Saving Seafood

Right whales: The fight for survival

June 28, 2018 — Will $5 million in research funds every year for 10 years save the right whale from extinction? A group of lawmakers hopes so.

Companion bills in the U.S. Senate and House, filed by five senators and four representatives, including the Cape’s Bill Keating, have put forward The SAVE Right Whales Act of 2018 (aka Scientific Assistance for Very Endangered North Atlantic Right Whales, Act of 2018).

It would establish a grant program to fund collaborative projects between states, nongovernmental organization, and members of the fishing and shipping industries to reduce the impacts of human activities on North Atlantic right whales.

“There are fewer than 450 North Atlantic right whales remaining in the world, and their population is rapidly declining,” said Scott Kraus, vice president and chief scientist of Marine Mammal Conservation at the Anderson Cabot Center for Ocean Life at the New England Aquarium.

“The biggest threat to their survival is entanglement in fishing gear. Eighty-five percent of right whales have been entangled once, and 60 percent have been entangled twice. This proposed bill is a great start toward finding solutions that protect both whales and the fishing industry. It calls for science-led conservation efforts with all stakeholders working cooperatively. Researchers, fishermen and government officials coming together is the only way that sustainable change will happen,” he said.

The northern reaches of Cape Cod Bay are familiar territory for right whales; they typically are the first whales seen returning to the area after the new year. In 2018 the first group, of about 15, was spotted in mid-January by Provincetown Center for Coastal Studies.

Read the full story at Wicked Local

MASSACHUSETTS: ‘Wicked Tuna’ captain, charter owner to treat warriors to a day fishing

June 28, 2018 — On Wednesday, as the U.S. celebrates the 242nd birthday of its Declaration of Independence, fisherman Capt. Dave Marciano of “Wicked Tuna” and Tom Orrell of Gloucester-based Yankee Fleet, are going for the hat trick.

For the third consecutive Independence Day, the two men who first met when a much younger Marciano worked for Yankee Fleet, are teaming up to provide a boat full of veterans — some of them still carrying the wounds of their service — with a free day of fishing on one of Gloucester’s iconic charter boats, the aptly named Yankee Freedom.

“We’re going again,” Orrell said Wednesday. “Same as last year.”

The fishing trip for veterans and their guests has become one of the city’s staples among July Fourth celebrations.

The lineup is a familiar one. There are parades, bonfires and fireworks. There are barbecues, ball games and trips to the beach.

And now there is the Yankee Freedom, which accommodates about 70 anglers, heading out from the Head of the Harbor on the morning of the Fourth for the recreational fishing grounds of the Atlantic.

The event has become almost as wildly popular as the “Wicked Tuna” fishing reality show that has made Marciano a celebrity, if not a star.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Daily Times

Offshore wind developers need workforce, ‘predictable’ regulations

June 27, 2018 — The budding Atlantic offshore wind industry needs a skilled workforce in the Northeast and a consistent federal approach to permitting and regulation, experts told members of Congress Tuesday.

The Northeast region alone aims to generate 7,500 megawatts of offshore wind power by 2030, said Stephen Pike, CEO of the Massachusetts Clean Energy Center, who called it “a once in a lifetime opportunity to establish a new industry in the United States.”

The House Subcommittee on Energy and Mineral Resources was hearing testimony on legislation that would create a federally funded wind career training grant program, and to extend the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act so the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management can offer wind energy leases off U.S. territories.

“Guam is a logical place to start looking,” Randall Luthi, president of the National Ocean Industries Association, told Rep. Madeleine Bordallo, D-Guam, sponsor of the extension measure. Bordallo said offshore wind makes sense for the Pacific island where power is generated with expensive imported petroleum, and Luthi said several developers have expressed interest.

“We would be more than happy to work with the territories,” said James Bennett, who heads BOEM’s renewable energy program. As it has with states, the agency would start by creating task forces to identify potential lease areas and determine what kinds of studies are needed, he said.

Read the full story at WorkBoat

MASSACHUSETTS: Piping down on pollution

June 27, 2018 — The clock was ticking on the young crew from Seafood Sustainability on Tuesday, as they rushed to complete about 20 new fishing line collection containers that will be donated to Gloucester and other Cape Ann communities to install at docks and other high-volume boating and fishing areas.

The problem was that it was Tuesday and the St. Peter’s Fiesta was set to begin a mere 24 hours later. And Fiesta, as anyone knows who’s experienced it, tends to monopolize the time and focus of the Gloucester Harbormaster corps as the city’s water-borne population swells to huge numbers of revelers.

“We’re rushing as fast as we can,” Kate Christiansen, the project manager for Essex-based Seaside Sustainability’s “Reel In and Recycle” program, said in a phone interview Tuesday afternoon. “We’re in the process of building them right now and trying to get as much done as we can before Fiesta.”

Literally as Christiansen spoke, Josh Sheridan, Essex Sustainability’s marine science coordinator, led a team of three interns in an impromptu assembly line to transform 6-inch PVC piping — donated by the Building Center on the Gloucester waterfront — into monofilament collection containers.

Working in a backyard on Marchant Street in Gloucester, Ryan Keeth of Belmont, Jack McMahon of Hamilton and Sophia Guerriero of Essex toiled in the bright sunshine to complete the marked recovery units designed to mitigate the environmental pollution and navigational hazard of abandoned monofilament fishing line in oceans and other marine venues.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Daily Times

MASSACHUSETTS: Artist Bob Lavoie salutes working waterfront in Fishing Heritage Center exhibit

June 27, 2018 — New Bedford Fishing Heritage Center’s latest exhibit, “Rigs, Hulls, and Wheelhouses: The Art of Bob Lavoie,” opens July 12, 6 p.m., and runs through Sept. 30.

Lavoie became acquainted with New Bedford’s working fishing boats when he began unloading vessels in high school. His time on the working docks continued while studying at Southeastern Massachusetts University (now UMass Dartmouth), where he earned degrees in graphic design and illustration. He fell in love with the aesthetics of the vessels — the colors, the machinery, the lines.

After a career spent as a graphic designer, illustrator, and art director at Hasbro in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, Lavoie felt the need to begin to paint again. He began using the brilliant colors of gouache, a thick, opaque Italian watercolor. When deciding what his subject would be, he went back to something that meant a lot to him — the working fishing vessels of New Bedford and Galilee, Rhode Island.

“I’ve tried to paint them as they are — working boats with the rust, nets, blocks and confusing jumbles of lines that make them beautiful,” Lavoie said in a news release. “These working vessels are disappearing in some ports, being displaced by pristine yachts in the slips and multi-million dollar condos on the docks where once these proud working vessels sailed out into the Atlantic to bring in cod, haddock and scallops that made New England one of the primary fisheries in the world. These paintings are a small attempt to preserve a part of our New England heritage that is fast disappearing.”

Read the full story at the New Bedford Standard-Times

MASSACHUSETTS: Warren challenger Lindstrom tours Gloucester’s fishing infrastructure

June 25, 2018 — The road to the state Republican Party nomination to run against incumbent U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren clearly runs through Gloucester.

At least it has in the past week, as two of three GOP candidates for the U.S. Senate have traveled to America’s Oldest Seaport to state their cases in advance of the September primary that will determine which Republican candidate lands on the ballot in November.

Thursday evening, state Rep. Geoff Diehl, who won the GOP endorsement at its April state convention, was here to unveil his plan to help the fishing industry.

On Saturday morning, first-time candidate Beth Lindstrom motored to Gloucester to tour the city’s iconic waterfront by water, visit some of the shoreside infrastructure for a firsthand look at the economic perils faced by commercial fishing stakeholders and take part in the blessing and christening of Intershell’s new surf clam boat, Bing Bing.

“Obviously, the fishing industry has shrunk and it’s really hard for these people to make a living,” Lindstrom said when asked what she took away from her tour. “I guess I didn’t really realize the extent of the problem.”

Read the full story at the Gloucester Daily Times

DON CUDDY: Late New Bedford scalloper never got justice he deserved

June 25, 2018 — It probably passed unnoticed by most people but an obituary for Larry Yacubian appeared in this newspaper on June 13. He died in Punta Gorda, Florida on May 18. But most fishermen still shake their heads when his name comes up. I don’t know if he died a bitter man. I hope not, although he had every reason to feel that way after the treatment meted out to him by federal law enforcement. Larry was a New Bedford scalloper and boat owner. In December 1998 his boat, the Independence, was boarded by the Coast Guard while fishing offshore and he was accused of fishing in a closed area. What followed can only be described, euphemistically, as a miscarriage of justice. The fines imposed on him by an administrative law judge working on behalf of NOAA were so excessive that he was forced to sell his boat, his permits and the Westport farm that had been in his wife’s family for 350 years — all of this to satisfy the greed of some ‘bad actors’ who considered themselves above the rule of law because they were carrying a badge. This particularly malicious prosecution ran Yacubian, a founder of the Fisheries Survival Fund, out of the fishing business and brought financial ruin on his family.

After a torturous legal process some justice was served when Yacubian was refunded $400,000 and received an apology in 2012 from NOAA administrator Jane Lubchenco and Commerce Secretary Gary Locke although that sum did not even cover his legal fees. But the details of this shakedown make exceptionally grisly reading. Yacubian’s case was just one of dozens, but by far the most egregious, uncovered by a special master appointed by the Department of Commerce to investigate excessive fines imposed on our commercial fishermen for relatively minor infractions. Thirteen of these originated from the Northeast Regional Office in Gloucester. Upholding justice was the proffered reason for assessing these fines but plain old money was the motivator. These huge fines went to swell the Asset Forfeiture Fund which allowed NOAA agents in the Office of Law Enforcement to purchase luxury vehicles and boats. It is all well-documented if anyone cares to look it up.

Read the full opinion piece at the New Bedford Standard-Times

House set to debate offshore wind energy bills in U.S. waters

June 25, 2018 — A U.S. House committee will kick off debate next week on three new bills aimed at boosting offshore wind energy leases in federal waters.

The House Subcommittee on Energy and Mineral Resources will hold a hearing on Tuesday on three bipartisan offshore wind proposals.

One proposal would require the Interior Department to develop a leasing plan or schedule for federal offshore leases, a second would create a federal grant for educational or career programs for the offshore industry, and a third would give Interior the authority to manage the federal submerged lands off of territories such as Guam for offshore energy. Turbines can be built on land beneath navigable waters.

The Trump administration has thrown its weight behind the nascent offshore wind industry by streamlining permitting processes and working to open up more areas for lease. The administration views offshore wind as an element in its goal for U.S. energy dominance.

“We are committed to working with the Trump administration in pursuing an ‘all-of-the-above’ energy strategy, which includes a robust offshore renewable component,” according to a committee statement.

Read the full story at Reuters

SAVE Act gets boost

June 22, 2018 — A statewide association of commercial lobstermen has thrown its weight behind a $50 million federal bill to protect North Atlantic right whales with targeted research that emphasizes collaboration.

The group intends to work with the International Fund for Animal Welfare to develop a pilot program to test buoyless gear this summer, according to Massachusetts Lobstermen’s Association Executive Director Beth Casoni.

“Massachusetts lobstermen are currently the leaders in the world for the conservation of right whales, and the association proudly supports the SAVE Right Whale Act of 2018,” Casoni wrote in an email.

Filed in Congress on June 7, the legislation would allocate $5 million annually in grants through 2028 for conservation programs, and the development of new technology or other methods to reduce harm to right whales from fishing gear entanglements and ship collisions. Grants could promote cooperation with foreign governments, affected local communities, small businesses, others in the private sector or nongovernment groups.

A grant program that is specific for right whale conservation and research will allow “the continued collaborative research needed for safe, realistic and viable outcomes for all that depend on the stocks’ success,” Casoni said.

Read the full story at the Cape Cod Times

MASSACHUSETTS: GOP Senate candidate Geoff Diehl outlines plan to help fishermen

June 22, 2018 — Geoff Diehl made his second visit to New Bedford this week to speak with fishermen.

The state representative and candidate running for U.S. Senate against Elizabeth Warren spoke to about five people within the fishing industry at Pier 3 on Thursday. It came just days after he attended a fishing roundtable discussion at the Whaling Museum, which discussed the groundfishing ban affecting the industry.

This second trip of the week was to unveil a set of guidelines he plans to follow to help fishermen if elected.

They involved repealing the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument Status, keeping Carlos Rafael’s fishing licenses in New Bedford and reducing the regulatory burden.

Diehl suggested establishing a NOAA headquarters in New Bedford to better facilitate discussions between the agency and fishermen in the nation’s most valuable seaport.

“They should at least have a satellite if not maybe move their main offices here,” Diehl said. “I think that would make a lot of sense to have them interact with the actual fishermen.”

Read the full story at the New Bedford Standard-Times