Robert Mazurek
Executive Director, California Marine Sanctuary Foundation
Robert Mazurek has spent 25 years working on ocean protection across California, East Africa, the Indian Ocean, and the Pacific. He currently serves as Executive Director of the California Marine Sanctuary Foundation, a 30-year-old nonprofit that he has grown significantly since 2021. He now manages over $25 million in annual conservation operations across more than 35 projects spanning water quality, marine conservation, and coastal resilience.
Earlier in his career, Robert served as founding director of Secure Fisheries at One Earth Future Foundation. There, he worked in Somalia, Kenya, Mozambique, Tanzania, Mauritius, Seychelles, the Maldives, and Madagascar to combat illegal fishing, strengthen maritime governance, and improve food security in conflict-prone coastal communities. He also served as a Maritime Expert for the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime's Global Maritime Crime Programme.
As a manager at the Pew Charitable Trusts' Global Ocean Legacy program, Robert contributed to the creation of several of the world's largest no-take marine reserves, including Australia's Coral Sea Marine National Park, Chile's Easter Island Marine Reserve, and the U.K.'s Pitcairn Island Marine Reserve.
Under Robert's leadership, CMSF has grown into one of California's most active marine conservation organizations, administering programs ranging from water quality and coastal restoration to marine protected area science and climate resilience. The organization's Blue Whales Blue Skies program, now entering its second decade, has enrolled 50+ international shipping lines and logged more than 1.5 million nautical miles at whale-safer speeds, reducing fatal ship strike risk while also cutting air pollution in coastal communities.
Robert began his conservation career at the Monterey Bay Aquarium as part of the founding team for the Seafood Watch program and later developed the management plan for the Elkhorn Slough National Estuarine Research Reserve. He serves as Chair of the California Ocean Alliance Board of Directors and sits on the External Advisory Committee for the UC Davis Graduate Program in Environmental Policy and Management. He is a longtime Santa Cruz County resident.
