Sign Committee to review Chili Town mural

BY COLBY FRAZIER
DAILY SOUND STAFF WRITER

In a city jam packed with white washed, spanish tiled buildings and houses, a bright, orange, purple, and red spray painted mural that popped up on the Milpas Street wall of a local restaurant has sparked debate throughout the city as to whether the eye-catcher is art, or simply graffiti.
Mark Abrishami, owner of Chili Town at 730 Milpas St., which took the place of The DogHouse, another local hot dog provider, insists that nothing is wrong with his brightly colored mural and plans to tell the city’s Sign Committee all about why at their bimonthly meeting on Wednesday.


“The city should be appreciative of what we did,” Abrishami told the Daily Sound yesterday. “This is nice, we should have more of this.”
Since the mural was painted about one month ago, Abrishami said his building hasn’t been vandalized with graffiti and insists that most of his neighbors like the addition to the neighborhood.
Abrishami, who also owns Luigi’s Pizza and Pasta at 5711 Calle Real in Goleta, said the mural represents an effort to turn negative energy into something positive.
“Instead of doing something ugly all over the walls, [we] do something beautiful,” Abrishami said.
But not everyone in the neighborhood shares his feelings.
During an interview with Abrishami at Chili Town yesterday, Alan Bleecker, co-owner of Capitol Hardware, which is located across the street from Chile Town, entered the dining room and asked Abrishami when he planned to paint over the mural.
“It’s arty but it’s not Milpas,” Bleecker told Abrishami.
Abrishami looked out the window at Bleeker’s building and told him he thought it was bland.
As Bleecker was on his way out, Abrishami offered him a burger on the house, which Bleecker declined.
After returning to his office, Bleecker said he simply doesn’t like the mural, which he can see from his office window.
Bleecker said he’s had at least 40 customers complain about the Chili Town mural and reiterated his earlier claim that the mural “Doesn’t represent Milpas Street.”
When asked what he thinks would better represent Milpas Street, Bleecker said, “Something that befits the city that doesn’t offend people when they go by.”
But offensive isn’t the word 15-year-olds Gabe Carbajal and Gabe Fonseca used to describe the mural.
“It’s tight,” Carbajal said. “I think they should just leave it.”
As the two boys walked away, Fonseca yelled “just don’t change it.”
Abrishami isn’t shy about his bright piece of art work and the controversy that surrounds it.
When a take-out customer was leaving Chili Town yesterday, Abrishami asked the customer what she thought of the mural.
“It’s a little flashy for me,” the woman said.
Abrishami, who solicited the help of UC Santa Barbara art students to paint his sign, said he would like to see the city take the graffiti style mural a step farther and provide an artistic outlet for youths who prefer a can of spray paint over a paint brush.
One way to provide such a service, according to Abrishami, is if the city built a concrete wall that would be used strictly for spray painting. He said the city could offer awards to the best artists. Another possibility he suggested would be to divvy out different squares of sidewalk to different graffiti artists, similar to a chalk art festival.
Abrishami also wondered why the city spends so much time and energy fighting his mural and other local signs when they could be fighting gangs, drugs and other crimes.
“To punish the people for the beauty of the city is wrong,” Abrishami said.
Santa Barbara Mayor Marty Blum said Abrishami should have gone before the sign committee before he had the mural painted.
“It isn’t rocket science it’s sign making,” Blum said. “That’s what you do, you go through [the sign committee]. They need to do that.”
Hilary Allen, an administrative specialist in the City Administrator's Office, said Chili Town was ordered to paint over the mural on Aug. 23.
Allen said Abrishami painted over large pictures of burgers and milk shakes that accompanied the mural, but asked to make its case before the sign committee to defend the bulk of its mural, which says “Chili Town.”
“The owners have been forthcoming about working with us and doing what they can,” Allen said. “They’re trying to do what they can to keep the mural in tact.”
According to section 22.70.010 of the city’s municipal code, “Signs have a strong visual impact on the character and quality of the community. As a prominent part of the scenery, they attract or repel the viewing public, affect the safety of vehicular traffic, and their suitability or appropriateness helps to set the tone of the neighborhood. Since the City of Santa barbara relies on its scenery and physical beauty to attract tourists and commerce, aesthetic considerations assume economic value.”
On an economical note, Eddie, a co-owner of Bear Automotive and J’s Tires, which shares a building with Chili Town, wondered how the city can expect businesses to survive when people can’t see the signs.
“I’m for him,” Eddie said of Abrishami. “You’ve got to do something to attract people.”
Eddie, who wouldn’t give his last name, said he spends a couple of hundred dollars each year on paint to cover up graffiti and said the city never arrives at his doorstep demanding it be painted over.
“They don’t say anything about that,” Eddie said. “They don’t come and say ‘we’ll help you paint over that.’ If it’s something you do and they don’t like it, they’re here in a snap.”
Eddie did say he’s not sure where the line on signage should be drawn, admitting that if Chili Town gets their mural approved, other businesses might want their own.
Cesar Ortega, a manager at Chili Town, said he loves the mural and hopes the sign committee rules in favor of Abrishami.
“It’s more artful,” Ortega said as he pointed at the mural. “That right there’s not tagging.”