San Luis Obispo County, CA Special Events & Permits: Street Fair Rules (2026)

56 defines a "commercial outdoor entertainment activity" as any music, dance or rock concert or festival, circus, carnival, or other theatrical or athletic exhibition to which the public is admitted for a charge and which draws more than 3,000 persons and is performed or viewed outdoors, with narrow carve-outs for school-grounds events, drive-in theaters, licensed race tracks and state-regulated fairs. 030(a) makes it unlawful to hold, operate, advertise or sell tickets to such an activity without first obtaining a license from the tax collector, and no license issues until every condition of the chapter is met; the application carries a nonrefundable fee set by board ordinance.

050 layers on a scaled map, a notice list of every assessed owner within 500 feet, a 72-hour post-event cleanup bond of at least $5,000 (scaled to $5,000 per 10,000 attendees), and $5 million combined-single-limit liability insurance naming the county as an additional insured. 300 set operational standards: potable water at 35 gallons per employee and 10 gallons per spectator per day, one toilet per 40 attendees, parking equal to one-fourth of licensed attendance, one uniformed security guard per 500 attendees, one fire engine per 100,000 attendees, and a physician on site at a ratio of one per 1,500 persons.

120 lets the board of supervisors suspend or revoke a license after a noticed hearing for false statements, unmet safety conditions, or violation of any license condition.