Homeowners Raising the Roof Over County’s Tax Bill Bungle

Sounds of the city.

* That howl you may have heard was from 40,000 property owners who got erroneous property tax bills from the San Diego County tax collector.

The 40,000 are among those who pay their property taxes through their mortgage lenders. But, through a mix-up, they got bills saying they should pay up immediately or else.

Ben Trovaten, manager of secured taxes for the tax collector’s office, says the goof was the result of “human error, organizational changes, a lot of different things.”

He says not to worry: lenders were making the tax payments all along, and nobody’s title will be clouded.

Still, he concedes that phone calls to the office “have been up considerably” since the bogus bills went out.

Others say two county workers have been doing little else for the past two weeks except answering calls from property owners who are nervous/panicked/annoyed.

* Jimmy Wilkins stories just keep surfacing.

Now it’s said that the idiosyncratic aide to Sheriff Jim Roache summoned deputies to his home in Poway one night and ordered them to tow away his neighbor’s boat (they were having one of those neighbor disputes).

The deputies looked over the scene and told Wilkins to forget it.

* A bird theft case is being investigated by San Diego Police Detective Robert Finch.

* Julie Gervais, 31, the pet store employee charged with shooting her ex-boyfriend in a dispute over a pet bird, is a former reserve deputy with the Sheriff’s Department.

She did two hitches: From January to July, 1985, from January, 1987, to July, 1988.

* Further proof that people who really want to do jury duty never get the chance.

Olga Schaefer, new wife of former Councilman Michael Schaefer, just got a summons for jury duty.

She’d love to do it. What a great way to participate in democracy!

There’s a problem. She’s still a citizen of the Commonwealth of Independent States, formerly the U.S.S.R., and thus, as a non-citizen of the U.S.A., ineligible.

* Yes, there really is a hand-printed political sign in rural Vista, “Re-Elect the Scum.” Go figure.

Keeping Tabs on the Tenor

The arts, lively and otherwise.

* The San Diego Opera left nothing to chance Thursday night at the $1,250-per-couple fund-raiser after Luciano Pavarotti’s performance at the Sports Arena.

Jan Friedenberg, the associate director of development, was assigned to remain at the tenor’s elbow during the black-tie bash attended by 350 persons.

Her duties: To (politely) shoo away patrons who might try to monopolize Pavarotti’s time, to keep his Perrier and lemon (good for the voice) at the ready, and to make sure his wine glass was full.

For the record: Pavarotti drinks only red wine, viewing white wine with proper disdain.

* A crew from the ABC “Home” show spent all night Wednesday at the Hotel del Coronado filming the work of ghost-buster Christopher Chacon.

The segment is for next Friday’s Halloween show.

Chacon, who runs the San Francisco-based Office of Scientific Investigation and Research, had his high-speed cameras and computerized contraptions set up in Rooms 3312 and 3502, looking for apparitions.

Room 3502 is where one Kate Morgan, 24, from Los Angeles met her demise mysteriously in 1892. Her youthful ghost is said to check in occasionally.

(Among those having weird experiences in Room 3502 was a Secret Service agent in 1983 who was assigned to guard a vice president named George Bush.)

* Bill Cosby is in San Diego tonight to headline a fund-raiser for a foundation helping foster children.

He’ll also get a key to the city from Mayor Maureen O’Connor. The mayor wants to ask him about his new venture, a redo of “You Bet Your Life.”

She has a familial interest. Her parents, Jerome and Frances, were on the original show with Groucho Marx.

* Alpine’s Terry Norris, WBC junior-middleweight champ, will throw out the first basketball tonight at the Lakers-Kings game at the Sports Arena.

Explanation: Magic Johnson is a big Norris fan.

Veni, Vidi, Visa

Steve Gaffen reports a license plate holder, “I Shop, Therefore I Am.”

Descartes Blanche, maybe?