SLO sets financial priorities

January 27, 2013

San Luis Obispo City Council members elected to focus on homelessness, neighborhood wellness, infrastructure, a skate park and bike paths at a financial priorities workshop on Saturday.

At the top of the list, city officials chose to partnership with Community Action Partnership of San Luis Obispo (CAPSLO) and the county in looking for strategies to eliminate homelessness. These strategies include case management which consists of requiring homeless residence who utilize services to give 70 percent of their income to CAPSLO to manage and helping to finance a CAPSLO homeless service center.

In order to sustain essential services and infrastructure, city officials said they support renewing Measure Y. The half-cent sales tax approved by San Luis Obispo voters in 2006 expires in April 2015.

Opponents of renewing Measure Y contend that too much of the money, which was meant to pay for services such as street maintenance and public safety, was being spent on day-to-day operational costs including employee salaries and benefits.

“The 2013-15 financial plan will link the most important, highest priority goals for the city to achieve with the resources necessary to do so,” city officials said in a press release. “Today, the City Council took its first major step towards shaping the 2013-15 financial plan by identifying its major city goals and there important objectives.”