The Real Reason We Race
The Santa Barbara Channel has a complicated history with oil — and the organizations below are working to keep that history from repeating. These are the groups actually doing the work. Every dollar raised through the Regatta goes directly to them.
Santa Barbara, CA
Protecting and restoring the Santa Barbara Channel watershed.
Channelkeeper uses science, advocacy, and on-the-water patrols to protect the Santa Barbara Channel from pollution, illegal dumping, and industrial harm. They've been doing this since 1999.
Santa Barbara, CA
Legal advocacy for the environment on the Central Coast.
The EDC provides free legal services to protect the environment of California's Central Coast. They've fought oil spills, pipeline projects, and coastal development for over 50 years.
Channel Islands, CA
Waters for All.
The National Marine Sanctuary Foundation is the official nonprofit partner of NOAA's Office of National Marine Sanctuaries. Their Channel Islands initiative engages local partners and commercial fishermen to remove marine debris from the sanctuary and restore habitat across 1,470 square miles of protected ocean.
Santa Barbara, CA
Protecting oceans, waves, and beaches for all people.
The Santa Barbara chapter of the Surfrider Foundation runs beach cleanups, water quality monitoring, and coastal policy campaigns to keep the Santa Barbara coastline clean and accessible.
Santa Barbara, CA
Reducing ocean pollution, healing our coast.
Heal the Ocean is a Santa Barbara-based nonprofit that delivers science-based solutions to reduce ocean pollution. Their work focuses on upgrading wastewater infrastructure, eliminating septic-to-sewer pollution, and reducing plastic and trash entering the Santa Barbara Channel.
Laguna Beach, CA
A second chance for marine mammals.
Pacific Marine Mammal Center rescues, rehabilitates, and releases injured and sick marine mammals — sea lions, seals, dolphins — while advancing veterinary research and ocean education. Operating since 1971, they serve as Southern California's primary marine mammal rescue facility.
About the Regatta
The Santa Barbara Channel has a complicated history with oil. The 1969 Union Oil spill — one of the largest in U.S. history at the time — sparked the modern environmental movement and gave us Earth Day. Today, six active oil platforms still operate in the Channel.
The Oil Rig Regatta uses the spectacle of platform relocation — a genuine, if glacially slow, industrial process — as a vehicle to raise money and attention for the Channel's most pressing environmental challenges. The race is the hook. The cause is the point.
The organizations above work year-round on water quality, legal advocacy, marine mammal rescue, and habitat restoration. They operate on limited budgets and against large opponents. Your support matters.