President's Report

For many years fluke were managed by state-by-state measures with conservation equivalency. Each state was given its own quota while being allowed to set their own regulations. In 2013 we still had state-by-state quotas but additionally, the ASMFC allowed the projected coastwide underage of fluke to be utilized. Ultimately New Jersey and New York shared this quota. It worked out well in that New Jersey was able to add additional days to its season while New York was able to reduce its size limit.

However, in 2014 regionalization was forced upon us against the will of the vast majority of our fishermen, fishing groups and those who represented NJ on the commission. New Jersey’s anglers wanted to stay with state-by-state measures or be made its own region. However, despite that the ASMFC, via a conference call, made exceptions for Massachusetts and Rhode Island allowing them to be their own regions even though that option was not in the addendum. Why were they allowed to do that when NJ was not?

New Jersey was forced into a region with Connecticut and New York. In part this was done because the fluke biomass has shifted further northward. However, even with New York's size limit being reduced to 18" from 19" while New Jersey's was increased from 17 1/2" to 18", New Jersey still caught far more fluke than New York. New Jersey has the most fluke, the most fluke fishermen and the highest percentage of fluke trips to overall fishing trips and yet regulations were adjusted so that New Jersey’s projected harvest was lower than some of its past quotas. It certainly seems that NJ should be allowed to be its own region.

Another reason NJ was forced into regionalization was due to a disparity in the regulations in the Raritan Bay area where the commission deemed it was unfair for NJ anglers to have a 2” lower size limit than anglers from NY who were fishing in essentially the same waters. However, instead of correcting the problem all the commission did was to transfer the problem to Delaware Bay. In 2014 NJ anglers had to abide by an 18" size limit while DE anglers fishing the bay were allowed to keep fluke that were just 16". This was unfair to the anglers of southern NJ and many of our fishing businesses there lost revenue as people opted to fish out of DE instead.

While you can say that with regionalization in 2014, we had a projected harvest for each state as opposed to quotas or target quotas, it certainly appears to be a reallocation of quota. It seems that a portion of New Jersey’s quota was reallocated to New York. Additionally though, fish from other states were also reallocated to our region. The projected harvest was substantially increased for Connecticut and New York while at the same time New Jersey’s projected harvest was decreased.

Then low and behold the MRIP numbers came out and showed that New Jersey over fished its projected harvest but since Connecticut and New York under fished theirs, our region is Ok. The data also showed that the coastwide quota was slightly exceeded but that may be neutralized by a slight coastwide quota increase for 2015. Now, it appears that NJ is being forced to stay in the regionalization plan or face significant cuts under state-by-state measures. Still, it initially seemed that even with regionalization, NJ would come out of this OK as our region underfished its projected harvest. One would think that therefore, we would at least have very similar regulations to what we had in 2014. However, there are several options that would change the structure of the regions and rumor has it that New York is pushing for a 18.5" size limit so that our region's season could be extended to 153 days, 25 days more than last year. An increase of the size limit to more than 18” will not be tolerated by the vast majority of anglers in NJ. In fact the majority of anglers in NJ may prefer returning to a 17 ½” size limit.

JCAA is on record as favoring state-by state measures with conservation equivalency. However, for 2015 we will only favor that option if it can be done without forcing us to have significantly stricter regulations. More specifically, we do not want a higher size limit, smaller bag limit or shorter season than we had in 2014.

Therefore of the various regionalization plans, we favor Option 5A. It is the fairest option not only to NJ but to other states as well. This option would have Delaware Bay as its own region and it could act as a transitional area between regions to the north and south of it. Perhaps Delaware Bay could have a 17” size limit while the region to its south could have a 16” size limit and the region to the north of it could have an 18” size limit. A 1” difference between any regions is far more acceptable than a 2” difference. Having a neighboring region with any more than a 1” less restrictive size limit is totally unacceptable. Further having Delaware Bay as its own region should have minimal impact on the other regions. For example, if the option to split NJ in half were chosen, there would likely again be a 2” gap between the regions. This would pit northern NJ anglers against those in southern NJ. Northern NJ as well as other states within that region would then likely have to sacrifice fish to accommodate southern NJ.

In closing we would like to urge the ASMFC to thoroughly review the pros and cons of each option and be as fair as possible to all the states. Lastly, we would like to thank you for allowing us to comment on this matter.

According to the Environmental Assessment published relative to this plan, sand will be mined from two areas that are acknowledged in Article 5.6.3 as Prime Fishing Areas, Borrow Area B and Borrow Area F. Borrow Area B is a small lump just outside of Manasquan Inlet inshore of the Axel Carlson Reef. Area F is a large lump known as Manasquan Ridge. Both of these areas have been very popular with fishermen for decades due to their fish holding structure and their proximity to the Manasquan Inlet.

Article 6.5.2 states that “prior to construction, further coordination with the NJ Division of Fish and Wildlife and NMFS will be required to develop a plan to minimize impacts to these prime fishing areas.” What response has been received from those entities? I don’t think they would approve if they considered the importance of these two locations.

The recreational angler is constantly being bombarded with restrictions in fish size, possession limits and reduced lengths of seasons. Now we are being faced with a proposal that will destroy historical fishing structure. It’s hard for us to understand why the DEP would ever consider mining these prime fishing areas. Surely, there are other areas to consider for sand mining for this project that are not as important to the fishing community.

JCAA is strongly opposed to the mining of borrow areas B and F and requests alternative locations be utilized.

Please advise.

The Jersey Coast Anglers Association (JCAA) is an association of saltwater fishing clubs with thousands of members that has been protecting our ocean as one of its main goals. The JCAA is deeply concerned about the seismic testing that is scheduled to occur during summer of 2015 and we strongly request the assistance of your department to stop this testing from occurring. There are many reasons why this testing should be stopped, but I will enumerate some of them and they follow:

1. Why is this testing really needed? A very good and sound rationale for it has never been advanced or explained! Checking the ocean structure for conditions related to climate change millions of years ago? Incredulous! When our club members heard of this explanation, it was met with derision!
2. Why were there no public hearings on this seismic testing last year? By a stroke of luck, the ship doing it last year experienced mechanical problems and had to cut short its testing, giving us a chance to challenge it for this year. As of this date, we have not learned the number of days this testing occurred last year. Why the lack of transparency on this issue?
3. This testing is scheduled to occur in the summer and that is a peak time for all types of fish to be in our nearby waters. Why schedule this testing during this peak fishing timeframe! The blasting of our waters with incredible loud sounds will not induce fisheries to stay in our waters and their disappearance will have a negative economic impact on both recreational anglers and commercial fishermen who rely on their presence for their business. Tackle shops, hotels, gas stations and other businesses will be negatively affected by the loss of business when anglers experience the absence of our fisheries. It does not take long for the word to get out among anglers that fishing is severely off its normal levels.
4. Finally and most importantly, the loud pounding of noise on ocean whales, dolphins (which we already know have their own sound systems) and other fisheries will certainly be disrupted for them and also their health. Save these fisheries and stop ocean testing!