The suspension of the federal days-at-sea leasing program, felled in the legal clash between an alliance of two states against the National Marine Fisheries Service in a federal courtroom, is wreaking economic havoc on the fleet based in Gloucester.
"I laid the crew off Friday," said Lady Jane owner and Capt. Russell Sherman.
Three of Sherman’s boat employees and a bookkeeper were idled in response to a freeze in a system that he expected would provide 37 days of fishing beyond the 10 he has left on his federal multispecies or groundfish permit for the 2008 fishing year that ends April 30.
Sherman said he had $11,000 in escrow for the extra days.
Read the Gloucester Daily Times story in full