The City of San Luis Obispo is asking the community to help identify priorities for the 2019-21 financial plan cycle.
Every two years, the city establishes top priorities that will make San Luis Obispo a better place to live, work and play. The City Council then matches the resources necessary to achieve these priorities through adopting the budget in June. The adopted budget sets the city’s course of action for the next two years and helps SLO continue to provide high-quality services that maintain an excellent quality of life for the community.
2017-19 city goals were identified as housing, multi-modal transportation, climate action and fiscal sustainability and responsibility. Downtown vitality was identified as another important objective.
This year, the city implemented the Fiscal Health Response Plan (FHRP) to address significant financial challenges due to increased pension costs. Continuing this progress toward long-term fiscal health, the 2019-21 financial plan will emphasize maintaining existing city infrastructure, providing core services and advancing FHRP objectives (employee concessions, new ways of doing business, operating reductions and new revenues). Given this, it is critical to have an effective process for setting the most important, highest priority objectives for the city to accomplish in the next two years.
Community members can help by completing an online survey by Sunday, December 16. Surveys will also be mailed in November utilities bills and available at the City Hall and the Senior Center. Members can also attend a community forum on Wednesday, January 23 from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. at the SLO Vet’s Hall, 801 Grand Avenue. At the forum, the community will have an opportunity to present ideas to council and discuss them with other members of the public.
City staff will compile community feedback for the council to review in advance of its goal-setting workshop on February 7. During the workshop, the council will officially set the goals for the next two years. The financial plan will be adopted in June 2019.