GREEN HAZE: Ventura County is paying a...

GREEN HAZE: Ventura County is paying a company almost $65,000 to count leaves here and across Santa Barbara County. Then experts will know how much pollution they can blame on your neighbor’s yard instead of your AMC Gremlin. . . . Turns out plants give off more than half of one of the two key elements of smog. . . . The “dirtiest” greenery: weeping willows and African daisies, says Chuck Thomas of the air pollution control district. Lemon trees, strawberries and poppies are among the cleanest.

PAYDAY: It’s Wild Wednesday at the county tax office as hundreds pour in to pay the second installment on their property taxes. Even the head man--Treasurer Harold S. Pittman--has been pitching in behind the counter. “I’m usually up front during the heavy times so they can see that I’m on the job,” he says. . . . Extra staff should keep the wait under 30 minutes, but savvy citizens can avoid the throngs and pay with a credit card by calling 654-2120.

CLERK OF AGES: While some in Thousand Oaks want historic status for a city hall built in the early 1970s, Ventura this week honored a living monument: City Clerk Barbara Kam has held her position longer than anyone else, 25 years. . . . “In private enterprise it used to be common for people to have that amount of time,” says Mayor Jack Tingstrom. “Now it’s more common in government” because of the economy. . . . Kam said it was no big deal, the mayor adds. “Well, yeah, it is a big deal.”

PIER DAZE: City Parks Supervisor Terry Murphy kept visiting the Ventura Pier on Tuesday, hoping to pick up broken pilings a dive team was harvesting from the sea floor (B1). . . . As she came and went, a cormorant chased a sea gull from a piling, a seal scared off the fish, the Harbor Patrol swung by for a look, and the dive boat just sat there. . . . It turned out all the work was going on underwater, and no pilings will be floated ashore until today. But it was a beautiful day on the pier.