Law

As the wheels of litigation begin to turn, U.S. Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., said Tuesday he plans to file an amicus curiae, or "friend of the court," brief supporting the city's federal lawsuit to revise implementation of severe new commercial fishing restrictions and allocate more fish to the fleet to keep it alive.

On Monday, Gov. Deval Patrick said that he supports the state joining the suit, as Gloucester and many other industry interests have already done. Attorney General Martha Coakley said she is looking into the matter before making a decision.

Frank's decision to jump into the fray follows a frustrating meeting between 13 members of Congress from the New England coastal states and U.S. Commerce Secretary Gary Locke. Frank has been especially frustrated with Dr. Jane Lubchenco, the head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, who hasn't conceded anything to the industry at any time during the process.

"The fact that the Obama administration has so far refused our request to increase allocations for this fishing season makes the catch share program completely unworkable. Catch shares is a controversial and radical change, and to institute this new system while also drastically reducing catch allocations guarantees that it would be devastating to the fishing industry. For this reason, I will support the cities' lawsuit."

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NEW BEDFORD — Gov. Deval Patrick was back in town Monday, this time to tour the New Bedford seafood display auction, offer another pledge of solidarity with the beleaguered groundfish fleet and confirm the possibility that the state will join the city's lawsuit against federal fishing regulators.

As a crew of lumpers offloaded haddock from the Jason & Danielle, out of Montauk, N.Y., Patrick clambered to the deck of the dragger for a guided tour.

But the governor had no fresh news either way for the local fishermen, who have been working under Amendment 16 restructuring since May 1.

Asked whether he would like the state to join in the city's federal lawsuit against National Oceanic and Atmoshpheric Administration, Patrick told The Standard-Times, "That's (Attorney General) Martha Coakley's decision."

He said that he has discussed it with her, and that "I think it's a good idea."

Read the complete story at The South Coast Today.

 

 

 

 

 

A green group filed a third lawsuit last Friday claiming a new experimental management plan for the New England groundfishery contains legal flaws. The fishing industry is meanwhile suing federal fisheries managers over shifts in policy that may harm the industry.

Oceana’s suit differs from the other two because it alleges the plan's fishing limits and conservation measures are dramatically insufficient.

Oceana is arguing that the federal government lacks a suitable way to limit by-catch and is requesting the federal courts take measures to fix this.

The suit was filed in US District Court for the District of Columbia and pushes for superior controls and stronger conservation. Conversely, the two fishing industry suits filed in the last week asked for relief from fishing limits.

Read the complete story at FIS World News.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Some local fishermen have joined the Massachusetts towns of New Bedford and Gloucester in a lawsuit against the federal government, filed as a response to the new fishing regulations that were effective May 1.

"If we're going to go down, we're going to go down swinging," said plaintiff Dick Grachek, who fishes out of Stonington and Narragansett. "It's like our last resort."

The lawsuit, filed Sunday in the United States District Court, District of Massachusetts, names Jane Lubchenco, administrator of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration, and Gary W. Locke, secretary of commerce, as defendants.

Read the Westerly Sun story in full

 

 

With any luck, the lawsuit filed Sunday against federal fishing regulators will put some objective eyes on the issue at last. The he-said she-said on Amendment 16, the new rules that went into effect May 1, has been a nightmare for any objective observer to wade through.

My fear, honestly, is that we won’t know who is right until it’s too late. Will half the fishing fleet be out of business in six months, as fishing interests have warned? That’s a serious doomsday prediction. Will most of the belly-up boats belong to small operators? Worse still.

On the flip side — the environmental side – will failure to implement the new rules leave some seafood species on a crash course with extinction?

Read this SouthCoastToday blog in full

 

 

A third lawsuit, alleging a new experimental management plan for the New England groundfishery has legal flaws, has been filed by an environmental group — but this suit, unlike the other two, says the plan's fishing limits and conservation measures fall too short.

The suit by Oceana complains that the federal government has no good way to limit the waste of fish caught and discarded as bycatch, and asks the federal courts to plug the alleged loopholes.

Filed in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia on May 7, the suit pushes for greater controls and more rigorous conservation — a push in the opposite direction of those taken in two fishing industry suits filed in the last week, which petitioned for relief from fishing limits said to be ruinous.

Read the Gloucester Times story in full

 

 

Two commercial fishermen from Montauk have joined with other commercial fishing groups and the City of New Bedford to sue federal fisheries managers over a major shift in policy. The suit claims that a new management system, when combined with unrealistic stock assessments, will cripple their industry.

Capts. Chuck Weimar and David Aripotch are party to the suit lodged against Gary Locke, the secretary of commerce, and Jane Lubchenco, administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The suit was filed with the United States District Court in Boston on Sunday. NOAA has also been hit with a related class action lawsuit filed by New Jersey fishermen.

In addition to the two Montauk fishermen and the city of New Bedford, the New Hampshire Commercial Fishermen’s Association, and the American Alliance of Fishermen and their communities are named as plaintiffs. All rely heavily on the groundfish fishery, which includes 19 species, among them cod, haddock, yellowtail flounder, and winter flounder.

Read the East Hampton Star story in full

 

 

Washington, D.C.-based Oceana Inc. sued the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and National Marine Fisheries Service in Federal Court over an April amendment to the Northeast Multispecies Fishery Management Plan.

Virtually all New England groundfish stocks are depleted, Oceana says. It claims Atlantic halibut is so overfished it will take until 2055 to reach a sustainable level.

Oceana says that though the plan amendment forges a "bold new direction" by establishing annual catch limits, the amendment still falls short.

Read the complete story at Courthouse News Service.

Read the Oceana suit document here.

 

 

 

The city of New Bedford, Massachusetts and an array of fishing interests have sued the U.S. Commerce Secretary and the administrator of NOAA in U.S. District Court, calling new groundfishing regulations both illegal and unconstitutional.

The lawsuit was filed Sunday, the last allowable day, and on Monday the city of Gloucester joined the lawsuit after reviewing it.

The lawsuit alleges that in imposing sector management and catch shares on the Northeast fishery, the government violated the National Environmental Policy Act, which "requires the agency to assess the impact of regulatory actions on the environment, including the human environment."

"The agency failed "» to comply with NEPA and to assess alternatives for mitigating (the) negative impact of Amendment 16 on the human environment," the suit said.

"Defendants' actions will permanently and unlawfully modify a centuries-old, traditional way of life for the sake of an agency's regulatory convenience, displacing fishermen, their communities and undermining cultural values in a manner inconsistent with the applicable law."

Mayor Scott W. Lang, meanwhile, on Monday sent a letter to Commerce Secretary Gary Locke endorsing the appeal of the region's congressional delegation for larger catch allocations, so the sectors management won't slowly bankrupt the boats and shrink the fleet by more than half.

In his letter, Lang encouraged Locke to use his scheduled Wednesday meeting with the delegation to exercise his secretarial authority to raise the catch limits to the amount allowable under the existing science.

Lang also reminded Locke of the complaint that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, led by Jane Lubchenco, illegally ignored Section 8 of the Magnuson-Stevens Act, which requires an analysis of proposed regulations' effects on the economy of the fishing industry and fishing ports.

Read the complete story at The South Coast Today [subscription site]

NOTE: The Standard-Times is a subscription site.  Unregistered visitors are able to read three stories per month, and registered visitors may view ten.  For unlimited access, please follow the subscription instructions on the site. 

 

 

 

 

The leading ports for the New England fishing industry, Gloucester and New Bedford — joined by a far flung coalition of commercial fishing interests — have teamed up to file suit against the federal government for creating and implementing what plaintiffs say is a ruinous new management system on the groundfishery.

 

The filing of the suit — plus a related class action claim from New Jersey — ratchets up of protests against the Obama administration's fisheries management policies under National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration chief Jane Lubchenco that began in the parking lot of the regional offices in Gloucester last October and expanded into a mass national rally at the side of the Capitol in February.

The new system was activated on May 1, and, in recent days, fishermen have testified at open meetings in both cities that business failures seemed inevitable.

Amendment 16, as the New England groundfish regimen is known, "drives yet another sword through the very heart of the fishing industry and fishing communities," New Bedford Mayor Scott Lang said in a letter sent Monday to Commerce Secretary Gary Locke.

Locke is scheduled to meet Wednesday with a New England and coastal congressional delegation that had appealed to him for emergency action to mitigate the unraveling of the industry.

Congressman Barney Frank and Sen. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, coordinated the appeal to Locke. Their letter with 23 signatures pointedly did not "cc" Lubchenco, who presides over the oceans and atmosphere for Locke's Cabinet department.

 

Background:

Nations' Largest Port, Fishermen, and Businesses from Six States Sue Feds

New Bedford Mayor calls NOAA leadership "disingenuous and fraudulent", joins lawsuit against NOAA

Largest New England Ports Revolt Against New Federal Regulations

NOAA releases draft national policy encouraging the use of catch shares (Dec. 10, 2009)