The San Francisco Chronicle, October 30, 1997:

Newly announced mayoral candidate Jerry Brown is constructing an environmental plan for Oakland in which solar generators quietly hum, eco-farmers grow food and "sustainable fishermen" haul in their bounty.

The intimacies of old-style town democracy would flourish under "Oakland Ecopolis," a draft that Brown has posted on the Web site for his We the People organization. It's the first indication the former governor has given for what he has in mind for Oakland since announcing his candidacy Tuesday and the best glimpse so far of how he would function as mayor.

In Brown's ecological metropolis, the rich and well-connected yield power to individual citizens set free to collaborate on transcendental solutions to such problems as crowded streets, ugly architecture and work that saps the soul.

Schoolchildren, particularly in black and Latino neighborhoods, would build their own simulated cities on Oakland-customized computer software....

The city would lead the way in creating parks, bike paths and in buying vehicles that run on electricity or natural gas.

The Ecopolis, the plan says, is no less than Oaklanders "striving to negotiate a common life of equity, balance and tolerance."

"A baby smiles and a flower grows," the plan says.

In selecting a model for a better Oakland, Brown would contrast not Oakland and a comparatively healthy city such as Pasadena, but Oakland and the Italian hill city of Perugia—an urban community that has sustained its integrity over hundreds of years.

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