Quick Take
Local business and fishing leaders Kristen Brown, Terrence Concannon and Melissa Mahoney warn that proposed offshore oil and gas leasing would endanger local tourism, fisheries and the region’s coastal identity. They urge the public to submit “negative nominations” to the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management by Feb. 26 to protect federal waters off Central California from drilling.
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As business leaders in Santa Cruz County, we strongly oppose offshore oil and gas development along the California coast.
It is unnecessary and places our coastal economy, our marine ecosystems, our food system, our tourism and hospitality industries and our community identity at serious risk.
Want to take action?
To comment, click here. In the search, type in either BOEM-2025-0583 for Central California or BOEM-2025-0582 for Southern California.
Your comment can include this line: Alaska, the Gulf of Mexico, and the entire Central and Southern California Planning Areas must be protected from oil and gas leasing and deep-sea mining due to conflicts with human uses, and the need to protect critical marine and cultural resources. You can also highlight use conflicts, the need to protect fragile ecosystems, tribal concerns over archaeological resources.
By mail, you can send your comments to the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Pacific Region, Office of Strategic Resources, 760 Paseo Camarillo (CM 102), Camarillo, California, 93010 in an envelope labeled “Comments on the Call for Information and Nominations for the (Southern or Central) California Planning Area Lease Sales.”
For more information, go to saveourshores.org/drilling/ or savemycoast.org.
That is why we all have to act now by making public comments using the online portal or regular mail as detailed in the accompanying box to voice our concern and protect our region.
Santa Cruz County and the greater Monterey Bay area depend on a healthy, thriving coastline. Ocean recreation, tourism and hospitality are core economic drivers, with surf-related businesses alone generating more than $150 million annually for Santa Cruz, along with millions more in related visitor spending.
The Monterey Bay visitor-serving industry comprises hundreds of small, locally owned businesses and generates approximately $4.3 billion annually. Hundreds of thousands of visitors visit our county each year to experience the natural beauty, clean air and sense of awe offered by our coastline. This experience would be fundamentally undermined – and the county tourism industry devastated – by industrial oil infrastructure offshore and onshore. Even those visitor experiences that do not include the coast would be negatively impacted.
Commercial and recreational fishing, which support both local jobs and regional food systems, would also face significant disruption. These industries are driven by local owners, and over the past 10 years, Monterey Bay’s commercial fisheries have generated a total value of almost $200 million, with about a $2.7 million average annual wage contribution to local economies, according to the California Department of Fish and Wildlife marine data explorer. Sonic testing done by the oil industry to look for offshore oil reserves would scatter fish populations in the region, thereby disrupting livelihoods, particularly for smaller operations.
Monterey Bay is one of the biologically richest marine regions in the world. Offshore oil and gas development threatens this extraordinary biodiversity and the natural systems that sustain it.
Previous oil spills along the California coast have shown that offshore extraction carries unavoidable risks, resulting in the loss of marine wildlife such as whales, sea otters, seabirds and other species critical to the ocean food system.
Much of the Pacific Coast is protected by a chain of national marine sanctuaries, including our own Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary. Opening the door to drilling or mining in or near these waters places our fisheries, tourism economy and coastal communities at unacceptable risk.
At the close of a 60-day public comment period on Jan. 23, over 308,000 citizens submitted their views. In less than four days after the first comment period closed, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) issued a new request for “information and nominations” in which the oil industry and public may nominate areas where they might want to drill.
We are asking everyone who cares about the future of ocean health off California to submit a “negative nomination,” which is a comment opposing any leases for oil and gas due to conflicts with recreation, boating, fishing, science, the military or sensitive areas such as marine protected areas and national marine sanctuaries.
The reason can include socioeconomic information such as economic benefits or the value of fishing grounds, environmental or biological information or archaeological resources. These areas would receive negative nominations due to the harm from oil spills, coastal industrialization, the acceleration of climate change and conflicts with other uses.
In response to this crisis, we formed an informal coalition of businesses, environmentalists and concerned citizens who have helped bring attention to this issue. Now we must continue the fight.
“Negative nominations” will counter the nominations of areas that oil companies might offer during this comment period.
Just as an oil company can nominate an area for its oil potential and easy access for pipelines and treatment facilities that support offshore drilling, negative nominations by private citizens, businesses, local governments and community organizations can talk about the reasons that certain areas, such as all federal waters off central California with three contiguous national marine sanctuaries and other sensitive areas, as well as the businesses that depend upon a healthy ocean. The deadline for comments is 8:59 p.m. on Feb. 26.
It’s our coastline, and ocean. We must defend it.
Kristen Brown is executive director of the Santa Cruz Area Chamber of Commerce.
Terence Concannon is CEO of Visit Santa Cruz County.
Melissa Mahoney is executive director of Monterey Bay Fisheries Trust.