UNDERSEA PARK PLAN MAKES WAVES IN MONTEREY AREA.

Byline: Calvin Demmon Scripps-McClatchy Western Service

The underwater park approved by the Monterey City Council last week isn't exactly what its proponents had in mind - but they say it's a start.

A coalition of conservationists and skin divers, intent on protecting sea life offshore, has been pushing Monterey and Pacific Grove to declare the area a park and to regulate activities there.

The Monterey council voted 4-1 to establish the Edward F. Ricketts Underwater Park, stretching from the Monterey breakwater to Lovers Point, out to a depth of 60 feet.

The Pacific Grove City Council has not yet set a date to vote on its part of the deal.

What the park proponents wanted was an area that would be open to visitors, including skin divers, but would be closed to fishing or any other taking of animals or plant life.

What they got from the Monterey council was a bit less. Spearfishing is banned, but hook-and-line fishing, scientific and educational collecting and squid netting will still be permitted. Three local companies will be allowed to go on harvesting kelp.

The council also voted to create an oversight committee to monitor the park and report back in a year. It will have members representing the two city councils, the state Department of Fish and Game, the commercial fishing industry, the kelp harvesters, the skin divers and the scientific community.

Rachel Saunders of the Center for Marine Conservation said the council watered down park plans to ``an eensy-weensy baby step'' in conservation.

``They were very swayed by parochial interests,'' she said.

At numerous public hearings held during the past year, Saunders and others argued that marine species in the area are in obvious decline, especially large rockfish and lingcod.

A no-fishing area would allow populations to recover, they said.

The council vote, Saunders said, seemingly ignored public testimony at a hearing April 9 at the Monterey Conference Center, where 300 people listened and about 75 spoke.

``It's like that hearing never happened,'' she said. ``None of the factual information they were provided seemed to matter.''

She added: ``We may have lost the battle, but we're still going to plug away at the war.''

Councilman Don Edgren, who had brought the whole park issue forward, cast the only vote against it as a protest to changes other council members made in his proposal.

But he said conservationists should appreciate the ban on spearfishing.

``Spearfishing is out, and that was the main thing I wanted. If you're spearfishing, you shoot the biggest thing you can find. They've killed off all the mature fish, and rockfish take eight or nine years to mature.''

Hook-and-line fishing is not so damaging in the area, he said, because lines get tangled in kelp that makes it difficult to fish from boats in the area.

Edgren also noted that the council's action limits kelp harvesting. Two companies feed kelp to abalone being raised in local underwater farms. A third company uses kelp in producing fish roe.

During discussions leading up to the council's decision, commercial fishermen felt threatened, scientists feared their research would be interrupted and parents feared their children would lose the joy of fishing with lines from the shore.

``We're just trying to prove that if you stop taking mature fish from the area, they will reproduce and will migrate out, populating other areas,'' Edgren said.