Esther Viti carries three business cards. One depicts three styles of benches for the Village\u2019s bench dedication program. Another card advertises the La Jolla Town Council and its palm tree logo. Her personal business card is mauve-colored with a lady\u2019s hat hovering above her name. Viti is tremendously energetic for her 77 years of age. She was in a coma for 14 days two years ago, but her ailment isn\u2019t apparent in her authoritative voice and “can do” attitude. Viti has garnered three nicknames for herself in the 22 years she\u2019s lived in La Jolla. “They call me the \u2018Hat Lady,\u2019 \u2018Bench Lady\u2019 and \u2018Trash Lady,\u2019” Viti said. She earned her latest moniker five years ago for assuming the reins of the Town Council\u2019s street cleanups. Viti now organizes monthly cleanups for the Village \u2014 the second Saturday of each month \u2014 as chair of the Nell Carpenter Beautification Committee. “People are willing to do it. They just need a leader,” Viti said. Viti\u2019s style for spreading the word about the cleanups is to “bolt up” during public comment at community meetings and through e-mails to past volunteers. One volunteer asked to clean La Jolla\u2019s streets for her 20 hours of court-appointed community service, which Viti agreed to and organized. Viti is looking for four others, like that volunteer, who need community service hours. Cleaning the streets is not Viti\u2019s “thing,” but she said she\u2019s so structured and organized she could manage anything with gusto. Viti began coordinating the bench program in the late 1990s and she continues to lead lead it today. Locals can pay $5,000 to dedicate a bench to a loved one with a plaque. Viti is no longer taking names for benches along the coast, but space is still available in the Village. Windansea\u2019s ocean viewing grew from four coastal benches to 12 under her watch. She headed the installation of more than 35 benches in total in the Village. Viti coordinates each step of the process \u2014 from helping locals choose a bench to contracting the services. During the concrete pouring at Windansea, Viti guarded benches from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. from delinquents wishing to leave their initials. “[The city] doesn\u2019t have to wonder what\u2019s being done,” Viti said. “They know Esther has taken care of it.” “A goodwill ambassador” is how past Town Council president Paul Kennerson describes Viti. Kennerson had asked Viti to coordinate the bench program for the Town Council in the late 1990s. “Underneath Esther is a lot of very decent prudence and accommodation of various interests,” Kennerson said. “She\u2019s very keen on that \u2026 the prime thing on the benches is that everyone wants one and wants it now and not everyone can have a bench and have it now.” Viti generated controversy in the Village two years ago, however, when she suggested volunteers sit on the benches to prevent the homeless from occupying them. Kennerson said he hadn\u2019t agreed with Viti\u2019s method for deterring the homeless. Viti\u2019s final business card is her personal touch. She loves hats and is rarely seen without one. She favors high-end designers. She always dresses like she\u2019s heading to a luncheon, meaning she doesn\u2019t wear jeans or slacks. “I hear others say, \u2018I wear a hat too,\u2019 but when I see their hat, it\u2019s not like my hat. My hat is a showpiece,” Viti said. Viti dons another sort of hat for her volunteer work with the city\u2019s Neighborhood Code Compliance Department \u2014 for which she doesn\u2019t carry a business card. Instead, Viti carries a digital camera, a badge and a letter from the department. She responds to concerns from the community about issues like trash bins and A-frame signs in the public right-of-way. She promptly strolls into businesses to inform owners of their violations and to straighten out the situation. “I\u2019m the eyes and ears for code enforcement,” Viti said. Working hard \u2014 with or without pay \u2014 is a way of life for Viti. Her parents immigrated to Chicago from Italy in the 1920s, and Viti was the sixth of nine children. As a 10-year-old, Viti worked alongside her father in the insurance business after school and on Saturdays. She rose early each morning to sing at 7 a.m. Mass. She often found herself taking charge \u2014 or being put in charge \u2014 of school and church projects. Viti later moved to Phoenix, raised six children, worked for an insurance company and volunteered for a weekend shift at the hospital each month. She suffered with a bout of rare cancer in her 30s, shortly after she had her sixth child, but rebounded quickly. Nowadays, Viti plans to sell long-term care insurance policies \u2014 a policy that has provided Viti with a home assistant since her coma left her with ailments. The motivation for volunteering is straightforward for Viti. “Self satisfaction. That\u2019s what it\u2019s all about,” Viti said. “I\u2019m fulfilled personally.” For more information about the monthly cleanups or the bench program, call (619) 742-1373.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Esther Viti carries three business cards. One depicts three styles of benches for the Village\u2019s bench dedication program. Another card advertises the La Jolla Town Council and its palm tree logo. Her personal business card is mauve-colored with a lady\u2019s hat hovering above her name. Viti is tremendously energetic for her 77 years of age. […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":726,"featured_media":280006,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"11560","_seopress_titles_title":"At 77, Viti brings energy, vitality to Village","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[11560,11551],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-280005","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-la-jolla-village-news","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/280005","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/726"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=280005"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/280005\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/280006"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=280005"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=280005"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=280005"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}