The City recently learned that the proposed San Luis Obispo Skate Park – one of the major city goals – did not receive a $1.8 million grant they applied for from the California State Parks Office, which would have been highly instrumental in the completion of the community skate park.

The skate park was one of more than 475 projects that applied in round one of the grant, which amounted to $1.6 billion in requests for only $184 million in available grant money that went to 62 recipients.  The City Parks and Recreation department intends to apply in the second round, which will be due in early 2011. 

However, since the grants are awarded based on community need, San Luis Obispo may not look as “needy” as other communities due to our median income and median cost of living.  Without the grant, the project will move forward but will probably be delayed by at least one year and the project will need to be financially supported by increased fundraising efforts throughout the community including the current “buy a brick, build a dream” campaign.