Saving Seafood

America’s largest scallop company sues New Bedford over waterfront expansion

February 22, 2021 — Roy Enoksen and his business partner own the largest scallop fleet in the world. Their 27 fishing vessels bring more than 80,000 pounds of seafood into New Bedford each day, employing more than 400 captains, fishermen and support staff.

But a construction project planned by the city’s port authority would cut off water access at one of Enoksen’s boat maintenance facilities.

A lawsuit filed by Enoksen last month has blown the lid off a simmering conflict between New Bedford and one of the largest employers along its waterfront. Enoksen owns multiple businesses that operate in the port, including Eastern Fisheries and Marine Hydraulics, a marine repair company that services his boats.

Mayor Jon Mitchell called the litigation “a veiled attempt to grab valuable land that belongs to the public for the purpose of enhancing the company’s already substantial profits.”

The proposed expansion of New Bedford’s North Terminal would cull more than six acres of fresh land from the harbor using sand dredged from the mouth of the Acushnet River. The dredging would create dozens of new spaces for commercial vessels and remove contaminated sediments that have turned the harbor into a federal Superfund site.

Read the full story at The Public’s Radio

MASSACHUSETTS: From boat to table: Family starts direct-to-consumer scallop business

February 22, 2021 — At the beginning of the pandemic and over 1,000 miles from New Bedford, Britt St. George and Madison Lees quarantined in Florida with their father, John Lees, founder of Mar-Lees Seafood and current president of New England Marine; their mother; and their significant others, Zack St. George and Edward Smith.

It was a time in which scallops were a part of nearly every conversation, Madison Lees said, and not just because their father is in the business. It was because the family business was growing.

Zack St. George and Smith are the guys behind The Scallop Guys, a new direct-to-consumer business selling scallops caught by Lees’ five New Bedford-based vessels.

Zack St. George, 30, said the pandemic gave them the extra motivation and time they needed to finally plan and launch the idea they’ve had for years.

They also figured it would be the perfect time to sell scallops directly to consumers online as restaurants were either closed or running at limited capacity, he said.

“Now or never, now is the time to do it,” Smith, 27, said.

Read the full story at the New Bedford Standard-Times

MASSACHUSETTS: Nordic Fisheries, Marine Hydraulics Suing City of New Bedford Over North Terminal Expansion

February 19, 2021 — Did the City of New Bedford breach a 99-year lease contract in the North Terminal expansion project? That’s what Nordic Fisheries and Marine Hydraulics are alleging. The two companies filed a lawsuit against the City of New Bedford on January 27.

The situation stems back to 2017, when the North Terminal expansion plans were first being discussed. By September 2019 Governor Charlie Baker announced the administration’s commitment of $24 million to dredge the New Bedford-Fairhaven Harbor. According to a press release, the funding would “enable the dredging of approximately 430,000 cubic yards of sediment from the harbor, deepening berths and access channels at more than 40 commercial marina and waterfront properties.”

Read the full story at Seafood News

MASSACHUSETTS: COVID-19 federal relief funds for SouthCoast fisheries topped $5 million

February 11, 2021 — Keith Decker, CEO of Blue Harvest Fisheries, said federal relief funds made a “big difference” in minimizing the impact of the pandemic. The company received just over $510,000 last year for its processing facility and four of its fishing vessels, according to state records.

Decker said they used the funds for production line modifications to allow for social distancing and improved worker safety. The company also adopted a temporary wage increase for “hazard pay” for workers who were able to continue working during the height of the pandemic, he said.

SouthCoast commercial fishermen, charter boat owners, aquaculture farmers and processors like Blue Harvest received about 18.5%, or $5.1 million, of federal funds allocated to Massachusetts last year for economic relief for fisheries.

The 2020 Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act, known more commonly as the CARES Act, authorized over $2 trillion in relief to individuals, businesses, hospitals, loan programs and other recipients to help ameliorate the economic impacts of COVID-19.

Read the full story at the New Bedford Standard-Times

Much of America’s seafood comes through this city. Here’s how it controlled COVID-19.

February 9, 2021 — At the heart of Fishing Vessel William Lee is a miniscule area to share meals. Crew members pack around a table just a few inches from an electric stove, which is outfitted with metal guards to stop piping-hot cookware from sliding onto them as the boat rocks on the Atlantic Ocean. About seven people will spend anywhere from 10 to 12 days at a time sharing these close quarters as they search for scallops, a famously lucrative and sustainable New England fishery.

In New Bedford, Massachusetts, where the William Lee docks, scalloping season begins in April. But in 2020, that aligned tragically with something else arriving on U.S. shores: a deadly pandemic.

Roughly 390 million pounds of seafood a year come through this place. A third of that is fished locally, while the rest is processed here but comes from Canadian, Scandinavian, and other international waters. After New Bedford processes and packages this mega-haul, the seafood is distributed globally via Boston and New York City. Whether you’re dining on poached halibut in Milwaukee or pan-seared scallops in Copenhagen, New Bedford almost certainly set the “market value” on the menu.

But nearby transportation hubs became the nation’s earliest viral epicenters, bottlenecking the supply chain. Heavy hits to the restaurant industry soon followed, causing auction prices for seafood to plummet even as the cost of the fishing expeditions—fuel, groceries, salaries, and tons of ice—remained high.

Read the full story at National Geographic

MASSACHUSETTS: New Bedford Fishing Heritage Center to Highlight Women’s Work

February 8, 2021 — Women have always played a big role in the world of commercial fishing, and a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts will help the New Bedford Fishing Heritage Center highlight their work at sea and on shore.

Women’s Work: At Sea, On Shore, At Home, In the Community will use photography, film, music, poetry, and storytelling to highlight the often-untold stories of women in commercial fishing communities.

The $15,000 NEA grant, which requires a local match, is among 1,073 grants awarded to local arts projects across the country, representing nearly $25 million in federal funding.

From March through December 2021 in New Bedford, gallery exhibits and programs will explore the lives, skills, and experiences of women who work in the fishing industry, as well as the work of those who are connected through family.

Read the full story at WBSM

Atlantic surf clams: With restaurant sales down, processors focus on retail

February 8, 2021 — Consumer demand for Atlantic surf clams and ocean quahogs has shifted in the past six months. Most of the fleet is centered around Point Pleasant Beach and Atlantic City, N.J.; Oceanview, N.Y.; Hyannis, Mass. (surf clams only); and New Bedford and Fairhaven, Mass. There is also a quahog fishery in Maine. 

Chris Shriver, general manager of Atlantic Capes Fisheries, a large processor headquartered in Massachusetts, says covid-19 has affected markets.

“A lot of our product does sell to the restaurant sector, wholesale, and to chains. All were impacted, due to the closures and limited seatings.” Shriver says some states are starting to open up a little, and that clam products from Rhode Island were still able to be sold locally in fry shacks and take-out establishments.

“But we’re all fearful for the next shoe to drop,” Shriver says. While Atlantic Capes does not produce canned products, they have substantial retail and soup manufacturing markets. The upshot is “there has definitely been an uptick in the retail sector.” But, adds Shriver, it is difficult to make up for the lost restaurant markets. 

Landings for surf clams, ocean quahog and Maine quahog are short of what they were at this time last year. By mid-September 2020, 32.5 percent of the surf clam quota (3.4 million bushels) and 25.5 percent of ocean quahog quota (5.33 million bushels) was harvested. Maine’s quahog fishery had harvested 10 percent of the 100,000-bushel quota for the state.

Read the full story at National Fisherman

Biden administration gives boost to offshore wind

February 5, 2021 — The Biden administration’s announcement this week of a plan to resume an environmental review of a wind farm off the Massachusetts coast and accelerate green-energy development was welcomed by developers and proponents of projects for Long Island.

Biden on Jan. 27 signed an executive order calling for the Interior Department to “identify steps to accelerate responsible development of renewable energy on public lands and waters,” a stark change from the Trump administration, which had slowed federal approvals. Trump himself was a vocal opponent of wind energy, saying it killed birds, was unreliable and even caused cancer.

The federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management on Wednesday released a statement saying it would restart the environmental review and work to develop a final environmental impact statement needed to approve the project’s construction and operations plan. The project, called Vineyard Wind, a company based in New Bedford, Massachusetts, had withdrawn its application for the construction plan for the 800-megawatt project, one of the first expected to come online, to review the prospect of using larger turbines.

Read the full story at Newsday

MASSACHUSETTS: New Bedford Fishing Heritage Center Receives NEA Grant

February 5, 2021 — The following was released by the New Bedford Fishing Heritage Center:

New Bedford Fishing Heritage Center has been approved for a $15,000 Grants for Arts Projects award from the National Endowment for the Arts to support Women’s Work: At Sea, On Shore, At Home, In the Community. This project will shine a light on the many roles women play in commercial fishing communities. New Bedford Fishing Heritage Center’s project is among 1,073 projects across America totaling nearly $25 million that were selected during this first round of fiscal year 2021 funding in the Grants for Arts Projects funding category.

“The National Endowment for the Arts is proud to support this project from New Bedford Fishing Heritage Center,” said Arts Endowment Acting Chairman Ann Eilers. “New Bedford Fishing Heritage Center is among the arts organizations across the country that have demonstrated creativity, excellence, and resilience during this very challenging year.”

“We are particularly excited to devote our gallery and much of this year’s programming to depictions of the full range of contributions that women make to the industry, thus dispelling the common misperception that the commercial fishing industry is exclusively a man’s world,” says Laura Orleans, Executive Director of New Bedford Fishing Heritage Center.

Women’s Work will use the arts of photography, film, music, poetry, and storytelling to highlight the often-untold stories of women in commercial fishing communities. From March through December 2021, an exhibit and public programs will engage visitors in exploring the lives, skills, and experiences of women who work in the fishing industry as well as those who are connected through family. The Center will partner with Our Sisters School, Greater New Bedford Vocational Technical High School, Global Learning Charter Public High School, and the YWCA to engage young people in this project.

This grant requires the Fishing Heritage Center to raise a match. We invite local businesses that may wish to sponsor this project to help us raise the match to contact info@fishingheritagecenter.org.

For more information on projects included in the Arts Endowment grant announcement, visit arts.gov/news.

Fate of boats owned by Carlos Rafael heading to court

February 3, 2021 — A legal dispute over the sale of fishing boats once owned by a disgraced former fishing magnate nicknamed “The Codfather” is headed to state court in Massachusetts this month.

It’s the latest development in a waterfront saga that has dragged on for years in one of busiest fishing ports in the country. Carlos Rafael, whose fishing operations were based out of New Bedford, Massachusetts, was once the owner of one of the largest commercial fishing operations in the U.S.

Rafael was sentenced to nearly four years in prison in 2017 for dodging quotas and smuggling profits overseas. The result of the government’s case against Rafael included forced divestiture of his assets and a permanent ban from commercial fishing.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at The Star Tribune