With investigators from the Inspector General’s office of the federal Department of Commerce about to probe fishermen’s — and our state and federal lawmakers’ — allegations of overly-aggressive federal enforcement tactics, we’ve taken another step in our coverage of this important, ongoing story. We’ve literally pulled all of this coverage together through a new presentation at gloucestertimes.com. There, as the header notes, you can "follow the fishing industry" and the Times’ coverage of it throughout this extraordinary, landmark period. You can access the page directly at gloucestertimes.com/fishing.
Why, with daily coverage of these issues, have we created this new page? Why do we give this level of coverage to the fishing industry? Why, you may well ask, is your community’s newspaper doing that?
Because we believe that, with a landmark change in the federal regulatory format, with a change at the very top of the National Atmospheric and Oceanic Administration, and with significant challenges to the way regulators carry out their duties, this truly is a crossroads time for the fishing industry.