Ecosystem-based management requires comprehensive assessments of the ecosystem to establish a feedback loop on the conditions in the systems under management. These assessments require observing data that reflect the pressures and ecosystem indicators of concern to managers. This report examines ongoing ecosystem assessment and modeling efforts in the California Current Ecosystem (hereafter referred to as 'ecosystem assessments') in the context of NOAA's model for Integrated Ecosystem Assessment (IEA) development. The goals of this effort are to 1) examine the ecosystem assessments in the context of a DPSIR (Driver, Pressure, State, Impact, Response) approach; and 2) identify ocean observing datasets in use by current assessments to identify gaps in the data and services available to support future assessments.