Keep Fishermen Fishing - Fix Magnuson Now!

The canary in the fish hold: why West Coast fishermen should be coming to D.C.

2012-02-28T15:21:00.002-08:00

Whether you’re a commercial fisherman, a processor, acharter boat operator, or you just fish for enjoyment, you know that groundfishseasons, fishing areas and harvest levels on the West Coast aren’t what theyused to be. The main reason is that we are required to rebuild fish stocks thathave been designated as “overfished,” including species like canary andyelloweye rockfish, bocaccio, and cowcod. No matter the reason for low populationlevels, we give up our ability to harvest healthy stocks in order to staywithin the rebuilding plan requirements.

I think everyone would agree that maintaining a sustainablefishery is important. However, most people involved in fisheries also thinkthat there needs to be a reasonable balance between rebuilding depleted stocksand having access to species that are flourishing. Unfortunately, the law andthe court decisions on the West Coast that have interpreted the law don’t allowthat balance to be struck. The result is lost harvest opportunities andforegone economic benefits for our coastal communities. What we need isflexibility in the law to make reasoned choices, to be able to give a littlehere and take a little there so that we keep biologically productive fisherieswithout putting people out of work.

And that’s why coming to the Keep Fishermen Fishing rally inWashington, D.C., on March 21^st is something more West Coastfishermen need to consider. There will be plenty of people in attendance fromthe East Coast and the Gulf of Mexico but we need to have our voices heard too.A cross-country trip isn’t easy but this is one where you can bring the family,tour the cherry blossoms and the museums, and show your kids how democracy inaction works. Most important, you will be letting our Congressionalrepresentatives know that we, too, have concerns about how our fisheries willbe managed.

Submitted by Rod Moore, executive director of the West Coast Seafood Processors Association in Portland, Ore. You can check out the WCSPA on Facebook at Facebook.com/WCSPA or its website at WCSPA.com. For more info about the rally, visit keepfishermenfishing.com.

SEnator Scott Brown on NOAA Enforcement's "Party Boat" and "Booze Cruises"

2012-02-18T09:59:00.002-08:00

His address is available on Youtube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lIdzt53FKtY&feature=youtu.be

The full IG report is available on the SavingSeafood.org website at http://www.savingseafood.org/images/documents/washington/www.scottbrown.senate.gov-public-index.cfm-files.pdf.

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I rise today to inform you and the public of some highly disturbing information that I’ve just learned about a broken agency within our federal government – The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

We all know that Washington doesn’t spend our money wisely. But sometimes it is worth highlighting examples of the corruption and waste.

Yesterday morning, I contacted the Commerce Department Inspector General to request a copy of their report on NOAA’s purchase of a $300,000 luxury boat.

It would be bad enough if they had purchased this boat with taxpayer dollars.

But they didn’t. They paid for it with money that should belong to our struggling fishermen. They paid for it out of the fines that fishermen pay into the pot when they mistakenly catch the wrong kind of fish. Those dollars are supposed to stay in fishing communities to help the fishermen.

Here’s the boat. For a government vessel, that’s pretty flashy. Take a look inside. That’s a fully-appointed bar, the latest in on-board entertainment systems, and leather furniture complete with the ice chest and tackle rack.

Furthermore, the fines that fishermen have been paying are putting fishermen out of business. The stories will break your heart.

So let me again describe the situation: NOAA levied totally unreasonable fines against our fishermen. Then they used that money to buy themselves a luxury boat. So what else did the IG investigation find? Mr. President, here are the disturbing headlines.

According to the IG, NOAA had no reasonable official use for this boat. Let’s start there. They didn’t need it. Period. They had some story about needing an “undercover vessel” to sneak up on whale watching vessels. Imagine that – armed federal agents sneaking up on school groups and tourists trying to learn about nature. The IG found this to be as ridiculous. NOAA officials wanted this useless luxury boat, then they invented a reason to buy it with fishermen’s hard-earned dollars.

So why did NOAA go to such lengths to “manipulate” and “violate” the government purchasing rules to get this boat? NOAA already has many boats and more cars than it has agents, so why add this to the inventory? Well, Mr. President, they apparently didn’t need it for official purposes. We know that because the IG says that it was never – I repeat, never – used for official business.

The sad truth is that it was a fishermen-funded party boat for bureaucrats, Mr. President. That’s right, while fishermen in Gloucester and New Bedford are struggling to put off foreclosure or mourning the loss of their livelihood because of NOAA’s overzealous enforcement, the NOAA office was living the good life on their dime.

NOAA officials used the boat for the following: trips to dockside restaurants; hamburger and hotdog BBQs and alcohol-fueled parties and with family and friends; and “pleasure cruises” at high rates of speed, with beer consumed on-board.

Even though federal rules ban non-employees from being on vessels, a NOAA supervisor even told a subordinate that his wife was welcome to “kick back and watch TV” on the boat.

They filed expense reports and reimbursed themselves for these trips.

What excuse did NOAA employees give for this behavior? They needed to do all these things to maintain the recreational appearance of this “undercover” boat that was never even used for the “undercover” work that it was supposedly purchased for.

Mr. President, let’s be honest. A booze cruise is a booze cruise.

One NOAA officer decided to take his family on a weekend trip to a posh resort. He took the undercover NOAA party boat to get there, but he was untrained in how to operate it and blew out a $30,000 engine. Rather than turn back and write the taxpayers a check, he simply abandoned it and took a marked NOAA law enforcement boat the rest of the way to their resort. Nothing could get between this NOAA employee and a good time. When asked about that incident, the NOAA employee lied to the IG and said there was no family on board. That was just one of many instances of NOAA employees deliberately misleading the IG.

Another NOAA officer used the undercover NOAA boat to take his wife to lunch in Seattle. On this trip, the boat engines stalled in a shipping lane because the boat ran out of fuel due to another operator error. The guy didn’t know how to switch the tanks. So they were stuck drifting in a dangerous shipping lane. The officer and his wife apparently found the situation comical. Well I don’t think that the fishermen in New Bedford are laughing.

Again – the money that belonged to fishermen was paying for all this.

To this day, Mr. President, no one has been held accountable. Let me repeat. No one has been disciplined, fired, or even reprimanded for anything having to do with this boat. As you’ve seen here today, NOAA has a culture of corruption that has created a chasm of distrust between the agency and the fishing industry.

Here is a list of all the problems I have encountered with NOAA since coming to the Senate: abusive treatment of fishermen, resulting in decimation of the fleet; investigations motivated by money; improper fines, leading to foreclosure and bankruptcy; “shredding parties” destroying 75%-80% of OLE documents; lying to Inspector General investigators; discouraging cooperation with the Inspector General; misleading Members of Congress; $300,000 party boat purchased with fishermen’s fines; $12,000 in party boat expenses paid with fishermen’s fines; $30,000 engine destroyed by NOAA employee on weekend vacation while using “undercover” NOAA craft.

This is simply unacceptable. This needs to change, and accountability starts at the top. NOAA’s leadership needs to change.

Rally goes out on PR Newswire today

2012-02-14T12:58:00.001-08:00

THOUSANDS OF COASTAL FISHERMEN TO RALLY IN WASHINGTON DC ON MARCH 21

In another historic show of solidarity, U.S. recreational and commercial fishermen will gather at Upper Senate Park in Washington DC on March 21, 2012 starting at noon in an organized demonstration supporting sensible reform of the Magnuson Stevens Fisheries Conservation and Management Act.

This is a follow-up to a rally in February of 2010 that brought some 5,000 recreational, commercial and party/charter vessel owners, fishermen and people in fisheries dependent businesses from all over the country to Washington. Twenty plus Members of the Senate and House of Representatives spoke regarding efforts to reform Magnuson.

Signed into law in 1976, the 36-year-old law “most notably aided in the development of the domestic fishing industry by phasing out foreign fishing,” according to the National Marine Fisheries Service. In recent years however, the act has been transformed from its original intent into a weapon employed by a handful of mega-foundations and the so-called marine conservation organizations they subsidize aimed at reducing overall participation in our nation’s rich fisheries while driving both commercial and recreational fishermen off the water.

Rally organizers are asking legislators for help by amending the law to provide a better balance of marine conservation and coastal commerce, as it was originally intended to do.

The upcoming rally is being billed as Keep Fishermen Fishing, and once again unites the commercial and recreational sectors under one common message; “Fix Magnuson Now.” There were more than 40 chartered buses filled with rally participants in 2010, and efforts are once again underway in many coastal states to transport fishermen to the rally.

“Those who didn’t attend or perhaps chose not to support the original rally are mostly unaware of the strides we’ve taken since 2010,” said Jim Donofrio, executive director of the Recreational Fishing Alliance and one of the rally organizers. “With the support of the two dozen members of Congress who addressed us at Upper Senate Park, leaders from both sides of the aisle have pushed to make Magnuson reform a Congressional priority. As a result, the House Natural Resources Committee is now reviewing eight different pieces of fisheries reform legislation.”

“Our coastal fishermen represent the true spirit of Main Street America, as over-burdensome regulations supported only by organizations and individuals supported by a handful of mega foundations is forcing third and fourth generation fishermen off the water and away from sustainable public resources,” said Nils Stolpe, producer of FishNet USA, representing the interests of U.S. commercial fishermen. “The plight of our coastal fishermen is finally getting the media and legislative attention it deserves, and we hope to keep that momentum moving forward on March 21.”

Keep Fishermen Fishing organizers thus far include Recreational Fishing Alliance, Southeastern Fisheries Association, National Association of Charterboat Operators, Morro Bay Commercial Fishermen’s Association, Garden State Seafood Association, United Boatmen, Long Island Commercial Fishing Association, Panama City Boatmen, Viking Village Dock, Fishermen’s Dock, Hull’s Seafood Markets, Lund's Fisheries, Westport Charterboat Association, Southern Off Shore Fishing Association, Garibaldi Charters, Florida Keys Commercial Fishermen's Association, New York Fishing Tackle Trades Association, Save the Summer Flounder Fishery Fund, New York Sportfishing Federation, Monkfish Defense Fund, Atlantic Capes Seafood, North Carolina Watermen United, Big Game Fishing Journal, West Coast Seafood Processors Association and Bristol Bay Regional Seafood Development Association.

For more information including bus details, visit http://www.keepfishermenfishing.com.
Follow Keep Fishermen Fishing on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/pages/Keep-Fishermen-Fishing/282791548442919, through our blog at http://fixmagnusonnow.blogspot.com/, via our Twitter feed at https://twitter.com/#!/FishMarchDC2012 or search for Keep Fishermen Fishing on Google+.

Commercial sector contact: Nils Stolpe (386-409-0675)
Recreational sector contact: Jim Donofrio (888-564-6732)

KFF Spotlight: National Association of Charterboat Operators

2012-02-10T11:56:00.000-08:00

In our effort to keep you in the loop on which membersare participating in this year’s Keep Fishermen Fishing rally, we’re focusingon the National Association of Charterboat Operators today.

NACO, based out of Orange Beach, Alabama, has been aroundsince 1991, representing marine charter companies. Many of these companiesprovide fishing charters, but a good number also do sailing, diving and ecotours or other excursions. That translates to hundreds or thousands of captains, crew and related businesses across the country who count on NACO for representation. Several of thosemembers likely will be at the rally.

But what does NACO do?

From its website at http://www.nacocharters.org/: “As the premiere Association that representscharter boat interests, our objective is to improve the professional charterboat operator's bottom line and to provide a strong voice in Washington, D.C.”Board members come from all over as well – so NACO truly represents themajority of charterboat businesses. NACO also helps to ensure its membersoperate safely and professionally.

Indeed, we are lucky to have NACO folks attending therally in March!

Just as an aside, one of the best things I like aboutNACO is the ability to search for and find local charterboat operators by usingthe directory on its website. I live on the West Coast and the folks I’ve knownand respected for years and worked with on fisheries management issues aremembers. I’m looking forward to meeting some of the other charterboat folksfrom around the country.

Have questions about how adding flexibility to theMagnuson-Stevens Act will affect NACO members? Drop them an email at info@nacocharters.org or leave us a question in the comments and we'll get back to you.

We're rolling!

2012-02-09T17:10:00.000-08:00

It’sofficial! We have the site, we have the times, recreational and commercialfishing groups have signed on and people are arranging buses and transportation– the Keep Fishermen Fishing rally is rolling!

Here are thedetails:

Who: Recreational and commercialfishermen and related businesses from across the country

What: Keep Fishermen Fishingrally

When: noon to 3 p.m., Wednesday,March 21, 2012

Where: Upper Senate Park,Washington, D.C.

Why: to support flexibility inthe Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act

Links:

Keep Fishermen Fishing website: http://www.keepfishermenfishing.com/index.html

Blog: http://fixmagnusonnow.blogspot.com/

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Keep-Fishermen-Fishing/282791548442919

Twitter: https://twitter.com/fishmarchdc2012

Google+: https://plus.google.com/u/0/b/116436539795976325243/

Leading recreational andcommercial fishing groups have already signed on to go, so in the days ahead wewill highlight a few of them so you can get to know them better. These folksare dedicated, serious, hard-working fishermen and women and seafood workerswho believe in the fishing and seafood industries. To us, fishing isn’t alwaysabout money; it’s culture, it’s history, it’s camaraderie, it’s a way of life.

And it’svanishing.

The changesto the Magnuson-Stevens Act we’re asking for are slight – just a littleflexibility so that we can keep our fleets on the water, anglers and theirfamilies fishing and seafood being delivered to consumers. Fish stocks will not suffer; species that are in troublewill still have legal protections in order to rebuild and become healthy again.But at the same time, our nation’s rich history of fishing and processing willbe allowed to maintain its legacy.

To learn more about the people who make up thisgreat legacy, check back here, follow our social media sites and take a look atour website. We’ll keep you up-to-date on all the latest happenings.

Revisionism and Reform - a response to Crockett's and Hogarth's Putting Fish Over Politics

2012-02-02T10:44:00.000-08:00

An Op-Ed Response From U.S. Fishermen

A recent national opinion piece jointly written by Lee Crockett of Pew Environment Group and Dr. Bill Hogarth of the Florida Institute of Oceanography is titled Putting Fish Over Politics - had news editors been aware of the history of fisheries management as it relates to these two former federal employees, we’re sure that editors would’ve agreed a better title might’ve been U.S. Revisionist History By Bureaucrats Turned Lobbyists.

First and foremost, it should be disclosed that both Crockett and Hogarth worked extensively in the federal public sector before taking their current posts as lonely friends of the fish; Crockett having spent seven years working inside a Congressional fisheries committee and another four-and-a-half at the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), while Hogarth himself is the former head NMFS.

While it’s common knowledge that the philanthropic endowments by Pew have given huge financial support to the Florida Institute of Oceanography over the years, what many media outlets probably aren’t aware of is the vast difference of opinion that Hogarth and Crockett once held when the NMFS chief was asking Congress to stop a law from being manipulated by Crockett’s group of anti-fishing, environmental lobbyists.

In an official 2007 memo NMFS director, Dr. Hogarth said of fishing regulations for a number of coastal species, "Based on the language included in the most recent reauthorization, 2010 will be a train wreck.” Call him prophet or genius, but Dr. Hogarth was absolutely correct; the rigid deadlines and statutory definitions included in the 2006 reauthorization of Magnuson have indeed greased the tracks to the point that the train barreled headlong into the heart of our coastal communities, leaving a wake of denied access and economic devastation for fishing communities including tackle shops, captains earning their livelihoods in the for-hire sector, commercial fishermen and many professionals in our marine communities who rely on sustainable coastal fisheries.

Fishermen of course tried warning legislators of this impending “train wreck” during the Magnuson reauthorization debate, bolstered by the scientific analysis of Dr. Hogarth himself. During this time, while Crockett’s group was putting heavy influence on the Senate to pass an extremely restrictive new federal fisheries law to the exclusion of coastal fishermen, Dr. Hogarth was giving contrary testimony in the House which warned of severe socioeconomic impacts given the inflexible nature of some of the newly authored statutory definitions.

In direct questioning from House Natural Resource Committee members in 2006, Hogarth was asked specifically if he thought it made sense to include rigid deadlines for rebuilding fish stocks, or if instead there should be some flexibility for the Secretary of Commerce to adjust timeframes in certain instances. “I think that there should be some flexibility, and I think we have utilized some flexibility,” Hogarth responded, adding “I think the key to this is do we rebuilt these stocks in a reasonable timeframe, and that is the key.”

Asked again if he believed there should be some management flexibility added into the new Magnuson reauthorization, Hogarth said “Yes, I think the Administration in its bill has talked about the rebuilding by the 10-year rebuilding timeframe we think is arbitrary, and there are better ways to deal with rebuilding.” He then added, “I think we need greater flexibility, I mean, so much for those stocks that can be rebuilt.”

Pressed to elaborate further on the statutory deadlines included in the legislation, Dr. Hogarth told Congress, “We think that 10-year is arbitrary. We think it should be based on the life history of the species, and we think we need that flexibility.”

House members continued to discuss various amendments to the Magnuson Stevens Act legislation in an effort to provide some of that limited management flexibility Hogarth favored, however, Pew Environment Group and its allies were ultimately successfully in fighting to keep the rigid and inflexible statutory language in place. In the end, whatever commonsense approach was being discussed, and indeed advocated by Hogarth and fisheries advocates in the House, was ultimately squashed when Pew and its political allies successfully worked over Senate leaders who steamrolled through a reauthorized version of the Magnuson Stevens Act by unanimous consent, summarily ignoring the debate taking place in the House Natural Resource Committee.

Today, we are experiencing a fisheries management “train wreck,” just as Dr. Bill Hogarth once predicted would happen with passage of the Magnuson Stevens Act in Congress. Fishermen have been virtually denied access to economically vital coastal fish stocks like cod, haddock, summer flounder, black sea bass, red snapper, gag grouper and others, even though in most cases these same fisheries have been statistically deemed healthier than in generations of management.

To the exclusion of the fishermen, these former fisheries opponents from the public sector have since buried the hatchet and have found mutual comfort beneath the blanket of Pew Charitable Trusts funding and together have been painting a misleading portrait of joy and contentment within our coastal communities. Nothing could be further from the truth of course, and while these former NMFS staffers are touting to media outlets by trumpeting the fruits of their bureaucratic labor, a coalition of real fishermen, most without the luxury of public sector pension benefits, continues fighting for meaningful fisheries reform at the legislative branch of government.

These fishermen from both the recreational and commercial sector recognize that heavy sacrifice in the name of conservation has been made during the past 36 years of fisheries management, ever since the Magnuson Stevens Act was first established specifically to create a robust and sustainable U.S. coastal fishery, which has led to more robust fish stocks from coast to coast. Regrettably, it’s those with the most to gain and lose, America’s coastal communities and private sector constituents, who are the ones asking Congress not just to “build upon the work of those who came before,” but to correct the inflexible provisions of Magnuson Stevens which has wreaked such damage to fishing families and their communities.

A plethora of lobbyists have helped manipulate the legislative system through the stealthy work of a few pensioned former bureaucrats who apparently don’t understand that Congressional testimony doesn’t actually disappear from public record. While Pew’s Lee Crockett – and probably by default the Florida Institute of Oceanography’s Bill Hogarth – don’t want to see flexibility instilled into the federal fisheries law that they each had a hand in seeing dismantled, a coalition of recreational and commercial fishermen will be in Washington DC on March 21, together in a rally against this type of hypocrisy and revisionist history.

Respectfully signed,

Keep Fishermen Fishing

What do the antis really want?

2012-01-31T07:07:00.000-08:00

With most of our fish stocks in better shape than ever - or at least since Magnuson became law in 1976 - the question "what do these people really want?" comes up more often. I put some information together in A Good Fisheries Crisis Is Hard To Find (http://www.fishnet-usa.com/A%20Good%20Crisis.pdf) that answers that question, and most simply written, it's all about the dollars. And it isn't their dollars, it's the dollars that they can charm out of a bunch of billionaires who don't know one end of a fish from the other by providing them with a bogus cause to fix (along, I'm sure, with a bunch of self-serving ulterior motives as well).

Nils

Rally in Washington - March 21, 2012

2012-01-31T05:04:00.000-08:00

The people who organized the rally in 2010 are in the process of organizing a follow-up event on March 21. We're looking forward to more people in attendance, more media attention and more support from our federal legislators, but that's all up to you.

In the two years since the last rally fish stocks have continued to improve, and they've improved only because of the sacrifices that we all, whether recreational or commercial fishermen, have made. What's it gotten us? Thanks to the efforts of a handful of multi-billion dollar "charitable" foundations, the so-called marine conservation organizations, the so-called fishing organizations and the federal bureaucrats that are little more than puppets in their anti-fishing campaign, we've gotten lower TACs, shorter seasons, less access and more restrictions than we've ever had before. We have a head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration whose stated purpose is to get fish and fishermen off the water, and as a country we're now importing more than 80% of the seafood we consume.

You can stay up to date on the plans for the rally as they develop by visiting the Keep Fishermen Fishing website (http://www.keepfishermenfishing.com/), following Keep Fishermen Fishing on Facebook and subscribing to the Keep Fishermen Fishing Twitter feed (https://twitter.com/#!/FishMarchDC2012). And, of course, by subscribing to updates to this blog.

Thanks for your attention, and remember that it's up to you.
Nils Stolpe

Fish and Oil: NOAA’s attitude gap

2010-05-15T11:39:00.000-07:00

“At the global scale, probably the one thing currently having the most impact (on the oceans) is overfishing and destructive fishing gear” (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration head Jane Lubchenco in an interview on the website Takepart.com on April 7, 2010.)

Jane Lubchenco was awarded a Marine Fellowship from the Pew Charitable Trusts in 1992. Since then she has been in the forefront of a handful of foundation-subsidized scientists supported by a frighteningly effective media machine that has trumpeted one and only one message: fishing is behind most of our ocean-related problems.

The Pew Trusts were established by the children of Sun Oil founder Joseph Pew and are directed by a Board of which Pew family members are in the majority.

Since Ms. Lubchenco was a Pew Marine Fellow, a small handful of ultra-rich foundations – led by Pew – have spent tens of millions of dollars on demonizing fishermen via ENGOs and academic institutions. Chief among the organiza-tions and academics has been the Environmental Defense Fund and Ms. Lubchenco (prior to becoming NOAA head, she was Vice Chair of the EDF Board). The mechanism to do this has been the creation and perpetuation of the belief that we’re in the midst of an ocean crisis caused by fishing.

These foundations have spent millions of dollars initiating and supporting legislative changes that have put fishermen’s boats, livelihoods and futures at risk for stepping afoul of any of a seemingly endless array of meaningless (in terms of conservation) regulations. They have spent millions of dollars on insuring through the courts and the federal bureauc-racy that the Secretary of Commerce zealously enforces every burdensome regulation inflicted on U.S. fishermen. And they have spent millions of dollars to convince the public, as Ms. Lubchenco stressed less than two weeks prior to the beginning of the Deepwater Horizon tragedy began in the Gulf of Mexico, that fishing is the major threat to the health of the oceans.

In the time frame over which this has been done, the fisheries in U.S. waters have been steadily improving. In fact, the latest NOAA/NMFS report on the status of our domestic fisheries charts the steady increase - in terms of that agency’s own Fish Stock Sustainability Index – over the last decade from 357 to 573, an increase in the sustainability of our fisheries of 60% (http://www.nmfs.noaa.gov/sfa/statusoffisheries/sos_full28_press.pdf).

You can see the end results of these anti-fishing expenditures in fishing ports from Maine to Florida to Texas, from Southern California to Alaska, in Hawaii and in the U.S. offshore possessions: empty docks, abandoned vessels and shuttered businesses that used to depend in whole or in part on fishing for their existence. And for the last decade you could see them as well in the print and broadcast media’s treatment as headline-level gospel of every biased bit of fisheries “research” accomplished by foundation subsidized scientists and blaming virtually all of the oceans’ ills on fishing.

You can also see the results in the huge slick that is now floating in the Gulf of Mexico, in the closed fisheries, the lost tourism dollars, the threat to beaches and wildlife from Texas to Florida’s East coast and beyond, and in the weeks of futile efforts by the oil industry and the federal government to shut down the well. It’s sort of like the Keystone Cops, but with wide-ranging and tragic consequences.

The rest is available on the FishNet USA website by clicking on the link at the end of the "Current Edition" section.

Fishermen find their voice

2010-03-06T19:25:00.000-08:00

Nils Stolpe
February 28, 2010

Wednesday, February 24, 2010 was the day that US fishermen* found their collective voice, and that voice was a roar. And that roar echoed in the halls of Congress. It was the day that two dozen US legislators heard that roar loudly and clearly, and responded unequivocally that they were committed to the cause that brought us all to Washington - to Fix Magnuson Now.

The day was a complete success from the fishermen’s perspective, and I can’t imagine it turning out any better than it did. Upwards of 5,000 fishermen were there, on the very steps of the Capitol, to express their dissatisfaction with the anti-fishing weapon that federal fisheries management has been turned into; a weapon based on the Big Lie that fishermen shouldn’t be involved in managing their own fisheries. Some fishermen expressed it with religious fervor and some expressed it with humor, but they all expressed it with passion, with pride, with integrity and with conviction. Anyone who was there and was listening couldn’t have missed that.

But there was a downside.

One of the major themes was the chasm that has developed separating fishermen from the federal fisheries managers and the federal fisheries management system. This was echoed by speaker after speaker. The NOAA/NMFS presence at and reaction to the rally provided compelling evidence that this chasm is getting wider and deeper, and that the people in charge at NOAA/NMFS aren’t at all interested in bridging it.

Two days before the rally Jim Donofrio, Executive Director of the Recreational Fishing Alliance and one of the rally’s chief architects, was contacted by NOAA/NMFS with a request to have Eric Schwaab, newly appointed NOAA Assistant Administrator for Fisheries, added to the agenda. When Jim found that Mr. Schwaab wasn’t interested in supporting our cause, legislation to bring much needed flexibility back to the Magnuson Act, he graciously declined and he did so with the unanimous support of all of us who were involved in putting the rally together.

On the day of the rally Mr. Schwaab issued a press release, which he passed out to the media reps in attendance, stating that he was there “to listen to those who have come to rally Congress.” But, as Tony Bogan, another rally organizer and president of the party/charter boat association United Boatmen, said, “his press release stated that he was ‘there to listen’ to fishermen, but he spent the majority of his time talking to reporters instead of listening to any of the thou-sands of us that were available.” And from what I’ve read subsequently, and based on his press release, his talking had everything to do with convincing those reporters that neither the rally nor the changes to the Magnuson Act that it was in support of were necessary.

In other words, according to Mr. Schwaab and NOAA/NMFS, all of those fishermen had wasted their time, their money and their energy and had wasted the time and energy of all of those legislators as well, because we didn’t need what we were asking for.

I’m not going to speculate here on how appropriate it was for the person in charge of the Obama administration’s fisheries agency to be actively campaigning against legislation introduced by high ranking Democrats and sponsored by more than thirty legislators from both parties at a rally of people who are supposed to be his constituents during his second week on the job. Nor on exactly whose interests he was representing while he was doing it. But for the sake of all of our fishermen, there are some serious questions about this that demand to be answered.

What of the rest of his press release?

I’ll start off with his plea for patience on the part of fishermen, predicated on his agency’s success in rebuilding four fisheries.

I’m familiar with two and know that the “success” in their management only started when cooperative research pro-jects inarguably demonstrated that there were far more monkfish and sea scallops available than the NOAA/NMFS vessels, crews and scientists had been able to find on their own. While perhaps Mr. Schwaab hadn’t yet been briefed on these fisheries (the sea scallop fishery is the most valuable in the country and the monkfish fishery is the most valuable federally managed finfish fishery on the East Coast), his claim that their management success was due to “rebuilding” was slightly less than accurate. They were both cases of fishermen working cooperatively with NMFS scientists and showing them how to find the monkfish or scallops that were there all along. (Unfortunately, such positive out-comes are unlikely in the future because NOAA/NMFS plans to transfer $6 million from the cooperative research budget to a campaign to force catch shares on fishermen who might not want them.)

As far as the third of the four species he mentioned, for as long as people have been fishing on the East Coast, the blue-fish population, regardless of fishing pressure, has cycled from high abundance to low. In fact, a page on Mr. Schwaab’s agency’s own website states “cycles of low and high abundance of bluefish follow a pattern…. Several re-cent studies have examined potential causes of this pattern and have found no biological explanations.” This cycling happens with or without management, and bluefish are at a high level of abundance now. His scientists don’t know why but Mr. Schwaab wants us to believe that his agency and its management program are what did it.

I don’t know anything about the king mackerel fishery, the fourth that he claimed as a “we rebuilt it” success. Perhaps he got that one right.

But most troubling to me was his ongoing advice to just sit back and let the management measures work because the sacrifices that fishermen are making now “have the potential to result in significant long-term economic benefits to fishing communities.” In his release Mr. Schwaab asserted “I am familiar with fishing communities, their proud traditions, and the challenges we face in keeping them vibrant for future generations.” I don’t know how much time Mr. Schwaab has actually spent on the ground in those fishing communities, but I’ll bet he’s never seen a fishing business or a fishing-dependent business closed down because of management cutbacks required by unnecessarily restrictive rebuilding requirements that was eventually replaced by another fishing business. Tee shirt shops, condominiums, convenience stores and fast food places definitely, but never another fishing business.

And what are the displaced business owners and employees in these fishing communities going to do while they’re waiting for these arbitrary rebuilding targets to be reached? Become investment bankers and finally get something from the federal government other than pain and suffering? That might keep them vibrant, but it sure won’t keep them as fishing communities.

Mr. Schwaab’s press release ended “I am interested in hearing the concerns of everyone involved, and I look forward to a cooperative and productive relationship,” but it seemed as if he wasn’t really interested enough to listen to the biggest gathering of involved and committed fishermen than I’ve ever seen.

On Wednesday I heard 5,000 fishermen saying that they were tired of, threatened by and paying grievously for a federal management system that was being run from the board rooms of billion dollar foundations by people who are about as far removed from the docks, beaches or marinas that any of us frequent as it’s possible to be. Those foundations have spent hundreds of millions of dollars on legislation that makes the fish more important than the fishermen and has taken all of the human judgment out of a system that was originally designed to rely on that judgment.

Congressman Pallone’s and Senator Schumer’s legislation is the first step, now that we have the knowledge, the safe-guards and the will to avoid another plunge into overfishing, in getting us back to the level of sustainable management where the fishermen matter as much as the fish. It’s too bad that the new head of the National Marine Fisheries Service had decided by his eighth day on the job that we don’t need anything like that, that what we really need is more of the kind of “fish first” management that brought us all to Washington.

I’d respectfully suggest that Mr. Schwaab find a somewhat more accurate definition of “cooperative” than the one he’s presently using.
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*When I write ”fishermen,” that’s my personal shorthand for men who fish, women who fish, kids who fish, and all of the people whose livelihoods depend in all or in part on those fishermen keeping on fishing.
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In what is an unfortunate postscript, on February 26 Mr. Schwaab sent out an invitation to “participate in an informal stakeholder call to introduce and familiarize myself with the interests and view points of you and your community,” scheduled for the afternoon of Monday, March 15. While it’s a sure thing that a host of foundation subsidized fisher-men and so-called marine conservationists will participate, that is the first day of the Boston Seafood Show, the most important annual event for the seafood industry in the U.S. That’s about the best way I could imagine to guarantee that an awful lot of commercial fishing industry leaders would not be available. Let’s assume that it was just an oversight. Considering that one or two phone calls or about a half a minute’s worth of web surfing would have revealed this conflict, Mr. Schwaab seems even more out of touch with the real fishing industry than his press release would indicate.

It isn't going to get better for any fisherman...

2010-02-21T04:02:00.000-08:00

until we fix Magnuson. The rally in Washington is a great start.