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Arson suspected in San Luis Obispo fire that burned vehicles

September 9, 2026

Photo by Jeff Specht

By JOSH FRIEDMAN

Authorities are investigating a fire that burned at least five vehicles at the San Luis Obispo water treatment plant on Tuesday as possible arson.

Multiple homeless people have encampments in the area, and one homeless man was seen standing and watching as firefighters responded to the blaze. The man remained by the scene of the fire response, despite emergency personnel requesting that civilians leave the area.

Shortly after 4:30 p.m. on Tuesday, a caller reported a fire burning off the Bob Jones Bike Trail near the intersection of Los Osos Valley Road and Highway 101. Firefighters arrived at the scene and found an approximate 50-by-50-foot area of vegetation burning near the decommissioned city utilities facility. Five vehicles that were being stored at the facility were fully engulfed in flames.

Crews extinguished the vegetation and vehicle fires and prevented the blaze from spreading into the surrounding area.

During the incident, San Luis Obispo police officers and Cal Fire law enforcement personnel conducted a search of the surrounding area with assistance from the SLO County Sheriff’s Office K-9 team. California Department of Fish and Wildlife personnel also responded and provided support. Authorities did not make any arrests.

Officials describe the fire as suspicious. Arson investigators are continuing to investigate the cause of the blaze. They have yet to make a determination as to who may be responsible.

Authorities ask that anyone who witnessed suspicious activity in the area of the fire, or has information that could assist investigators, contact the San Luis Obispo Police Department non-emergency line at (805) 781-7312.

 


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7 Comments

Don’t worry . You’re be out soon .


0

utterly HILARIOUS. “Suspecting that the homeless started the fire”…LOL. Anyone who lives here knew the second we saw the smoke and where it was coming from. IT IS OBVIOUS! The state ABSOLUTLEY needs to get these homeless drug addled mentally ill off the street and out of the bushes and ditches. There is SO MUCH talk about “help is available” but it actually is NOT. If they decide they want help to get off the street, there is no easy way to get a place to go have a bed and a place to put their car or stuff and get a reset. Its all talk and all thievery on the part of the demonrats. Their “job creation” is simply creating “programs” so they have jobs pushing case work around with no real result.


14

The tent people are always starting fires there… and elsewhere. Pismo just had one. They’ve burned billboards at the water plant. Time to start building more permanent mental and drug facilities and get them off the streets. Not the temporary Prado stuff. And don’t blame President Reagan. That was a half century ago… and who has been in charge since? Just sayin.


32

The drug addled, mentally ill homeless (not the “unhoused,” you Libocrat fools) were the first suspects that came to mind when this story broke.


The REAL taxpayers are sick of this law ignoring rot creeping amongst us and the endless financial drain to our tax coffers through an abuse of our first responders T&E.


ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!


STOP trying to appease the extreme fringe minority.


END the homeless industrial complex (HIC) that wontonly perpetuates this vile (money making) game that they play with other humans.


Get the HOMELESS treatment and off the streets or they go to jail for a long time to protect the vast majority of us law abiding, TAXPAYING citizens.


Those need to be the only 2 options. That’s it!


ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!


Elect new non-Libocrat leadership to bring back sanity and common sense for the masses.


38

Your main point is correct. The HIC. NGOs and Government bureaucrats are well entrenched in this well paying grift and, sorry to say, but the once red SLO County is purple at best, but with all the retiree’s from the two major metros, leaning blue and soon to be solidly blue. So the HIC is well and getting stronger. Keeping the homeless in tents encourages their visibility and thus the industry. No way the system will get them off the streets. If that was to happen, the money would dry up and the system would shrink. Blue states and local jurisdictions will never shrink bureaucracies. For them, government is the answer not the problem. A-Town, my suggestion is just to understand and live with the fact that more of yours will be taken and given to more of them. There is no way that CA will ever turn this issue around. The cancer is fully metastasized.


There are a few CA cities, Huntington Beach comes to mind, where this nonsense is not allowed. But they nipped the system in the bud.


0

It’s not allowed in A-town either. The new(est) PD Chief used all the levers to clean that nonsense up after the SCOTUS clarified that no camping in public spaces, as a law, can be enforced by LE.


It’s the will of the taxpayers in A-town.


1

WE need the Pratt style of homeless care! The only actual resolve proposed so far. And No doubt a great threat to the HIC and all those nonprofits profiting.


1