Ohio’s Coastal Erosion Area (CEA) program was conceived to address erosion problems on Ohio’s Lake Erie coast. The CEA program was a response to decades of land loss, infrastructure damage, and haphazard shore protection structure designs that were ineffective and sometimes worsened erosion problems. The CEA program maps coastline areas likely to be impacted by erosion in the next 30 years, and these areas are subject to certain requirements for building or further development. Map creation starts with aerial photographs, which serve as the base maps onto which historical shorelines are traced. The historical shoreline and the shoreline on the aerial photographs are digitized, and GIS calculates the distance between the shorelines and the yearly rate of recession. The yearly recession rate is multiplied by 30 to arrive at a 30-year anticipated recession distance, which is plotted onto the base map. Landowners can use the maps to determine if their properties are affected. The first CEA maps were finalized in 1998, and an updated set of maps is due to be released soon. The maps will show that the amount of Ohio’s coastline in a 30-year recession zone has declined by about two-thirds since the first maps were finalized. The reduction is most likely due to lower lake levels and increasing amounts of shoreline protection.