Cambria finally got a permit for its water facility. It’s been more than a decade since the Community Services District (CSD) decided to spend millions of dollars to build a facility that it ultimately couldn’t use, repeatedly butting heads with San Luis Obispo County, the California Coastal Commission, and itself.
The initial decision to build under a drought emergency permit ultimately tore the small coastal berg’s residents apart, spurred conspiracy theories, and spiked water bills.
Now, many CSD executive directors later, that golden permit granted by San Luis Obispo County’s Planning Commission on Feb. 26 is likely going to go through the appeal ringer. But General Manager Matthew McElhenie deserves a fast clap for his work to see this thing through to fruition (for now).
He pushed and pushed, keeping things moving, ticking off the to-do list of studies one by one, checking in and rechecking in with county staff and other agencies. Whatever you might think of him or the CSD, you’ve got to hand it to him.
“This is a milestone, not the end,” he said.
He knows what’s coming. More plodding persistence to continue pushing through regulatory hurdles—but maybe it won’t get appealed!
Hah! Unlikely. There are some residents who believe that this whole water facility is a grand scheme to loosen up the development restrictions in town. McElhenie said that’s not happening. The moratorium on new water hook-ups stands!
San Luis Obispo is facing a long plodding persistence problem of its own. Rentals. As in subpar rentals at extravagant prices in tight—TIGHT!—supply. The city’s been kicking the can down the road on tackling the issue with any sort of aplomb for years. And the SLO Tenants Union is sick of it!
Do you remember a decade ago, when the city finally tried to do something about all of the problems renters were facing? The Rental Housing Inspection Program aimed to take care of slumlords and the positions that they put neighborhoods and tenants in. It was controversial from the start, of course.
Community members argued over the program. Some claimed it was just a revenue-generator for city coffers, some landlords actually sued the city over it, and some tenants complained that it drove rents higher. Nobody liked it.
Then City Councilmember Dan Carpenter started circulating a petition to repeal it almost as soon as it became law. Wannabe council members campaigned that they would repeal the ordinance and got voted into office. By 2017, that ordinance was dunzo. It didn’t stand a chance!
Now, the can of rental problems has landed squarely in the current City Council’s lap.
Barry Price with the Tenants Union has advocated for a rental registry for more than two years now, after “hearing more and more from tenants who we were speaking to that rents were skyrocketing, that conditions were deteriorating, and landlords and property managers were not being responsive.”
Sounds like the same ol’ issues. Only worse. The rent is even damn higher!
The average rent for a studio in San Luis Obispo, according to Rentometer (Is it a trustworthy source? I have no idea. The numbers are all over the place on these kinds of websites.), is $1,800. For a one bedroom, $2,150; two bedroom, $2,800; three bedroom, $4,000.
More than two-thirds of city residents are renters. More than 60 percent of the city’s housing stock is rentals, according to estimates, but SLO wants something more concrete.
So the city is looking into the registry that tenants have been asking for, because it wants to avoid housing inspection program disaster 2.0. But it also wants to have real numbers to base policy on, according to SLO Housing Coordinator David Amini.
“We hear a lot of anecdotal stories from our community about issues such as the price of renting, safe housing, and other issues,” he said.
But he can’t say with certainty what the average rent in SLO is (So, Rentometer is not a trustworthy source?) or how many two-bedroom or one-bedroom units even exist in the city.
So the city wants that data from you, slumlords! Actually, I’m sure some of you are very nice people. But a few bad apples spoil the whole bunch, amirite?
SLO wants to know how many units you own, occupancy statistics, eviction history, how high the rent is, and potentially other things—like, perhaps, do all the toilets flush? Is there mold in the walls? Is someone living in a closet?
But not yet, thankfully for all the landlords and real estate agents who complained about the idea at a recent study session. The fees, they said, would be too damn high! Umm, that’s $25 per unit at the low end. Ouch! Not. And, they would obviously pass that fee on to renters. No one thinks that property owners are taking that fee in stride.
The registry, though, isn’t anything immediate. It’s considered a “work program item” for the 2027-29 budget. Price wasn’t too happy about that and said the city was capitulating to “wealthy and well-connected landlords and realtors.”
“The city is about to embark on an update for the housing element … and yet they don’t have this critically important information,” he said. “We’re disappointed that they kicked the can down the road another two years.”
No surprises there. ∆
The Shredder is a can catcher. Send recycling to shredder@newtimesslo.com.
This article appears in March 5-12, 2026.
As a renter, I can’t say enough about how well we’ve been treated by California-West property management. They’ve been responsive to any maintenance requests we’ve submitted and take care of the property they manage. No complaints here.
Rental housing oversight is necessary in the city of SLO. How someone can rent out a what is basically a glorified storage shed with a bathroom attached for $1500 is beyond me (somewhere on South Street). No A/C or privacy, but it’s conveniently located. And there’s a wait list. And that’s not the worse housing rentals I’ve seen. Don’t get me started on living arrangements. Four people sharing a studio unit is normal due to ridiculously high cost to rent and negative availability. But there is tremendous opposition to even minimal oversight, let alone rental inspection. In 2017, it caused so much turmoil that it forever changed the political landscape in both the city and county. There were even threats of violence against supporters of the rental inspection program. It cost Mayor Jan Marx her election bid, where she lost to Heidi Harmon. That’s not all- remember mayoral candidate Kevin Rice? It was the main reason for his mayoral campaign. That’s how crazy it got. Some may say that was when we stopped being the happiest city in America. Any reform in the rental housing sector is welcome and long overdue.