City Council takes a look at financial impact of General Plan

By Mike Chaldu · Thu Jun 11 2026

Council also hears from fire chief on city's emergency operations plan

ATASCADERO — The City of Atascadero's 2045 General Plan took another step toward adoption as the City Council heard a presentation on the plan's Fiscal Impact Analysis during its Tuesday, June 9, meeting.

The conclusion from councilmembers was that the financial impact of the General Plan looks to be generally positive, even after a few scenarios generated by Councilmember Susan Funk.

Community Development Director Phil Dunsmore gave the presentation for the analysis, focusing on land use and projected "assumptions" made for future fiscal analysis.

Dunsmore had revenue for the city projected at an approximate $9.9 million per year, with expenses at $6 million a year, for a net positive annual impact of approximately $3.9 million.

Dunsmore also delved into land use, and the kind of development that the city would see over the next 20 years.

"We're looking to have 2,890 residential units," he said. "In addition to that, we're assuming $1.54 million square feet of retail space, and for tourism about 225 additional hotel rooms."

The one aspect the city would have to deal with, according to Dunsmore, was the development of multi-family housing (built under the affordable housing umbrella) exceeding General Fund revenues, but said that the city would gain on single-family housing developement and, especially, retail to make up for that shortfall.

In summary, the presentation stated that "growth enabled by the General Plan Update is fiscally sustainable and provides resources for services and reserves."

While the council ultimately was positive about the update, it wasn't without questions, especially from Funk and Mayor Charles Bourbeau, which were fielded by Dunsmore, Administrative Services Director Jeri Rangel, and consultant Megan Gregory.

Bourbeau questioned the study's calculation of daytime service population as the total city population plus 50% of employment. The mayor felt the city was seeing more people leave town for employment (mainly San Luis Obispo), which trumped the number of people coming in.

Dunsmore pointed out that the Atascadero State Hospital was the second-largest employer in SLO County, which made up somewhat for workers leaving town, and Gregory said the DSP did not necessarily mean middle of day, but at any given time of day.

Funk had questions about the retail projections, asking how online purchase worked into that, as the city would not get sales tax for that. She also pointed out much retail came from gas stations, which promises to shrink because of the rise in electric vehicles.

During Public Comment for the item, Atascadero resident Geoff Auslin was skeptical about the city filling all the retail space it was envisioning with tax-paying businesses.

However, when the item went back to council, Funk brought out a spreadsheet she had created that provided a lot of "what-if" scenarios and the probable results of those scenarios. The document including scenarios of each revenue or expense going up or down up to 20%.

"I've found that plus or minus 20%, on all housing categories, none of them are large impacts," she said. "If they develop faster and slower, no one should lose any sleep over it. In the retail, if the use of new commercial spaces goes down, it should still be a net positive."

Funk said if revenues went down the maximum 20% and the expenses rose by 20%, the city would still be OK, for the time being.

"That would be something we would have to address as a council, but we would still be at a net positive," she said

Funk also figured out a worst-case scenario.

"Finally, to get a worst-case scenario, to get negative impact, I would have to get none of projected hotels, and half of office/industrial, only 28% of retail, 150% of multi-family, half of single-family," she said. "This is an almost impossible because most of multi-family and below-market housing will be happening in mixed-use developments, where the retail would make up for it."

"This is robust," Funk concluded. "It's unlikely in any scenario for this plan to get us into trouble financially — this is a solid plan."

In other business, the council also heard a presentation from Fire Chief Casey Bryson on the city's Emergency Operations Plan.

Bryson said the new plan would be an update from the 2018 plan providing a framework for managing emergencies and coordinating multi-agency response. He said it was largely unchanged from the plan submitted to council in January.

The plan outlined the functions and responsibilities for an emergency, with the city manager, currently Jim Lewis, being the director of emergency services, and who would appoint the fire chief to be the emergency coordinator.

Bryson said the Disaster Preparedness Committee and Executive Team provided review and input, and recommended the EOP for adoption.

One notable question from Funk was whether the use of HAM radio operators were incorporated into the plan, and Bryson assured her they were.

The plan was unanimously approved by council.

At the start of the meeting, Public Works Director Nick De Bar presented seven plaques signifying an award given to the city for its downtown El Camino Real project.

The city won two awards from the Central Coast chapter of the American Public Works Association, including Project of the Year, and four awards from the American Society of City Engineers, including Outstanding Sustainability Project and Outstanding Construction Project. Finally, the city was American Planning Association's Urban Design Award for Excellence.

The City Council next meets Tuesday, June 23, at 6 p.m.