VISTA -- Enforcing Vista's day-laborer hiring law during the past year and defending it against a high-profile legal challenge has cost the city hundreds of hours in staff time and more than $40,000 for outside legal assistance, officials said last week.

Vista council members say the money has been well spent.

Some of the law's most outspoken critics say it's a waste of taxpayer dollars.

And anti-illegal immigration activists say the city should invest even more on the crackdown.

The controversial law, which thrust Vista into the national spotlight last summer, requires employers who hire temporary workers off the street to register at City Hall, display permits in their car windows and present workers with written terms of employment.

Council members say it was designed to protect the mostly Latino workers from unscrupulous employers and to disperse the crowds of workers who gather at the city's most popular hiring spot, a shopping center parking lot near Escondido and South Santa Fe avenues.

Critics decry the law as discriminatory and unfair.

Feet on the ground

Since June 2006, Vista's code-compliance officers have spent roughly 850 hours at the Escondido Avenue shopping center, handing out information about the law, checking employers' registration certificates and writing citations, Deputy City Manager Patrick Johnson said Thursday.

As of last week, Vista had issued 111 free registration certificates and 54 citations to employers, Johnson said. Thirty-two of the citations, which are typically for $100, had been paid.

For months, the city stationed one or two officers at the site for several hours a day, but later reduced their daily presence to two 30-minute visits -- a move that officials said was pragmatic given the department's other responsibilities.

"I'm getting criticism that its not enough, but there are other things in the community that need attention, " Councilman Bob Campbell said Wednesday.

Vista's five code-compliance officers each cost the city between $76,010 and $88,176 a year in salary and benefits, Johnson said. In the budget for the next fiscal year, which starts today, the council set aside money for two more officers to bolster the division.

Legal costs

On the legal front, the city spent approximately $43,000 through May 31 on outside attorneys to defend the ordinance against a federal lawsuit filed last year by two civil rights groups, said City Attorney Darold Pieper.

The suit was filed by the American Civil Liberties Union of San Diego and Imperial Counties, and California Rural Legal Assistance Inc.

In addition, the city's own legal staff devoted a "modest" amount of time on issues related to the ordinance, Pieper said.

Legal fees aren't likely to climb much higher. Last week, the parties reached a settlement that allows Vista to continue enforcing the law provided it give first-time employers the option of registering in the field.

In the settlement, all parties agreed to pay their own legal fees.

"That's the cost of government -- the cost of us doing something to attack a situation that was creating something of a problem for the community," Mayor Morris Vance said Thursday.

Is it worth it?

In interviews last week, several council members said that they had anticipated the expenses when they adopted the law.

"I definitely think it has been worth it," Councilman Steve Gronke said, citing fewer complaints about day laborers gathering near the shopping center parking lot.

The hiring site once drew upward of 100 laborers a day, drawing comments from business owners and council members that it had become intimidating to passers-by.

The laborers haven't disappeared -- 30 to 40 still congregate at the lot in the early hours of the day -- but many say they've had fewer job offers since the ordinance took effect.

The scene also appears less chaotic: Rarely are workers seen crowding around incoming cars as they did in the past.

"People don't feel as unsafe going to the shopping center," Vance said.

Standing along the perimeter Thursday, a small cluster of workers said even though they're less likely to get work, they still come to the hiring site when steadier jobs fall through. Some blamed the hiring law for the slowdown, stating that the fines had driven employers away.

Gronke said the law had succeed in changing the dynamics of the hiring process, forcing employers to take the process more seriously.

"It's not perfect -- nothing in life is perfect -- but I think it has improved the situation," Gronke said.

Councilman Frank Lopez added that the city will ultimately benefit financially by making the shopping center a more comfortable place to visit.

However, not everyone is happy with the status quo. Some say the law has gone too far; others say it hasn't done enough.

"It's better than before," said Salam Gabrail, owner of a cigar shop in the center, "(but) I see the same people out there. It hasn't changed that much."

The city should have tackled the issue sooner, he said.

Jeff Schwilk, a Vista resident and leader of the San Diego Minutemen, said he's discouraged with the level of the city's enforcement. Schwilk and other anti-illegal immigration activists have rallied at the site to discourage day-labor hiring.

"A year later, I'm not sure all this money that the city has invested on code compliance and enforcement has really done a whole lot," Schwilk said at a recent council meeting.

Tina Jillings, a day-labor advocate who suggested repealing the ordinance when she ran for City Council last year, said the law is "costly and ineffective" and the city should make it go away.

"It's a waste of time, money, effort and energy," she said.

Jillings said the recent settlement should help ease the sting of the law and bring back potential employers, but she remains frustrated that Vista enacted the law in the first place.

"The sad thing is, this is taxpayer money and we wouldn't even have had to do it if Vista wasn't bowing to special-interest groups like the Minutemen," she said.

Contact staff writer Craig TenBroeck at (760) 631-6621 or ctenbroeck@nctimes.com.