Letter: Diablo Canyon closure will impact the lives of workers and their families 

To the editor

With the impending closure of Diablo Canyon, I’m starting to get worried about what this really means for San Luis Obispo County.

Over 1,500 jobs will be lost when Diablo Canyon is gone. This not only impacts the lives of those workers and their families, but it also impacts the small business owners in our area who rely on local customers. Likewise, the loss of tax revenue to our county could hurt our ability to receive things like a speedy response to an emergency.

That’s something I’m particularly worried about. We live in a fire-prone area; our neighbors just to the north of us are battling one as I type this. What happens when funding is cut to fire protection or public safety?

Public safety isn’t the only thing that will suffer. We have some of the best school districts in the country. What happens to our schools when the education budget gets slashed by millions of dollars? With Lockheed Martin and Weatherby leaving SLO County and our new ranking as a top 10 worst place to open a business, I’m concerned that we may not recover if we keep losing businesses and hurting our economy.

Zoe Duty
Atascadero