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After years of community advocacy, the city of Berkeley plans to launch a mental health crisis response team that is independent from law enforcement this summer.
Known on the streets of Berkeley as “the soup lady,” Barbara Brust died Feb. 25 at the age of 69.
Brust founded Consider the Homeless!, or CTH!, shortly after Thanksgiving Day in 2014, when she brought meals to encamped individuals at Provo Park. Since then, the organization has continued to deliver food, clothes and other supplies to Berkeley’s unsheltered population.
Berkeley declared Dec. 1, 2020, as “Barbara Brust Day” in honor of her community work and advocacy for people without housing.
Those closest to Brust described her as a “straight shooter,” a fiercely tender friend and a “bulldozer for justice.”
When CTH! was getting off the ground, Brust did not have any volunteers, outside guidance, nonprofit status or soup recipes that had been tested, according to her friend Deb Bryant.