City of San Luis Obispo, CA

The City of San Luis Obispo is providing advance notice that annual changes to certain City user fees and impact fees will take effect on July 1, 2026.

The fee adjustments are routine annual updates tied to inflation indexes approved by the City Council, including the Consumer Price Index (CPI) and California Construction Cost Index (CCCI).

As a result, and consistent with inflation, user fees are increasing by 3.68%, helping ensure fees remain aligned with the cost of providing City services. Impact fees are decreasing by 0.51%. Parking rates are not changing.

"Providing advance notice helps community members plan ahead and understand why these routine adjustments occur," said Finance Director Emily Jackson. "Our goal is to be transparent about fee changes and make information easy to access. Given that fees are increasing by the percentage change to the Consumer Price Index and California Construction Cost Index, the most significant changes are to our higher cost fees.  It is important for our customers to understand that fees are set at a level to recover the City’s costs for providing certain services that have an individualized benefit.”

Most Commonly Encountered Fee Changes
For most community members, the fee changes they are most likely to encounter are associated with home improvement projects, recreation programs, special events, and operation of a business within the city.

Examples include:

City fees support a variety of services, including permits, inspections, plan review, recreation programs, facility rentals, business licensing, and development services. While many City services are funded through taxes, others are funded through fees paid by the people who directly use those services. Charging fees helps to ensure that the general taxpayer doesn’t pay for services that they don’t use.

The annual fee update is not a major restructuring of City fees. Instead, it is part of the City's regular process for keeping fees current with inflation and the actual cost of delivering services.

Most everyday services will see relatively modest increases, while the largest dollar increases are associated with major development applications and construction projects because those fees are already substantially larger in scale.

Annual fee updates help reduce the burden on taxpayers who may not use those services while allowing the City to continue providing high-quality services that are responsive to community needs. By keeping fees aligned with service costs, the City can continue processing permits, reviewing development applications, providing recreational services, and other important community services efficiently and effectively.

Community members with questions are encouraged to contact the department that provides the service they are seeking or visit www.slocity.org/fees.

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MEDIA CONTACT: Whitney Szentesi, Public Communications Manager, 805.783.7716, wszentes@slocity.org