May 26, 2023 — Hurricane Ian destroyed nearly all of Lee County’s commercial fishing industry, but the feds denied Gov. DeSantis’ fishery disaster request.
Shocked, bewildered, frustrated, and abandoned are all adjectives ABC Action News reporter Michael Paluska heard from commercial fishermen to describe a recent decision by NOAA to deny Gov. Ron DeSantis’ request to declare a federal fisheries disaster.
Are bad policies and poorly written federal statutes to blame? Or does it boil down to politics? That depends on who you ask. But, commercial fishermen across the state are sounding the alarm about the future of the commercial fishing industry and whether seafood that comes fresh from Florida can survive.
“This industry is really on the verge of being gone,” Casey Streeter said.
Streeter’s fish house on Matlacha was destroyed during Hurricane Ian, and his home in St. James City.