Former RULE Member Announces Sutter Emeryville Hospital Complex Is Ill-Suited For Proposed Site

 Letter to the Tattler: City Council Should Reconsider Approval of the Sutter Hospital Proposal at Hollis Street Site

The Tattler offers citizens with news worthy stories about Emeryville to submit letters for publication for the 'Letters to the Tattler' feature.

Judith Timmel, a 34 year Emeryville resident and co-founder of the former resident activist group Residents United for a Livable Emeryville (RULE), opines about the proposed billion dollar Sutter Health 325 bed hospital proposed for a 12 acre site on Hollis Street (at 53rd).  Sutter recently purchased the former bio-tech site by use of a City Council initiated change to Emeryville’s charter.  The hospital and its administration complex will host the tallest building in Emeryville if Sutter completes its build out.  The “temporary infusion of cash into our city coffers” that Ms Timmel refers to is the $11 million one time real estate transfer tax the City imposed upon the sale. 

To the City Council members-

 I attended the meeting Sutter recently held regarding their proposed project.  I have to say I was shocked and dismayed to find that the city council members had given a preliminary approval to this totally unacceptable development in our neighborhood.  What I appreciate about my neighborhood is livability and small-scale development which fosters community and a sense of safety.  This project is totally outside of any precepts in the General Plan and the hopes I have for our community that I thought that you all shared.

The looming presence of a huge tower would destroy our sunlight, our sense of neighborhood and aesthetics that we now enjoy.  The ambulances, shuttles and helicopters, not to mention the 4 years of construction noise, would destroy our peace and quiet, seriously disrupt our streets and destroy our bike boulevard.  Students going to and from school on 53rd St would be endangered and residents become even more inconvenienced by the increased traffic.  The streets surrounding the proposed project are not meant for this level of traffic and would become over-burdened.

It seems you have been swayed by the temporary infusion of cash into our city coffers.  I submit that this gain is short-lived and short-sighted.  What will be gained by the city after the project’s completion? Sutter’s non-profit status renders them exempt from many taxes.

I support Sutter’s taking over and re-purposing the existing buildings for medical uses. I would support a small-scale building on the vacant property.  What I will not support is a huge hulking monstrosity wedged into an inappropriate space in an incongruous neighborhood.

Alternative location for this hospital? Why not Site B?  Could a trade be made? As long as the height is reduced, and it could be with a larger footprint, it seems a more accessible and less disruptive location.

I urge you to reconsider, and I will be spending considerable time and energy to inform the residents of Emeryville of this impending disruption in their lives.

Respectfully submitted, 

Judith T, resident

Sutter hospital site at Hollis and 53rd Street looking northwest.

Emeryville Small Business Owner Says City Should Help Small Business Owners

 Letter to the Tattler: My Emeryville Small Business Is Under Attack

Emeryville Resident and Small Business Owner, Empress

Small Business in Emeryville Should Be Encouraged

What's Happening Here is Discouragement

The Tattler offers citizens with news worthy stories about Emeryville to submit letters for publication for the 'Letters to the Tattler' feature.

I run a small, street-facing live-work business on Sherwin Avenue at The Emery, on the historic grounds of the former Sherwin-Williams site, where I craft and sell artisan cookies through my company, Choc’late Mama Cookie Co. What I’ve built is more than a cookie business. It’s a community-centered space rooted in culture, wellness, and connection. It’s also exactly the kind of neighborhood-serving storefront the City of Emeryville envisioned when approving this mixed-use development: active, locally owned, and engaged with the public sidewalk.

But since October, my ability to operate has been under coordinated attack.

A neighboring resident, Emeryville Housing Committee member James Brooks Jessup, who occupies an adjacent live-work unit, has led an effort to challenge the legitimacy of my business. He and a group of aligned neighbors have repeatedly claimed, falsely, that I am operating an illegal restaurant rather than a permitted retail cookie business. These claims have been submitted to the City, Alameda County, and property management, triggering investigations and enforcement actions.

The truth is straightforward: I have the permits required to operate my business. The City has confirmed this. And yet, a pattern has emerged where complaint-driven enforcement continues to escalate, regardless of verified compliance.

Through documents obtained via the California Public Records Act, I have uncovered what appears to be a coordinated campaign of complaints, surveillance, and targeted reporting. The result has been an environment of ongoing scrutiny and intimidation, one that no small business owner should have to endure simply for operating within the bounds of the law.

At the center of the current dispute is an attempt by Alameda County to reclassify my business under a Microenterprise Home Kitchen Operation (MEHKO) permit. This designation is intended for home-based food businesses not street-facing, mixed-use storefronts like mine. Applying it to my business would impose a cap of just 90 sales per week, effectively making it impossible to sustain operations or grow.

I declined this misclassification and requested a designation that accurately reflects my live-work storefront model. At present, no such classification exists.

This is not just about my business. It reveals a larger systemic failure: outdated regulatory frameworks are being used to govern modern, hybrid business models; enforcement is being driven by complaints rather than facts; and there are no meaningful protections in place for small business owners facing bad-faith reporting.

Despite bringing these concerns forward, I have received little support from the City of Emeryville and no support from property management at The Emery. In fact, I was forced to remove my signage and outdoor seating from the patio outside my unit that is clearly designed for such use. With the exception of Councilmember Kalimah Priforce, there has been no meaningful intervention to address the harm being caused or to protect my ability to operate as intended within this development.

What’s at stake is more than one business. If I am forced out, it is likely that my unit will revert to residential-only use, leaving a dark storefront where there was once community engagement. That outcome would directly contradict the City’s stated vision for The Emery as a vibrant, activated neighborhood with locally serving retail at its core.

Instead, I now face housing insecurity, loss of income, and the erosion of a business I have spent years building while the systems meant to support small entrepreneurs remain silent or ineffective.

When I moved into The Emery, I was told these storefronts were meant for businesses like mine locally rooted, community-driven, and accessible to the public. That is exactly what Choc’late Mama Cookie Co. represents.

The question now is whether Emeryville will honor that promise.

BIO: A single-mother and lifelong native of 94608, Empress founded Choc’late Mama Cookie Co., now the only Afro-Indigenous woman-led cookie café and community hub in Emeryville.  For over a decade, her work has used culinary art and hospitality as both nourishment and medicine, intentionally creating spaces that cultivate connection across the Bay Area and beyond.

This moment is about more than cookies, she says.  It’s about who gets to exist, create, and thrive in spaces that claim to support small, local business, and what happens when that support is tested.  

Choc'late Mama Cookies' mailing address is 4310 Hubbard Street but pedestrian access is on Sherwin Avenue between Hubbard and Horton streets.  Phone: (510) 846-1229

Follow @chocolatemamacookies on Instagram to witness the community, culture, and consistency behind her work.

Letter to the Tattler: Emeryville Needs an Ethics Commission

Emeryville Should Have an Independent Ethics Commission Like Other Bay Area Cities 

Open Letter 

by Elisabeth Montgomery

The City of Emeryville recently devoted time and energy to establishing a Code of Ethics, which I applaud since small communities must stay engaged and diligent about upholding government standards in our democracy. The City Council was asked to begin this process based on behaviors exhibited by our councilpersons during the July hiring hearings in 2021 when several applicants were for the open City Planning Commission. One councilperson spoke in hostile words towards one or more applicants. Disclaimer - one of the applicants happened to be my husband Eugene Tssui. When researching how to send a complaint about a City Council member’s conduct, I discovered that Emeryville had no ethics code. “Who handles complaints against council members?” The reply from the legal department was, “City Council will decide if the complaint is valid.”

Emmy Award winning 
Emeryville resident
Elisabeth Montgomery

Thus, I began a journey to understand how a Code of Ethics can inform our city leaders about running our local government. I wrote letters to then-mayor John Bauters and spoke to city lawyers and clerks. I reviewed city council transcripts and spoke with regional organizations that assist cities in setting up a Code of Ethics. Like our US Constitution, I learned that developing a great Code of Ethics is a “living document” that is always “in progress” and needs annual reviews. 

One hallmark of a great Code of Ethics is not just writing up a legal template for the city staff and saying it is done. Instead, it requires gathering input from the residents and community. According to legal experts at the Institute for Local Government, the other explicit guarantee to be embedded in the Ethics Code is that the clear objective - when confronted by constituents with challenges to city staff conduct - the City Council should not be the only decision-makers on the issue. Instead, an independent governance body should help decide the case. This will assure elected officials avoid perceptions that their values are based on their views rather than the everyday ethics that determine our laws. 

The current Emeryville Mayor must take the next step to inform residents, gather input, set up an oversight committee, and update the Code of Ethics in 2024. 

Elisabeth P. Montgomery, Ph.D., GCDF is an international career development educator and an Emmy Award winning documentary film producer.  She has lived for 34 years in Emeryville with her husband Eugene Tssui, himself an international architect and author.  Mr Tssui's work is currently being shown at the New York Museum of Modern Art.  The couple have been advocating for an ethics commission for Emeryville for the last two years.  The current Mayor of Emeryville, John Bauters, has recently said NO to the question of an ethics commission for Emeryville.

Letter to the Tattler: Brooke Westling

The following letter was received from Brooke Westling, a candidate for Emeryville City Council.  During the campaign season, Ms Westling has not sought to win her seat or at least she has chosen to not engage with Emeryville voters about her ideas for our town.  Early in the season, she declined to answer the Tattler City Council candidates questionnaire; a losing strategy for the only two former candidates that dared to ignore it (anybody remember Frank Flores or Jason Crouch?).  Nonetheless, because Ms Westling is a candidate for Emeryville City Council, we extend the courtesy of posting her letter to the Tattler.

Here then is the letter from Brooke Westling:

To the Emeryville Tattler-

Since joining the race for Emeryville City council, I’ve had the unique opportunity to connect with our city, our community, and learned of the many ways our city leadership has led us in the right direction and the times they have not.

Learning that the vacated seats, early on, were not being filled, I submitted my entry into the contest in the hopes that city hall and the people of Emeryville would benefit from a more independently minded candidate to choose from. However, every indication I received confirmed that residents do want transparent, bold representation on city council, but that the race was being skewed into preferences intentionally shaped by powerful interest groups and their historical influence on elected officials..

On the morning of October 20th, I participated in a candidate forum hosted by the students of Emery High School along with Eugene Tssui and Kalimah Priforce. We were the only candidates that accepted their invitation after weeks of preparation by the teachers and staff and it turned out to be a wonderful exchange between us as candidates and the students.

After this experience which includes the camaraderie and kindness Kalimah and Eugene extended towards me, I found them to be the kind of leaders that the city needs for this election. They both reflect the independent open-mindedness I’ve come to admire about them and they are both willing to place a significant amount of resources towards changing the dynamic of the city council in ways that, at this moment, I would rather utilize towards supporting their bids.

Come November 8th, 2022, I will be voting for Eugene Tssui and Kalimah Priforce for the two at-large seats for Emeryville City Council. They have my endorsement and friendship moving forward and I encourage my supporters to do the same. I will continue to lend a voice and play a role in helping to steer the city in the right direction, and I am confident that Kalimah and Eugene’s tenure will be inclusive of people like me and all those whose voices have felt excluded from city hall.

 -Brooke Westling

Letter to the Tattler: Charlotte Danielson-Chang

 Letter to the Tattler: Charlotte Danielsson-Chang

Racism, Ageism Charged in City Council Planning Commission Selection

Watergate resident Charlotte Danielsson-Chang (bio below) writes to the Tattler about a recent selection of two new Planning Commissioners by the City Council whom she says were not properly selected.  Ms Danielsson-Chang, an applicant for the position of Planning Commissioner herself, was among four rejected  by the Council on March 16th (https://emeryville.granicus.com/player/clip/1949?view_id=5&redirect=true)   She charges the City Council with bias and racism among other improprieties in their selection of  Erica Zepko and Henry Symons (pictured below) to serve on the Commission.  As a preamble to her letter, Ms Danielsson-Chang sent the following to the Tattler:

“Ethics rules for public officials require fair process and public officials also have a duty of impartiality and merit-based decision making. With the exception of Scott Donahue, I believe the other City Councilmembers violated these ethics rules during the Planning Commission appointments process.  There were also elements of systemic racism and ageism in the process; a city council that considers itself progressive should at a minimum understand that electing insiders has the effect of bolstering systemic racism, ageism, and discouraging wider civic involvement by the community.” 

— Charlotte Danielsson-Chang

To the Emeryville Tattler Readers-

by Charlotte Danielsson-Chang

After days of complete shock over the bias and ethical violations I witnessed at an Emeryville City Council meeting on March 16th, I felt compelled to write an apology email to Dr. Eugene Tssui, a renowned Asian-American architect with over 30 years experience, for the treatment he received by the Emeryville City Council during his application for the Planning Commission. As a fellow Planning Commission applicant, I had no say over what happened but I felt like someone…anyone…needed to say the simple words of “I’m sorry that you were not treated fairly and not given the respect you deserved.”  

Ethics rules for public officials require merit-based decision making.

Dr Eugene Tssui has 32 years of experience and holds multiple advanced degrees in Architecture and City & Regional Planning, including two masters and a PhD from UC Berkeley. He is the author of 7 international books on architecture, city planning, ecology, biomimicry and ecological behavior change and has served as professor and instructor at 5 different universities including UC Berkeley. During his time as a Visiting Research Scholar at Harvard, he researched and developed biomimicry principles for developing construction materials that mimic the characteristics of zoological and botanical organisms. There has even been a documentary made about him. Before climate change, green building, conservation, using recycled materials were even words that existed in our vocabulary, Dr. Tssui was championing these concepts in urban planning and architecture.  The two candidates the City Council chose over Dr. Tssui? One is a mortgage broker working for a startup who graduated in 2010 that has only lived in Emeryville for 1.8 years; the other, a legislative liaison that graduated in 2016 that has lived in Emeryville for 7 years. Current Planning Commissioner C Tito Young  commented, “Dr. Tssui is what I would call a true ‘Renaissance Man.’  This is not a title, this is not a job description, and cannot be learned or taught. It is the ability to problem solve using multiple backgrounds, professional or otherwise, to obtain a solution.  It is more than a being purely sensitive because it entails a multidimensional level of observance.  In my lifetime, I have only met a handful of persons that may fall in that category.  They have the ability to realize the scope as a whole and not a scope as a part.  They are not swayed by popular belief or by any similar gains.  They simply want to make the built environment better, more interesting, and challenging to the social norm for people of many walks of life.”

Ethics rules for public officials require fair process and public officials also have a duty of impartiality.

With the exception of Councilmember Scott Donahue, the remaining Councilmembers violated all of these ethical rules on March 16th.  ”Are you familiar with the City of Emeryville’s Proposed Housing Expenditure Plan for Measure C?” asked Councilmember John Bauters of the applicants. Of course, no one but the two candidates selected who had spent time on the Housing Committee recently were likely to know the answer to that because it wasn’t one of the 5 questions interviewees were given in advance of the interview.  It also wasn’t even under the Planning Commission documents that your A+ type applicants would have reviewed prior to the interview; in fact, it was something that the Housing Committee (not the Planning Commission) had worked on recently. True, the City Council had voted on it at a meeting a few weeks prior to the March 16th interview for Planning Commissioner but the minutes of that meeting were not published until March 17th…the day after the Planning Commission interview.  Knowledge of Measure C’s Housing Expenditure Plan became the pivotal deciding factor for all of the Councilmembers with the exception of Scott Donahue.  This could lead any reasonable observer to wonder if this was not just a violation of fair process but also a violation of impartiality…or even a sign that the two chosen applicants had been preselected. “It baffles me that the city would not jump at the chance to have a pre-eminently qualified architect to be on the planning commission, one that is in the forefront of conservation and sustainability. The decision was not in the best interest of Emeryville, and I believe something was not right with the process.” Joe Lutz, former Emeryville Planning Commissioner for over 12 years and 45+ year resident of Watergate.  The Planning Commission handles a wide variety of issues of which affordable housing is only one element. Per the municipal code, the planning commission’s duties include residential, commercial, and industrial districts, traffic and parking conditions, boulevards, street openings and widenings, public parks, playgrounds, and other recreational areas, flood control, subdivisions.  Measure C was passed in July 2018 and numerous City Council planning commission selection meetings have been held since then.  Interestingly, knowledge of Measure C was not a deciding factor in those appointments…in fact, it was never even brought up as a question.  Note, also that appointment as a Planning Commissioner does not require any prior experience on another committee per the municipal code nor per prior practice of the City Council. “All of the candidates seemed reasonably qualified, however, in light of the mandate of the Planning Commission I was surprised that the Council chose not to select Eugene for one of the two Commission positions given his extraordinary qualifications. It’s a shame not to take advantage of this long-time Emeryville resident’s experience and commitment to city planning,” stated Steve Shane, Vice Chairperson of the City of Emeryville’s Commission on Aging.  

During the decision portion of the meeting, there wasn’t even a pretense of impartiality.  As Mayor, Dianne Martinez was responsible for leading the discussion and laying out the impartial criteria for decision making--a task she delegated to Councilmember John Bauters. Councilmember Bauters started off the discussion by stating that knowledge of Measure C was the deciding factor for the Planning Commission appointments.  He then proceeded to personally vouch for one of the applicants chosen because of his interactions with him. Councilmember Ally Medina then followed suit by herself endorsing that applicant as well.  Both Councilmembers then shared personal details about both applicants not in the record and actually used those details as additional criteria for their selection.  Of the first chosen applicant, Councilmember Bauters stated “he would be a phenomenal addition…..with his young family here in Emeryville I just think he offers a really excellent perspective.”  Councilmember Medina stated she was very impressed by the second chosen applicant who failed to attend due to a family emergency and stated “in an emergency situation she took the time to fill up the answers to our questions so she could still be considered tonight and I think that speaks to a level of commitment and quite frankly this committee requires a great deal of commitment.” Mayor Martinez, complicit in her silence during the inappropriate comments, ultimately took the path of least resistance by whole-heartedly agreeing with Bauters and Medina. 

What’s the cost of the bias to the community?

Narrow vision hurts Emeryville

“Housing already has its own committee.  Using housing as the deciding factor for Planning Commission appointments, that is just beyond dumb.  It’s such a narrow criteria, it makes me question whether those City Councilmembers are smart enough to be directing the city,” Celeste Burrows a 14 year member of Emeryville’s Bicycle & Pedestrian Advisory Committee, 2 year member of the Council on Aging, and a resident of Emeryville for 27 years. State law requires that each city submit a general plan (i.e. blueprint for meeting the community’s long-term vision for the future) and provide annual updates on the progress of the city towards that plan.  The 9 elements of the General Plan are Land Use, Circulation, Housing, Safety, Noise, Conservation, Open Space, Urban Design and Sustainability and the General Plan is broken down into 79 specific actions that are to be completed in a 20 year period starting in 2009. Note, affordable housing is a subsection of the general housing element.  In the General Plan Annual Progress Report for 2020 (report date 2/18/2021) that the Emeryville city staff submitted to the Emeryville Planning Commission, it was noted that out of the 79 actions required in the General Plan, only 16 have actually been completed, 59 had some progress made on them in 2020, and 4 had no progress. 11 years into a 20 year plan, only completed 20% of the required actions have been completed!

Although Dr. Tssui and I had never met, or even spoken, before that City Council meeting, we both applied for the Planning Commission with the same thought…that it’s ridiculous that Emeryville is falling behind when it could so easily achieve its General Plan goals well in advance of its anticipated timeline if it stopped trying to reinvent the wheel! We both held decades of experience and connections from different parts of the world that had already successfully accomplished all of the things that Emeryville’s General Plan was attempting to do in short timeframes.  My 22 years as a California attorney helping US tech companies and companies from throughout the world establish here along with my nonprofit work bridging innovation between Europe and Silicon Valley has given me unique knowledge of and connections in cities such as (1) Copenhagen, Denmark—a city that has already successfully built a giant network of bike paths and lanes and even an extensive Cycle Super Highway that joins over 25 municipalities and the Capital.  That city has accomplished these goals to the point that 9 out of 10 people there now own a bike and 40% of all commutes are via bike and only 29% of households now own a car; (2) Stockholm, Sweden—a city that has the highest number of eco hotels in the world and it is one of the only cities in the world that recycles all of its household waste; (3) Oslo, Norway—the city that has the most electric cars per capita in the world and has a car-free city center; (4) Estonia—a country that has been named “the most advanced digital society in the world” because it has efficient, secure and transparent ecosystem where 99% of governmental services are online. Dr. Tssui’s architectural and city planning expertise and network extends to China. He has taught architecture and city planning at four of China's greatest universities and has designed two towns and cities in China.  Dr. Tssui commented that “China has proven itself in its seriousness, know-how, and be on-time and on-budget mentality, to create infrastructure, buildings, and landscapes. In only two generations, China has gone from a back-water, agrarian society with no economic ranking, to the most powerful economic engine in the world. It has moved from absolute poverty to the middle class, and has cornered the market on 5G electronics, pharmaceuticals, and bought the entire continent of Africa.” Dr. Tssui continued enthusiastically saying “China is a country that finished a 57 story skyscraper in 19 days and rebuilt a 4-way, 8-lane, uni-directional, freeway intersection in downtown Beijing in 18 hours! Imagine what even just a fragment of that know-how could do for Emeryville!” 

Lack of Geographical Representation Leading to 25% of Emeryville being voiceless; enforcing ageism and systemic racism

Per the municipal code, the City Council “shall attempt to appoint Planning Commissioners in such a manner that the various geographic districts of the City are represented by a Commissioner.” The two applicants chosen were from districts already represented on the Planning Commission.  “Watergate represents a sizable portion of city residents, it remains unrepresented on the planning commission, and has so for years,” commented Joe Lutz. Both Dr. Tssui and I are residents of Watergate on the Peninsula, a community that represents roughly 25% of the city’s population and continues to be voiceless in planning matters because it has no representation on the Planning Commission. Watergate was built in the 1970s and many of its original residents still reside there.  When Dr. Tssui talked with Councilmember Bauters after the City Council meeting about the Planning Commission decision, Councilmember Bauters told him “Eugene, you would be perfect for our Commission on Aging…you should apply for that.” Surely, someone in their 60s is still capable of using their professional expertise to benefit the city in their area of expertise and not only regarding issues of aging! In addition to that, 30% of the population of Emeryville is Asian but our city committees and commissions don’t reflect that and the addition of Dr. Tssui would have been an important step toward balancing out the representation within the city. In the current climate of increased anti-Asian hate that affects so many the actions of the City Council seem especially egregious. A city council that considers itself progressive should at a minimum understand that electing insiders has the effect of bolstering systemic racism, ageism, and discouraging wider civic involvement by the community.  Emeryville’s current City Council has very much benefitted from the low civic involvement of the city. Councilmembers Bauters, Medina, and Patz just received new four year terms without an election because no one came forward to challenge them so the formality of an election was avoided altogether.  In a city of over 12,000 people, Mayor Martinez holds her office because of a mere 1471 votes.  

What’s next?

Dr. Tssui says his goal for Emeryville is “to initiate and reinforce a higher degree of development and constructable conceptual design for the City, to create a dynamic and proactive program of ecological behavioral change, and to introduce design concepts that support a zero to minimum footprint on the planet, restore the natural environment, minimize energy use, create disaster-free architecture, help to unify the City's east, west, north and south sides, and give a new future thinking character and excitement to the City” and he states adamantly that he “will not give up.” 

As for me, I don’t give up either.  This experience inspired me to organize a free virtual conference (www.futurecitiestoday.com) for June 10th where Dr. Tssui, along with other innovators and leaders from around the world, will show us how we can combat climate change through innovative architecture; how we can build a people-focused work environment and wellness based city with a focus on sustainability, pedestrian focused city, bike highways, carless city centers…now, not 10 years from now; how we can prepare our energy systems for our “new normal“ of extreme weather events (avoiding Texas winter storm outage and California rolling blackouts); and how innovative startups from around the world already have the solutions for our local issues.

Charlotte Danielsson-Chang received her JD from Stanford Law School and her Bachelor’s degree in Economics & Political Science from Berkeley.  She has practiced corporate law & business immigration law for technology companies since 1998. She is committed to pro bono/nonprofit work focusing on increasing the exchange of technology & innovation between countries around the world and the United
States.  Charlotte is an Ambassador for MIT Technology Review and is responsible for nominating Innovators Under 35 who have made outstanding technological achievements as entrepreneurs, inventors, visionaries, pioneers and humanitarians. Charlotte currently serves as a Commissioner for the Alameda County Human Relations Commission. 

Erica Zepko
Newly selected Planning Commissioner

Henry Symons
Newly selected Planning Commissioner

Letter to the Tattler: Eugene Tssui

Eugene Tssui: 

Christie Avenue's Onni Tower 

"...A Lethal Environmental Catastrophe Waiting to Happen"

I am writing in response to the proposed 54 story building known as the Onni Tower, and the 
16 story ancillary building, to be located on Christie Avenue, next to the current Wells
 Fargo bank building and FedEx/Kinkos building.

The Onni Tower
At nearly 700 feet tall, the Onni Project will add
some 1,100 new renters to Emeryville and an
undetermined number of daily car trips.

I have calculated the carbon dioxide levels that the two proposed
 buildings for Emeryville will produce:  The buildings have a total
 square footage of 258,000 square feet as described by the real estate
 developer's stated specifications.  Multiply this figure by 20 to
calculate the number of BTU's required to heat, cool, and ventilate
 these buildings.  The figure is:  5,160,000 BTU/hour that the 
buildings produce.  To convert this to kilowatts per hour, multiply
 each BTU by .000293071.   The result is:  1511.88 KWH/Hour to 
heat/cool/ventilate these buildings.  One KWH = 1.13 Pounds of CO2
(Carbon Dioxide).  Multiply 1511.88 KWH/H x 1.13 Pounds = 1708.4244
 pounds of CO2 per hour that these two proposed buildings will inject into Emeryville's air.  Every 24 hours the amount of CO2 will be 
41,002.185 pounds or 20.50 tons of CO2.  To check my calculations, I have also used an alternative method produced by the Carbonfund organization, and get a result of 17.6 tons of CO2 per day created by this building.



Carbon dioxide (CO2) deprives cells in the body and brain of oxygen
 by combining with the oxygen carrying hemoglobin of the blood to form 
carboxyhemoglobin.  This reaction prevents oxygen from binding to 
hemoglobin, thus leading to anoxia (lack of oxygen).

  How might it affect the environment?   Carbon dioxide reacts with 
other pollutants in the air to form potentially harmful ground level
 ozone.  This occurs close to the site of emission.

  Inhalation of carbon dioxide at high concentrations can be fatal 
because it prevents the transport of oxygen (in blood) around the
 body. Releases from poorly maintained appliances and interior heating,
 cooling and ventilation systems, in poorly ventilated spaces could 
result in concentrations high enough to cause death.  Long-term
exposure to lower concentrations (such as through smoking) could harm 
unborn babies or cause neurological damage.

'Sick Building Syndrome' is
 a term sometimes used for interior air pollution maladies but this building proposes to expel 17.6 to 20.5 tons of CO2 into the air on its exterior, and thus is a lethal environmental catastrophe waiting to happen.  It will dump a
 minimum of 17.5 to 20.5 tons of toxic CO2 into Emeryville's air per day.

  Is this what you want for Emeryville and for your own health, your
 family's health and the health of your local neighborhood 
environment?

  This proposed building design, and its day-to-day function will be
 a disaster.  Our planet earth is dying and a major reason 
for its accelerating death is the continued creation of architectural 
buildings, such as this one, which will add to the lethal CO2 content of 
our air, water and soil.  We do not see this insidious attack on our air because it is up high, on the roof, where we cannot view it.  Every day, we have the choice to mitigate 
and resolve our urgent dilemma of a dying earth or contribute to its 
on-going destruction.

 I have not even touched upon the energy and 
materials resources that this building will require and the lethal 
pollution that will result from the fabrication and erection of its materials.  
The drinking water wasted, the toxic oil and gas, and the polluting 
electricity needed to create the materials of construction of this
 proposed building and its heating, ventilation and air-conditioning
 systems will further devastate what healthy resources, fresh air,
 drinkable water and non-polluted soil we have left in our
 Emeryville neighborhood.



Emeryville, and the world, does not need another lethal architectural
 behemoth that silently contributes to the killing of our planet.  

Please consider carefully, and with informed study, the consequences 
of the existence of such an ecological and architectural disaster.   Buildings, such as this one, are killing us and robbing our planet of what healthy future we have left.

Sincerely,

Dr. Eugene Tssui,
Architect, Author, International Professor

Eugene Tssui resides primarily in Emeryville since 1989 and has raised a family of five here.  He is an internationally practicing architect, maintaining offices here and in Shenzhen, China, specializing in "true zero-footprint" and disaster-proof buildings. He graduated from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1989, and holds an Interdisciplinary Doctorate in architecture and education, and two Masters Degrees in architecture and city and regional planning.  Dr. Tssui is the author of seven books on architecture and ecology and has been a professor of architecture and ecology at UC Berkeley and Beijing University in China.  He was a Harvard University Research Scholar in 2011 and 2012.  His articles on architecture and ecology have been published globally in over 100 magazines and newspapers ranging from Nature magazine to the New York Times.

Recently, he has been involved in designing the tallest building in the world, in development for Shanghai, China, using the natural ambient temperature of the Earth as a passive heating, cooling, and ventilation source and thus having no ecologically destructive HVAC (Heating, Ventilation, Air-Conditioning) systems.  Dr. Tssui has been featured on global television programs such as National Geographic, the Discovery Channel, the Learning Channel, the History Channel. PBS CNN, NBC, CBS, The McNeil/Lehrer Report, the BBC, MTV and CCTV television in China, and Nippon TV in Japan, and has been the recipient of grants from the National Endowment of the Arts and the Graham Foundation.  Dr. Tssui was recently bestowed the title "Guardian Angel of the Planet" with Jane Goodall and Jean Michael Cousteau, by Multivu News, New York. 

Update Note: References to carbon monoxide were changed on 5/31 to carbon dioxide at the author's request.

Letter to the Tattler: Ken Bukowski

Teachers Union Snubs Ken Bukowski and Their Own Democratic Process

As Emeryville's election period begins, the Emery Teachers Association president, Ericka Castillo has drawn fire from community members.  When she recently announced her union had used a democratic process in the selection for their School Board candidate endorsements, it was learned one candidate had been snubbed; Ken Bukowski.  Mr Bukowski is now rightly asking how can the teachers union know not to vote for him if they didn't even hear his ideas for the District.  The snubbing of Mr Bukowski and the democratic process represents an unfortunate soiling of the ETA's reputation as well as a disservice to Emeryville voters.  
Mr Bukowski reached out to the Tattler to help the community hear his ideas for our schools the Emery Teachers Association isn't interested in hearing.
Here is School Board candidate Ken Bukowski's letter-  


Regarding the recent School Board endorsements, I would like to say the president of the Emery Teachers Association (the teachers union) is misguided about the election process.  Of course, the ETA has the right to endorse whomever they wish and I was not endorsed this time.  However, I take issue with a recent misleading statement about the School Board endorsements made by the president of the ETA,  Ericka Castillo.  She told the E’ville Eye blog her union’s candidate vetting process was fair; "the process was extensive and democratic” she said.
Her comment is an insult.  This misleading response makes you believe all the candidates were "extensively" considered, and apparently those not chosen were rejected.  What she’s not admitting though is the ETA did not reach out to all the candidates for School Board.
We were not asked to complete a questionnaire and not every candidate was interviewed.  This in mind, I have to ask, what information was provided to the teachers to make the their ranked choice decisions?
This highlights the ongoing problems the District has had with a lack of transparency.

I'm running for the School Board because I'm concerned about the kids.  I've seen this District go bankrupt twice.  And now, we are on the same road again.
The first time the state ordered the District to sell the Middle School, but (we) the City refused to re-zone the property to accommodate the buyer.  Instead the school was leased and that money helped turn the District around.
The second time it went bankrupt is when the District decided to operate three schools again.  The City ultimately ended up bailing out the District.  The City recognized the District could not afford to operate three schools so we combined all the children in one building so the City could help share the costs.
The resultant ECCL was thus planned to help make the District solvent. However, at the last minute, the full $95 million bond issued to pay for the ECCL could not be sold in the bad market of the Great Recession.  The project was consequently scaled back to reflect the new fiscal realities.  But the necessary elements for the District to be solvent, formerly elucidated by a chaste School Board were simply eliminated.
As you can see, we have a big problem.

The Emery School District is top heavy with administration.  The cost of operating a separate district takes away funds which could be used for the kids education.  But there is a real opportunity for the District to develop teacher housing on the surplus sites (the former elementary and middle schools) thanks to a bill by Assemblyman Tony Thurmond created for this purpose.  I talked with Tony about it for Emery and he said he would love to see his bill help leverage State money to supply teacher housing here.
Having teachers in the community full time would be a great advantage.

It's important for me to put these ideas on the table and I think it sets a bad example when you don't have a fair process from the ETA.
I’m running for the Board to help the district avoid bankruptcy for a third time.  Misleading information put out from those who are supposed to help is not appropriate.  I  sincerely hope the ETA can have a fair endorsement process in the future and show appreciation for every candidate.

-Ken Bukowski
Candidate for Emery School Board

Letter to the Tattler: Traffic Diverters Needed; Former City Councilman John Fricke

Traffic Diverters in the Triangle Neighborhood Overdue

-by former Emeryville City Councilman John Fricke

Last night, an SUV driver, traveling at a high rate of speed down my residential street in the Triangle neighborhood, struck a traffic circle, lost control of the vehicle, and struck a utility pole and a parked car.  The parked car, in turn, struck another parked car behind it, which then struck a third car.  

I was not at home at the time, but my neighbor told me that the force of the collision shook his house.  The Emeryville Police Department responded.  The SUV driver struck the wooden utility pole with such force that PG&E was summoned to inspect the integrity of the pole.

This incident would not have occurred had the City of Emeryville permanently installed the traffic diverters that were tested over ten years ago.  The policymaking process was exemplary, up until my colleagues on the City Council made the snap decision to deviate from the orderly process:  

•  A number of neighbors and I drew attention to the problem of a large volume of cut-through traffic on the east-west streets (41st, 43rd, 45th, and 47th).
•  The City Council convened a series of widely-advertised community meetings to solicit input from Triangle neighbors.
•  At these well-attended community meetings, we discussed various solutions, including speed bumps, traffic circles, and traffic diverters, ultimately reaching consensus on the need for traffic diverters.
•  The City Council directed the city staff to install temporary traffic diverters for a six-month trial period, data would be collected before and during the trial period.
•  The preliminary data showed that the traffic diverters were effective in reducing the volume and speed of vehicle traffic.
•  At two city council meetings during the test period, a vocal minority of Triangle neighbors complained about the traffic diverters.
• At a meeting in October, 2007, the vocal minority prevailed over the orderly process.  A City Council majority consisting of Ruth Atkin, Ken Bukowski, Nora Davis, and Dick Kassis, made a snap decision to halt the data collection, ordered the city staff to remove the diverters, and replace them with temporary traffic circles (a permanent version of one of these circles was struck by the speeding SUV last night).  
•  I voted 'NO' to the snap decision to prematurely end the trial period.  
•  Why was the original traffic diverter on 47th Street spared from the City Council majority’s impetuous decision?  Because none of the vocal minority complained about 47th Street.

This series of events took place before and after my election to the city council.  Indeed, it was one of the issues that I ran on, including advocating for traffic diverters during my campaign.  

https://www.dropbox.com/s/vk83k107tzp2s2p/ProposedTriangleTrafficDiverters_Aug.2005.pdf?dl=0

The City Council majority’s decision to ignore the process that it established was a slap in the face of the numerous Triangle residents who attended the community meetings, who listened to the consultant describe alternatives, who listened to their fellow neighbors’ input regarding the possible solutions, and who ultimately reached consensus around traffic diverters.  Their fault lies in the fact that they had confidence that a majority of their elected representatives would engage in evidence-based policymaking, namely test a proposed solution by collecting and comparing baseline data against data collected during the test period.  They did not anticipate that the decision would be governed by a few loud voices.

The legacy of this process is failure.  The traffic circles have failed to solve the problem.  Over the years, I have observed an increase in the volume of cars.  The number of speeding cars remains high.  As I type this opinion piece on a Saturday afternoon from my home computer with a view of the traffic circle at 43rd and Salem streets, I have counted thirteen cars that have not slowed their speed at all as they drive through the stop sign.  This traffic circle is right next to the entrance of the playground of the elementary school, the gate to which is opened each weekend day for the neighborhood’s use (shout out to School Board member Barbara Inch for getting this done).  These residential streets should include traffic calming that places the safety of residents above the convenience of cut-through traffic.

I believe that traffic diverters are the best solution.  I will send this column to each of our five elected representatives on the new City Council (John Bauters, Scott Donahue, Dianne Martinez, Ally Medina, and Christian Patz).  I will ask them to decide whether there is a problem that needs to be addressed, if so, to collect data, and then to implement an evidenced-based solution.  
Photos courtesy John Fricke 

Links:

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https://www.dropbox.com/s/g28xlme5ya7hcak/TrafficCalmingMeasures_Sept.2006.pdf?dl=0

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https://www.dropbox.com/s/eyimbvw0338iwc3/Emeryville%20Summary_Nov.2005.pdf?dl=0

Before data:https://www.dropbox.com/s/0ctup5vzggajsze/WorkshopSummary_April2006.pdf?dl=0

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https://www.dropbox.com/s/l6gy3bueh442bnh/TrafficCounts_BeforeTriangleTrafficCalming.pdf?dl=0

During data (partial):

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https://www.dropbox.com/s/s8m4al1f61f3nlt/TrafficCounts_AfterTrafficCalmingSalemSt_Sept.2007.pdf?dl=0

John Fricke moved to Emeryville in 1994 and was an Emeryville City Council member from 2005-2009. An attorney, he worked for the Alameda County public defenders office before setting up a private practice in Emeryville.  After having lived abroad and in San Francisco for several years following his Council stint, Mr Fricke calls Emeryville his home once again.

Dr John Rubio's Record in Vacating Teacher's Testimony

Tattler Called to Serve as Repository for School District's Archive

Letter to the Tattler: Malcolm Waugh

The following letter to the Tattler was received from Emery Unified School District teacher Malcolm Waugh.  Mr Waugh, a long time kindergarten teacher at Anna Yates Elementary School, expressed concern that his fellow EUSD teacher's heart rending and condemnatory testimony given at a June 15th School Board meeting would be lost; no record having been provided for it by the School Board.  At the following meeting, June 28th, the Board majority, inexplicably voted to approve official minutes of the now epic June 15th meeting penned by Superintendent Rubio himself, that removed all criticism of the Superintendent the nine teachers/educators had poignantly offered.  Of particular concern to Mr Waugh is the fact that the comments and criticism against Mr Rubio made by most of the nine teachers, served as their final outgoing statements, most of them leaving Emery to seek employment elsewhere owing to a crisis at the District, brought on they said by Mr Rubio.  The nine represent part of an ongoing mass exodus of teachers at Emery, the worst teacher retention record of any district in the Bay Area a result of a failure of leadership by Mr Rubio chronicled by the teachers on June 15th.
Malcolm Waugh is so concerned the public record will not be faithfully documented because of the School Board's revisionary minutes they approved, he is looking to the Tattler to provide a safe archive of the testimony of the nine teachers.  Mr Waugh painstakingly provided to the Tattler the following letter, the verbatim text of the teachers culled from a video provided by the Emeryville Property Owners Association.  
We are pained this teacher has abandoned the District and is looking to the Tattler as a refuge for keeping an accurate record of the testimony, but we willingly take on this role, at least until a change in the politicized culture at Emery Unified allows for a return to their traditional charge to properly account.

Mr Waugh lists each teacher/educator with a number representing their speaking turn at the meeting followed by the verbatim text from each.  The Superintendent's secretary, Lisa Taymuree is documented as she interrupted the speakers to remind them their allowed three minutes of speaking time had elapsed.  Many were permitted to continue speaking after colleagues yielded their time to the speaker.  

START

1. MEGAN McLAUGHLIN  

Hi, everybody, I'm Megan McLaughlin.  I just have a few comments.  I'm retiring, and I wanted to have a chance to talk to you tonight.  

When I was hired here in 2006 I was really excited to be part of Emery.  My colleagues Evan Pippen, Malcolm Waugh, and Audrey Miles were amazing co-teachers - smart, kind, funny - could not ask for better partners.  I remember telling my sister, a superintendent in Delaware, about the school and the curriculum.  'Wow', she said, 'you have TERC Investigations for math, Lucy Calkins for writing?  You have a literacy coach, and a math coach?  You have paid time for collaboration?  You must have a really progressive school'.  We worked as a school to improve writing across the grades, and across curriculum.  We had thoughtful, well-planned professional development that I looked forward to.  We had time in August to get to know each other and have a few laughs.  

This year, I'm one of many teachers voting with my feet.  I'm leaving Emery to retire.  I've a lot of good, positive things in my future; I have a lot of concerns for the students, for the parents, for the staff, for the teachers.  Here are a few points.  No one asked me for an exit interview, so I'm trying to fill you in here.

Teachers need a voice.  They need to feel that it is safe to speak up when there is an issue, and not receive retribution.  

When I had a challenging class last year with a high number of students with significant behavior challenges - this is the same class that is now the first-grade cohort - I asked for help.  Ms. Lang helped me to turn around the behaviors that were making the class unsafe and were making it very challenging to teach.  On the last day of school, at 3 p.m. - this was Friday, the day when I was the only teacher, I believe, at school except for Ms. Wren - I was called to a surprise meeting.  What a surprise.  What Dr. Rubio said broke my heart - he was present via phone.  He asked if I'd like to be one of the on-call substitutes for the 2016-2017 academic year.

I've seen many examples of his leadership.  He seems to lack the ability to reflect upon what he's done, to 'stay in his lane' as the superintendent and let the principal do her job.  There is a surface politeness covering a man I've come to distrust.  Not responding to issues, but instead, attacking teachers.  This is difficult for me to say, Dr. Rubio, but I'm trying to speak my truth.  

Communication can be improved on all levels --

"Sorry, your three minutes is up." (Lisa Taymuree)

O.K. (Megan)

"Could we ask that she be allowed to continue?" (Board member Barbara Inch) 

"My name is Lauren LaPlante and I'd like to defer my three minutes to Ms. McLaughlin." (Lauren)

I just need one more minute.  

For the good of all the students, for everyone in the community, I believe that we need better systems - how the students move around the school safely.  We need routines in place.  We need better supervision of the children while they're at play.  We need a few items of safety, such as the planters, which I believe are a lawsuit waiting to happen - those planters right outside.  I believe that the behavior issues that present themselves today are such - they're so challenging, even to a veteran teacher such as I - that when I spoke to parents today, were my kindergarten students, they expressed to me that they were willing to stick it out for one more year, but if things didn't change they were going pull their children out of Emery because they were afraid for their safety in the classroom.  Besides the point, they were afraid that their children were not getting anywhere near the education they expected because of the discipline issues.

I believe the best days are ahead for Emery.  I believe this community is amazing.  I've never met a staff that is so resilient and works so well together in the face of adversity, and I believe that Emery deserves leadership that reflects the efforts of the teachers.

Thank you very much.

"Any additional public comment?" (Board President Donn Merriam)

***

 2. ANTHONY RODGERS

My name is Anthony Rodgers.  I've been a middle school teacher here for 11 years.  I mentioned to the staff yesterday that I never thought that I would leave here so early in my career.  I took those three guiding principles that we had years ago to heart, about ending classist and racist practices and creating a sense of family and using innovative practices in our classroom.  And this is my family. [Now I ask and plea] to the board is, make sure there's more horizontal and vertical communication and articulation in the district.  We are administrative-heavy in this district with two schools.  Anjali Kamat and myself, we have 22 years of your institutional memory for your middle school.  We're the dinosaurs of the middle school here.  We were the instructional coaches of the middle school this past year.  We both finished our administrative credentials, and yet there is someone else from the outside coming in with not as much experience as us to run our middle school.  And so, if - and this isn't personal to anyone, this is about business and this is about our students - so if we're in a position to end these racist and sexist principles and classist principles, we need to do it now.  I'm asking the board to please work as a united front, no matter what our differences are, let's come here and do the work for our students.  That's what we do every day when we pound the pavement in the school as teachers.  But I'm actually leaving - I'm leaving.  And with myself, Ms. McLaughlin, Ms. Coombs, Ms. Brunick and Ms. Kamat, and even Ms. Lang, you have about a hundred years of your service leaving your community.  A hundred years of service.  And I don't care what you and who you bring in, that's not bringing in that same institutional memory of families.  Our reputations with families, it precedes us.  Families want to come to us because we taught their families.  I just think that's something to really think about.  We really have to think about that, but again, we're administrative-heavy, and I would say with some of the new administrators coming in, they're not culturally sensitive.  They come in with a hierarchical approach to life and treat everyone as if we're roaches and dogs.  And that's not the way to treat anyone, even if you have a title, wherever you bought it from, even if you have that title, it's not acceptable.  In addition to that, when I - I had to reapply for my position on Ed-Join, had to submit my resume for the same position that I was teaching.  So I really want to ask you all, please look at the practices of how teachers are moved around here, because if it isn't equal, then that's discriminatory.  I had to reapply for my position in the classroom that I was in.  And that's not personal - that was personal to me.  I'm not a person who's vindictive in that way.  I kept moving, I kept pounding the pavement, but if we have other teachers that are moved in this district, please look at skin color, please look at gender, and please look at how people are being moved around in this school.  Thank you.

[Marcelline Krafchick speaks]

***

3. LESLIE THORNLEY

Good evening.  My name is Leslie Thornley.  I'm one of the teachers planning on returning in the Fall, and I have some concerns and worries, and feel like my esteemed colleagues that have been here for many years can address better than I, and it feels a little safer to have other people speak for me.  So on behalf of that I'd like to donate the rest of my time to Holly Coombs.

***

4. HOLLY COOMBS  

Hello, Board.  I'm Holly Coombs, and I have been teaching at Anna Yates for 15 years, and I'm going next year to teach in San Francisco.  Anyone who asks me I say I'm going to teach to be closer to my house, I have two little kids, the commute is killing me.  But people who push a little farther, they find out a little more about why I feel it's right for me to leave.  So, I'm here to just tell you why I, all the reasons why I'm leaving.  So, first of all, I came to work at Anna Yates because I really wanted to work with some colleagues - Gabrielle Thurmond and Anakarita Allen.  I really respected them and the equity work that we were doing here, and I felt like I was really part of something very special, something very important.  Our work with BAYCES and the connections that we were building through our retreats, and I felt like I was learning how to be a culturally relevant teacher, which is really important being a white educator with mostly kids of color.  It was really important for me to tackle my own racism, and this school district was teaching me how to do that, and I felt like we were really creating something here.  What I've noticed over the last 15 years is that I feel like our best years were when we were K-6, and Anakarita was our principal and we were really moving forward.  And then there was a few things that happened here that didn't really feel like they were the best for the students.  The middle school got put with K-6 and there was no real middle school program, and Anakarita got moved, and BAYCES, we didn't really work with them, and it just gave me pause because I wasn't sure that that was best for the students, and it felt like interference but it didn't really interrupt the core of this solid group of teachers.  The last few years have been so difficult, however, that I feel like I must leave.  I feel that it has become so difficult to be here and watch the institutional racism that I see around me, and that we're not really deeply doing the equity work that we need to be doing.  It's sort of on the surface.  There's a lot of dysfunctions at the school that I can't really go into here because this is a public, formal setting.  I haven't actually met any board members except for Brynnda.  She's the only one who's come up and talked to me, but had any board member come up --

"You're out of time." (Lisa Taymuree)

[time donated]

-- I would have been able to go into more detail.  So it just matters to me about where I work, and I was willing to do this commute for 15 years because I felt like I was part of something really important, and I'm not sure that the work San Francisco is doing is as focused on equity.  And so, what I've been thinking about is the implications of this.  The first is that I really feel that the town of Emeryville needs to recommit to public education - the people of Emeryville - and that the school board - I haven't worked with you, so I don't know your practices, I know you're new - but, in general, the school board needs to be culturally competent and really committed to the community.  So in the past the school board members, I had their numbers on my cell phone, they came, like [former board president] Josh [Simon] came and helped me set up my classroom - he brought me books.  They all knew my kids, you know, it was very familiar.  They either had children who went here or they went here themselves, and they were just very much part of the community.  So I just want the school board to be, to really reflect on their practices, and notice if they are actually being culturally competent themselves.  I really appreciated the board policy that I saw, but I was wondering, well, how would you do that?  How would the board and our current superintendent actually be the ones to help create this equitable environment?  I was thinking maybe you needed a how in that plan.  And I want to let the school board know that you set the tone, and so if you need to - I'm hoping that you will create some kind of reflective practice on your own work - but also on how you hear from teachers, because this, this is not really the way you're going to find out what's going on with teachers.  But it also needs to be fair.  So some sort of fair process where you really know what's going on, and if anyone interferes with that or tells you that you don't need to hear from teachers, that that person can tell you themself, then that should be a red flag for you.  And finally, I've seen a lot of superintendents at our district and I feel like it's difficult to be a superintendent of this district - it's difficult, it's small town, there's all these politics.  Please, in the future, please look carefully for a superintendent who's an experienced educator and also has all of their cultural competency in place, either because they are a proud person of color, they grew up in the community, or they just know our kids, and it will just help resolve, it'll help prevent a lot of the pain that a lot of people have felt, particularly the people of color.  I have not felt any pain, but the people of color, my colleagues, have felt a lot.  And also there's just a lot of things I see all the time, that I don't actually believe a deeply culturally competent person would allow --

"You're out of time." (Lisa Taymuree)

Thank you (Holly).

[time donated]

That's O.K.  That's O.K. (Holly)

"Another three minutes." (Donn Merriam)

I'm done.  Thanks.  (Holly)

"Thank you.  Additional public comment?" (Donn Merriam)

***

5. DIANE LANG

Hi.  Good evening to the Emery Board.  I'm Diane Lang.  I've been the principal of Anna Yates K-8 school for the past three years, and so some of the people you've been hearing from have been on my staff during that time.

I'm really happy to say that today I closed out my final year here in Emeryville.  I was on campus until our last student left for home, safely.  It's been three years.  

I wanted to come before you to talk about leadership.  And to lead means to go first.  But leadership for me is also about putting my name and myself before the community, because when there's a challenge in the school building, it's me that they want to see, it's me who they hold accountable, and so it's important to me that I express to you the difficulty that it creates when I as a leader, the face of the school, cannot with full confidence communicate things to community members, members of my staff, with the confidence that it will come to fruition without changes or without things being possibly even undermined.  It makes it hard.  It makes it difficult.  So I want to be really up front about that.  

As the principal who has been here for three years, we've done work, findings, about what works and what does not, best practices, and ultimately what works best for our kids.  It is unfortunate to ever have that work, those finding, dismissed as opinions, when my feet are on the ground every day, here with the teachers, in classrooms, in hallways, in the lunchroom, on the field.  How could my finding be just opinion?

I wanted to make sure that everyone is aware of the challenges of selective accountability.  And we talk about equity - it needs to be more than just a buzzword, but a real set of practices that we put in place.  And we are letting ourselves off the hook in terms of equity when we say things like 'Oh, I forgot to talk to you, the principal of the school, about this decision that's being made that's going to impact our students, and that parents and community members are going to hold me accountable for.  How could you forget to speak to me, or to remember that I'm the principal of the school?  How could anyone forget?  And if it happens once, we all make mistakes, and if it happens twice, I've certainly made two mistakes, three mistakes, but if it happens on a regular basis, perhaps there's something else that's the issue, in terms of remembering I'm the principal.  And when things are good, I get the credit, and when things are not so good, I get the blame.

"Your three minutes is up." (Lisa Taymuree)

[time donated]

"O.K., go ahead, please." (Donn Merriam)

We have a partnership with the city of Emeryville that has built this lovely facility here.  I want to remind everyone the importance of mutual respect, that considers the need of students first, always.  This facility is for our children, and our children need to be educated, and that is what we have been tasked with, providing them with an education.  Recreation is optional.  Their foundational skills of being life-long learners and scholars is not optional.  So I hope that everyone is fully aware and engaged in making sure that a partnership is truly a partnership that centers around the need of students.

I am not done leading schools.  I will be leaving - this is my final year.  I'm very excited that we've reached the last day of school.  I will continue my work with a very similar community.  This is the community I want to serve.  But just looking for the opportunity to be remembered and respected as a black, female principal who's been here every day doing the very best I could in spite of whatever the circumstances presented.  So again I just ask that equity be a real set of practices that lead our work, not just something that we write down or say, something we really live by and really do.  Thank you.

***

6. KEVIN BOYD

Good evening.  My name is Kevin Boyd.  I used to be a colleague - well, these are my colleagues.  I've been here in this district since 1999.  I've seen, I've seen a lot of superintendents come through here.  I've seen a lot of principals.  I've seen a lot of what was constructive for this school but also what is destructive, but also watched how many of these teachers - many of the faces that I see work their asses off, you know, to make things happen for these kids that we dealt with.  I was with the old school, and the hats we had to wear were, you know, many.  Ms. Taymuree, Ms. Collins were two women that I admire very highly as they worked with me.  A lot of people here know what I dealt with, this kids I dealt with, and how I dealt with, and was unorthodox, but I did get support, and I was always support for my friends and colleagues who worked here.  What I see the lack of here and have is just that.  There is no support.  I mean a serious lack of support for our teachers in their classrooms, for our kids, you know, and right now I sub at the high school in the office because I refuse to go into a classroom where teachers just don't seem to have it all together and that's all over the place because so many of them are just being, you know, just drowned by what's going on.  Now with that I just want to say I, like I said, I've been through quite a few superintendents.  I've never seen the lack of leadership as I've been seeing here right now, the lack of personal pride, because I could always talk to the superintendent.  I could go into that office at any time and speak to them.  I just didn't see that.  I haven't seen that in a few years here and it's very, you know, it's not cool, it's not cool at all, so I just wanted to say that because I'm here every once in a while, but I still see what I don't like seeing.  We need to see more support for our students, for our teachers, a lot more support for these students, and generally just we got to get this, get what we built here back on what it should be, back on track.

***

7. TAUHEEDAH WREN

Good evening, Board, and superintendent, and principal, fellow staff members, and friends.  Ramadan...This is a month of fasting for Muslims - I'm a Muslim - and this is a month of peace, so not to minimize anything that was said, because I agree with everything that was said from our teachers and our staff members.  The colors here are changing in this community from black, brown, yellow, to white, and that's not a good thing.  Our children are watching us.  They're looking at how we lead, not only them, but how we interact with each other.  Children know things that we don't even realize.  I know it because they come and tell me.  Ms. Wren, did you know that, you know, Ms. Lang is leaving, Mr. Rodgers is leaving.  You know, he's like a father to me.  She's one of the best principals I've ever seen.  We have parents crying to me in the hallway.  Ms. Wren, are you kidding me?  I'm having to leave my son, take my son out of this school, and the son is crying because he's leaving his friends.  She said, but I'm so afraid for their safety.  Things are changing - that is not cool, not O.K., and we have to stand up, we got to be, we are resilient staff members, we are, and we're going to make lemonade out of the lemons.  But we can't do it without you recognizing - we see, we see that you are not being equitable with our staff, with our children, with our parents, and we don't like it.  And we're going to stand up, we're going to fight, and we're going to protest in the ways that we know, and we got to ask God to help us in this fight, and we know we're going to win.  We know we're going to win, because we're here, it's about the children.  We're here for the children.  We love these children, as much as the hell as they put us through, and you know, I told one student, you know, this has been a difficult year, and he said, Ms. Wren, we've given you fifty gray hairs this year, and I said I know you've given me about a thousand gray hairs this year.  I've used the dye more often than I normally do.  But, you know, to make things more serious, our children are suffering, they're crying.  Their father is leaving - Mr. Rodgers is like their father.  And that's not to say that he's not going to be a father where he's going, and I'm real proud that he's moving on to another place.  They got, they got our gold.  They're going to enjoy him, they're going to learn from him, they're going to respect him, they're going to do their community meetings, they're going to love themselves, they're going to stand up with pride, and they're going to love each other, they're going to acknowledge each other, they're going to be on the hot seat and let each other know, we love you, and what I like about you is this, and I didn't realize it, you, you would come to me when I needed help.  These are the values that he has given not just one classroom but many, most of the classrooms.  Am I right?  We do community meetings.  So it's not about the teachers are leaving, it's about our children.

"You're out of time." (Lisa Taymuree)

Thank you. (Tauheedah)

"Thank you.  Further comment?" (Donn Merriam).

***

8. AUDREY MILES

Good afternoon.  Audrey Miles, TK teacher.  It's been a very difficult two months, but we continue on each and every day to give our kids the best that we can give every day.  We walk in and we find ways to find joy in each other every morning.  Many of you don't know my room is the coffee room, you know, and we find that opportunity to have community together, and hug each other and start our day off with a positive when often there are no positives, when you don't feel loved, when you don't feel supported.  We find ways to find opportunities for our children.  Today we took 77 TK and kindergarteners on a bus to San Jose to a farm.  We provided a community meal buffet of everything that they would want to eat - hotdogs, everything - and we paid for it ourselves.  We paid for it by fundraising, we paid for it by writing grants.  Every family that was there, there's an extended relationship with each one of those parents.  I have taught their siblings, I have taught their aunts, their cousins, their uncles, even.  I've been here for 14 years and I've never felt sadder than right now because, I heard Mr. Rodgers is leaving, it broke my heart.  And then I was walking down the hall and Ms. Kamat said 'Can I talk to you for a second?', and she came and she started talking to me and she told me that she was leaving and it broke my heart and I just stood in the hall and I just started crying, because it's just painful that - and everybody always thinks that Ms. Miles is a rock, you know, Ms. Miles has got a marshmallow heart, O.K.?  And I love each and every one of these people in here, from the high school up and I saw my class graduate yesterday, first class I taught here.  Those were my kids in K and 1.  I have his history here.  I need to be respected.  I need to have my voice heard.  It's important.  This is my community.  Not only do I work here, I live here, and I vote here.  So I want you to know that as you sit here on the board, many of your faces that I know.  That's one of my students right there.  She's graduating next year, O.K.?  I'm an important part of this community, and I'm an important part of this school and my voice needs to be heard.  And you need to respect me for the work that I do each and every day.  And I respect you, and respect is a two-way street.  You get what you give.  So if that's what you want from us, if you want that hard work to continue, you need to give us the same amount of respect, and listen, and understand who we are and not just pass us over and say, well maybe there's a new teacher who is better qualified, which is the things that we hear sometimes, O.K.?  So, hear our voice.  That's all we're asking you to do is to hear our voice.  And this right here is our future, O.K.?  The same amount of effort that I give to my TKs - this is my grandchild, O.K.?  And she can do everything that I give my kids in the classroom and more.  Thank you.

"Additional, further comment?" (Donn Merriam)

[Joshua Simon, former EUSD Board president, speaks]

***

9. LESLIE EPSTEIN

Hi, my name is Leslie Epstein.  I've been here 14 years, and I used to be so proud to work here - sorry - and I don't feel that way anymore.  And seeing so many people leave makes me - I thought about it - and the only reason I stay is because I have the most amazing group of students and families.  I stay with many of my students for years as special ed. teacher, and I always thought when, particularly years when Simon's daughter was here, Maya, all those years I thought when I have a kid my son or my daughter is going to go to this school, and I can say now I would never send my son here.  And to me that speaks volumes.

"Thank you.  Further comment?"  (Donn Merriam)

"Could we allow the people that donated their time to go ahead and speak?" (Member Barbara Inch)

"Yes, please, whoever did donate time, whatever's remaining on their allotted..." (Donn Merriam)

10. LESLIE THORNLEY

Thank you, Board.  Thank you, esteemed colleagues, I appreciate your voice today and you've inspired me.  I am coming back in the Fall.  I have every intention of returning, and on my plate I see a brand new reading series; I see a brand new math series I'm going to be piloting; I'm going to be working with a new colleague that I haven't worked with before.  There's equity and PBIS, which I think I mentioned fourth, which should have been mentioned first.  There's technology, and I'm excited and thrilled that students are going to be having computers in their classrooms.  I'm going to need a lot of training to leverage and use that program well.  I'm also going to be doing this without my family.  I'm going to be forming new relationships, and I hope time and space is given to do that, because to the work of equity requires a lot of trust, and it requires openness, and it requires safety, and that work has to be hallmark if we're going to serve the needs of our children.  I was watching a videotape that I put together for my class, you know, one of those slide-shows for open house, and I was looking at it and feeling pretty good about it myself, and then all of a sudden I paused and thought, now wait, I really need to look at this through some of the work that I've done in this district, and I looked at my slide-show again, and I had far more children in that slide-show of children with light-colored skin than dark-colored skin.  I figured that out myself.  I was appalled.  I'm feeling that it was really brave of me to even say that right here, but this is the work that needs to be done if teachers like me are going to help children of color, and this work needs to continue and it needs to be at the forefront, and I need help with the introspection.  I want the help with the introspection, because I don't think I can serve these kids well if I don't have it.  But, again, what I need for that to happen is I need a lot of trust.  I need to be in a place where I feel trust, and I'm going to need time to get to know my new colleagues, and my new administrators, and to do the work that we have to do.  It has to be here.  So, thank you for letting me speak.

"Thank you." (Donn Merriam)

Testimony finished.

EUSD- Emery School Board = Jun 15, 2017

Emeryville Property Owners Association.  Published on Jun 21, 2017.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3U7fASj-FYM

Time stamps:

Megan McLaughlin 01:12-04:53

Anthony Rodgers 06:10-09:02

Leslie Thornley[1] 14:10-14:33

Holly Coombs 14:37-20:50

Diane Lang 21:04-24:40      

Kevin Boyd 24:58-27:38

Tauheedah Wren 27:52-31:14

Audrey Miles 31:26-34:32

Leslie Epstein 40:18-41:05

Leslie Thornley[2] 41:49-44:44