Keep Berkeley Affordable
- Make Housing More Affordable and Accountable: Strengthen the vacancy tax on empty homes, crack down on chronic vacancies, and make sure every district does its fair share of housing.
- Turn Empty Storefronts Into Homes, Studios, and Businesses: Streamline live/work conversions along Shattuck and San Pablo and incentivize long-term leases to artists and local entrepreneurs.
- Build More Affordable Housing, Not Just Fees: Support social housing and community land trusts, strengthen tenant protections, and reassess in-lieu fees so paying a fee is never a cheaper alternative to actually building affordable homes.
- Build Student Housing and Hold UC Accountable: Push UC to build on pre-approved campus sites, negotiate a fairer financial agreement, address the impacts of campus growth, and give students a real voice.
Safety That Means Care
- Restore Unarmed Crisis Response: Restore the mobile crisis team and expand unarmed responses to behavioral health and quality-of-life calls.
- Police Accountability, Not Mass Surveillance: Strengthen civilian oversight, protect access to police records, and oppose Flock surveillance and the militarization of local policing.
- End Sweeps and Expand Real Alternatives: Invest in safe parking with sanitation, dignified shelter with services, and permanent supportive housing for people who need it.
- Defend Berkeley as a Sanctuary City: Keep city resources and data away from federal agencies, fund legal defense, expand language access, and support refugee resettlement.
Support Small Business and Workers
- Cut Red Tape and Small Business Fees: Reduce health permit and business license fees and explore targeted tax incentives for startups and small businesses.
- Create a One Stop Small Business Portal: Put permits, licensing, inspections, grants, and city services in one simple, accessible place.
- Build a Berkeley Public Market: Establish a permanent marketplace modeled after Emeryville’s Public Market, where local food vendors, farmers, makers, and entrepreneurs can access affordable, flexible spaces and bring more activity to our commercial corridors.
- Support Workers and Local Hiring: Expand local hiring, enforce prevailing wage standards, and support worker cooperatives.
A Budget and City Hall You Can See
- Accountability Before New Taxes and Bonds: Require a program by program review of city spending, contracts, outcomes, and community impact before asking residents for new taxes or bonds.
- Protect Services and Working Families: No layoffs, no service cuts, and no contracting out public work; raise new revenue from those who can afford it rather than renters and working families.
- Put City Hall’s Work Online: Publish budgets, contracts, council and mayoral objectives, and performance metrics in a public dashboard residents can actually use and that keeps elected officials accountable.
- Bring City Hall Into the Neighborhoods: Hold regular neighborhood office hours and community meetings before major decisions, not after.
Streets, Access, Parks, and Climate
- Repave Hopkins and Plan Streets Responsibly: Repave Hopkins now while conducting a full complete street study before any permanent redesign.
- Make Berkeley Safer and More Accessible: Build safer crosswalks, sidewalks, curb ramps, and bike routes; improve bus speed with signal priority and boarding islands; and protect paratransit.
- Invest in Parks and Public Spaces: Fund park maintenance and staffing, expand green space and community gardens, and provide public restrooms and hygiene centers in high need areas.
- Build a Cleaner, Greener Berkeley: Electrify city buildings, expand community solar, pursue a public energy option, and grow Berkeley’s tree canopy.
