Cityhood Celebrated in Malibu : Municipalities: Flags fly as incorporation becomes official. County is inundated with building permit requests in final days of its jurisdiction.

Malibu, an international symbol of sun, sea, sand and affluence, became Los Angeles County’s 87th city Thursday, celebrating the end of its long struggle to break free from county control with pomp, ceremony and a visit from the Goodyear blimp.

“We made it,” said Mike Caggiano as he prepared to take the oath of office and become part of the five-member City Council. “Now comes the hard part.”

Indeed, many in the shoestring-shaped community of 20,000 appeared to welcome cityhood with as much relief as celebration.

“Everyone’s extremely happy, but we’re also a little tired, and we’ve got tremendous work ahead of us,” said Walt Keller, Malibu’s new mayor, in a reference to the county’s having delayed incorporation for nearly 10 months while trying unsuccessfully to start work on a much-opposed sewer system in the community.

More than 600 people crammed into a school auditorium Thursday night to witness the council’s inaugural meeting, which was presided over by County Supervisor Ed Edelman.

Malibu’s slow-growth-oriented council members, all dressed up with no place to go since they were elected last June, will get to work on such matters as a building moratorium, a sewer plan, a rent-control ordinance for mobile homes and several other controversial subjects that will probably ensure that the euphoria will not last long.

But none of that seemed to matter Thursday as huge red, white and blue banners flapped in the breeze above Malibu’s main commercial area, bearing such slogans as “We Won” and “This is Our City, We Love You.”

“The mood is pure jubilation,” said Joan House, the head of a volunteer group arranging for a weekend-long celebration that includes a parade Saturday, followed by a sky-diving demonstration in which parachutists plan to drop into town while using smoke canisters to spell out the letter M.

Thursday’s ceremonial meeting was part inauguration, part business and a lot of partying. As the crowd of well-wishers and invited guests gathered at the school, the blimp hovered overhead beaming an electronic message: “Best wishes to all Malibu.”

“I had a woman call and ask what I thought she should wear, if a swimming suit would be OK,” House said. “That’s how giddy with enthusiasm a lot of people are right now.”

But while many Malibu residents celebrated the first day of cityhood as a dream come true, it proved to be a nightmare for others.

At least 40 people seeking building permits were turned away from the county Building and Safety office in the community, unlucky latecomers in the frenzy to get projects approved before an anticipated development crackdown by the city government.

“Therapy time--absolutely crazy!” is how county building and safety official Grant Lawseth described the line of applicants, up to 150 long at times, outside his office the last several days.

Despite adding temporary workers to meet the crunch, there were still 50 people waiting at closing time Wednesday, the last day for the county to issue permits in Malibu. “We didn’t have the heart to turn them back,” Lawseth said. “It took us another five hours, but we stayed and processed them.”

County officials said that they collected more than $1 million in permit fees in the community during the last month, 20 times the normal amount.

“The sound you hear is grading in progress,” said one slow-growth advocate, only half-jokingly.

It was opposition to what many in the community feared were the county’s efforts to transform Malibu from a semi-rural enclave to another Miami Beach that fueled last June’s incorporation election, in which 84% of voters approved cityhood.

Mayor Keller acknowledged the struggle in his remarks Thursday, telling well-wishers that “when the state and county governments looked at Malibu, they saw a land ripe for freeways, marinas, power plants and hotels. But the residents of Malibu had a different vision.”

Although dozens of Malibu’s many celebrities donated money, and a few, including Michael Landon and Olivia Newton-John, made public appearances on behalf of cityhood, celebrities have maintained a low-profile in the cityhood effort.

At City Hall, where the first paid clerical employees were not expected to arrive until next week and the phones were being answered by volunteers Thursday, interim City Manager Bruce Spragg was still trying to round up desks and chairs.

“It’s going to take us a while to catch our breath,” he said. “But after what people here have gone through, I don’t think they’ll mind the wait.”