@LilahJane
Lilah Klein
@LilahJane · 4:52

UC Berkeley’s Controversial Relationship with People’s Park

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So the reason I wanted to bring this up is because the University has been fighting to build student housing here for a while, and they finally got the green light to do so. And it is very controversial. So basically, what the plan is is to build two buildings that have 1100 students, 112 story building and one six story building, which twelve storey is, like, so tall. I can't think of another campus building that's twelve stories
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@chlomonsta
Chloe Kaminskas
@chlomonsta · 1:20

People’s Park!

But I definitely agree with you that there is some violence happening, so that is obviously concerning. But I feel like my opinion is kind of like if we're going to build this new place that we need to build a place for all those people to go, we can't just displace them and let them figure it out. The rest are just going to not have anywhere to go that's safe
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@OKRL
Oscar K
@OKRL · 1:56

🌳🌳

I think, though, if they're going to do it using People's Park, they have to obviously address all the factors, the biggest one being the unhoused people who are currently occupying. If I'm not mistaken, I think in the email they did mention that part of this project was going to include the effort of housing all of the members who are currently occupying the park. It's hard to know what that really means
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@Noalily
Noa Lily
@Noalily · 2:18

What’s the plan??

And I'm not quite sure I'm not educated enough on this. So I definitely am going to do some more research after. But I don't quite understand why developers have decided that People's Park needs to be the spot for this because there is a community there. There are people who live in this area now, and obviously there's violence that's occurring, and that is because of the malfreatment that is happening there
@Tim
Tim Ereneta
@Tim · 3:18

my perspective as a long time Berkeley resident

If they want to develop it, they under the law can develop it. Number two, People's Park has been a tribute to free speech. That's how it was set up. And I've heard evidence that starting in the 19s 70s, it was not a pleasant place to be. I moved to Berkeley in the 90s and it was a sketchy place, not somewhere that people brought their kids to play. So are there people currently residing there?
@Swell
Swell Team
@Swell · 0:15

Welcome to Swell!

@LilahJane
Lilah Klein
@LilahJane · 2:02
And I think if that was maybe advertised more, it would not be such a contentious issue because for me, I grew up working at a homeless shelter and one of my closest family friends was on the board of directors there. So I've seen what works and what doesn't work. And I know I know that social work can be a really great resource, and I think that is a really great call on their end
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