Gloucester Archives - Page 26 of 45

MASSACHUSETTS: Seafood Coalition planning gala

May 30, 2017 — The Northeast Seafood Coalition will hold its annual fundraiser in July, but with a twist: This year’s event has a specific theme tied to elevating the group’s role in improving groundfish stock assessments.

The Gloucester-based fishing advocate’s gala, set for July 27 at The Gloucester House restaurant, is flying under the banner of “Know Fish: Better Science” and will include big-money raffles, a celebrity seafood cooking demonstration, an auction, live music and a seafood buffet.

Beyond the festivities, the event will underscore the need to improve the science that serves as the foundation for the stock assessments and potentially bridge the discrepancies between what the current science shows and what the fishermen are seeing on the water.

“We decided to do a larger theme this year than just center the event around fundraising,” said Jackie Odell, NSC executive director. “We’re raising money from the event to allow us to better engage in the scientific process and better engage in the science of assessments.”

The coalition has established several levels of financial support. The event, scheduled to begin at 6 p.m., will be limited to 500 attendees.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Times

Public invited to meetings of fishing regulators

May 12, 2017 — Gloucester, Massachusetts will sit at the epicenter of the national fishery management universe next week when top regulators from around the country gather here for three days of overviews of the nation’s individual fisheries.

The Council Coordination Committee, which includes chairmen and directors of the eight regional fishery management councils, is set to discuss issues such as national monuments and sanctuaries, habitat, recreational fisheries, enforcement and legislation.

The meetings at the Beauport Hotel Gloucester are being hosted by the New England Fishery Management Council, which was determined to hold them in a working commercial fishing port, according to NEFMC Executive Director Tom Nies.

Nies said the meetings give the geographically diverse regulators — who hale from Alaska to the Caribbean — the chance to discuss issues that cut across all of their councils. It also affords NOAA Fisheries the opportunity speak to the collective councils as a single group.

“We meet twice a year and it’s really the only time all eight council have the chance to discuss national-level policy issues and issues that other councils are facing that we may face ourselves in the future,” Nies said.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Times

MASSACHUSETTS: Nation’s fish leaders meeting in Gloucester next week

May 10, 2017 — Leadership teams from the nation’s eight regional fishery management councils will convene in Gloucester next week to discuss national marine monuments, habitat and other fishery management issues.

The meeting of the Council Coordination Committee, which includes the chairmen, vice chairmen and executive directors of the eight regional fishery councils, is set for the Beauport Hotel on Commercial Street, May 15 to 18.

The first day is set aside for internal organizational meetings, with the principal agenda items scheduled for the following three days, according to Janice Plante, spokeswoman for the New England Fishery Management Council.

Plante also said the NEFMC plans to have its September meeting at the Beauport Hotel.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Times

MASSACHUSETTS: Gloucester condemns Commercial Street wharf

May 4, 2017 — The city is continuing its investigation into what caused a wharf at 80 Commercial St. to collapse into Gloucester Harbor on April 28, taking a tin outbuilding with it.

City Building Commissioner Bill Sanborn said the remaining portions of the pier and the damaged building have been condemned and the owners ordered to remove it.

“We’re still investigating and haven’t determined the cause,” Sanborn said Wednesday. “We’re working with the owners, requiring them to bring in an engineer to tell us what caused the failure and how they’re going to make it safe.”

Sanborn said the city has not cited the owners for any violations, but reiterated that the investigation is ongoing.

City assessor records list the owner of the 80 Commercial St. site as the Anthony Curcuru Trust et al, but Sanborn said the ownership is more complicated than that.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Times

Fishery Management Councils to Meet May 15-18 in Gloucester

May 2, 2017 — The following was released by the New England Fishery Management Council:

Leadership teams from the nation’s eight regional fishery management councils will be gathering in Gloucester, MA for the spring 2017 Council Coordination Committee (CCC) meeting.

The CCC is comprised of the chairs, vice chairs, and executive directors of the New England, Mid-Atlantic, South Atlantic, Caribbean, Gulf of Mexico, Pacific, Western Pacific, and North Pacific Fishery Management Councils. CCC chairmanship rotates annually among the eight Councils.

The committee meets twice each year to discuss issues relevant to all fishery management councils. The National Marine Fisheries Service – often called NOAA Fisheries – annually hosts the first meeting, which for 2017 was held Feb. 28-March 1 in Arlington, VA. The New England Council is serving as this year’s CCC chair and will be hosting the May 15-18 spring meeting at the Beauport Hotel on the Gloucester Harbor waterfront. The public is welcome to attend.

Principal agenda items will be discussed Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, May 16-18, beginning at 8:30 a.m. each day. The eight Councils will take part in a Round Robin on Tuesday morning. Council deputy directors will meet concurrently and report to the full CCC on Thursday, May 18. Copies of the agenda will be available shortly. Hotel information can be found at http://www.beauporthotel.com.

Read the full release here

MASSACHUSETTS: Building, wharf collapse on Gloucester waterfront

May 1, 2017 — Cape Ann Ice owner Scott Memhard was one relieved man last night as he stood surrounded by fire trucks off Commercial Street and surveyed the wreckage of a wharf — originally reported as his — that had collapsed into the Inner Harbor some 20 minutes earlier.

“It sounded over the scanner like it was ours,” Memhard said, although Cape Ann Ice’s wharf, located two buildings over, is in sound shape.

More reports came in that the collapse was at the old FBI Wharf, which became the North Atlantic Fish wharf, before North Atlantic was bought out by Channel Fish Processing in 2012. There was also confusion about the actual address; fire Capt. Tom Logrande said the storage building was likely 80 Commercial St. but Channel lists its address as No. 88.

Memhard said the collapsed wharf was leased from the Filetto family for storage by Channel Fish. LoGrande said Channel was aware of the wharf’s condition and had cordoned off it earlier in day, which Memhard confirmed.

“They knew it was at risk and were planning on moving to Braintree because of it,” said Memhard, shaking his head. “Then this afternoon they heard it creaking, and came and roped it off and moved some stuff out.”

They heard it creaking over at The Pub at Cape Ann Brewery at 11 Roger St., too, where at about 6:30 p.m. a deck full of patrons were drinking in the warm spring air along with the cold local brews.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Times

New management could be coming to East Coast herring fishery

April 27, 2017 — Federal fishing regulators are considering a host of alternatives about new ways to manage the herring fishery.

Atlantic herring is a major industrial fishery on the East Coast, including in Gloucester, with fishermen frequently bringing more than 200 million pounds of the little fish to shore every year.

Herring are used as human food and bait for other fisheries, such as lobsters. The catch of herring off of New England has been inconsistent in recent years, leading to volatility in the lobster bait market.

The New England Fishery Management Council is considering nine alternatives about how to manage the fishery. The options would allow for measures such as area closures and restrictions on types of gear.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Times

2016 fishing review highlights monitors —human and electronic

April 24, 2017 — NOAA’s Greater Atlantic Regional Office released its annual year in review for 2016 and nowhere does it mention the ever-churning debate over Gulf of Maine cod and the yawning divide between scientists’ data and the primary-source observations of fishermen.

For the most part, the report is a four-color chronicle of what officials at Gloucester-based GARFO — which manages the nation’s federal fisheries from the Gulf of Maine south to Cape Hatteras and west to the Great Lakes — consider the agency’s most tangible accomplishments in 2016.

Still, the review gives some insight into some of the agency’s management priorities and policy areas where it may marshal its resources in the future.

It specifically mentions the office’s work in drafting a recovery plan for endangered Atlantic salmon and a five-year action plan for the species. It highlights its work with commercial groundfishermen — many of them from Gloucester — on potential changes to the small-mesh whiting fishery.

The report also highlights the agency’s transfer of the cost of of at-sea monitoring to permit holders.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Times

States to host hearings on changes to squid fishery

National Fish executive makes deal in fraud case

April 24, 2017 — A senior executive at Gloucester-based National Fish & Seafood pleaded guilty to one count of tax fraud Thursday in U.S. District Court in Boston and is set to be sentenced in July, the Justice Department announced.

Richard J. Pandolfo, 71, of North Andover, was indicted by a federal grand jury last June on four counts of filing false federal tax returns between 2009 and 2012.

The charges were reduced to one count as part of a plea agreement with federal prosecutors. Pandolfo, an executive vice president at the East Gloucester seafood processor, faces up to three years in prison, one year of supervised release, a fine of $100,000 and restitution of $25,879 to the Internal Revenue Service.

Prosecutors charge Pandolfo failed to pay federal tax on about $90,000 of the $95,000 in “substantial supplemental income” he received from former National Fish & Seafood executive and part-owner Jack Ventola from 2008 to 2012.

According to the original indictment, some of the supplemental income went directly to Pandolfo, while other payments went to a shell company established in the name of Pandolfo’s wife, who is not named in the indictment, through another shell company controlled by Ventola.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Times