July 1995
July 1995
Although California has dealt with specific issues of ocean management from its earliest days as a State, comprehensive management efforts did not begin until just over 30 years ago with a state-sponsored Conference on California and the World Ocean in 1964. Efforts since that time have resulted in important advances in ocean and coastal management but, up to now, no comprehensive program has successfully been developed to assemble data, coordinate programs, and identify clear State ocean management policies.
California's Ocean Resources: An Agenda For the Future is our start in this direction and has been prepared pursuant to a legislative mandate (AB 205, Chapter 1027, Stats.1991). This document will help the California Ocean Resources Management Program realize its mission of ensuring comprehensive and coordinated management, conservation, and enhancement of California's ocean resources for their intrinsic value and for the benefit of current and future generations. In doing so, the major State and federal laws that impact California's ocean ecosystem are listed and described herein, as are the roles of the agencies charged with implementing these laws. California's complex system of State and federal reserves, refuges, sanctuaries, areas of special biological significance, and other managed areas are described and mapped in a single source document for the first time. A computer-based geographic information system is being developed in conjunction with this effort that will allow immediate retrieval and analysis of an extensive array of ocean and coastal resource information.
Also included is an economic analysis prepared specifically for this project which reveals that seven ocean-dependent industries directly and indirectly contributed 17.3 billion dollars to the State's economy in 1992, supporting over 370,000 jobs in California. The ocean is obviously a key part of California's dynamic economic engine and following the course of action described in this Agenda will help ensure that it remains such in the decades ahead.
We make recommendations in eleven issue areas for improving our approach to such issues as habitat and fishery management, water quality protection, vessel traffic safety
systems, and shoreline erosion control. A key finding is the need to borrow from some of our onshore successes with integrated resource management and adapt them to the highly complex ocean resource ecosystem.
In preparing this analysis and these recommendations, one overriding theme has emerged. There are numerous, overlapping, duplicative and, in some cases, inconsistent mandates and agencies of jurisdiction that bear on ocean resource management issues. Ocean resource managers and policy-makers at the local, State, and federal levels do not always communicate with one another about efforts or approaches being considered, successes that have been achieved, or failures that have occurred. In short, scarce public dollars are not being used most efficiently.
These institutional barriers will not be easily changed or removed. As a first critical step, we recommend that the State convene a cabinet-level ocean resources management coordinating council, composed of high-level State officials with ocean and coastal resource management responsibilities. The initial purpose of this council will be to help coordinate the multiple State agencies and programs of ocean and coastal jurisdiction. However, the long term effectiveness of this council will depend, in large part, on its ability to improve coordination between and among other levels of government, the public, the private sector, and the academic community.
In short, this Agenda represents a start to integrate and make more efficient methods for protecting and safely using our ocean resources. The approaches suggested herein are by no means the final word on comprehensive ocean resource management for California, but they do provide needed direction to help us get to that result.
