December 19, 2012 — And as darkness gave way to morning, nervous riders, on their way to the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission meeting, worried that many of the them would not have jobs when the day was over.
The Sun was just coming up when two buses carrying Omega Protein employees from Reedville crossed into Maryland last week.
And as darkness gave way to morning, nervous riders,on their way to the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission meeting, worried that many of the them would not have jobs when the day was over.
On Dec. 14, the commission decided whether the annual catch of menhaden would be reduced.
If the cuts were deep enough, Omega could go out of business and more than 200 Northern Neck workers would be jobless.
When the buses left Baltimore it was dark again. The men still had jobs, but it had been a close run.
Starting two years ago, the ASMFC had begun looking into whether the menhaden stocks had fallen to dangerously low levels. Nothing indicated they had under the then existing method of computing, but a newer method indicated that the fish might be in trouble.
During the meeting, at which the members of the commission were seated in such fashion that it was almost impossible to tell who was speaking, someone asked the Menhaden Board’s technical committee about the new method of calculating when fishing pressure was too heavy. “In other words, we’re going to move the goal posts?” a committee member asked. The technical committee confirmed that was the case.
The committee advised the commission that the computer model it had used in the past to estimate the size of the menhaden stocks had failed when it was used in attempting a stock assessment in 2011. In fact, John Bull of the Virginia Marine Resources Commission said the 2011 assessment showed that the menhaden had been extinct for 30 years and they clearly are not. That left the technical committee with no firm scientific basis upon which to recommend action to reduce the menhaden catch but it concluded on what it called an “ad hoc” basis that there was enough concern that the ASMFC should consider putting a limit of the annual catch of menhaden.
Read the full story at Northern Neck News