Beach Parking Battle Turns Into Political Spat

Did the deputy mayor act like a political bully to get a parking space near the beach? Or did the hairstylists come on like sexists and ageists?

Inquiring minds in Solana Beach want to know.

Our tale starts with Solana Beach Deputy Mayor Celine Olson driving to the Fletcher Cove beach to be part of a Saturday cleanup. The parking lot was full.

So she eased her Mercury Marquis into a private lot near the Citadel Salon hairstyling parlor.

As Olson tells it, the two hairstylist-owners (Cary Manning and Zdenek Vagner) charged out of the salon and ordered her angrily to move her car or they would have it towed.

She says she politely stood her ground and identified herself as the deputy mayor. She says she informed the hairstylists that her understanding of Coastal Commission rules is that their parking lot is open to the public on weekends.

“He (one of the owners) looked at me like I was some old gal he didn’t have to pay attention to,” Olson said. “He came across very hostile.”

As Manning and Vagner tell it, Olson loudly proclaimed that as deputy mayor she could park anywhere she pleased, and if they didn’t like it maybe she’d have the city sue them.

“Suddenly I had this ranting, raving elderly woman in my salon,” Manning said. “I had to escort her out.”

Each side says the other is lying about who said what to whom. There is agreement, however, that Olson left her car and went to the beach, and was not towed.

Soon thereafter Manning and Vagner sent a demand to City Hall that Olson apologize. She refused.

City Manager Michael Huse declined to referee, although he said he can find no regulation, coastal or otherwise, that makes the Citadel lot public.

Manning and Vagner have quit the Chamber of Commerce in a huff. Olson wonders if the whole thing was a setup to hurt her chances to become mayor.

Manning and Vagner show no signs of backing down.

“I can’t believe a politician can abuse people and get away with it,” said Manning, 29.

Olson, 65, wishes it would all go away: “It was a stupid incident.”

All Around the Town

Here and there.

* An after-lunch speaker (me) was telling the La Jolla Rotary Club that slow-growther Peter Navarro lives very close to the city line in Del Mar Heights.

And that a landslide could make Navarro’s home slip into Del Mar, making him ineligible to run for mayor of San Diego.

Came a voice from the audience: “Pray for rain.”

* The Guild Theatre in Hillcrest is showing “My Private Idaho.”

Maybe that explains why some wise guy fixed the marquee to read “The Story of Boys and Potatoes.” Then again, maybe not.

* La Panaderia Bakery at Bazaar del Mundo in Old Town sells about 1,000 hurros (cinnamon-sugary Mexican pastry twists) per weekend.

The bakery even provides reasons to eat a churro.

Among them: “Because it does not come in a high-tech compartmentalized plastic microwave dish completely assembled in an offshore factory, flash frozen and cryogenically shipped directly to your grocer’s door.”

If that isn’t reason enough: “Just to spite Jenny Craig.”

* Yes, those were movie reviewers Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert having a late dinner at the Prince of Wales restaurant at the Hotel del Coronado.

At the Del to address a convention of the American Assn. of Advertising Agencies.

* Books spotted on the bailiff’s desk at the preliminary hearing of ex-cop Henry Hubbard on rape charges:

“Leadership Secrets of Attila the Hun” and “One Up on Wall Street: How to Use What You Already Know to Make Money in the Market.”

Watch That Stuff

From a press release correction sent out by Marrow-Tech Inc. of La Jolla:

“In the third graph, fifth line, should read ‘glycosaminoglycans,’ rather than ‘glymosaminoglycans,’ as originally transmitted.

“Also, in the fifth graph, eighth line, should read ‘Investigational Device Exemption,’ rather than ‘Investigation Device Exemption.’ ”

I had spotted those errors in the original release but was too polite to point them out.