Paso Robles City Council members met this week to discuss the city's budget priorities for the next fiscal year after hearing input from community members.
The visioning and goal-setting workshop took place on Saturday in two parts - an interactive morning visioning session attended by 50 community members, council members, and city staff, and an afternoon goal setting session that allowed council members to use the input gathered in the morning session to focus in on targeted goals prior to adopting the city's next budget in June.
Council and participants received a presentation that included a review of 2018-2020 goals and accomplishments; an overview of evolving trends and changing context due to the pandemic, updated local data on housing, crime, response times, and more; a snapshot of the city's 10-year financial forecast; COVID-19 impacts and more.
Participants were polled about what they love most about the city, how they feel about the future of the city, and a headline they would like to see about Paso Robles in 2024.
Council and the public received a presentation that reviewed the reflections from the morning session and the proposed areas of focus for the city council to address in the next two years, include:
• Community Health and Economic Recovery (COVID-19)
• Infrastructure
• Public Safety
• Housing and Homelessness
• Quality of Life Amenities and Programs
• Governance and Community Partnership
Council members then provided specific items of focus they would each like to see added to the list and will adopt their final goals for the rest of 2021-2022 on March 2.
City Council is expected to adopt the next budget at its June 15, 2021 meeting, and will consider various elements of the budget at meetings leading up to June.
