Officials Look Across the Bay For Tips on Improving Telegraph

Telegraph Avenue merchants and officials took a revitalization lesson Monday from officials in another one of the country’s most famed hippie hangout neighborhoods—San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury.

More than 25 Berkeley merchants, residents, police officers and officials traveled to the Haight Street area to foster a conversation about how to handle issues with homelessness, safety, upkeep and communication, organizers said.

Telegraph and Haight have fluctuating populations of college students, a similar population size, parks and people who loiter on the street, said Al Geyer, the trip’s organizer and president of the Telegraph Merchants’ Association.

But the Haight has adopted more effective methods to help revitalize the economy of the area, Geyer said.

“It was terribly degraded 10 years ago and it has re-emerged and is an example of a successful recovery,” Geyer said.

Michael Caplan, the city of Berkeley’s economic development director, said the trip was interesting. Because of Telegraph’s direct proximity to the UC Berkeley campus, however, he said it presents “a different set of both issues and opportunities.”

San Francisco police officers in the Haight area discussed tactics and preventative community measures with the Berkeley representatives, Geyer said.

San Francisco police officers work the Haight beat by their own request, walk the street frequently and hold the position for longer periods of time than Telegraph officers, which creates familiarity with the neighborhood, said John Ehrlich, captain of the San Francisco Police Department’s Park Station.

Councilmember Kriss Worthington, who also attended the Haight-Ashbury trip and whose district includes Telegraph, said he has submitted an item to the Berkeley City Council for review in May that seeks to determine how much similar policing programs would cost for the Telegraph area.

San Francisco police also work closely with the area’s neighborhood association, the Haight Ashbury Improvement Association, to solve social problems.

Geyer said adopting these practices will help tackle many of the issues Telegraph is facing.

“We have to come up with some positive solutions in both the commercial side, public perception side and problematic side,” Geyer said.

But the education was not one-sided.

“I learned things about what they’re doing and some of the problems they have,” Ehrlich said. “Telegraph and Haight are very close in many respects but they’re not identical. Berkeley has some advantages we don’t have in the Haight.”

The topics discussed in San Francisco will be shared with Berkeley officials who could not attend, Geyer said.

“I just hope this is considered openly and positively by the powers in Berkeley,” he said.

Tags: