INSIDE METRO: News, people and events in Los Angeles County’s communities.

Westlake Village has an identity crisis unique to Southern California cities: It is the only municipality that owes allegiance to both Los Angeles and Ventura counties.

For most of its history, Westlake Village has been a tale of two counties. Residents of this master-planned, manicured, 5.4-square-mile community, built around a pampered lake, are served by two separate fire departments, two sheriff’s departments and two telephone area codes, 818 and 805.

The Los Angeles County portion was incorporated in 1981 to become the city of Westlake Village. The Ventura County portion, substantially larger and known simply as Westlake, has been part of Thousand Oaks since that city incorporated in 1964.

Despite the geographic division, many residents consider themselves members of one community, just as their founder envisioned.

In the early 1960s, shipping magnate Daniel K. Ludwig traipsed through bean fields on land once owned by William Randolph Hearst, who sold it in the 1920s when he found out it had no oil. Ludwig knew this land, 40 miles west of downtown Los Angeles, was situated astride a future freeway, and he envisioned a “new city in the country,” built around a lake.

After paying what was reported to be a record price for undeveloped land--$2,500 an acre--Ludwig found he had a potentially serious flooding problem where four creeks crisscrossed. Instead of building a required flood control channel, he chose to build what was then the world’s largest privately owned concrete dam and doubled the size of the planned lake.

Homeowners began to flock into the area even before the lake was filled. Under Ludwig’s vision, the city became home to the nation’s first golf course lighted for nighttime play and a man-made lake.

Despite its serenity, the lake has given the community a few headaches, including problems with algae and a long-running squabble over whether water should be used to maintain green fairways or fill the lake--and keep boats from hitting bottom.

Westlake Village Inside Out

CAT KILLER: In a town known for having little or no crime, there was a time when cats weren’t safe within the Westlake Village city limits. For six years, investigators hunted for the killer of more than 200 cats--most of them family pets--found mutilated throughout the city. Two sheriff’s deputies were assigned to the case full time, and a Cat Concern Committee put up a $1,600 reward. The slayings stopped in 1983--about the same time that a biologist’s report fingered as the likely culprit an overweight coyote that had recently been captured and killed.

STAR SIGHTINGS: William “Engineer Bill” Stulla, the popular host of a children’s talk show in the 1950s and 1960s, had decided to high-tail it to Newport Beach after retiring, but one glimpse of Westlake Village and he was sold on its serenity. Jack’s Restaurant and Deli on Westlake Boulevard has attracted stars such as Tom Selleck, Rob Lowe, Sylvester Stallone, Robert Young and Frankie Avalon.

HEADS UP: In 1986, an average of one ball a day cleared the Westlake Village Golf Club course and soared onto the Ventura Freeway, causing a few collisions but no known injuries. If a golfer’s drive hooked to the left or was hit straight down the fairway, it posed no problems. But when golfers sliced balls--at speeds up to 170 mph--startled drivers and smashed windshields resulted. To stop wayward balls and end the peril to drivers, the club spent thousands of dollars erecting fences and redesigning holes.

ISLE OF EXCLUSIVITY: An enclave know as “the Island,” in the center of Westlake Lake, offers a sublime existence of morning tennis matches, cocktail hours on drifting pleasure boats and midnight strolls. Private guards keep lookout from a gatehouse and patrol the only road in the 329-house colony. But the guardhouse and a moat aren’t enough security for one waterfront mansion, which bristles with surveillance cameras and electronic listening devices.

SPORTING LIFE: The Westlake Yacht Club has been a breeding ground for dozens of international and national dinghy champions who learned sailing on the narrow, mile-long lake and won most of their titles on the ocean. The club also takes pride in two of its members who went to Seoul, South Korea, for the 1988 Olympics, to participate in the first women’s sailing event.

POWER MOVE: Gasoline-powered motorboats have been banned on Westlake Lake since it was built, but not everyone has obeyed that rule. In one memorable case, a Phoenix man drove his Mustang down the boat-launch ramp and plunged into the lake. Firefighters arrived just after the Mustang--which had been equipped to double as a boat--pulled up to a friend’s dock.