Albany: Activists raise stakes with renegade farm Albany

A masked occupier pushes a large rototiller across a patch of arable land at the intersection of Buchanan and Jackson in Albany on Sunday. Several hundred people occupied a tract of arable land in Berkeley on Sunday where they tilled soil and planted seeds for a community garden. less A masked occupier pushes a large rototiller across a patch of arable land at the intersection of Buchanan and Jackson in Albany on Sunday. Several hundred people occupied a tract of arable land in Berkeley on ... more Photo: Kevin Johnson, The Chronicle Photo: Kevin Johnson, The Chronicle Image 1 of / 14 Caption Close Albany: Activists raise stakes with renegade farm 1 / 14 Back to Gallery

A tussle between preservationists and UC Berkeley over a decadelong development project in Albany erupted into a pitchfork protest Sunday, when activists planted a renegade farm on a plot of land known as the Gill Tract in an effort to keep it agriculturally pristine.

Timing their action to Earth Day, about 200 members of Occupy the Farm to Take Back the Gill Tract broke a lock on a gate, rototilled the soil and planted carrot, broccoli and corn seedlings on part of the 10-acre site at Marin and San Pablo avenues. The Albany tract is owned by UC Berkeley, which has plans for further housing and commercial development nearby.

Police were on hand not long after the activists broke in at mid-afternoon and informed them they were breaking the law, but no arrests were made.

By early evening, there was no police presence visible at the site, located near a busy street corner just east of Highway 80. Most of the activists had departed, but 50 or 60 planned to camp out at the site and had begun erecting tents.

Anya Kamenskaya, a spokeswoman for the group, said police officers told them they might return, but it was unclear if they would try to evict them.

"Our goal is not to live here, our goal is to create a working urban agro-ecological farm," Kamenskaya said.

There was no immediate comment on the situation from UC Berkeley representatives.

The university in recent years tore down and rebuilt a more modern University Village family housing complex in the area for faculty and students, two portions of a three-phase project. In the last phase, the university is poised to renovate the Village's community center and add more new housing to the site.

Grocery store planned

The university plans a separate project that calls for construction of a for-profit senior housing complex and grocery store on the Village land. The final segment of phase three calls for Little League fields that currently stand on Village land to be moved to the Gill Tract, occupying only about half of the 10 acres, with the rest of the land to remain open in some form, according to Albany City Councilman Robert Lieder.

Preservationists want the entire Gill Tract, which they describe as pristine, to be saved as open space or an urban farm.

"I wouldn't call this property damage, I'd call it property enrichment," said Lesley Haddock, a UC Berkeley sophomore who was part of the farm-in. "Basically what we did was pull out weeds. We're not trying to protect it as is, but to turn it into a community hub for agriculture."

She said Occupy the Farm was not linked to the Occupy Oakland protests, but "was philosophically inspired by it." The movement, she added, was done in solidarity with the Brazilian Movimiento Sin Tierra (Landless Workers Movement) and La Via Campesina (the International Day of Peasant's Struggles).

The activists erected signs, including one that read "Whole food, not Whole Foods," a reference to the grocery chain that is a possible tenant at the site.

"We think it is the height of irony that a upscale national chain grocery store would be building on arable land where food can be grown here for the community," Kamenskaya said.

'This treasure of ours'

Albany community activist Jackie Hermes-Fletcher said UC students acted independently in organizing the protest and that it was not timed to upcoming hearings on the UC development plans at City Hall.

"I really didn't plan it myself, but I wish I did," Hermes-Fletcher said, talking by cell phone on a visit to the site.

"We've spent 15 years trying to present solutions for this land, like an educational interpretive center, an urban farm, a neighborhood co-op, community garden or farmers' market. It's very dramatic and extremely fantastic. It's going to put a bright light on this issue, on this treasure of ours, Gill Tract."