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Region 2 presents early subsistence-fishing survey results; project aims for 200 interviews and larger EPA grant
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Summary
Christina Yoshida of the State Water Board’s SWAMP program presented early results from a subsistence fishing and consumption survey in the San Francisco Bay, reporting roughly 50 interviews so far, plans for 200 surveys this year and an EPA grant application to expand to ~1,000. The work aims to inform a subsistence beneficial-use designation.
Christina Yoshida, SWAMP coordinator for Region 2, told the California Water Quality Monitoring Council’s safety work group that her office is conducting a multi-phase subsistence-fishing and consumption survey in the San Francisco Bay to inform a subsistence beneficial-use designation.
"The goal of this project is to assess subsistence fishing and consumption practices in the San Francisco Bay," Yoshida said, describing three development phases that began with survey design and community workshops in 2024.
Yoshida said Region 2 partnered with the San Francisco Estuary Institute and local community-based organizations and tribes to develop a culturally accessible survey. A small pilot and early field work were completed; she said the project has conducted roughly 50 interviews so far and has a goal of completing 200 surveys this spring and summer to combine with pilot results.
Preliminary findings show the sample so far skews Asian and Latino, with about one-third of respondents reporting household incomes below the California poverty level. Yoshida said roughly 18 percent of respondents reported eating fish more than once per week and that household sharing sometimes includes children and people of childbearing age. She cautioned that the sample remains small and geographically concentrated in the central bay.
Yoshida described practical lessons: compensate interviewers and interviewees, provide multilingual interviewers and translated materials, use visuals and tablets to reduce data-entry errors, and work with community partners to build trust. "We've definitely learned they have to ask questions multiple times in multiple ways," she said, noting language barriers and distrust affect participation rates.
Looking ahead, Yoshida said the team applied with SFEI for a larger EPA grant that would add surveys and tissue analyses. "If we get that funding, it would add about 1,000 more surveys and allow us to pay local CBOs and tribes to do the interviews," she said. Without that grant, she said the region will seek smaller-scale funding to continue the work.
Laurie Weber, director of the Water Quality Monitoring Council, and other attendees asked about timelines and representativeness. Yoshida said she would feel more confident in estimates for consumption rates with several hundred surveys and expects greater confidence only after larger-scale work or the requested EPA funding.
The project will combine survey responses and tissue data already available in CDN where possible, and finalized results and reports will be shared with the work group when available.
