FINALLY ZIPPED? For 10 years, Villa Park...

FINALLY ZIPPED? For 10 years, Villa Park has been trying to secede from the city of Orange’s ZIP code. Next week, after finally convincing Washington, its council will meet with post office folks to iron out final details on the city’s own ZIP code. Villa Park is high income--its single-family homes average $600,000--but it’s the smallest city in the county, with just 6,300 residents. . . . “We’re the best-kept secret in Orange County,” Councilman John Frackleton says. “We’d like the recognition as a city unto ourselves.”

DO NOT PASS GO: The Boardwalk Cafe in downtown Santa Ana is a lunchtime hangout for city council members, lawyers and judges. But now the Boardwalk is going after a new clientele: the people some of those lawyers represent. . . . The city on Monday approved the restaurant’s bid to serve food to inmates at Santa Ana’s temporary jail, to open in November. . . . Boardwalk owner Bryan Leighton explains: “The recession hit everybody; we were looking for other outlets to increase our profits.”

CREAN RISING: When the Children’s Bureau of Southern California, which helps abused youths, recently asked wealthy Donna Crean of Santa Ana Heights if she’d lend a hand, she did more than that. Crean and husband John--the cable TV chef--donated $50,000 and have now put together the bureau’s first Orange County foundation. . . . “I was lucky to find friends who wanted to help,” Crean says. Its first fund-raiser is a beach party Sunday at the Balboa Bay Club.

DRIVE ON UP: How do you throw a party for club members if there are 600,000 of them? That’s how many county residents belong to the Automobile Club of Southern California, which holds a bash for them at the Disneyland Hotel tonight. . . . But don’t show up just because you belong: The Auto Club selected 33,000 members at computer random. Only the first 2,000 to RSVP got tickets. Club president Thomas V. McKernan will answer questions--and field complaints.