Oceano finally got what it wanted—deserved?
Well, some Oceano Community Services District (OCSD) board members didn’t want it, but residents spoke up with their votes against increasing taxes to pay for the town’s portion of Five Cities Fire Authority services and bing, bang, boom, no more fire services! The irony of it all is that the Five Cities Fire Authority will continue providing fire services to Oceano—just not from Oceano’s fire station.
It took almost two years for the OCSD to divest its fire service responsibilities, which the SLO Local Agency Formation Commission officially approved in December.
One recently reelected OCSD board member is still sour about how everything shook out: Shirley Gibson. She blames Charles Varni, who she beat for the seat she just won, which is silly because he wasn’t on the board that tried and failed to pass the same flat parcel tax to pay for fire services twice. She was.
Repeating something that didn’t work the first time is the definition of stupid.
Gibson laments a lot of things, including how much the OCSD had to give up to SLO County to pay for its new fire services arrangement as well as the Oceano fire station’s closure. It’s giving up $1.3 million in annual property taxes and the OCSD’s public facility fire fees. The OCSD also had to give the county $2.5 million in assets and liabilities.
Whew, I guess public safety services ain’t free, amirite? Everyone’s got to pay their way!
That’s something that I’m sure the San Simeon Community Services District‘s residents will learn at some point in the future.
With the San Simeon CSD’s decision to divest itself from all of its utility responsibilities in March 2024, the CSD is still wading through all the administrative work it will actually take. Will it take two years? Will it take longer? What will it eventually cost everyone involved?
Is 2025, San Simeon’s year?
I doubt it.
San Simeon said it’s broke and will be even broker in the future if it has to fix everything that needs fixing. The CSD doesn’t want to charge the people it serves! And it’s hoping the county will just take care of everything—fingers crossed!
In June, the county said it needed more time to study it all. Later in June, the Local Agency Formation Commission said that the CSD’s application was incomplete and put it on hold. And the county’s opted to hire a consultant to wade through the mess of existing infrastructure and service needs for the wastewater, water, waste collection, roads, and streetlights.
Hopefully, San Simeon’s residents who are stuck in the middle don’t have to wait as long as the Western monarch butterflies have been waiting for a little extra help to survive. It’s been 10 years and counting.
In 2020-21, an estimated 2,000 Western monarch butterflies were counted at overwintering sites. In 2022-23, that count hit 300,000.
But this winter is expected to be super low, with the count ongoing and a little less than 200 counted at Pismo State Beach Monarch Butterfly Grove in December—and more than 10,000 counted the year before. So what do we do?
Propose the species to be listed as threatened under the federal Endangered Species Act! Maybe this time around will shake out a little differently than the last go-around.
In 2014, monarchs were also petitioned for a listing. But in December 2020, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service decided that while a listing might be warranted, there were other listing actions that took precedence on its national priority list. Umm, what?
In December 2024, the service decided to propose listing the monarch as threatened. So I guess we’ll see what gets national priority.
The service estimates that the monarch could go completely extinct by 2080, so as long as there are two fluttering around maybe there’s still time?
Meanwhile, in California, monarchs aren’t listed under the state’s Endangered Species Act, either. But it is identified as a species of greatest conservation need in the State Wildlife Action Plan, according to the California Department of Fish and Wildlife.
Wow, everyone. We’ve been talking about protecting monarchs for what seems like forever, but we haven’t managed to make the species a priority quite yet. Except for telling everyone to plant milkweed!
Slow clap! Let’s not wait until it’s too late.
People upset over employee parking in Paso Robles will continue to wait for an answer to whether the city will rid its downtown of the parking spaces reserved for workers. It costs $5 per month to park in the 98 spots near 12th and 13th streets. And the city said that it doesn’t effectively enforce the permit system.
Wait, isn’t parking free in downtown Paso now anyway?
The free parking has made it hard to find parking, according to some Paso business owners who spoke up during the Dec. 17 City Council meeting. Councilmember Fred Strong said that they should remove the parking lots’ legal restrictions but leave up the permit signs to dissuade tourists from parking there.
What?
That’s the same sentiment Mayor John Hamon had. He said it would be “unethical.” And he’s right.
New Councilmember Kris Beal called the conversation “torture.” Hah!
It was. And it will continue to be in the future. Δ
The Shredder’s always waiting for the next shred. Send tips to shredder@newtimesslo.com.
This article appears in Jan 2-12, 2025.
I want to again correct a misunderstanding regarding Oceano property taxes and emergency medical/fire services. The County takes 96.15% of Oceano property taxes every year whether we have fire services or not. Just like it takes all of the Oceano tourist taxes and puts them in the County General fund; same for sales taxes; public development fees; and County campground fees. In case you did not know, the County returns 7% of City’s property taxes to local government. This is County policy created by the Board of Supervisors.
When the Shredder says “(Oceano’s) giving up $1.3 million in annual property taxes and the OCSD’s public facility fire fees” we are not actually giving up anything. It is being taken by the County and OCSD is left with 3.85% of local property taxes for use as its General Fund. As far as I know, this is the situation across the unincorporated County with CSD’s like Oceano, Nipomo, Los Osos, San Simeon, etc.
The major question for all taxpayers living in such a situation is whether the County is spending a sufficient amount of locally generated property tax money on local projects and services?