Brown Administration Abandons Raid on Fishing License Funds!

Brown Administration Abandons Raid on Fishing License Funds!

by Dan Bacher

In a victory for recreational anglers and the public trust, the California Ocean Protection Council (OPC) has abandoned its plan to raid fishing license funds to manage questionable "marine protected areas" created under the privately funded Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) Initiative.

This reversal, in direct response to objections raised by the Coastside Fishing Club and the California Sportfishing League (CSL), shows that California’s fishing community can be a powerful voice in influencing the outcome of public policy.

The OPC on December 1 confirmed the removal of fishing and hunting license funds as a potential source of funds for marine protected area management. (http://www.opc.ca.gov/webmaster/ftp/pdf/agenda_items/20141202/Item5-141125-PageErratumFGPreservationFund.pdf)

According to a Council document, “Current and potential funding streams for MPA management include: 'the bullet point “Fish and Game Preservation Funds, xiv' and the associated footnote have been removed, as well as references to such funds in Appendix F. This is in response to comments received by Coastside Fishing Club on July 3, 2014 and Nov 21, 2014 and from California Sportfishing League on July 1, 2014 and November 24, 2014."

Not only was the proposed raid illegal, but it was a violation of the public’s trust, according to the fishing groups. Fishing license funds are intended to support programs that protect and enhance recreational fishing opportunities, not programs that deny anglers access to California’s coastline.

George Osborn, Legislative Advocate for Coastside and CSL, emphasized, "If it's so important for the state to have these MPAs, then it should be equally important for the state to fund the management of these MPAs from the general fund - and not to raid money dedicated for conservation, fish hatcheries and protecting and enhancing fishing opportunities."

In a letter to OPC Executive Director Catherine Kuhlman on November 21, Dan Wolford, President of the Coastside Fishing Club, summarized the Club's objections to the use of Fish and Game Preservation Fund as a source of monies for MPA management:

"Throughout the MLPA's implementation anglers were lectured that the purpose was ecosystem protection and not fishery management. The resulting MPAs have deprived receational anglers of access to public waters. It would now be inappropriate to argue that MPA management is anything but a nongame program. Therefore, under State law the Fish and Game Preservation Fund is not available for MPA management. The OPC's Partnership Plan must be amended accordingly."

The proposed use of the dedicated license funds to "manage" the alleged "marine protected areas" would have been a great mockery of justice, considering that these "marine protected areas" are not authentic ones that actually protect the ocean.

The questionable "marine protected areas" created under the MLPA Initiative fail to protect the ocean from fracking, oil drilling, corporate aquaculture, pollution, military testing and all human impacts other than fishing and gathering.

Unfortunately, while the OPC agreed to not raid fishing license funds to support the management of MPAs, it unanimously adopted on December 2 “The California Collaborative Approach: Marine Protected Areas Partnership Plan” as "an overarching guide for how a variety of partners can engage in marine protected area (MPA) management." The California Fish and Game Commission then endorsed the plan in its meeting in Van Nuys on December 3.

"The Council also directed staff to continue to manage and update an internal workplan with core state agency partners that explicitly assigns roles and responsibilities for ensuring implementation of the Partnership Plan," according to a memo from John Laird, California Secretary for Natural Resources and Chair of the Ocean Protection Council.

Laird failed to mention that Ron LeValley, the co-chair of the MLPA Initiative "Science" Advisory Team for the North Coast that oversaw the crafting of alleged "marine protected areas" that violate the gathering and fishing rights of the Yurok and other Tribes, is now in federal prison for conspiracy to embezzle over $850,000 from the Yurok Tribe! (https://intercontinentalcry.org/former-mlpa-science-co-chair-sentenced-10-months/)

Rather than discussing this draft plan, the members of the Council and the Commission should have asked for a review of the alleged MLPA "science" in light of the fact that LeValley, the head science official for the North Coast MLPA process, was involved with a scheme to embezzle money through false invoices for scientific "spotted owl surveys" that were never conducted!

In addition, Laird and other MLPA Initative advocates have continually claimed that the process "respected" Tribal gathering rights, but that claim has no basis in fact, since the MLPA Initiative prohibits Tribal fishing and gathering in the State Marine Reserves created under the Initiative.

In the April 2014 election edition of the Yurok Today newsletter (http://www.yuroktribe.org/documents/2014_ELECTION_YUROK_WEB.pdf), Yurok Tribe Vice Chairperson Susan Masten summarized the position of the Yurok Tribe, the largest tribe in California with over 5000 members, regarding the MLPA Initiative:

"The State of California is beginning to implement the so-called Marine Life Protection Act. From the very start, the Tribe has not supported this initiative because it does not recognize the Tribe’s inherent hunting and gathering rights. Also, the Act lacked the sophistication required to properly steward the diverse ecosystems on the Yurok coastline.

Since time immemorial, the Yurok Tribe has practiced a highly effective method of marine resource management, which has ensured an abundance of sea life to sustain our people. The Creator gave us the right to properly harvest marine resources in the coastal areas within Yurok Ancestral Territory. With this right, comes a great duty to protect and conserve these resources. To that end, we are developing our own marine life management program, based on our traditional knowledge of ocean ecosystems as well as western science."

The MLPA Initiative, called an "open, transparent and inclusive" process by Laird, other state officials and corporate "environmentalists," was anything but. The process was characterized by its private funding by the Resources Legacy Fund Foundation; its failure to create authentic marine protected areas; numerous conflicts of interests including the leadership of the South Coast process by the President of the Western States Petroleum Association; incomplete and terminally flawed science; and violation of traditional Tribal gathering rights.

The problem is that "the California Collaborative Approach: Marine Protected Areas Partnership Plan" that the Council and Commission endorsed, does nothing to address any of these "inconvenient truths."

The 46-page plan accepts as legitimate the questionable "marine protected areas" created under an illegitimate process - and serves to only greenwash a process based on bad science and public policy, rather than attempting to deal with the MLPA Initiative's "inconvenient truths."

For example, the use of private funding, the basis of the Initative's myriad of problems, will be encouraged in the monitoring phase, according to Page 33 of the plan:

"Private philanthropy actively supported the design and designation phases and now the management of California's MPA network. There is an opportunity for private philanthropy to become involved in financially supporting management of various scales. Currently, private donors can support registered 501(c)(3) organizations that are partnering to support management. In the future, however, additional mechanisms may be established to increase opportunities for giving."

Of course, there is nothing in the document about Catherine Reheis-Boyd, the President of the Western States Petroleum Association (WSPA), chairing the Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA) Initiative Blue Ribbon Task Force to create so-called "marine protected areas" in Southern California at the same time that the oil industry was fracking like crazy in the Santa Barbara Channel. Reheis-Boyd, the leader of the campaign to frack California and eviscerate California's environmental laws, also sat on the task forces for the Central Coast, North Central Coast and North Coast.

Laird's leadership role in pushing the creation of fake "marine protected areas" that fail to protect the ocean from fracking, oil drilling, pollution, corporate aquaculture, military testing and all human impacts on the ocean other than sustainable fishing and gathering is part of the overall Brown administration neo-liberal "environmental" vision that favors Big Oil, corporate agribusiness, corporate polluters, greedy billionaires and the 1 percent over the public trust and the people of California.

The final draft of the "California Collaborative Approach: Marine Protected Areas Partnership Plan" is now available at: http://www.opc.ca.gov/webmaster/ftp/pdf/agenda_items/20141202/Item5-master-final-partnership-plan.pdf

For more information about the MLPA Initiative, read my investigative piece, The Five Inconvenient Truths of the MLPA Initiative: http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2013/05/25/18737342.php