The Berkeley City Council met on Tuesday, February 10, 2026, at approximately 7:00 PM. The meeting included ceremonial proclamations, a report from the mayor on the U.S. Conference of Mayors, consent calendar approvals, and a public hearing on an appeal of a zoning decision for a mixed-use development at 2109 Virginia Street. The council ultimately voted to deny the appeal and affirm the Zoning Adjustments Board’s approval of the project.
Hello, everyone, good evening. All right. Hello. I am going to call to order the Berkeley City Council meeting. Today is Tuesday, February 10th, 2026. Clerk, could you please take the roll? Okay, Councilmember Kessarwani. Here. Kaplan. Bartlett. Here. Tregu, I. O'Keefe. Present. Here. Lackaby. Here. Lunapara. Here. Humbert present and Mayor Ishi. Here. Okay. Quorum is present. All right. So it is the first meeting of February, so we will have Councilmember O'Keefe read the land acknowledgement statement. For those of you that don't know, we've been taking turns reading the land acknowledgement. And so, Councilmember O'Keefe, if you could take it away, please. Okay. The City of Berkeley recognizes that the community we live in was built on the territory of the Huchun, the ancestral and unceded land of the Tucheno speaking Alone people, the ancestors and descendants of the sovereign Verona Band of Alameda County. This land was and continues to be of great importance to all of the Alone tribes and descendants of the Verona Band. As we begin our meeting tonight, we acknowledge and honor the original inhabitants of Berkeley, the documented 5,000-year history of a vibrant community at the West Berkeley Shell Mound, and the Alone people who continue to reside in the East Bay. We recognize that Berkeley's residents have and continue to benefit from the use and occupation of this unceded stolen land since the City of Berkeley's incorporation in 1878. I was stewards of the laws regulating the city of Berkeley, it is not only vital that we recognize the history of this land, but also recognize that the Alone people are present members of Berkeley and other East Bay communities today. The City of Berkeley will continue to build relationships with the Lijan tribe and to create meaningful actions that uphold the intention of this land acknowledgement. Thank you very much, Councilmember. We will now move on to ceremonial items. So we have a proclamation that was brought by Councilmember Humbert. So, Councilmember, you're welcome to read the proclamation, and I know you have some remarks as well. And actually, if the awardees would like to come forward, go ahead. Yeah, I'll the whole troupe could come up if you'd like. The entourage, thank you. I want to thank the mayor and her staff for helping create a proclamation recognizing the work of Tom Broham and Barry Warren, who were instrumental in advocating for the City of Berkeley to establish first in the nation recognition of same-sex domestic partnerships. I'm proud that these brave and persistent men are Berkeleyans. Whereas Tom Broham and Barry Warren have shared their lives together since 1975, and through their tireless advocacy, fundamentally changed the landscape of civil rights for the LGBTQIA plus community in Berkeley, the United States, and across the world. And whereas in 1979, while working for this city, the city of Berkeley, Tom Brough discovered that he could not enroll his partner Barry Warren in city health and dental benefits because those programs were strictly limited to married spouses. And whereas Tom Broham recognized a critical contradiction between Berkeley's 1978 non-discrimination ordinance and its exclusionary marriage-based benefits, leading him to author two historic letters in August 1979, proposing the first domestic partnership policy. And whereas Tom and Barry spent years persistently lobbying the City of Berkeley, the University of California, and local unions to adopt this new legal protection, providing a path for equity rooted in basic fairness and recognizing shared humanity. And whereas their work inspired the formation of the East Bay Lesbian Gay Democratic Club, which organized a methodical community-led campaign that successfully made domestic partnerships a central issue in the 1984 Berkeley municipal elections. And whereas in December 1984, the City of Berkeley enacted the first policy of its kind in California, and I think the nation, and Tom Brom and Barry Warren became the first couple to file for employee domestic partnership benefits under this landmark legislation. And whereas this pioneering policy served as a national model, overcoming the resistance of health care providers, employers, and reactionary opposition, and paving the way for statewide registries, civil unions, and eventually full marriage equality.