A ‘60s-Style Uproar Over People’s Park

In this former counterculture mecca, the revolution has been enshrined not in statues and monuments, but in the head shops that peddle incense and in the Volkswagen minibuses that still rumble through the streets.

Perhaps the most visible--and controversial--icon of the ‘60s movement is a 2.8-acre patch of grass known as People’s Park, a public space with a 30-year history marked by anger and bloodshed and a place that continues to spark heated debate.

The park is owned by UC Berkeley and lies four blocks south of campus. For years, the slightly tattered green has been a hangout for the homeless, a few students and young men playing basketball. But beneath the placid surface lies a simmering conflict that was reignited recently by a passing comment by Robert Berdahl, the university’s chancellor.

Berdahl suggested to students in April that People’s Park might make a good site for new dormitories. Although university administrators later backed away from the statement, saying there are no plans for construction, the chancellor’s words have drawn park critics and defenders out of the woodwork and fanned a conflagration that has burned since 1969. That was the year violence erupted after thousands of protesters gathered to defend the park against the same kind of proposal to build student housing on the land.

“They should get on with building the dorms,” said Martha Jones, president of the city’s Council of Neighborhood Associations. “The days of People’s Park’s historic significance are long gone. Never has so much been shelled out for the benefit of so few people.”

Jones, who has lived in Berkeley since 1948, appeared before the student council in September and urged students to push for housing on the land. In recent weeks, after the local media published Berdahl’s comments, the student newspaper received a barrage of letters in support of the chancellor.

Berdahl made his comments while meeting with students to discuss Berkeley’s worst housing crisis in years, which has been exacerbated by the recent abolishment of the city’s rent control laws.

Reviving the dorm debate has inflamed some city officials and activists who see People’s Park as a symbol of free speech and the anti-establishment movement. They want the university to turn over the land to the city, which now manages it. And they have stepped up plans to beautify the park in hopes of discouraging construction.

“As long as the university continues to own the park on paper, there will always be the possibility they will develop it,” said Lisa Stephens, chairwoman of the city’s Parks and Recreation Committee. “They have different goals than the rest of the community.”

Stephens and other park supporters staged a 30th anniversary celebration April 25. Hundreds of revelers showed up to commemorate a struggle that began in April 1969, when the university announced plans to build dormitories on the land. When more than 3,000 protesters descended on the park, then-Gov. Ronald Reagan called in the National Guard and declared the city under a state of emergency. In the ensuing rioting, soldiers and police fired tear gas on students and other residents, accidentally killed one demonstrator and arrested 600 people.

In 1991, protesters again clashed with police when the university announced plans to build volleyball courts on the property. Police used rubber bullets and arrested more than 150 people. The courts were built, then torn down in 1997 because few students used them.

Berdahl’s comments reminded park supporters that the university has final say over People’s Park, and they believe that one way to protect it is to enhance it. Several activists and city officials are pushing for the city to reroute a creek that runs beneath the property so that it runs on the surface.

“We don’t want to have to keep fighting this fight every five years,” said Councilman Kriss Worthington, whose district includes the park. “We want to make it a permanent park by improving the park features. If the creek project were completed, it would be very difficult for someone to come along in the next year and suggest building there.”

But some residents complain that the park has emerged as a trouble spot plagued by drug sales and other crimes.

A nonprofit group called Safe Streets Now has threatened to sue if the university doesn’t clean up the park. The Oakland-based group brought together more than 40 neighbors and merchants willing to file separate small claims lawsuits against the university--a tactic that Safe Streets Now has used against apartment landlords nationwide.

In response, university officials hired a security guard to watch over the park on weekday afternoons, relocated a clothing donation box that was drawing crowds and made plans to add lighting and trim trees.

Administrators said they hope that such actions will quell the recent anger and demonstrate the university’s commitment to People’s Park. They said they will not turn over the land to the city as park activists want, but don’t have immediate plans to build, as some park critics have demanded.

“We want to show that we’re going to keep it an open space,” said university spokesman Jesus Mena. “We’re working at finding ways to improve it.”