SLO County pays into renewed statewide coalition to combat offshore oil drilling

San Luis Obispo County is formally back in the fight against offshore oil drilling.

At its Aug. 18 meeting, the San Luis Obispo County Board of Supervisors voted 3-2 to contribute $25,000 to Santa Cruz County, the lead agency in a revived statewide coalition of local governments working to block federal plans to open California's coastal waters to new oil and gas leasing, the New Times SLO (Atascadero) reported.

The contribution secures SLO County's seat in the Local Government Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) Coordination Program — a coalition that first formed in 1980 during the Reagan administration and disbanded in 1994 after offshore expansion was halted and the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary was designated. Santa Cruz County revived the group last year under 3rd District Supervisor Justin Cummings.

For Atascadero residents and others across the North County, the decision matters beyond symbolism: the federal government's draft leasing program includes areas off the Central Coast that could be opened to drilling between 2027 and 2029.

What the Federal Leasing Plan Proposes

The renewed coalition exists to counter a U.S. Department of the Interior proposal to offer oil and gas leases in federal waters under its 11th National Outer Continental Shelf Program. If approved, waters off California under federal jurisdiction would be open to lease sales over the next five years.

According to the New Times report, a Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) map shows a federally designated area near Northern California touching the Oregon border would open in 2029; an area near the Central Coast would open between 2027 and 2029; and an area near Southern California would open from 2027 to 2030. The draft program proposes six offshore lease sales off the California coast.

Richard Charter, whom Santa Cruz County hired to operate the coordination program — and who ran the original coalition from 1980 to 1994 — told New Times the current effort is more serious than the one four decades ago. He said the Trump administration is ignoring national marine sanctuary protections that are meant to prevent offshore drilling.

"Back in the early '80s, we were having more oil spills primarily due to poor inspection and poor monitoring, combined with aging infrastructure," Charter said. "The whole orientation of the federal program is now aimed at opening new areas that they've never been able to open. … So, is this more dangerous than the early '80s? Absolutely."

A Local Legacy: Measure A and the 'Blue Wall'

SLO County has been down this road before. The original coalition's success in the 1980s and '90s rested largely on what Charter called "California's Blue Wall" — more than two dozen local ordinances, some passed directly by voters, that restricted or prohibited onshore support facilities for new offshore drilling.

SLO County's contribution to that wall was Measure A, approved by county voters in 1986, which remains part of the county's local coastal program today.

The coalition's updated strategy, Charter told New Times, is to create a chilling effect on lease bidding by adding to the ordinances that still exist and advocating to strengthen the ban on using existing state infrastructure for new federal leases. The California Coastal Sanctuary Act, which permanently prohibits new oil and gas leases in state waters extending up to 3 nautical miles from shore, is another layer of protection the group points to.

The Vote and the Dissent

The board's approval was not unanimous. 1st District Supervisor John Peschong and 5th District Supervisor Heather Moreno dissented, and according to New Times, they joined two county residents at the Aug. 18 meeting in questioning whether taxpayer money should be sent to Santa Cruz County.

That pushback prompted 4th District Supervisor Jimmy Paulding to request a report from Santa Cruz County detailing how SLO County's contribution is spent.

Charter told New Times the funding goes toward "legislative and procedural engagement" — keeping counties informed about how to participate and tracking the many procedural deadlines in the federal leasing process.

"The idea is counties need to be informed about how they can best participate, kept up on the deadlines, because there are a lot of deadlines, and that enables them to be working in a coordinated fashion," he said. "Nobody's missed a deadline yet because I keep them up to date."

2nd District Supervisor Bruce Gibson, who championed the contribution, said he'd followed the program's efforts for a while and received a specific funding request a little over a month ago.

"I've been impressed with their organization and energy in carrying the anti-offshore oil message — I've also been increasingly concerned about the Trump administration's relentless attacks on California's coastal protections," Gibson told New Times by email. "For those two reasons, I thought the time was right for SLO County to make a clear statement of our values and help fund the effort."

A Growing Coalition

SLO County joins Monterey, Marin, San Mateo, and Sonoma counties and the city of Monterey, which have contributed between $1,000 and $30,000 each to the revived effort. Santa Cruz County and the city of Santa Cruz each paid $29,000, bringing the coalition's total funding to $192,000, according to New Times.

The supervisors' vote follows their December 2025 resolution reaffirming the county's opposition to new and existing offshore oil drilling and seabed mining. Peschong was the sole dissenter on that earlier resolution.

For a county whose coastline includes Morro Bay, Avila Beach, and the waters off Montaña de Oro — and whose economy leans heavily on tourism, fishing, and coastal recreation — the stakes are familiar ones. Residents who lived through the 1969 Santa Barbara oil spill and decades of local battles over offshore platforms have seen this fight before. Now, county leaders have decided, it's a fight worth funding again.