With a cast of characters that only make sense if you're from Oakland, a whistleblower suit has been filed in the matter of Thomas Berkley Square at 20th and San Pablo. We understand that the rent seems high (it was negotiated during the dot-com boom) and that the developer built a parking and retail structure next door- which he's now building market-rate condos on top of. Sounds like a cocktail of image problems and political agendas. Molotov, not Cosmopolitan. But fundamentally it all comes down to homeless people, again. And if a developer has the nerve to put up condos next to a homeless drop-in center facing a wasteland in downtown Oakland, we say give them credit for guts.
From another viewpoint: a tip from deep inside Wurster Hall about the aforementioned condos. Seems they employ an innovative steel structure called Conxtech . It's supposed to be faster (think construction loans) and less expensive (profit!) and allows for more storeys (4 to 8 over the conventional 3.) And their website gave us a new word, one we'd be proud to have made up: Re-urbanization. Expect to see re-urbanization everywhere.
· Surprise suit over welfare offices Matier & Ross,SF Chronicle]
· Conxtech