Ahab's Journal

Legislative study committee created to reorganize saltwater management

HB 353 would have re-classified red drum, spotted seatrout and striped bass as gamefish, thus making them off limits to harvest and sale or bartering. In effect, netting of these fish to be sold for profit would have been banned.
However, the bill didn’t survive a June 9 deadline to “cross over” to the Senate for consideration, either because five Democrats made deals with the Republican majority for their budget approval votes or the Republican majority didn’t want to answer questions about a relatively small number of job losses in the commercial fishing industry should HB 353 become law.

In either case, McCormick and bi-partisan sponsors of HB 353 managed to morph the bill into an all-encompassing study of saltwater resources management.

One of HB 353’s sponsors told North Carolina Sportsman by opposing the game-fish status bill during this legislative session, commercial fishing interests “basically threw kindling on a smoldering fire.”

A quick look at the topics the committee will examine bears out that legislator’s words. Each section could be a nightmare for the state’s commercial fishing industry and the N.C. Marine Fisheries Commission.

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USA. Legislation introduced to stop unwarranted Fisheries Closures

The Fisheries Science Improvement Act will help ensure  science is the primary driver of federal fisheries management decisions

Take Action: Ask Congress to Make Federal Fisheries Management Decisions Based on Science

The Fisheries Science Improvement Act (H.R. 2034), introduced in the House of Representatives by Rep. Rob Wittman (R-VA) on June 23, 2011, with the support of a bi-partisan group of 18 other Members of Congress, seeks to ensure that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Marine Fisheries Service (NOAA Fisheries) is required to set catch limits based on data, not on guesstimates.

This legislation will guide federal fisheries management towards a more science-based approach and prevent NOAA Fisheries from setting arbitrary and overly-restrictive catch levels on numerous important recreational fisheries.

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Commercial fishermen eyeing changes in new year

BY SUSAN WEST, OUTER BANKS SENTINEL | Even in the calmest of seas, there are no sure bets in the commercial fishing business, but fishermen are sailing into largely uncharted political and economic waters in 2009.

New federal and state administrations with new policies, and a global economic crisis of staggering proportions, are likely to cast 2009 as a turning point for the industry.

Action Plan for Alaska Fisheries

"If you insert the Alaska comparable into this Action Plan, you have a pretty good blueprint for halting the demise of the Alaska fishing industry. There is no evidence that this industry isn't going the way of the other basic industries in this country, like the auto industry, or the steel industry, or fishing in California, Oregon and Washington. Commercial fishermen are like United Autoworkers Union members. It has been a good gig, but things changed. Business as usual is not sustainable or competitive. Either one is a killer for them and the communities they live in, and is darned dangerous for the country as a whole." 

Read "Action Plan for Alaska Fisheries"

 

AN ACTION PLAN FOR NORTH CAROLINA’S COMMERCIAL FISHING FUTURE

President-elect Barack Obama, Governor-elect Beverly Perdue, the United States Congress, and the North Carolina General Assembly have an unique opportunity to assist the commercial fishing communities that harvest carefully managed, sustainable marine resources, provide wholesome, healthy food to U.S. consumers, and lend support to local, state, and national economies.