February 11, 2015 — This second wave of funds aims to make whole fishermen, including many in Marshfield and Scituate who struggled to pay their bills after the catch allocation changes.
A second wave of federal funding has been released to the Commonwealth to help workers in the groundfish industry who are struggling from closures and tightened regulations.
National Marine Fisheries Service recently allocated $8.3 million of a $32.8 million federal groundfish disaster aid package to Massachusetts, according to agency officials.
It is the second round of disaster assistance that the federal government has released since 2012, when state officials declared a fisheries disaster brought on by significant cuts to groundfish catch allocations.
Ed Barrett, a commercial fisherman from Marshfield, thinks the money will help a lot of fishermen missed in the first round of disaster aid released last year.
But, he said, it should have come sooner.
“It’s been very frustrating. Our legislation worked hard to get money, but the process hasn’t gone easily,” Barrett said. “Come Christmastime, people were hoping to get it by then… People were waiting to pay their mortgage, their gear bills, their fuel bills, and it didn’t happen.”
Read the full story from Wicked Local – Gloucester