End of most fishing?

[dizzy]

http://sports.espn.go.com/outdoors/salt ... id=4975762


Monday, March 8, 2010
Updated: March 9, 1:59 PM ET
Culled out
By Robert Montgomery
ESPNOutdoors.com

The Obama administration will accept no more public input for a federal strategy that could prohibit U.S. citizens from fishing the nation's oceans, coastal areas, Great Lakes, and even inland waters. This announcement comes at the time when the situation supposedly still is "fluid" and the Interagency Ocean Policy Task Force still hasn't issued its final report on zoning uses of these waters.
That's a disappointment, but not really a surprise for fishing industry insiders who have negotiated for months with officials at the Council on Environmental Quality and bureaucrats on the task force. These angling advocates have come to suspect that public input into the process was a charade from the beginning.
"When the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) completed their successful campaign to convince the Ontario government to end one of the best scientifically managed big game hunts in North America (spring bear), the results of their agenda had severe economic impacts on small family businesses and the tourism economy of communities across northern and central Ontario," said Phil Morlock, director of environmental affairs for Shimano.
"Now we see NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) and the administration planning the future of recreational fishing access in America based on a similar agenda of these same groups and other Big Green anti-use organizations, through an Executive Order by the President. The current U.S. direction with fishing is a direct parallel to what happened in Canada with hunting: The negative economic impacts on hard working American families and small businesses are being ignored.
"In spite of what we hear daily in the press about the President's concern for jobs and the economy and contrary to what he stated in the June order creating this process, we have seen no evidence from NOAA or the task force that recreational fishing and related jobs are receiving any priority."
PHOTO GALLERY

Fisheries In Danger

Consequently, unless anglers speak up and convince their Congressional representatives to stop this bureaucratic freight train, it appears that the task force will issue a final report for "marine spatial planning" by late March, with President Barack Obama then issuing an Executive Order to implement its recommendations — whatever they may be.
Led by NOAA's Jane Lubchenco, the task force has shown no overt dislike of recreational angling, but its indifference to the economic, social and biological value of the sport has been deafening.
Additionally, Lubchenco and others in the administration have close ties to environmental groups who would like nothing better than to ban recreational angling. And evidence suggests that these organizations have been the engine behind the task force since before Obama issued a memo creating it last June.
As ESPN previously reported, WWF, Greenpeace, Defenders of Wildlife, Pew Environment Group and others produced a document entitled "Transition Green" shortly after Obama was elected in 2008. What has happened since suggests that the task force has been in lockstep with that position paper.
Then in late summer, just after he created the task force, these groups produced "Recommendations for the Adoption and Implementation of an Oceans, Coasts, and Great Lakes National Policy." This document makes repeated references to "overfishing," but doesn't once reference recreational angling, its importance, and its benefits, both to participants and the resource.
Additionally, some of these same organizations have revealed their anti-fishing bias by playing fast and loose with "facts," in attempts to ban tackle containing lead in the United States and Canada.
That same tunnel vision, in which recreational angling and commercial fishing are indiscriminately lumped together as harmful to the resource, has persisted with the task force, despite protests by the angling industry.
As more evidence of collusion, the green groups began clamoring for an Executive Order to implement the task force's recommendations even before the public comment period ended in February. Fishing advocates had no idea that this was coming.
Perhaps not so coincidentally, the New York Times reported on Feb. 12 that "President Obama and his team are preparing an array of actions using his executive power to advance energy, environmental, fiscal and other domestic policy priorities." Morlock fears that "what we're seeing coming at us is an attempted dismantling of the science-based fish and wildlife model that has served us so well. There's no basis in science for the agendas of these groups who are trying to push the public out of being able to fish and recreate.
"Conflicts (user) are overstated and problems are manufactured. It's all just an excuse to put us off the water."
In the wake of the task force's framework document, the Congressional Sportsmen's Foundation (CSF) and its partners in the U.S. Recreational Fishing & Boating Coalition against voiced their concerns to the administration.
"Some of the potential policy implications of this interim framework have the potential to be a real threat to recreational anglers who not only contribute billions of dollars to the economy and millions of dollars in tax revenues to support fisheries conservation, but who are also the backbone of the American fish and wildlife conservation ethic," said CSF President Jeff Crane.
Morlock, a member of the CSF board, added, "There are over one million jobs in America supported coast to coast by recreational fishing. The task force has not included any accountability requirements in their reports for evaluating or mitigating how the new policies they are drafting will impact the fishing industry or related economies.
"Given that the scope of this process appears to include a new set of policies for all coastal and inland waters of the United States, the omission of economic considerations is inexcusable."
This is not the only access issue threatening the public's right to fish, but it definitely is the most serious, according to Chris Horton, national conservation director for BASS.
"With what's being created, the same principles could apply inland as apply to the oceans," he said. "Under the guise of 'marine spatial planning' entire watersheds could be shut down, even 2,000 miles up a river drainage from the ocean.
"Every angler needs to be aware because if it's not happening in your backyard today or tomorrow, it will be eventually.
"We have one of the largest voting blocks in the country and we need to use it. We must not sit idly by."

 

[dizzy]

THEY'RE KILLING US': Captains, politicians react and Rodeo reshuffles as feds lock down amberjack (UPDATED)




October 22, 2009 8:24 PM

Tom McLaughlin..

DESTIN — News that a federal agency had slammed the door on this year’s amberjack season without notice didn’t sit well Tuesday with charter fishermen.
They believe Big Brother is out to take their livelihood from them.
“They’re killing us,” said boat captain Thomas Swanson. “They’re flat killing us.”
Read the press release from the NOAA Fisheries Service »
A morning announcement that no greater amberjack could be caught after midnight Saturday swept across the docks at Destin Harbor. It didn’t take long for an angry group of fishermen to gather to vent.
It also didn’t take long for the fishermen’s frustrations to reach the ears of state Sen. Don Gaetz and, eventually, Gov. Charlie Crist.
Crist said he’d do what he could to help.
“We’ll do all we can as quickly as we can,” he said.
Fishermen said the last week of October is crucial a time when they need to make money.
There are 11 days left in the Destin Fishing Rodeo and, with a ban already in place on snapper, amberjack is the last large fish charter captains know they can find for their customers.
“I’ve been amberjack fishing since they closed the snapper Aug. 15 and now they’re closing the amberjack on us,” captain Greg Marler said. “People are going to quit coming to Destin to fish if they can’t catch anything.”
The announcement that a “recreational quota” of 1.368 million pounds of greater amberjack had been reached went out over the Internet on Tuesday along with word that the season would close.
As the news spread, captains and mates assembled on the dock behind the scales where weighmaster Bruce Cheves presides over the day’s catch during the annual fishing rodeo.
“As we sit here, there’s amberjack being caught on short (four-hour) trips. There’s no shortage of them and there’s no shortage of snapper,” Cheves grumbled. “Economically, they’re killing us. Rodeo entries are down about 25 percent.”
On a sun-kissed October day, most of Destin’s 200-plus charter boats were stuck in port.
The ban on red snapper has devastated recreational fishing in Destin, the fishermen say, and eliminating amberjack will only make a bad situation worse.
“You can see how it’s affecting us by the number of boats at the dock. Usually during October the boats are all gone,” Marler said.
The fishermen say the people making the regulations don’t know what they’re doing and use faulty numbers to support their actions. The snapper are so over-populated now, the fishermen say, that they’ve gone through all the available shrimp and are eating the young of other fish and killing those populations.
Roy Crabtree, the regional administrator for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Fisheries Service, said his agency gathered its information on pounds of amberjack caught by studying “several different sources of data.”
The data is based on “landings” and some of the data is collected through “dock-side surveys and phone calls,” according to Charlene Ponce, an agency spokeswoman.
Crabtree said data collected this year indicates there could be an amberjack catch that exceeds the annual allotted limit. That would mean harsher restrictions on fishing next year.
Crabtree also said that the Gulf of Mexico Fisheries Management Council could be persuaded to change the dates that it closes gulf waters to fishing.
“If folks would rather have closures at a different time of year I would have no problem with that,” he said.
He said the council is scheduled to meet in Destin next August.
The sudden decision to close the amberjack season immediately was another sore spot for the assembled charter fishermen. In 11 more days, Marler said, the fishing rodeo will be over and the amberjack fishery would have several months to recover its numbers.
Destin Mayor Craig Barker said federal regulations are crippling and could eventually destroy the charter fishing industry in his city and elsewhere.
“If allowed to go forward, these closures will further devastate the economies of coastal fishing communities all across the Gulf of Mexico and shatter the lives of the men and women who work so hard to earn their living from the sea,” he said in a news release.
Gaetz sent out a call Tuesday to Florida’s U.S. Sens. Bill Nelson and George LeMieux and U.S. Reps. Jeff Miller and Allen Boyd.
“I’ve asked them to join me in asking the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Fisheries Service to reconsider and recall their announcement,” Gaetz said.
Gaetz said he had also asked Crist to “use his influence on behalf of the state of Florida.”
Asked about Gaetz’s call, Crist responded. “We certainly can try.”
Gaetz said he had also, in his role as chairman of the state Senate’s Committee on Florida’s Economy, requested that Workforce Florida “develop and authorize dislocated worker and training services to Northwest Florida fishermen who have no other choice but to seek other ways to make a living.”
“This is not just based on the amberjack decision,” said Gaetz, R-Niceville. “It’s about the national attack on the sport fishing industry.
“Those of us who represent coastal communities have to speak up about insensitive and really dumb decisions like this,” Gaetz said.
To read more about the early snapper lockdown, click here.

Here is a statement on the closure by Mayor Craig Barker, who is running for the District 4 state House of Representatives seat.


As mayor of the City of Destin I have worked alongside all the fishermen from Apalachicola to Alabama helping to represent their interests before the National Marine Fisheries and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. During that time the fishermen have held firm to one fundamental position – that the data upon which these fishery management decisions are based is fundamentally flawed and leads to irrational conclusions.

Every charter fisherman I know understands the finite nature of the resource and takes it upon him or herself to implement their own management practices in addition to those restrictions imposed by the State and Federal governments. Yet they remain clear and consistent in their belief that the regulator’s conclusions are wholly inconsistent with their own real-world observations.

Nonetheless, based on extrapolations of data the National Marine Fisheries unilaterally announced yesterday the immediate closure of the greater amberjack fishing season and discussed the potential closure of next year’s red snapper season. If allowed to go forward these closures will further devastate the economies of coastal fishing communities all across the Gulf of Mexico and shatter the lives of the men and women who work so hard to earn their living from the sea.

A full-blown stock assessment has not been conducted since 1991. Until a new assessment can be completed it is imperative that Congress immediately take action to call for a full-blown stock assessment for each of these fisheries, establish a near real-time data collection system, and update the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act so that faith and accountability can be restored in its scientific and management procedures.

Here is a statement from Sen. Don Gaetz on the topic:

Today, without warning and with apparent disregard for the impact on Northwest Florida’s economy, the National Marine Fisheries Service suddenly announced that it was closing the amberjack season. This decision combines too much authority with too little science.

I strongly oppose this arbitrary decision and have asked the NMFS to reconsider and recall their announcement. No valid and reliable scientific evidence has been presented that would justify this action.

NMFS is a federal agency outside of the jurisdiction of the State of Florida. Therefore I am appealing to our two US senators, George LeMieux and Bill Nelson, and Congressmen Allan Boyd and Jeff Miller to join me in a request for reconsideration.

It is a measure of the insensitivity of NMFS that the agency would take this last minute action while the Destin Fishing Rodeo still has a week to go. Destin is hosting fishermen who have come here from throughout the country. The amberjack fishery is important to visitors who spend millions of dollars a year supporting our coastal economy. Though we will feel the sting here, this draconian action affects communities along our entire Gulf coast.

It is ironic that a federal government handing out billions of “stimulus dollars” with one hand is, with the other, hurting the entrepreneurs, the small businesspeople who own, operate and work on fishing boats in our area. For many of our captains and mates trying to hang onto their livelihood, decisions like that made today by NMFS are an anchor rope around their throats.

Unfortunately, it appears we will see a continual attack on our sport fishing industry by federal regulators. Red snapper, grouper and other fisheries have already been victims of NMFS. Therefore, in my capacity as Chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Florida’s Economy, I have today requested Workforce Florida to develop and offer dislocated worker and training services to Northwest Florida fishermen who may have no choice but to seek other ways to earn a living.

 

[bobimport]

k