The early Coast Guard environmental protection mission traces back to which program?

• A. Timber reserve for the Navy
• B. National Parks Service
• C. Clean Air Act
• D. Coastal Management Act

Answer: (A)

The early Coast Guard environmental protection mission grows out of protecting strategic resources used by the Navy. The timber reserve program was created to guarantee a steady supply of timber for shipbuilding, and safeguarding those timber reserves required Coast Guard-style enforcement and coastal patrols. That role—protecting important national resources and enforcing related regulations—formed the foundation for the Coast Guard’s environmental duties, long before later laws broadened environmental protection.

The other options point to initiatives that came later or are not tied to the Coast Guard’s origin: the National Parks Service focuses on park preservation, while the Clean Air Act and Coastal Management Act are later laws that formalized environmental protections rather than starting the Coast Guard’s environmental mission.