ENCINITAS – Christmas has become a lightning rod in Encinitas. What was supposed

to be a season of sharing has become what some consider a season of exclusion.
For the third time in one year,…

ENCINITAS – Christmas has become a lightning rod in Encinitas. What was supposed to be a season of sharing has become what some consider a season of exclusion.

For the third time in one year, Encinitas officials have ignored calls from the Jewish community to recognize the city’s diverse population.

This time, it is a Dec. 2 Christmas Concert at La Paloma Theatre, hosted by the city to precede the city’s Christmas Parade, another sore point within the Jewish community.

The Christmas Parade, renamed from Holiday Parade last year, was the first use of the word Christmas, which started an ongoing flap over what some say is the city’s cultural insensitivity.

Hurt feelings from last year had scarcely cooled when the city again offended the Jewish community by organizing a reading of “Operation Homecoming,” an anthology of experiences of military personnel in Afghanistan and Iraq, on the evening of Rosh Hashana, Sept. 22.

The National Endowment for the Arts, which co-hosted the book reading with the city, defused the situation by offering another reading at a date yet to be announced.

The peace did not last long. The Christmas Concert is whipping up emotions again.

“I am baffled as to why the city continues to use taxpayer dollars to promote events that are designed and clearly intended to create an ‘us-them’ divide in our community,” Nan Sterman, a Jewish resident, wrote Monday in an e-mail to city officials, City Council members and Councilwoman-elect Teresa Barth.

“This is a hurtful and shameful practice that, as far as I can tell, does not represent the feelings of the vast majority of our residents,” she wrote.

The city will not change the name of the concert, for which it will spend $3,900, Mayor Christy Guerin said. The concert will include an appearance by Santa Claus; performances by the Grammy-nominated Westwind Brass of San Diego and Brioso, the youngest choir from the North Coast Singers of Encinitas, which will sing Christmas carols; and other holiday performances.

The concert will begin at 3 p.m. Dec. 2 and will be followed by the parade at 5:30 p.m. downtown on South Coast Highway 101. The parade is expected to cost $37,000.

“There is a feeling on the council (that) we are not going to address it,” Guerin said. “We’re not going to make everybody happy; that’s the bottom line.

“People need to understand: Why should everything we respect about the holiday be taken away because it offends somebody?” Guerin said.

Councilman Dan Dalager, who as mayor changed the name of the parade from Holiday Parade to Christmas Parade last year, said he was the one who proposed a Christmas Concert before the parade. Despite the controversy over the renaming of the parade, Dalager won re-election this year.

“Some people get upset about most everything. What can you do? If they don’t like it, they don’t have to come,” he said.

Councilwoman Maggie Houlihan said she will initiate discussion of the use of the word Christmas in city events at the coming goal-setting session in January.

“Dec. 2 is removed from the holiday,” Houlihan said. “It seems holiday and seasonal themes are more apropos.”

Encinitas is not the only North County city that is reasserting the use of the word Christmas. Last week, the Vista Chamber of Commerce changed the name of its parade from Holiday Parade to Christmas Parade.