Saving Seafood

Lawsuit Challenges NMFS Exempted Fishing Permits for Two Pelagic Longline Vessels Off California

June 10, 2019 — SEAFOOD NEWS — The Center for Biological Diversity and Turtle Island Restoration Network sued the Trump administration this week for permitting a new longline fishery — two vessels –in the Pacific Ocean.

The fishery, authorized in May by the National Marine Fisheries Service, would operate off California despite a federal ban on longline gear created in 2004 to protect sea turtles. This fishing will threaten endangered leatherback sea turtles, as well as olive ridley and loggerhead sea turtles and Guadalupe fur seals, the Center said in a press release.

“Leatherback sea turtles need to catch a break, not a longline hook,” Catherine Kilduff, a Center senior attorney, said in the release. “Californians demand more selective and sustainable fishing for swordfish. But the indiscriminate longlines authorized by the Trump administration will hook, injure and drown endangered species off our coast.”

“This is basically the same fishery the agency outlawed fifteen years ago, and the same agency is using a backdoor maneuver to get the fishery reopened,” Todd Steiner, executive director of Turtle Island Restoration Network stated. “Sea turtles could go extinct if deadly longline fisheries are expanded. And it’s not just in California— the Hawaii longline fleet has been forced to close early two years in a row because they have exceeded their legal turtle take. It makes no sense to re-authorize this wasteful fishery off of California.”

The exempted fishing permit has been years in the making and was approved unanimously by the Pacific Fishery Management Council after being fully vetted by the Council, its advisory bodies and the public. NMFS then issued the permit that allows for only two fishermen on two vessels to target highly migratory tuna and swordfish.

The EFP requires 100% monitoring by observers and establishes hard caps on ESA-listed species. That is, fishing must stop if the number of incidental interactions with animals exceed certain parameters. It also excludes any fishing within 50 miles of the coast or offshore islands and requires a full suite of verified mitigation techniques be used during all test fishing. These techniques are known to reduce or eliminate interactions with sea birds, sea turtles and marine mammals.

In fact, NMFS issued terms and conditions for the EFP that are more restrictive than those listed in the original application.

“NOAA’s decision is a huge win for American fisheries, fishermen and ultimately, the environment,” Dave Rudie, owner of Catalina Offshore Products and President of the California Pelagic Fisheries Association, said in a statement. “It will greatly benefit San Diego and southern California and our consumers as well.”

The new permits could increase reliance on local seafood, particularly where swordfish and tuna are concerned. The North Pacific swordfish population is very healthy and would support a substantial additional harvest according to all international fisheries experts and published reports. Any increase in U.S. fisheries production improves America’s seafood security as well as provides for a sustainable ecosystem footprint often lacking in the weak environmental oversight of foreign fisheries, the association noted in a press release.

The Center said Pacific leatherback sea turtles are highly endangered, with scientists predicting their extinction in 20 years. Yet the exempted fishery will occur in an area that includes the Pacific Leatherback Conservation Area, which prohibits swordfish fishing using drift gillnets to protect leatherback sea turtles.

However, the increased mitigation requirements mandated by NMFS specify no-fishing areas such as the Southern California Bight and within leatherback critical habitat or 50 nautical miles from the coast, whichever is greater.

The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, states NMFS’ issuance of the permit violated several environmental laws, including the Endangered Species Act and National Environmental Policy Act. The suit seeks to invalidate the permit, protecting the turtles and seals from longlines.

NMFS issued the permit May 8.

This story was originally published on SeafoodNews.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission.

HANK SOULE: Rafael: Punishment should fit the crimes

May 9, 2017 — New Bedford fishing mogul Carlos Rafael has now pleaded guilty to a suite of felonies including tax evasion, smuggling fish to shore and cash offshore, false federal reporting, and evading quotas. The Justice Department has worked up a plea deal including four years in prison and seizure of some boats and permits. That suffices for the cash-related crimes, and thanks goes to law enforcement for their long, hard work and the penalties imposed. But it’s not enough.

Rafael has a multi-decadal history of lawbreaking. In 2016 the Boston Globe reported, “Rafael has a history of crime related to his business. He served a six-month prison term for tax evasion in the 1980s and was charged with price-fixing in 1994, though he was acquitted in that case, according to court records. He was also convicted of making false statements on landing slips for commercial fishing vessels in 2000 and was sentenced to probation, according to court records.”

That’s not the half of it. The National Maine Fisheries Service has record of 20 separate admitted violations over the last two decades involving Rafael’s vessels and corporations. They include sub-legal net mesh sizes, missing fishing day declarations and under-counting, quota violations, false reporting, and concealing illicit catch. The boats and scams varied but they all have one common thread: The name “Rafael” stamped on the corporate documentation.

It is no stretch to stipulate that this record, along with the recent case at hand, constitutes prima-facie evidence of repeated, willful, and egregious criminal activity on the part of Rafael. These violations caused unknown harm to fishery resources — by statute, property of the people of the United States — and to all the law-abiding fishermen who have suffered under increasingly stringent regulations (or been forced out of the business entirely). The question at hand is: How to protect the victims and environment alike from this serial offender?

Here’s the rest of the story: In addition to the 13 vessels and permits to be seized, Rafael has another eight vessels and 25 permits still enrolled in the groundfishery. The government has not proposed to restrict those vessels in any way. There are no known sanctions on the offending captains. No additional monitoring of those vessels is planned. In other words: It’s pretty much business as usual, and for Rafael while the loss of those 13 vessels is unfortunate, it’s just one of the costs of engaging in smuggling.

Read the full opinion piece at National Fisherman

Farmers Pitted Against Fishermen in House

July 13, 2016 — The plan to buoy historically low salmon populations imperiled by California’s historic drought made for a contentious hearing Tuesday on Capitol Hill. House Republicans accused federal agencies of depriving farmers of water while the Golden State’s reservoirs sit full.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Maine Fisheries Service teamed up for the drought proposal debated at this morning’s hearing of the House Subcommittee on Water, Power and Oceans.

Though recent El Nino storms have left the state’s largest reservoirs full, the contentious plan calls for less water to be pulled from California’s largest reservoir, Shasta Lake, to preserve cold-water supplies needed to keep the Sacramento River at or below 56 degrees this fall.

Warm water in the Sacramento River has contributed to devastatingly high mortality rates of juvenile winter run Chinook salmon over the last several years, but the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation has complained that the plan could block federally contracted water deliveries without much warning.

Jeff Sutton, manager of the Tehama-Colusa Canal Authority in Northern California, told Congress the move would cripple harvests.

This year’s wet winter encouraged the planting of additional crops, Sutton said, with farmers expecting to receive their full-contracted water allotments for the first time in several years.

Read the full story at Courthouse News