Eric Schwaab, the new chief at National Marine Fisheries Service, is stepping into the job at a time when frustration with federal fisheries policy is bubbling over in coastal towns from Maine to Alaska.
Schwaab was sworn in as the assistant administrator for fisheries in the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) on February 16, only a little more than one week before commercial and recreational fishermen stage a protest rally in Washington, D.C.
Fishermen are asking Congress to revisit the Magnuson Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act, the framework for federal fisheries management. The law sets out a time schedule for rebuilding fish stocks that is rigid enough that regulators must ban fishing for some species altogether, resulting in what fishermen describe as irreparable damage to coastal economies and communities.