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by Rich Esposito
(from Jersey Coast Anglers Association March 2002 Newsletter)
I’d like to take this opportunity to express our gratitude to Jerry Flaxman and the Montana Group for the generosity that was extended to the Jersey Coast Angler’s Association during the recently held Atlantic City Boat Show. From all reports, the show was a huge success, probably due to the hard work put forth by Jerry and his staff. Everything was first class. We all know that we can accomplish so much more when we work together, and I look forward to having a continuous working relationship between our organization and theirs. That will be a benefit to both of us.
Speaking of the Boat Show, I’d like to compliment our Vice President, Mark Taylor, for the great job he did coordinating the coverage of the booth for the five days the show ran. It has also become apparent that we have developed a strong core of volunteers willing to put forth the effort needed to make these shows successful. I also wish to express my thanks to all the volunteers who helped out during the show. I am now confident that we can expand the JCAA’s involvement in this type and other types of Sportsman Shows which will continue to make our organization stronger and more of a benefit to the recreational fisherman in the State of New Jersey.
I want to remind all club representatives that the vote on the JCAA’s stand on the Summer Flounder Regulations for this year will be held at this month’s general membership meeting. I would urge all of you to make every effort to attend this most important meeting. We need to know which of the proposals your club has voted to support. We will then take the one the majority votes on and prepare for the meeting where the season will be finalized. That meeting will take place on March 7th.
Please be advised that the JCAA’s monthly general membership meeting is not a meeting open to the public. Our meetings are only open to member club representatives and invited guests. Anyone who is not a club representative that wishes to attend must first have permission from either the President or Tom Fote before he or she will be allowed to attend. The phone numbers for these individuals can be found in the newsletter. To avoid any confusion in the future, we will have the fact that our monthly meeting is not an open public meeting printed in our newsletter every month and will also be stated on our website.
I invite all of you to visit our website and view the new monthly calendar which will outline all the important upcoming events for the month. You will be able to click on a particular event and find out where and when this event will be taking place. We are making another attempt to get all the information out to all of you, and we sincerely hope that this will increase your participation in meetings where the public is welcome to show your support for the JCAA.
At our last general membership meeting a motion was made to write letters to the National Marine Fisheries Service concerning a petition that has been filed with that agency. Below are two letters that I have sent to William Hogarth, Assistant Director of the National Marine Fisheries Service. I believe both letters are self-explanatory. JCAA recommends that you send similar letters to NMFS.
Dr. William Hogarth
Assistant Director of the National Marine Fisheries Service
1315 East-West Highway
Silver Spring, Md. 20910
Dear Dr Hogarth:
JCAA has serious concerns on the petition NMFS has received to put white marlin on the endangered species list. NMFS has agreed to review the merits of this petition. This petition is well written. Approval of this petition may put all fishermen out of business in the canyon areas, not just longliners. I do not know if that is the intent of the petitioners. However, a key provision of the Endangered Species Act (ESA) covers the issue of “critical habitat.” The ESA mandates that the critical habitat of any endangered or threatened species must not be violated.
The petition’s area and closure being specified as critical habitat is:
Area: Cape Hatteras to George's Bank from the 100-fathom line to the 1000-fathom line.
Time: June 1 to October 31.
An endangered species listing for white marlin is a critical issue. Although the petition specifically targets longline fishermen as the cause of the white marlin decline, extensive recreational data is included in the petition. Even if the intended purpose of the petition were not to eliminate and end all fishing off the 100-fathom line for everyone, this would be the result. This unilateral US action will have absolutely no impact on the recovery of white marlin, but it, however, might stop the fishing of all tuna, dolphin, swordfish and other species in the canyons. The US commercial and recreational fisheries combined represent such a tiny amount of the white marlin killed yearly that the conservation value of ending all their fishing is zero. However, the closing of these grounds for all fishing would have a huge economic impact on the recreational and commercial community. The US fishing community and the related industries that depend on this would lose billions of dollars for no purpose.
What NMFS needs to do is to follow their own 1988 NMFS billfish plan in regards to controlling the marlin bycatch and dead discard in the commercial HMS fisheries. NMFS has ignored their own rules and have never addressed this key issue. The bycatch issue was again part of the 1996 revised billfish plan and, again, was ignored. Would there be any need for an ESA listing if NMFS had followed the rules included in previous marlin plans they wrote?
The Magnuson/Stevens Sustainable Fisheries Act gave NMFS up until November 1999 to address the commercial bycatch issue in their entire fishery plans. The billfish plan of 1988 and 1996 are also examples of NMFS failure to follow their own rules for controlling commercial bycatch.
Again, what NMFS needs to due is to be diligent in following rules that already exist and not create new ones. That is why the JCAA cannot support this petition at this time.
Very truly yours,
Richard Esposito,
President JCAA
CC: Hon. Frank Pallone
Hon. John Saxton
Hon. Robert Torricelli
Hon. Jon Corzine
Chris Rogers, HMS
Dr. William Hogarth
Assistant Director of National Marine Fisheries Service
1315 East-West Highway
Silver Spring, MD 20910
Dear Dr. Hogarth:
The JCAA would make the following comments on the HMS recreational marlin reporting and swordfish limits:
Swordfish: When has the NMFS stopped adhering to what ICCAT says? This proposal seems to run counter to the position that historically NMFS has taken with the commercial sector saying that they must allow the user groups to harvest their available quota. We have been told time and again that the rule states that US fisherman must allow their entire ICCAT quota. Recreational landings must not be treated differently than commercial fishermen.
This proposal has been put forth to address an illegal hook and line commercial fishery in Florida. That is what the regulations should address, not penalize all the recreational anglers along the east coast for illegal commercial fishermen in Florida. This does not even address the problem since they are breaking the law already and will continue to do so. The Recreational anglers did not cause the problem with the swordfish stock but NMFS is always trying to shut them out of this fishery. This is not the first time that NMFS has tried to shut the recreational community out of the swordfish fishery. In the late 1980’s NMFS tried to limit the catch of the whole recreational catch of swordfish to 125 fish without doing anything to the commercial sector. The proposal is the same story dressed in a different cover.
Marlin: The separate method of collecting catch-associated data for recreational landings of Atlantic blue and white marlin is counter-productive. NMFS has already imposed a national landing quota. It is unclear how NMFS intends to count landings under this proposal. If it is NMFS intent to create a new separate system different from the current bluefin tuna reporting system, this is not prudent use of taxpayer money. How does NMFS intend to register recreational anglers for such a reporting system? If the current tuna boat permit is used, that is one issue. If an entire new layer of staff is needed with a new reporting system, then this proposal is unacceptable and should be rejected. Will NMFS admit fault when it finds that it underestimated the catch all these years. Not likely! What they will say is that we have increased our catch and we need to be further restricted. For those reason we cannot support this proposal until those concerns are addressed.