Koreans Orange County

Orange County will be represented in September's ambitious and wide-ranging Los Angeles Festival by several artists, including a Latino muralist, Korean contemporary painters and Laotian craftsmen, organizers announced Thursday. Some local artists will take part as members of large music or dance ensembles or extensive group art exhibits, festival officials said in explanation of why a precise breakdown by county of participants was unavailable.

Ten delegates from Garden Grove's sister city of Anyang, South Korea are set to arrive today for an eight-day tour of local attractions and businesses and to attend the annual Korean Festival this weekend. Led by Anyang Vice Mayor Kwon Ho Jang, the delegates will tour the Crystal Cathedral, Garden Grove High School and city facilities during their stay. The visit marks the ninth year Anyang officials have visited Garden Grove.

First up was a love song with the usual laundry-load of sudsy sentiment and a little lust thrown in for spice. Then came the hourly weather report, promising a day of bright, cloudless skies. Next was a public service announcement, then a traffic update and finally a segue back to the music. It was just a typical morning's programming for KWIZ-FM, 96.7 on the FM dial . . . and it was all in Korean.

Thousands of Orange County Korean-Americans will celebrate the traditional Korean New Year on Tuesday, and many are hoping the holiday will mark the end of a disturbing number of hate crimes around the county in 1990. Following a year that saw such crimes as vandalism to Korean churches and schools, the Korean American Assn. of Orange County is launching a series of programs to promote better ethnic awareness.

Vice President Dan Quayle, stumping for money and votes in Republican-rich Orange County, joined local GOP leaders Tuesday in an aggressive appeal to the area's rapidly growing Southeast Asian community. Quayle and Republican gubernatorial candidate Sen. Pete Wilson launched the opening of the 1990 Asian American Republican Headquarters in Westminster's Little Saigon neighborhood, home of the largest Vietnamese population in the United States.

At least seven men are being sought for what the Orange County Sheriff's Department is calling a racially motivated beating of a Korean liquor store owner and his son. The two beating victims escaped the Friday evening assault at On the Rocks Liquor, 21991 El Toro Road, with deep bruises and cuts on their bodies. Junghun Park, 22, who was beaten and cut with liquor bottles, was treated at Saddleback Memorial Medical Center and released.

Faced with organized opposition from the Asian business community and the threat of a lawsuit, city officials decided Monday to reconsider a proposal to make all businesses display signs in English. The controversial ordinance, which civil libertarians and minority groups called unconstitutional, was to be part of a major overhaul of the city's billboard code. But Korean businesses maintained that they scoured the city and found only nine signs that contained no English.

The City Council has granted a permit to the Korean Martyrs Catholic Center to add a two-story building to its facilities despite opposition by nearby apartment residents who said it will increase traffic. The 7,709-square-foot building will provide meeting rooms, bathrooms and a nursery, and will ease the overcrowding in the church at 7655 Trask Ave., church officials said. "Thank God there's overcrowding in our churches, not in local bars," said Mayor Charles V.