Magnuson-Stevens Act Archives - Page 25 of 45

Pacific perch stocks declared ‘rebuilt’

January 18, 2018 — PORTLAND, Ore. — In welcome news for commercial fishermen, an important West Coast groundfish stock that was formerly overfished has now been rebuilt.

Pacific ocean perch, which is managed by the Pacific Fishery Management Council and the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS or NOAA Fisheries), has constrained the West Coast trawl fishery for decades.

Pacific ocean perch was overfished starting in the mid-1960s when foreign fleets targeted groundfish stocks, in particular Pacific ocean perch, off the U.S. West Coast. The mandates of the 1976 Magnuson-Stevens Act, the primary law governing U.S. fisheries management, eventually ended foreign fishing within 200 miles of the U.S. coast. The first federal trip limits to discourage targeting and to conserve a U.S. West Coast groundfish stock were implemented for Pacific ocean perch in 1979 by the PFMC and NMFS. Rebuilding plans for Pacific ocean perch were adopted in 2000 and 2003.

Managing groundfish fisheries under rebuilding plans has been an immense challenge for the Pacific Council and the NMFS, accoding to a press release from the agencies. These plans required sharp reductions in commercial and recreational fisheries targeting groundfish, and included widespread fishing closures through the establishment of Rockfish Conservation Areas off the West Coast and other measures.

“We are pleased to see that our management strategies have been successful in rebuilding this important groundfish stock, and want to acknowledge the industries’ cooperation and sacrifice in this effort,” said Council Chair Phil Anderson. “We also want to recognize NMFS for committing the resources to monitor and research groundfish stocks to improve the science used to sustainably manage these stocks.”

Read the full story at the Daily Astorian

Michelle Malkin: Big Brother on America’s Fishing Boats

January 17, 2018 — Salt water. Seagulls. Striped bass.

My fondest childhood memories come from fishing with my dad on the creaky piers and slick jetties of the Jersey shore. The Atlantic Ocean is in my blood. So when fishing families in New England reached out to me for help spreading word about their economic and regulatory struggles, I immediately heeded their call.

Now these “forgotten men and women” of America hope that the Trump administration will listen. And act.

The plague on the commercial fishing industry isn’t “overfishing,” as environmental extremists and government officials claim. The real threats to Northeastern groundfishermen are self-perpetuating bureaucrats, armed with outdated junk science, who’ve manufactured a crisis that endangers a way of life older than the colonies themselves.

Hardworking crews and captains have the deepest stake in responsible fisheries management — it’s their past, present, and future — but federal paper-pushers monitor them ruthlessly like registered sex offenders.

Generations of schoolchildren have been brainwashed into believing that our seas have been depleted by greedy commercial fishermen. In the 1960s and ’70s, it is true, foreign factory trawlers from Russia and Japan pillaged coastal groundfish stocks. But after the domestic fishing industry regained control of our waters, stocks rebounded.

Reality, however, did not fit the agenda of scare-mongering environmentalists and regulators who need a perpetual crisis to justify their existence. To cure a manufactured “shortage” of bottom-dwelling groundfish, Washington micromanagers created a permanent thicket of regional fishery-management councils, designated fishing zones, annual catch limits, individual catch limits, and “observers” mandated by the Magnuson-Stevens Act.

Even more frustrating for the fishing families who know the habitat best, the federal scientists’ trawler surveys for assessing stocks use faulty nets that vastly underestimate stock abundance.

Meghan Lapp, a lifelong fisherwoman and conservation biologist, points out that government surveyors use a “net that’s not the right size for the vessel.” This produces “a stock assessment that shows artificially low numbers,” she says. “The fishing does not match what the fishermen see on the water.”

Instead of fixing the science, top-down bureaucrats have cracked down on groundfishermen who fail to comply with impossible and unreasonable rules and regulations. The observer program, which was intended to provide biological data and research, was expanded administratively (not by Congress) to create “at-sea monitors” who act solely as enforcement agents.

Read the full story at the National Review

Nominations Sought for NEFMC

January 16, 2018 — The New England Fishery Management Council (NEFMC) is seeking nominees for upcoming open seats. The NEFMC is one of eight regional councils established by the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act (MSA) in 1976, and is charged with conserving and managing fishery resources from three to 200 miles off the coasts of Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut. The MSA specifies that council nominees must be individuals “who, by reason of their occupational or other experience, scientific expertise, or training, are knowledgeable regarding the conservation and management, or the commercial or recreational harvest, of the fishery resources of the geographical area concerned.” Council members are directly involved in:

Developing and amending fishery management plans.
Selecting fishery management options.
Setting annual catch limits based on best available science.
Developing and implementing rebuilding plans.

The NEFMC manages: sea scallops, monkfish, Atlantic herring, skates, red crab, spiny dogfish, Atlantic salmon and groundfish** . Please note that the NEFMC does not manage summer flounder, scup, black sea bass, bluefish, striped bass or tautog.

MAINE
One obligatory (state) seat currently held by Terry Alexander of Harpswell, ME. Mr. McKenzie is completing his second of three possible consecutive 3-year terms.

MASSACHUSETTS
One obligatory seat currently held by Dr. John Quinn of New Bedford, MA. Dr. Quinn is completing his second of three possible consecutive 3-year terms.

Qualified individuals interested in being considered for nomination by the Governor to the Council should contact Samantha Andrews (617-626-1564, samantha.n.andrews@state.ma.us.) Nomination application kits will be made available upon request. All applications are due to DMF (c/o Samantha Andrews, 251 Causeway St, Suite 400, Boston, MA 02114) by the end of day on Monday, February 12, 2018. As part of the application process, the Commonwealth will conduct an initial background review.

Read the full story at The Fisherman

Rafael Faces New Allegations For Violations In Scallop Fishery

January 16, 2018 — A New Bedford fishing mogul known as “The Codfather” is facing new federal allegations for misreporting the amount of fish harvested by his fleet, this time in the scallop fishery.

“The Codfather,” or Carlos Rafael, is currently serving a 46-month prison sentence for falsifying groundfish quota, and for other offenses including tax evasion and bulk cash smuggling.

Now, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is alleging Rafael lied about how many scallops four of his vessels caught during fishing trips in 2013. NOAA is looking to revoke permits issued to those vessels and charge Rafael a penalty of $843,528.

Peter Shelley, senior counsel at the Conservation Law Foundation, an environmental advocacy group, said these new allegations are critical.

“I think (these allegations) will be a strong enough deterrent that will really discourage people who might want to break the law from doing that, and it certainly will support the many fishermen in the fishery who obeyed the law that they’re not doing it for vain, that the agency will back them up,” Shelley said.

Read the full story at Rhode Island Public Radio

New Charges Against Carlos Rafael Include Count Against Sector IX, 12 Counts Misreporting Scallops

January 15, 2018 — SEAFOOD NEWS — The charging document released by NOAA revoking Carlos Rafael’s and Associated entities fishing permits contained a number of new allegations that were not part of the criminal trial.

One count was against sector IX, which applied to the entire sector, including Rafael’s vessels, was filing a false report of the volume of yellowtail flounder landed in the sector in 2011. Through a special agreement, the statute of limitations on this alleged misreporting was waived by Rafael.

NOAA is seeking a $140,000 fine from all members of sector IX for this offense.

The other new charges all involve scallops during the 2013 fishing year. 12 of the counts are of falsely reporting the volume of scallops landed.

For example, on January 15, the vessel F/V Ilha Brava submitted a ‘broken trip’ report to NOAA, claiming the vessel only harvested 7,886 lbs of scallops on its trip. In fact, the vessel landed 17,200 lbs.

The other eleven counts are similar. Some include broken trip reports that were false. Others include lying about the volume of scallops taken from a limited access area.

For example, September 13-18, the vessel F/V Acores reported it only caught 1851 lbs of scallops in a limited access area trip, when in fact it had caught 12,700 lbs.

Two counts involved vessels failing to transmit the position via the vessel monitoring system as required.

NOAA says that under Magnuson:

(1) In any case in which (A) a vessel has been used in the commission of an act prohibited under section 1857 of this title, (B) the owner or operator of a vessel or any other person who has been issued or has applied for a permit under this chapter has acted in violation of section 1857 of this title… the Secretary may—

(i) revoke any permit issued with respect to such vessel or person, with or without prejudice to the issuance of subsequent permits…[or]

(iii) deny such permit.

This is the authority they are using to revoke 38 permits, including two scallop permits which were not part of the original criminal complaint.

The full charging document can be read here.

This story originally appeared on Seafoodnews.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission.

NOAA seeks lifetime ban for jailed New Bedford fishing mogul

January 11, 2018 — The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is seeking a lifetime ban from the fishing industry for jailed New Bedford fishing mogul Carlos Rafael, a revocation of the permit for his wholesale fish dealership, and a revocation of 38 fishing permits from 28 of his vessels. NOAA is also seeking new penalties in two additional cases unrelated to the one that put him in prison, according to a spokeswoman for the agency.

Rafael is serving a 46-month sentence after pleading guilty last year to falsifying fish quotas, false labeling of fish species, conspiracy, smuggling large amounts of cash out of the country and tax evasion. In September, a federal judge ordered U.S. Marshals to seize four of his fishing vessels and their fishing permits as part of a plea deal in the criminal case against Rafael, once the owner of one of the nation’s largest fishing fleets.

Rafael owned at least 44 vessels, including 10 vessels with scallop permits and 43 that also had lobster permits, the two most valuable fisheries in the Northeast. Many of those vessels continued to fish, even after he was jailed. But in November, NOAA regional director John Bullard ordered groundfish Sector IX, a fishing cooperative dominated by Rafael to stop fishing, saying the sector had failed to account for his illegal fish and hadn’t enforced its own rules. There are 60 groundfish permits in Sector IX, 22 of which were actively fishing.

Read the full story at the Cape Cod Times

NOAA’s civil action against Carlos Rafael involves scallop permits

WASHINGTON — January 10, 2018 – Today, NOAA issued a charging document to Carlos Rafael, Carlos Seafood, Inc., 28 separate business entities related to Carlos Rafael, and two of Carlos Rafael’s scallop vessel captains, alleging violations of the Magnuson-Stevens Act.

This case seeks to:

Impose $983,528 in civil monetary penalties;
Deny any future application by Carlos Rafael for any permit issued by NOAA under the Magnuson-Stevens Act;
Revoke the seafood dealer permit issued to Carlos Seafood, Inc.;
Revoke 38 commercial fishing permits; and
Revoke the operator permits issued to two of Rafael’s scallop vessel captains.

The civil action alleges 35 violations:

Counts 1-19 are based on Rafael’s conduct involved in his recent criminal case, specifically, the misreporting of species landed. For these violations, NOAA seeks to revoke the federal fisheries permits associated with the vessels at issue in the criminal case, but does not seek monetary penalties.

Counts 20-35 involve conduct unrelated to Rafael’s criminal case. Count 20 alleges that Rafael and related entities misreported where they caught yellowtail flounder in 2012. For this violation, NOAA seeks to revoke numerous permits involved and a $140,000 penalty.

Counts 21-35 involve misreporting in the scallop fishery. NOAA alleges that on four separate fishing trips in 2013, Rafael and related entities, along with two of his fishing vessel operators, filed false reports regarding the amount of scallops harvested by four vessels. For those violations, NOAA seeks to revoke permits issued to these vessels and a $843,528 penalty.

Dr. Ray Hilborn talks U.S. fisheries policy at Bevan Series lecture

WASHINGTON (Saving Seafood) – January 8, 2018 – Last week, Dr. Ray Hilborn, a professor at the University of Washington’s School of Aquatic and Fishery Sciences, presented on U.S. fisheries policy and how scientists can communicate with Congress to promote good decision-making. The lecture, “Is U.S. Fisheries Policy Working? Getting the Message to Congress,” was the first of the 2018 Bevan Series on fisheries management.

The Bevan Series features “internationally recognized experts” discussing current issues facing fisheries and marine conservation. This year’s series features 10 weekly seminars held at the University of Washington in Seattle.

MAFMC: NEFMC to Hold Mid-Atlantic Port Meetings to Gather Public Input for Independent Program Review

January 5, 2018 — The following was released by the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council:

The New England Fishery Management Council is currently undergoing an independent review to: (1) assess past performance; (2) gather feedback on strengths and weaknesses of the Council process and operations; and (3) identify potential areas for improvements. Twelve port meetings and one webinar meeting were held in November and December to gather public input.

Two additional port meetings have been scheduled in the Mid-Atlantic region:

Monday, January 8, Montauk, NY – Montauk Playhouse Community Center, 240 Edgemere Street, 5 p.m.
Tuesday, January 9, Cape May, NJ – Rutgers University, 1636 Delaware Ave., 5 p.m.

Stakeholders can also provide input through an online survey, which is available HERE.

More information can be found at Council Program Review.

The Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council is one of eight regional councils established by the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act of 1976. The Council has primary responsibility for twelve species of fish and shellfish in the exclusive economic zone (EEZ) between 3 and 200 miles off the Mid-Atlantic coast. Member states include New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina. Visit our website for more information.

NOAA to open New England scallop areas, invite record harvest

January 5, 2018 — New England sea scallop fishers can start planning now for what promises to be their best season in 14 years, thanks to a decision coming soon from the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS).

John Bullard, the outgoing administrator of NOAA’s greater Atlantic region, informed the New England Fishery Management Council (NEFMC), in a five-page letter sent late Wednesday, that the agency will follow most of its recommendations with regard to the “essential fish habitat” amendment – a long-discussed plan to reset fishing management and conservation practices in the area.

That includes opening up to scallop harvesters an expanded portion of Closed Area I and the western part of the Nantucket Lightship area, two sections of the Atlantic Ocean that have been closed for a decade and are now expected to be loaded with large scallops.

“NMFS determined that the removal of the Closed Area I designations and proposed new designations do not compromise the ability of the council’s fishery management plans to comply with the [essential fish habitat] requirements of the Magnuson-Stevens Act,” Bullard wrote in his letter, which was addressed to John Quinn, NEFMC’s chairman.

Based on surveys reported in September, Closed Area 1, including the previous off-limit “sliver” area and northern portion, contains 19.8 million pounds (9,016 metric tons) of exploitable scallop meat, referring to scallops found with shells that were at least 4 inches wide. Even better, as much as 45.6m lbs (20,670t) of exploitable scallop meat is projected to exist in the west Nantucket Lightship area.

Read the full story at Undercurrent News