SLO County veterans hall closed due to safety concerns. Can historic building be saved?
The North Coast town of Cayucos has lost access to its historic veterans hall.
The Cayucos Veterans Hall at 10 Cayucos Drive has been a popular venue for everything from governmental meetings to weddings, fundraisers, parties and barbecues for decades.
San Luis Obispo County Supervisor Bruce Gibson called the venue Cayucos’ “civic heart” and “home to a lot of community activity.”
The main part of the building has been closed since 2016, due to structural issues. Now the aging hall is completely off limits, having been red-tagged by the California Office of the State Fire Marshal in late June.
The closure displaces the Cayucos Historical Society, Cayucos Art Gallery and the Cayucos Lions Club, which all use the building.
“We have been given eviction orders once again,” Lions Club facilities manager Breck Smith told his team via email.
Some community members say they’re afraid that the fire marshal could declare the building to be unsalvageable and a safety hazard to the surrounding area, which includes the recently renovated pier.
But officials involved peripherally in the project — including Gibson and Nick Franco, San Luis Obispo County Parks & Recreation director — say they’re confident repairs will go forward.
First, however, they have to find the money to stabilize, repair and update the building, a project currently estimated to cost from $4 to $5 million.
History of Cayucos Veterans Hall
Originally known as the Cass Warehouse at Cayucos Landing, the Cayucos Veterans Hall dates back to 1872, according to the Cayucos Veterans Hall website.
The Cass Warehouse was one of a series of buildings in downtown Cayucos in 1875, which also included Capt. James Cass’ store, lumberyard, home, wharf and pier.
In 1920, the warehouse was acquired by the state of California, according to a 2017 San Luis Obispo County evaluation of the warehouse structure.
The evaluation concluded that “the Cass Warehouse meets the criteria for listing in the California Register of Historical Resources” due to its strong associations with Cass and the California maritime economy.
The county called the building “a rare example of a late 19th-century wharf warehouse and a significant element of the county’s and the state’s maritime cultural landscape.”
Building’s condition an issue for years
The stability of the Cayucos Veterans Hall has been an issue for a long time.
According to a county news release on May 4, 2016, the building was declared “closed indefinitely due to unsafe conditions” and structural inadequacies discovered during routine maintenance, such as a sagging stage floor.
The Lions Club had one day to vacate.
Undaunted, the county had a structural engineer evaluate the property, make recommendations and provide plans to stabilize whatever could be made safe.
The county reinforced the main hall with interior bracing, rendering it blocked and unusable.
Other areas such as the kitchen and bathrooms were subsequently declared to be safe to occupy. The community was allowed limited access to those sections, which had been add-ons to the original structure.
California State Parks added a 30-by-60-foot tent over the patio area, but it collapsed in the winter of 2021, Smith said.
According to the state fire marshal, the Cayucos Veterans Hall will not be considered safe until the entire building can be deemed to be structurally sound.
Deputy fire marshal Joshua Gibson told The Tribune that he was “not at liberty to discuss the Cayucos Vets Hall. The (closure) notice has been posted in public view on the Vets Hall doors.”
Coincidentally, Joshua Gibson and his brother, Joseph Gibson, who both work for the state fire marshal’s office, are former Cambria Fire Department firefighters. Their brother, Johnathan Gibson, is a fire captain with the Cambria agency. (They’re not related to Gibson, the county supervisor).
Closure of building follows application for fireworks show
The state fire marshal’s action came after the community’s unrelated application for a professionally presented fireworks show on July 4 wound up in that office.
As part of the standard permitting process, “The marshal said, ‘Let’s look at the entire area,’ ” said Blake Fixler, Supervisor Bruce Gibson’s legislative assistant.
On June 25, Joseph Gibson red-tagged the Cayucos Veterans Hall, pending inspections by a structural engineer, staffers from San Luis Obispo County Public Works and others, who have since prepared reports on the structure’s condition.
On July 13, Gibson’s initial decision became permanent until the building’s stability is reinforced and can be confirmed by future inspections.
Although the Lions Club had used the barbecue and patio areas, along with the kitchen and bathrooms, since the 2017 shoring-up work was completed, the latter two areas are now off-limits — and won’t be available until the new project is complete and has been declared safe by the fire marshal.
Lions Club members and others have just two days on which they’re allowed to enter the shuttered structure and retrieve items that are stored there.
“We have two Fridays — July 16 and 23 — to get everything out and will not be allowed back in until restoration is complete,” Smith said.
The Lions Club continues to rent out the large, adjacent barbecue and patio areas, including the tables, according to Smith.
The situation has been a huge financial drain on the Lions Club coffers, which had $18,000 in deposit refunds in 2016. The organization also must deal with ongoing maintenance and utility costs.
But Smith remains hopeful.
He said the renovation plan is to “raise the building up three feet and go in with steel columns and rafters” to conform to the California Coastal Commission’s flood zone requirements.
“When it’s done, it will be gorgeous, stunning, with a huge deck that joins up to the pier,” Smith said. “But when that will happen, we don’t know.”
How complicated is the property’s management?
As San Luis Obispo County real property manager Phil D’Acri explained it in an email to various people involved in the decision and restoration project, the state owns the Cayucos Veterans Hall but the county maintains the facility and the grounds,
“The county has an agreement with the Lions Club to operate and provide general maintenance of the Vets Hall building,” he explained.
Nick Franco, county Parks & Recreation director, elaborated, saying that “the state-park-owned building is managed by the county,” which hands off day-to-day management to the Lions Club.
“The county department that operates the building (Central Services) is different from the one that operates the beach and pier (Parks Department),” Franco said. “And county Public Works leads the restoration project.”
Adding another layer of confusion to the repair project’s permitting process, Franco added, “the portion of the building that faces the ocean is in the original jurisdiction of (the) Coastal Zone,” so permitting applications for any work done there “go straight to the California Coastal Commission.”
“The other portion,” including the parking lot and street, he said, “is covered by the Local Coastal Plan managed by the county.”
Franco noted that the Cayucos Veterans Hall is a historical building, which can carry its own restrictions, regulations and requirements.
Plus, he said, the warehouse has those three separate parts, built at different times.
The old warehouse building came first, Franco said.
“Then the kitchen and bathrooms were added, then the meeting room was added on,” Franco said. “At one standpoint, it could be considered to be three structures joined together.”
“But the fire marshal says you can’t have partial occupancy,” he said.
Can North Coast community save structure?
According to Fixler, the Cayucos Veterans Hall renovation project “has an approved construction permit (and is) ready to go to bid, as soon as we have the money.”
The county was awarded a $1.937 million Natural Resources Agency grant for the project in 2019. “The estimated funding gap to complete the project is approximately $3 million,” Franco said.
“We have been working hard to secure the remaining funding necessary to get this important project started,” Gibson said. “Our first choice, obviously, was additional grant funding, but those have tight eligibility requirements.”
Previous attempts to secure federal funding were unsuccessful, Fixler said. “So now, we’re looking at some alternatives for funding sources to make up that difference. It’s better than letting the building sit in worsening conditions.”
That may include enlisting help from the community to raise funds.
“Community fundraising certainly helps,” Fixler said. “Any time we can show community investment, that it’s not just us trying to make a pretty thing.”
And if the county does secure funds through grants or loans, money raised by concerned townspeople, he said, “could be used for furnishings and upgraded kitchen facilities.”
“We’re currently working on securing a loan, payable by revenue generated from renting the hall, and we are exploring a couple options on that,” Gibson said. “The loan option should work if we can get the right terms.”
“Come hell or high water, we’ll find some way to do it,” Fixler said.
“The restored hall will be a highly attractive venue for weddings and other events, and should produce a good revenue stream,” Gibson said. “We are working on the details to be sure that community groups have access at reasonable rates.”
“My vision ... is to have it be a community center where local groups can meet free of charge or at least a token amount for their club or group’s weekly meeting,” Smith said, for “quilting, sewing, carving, painting, drawing, dancing, exercise, bingo and more.”
He estimates that fees paid for weekend weddings and other events could “cover the cleaning, maintenance, and utilities, along with restoration debt retirement. I know it’s possible,”
“I don’t know what the future holds, but I hope it comes soon, said Smith, who is 67. “I hope to be alive to see it.”
