city activities and governance. It would be useful to divide up the Commissions--maybe 3-4 per person, if we can find ten willing people--who, over the next six months, would go to three or four Commissions apiece and speak during general public comment at the beginning about the Civic Center and what is needed, and deliver a simple handout. Repeated presentations like that make a difference. 

On the two Commissions I'm on, there are community members who have come several times to meetings and spoken politely and passionately about non-agendized topics...and the Commissions have actually listened, and are incorporating those issues into their thinking and consideration.  Same thing could work here, raising consciousness among Commission members (who have the ear of Councilmembers) and Commission Secretaries / Staff about Civic Center. 

(3b) Also..EVERY Commission has problems /complaints about its meeting facilities and lack of availability of space for community meetings. The presentations could emphasize that whatever your role in Berkeley civic life, there will be a place (formal meeting rooms, event spaces...) in the renovated Civic Center buildings that you can use.

Steve F