DEAL THEM OUT: Two weeks ago, Oxnard...

DEAL THEM OUT: Two weeks ago, Oxnard council members were saying they weren’t sure how the public felt about a proposed card casino. Now they know. About 300 people crammed into Tuesday night’s meeting, most of whom opposed the idea. “This is the largest body I’ve ever seen here,” said Mayor Manuel Lopez, a 25-year veteran of city government. . . . Another 2,000 opponents sent letters or signed petitions. After months of flirting with the casino’s lure of jobs and taxes, the council unanimously bowed out of the game. (B1)

SIGN OF TIMES: Now here’s a switch: Thousand Oaks officials, who don’t allow billboards and routinely reject requests by businesses that want bigger signs, plan to lobby the Legislature to permit larger gas-food-lodging signs along the Ventura Freeway (B1). . . . The freeway signs, which would include the logos of businesses, are needed to help the local economy, some officials said. Under the city’s notoriously rigid sign rules, some Thousand Oaks businesses are so hidden away that even Mayor Judy Lazar admits that she sometimes has trouble finding them.

AMERICAN DREAM: Despite instability in real estate and soaring construction costs, some Ventura County residents cling to the dream of designing and building their own homes (Ventura Life, J8). It’s not easy, Camarillo dentist Mike Potts said. “If you can hold onto your marriage while building a house, you’re doing great.”

ADOPTION AGENCIES: First came Caltrans’ Adopt-a-Highway program for litter cleanup. Then school districts got into the act with Adopt-a-School. With his privately financed workers’ comp fraud unit, Dist. Atty. Michael D. Bradbury has an Adopt-a-Prosecutor program. Now the Rancho Simi Recreation and Park District has enlisted the first participant in its Adopt-a-Trail program (B1). . . . What’s next? Hard to imagine much interest in a Planning Department or sewage plant, but some cities are talking about putting parks up for adoption.