WASHINGTON – An independent commission studying ocean life off the U.S. coasts concluded Wednesday that government oversight, ecosystem managers and more marine reserves are needed to reverse a crisis caused by pollution, overfishing and too many people.

The Pew Oceans Commission report said depletion of marine life requires “a serious rethinking of ocean law, informed by a new ocean ethic.” It urged Congress to enact a National Ocean Policy Act to streamline the government’s approach and create national marine reserves that would be protected like wilderness areas.

The panel said a new oceans agency should take over the Commerce Department’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and marine-related programs run by the departments of Interior and Agriculture, the Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

It also recommended a White House oceans council and a network of “regional ocean ecosystem councils” to participate in the regulation of farmland and urban runoff into oceans.

“Some species serve to create a habitat for others,” said commission member Jane Lubchenco, professor of marine biology at Oregon State University. “We need to focus on ecosystems in a more holistic fashion.”

The United States’ reach over ocean waters spans nearly 4.5 million square miles – nearly 25 percent larger than the nation’s land mass – because of the exclusive economic zone stretching about 200 miles from the continent and Pacific and Atlantic islands.

“We are now capable of altering the ocean’s chemistry, stripping it of fish and the many other organisms which comprise its rich biodiversity, exploding and bleaching away its coral nurseries, and even reprogramming the ocean’s delicate background noise,” the report said.

Explorer and environmentalist Jean-Michel Cousteau, founder of Ocean Futures Society, called the report an “authoritative set of research and recommendations that is imperative to the future of all living things in our ocean.” Cousteau is not a member of the commission.

The 18-member commission – including top marine experts, commercial fishermen and elected officials such as Gov. Tony Knowles of Alaska and Gov. George Pataki of New York – is the first to complete a review of U.S. ocean policy in three decades.

Knowles said the commission was guided by the principles that “national standards are appropriate, local solutions are crucial.”

“While our technology has greatly improved, more and more fishermen are struggling to survive,” said Patten White, a commercial fisherman from Maine. “More and more fishermen cannot afford to live along the coast.”

The first federal oceans commission worried about foreign fishing fleets operating close to U.S. coasts. Its 1969 recommendations to Congress led to the creation of NOAA and coastal zone management and fishery conservation laws.

“Thirty years later, the threat is not so much other countries coming and taking our fish but it’s our own behavior,” commission chair Leon Panetta said in an interview.

The second federal oceans commission was ordered by Congress and President Clinton in 2000 to study all marine-related issues and effects of federal ocean-related policies. Its report, capping three years of work, is due by fall.

James Watkins, a retired admiral heading the U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy, said a new White House oceans council headed by a presidential assistant should coordinate government regulation, scientific research and assistance to communities and states.

The private panel funded by Pew Charitable Trusts, a $4 billion foundation created by sons and daughters of the founder of Sun Oil Co. (now Sunoco Inc.), hopes its final report also will hold sway with Congress.