Stephen Barton

With the general election less than two weeks away, Measure DD’s campaign has now acquired more than $577,000 in total monetary contributions for the calendar year, while the opposing Measure U1’s campaign has raised about $71,000.

With the university preparing to take in 6,500 additional students next year and UC Berkeley itself expecting 750 new students, the campus is looking at options to house its share.

Berkeley is one of numerous cities in the Bay Area and the nation struggling to resolve a dearth of affordable housing.

Rent control, a blessing for tenants and a curse for landlords, restricts apartment unit price increases for buildings built prior to the mid-1980s and has remained the subject of contentious debate for decades.