Does Your Public Comment Count? Two Ocean Wins Show How

Earlier this year, about 65,000 people submitted comments on a federal deep-sea mining proposal near the Northern Mariana Islands, most of them opposed. The area under consideration nearly doubled anyway. So why should anyone show up to a public meeting about the ocean? Andrew Lewin makes the case with two marine protected area processes that earned broad public support by design.

The first is the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park's Representative Areas Program, which rezoned the entire park between 1999 and 2004. Two formal community participation phases, one before any draft existed, drew more than 31,000 public submissions, while standing local advisory committees kept fishers, tourism operators, and coastal communities in the conversation year round. No-take zones grew from about 4.5 percent of the park to 33.3 percent. The second is the Chumash Heritage National Marine Sanctuary off California's Central Coast, nominated by the Northern Chumash Tribal Council in 2015 and designated in October 2024 after a staged NOAA process that drew more than 110,000 comments, over 98 percent in support.

Andrew explains what those processes had that a bare petition process lacks: staged phases, standing advisory structures, clear ownership of the proposal, and a room where people feel safe to speak. He connects it to what happened in California's MPA review, covered earlier this week with Anupa Asokan, and to the Fish and Game Commission meetings in Sacramento this October. He wants to hear about your own public comment experiences, good or bad.

Takeaways:

• A petition process with no staged phases, standing advisory structure, or way to reconcile competing input tends to produce conflict and weak buy-in.
• The Great Barrier Reef rezoning ran two formal public phases, in 2002 and 2003, and drew more than 31,000 submissions.
• Local marine advisory committees kept dialogue with fishers, tourism operators, and communities going between the formal windows.
• No-take zones grew from about 4.5 percent to 33.3 percent of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park in 2004.
• Andrew recalls fisher tracking data being used to place new no-take areas where they would have the least impact on fishing.
• A study of the rezoning found science, leadership, public engagement, and politics all had to work together for approval.
• The Chumash Heritage National Marine Sanctuary was the first tribally nominated national marine sanctuary in the US, and more than 98 percent of comments supported it.
• Without buy-in, a marine protected area risks becoming a paper park.
• Knowing how the process works makes it easier to show up, speak, and support others in the room.

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