New York Mayor Bill de Blasio was in Berkeley on Thursday. His schedule was no doubt full. Among other things, he and Cal professor Robert Reich joked about the disparity of their respective heights before sitting down to talk about inequality at an event co-organized by the Goldman School of Public Policy.
De Blasio also said a brief hello to Berkeley Mayor Tom Bates in the Green Room at the Freight & Salvage before the conversation with Reich. (Indeed it was a veritable Mayor-Palooza day for Bates who in the morning got on his bike with both Mayor Morten Kabell of Copenhagen and Mayor Albrecht Schröter of Jena, Germany, as part of the many Bike to Work day events in the city.)
De Blasio also found time to grab lunch with UC Berkeley Chancellor Nicholas Dirks, who tweeted about the get-together Friday morning.
Berkeleyside clearly needed to find out where the pair went to eat, so we put our crack investigative team to work. (Oh, OK, we tweeted Dirks and asked him). He responded immediately: Italian bakery and pizza joint PIQ in downtown Berkeley was the chosen spot. Now we just need to figure out which sandwich de Blasio appears to be about to tuck into. Prosciutto mozzarella perhaps?
The question of food came up in the conversation with Reich too, as it happens. The former U.S. Secretary of Labor commented that Berkeley might not be able to match New York for its choice of good delis. However he then remembered Saul’s Deli in the Gourmet Ghetto and suggested it would stand up to the best the Big Apple had to offer. It is not known whether de Blasio had time to check out that claim. (And, no, we don’t plan to tweet him to find out.)
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