NEW BEDFORD, Mass. — August 8, 2012 — A federal district court judge in Washington, D.C., has ordered fisheries managers to produce a legal regulatory framework for Atlantic herring in exactly one year.
In March, according to a news release, Judge Gladys Kessler sided with recreational and charter fishermen who contended that NOAA and the New England Fishery Management Council illegally disregarded four types of threatened herring when they set the guidelines for fishing Atlantic herring in the document called Amendment 4.
The fishermen contended that this meant the commercial herring boats are fishing on a different set of rules and causing bycatch that is undoing years of conservation efforts.
Kessler gave the parties time to make suggestions on bringing Amendment 4 into compliance, and she sorted through them before issuing her order this week.
And rather than issue an injunction, she left the process up to the responsible agency, which she said is always the court's first preference.
Read the full story at the New Bedford Standard Times.