August 17, 2018 — In many ways, the city is the mecca for scallops. Now, Dana Rebeiro wants to expand that to oysters.
The Ward 4 councilor filed a written motion Thursday asking the Committee on Fisheries to help draft an ordinance that Mayor Jon Mitchell’s administration has been crafting regarding aquaculture permits.
The permits would allow fishermen to begin growing oysters as part of the city’s movement toward aquaculture.
August 16, 2018 — Two local chefs.
One mystery fish.
One local farmers’ market. And a live New Bedford audience.
We usually talk music in Spotlight, my friends, but this slice of outdoor summer entertainment is way too fun not to mention this week.
Think Food Network’s “Iron Chef,” but with local chefs, local ingredients, local judges, and a live showdown performed in downtown New Bedford. Oh, and it’s free. Limited sampling will be available.
Yup, you’re invited to bring a lawn chair to Custom House Square Aug. 23 at 5:30 p.m. for New Bedford’s 2018 Seafood Throwdown. The event is presented by the New Bedford Fishing Heritage Center, in collaboration with the Northwest Atlantic Marine Alliance, Coastal Foodshed, and New Bedford Farmers’ Market.
This year it’s UMD vs. URI, baby.
In one corner, [ding ding ding!] we have Chef Kevin Gibbons, executive chef at UMass-Dartmouth. In the other corner, we have Chef Michael Comire, executive chef at the University of Rhode Island.
August 9, 2018 — As offshore wind companies jockey for position in preparation for Massachusetts’ next round of bidding, Bay State Wind announced an adjustment to its proposal earlier this week.
According to Lauren Burm, the head of public affairs for Bay State Wind, after speaking with “key stakeholders including the fishing community,” the company altered its proposal in terms of spacing between turbines to a nautical mile in rows running east to west..
“Based on their helpful feedback we have adjusted our layout to better accommodate fishing patterns and vessel transiting through the wind farm, while also maintaining efficiency and maximizing power production,” Burm said.
Those within the industry disagree that the adjustment by Bay State Wind, a partnership between Orstead and Eversource, helps fishermen navigate.“There’s no way a mile spacing would result in a safe transit,” New Bedford scalloper Eric Hansen said.
Similar sentiment has been expressed in the past by fishermen.
Hansen said he traveled to Europe, specifically Great Britain, to learn more about the offshore wind farms.
He said the turbines are spaced less than a mile apart, however, the fishing vessels are much smaller, too.
When he spoke to fishermen across the pond, he learned they were wary of navigating between the turbines.
August 6, 2018 — The news emerged on July 19 that NOAA approved a plan that may now permit some New Bedford fishermen to go back to work.
It has been eight months in the making since the National Marine Fisheries Service shut down Sector IX last November after Carlos Rafael was convicted for falsifying landings and jailed. His fishing operation was so large that the closure impacted a lot of people in the business, both afloat and ashore.
In March, fishermen with quota in Sector IX moved to join Sector VII, which also operates out of New Bedford, but that quota remained frozen while the people at NMFS worked to determine how to correct for the “overage” — how much and of what species — that resulted from the fish caught and mislabeled by Rafael’s boats.
So while this decision is a small step forward for the groundfish industry here, it is not yet time to set the church bells ringing since the majority of the inactive quota is owned by inactive fishermen. When the catch share system was introduced in 2010 it gave all permit holders a slice of the pie — the “pie” being a share of the TAC, or total allowable catch, for the annual fishing year, which for groundfish begins on May 1. Individual allocations were based on a permit holder’s catch history over a ten-year period from 1998 to 2008, I believe it was.
This effectively means that all of the cod, haddock and flounder swimming around on Georges Bank, more than one hundred miles offshore, have someone’s name on their back, similar to a herd of cattle. And like cattle, these fish can be leased, sold or traded. So this allowed some fishermen to retire, stay home every year, and lease their quota. Also, you are not required to have a boat to keep a permit.
August 6, 2018 –People are eating fish they catch in New Bedford Harbor despite a public awareness campaign against it.
In a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency survey of people seen fishing in 2017, 56 people said they catch and eat fish from the inner or outer harbor, known as Areas 1 and 2. That’s 81 percent of people who were willing to answer.
For the last few years, the New England EPA office has hired local people, some bilingual or trilingual, to visit fishing spots in spring, summer and fall. They talk to people fishing from shore in New Bedford and Fairhaven, both inside and outside the hurricane barrier.
In 2017, survey workers recorded making 111 visits to 18 locations. They observed 252 people fishing and spoke with 218 people, not all of whom were fishing at the time.
Fishers reported catching a variety of species in the harbor, including scup, tautog, bluefish, striped bass and sea bass.
While not much has changed since 2016, EPA spokeswoman Kelsey Dumville said the good news is that not many people reported frequently eating fish from the most contaminated portion of the harbor, Area 1, which includes everything north of the hurricane barrier.
July 27, 2018 –Fishing Partnership Support Services aims at focusing on the health and well-being of fishing families in New England. Sometimes that involves aid with health insurance, but Thursday in its New Bedford office at 114 McArthur Drive it meant yoga mats, Narcan and AEDs.
The organization conducted a four-hour CPR and first-aid training certification seminar for those associated with the fishing industry.
“The hard job that fishermen have to do for an extended amount of time really does put them in a risk situation,” safety training coordinator Luis Catala said. “This is a hard to reach, underserved community that really needs these services. That’s why we do our best to make ourselves accessible and bringing training to them.”
The seminar, which ended with those participating receiving CPR certification, covered everything from administering Narcan and EpiPens to dealing with amputated digits as well as performing CPR and using automated external defibrillators (AEDs).
July 25, 2018 — Fishing Partnership Support Services is bringing its CPR / First Aid training to New Bedford from 8 a.m. to noon Thursday at the Massachusetts Fishing Partnership Office, 114 MacArthur Drive.
Cost is $25 payable on the day of the event. However, if payment is a problem, contact Deb Kelsey, Fishing Partnership Navigator, to discuss scholarship opportunities.
Fishing Partnership Support Services is incorporating two additional offerings for free: ergonomics and opioid awareness. The ergonomics training was designed specifically for commercial fishermen and will provide information on ways to reduce pain and injury through more efficient work practices. Opioid awareness training provides information on recognizing signs of opioid addiction, understanding how to recognize an overdose, and administering Naloxone (Narcan), an opioid antagonist, during an overdose.
July 23, 2018 — Nearly eight months after NMFS announced the decision to shut down Northeast Fishing Sector IX following the criminal trial of quota-skirting kingpin Carlos “the Codfather” Rafael, the agency lifted the ban that has kept at least 80 fishermen off the water and out of work.
NMFS announced the end of the ban on Thursday, approving lease-only operation plans for Sector IX and allocated quota for Sector VII.
When little headway was being made in lifting the ban this spring, 55 vessels in Sector IX, including four owned by Rafael, moved to be included in Sector VII for the 2018-19 fishing season in order to lease their quota and recoup losses from missed fishing time.
The process was slow moving, with quota remaining frozen while NMFS officials and the New England Fishery Management Council worked to review and approve a new operating plan.
NMFS’ final rule on the situation — published and opened for comment on Friday, July 20 — “determines the quota overages that Northeast Fishery Sector IX is responsible for paying back, allocates annual catch entitlements to Northeast Fishery Sectors VII and IX for the 2018 fishing year, approves a new lease-only operations plan for Northeast Fishery Sector IX, and approves a substantive amendment to Northeast Fishery Sector VII operations plan,” according to the Federal Register.
July 23, 2018 — New Bedford’s groundfishing fleet began to emerge from the criminal shadow of Carlos Rafael on Thursday when NOAA Fisheries announced the approval of new operational plans for two fishing sectors that have been shut down for the past eight months.
They’re not fishing yet. But there is light on the horizon.
NOAA Fisheries, in an interim final rule published Thursday morning in the Federal Register, approved plans to transform Northeast Fishing Sector IX to a lease-only operation for 2018. Meanwhile, all of Northeast Fishing Sector VII’s 56 vessels remain inactive and those vessels and permits owned by Rafael will remain unable to fish until they are sold to independent third parties, NOAA Fisheries said.
“To become active, the sector board would have to allow a vessel to harvest sector annual catch entitlement consistent with normal sector operations, and notify (NOAA Fisheries) of the vessel change in status” the rule stated. “In contrast to the vessels owned by Mr. Rafael, these vessels do not need to be sold in order to be active in the groundfish industry.”
In both cases, NOAA Fisheries said, the agency approved plans developed by the individual fishing sectors in consultation with federal fisheries regulators.
July 23, 2018 — New Bedford fishermen last week received the news they had been waiting to hear for eight months. Federal regulators lifted their ban against Sectors VII and IX — two groundfishing groups tied to Carlos Rafael.
The ban, which had been in place since Nov. 20 of last year, prevented 17 boats and roughly 80 fishermen from going out to sea. And it caused a ripple effect that was felt around the seaport.
Fuel suppliers, fish processors, boat engine mechanics and all the other support industries that work with the fishing fleet were hurt. By one estimate, some 240 jobs were lost to the ban.
So Thursday’s announcement from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration was welcome news.
“It’s finally happening,” said U.S. Rep. Bill Keating, who had long pressed for a timely resolution.
“We’re happy,” he said. “It’s something that we’ve been doing everything in our power to encourage.”
At The Standard-Times, we think NOAA’s action — albeit too long in coming — was a good first step. But we’re not ready to uncork the champagne yet.
Read the full opinion piece at the New Bedford-Standard Times