Sunnyslopetopia

For Nina and Ray Estes, young marrieds who've just moved here from Santa Clara, California, that arts-friendly vibe cinched their decision. "We didn't really know we were in Sunnyslope," Nina says, laughing. "We thought we were in Phoenix. We had it narrowed down to Phoenix and Seattle, and then we found this part of town and we were, like, 'This is it.'"

It was only a matter of time before someone — in this case, Mike Nielsen — starting cooking up Sunnyslope's answer to downtown Phoenix's First Fridays. "I want to call ours Second Saturdays," Nielsen says. "We don't have a lot of art galleries up here, but we have a lot of public space over by the canal, and a lot of parking lots. Merchants could offer their lots to independent artists to set up in for that one night, and we'll really have our own arts scene."

Until Second Saturdays get going, Nina, a painter, and Ray, a metal worker who hopes to open a wind-chime shop in the neighborhood, have plenty to keep them busy in their new neighborhood. They love Via de Losantos, an unpretentiously kitschy ma-and-pa Mexican restaurant on Central Avenue whose bar is crowded with young scene-makers who dig the hole-in-the-wall atmosphere and the framed photos of Rose Mofford on the walls. They grab their morning brew each day at Grinder's Coffee Company, and they can't step into Corbin's for dinner without running into three people they know.

"I kind of don't want to say too many good things about Sunnyslope," Ray says. "I don't want it to be overrun with boring people."

Ray needn't take up the "Sunnyslope is here!" cheer because there are already hundreds of men and women to do it for him. There must be something in the water in Sunnyslope. How else to explain all these otherwise reasonable adults hollering with joy about a neighborhood that's been struggling to get it together for 100 years? Why else would normally grumpy school principals refer to their community as "a magical place" and councilmen say things like "I was afraid when I moved districts that I would lose Sunnyslope"?

Jim Mapstead, who's chaired the Quarterly Sunnyslope Business Coalition meeting since its inception, likes to talk about how, mere days after breaking ground on the new Sunnyslope police station, the city ran the Hell's Angels out of the neighborhood by buying up the bikers' local clubhouse. Corbin's owner Kevin McNeill is looking forward to using the just-launched Phoenix Neighborhood Circulator route, a free shuttle service that's Sunnyslope's answer to the light rail. Former Sunnyslope High principal John Croteau, who's affectionately known as "the king of the neighborhood," boasts that his school, long ranked as one of Arizona's "excelling schools," made the list of Newsweek's top 1,300 schools this year. "It's Viking pride!" he says, referring to the school's mascot without a trace of irony. And neighborhood crime, according to published reports from the Phoenix Police Department, is down nearly 30 percent from this time last year.

And then there's that 100-foot-tall "S" painted onto the southernmost side of Sunnyslope Mountain, which Croteau swears is part of the secret of Sunnyslope's success. "That 'S' draws all eyes to our community," he says, "and so we don't want it to fail." He's apparently not kidding.

Eventually, every conversation with a Sunnyslope resident will turn to that giant, white "S." Locals seem inordinately proud of the colossal upper-case letter, and of the annual ritual that sends Sunnyslope High's freshman class up the hill to refresh the "S," which 'Slope historian Connie Kreamer claims can be seen from 30 miles away.

Kreamer's name comes up a lot, too. She's regarded as the community's unofficial den mother and historian, and "I'm not sure, but Connie will know" appears to be the mantra of every local. She's lived here since 1959 and presides over the rather Spartan Sunnyslope History Museum, founded in 1988. She's a font of knowledge about the neighborhood's past and present, but she's a little bit worried about its future, too.

"Families die off," she says. "And I wonder if the younger generation will follow in our footsteps. You have to wonder if the kids will have the same sense of place that we have."

Despite all the cheering, Sunnyslope still has far to go before it can call itself a model community. For every cool new bungalow, there's a street's worth of teardowns; for every gated community, there are two scuzzy trailer parks. And though most neighborhood communities don't have their own Web sites, few that do include a menu with choices like the rather dire options offered on Sunnyslope's WINS (which stands for "Where Impacting Neighborhoods Succeeds") Web site. Visitors to the site can choose from Blight, Bulk Trash, Drug Activity, Graffiti, Liquor Enforcement, Prostitution, Shopping Carts, Suspect Stolen Vehicle, and Trespassing.

"We still have the same challenges as the rest of Phoenix," admits Cindy Hallman, executive director of Desert Mission. "Crime is still a concern, and people still don't feel safe walking around here at night. There's still some prostitution and drug houses. But we're working on moving those people along."