California's Fish and Game Commission has spent the week listening to two irreconcilable versions of what the Central Coast ocean is for. On one side are Chumash groups asking the state to close three stretches of water to fishing. On the other are the charter captains, crabbers and harbour towns who work them.
Commissioners met on August 12 and 13. Nothing was decided; a ruling is expected in October.
The sharpest dispute sits off Morro Bay. The Santa Ynez Band of Chumash Indians has petitioned for Chitqawi, an 8.45-square-mile State Marine Conservation Area stretching from Morro Rock north toward Cayucos. The version filed in 2023 preserved some public fishing. An April amendment removed it, leaving take rights with tribal members alone.
"The original petition proposed the allowance of recreational take of finfish and invertebrates except mussels and scallops," said Claire Waggoner, habitat conservation program manager for the California Department of Fish and Wildlife's Marine Region. "So it would've still continued to allow some recreational take."
Tribal chairman Kenneth Kahn describes the proposal as shared stewardship, not exclusion.
"Our goal, as the only federally recognized Chumash tribe in the nation, is to help protect the biodiversity and cultural resources in the waters along the central coast through co-management with the state," he said in a statement. "We filed the Chitqawi MPA petition in 2023 to protect the northernmost coastal Chumash village site that is culturally and historically important to the tribe."
The boundary as drawn takes in working grounds for Dungeness crab, rock crab, halibut and salmon — which is why Morro Bay has reacted the way it has.
"It's our livelihood," said Lori French, whose husband fishes out of the harbour. "It's his identity. It's not like you just go to work and shut the job off."
French's larger complaint is about being left out. "In the whole MPA process, we have been, I would say, ignored," she said. "For the fishermen, it would have a devastating economic impact and for the town, for Morro Bay, I think it would be pretty severe also."
The city put that in writing to Fish and Wildlife director Meghan Hertel and commission president Eric Sklar. Mayor Carla Wixom and harbour vitality director Chris Munson wrote that "the City of Morro Bay was not notified, consulted, or invited to participate in the petition review proceedings conducted to date" — tribal committee meetings in August 2025 and April 2026 included — and warned that "a process that excludes local municipalities risks overlooking real-world impacts and undermining the public trust that is essential to successful, long-term marine stewardship."
Further south, the Northern Chumash Tribal Council and the Natural Resources Defense Council want 9.18 square miles off Point Sal protected, out to just over four miles. Shore-based hook-and-line fishing would survive, as would take connected to Vandenberg Space Force Base operations.
"Point Sal emerged as a really special place with really strong connections to Chumash heritage and identity, and a place that was pristine and beloved by locals," said Sandy Aylesworth, the NRDC's director of Pacific initiatives. "It was for that reason that we thought that Point Sal might be a promising area to have a new marine protected area."
"Ultimately sacrifices and things were made with the marine sanctuary designation that we would like to see shore up better protections for the biodiversity and for durable protections for the coastline," she said. "And this is one way that we can achieve that."
Charter skippers say each new closure concentrates pressure on what is left. Wayne Blicha of Flying Fish Sportfishing, out of Port San Luis, told the commission he is not against conservation in principle.
"I consider myself a marine steward, even though I'm a taker of the ocean," he said. "We look at Point Sal as being a very important habitat to us." With closures already in force off Point Buchon and Point Purisima, "we have a very shrinking area that we're able to access and more emphasis will be put on those smaller areas to fish."
Erik Rodrigues, who runs the Patriot out of Avila Beach, was blunter: "With this imposed MPA it would cause too much pressure on our limited amount of reef structure, which is already taken away from us. So, if the goal of this MPA is to remove us from fishing, then it will work."
The third petition — Mishopshno, 9.05 square miles off Carpinteria — produced the same divide at a packed Goleta hearing, supporters in blue shirts, opponents in green. Veronica Mendoza of the Northern Chumash Tribal Council made the case for holding back: "Abundance is never created by taking everything. It is created by relationship, by reciprocity, by understanding that if the ocean is feeding you, your family, your body, your spirit, you have a responsibility to feed it back."
Jaime Diamond, who runs Stardust Sportfishing out of Santa Barbara, said the closure would cost families food, not recreation. "Our kids and our local community, who do rely on this as a food source, will lose that access," she said. "It's not something that will be regained going somewhere else."
All three petitions are part of a batch of 20 filed in November 2023 with 72 proposed regulatory changes attached. Five were resolved in December 2024. In March 2026 CDFW published evaluations of ten more — every one of them a petition without tribal leadership. The tribal-led petitions, Chitqawi and Point Sal among them, remain under review.
Waggoner was clear that the department's evaluation is only one input. "It's beyond our evaluation," she said. "The commission has a lot of things that they can factor into their decision."
And approval would not empty the water overnight. Any granted petition still faces California Environmental Quality Act review and further public engagement — two to five years, by Waggoner's estimate.
