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San Luis Obispo’s successful zero tolerance operation

March 16, 2025

Quiet street in San Luis Obispo on St. Fratty’s Day 2025

By KAREN VELIE

San Luis Obispo officials successfully conducted a zero tolerance operation focused on stopping the rowdy and destructive St. Fratty’s Day parties that have frustrated neighbors of the Cal Poly’s campus for years.

The street party had grown exponentially over the past several years with major impacts to the neighborhood, including property damage, personal injuries, and illegal and dangerous behavior. Last year, an estimated 6,500 people gathered on residential streets where they broke mutiple car windows, fences and alcohol bottles.

The SLO Police Department conducted a coordinated operation to end the yearly street party on Saturday, along with 23 allied agencies. Some roads were blocked while other streets were lined with no parking signs.

The San Luis Obispo Police Department and its allied agencies took a “zero tolerance” approach. Officers order people not to gather in the roadways. They also immediately addressed illegal behavior as it was observed.

Even though there was a large number of people throughout the neighborhoods, no gatherings were permitted.

Law enforcement arrested four people for misdemeanor public intoxication on Saturday. Citation and arrest information for the entirety of the safety enhancement zone will be provided after the enforcement operation ends.

The SLO Police Department wants to thank city staff, Cal Poly and agency partners that participated in the operation:

  • California Highway Patrol
  • California State Fish and Wildlife
  • Ventura County Sheriff’s Office
  • Arroyo Grand Police Department
  • Morro Bay Police Department
  • Atascadero Police Department
  • Atascadero State Hospital
  • Guadalupe Police Department
  • California State Parks
  • San Francisco Police Department
  • Kings County Sheriff’s Office
  • Shafter Police Department
  • Pismo Beach Police Department
  • California Department of Alcohol Beverage Control
  • San Luis Obispo County Probation
  • California Department of Corrections
  • Oxnard Police Department
  • Santa Maria Police Department
  • Lompoc Police Department
  • Santa Barbara Police Department
  • San Luis Obispo County Sheriff’s Office
  • Santa Barbara Police Department
  • Grover Beach Police Department
  • California National Guard

 


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This enforcement action should have been done in 2023 when the crowd was growing. By waiting, the number of participants ballooned to over 6,000 (which was the estimated attendance at the on-campus concert this year), requiring the city to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to put a stop to it. Cal Poly also spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to put on their on-campus concert. All this money spent because students feel entitled to party. The party culture has grown and is extremely disturbing to residents who have fraternities illegally operating in their single-family zoned neighborhoods. The spread of the illegal fraternities, and their satellite houses, is now so significant that the city lacks the resources to resolve the problem they’ve let grow. Waiting until a problem is too big to control is not a good strategy and can end up costing a lot more to resolve. Will they never learn?


4

23 different agencies involved, talk about a police state. Here’s the thing- SLO wanted a big college to bring more money in to SLO, and when kids do what kids do they freak out. Cal Poly has been a large part of why SLO no longer feels like a unique city and instead like many other cities who all look the same and have sold out. How unique.


10

Sickening, all these resources to defend some Rich kids getting drunk at our expense. And this state funded and federal funded school isn’t free for locals yet I pay endless taxes to fund a Corporation that is used for a corporations to hire kids to make Bombs. Awesome. Fk Cal Poly. FK the drunk rich Nepo Kids. Why isn’t Doge making school free if we all Pay Into It? Why aren’t the DoD contractors affiliated with this paying into it, vs, hiding taxes offshore in Panama and Ireland?


So, a school can shut a city down and affect property owners because they want Kids to Get Drunk and Use Drugs Openly? I hate Cal Poly. It’s racist roots, it’s terrible ethics, it’s total lack of social empathy.


0