Dr. Rebecca Blank, President Obama's nominee for deputy secretary of commerce, told Sen. Kelly Ayotte, R-NH, that while catch share is just one fisheries management approach and is working in other areas of the country, more “transparency and communication and collaboration” would be important moving forward. Blank also said there needs to better explanation of the science about fish stock sizes and catch limits.

“I think that there has not been as much consultation back and forth in terms of NOAA's interactions with some of the fisheries councils in an open and completely transparent way with some of the fisheries councils in the New England region,” Blank said to the Senate Commerce Committee. “We've obviously in the past had some problems with our law enforcement that I think we've completely cleaned up. And I think we've sometimes not been quite as transparent as we need to be about the science.”

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