Walk on the Walled Side

Northern Exposure

PLAYING TAG: The builders of Santa Fe Walk in Vista don’t want their new residential development to be just another walled-off community. So the Olson Company has partnered with the city of Vista to hire a graffiti artist to doll up the big gray concrete barrier, which stretches 200 feet and will soon be visible to riders on the Sprinter commuter train along State Route 78. Jason Hailey is getting $4,000 to create a mural that will trace the evolution of Vista as well as the transformation of the town’s old train station into the new Sprinter railway. He’ll be using aerosol spray paint, just like taggers. Hailey works full time as a legal graffiti artist, with his work adorning walls from San Francisco to Philadelphia and even Mexico City. City officials are hoping Hailey’s “street cred” will keep taggers from, uh, modifying his work with their own markings.

SHOP TILL YOU DROP: Del Mar may be known for its quaint downtown, but apparently there aren’t enough places to shop to satisfy the tony coastal town’s city council. Hence, an ordinance that allows only retail shops to move into vacant building space along Camino del Mar between Ninth and 15th streets and along 15th west to the ocean. The ordinance, effective for 45 days only, was passed in March, but has since been extended into next year.

SURF ’N’ TURF SCENE: San Diego’s vaunted Street Scene music festival is coming to North County. Run out of its original downtown site by redevelopment, the festival last year languished in the parking lot of Qualcomm Stadium. This year, promoter Rob Hagey is teaming with concert titan Live Nation to stage Street Scene 2007 on the Del Mar Fairgrounds September 22-23, despite quoted concerns from Del Mar city manager Lauraine Brekke-Esparza about “drinking, young people, punk rock.”

ZIP IT: The latest ZIP code change in San Diego County takes place at the end of this month in Oceanside. About 25 percent of residents and businesses with a 92054 ZIP are being assigned 92058. The affected area: from Camp Pendleton to Mission Avenue, between Interstate 5 and Douglas Drive. After the change, Oceanside will have four ZIP codes——the same number as Carlsbad, which has about half the population of Oceanside.

DIRTY WATER: In case anyone’s keeping track, the latest sewage spill at Buena Vista Lagoon, 5 million gallons, was one of the two biggest such spills in the lagoon’s history, equaling the 5 million gallons that streamed into the lagoon in 1994. Since 1984, nine separate spills have dumped a total of 14,713,000 gallons of raw, untreated sewage into the lagoon. Conservationists predict more befoulings in the future, noting that as San Diego’s North County grew, sewage lines were put into what was seen as the path of least resistance——the network of coastal lagoons. Now, those pipes are aging, and the need for millions of dollars of repairs is looming.

AMBITIOUS FELLER: Oceanside Councilmember Jack Feller has become the first announced candidate for the city’s November 2008 mayoral race, challenging incumbent Jim Wood. Feller’s four-year term on the council expires the same year, so if he loses, he’s out. Feller is part of a three-member council majority that recently approved a controversial hotel project on Buena Vista Lagoon, which Wood and Councilmember Esther Sanchez opposed.

SCHOOL DAYS: Ken Noonan, the oft-praised superintendent of the Oceanside Unified School District, is retiring at the end of this month, capping a 40-year career in public education. The 67- year-old Noonan, at the school district’s helm for 10 years, also is a trustee on the state Board of Education, a position he plans on keeping . . . Meanwhile, Don Phillips, superintendent for five years of the Poway Unified School District, has been named superintendent of the year for San Diego and Imperial counties by the Association of California School Administrators.

TAXING SITUATION: Vista now has the highest sales tax rate of any North County city. A 30-year, half-cent increase has gone into effect, boosting the rate to 8.25 percent. Vista voters approved the increase last November; city officials plan to use the estimated $309 million in additional funds they expect to raise over the next 30 years to build a civic center, two fire stations and a sports park and make improvements to the Moonlight Amphitheatre.

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