{"id":177914,"date":"2026-02-14T12:34:16","date_gmt":"2026-02-14T12:34:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/177914\/"},"modified":"2026-02-14T12:34:16","modified_gmt":"2026-02-14T12:34:16","slug":"in-50-year-fight-to-protect-californias-coast-theyre-the-real-mccoys-still-at-it-in-their-80s","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/177914\/","title":{"rendered":"In 50-year fight to protect California’s coast, they’re the real McCoys, still at it in their 80s"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mike and Patricia McCoy answered the door of their cozy cottage in Imperial Beach, a short stroll from crashing waves and several blocks from the Tijuana River Estuary<\/a>, where California meets Mexico and the hiking trails are named for them.<\/p>\n

They offered me a seat in a living room filled with awards for their service and with books, some of them about the wonders of the natural world and the threat to its survival. The McCoys are the kind of people who look you in the eye and give you their full attention, and Patricia\u2019s British accent carries an upbeat, birdsong tone.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

A sign shows coastal conservationists Mike and Patricia McCoy as young adults “Making a Difference” at the estuary. (Hayne Palmour IV \/ For The Times)<\/p>\n

In the long history of conservation in California, few have worked as long or as hard as the McCoys.<\/p>\n

Few have achieved as much.<\/p>\n

And they\u2019re still at it. Mike at 84, Patricia at 89.<\/p>\n

The McCoys<\/a> settled in Imperial Beach in the early 1970s \u2014 Mike was a veterinarian, Patricia a teacher \u2014 when the coastal protection movement<\/a> was spreading across the state amid fears of overdevelopment and privatization. In 1972, voters approved Proposition 20, which essentially laid down a hallmark declaration:<\/p>\n

The California coast is a public treasure, not a private playground.<\/p>\n

Four years later, the Coastal Act became state law, regulating development in collaboration with local government agencies, guaranteeing public access and protecting marine and coastal habitats.<\/p>\n

Read more: Lopez: Half a century ago, Californians saved the coast. Will Trump threats spark another uprising?<\/a><\/p>\n

During that time, the McCoys were locked in a fight worth revisiting now, on the 50th anniversary of the Coastal Act. There had been talk for years about turning the underappreciated Tijuana River Estuary, part of which was used as a dumping ground, into something useful.<\/p>\n

Mike McCoy knew the roughly 2,500-acre space was already something useful, and vitally important. It was one of the last major undeveloped wetlands in Southern California and a breeding and feeding site for 370 bird species, along with fish, reptiles, rabbits, foxes, coyotes and other animals.<\/p>\n

In McCoy\u2019s mind, it needed to be restored, not repurposed. And certainly not as a giant marina, which would have destroyed a habitat that was home to several endangered species. At a 1977 Imperial Beach meeting packed with marina supporters, Mike McCoy drew his line in the sand.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

The Tijuana Estuary in Imperial Beach is seen on Friday. (Hayne Palmour IV \/ For The Times)<\/p>\n

\u201cI went up there,\u201d McCoy recalled, pausing to say he could still feel the heat of the moment, \u201cand I said, \u2018You people, and I don\u2019t care who you are, you\u2019re not going to put a marina in that estuary. That\u2019s sacrosanct. You don\u2019t mess with that. That\u2019s a fantastic system, and it\u2019s more complex than you\u2019d ever believe.’\u201d<\/p>\n

The estuary won, but the McCoys weren\u2019t done. As I began talking with them about the years of advocacy that followed, Patricia\u2019s modesty blushed.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t want to be blowing our own trumpet,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

They don\u2019t have to. I\u2019m doing it for them, with the help of admirers who were happy to join the symphony.<\/p>\n

Patricia went on to become a member of the Imperial Beach City Council and served for two years on the Coastal Commission, which oversees implementation of the Coastal Act. She also helped Mike and others take the estuary restoration fight to Sacramento, to Washington, D.C., and to Mexico.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is what a real power couple looks like,\u201d said Sarah Christie, legislative director of the Coastal Commission. \u201cThey wield the power of nature and the power of the people. You can\u2019t overstate their contribution to coastal protection.\u201d<\/p>\n

The McCoys\u2019 signature achievement has been twofold, said Jeff Crooks<\/a>, a San Diego wetlands expert. They helped establish the estuary as a protected wildlife refuge, and they also helped build the framework for the estuary to serve as a research center to monitor, manage and preserve the habitat and collaborate with other managed estuaries in the U.S.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been a living laboratory for 40-some years,\u201d said Crooks, research coordinator for the Tijuana River National Estuarine Research Reserve.<\/a><\/p>\n

Sewage and debris flow from Tijuana<\/a> are an ever-present threat and decades-long source of frustration and anger in Imperial Beach, where beaches have been closed and some residents have planted \u201cStop the Stink\u201d yard signs. Crooks said there\u2019s been some progress on infrastructure improvements, with a long way to go.<\/p>\n

\"Coastal<\/p>\n

Coastal conservationist Mike McCoy looks at a new interpretive sign at the Tijuana Estuary in Imperial Beach on Friday. (Hayne Palmour IV \/ For The Times)<\/p>\n

But \u201ceven though we\u2019re beating it up,\u201d Crooks said of the pollution flowing into the estuary, it\u2019s been amazingly resilient in part because of constant monitoring and management.<\/p>\n

Chris Peregrin, who manages the Tijuana Estuary for the state park system, said the nonprofit Tijuana Estuary Foundation<\/a> has been a good partner, and the president of the foundation board is guess who:<\/p>\n

Mike McCoy.<\/p>\n

The foundation \u201dfills gaps that the state cannot,\u201d Peregrin said. \u201cAs one example, they run the research program at the reserve.\u201d<\/p>\n

For all their continued passion about the mission in their own backyard, the McCoys fret about the bigger picture \u2014 the alarming increase in greenhouse gases and the biodiversity decline. Through the estuary window, they see a planet in peril.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey both think big like that,\u201d Crooks said. \u201cMike especially comes from the mindset that this is a \u2018think globally and act locally\u2019 kind of thing.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cRestoration is the name of the game, not intrusion,\u201d Mike told me, and he wasn\u2019t talking just about the estuary.<\/p>\n

On the very week I visited the McCoys, the Trump administration delivered a crushing blow<\/a> to the environmental movement, repealing a government finding that greenhouse gas pollution is a threat to the planet and public health. He called those claims, backed by overwhelming scientific consensus, “a giant scam.”<\/a><\/p>\n

It\u2019s easy to throw up your hands at such knuckle-dragging indifference, and Mike told me he has to keep reaching for more stamina.<\/p>\n

But Serge Dedina, a former Imperial Beach mayor who was inspired by the McCoys\u2019 activism as a youngster, sees new generations bringing fresh energy to the fight. Many of them work with him at Wildcoast,<\/a> the international coastal conservation nonprofit he founded, with Patricia McCoy among his earliest collaborators.<\/p>\n

Read more: Destruction from sea level rise in California could exceed worst wildfires and earthquakes, new research shows<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cI wouldn\u2019t be a conservationist and coastal activist without having worked with Patricia and Mike and being infused with their passion,\u201d said Dedina. \u201dI think sometimes they underestimate their legacy. They\u2019ve had a huge impact on a whole generation of scientists and conservationists and people who are doing work all along the coast.\u201d<\/p>\n

We can\u2019t underestimate the legacy of the citizen uprising of 1972, along with the creation of an agency dedicated to coastal conservation. But it\u2019s only fair to note, on the 50th anniversary of the Coastal Act, that not everyone will be reaching for a party hat.<\/p>\n

The Coastal Act has been aggressively enforced, at times to a fault in the opinion of developers, homeowners, commercial interests and some politicians. Former Gov. Jerry Brown, who signed the act into law, once referred to Coastal Commission agency staffers as “bureaucratic thugs”<\/a> for tight restrictions on development.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s been constant friction, thanks in part to political pressure and the clout of developers, and one of the many future threats to the core mission is the need for more housing throughout the state. The balance between new construction and continued conservation is sure to spark years of skirmishes.<\/a><\/p>\n

\"Costal<\/p>\n

Coastal conservationists Mike and Patricia McCoy on a trail named after them at the Tijuana Estuary Visitor Center in Imperial Beach. (Hayne Palmour IV \/ For The Times)<\/p>\n

But as the Coastal Commission website puts it in marking the anniversary, the major achievements of the past 50 years<\/a> include the \u201cwetlands not filled, the sensitive habitats not destroyed, the access trails not blocked, the farms and ranches not converted to urban uses, the freeways and gated communities and industrial facilities not built.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the words of the late Peter Douglas, who co-authored Proposition 20 and later served as executive director of the Coastal Commission, the coast is never saved, it\u2019s always being saved.<\/p>\n

Saved by the likes of Mike and Patricia McCoy.<\/p>\n

I had the pleasure of walking through the estuary with Mike, past the plaque dedicated to him and his wife and \u201call who cherish wildlife and the Tijuana Estuary.\u201d We also came upon one of the new interpretive signs that were to be dedicated Friday, including one with a photo of Mike and Patricia as young adults \u201cMaking a Difference.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mike pointed a finger here and there, explaining all the conservation projects through the year. We saw an egret and a rabbit, and when I heard a clacking sound, Mike brightened.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s a clapper rail,\u201d Mike said, an endangered bird that makes its home in the estuary.<\/p>\n

The blowing of the trumpet isn\u2019t just for the McCoys.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a rallying call to those who might follow in their footsteps.<\/p>\n

steve.lopez@latimes.com<\/p>\n

Sign up for Essential California for news, features and recommendations from the L.A. Times and beyond in your inbox six days a week. <\/a><\/p>\n

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mike and Patricia McCoy answered the door of their cozy cottage in Imperial Beach, a short stroll from…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":177915,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[7,9,8,84566,46443,84572,12452,84571,929,52220,84564,4931,84570,84569,84568],"class_list":{"0":"post-177914","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-california","8":"tag-california","9":"tag-california-headlines","10":"tag-california-news","11":"tag-coastal-act","12":"tag-coastal-commission","13":"tag-coastal-protection","14":"tag-conservationists","15":"tag-hayne-palmour","16":"tag-imperial-beach","17":"tag-mike-mccoy","18":"tag-patricia-mccoy","19":"tag-tijuana","20":"tag-tijuana-estuary","21":"tag-tijuana-estuary-visitor-center","22":"tag-tijuana-river-estuary"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/177914","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=177914"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/177914\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/177915"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=177914"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=177914"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=177914"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}