MLPA's Public-Private Partnership Protects Oceans During Lean Budget Times
Ray Hiemstra
California Progress Report
02/28/2011
From the lemons-out-of-lemonade department: California is working to create the nation’s first science-based, statewide ocean park system as part of the Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA). A group of non-profit foundations is helping to pay for the public planning process to ensure the state can move ahead with critically needed ocean protections during these tight times.
Now, some fishing groups are trying to block approved protections because they are too shortsighted to recognize that preserving fish breeding and feeding grounds is good for their bottom lines. Rather than complaining about private funding for this important effort, they should be celebrating our progress!
Of course, the foundations involved do support the MLPA and the idea of setting aside a network of protected waters to ensure the long-term health of our ocean and marine life. So yes, they have an agenda: they want to implement the law. However, they have no say over direct decision making: that’s down to local stakeholders and state officials.
I was a member of the South Coast Regional Stakeholder Group that designed Marine Protected Areas for southern California. I spent untold hours working with fishermen, divers, business owners, and scientists to map out a plan that worked for all interests. Many of the people now suing the state sat at the bargaining table and got much of whatthey wanted out of the process.
And they had private funding from the same non-profit foundations to be there. Both United Anglers and the Fisherman’s Information Network received large grants to participate in the process and produce proposals for consideration.
The goal of the foundation funding was to allow the community to have a voice in the creation of Marine Protected Areas. Every stakeholder received a travelstipend to ensure we could attend meetings throughout the region to listen to local ideas and concerns. Thousands of people attended the 50 public meetings during this process, and 18,000 sent emails. Everyone’s input was taken into account by decision makers who ultimately adopted a fair and balanced plan that will keep our ocean and coastal economy healthy for the long-term.
The public-private partnership was no secret: the memorandum of understanding between the state and funders has been posted on the Department of Fish andGame website for five years, and everyone involved in the process was well aware of it. So why are fishing groups now crying foul?
It seems they were waiting to see how the process turned out. Now – since they don’t like the final result – these groups have the gall to claim that the fix was in. Which is ironic, considering UA and the FIN were themselves funded by a consortium of fishing tackle manufacturers to water down the result. The misleadingly named Partnership for Sustainable Oceans (PSO) poured millions into influencing the MLPA, including directly funding fishing stakeholder organizations. Stakeholders representing PSO funded organizations were required to lobby for a pre-designed proposal while being monitored by enforcers in the meeting rooms that kept them on the PSO script. All of us who care about the ocean should be grateful to the brave fishing community stakeholders that stayed independent and made substantial contributions to the success of the process.
