The California Theatre has been shuttered since March 2020. Credit: Nico Savidge/Berkeleyside

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The nonprofit Berkeley Youth Alternatives was awarded a six-figure contract from the city of Berkeley to curb teen cannabis use. BYA failed to complete key parts of the project — but still got paid over $600,000. A company that won a portion of the contract was incorporated by Yelda Bartlett, the wife of Berkeley Councilmember Ben Bartlett, and Patricia Brooks, now chief of staff to the president of Oakland’s City Council. Brooks said neither Yelda nor Ben Bartlett benefitted financially. (SF Chronicle)

Less than a year after a developer pulled out of a plan to redevelop downtown Berkeley’s historic California Theatre into a 18-story apartment building with 24,000 square feet of live performing arts space, the building has been sold to a Beverly Hills executive. (Mercury News)

The University Inn & Suites hotel could be headed to the auction block. (Mercury News)

Black people are stopped by UCPD officers at rates far exceeding their share of both the UC Berkeley community and Alameda County’s population. (Daily Cal)

A stretch of eastbound I-80 through Berkeley is one of the 10 worst freeway “bottlenecks” in the Bay Area, wasting about 91,000 hours of people’s time between April and June 2025, according to a new study. (SF Chronicle)

About 75% of UC Berkeley students voting in student government elections supported a referendum calling for the Berkeley Foundation — the managers of the UC Berkeley endowment — to disclose all of its current holdings in military and surveillance companies, divest all current material holdings from these companies and commit to not investing in them for the future. Students also voted overwhelmingly to continue a subsidy of the Daily Californian. (Daily Cal)

An e-bike rider in his 50s, who wasn’t wearing a helmet, was hospitalized after a crash at Cedar and San Pablo avenues. (Berkeley Scanner)

Two sisters, their two husbands and a toddler go house hunting in Berkeley and Oakland. (New York Times)

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