A crime has been committed in Berkeley. No one got injured or killed. However, someone was just robbed. They don’t know exactly what was lost, but it could be in the millions of dollars. Everyone in town knows who did it. There is no mystery about the facts of the case. It happened at a public meeting with official notes being transcribed. It was vigorously cheered by many community members. This notorious gang has victimized people before and will probably strike again. Word on the street is the victim had a plan that would led to a youth center. But the future is in doubt. The unfriendly gang that did the deed was none other then the Berkeley City Council. The story is from the San Francisco Chronicle and Beetle’s collected comments are available.

Berkeley Iceland was designated a landmark by the Berkeley City Council last night. This effectively freezes any major plans to modify the building. While this might be ok if the old ice rink was in use, it was closed earlier this year because its cooling system was not considered up to date and renovation would have been too expensive for the owners. The ice rink was put up for sale. A group called Save Berkeley Iceland organized a drive to keep it open and even put in a bid to buy the property. However, they did not have enough money so a developer bought it.

Now after the sale has happened, some people are very sentimental. They have such fond feelings of the old Iceland, they don’t want anything to happen to it. So it has been landmarked. For the foreseeable future, Berkeley Iceland will be an old building that houses an unused ice rink that has an outdated cooling system no one has the money to fix. According to the Chronicle, the owner was going to lease the renovated building to YMCA for youth activities.

While there can be compelling cases to landmark structures to preserve historical heritage, Berkeley has a history of abusing the process. The East Bay Express examined one such case a few years ago. For Berkeley Iceland, the timing of the designation is questionable. It was not during its many years of operation or even when the property was put up for sale, but only after the property was sold that its status was declared.

I thought there were laws and common sense that would stop this kind of interference of a person’s property. However, I guess those only apply when convenient.