Governor Muscle Wants to Take, Take, Take the Ocean

[PAL]

I worked side by side with Terry Maas on the MLPA South Coast Regional Stakeholders Group to preserve reasonable fishing access. Like Terry, I witnessed the complete corruption of a so-called open and transparent public process, as for-pay environmental operatives played dirty to grab everything possible for their corporate trophy cases. Arnie cleared the way for this transparent greenwashing.

Terry is a legend in the free diving community, a great waterman, an ocean lover and conservationist. He posted the following on Spearboard. Read it - you'll get a quick MLPA education.

The F&G Commission meeting this month on the 20th or 21st (schedule pending for public comment) is our LAST CHANCE to speak out and possibly delay this process to the new administrations of either candidate, both of want a more reasoned approach to marine resources. SIMPLY PUT, IF WE GAIN A DELAY, WE WIN, IF NOT WE LOOSE. With the commission stacked against us it will take every restrictive option to the proposed IPA and may well add elements of the even more radical C proposal

Our time is running out and so is the governor’s who is hell bent on leaving a MPA legacy. So intent, that he has stacked the deck on the F&G Commission by recently switching out a reasonable commissioner with a Heal-the-Bay lackey in order to guarantee cramming his environmental no-take, anti-fishing vision down our throats.

As a regional stake holder in this latest process and the aborted attempt 7 years ago, I have become thoroughly disgusted with the entire politics of marine reserves. What really bothers me is that I think marine reserves are good ideas when implemented properly. I’m fed up with so-called environmentalists and preservationist who have no real connection to the ocean, who don’t swim it or fish it, who might throw on a scuba tank once a year if at all. I’m fed up with the scientists who sell their opinions for the promise of more grant money to study the reserves they create. Both groups contain many paid whores looking to protect their pay checks. It is tough to fight against full-time paid environmental lobbyists with volunteer time from folks with real jobs, who donate their time. I've watched these professional "environmental" folks spin their lies, manipulate the facts, and grab huge swaths of the shore for themselves and their well healed supporters. Follow the money: reserves at Malibu and Laguna are paid for by the land owners who want to sit at their beach front homes and enjoy their margaritas without having to look at you. They want it all for themselves.

What really gets me is that these paid hacks have no real connection to the ocean. Taking our prime fishing spots is simply of no concern to them. While they claim to champion the ocean, they don't care. They have never experienced the wonders of the ocean that we crave and that brings us back week after week. They sit at arm chairs and pontificate, and lobby, and misinform the public.

I’m fed up with this whole corrupt process. Thankfully, the Partnership for Sustainable Oceans PSO, of which the Watermens Alliance is a key supportive member, has been able to expose the closed-door corruption. In the lawsuit by the United Anglers and Bob Fletcher, the court held that the whole process is in fact a state body subject to the open door law of the Bagley Keen act. This means that the Blue Ribbon Task Force and the Scientific Advisory Committee must disclose their deliberations and their financial backing. It means that the IPA is suspect and that it was incorrect to make the environmental impact study only on it and ignoring the other proposals submitted to the commission.

OUR LAST CHANCE TO STOP THIS TRAIN WRECK AND DEFER TO A MORE REASONABLE ADMINISTRATION IS THIS MONTH! PLEASE SHOW UP!

The Watermens Alliance is spending all of its remaining donated funds on this all-out final effort. Free Pizza, Beer, T-shirts and donated prizes will be offered by us for all of you who speak at the meeting. We will help prepare talking points so that you are well armed.

Here is how the PSO sees the issue:

The PSO engaged in the MLPA process constructively and in good faith. But when we have been critical of the process, especially of the secretive decision making, our concerns have fallen on mostly deaf ears.

On December 9, 2009, the Chair of the Blue Ribbon Task Force testified to this Commission that the BRTF regularly has meetings that exclude the public. Further, when asked by Commissioner Richards if she is familiar with Bagley-Keene, California’s open meetings law, the Chair testified, “Absolutely. Even though we’re advisory in nature we act as if we are bound by those same requirements.” We have even heard a Commissioner condescendingly dismiss a member of the public while defiantly declaring that “the BRTF is not subject to Bagley-Keene.”

Clearly, the BRTF chair spoke and then contradicted her own testimony in less than two minutes time by saying that the BRTF acts as if it is bound by Bagley-Keene while admitting that they do not. As a matter of fact, the BRTF did not, does not and never has abided by either Bagley-Keene or its own “open and transparent policy.”

Now because of the Superior Court ruling on October 1, 2010, in the matter of Fletcher v. Blue Ribbon Task Force and the Master Plan Team of the Marine Life Protection Act Initiative, we know that the BRTF and the SAT are not “merely advisory” but are, in fact, public agencies bound as public agencies by statutes that govern their conduct. Those statutes do not allow such private meetings as disclosed by the BRTF Chair and requires that the meetings of public bodies and the writings of public officials and agencies, including the BRTF and the SAT, shall be open to public scrutiny.

California’s open meeting statutes also require that the public be informed on a timely basis of what is to be discussed and/or decided by public agencies in their scheduled meetings. Of the 12 different meetings of the BRTF in the South Coast study region, 10 meetings had revisions to the meeting agenda fewer than 10 days prior to the meeting date – a violation of Bagley-Keene. Revised agendas for eight of those meetings were issued either on the day of the meeting or one day prior.

Not only has the BRTF and the Science Advisory Team (SAT) made a mockery of California’s open meeting laws, they refused to provide their MLPA documents to which the public is entitled as required by the Public Records Act (PRA). Fletcher was forced to file a lawsuit to force such disclosure.

So much for the “most open and transparent public policy process ever” as the implementation of the MLPA has been described by the Initiative team and some members of this Commission.

Because the BRTF and the SAT are public agencies, the people of California have a right to expect that they act as such and conform to California’s open meeting laws. Instead, the BRTF and the SAT fashioned marine closures in back-room deals based on politics and pseudo-science. Further, because the actions of the BRTF and the SAT have so egregiously violated statutes governing the conduct of the people’s business, the result of their work is tainted beyond salvage and must be discarded.

Because of the improper actions and violations of statute by the BRTF and the SAT, including the BRTF’s disingenuous testimony to this Commission, we request that the Commission begin proceedings to invalidate the regulations imposed in the MLPA Central Coast phase and the North Central Coast phase and suspend the MLPA process for the MLPA South Coast and the North Coast phases.

If the Commission were to take such action, we would gratefully offer our commitment to cooperatively working with the Department and the Commission in a truly open and transparent, science-based, implementation of the MLPA that is acceptable both to consumptive users and the Department and achieves the true goals of the MLPA. Such implementation would address the real issues that threaten the marine habitat and ecosystem: pollution from off-shore oil drilling and oil terminals, chemical and other pollution, storm-water runoff, sewage outfalls, once-through cooling, and other environmental threats.

We hope both for the benefit of the marine resources of the state of California and for all of us who use the resource that you will grant our request. Otherwise, we will exercise our right to pursue any and all avenues available to us to ensure that the MLPA is implemented in a manner consistent both with the goals of the MLPA and governing statutes.

Terry Maas for the Watemens Alliance and for all divers interested in a fair balance between marine reserves and utilization of the ocean's resources.