June 12, 2012 – U.S. Commerce Secretary John Bryson, who was involved in a potential felony hit-and-run traffic incident Saturday night and found unconscious behind the wheel of his car in the Los Angeles area, has been no more than a virtual presence for the hard-pressed New England fishing industry in his brief tenure in the Obama Cabinet.
In October, soon after he was confirmed by the Senate and praised by Sen. John Kerry as the ideal candidate, Bryson promised Kerry to visit Massachusetts to get a firsthand view of the industry, struggling under regulations authorized by the secretary. But that visit never came off, nor was it ever rescheduled.
A former utility executive and adviser to the global private equity firm, Kohlberg, Kravis Roberts & Co., Bryson made streamlined regulation, job creation and exports his priorities in confirmation hearing testimony, but his early involvement with the Natural Resources Defense Council, drew opposition from Congressmen John Tierney and Barney Frank.
In November, Gov. Deval Patrick filed a set of socioeconomic scientific studies to make the necessary legal case for Bryson to declare that federal fisheries policies had created a job-destroying economic disaster for the state and region.
But Bryson has taken no action on the request which was upgraded from an earlier filing that was deemed to lack the necessary "new" scientific proof of a fisheries failure.
Read the full story at the Gloucester Times.