OPC Science Advisory Team (OPC-SAT)

New! OPC-SAT Working Group Reports:

• Accompanying Foreword for the newly released MPA reports below:
  • Evaluating California’s Marine Protected Area Network (June 2021)
  • Climate Resilience and California’s MPA Network (June 2021)
• Microplastic Risk Assessment Framework Development for California (May 2021)

About the Ocean Protection Council Science Advisory Team

The Ocean Protection Council Science Advisory Team (OPC SAT) provides scientific analysis and advice to the OPC and works to ensure that OPC policy and funding decisions are informed by the best available science. The OPC SAT was established in 2008 to help meet the goals of the California Ocean Protection Act, and offers a critical venue to bring state leaders and scientists together around pressing ocean and coastal challenges. The OPC SAT takes on a range of topics with emphasis on state priorities to address issues impacting coastal and marine ecosystems in California.

The OPC SAT and its members engage in four principal work modes: Expert Taskforces, Advisory Committees, Expert Panels, and as individuals. The work of the OPC SAT is funded by the OPC and Ocean Science Trust serves as Secretariat.

For more information about how the OPC SAT participates in its activities, forms collaborative groups, and reviews and approves its work products, see the “The Ocean Protection Council Science Advisory Team: Responsibilities and Working Procedures (2018).”

OPC-SAT Work

Active Working Groups

• Working group: MPAs and Climate Resilience Science Synthesis and Data Needs (through 2020)
• Working group: 2022 MPA Management Review Scientific Guidance (through 2020)
• California Ocean Acidification and Hypoxia Science Task Force (through 2021)

Previous Work

• Working Group: Microplastic Risk Assessment Framework Development for California (2021)
• Position Statement: The Ocean Will Help California Recover (August 2020)
• Ocean Restoration Methods: Scientific Guidance for Once-Through Cooling Mitigation Policy (2018)
• California’s Coast and Ocean Summary Report as part of California’s 4th Climate Change Assessment (2018)
• Herring Fishery Management Plan Peer Review (2018)
• Red Abalone Fishery Management Plan Peer Review (2018)
• Supporting California’s 4th Climate Assessment (2017-2018)
• Submerged Aquatic Vegetation as an Ocean Acidification and Hypoxia (2017)
• Updating California’s Sea Level Rise Guidance (2017)
• Climate Change and California Fisheries (2017)
• Fisheries Peer Review Guidance for the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (2017)
• Evaluating Impacts from Scientific Activities in MPAs (2012 – 2017)
• Harmful Algal Blooms and California Fisheries (2016)
• West Coast Ocean Acidification and Hypoxia Science Panel (2013-2016)
• Spiny Lobster Fishery Management Plan peer review (2015)
• Abalone Density Estimates Peer Review (2014)

Annual Workshops

The OPC SAT comes together as a whole at least once per year in an in-person workshop. These workshops bring together OPC SAT members, OPC leadership and staff, Ocean Science Trust, agency decision-makers, other experts, and partner organizations as needed to share information and updates, discuss priorities, launch new initiatives, or hold technical workshops on specific questions.

• April 8, 2019: Engaging the OPC SAT  in OPC’s new draft Strategic Plan
• March 15, 2018: Supporting the OPC’s new strategic vision
• May 23, 2017: The Science of Climate Adaptation in California, full proceedings & two-page summary
• April 18, 2016: Bracing for a Changing World, full proceedings & two-page summary
• February 25, 2015: Readying California’s Fisheries for Climate Change, full proceedings & two-page summary
• June 11, 2014: Ocean Health as a Scientific Concept & Management Goal, full proceedings & two-page summary
• September 4, 2013: Advancing Science in California Fisheries, meeting summary 
• November 19, 2012: Ocean Acidification & Hypoxia: Engaging California in the Challenge, meeting summary
• April 18, 2012: Summarizing work related to aquatic invasive species, and engaging on harmful algal blooms in light of Sonoma coast event, meeting minutes
• September 30, 2011: Summarizing work related expert judgment as a science integration tool, and OPC SAT input on the 2012 – 2017 OPC strategic plan, meeting minutes
• January 31, 2011: Launching our input into the development of the 2012 – 2017 OPC strategic plan, developing a position statement on climate change, meeting minutes
• July 20, 2010: Providing input on focal areas for the OPC: climate change adaptation, land/ocean interface, sustainable fisheries, marine spatial planning, and emerging industrial uses, meeting minutes
• December 1, 2009: Exploring the role of the OPC-SAT, meeting minutes
• September 10, 2008: Establishing the OPC-SAT (our first meeting), meeting minutes

Members

2019 Executive Committee

Mark Gold
Executive Director, Ocean Protection Council

Jenn Eckerle
Deputy Director, Ocean Protection Council

Gretchen Hofmann, co-chair
Professor and Chair, Department of Ecology, Evolution and Marine Biology, University of California, Santa Barbara

Liz Whiteman, co-chair
Executive Director, California Ocean Science Trust

Madeleine Hall-Arber, co-chair elect
retired, Professor and Anthropologist, Sea Grant, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (formerly)

John J. Stachowicz, co-chair emeritus
Professor, University of California, Davis

Richard F. Ambrose
Department of Environmental Health Sciences, University of California, Los Angeles

Clarissa Anderson
Executive Director, Southern California Coastal Ocean Observing System

Marissa Baskett
Associate Professor, University of California, Davis

Alexandria B. Boehm
Professor, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Stanford University

Mark Carr
Professor, Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of California, Santa Cruz

Daniel R. Cayan
Researcher, Climate Atmospheric Science and Physical Oceanography, Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California, San Diego

Francisco Chavez
Senior Scientist, Biological Oceanographer, Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute

Kenneth Coale
Professor, Moss Landing Marine Laboratories, San Jose State University

Holly Doremus
James H. House and Hiram H. Hurd Professor of Environmental Regulation, Co-Director, Center for Law, Energy & the Environment, Director, Environmental Law Program, University of California, Berkeley

Juliette Finzi Hart
Oceanographer, United States Geological Survey

Briannon Fraley
Interim Chief Executive Officer, Self Governance Director, Tolowa Dee-ni’ Nation

Gary Griggs
Professor of Earth Sciences and Director, Institute of Marine Sciences, University of California, Santa Cruz

Elliott Hazen
Research Ecologist, NOAA Southwest Fisheries Science Center

Eunha Hoh
Professor, San Diego State University

Anne Kapuscinski
Director, Coastal Science and Policy Institute, University of California, Santa Cruz

Kristy Kroeker
Associate Professor, University of California, Santa Cruz

Arielle Levine
Professor, San Diego State University

Barry Wayne McCovey Jr.
Fisheries Biologist, Yurok Tribal Fisheries Program

Steven N. Murray
Professor of Biology and Interim Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs Emeritus, California State University Fullerton

Karina J. Nielsen
Professor and Director, Estuary and Ocean Science Center, San Francisco State University

Carrie Pomeroy
Extension Specialist, California Sea Grant Extension

Laurie Richmond
Associate Professor, Humboldt State University

Jim Sanchirico
Professor, University of California, Davis

Jerry Schubel
President and Chief Executive Officer, Aquarium of the Pacific

Chuck Striplen
Environmental Scientist, North Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board

William Sydeman
President and Senior Scientist, Farallon Institute for Advanced Ecosystem Research

Stephen Weisberg
Executive Director, Southern California Coastal Water Research Project

Contacts

Jenn Eckerle, Deputy Director, Ocean Protection Council
jenn.eckerle@resources.ca.gov

Hayley Carter, Senior Science Officer, California Ocean Science Trust
hayley.carter@oceansciencetrust.org