On eve of elections, candidates talk jobs for Atascadero 

City may be looking at a “renaissance”

—Jobs are at the top of everyone’s mind, but to drive through downtown Atascadero, from Del Rio to Santa Rosa, a casual visitor to this community might not see much more than a humble North County cousin to San Luis Obispo, which has the feel of a small but bustling city.

There are some longtime residents who have a persistent vision that Atascadero could become much more than a bedroom community. In fact, to talk to the candidates running for election tomorrow and other Atascaderans, A-Town might just be looking at a renaissance. And if “rebirth” is too strong a term, then perhaps “facelift” is more apt.

Mayor Tom O’Malley, who is running for re-election, spoke at length to the A-Town Daily News about how Atascadero has bent over backwards to help create jobs. “It’s been a priority in my time,” he said. “As with other towns you had a pro-growth versus no-growth battle here for years. But we’ve marketed what we already have to offer—our great quality of life…We’ve been able to attract outside businesses because of the low cost of living, and the low cost of water. One big business owner says for example, his water bill now is $600 a month, whereas it used to be $6,000 a month [in San Luis Obispo]. We have focused on service and efficiency.

“In 2013, our centennial year,” O’Malley said, “we issued the most number of housing permits, we processed more that year than almost all SLO County cities combined. We have also deferred fees and streamlined permit processes. It used to take a year for a complex construction project; now it’s down to a few months.”

To hear O’Malley tell it, the reason that Atascadero has had a hard time catching up to Paso Robles in terms of business growth and the number of available jobs is partly explained by the fact that Paso incorporated as a city way back in 1889, while A-Town has only been a city since it incorporated in 1979—less than 40 years.

Another reason Atascadero has been behind the curve when it comes to attracting big business, says Community Development Director Phil Dunsmore, is its topography. “We have an extremely limited amount of flat commercial land,” Dunsmore said, “and a lot of diverse, hilly topography. Paso Robles has a lot more flat land,” he added. “From our beginnings it was challenging.”

City Manager Rachelle Rickard agreed. “Our biggest challenges to job development have been our small commercial lot sizes and our topography. Right now there is a strong market in Atascadero for large business space. The city routinely gets inquiries from businesses wanting to locate here that are looking for 10,000+ square feet of space.”

In fact, Santa Maria Brewing Company will soon be moving into the old Gary Bang Harley dealership on the corner of El Camino Real and Curbaril, into a complex of more than 23,000 square feet. They plan not only to move and expand their brewing operations from Nipomo, but also open a distillery and a restaurant where they expect to present events. Co-owner Byron Moles acquired Santa Maria Brewing from its cofounder Dan Hilker, who has stayed on as the company’s master brewer. Moles said that while he’s looking forward to the expansion, he’s still getting his feet wet in the area.

“We are excited about moving up to North County,” Moles said. “Almost all of my past business experience on the Central Coast over the past 30 years has been in SLO, Pismo, Santa Maria, and Santa Barbara. I have watched as Paso has exploded and it would appear that Atascadero has struggled.”

City Manager Rachelle Rickard suggested that the jobs created by Santa Maria Brewing in Atascadero are the tip of the iceberg, however. “Atascadero’s commercial rent is among the lowest in the area, much of the workforce already lives up here in the North County, and the city is easy to work with.”

Rickard offered a list of new businesses with plans to open soon in Atascadero, and Mayor O’Malley insisted that, “We are young and hungry so we work harder in some senses.”

But not everyone is sanguine about Atascadero’s promise to create more jobs. O’Malley’s prime mayoral challenger, Nicholas Mattson, describes the town as “a hodgepodge,” and says for years it has failed to live up to E.G. Lewis’s vision as “the most advanced master-planned community in the world.”

“The initial ingredients still exist as a foundation of Atascadero,” Mattson noted, “but we don’t have another 40 years of city management available to find ourselves and define what kind of city we are going to be.”

Mattson’s vision is to redefine A-Town by breaking it up into three specialized districts. While he says that the downtown Colony District “is generally well-defined,” he proposes a retail-based stretch or “Ascuncion District” along El Camino Real from San Anselmo to the north end meeting up with Home Depot and SpringHill Suites. “It will still be mixed use, but largely dedicated and encouraged as retail nodes with big box centerpieces.”

Mattson suggests that heading south from Curbaril to San Gabriel Road could be a professional zone, the “Caladero District,” also still mixed use “but largely dedicated and encouraged as professional parks and nodes to attract new business, create synergy, and drive traffic.”

Charles Bourbeau, Atascadero’s planning commissioner, is running for city council. He believes that Atascadero can compete with Paso Robles, but it will mean a lot of catching up. “Earlier this year I attended a North County economic update,” he said, “and the most interesting slide I saw showed how Paso and Atascadero have about the same population but Paso has 17,000 jobs and we have only 10,000. Nothing depicts our jobs/housing imbalance more succinctly. It means our community has 7,000 more people hitting the road each day to go to work in other communities. When they do they waste time and gas on the freeway and spend their money elsewhere.”

Bourbeau said that with better high-speed internet, or broadband, more high-tech businesses could move into the area. Plus, he said, “We have a great place to live with lower housing costs than SLO.” He pointed out that both San Luis Obispo and the City of Morro Bay have agreements with Digital West to improve broadband access. “The City of Atascadero could work on a similar arrangement with a firm chosen on a competitive basis. The city could also defer, lower, or waive applicable fees to attract the types of businesses we want.”

But a lingering impediment to attracting big business to Atascadero is the essential resistance of many older residents. Roberta Fonzi, who is running for re-election to Atascadero’s city council, has no stars in her eyes. “The demographics are a significant challenge to drawing employers to our community,” she said. “More than 55-percent of local residents are retirees; they are not looking for jobs. Employers looking to relocate a business will consider the lack of a young, skilled workforce as a negative, making it harder to attract new businesses to Atascadero. In contrast,” Fonzi said, “Paso Robles demographics reflect a younger and more balanced population.”

Not that Roberta Fonzi is running on let’s-stick-our-heads-in-the-sandism. She believes that Atascadero can nurture job growth. “Atascadero has several things going for it as well,” she said.

What about the promised Walmart that has been approved by the city council some years ago? Certainly that would create a lot of jobs, though mostly low-wage?

Fonzi said, “We cannot ignore the fact that a significant portion of the population isn’t interested in bringing small industries to Atascadero for fear that development of this nature will both change the local demographics and imperil their rural quality of life that drew them to this community in the first place. Even large retail has posed its challenges.

“The fact that it has taken longer to build a Walmart in Atascadero than to build the Hoover Dam says a lot about the preferences of the local community.”

But Rachelle Rickard says, “Walmart representatives are hoping to have everything in place by this Spring to start construction.”

She reports that several new restaurants will or have already opened, notably Taco Roco, which already had stores in San Luis Obispo and Paso Robles, and Marstons 101. Located next to the Holiday Inn Express off Santa Rosa and West Front Road, Marstons is an upscale eatery that boasts a full bar, brunch and eclectic menu, open daily from 11 am to 10 pm, later on Fridays and Saturdays. Rickard added that Little Planet Brewing is planning “a small on-site brewery with tasting and pub service,” and Wendy’s will soon reopen.

To hear Mayor Tom O’Malley, you would think the town is looking at a renaissance. He talked about the Atascadero Tourism Business Improvement District and how tourism has been growing. “We’ve seen an increased growth rate in local restaurants,” he said. Plus, “People are buying up more properties and making bigger, more upscale spaces.”

“We’ve had more outside visitors showing up in Atascadero than at any other time in my lifetime.”

Said City Manager Rachelle Rickard, “The renaissance is occurring and I think that in three to five years, you will see a lot more jobs and business located here in Atascadero.”

This article is one in an on-going series in both A-Town Daily News and Paso Robles Daily News. The next article will look at the North County job growth and the “creative economy.”