MERITO (Multicultural Education for Resource Issues Threatening Oceans) is an initiative to reach and educate underserved segments of the population, with a preliminary focus on the Latino Community of Monterey County.

The MERITO program is committed to providing programs and materials geared for our diverse multicultural communities. With limited resources, the initial focus for the first year was developing partnerships with Spanish-speaking residents and visitors, as they represent the largest multicultural population in the Central Coast region. With full funding and implementation of MERITO, we plan to address additional multilingual and multicultural communities that reside in the Central Coast area, and eventually the entire California region.