Saving Seafood

Long Island fishing industry takes a hit during pandemic

May 13, 2020 — On Tuesday morning, commercial fishing boats sat idle in the water at the Montauk town dock—an uncommon sight, especially this time of year. But lately, it’s become the new normal.

Bonnie Brady, the executive director of the Long Island Commercial Fishing Association, said that the majority of East End commercial fishermen, who are essential food production workers, are reeling from the COVID-19 pandemic. They’ve lost a tremendous amount of sales since many restaurants closed.

“When the restaurants closed, we lost the market with which we sold our fish,” Brady said. “We need to find ways to create markets, to create processing on the fly, long-term create mobile fish markets—anything and everything until we get our present system back in order.”

Pot fisherman Jim Auteri, who catches lobster, was hoping for a banner season.

Read the full story at Fox 5

NEW YORK: Where is money for Long Island’s fishing industry?

May 8, 2020 — Containing more than $2 trillion in stimulus spending, the CARES Act seemingly had something for everybody reeling from the coronavirus pandemic. That includes the nation’s fishermen, many of whom call Long Island their home. CARES contains $300 million to compensate both those who live off the sales of their catches and those whose boats are chartered by recreational anglers.

Boats that docked in Montauk alone in 2018 nabbed 12 million pounds of fish and cleared $18 million for the catch.

But for six weeks, none of the appropriated $300 million had been divvied up or released, and Rep. Lee Zeldin was badgering Congress and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration for details on how it would be divided and paid out.  Then, Thursday afternoon, information began to trickle out. The money is reportedly being allotted based on past-year revenues of each state’s fishing industries, so much of it went to big fishing states. Sen. Susan Collins tweeted that Maine, for instance, got about $20 million.

Read the full story at Newsday

A Quarantine Surprise: Americans Are Cooking More Seafood

May 5, 2020 — In 1963, on their way home from the hospital after he was born, Louis Rozzo’s parents stopped by a building on Ninth Avenue in Chelsea, where the family ran a wholesale seafood business, to weigh him in a scallop scale. This March, when virtually every restaurant, club and hotel that bought seafood from him closed and his firm’s income dried up in a matter of days, Mr. Rozzo went back to where it all began.

The F. Rozzo & Sons building was still in the family. Mr. Rozzo converted the ground floor into a makeshift store where he sells clams, scallops, sea bass and American red snapper to people who are suddenly cooking at home a lot more than they used to.

“I’m seeing people taking home fish, then coming in the next day and showing me pictures of how they prepared it,” he said. Some of them undertake recipes that require the better part of a day. Mr. Rozzo enjoys their enthusiastic feedback, although he also suggested that some of the energy New Yorkers are devoting to their kitchen projects is, like his overnight fish store itself, born of desperation.

“There’s not much else to do,” he said. “It’s either that or go home and drink all day.”

Read the full story at The New York Times

Commercial fishing industry on the ropes as pandemic-era shoppers avoid seafood

May 6, 2020 — Fisherman Marty Scanlon has not returned to his Long Island home since leaving for North Carolina at the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic in New York.

Scanlon, a longliner captain from Hauppauge left for North Carolina in early March — roughly the same time the first case of Covid-19 emerged in Manhattan. In the weeks that followed, Gov. Andrew Cuomo ordered most businesses to close, effective March 22, casting a pall over New York City restaurants in a once-bustling culinary capital.

Business for Scanlon has been brutal ever since.

“We basically don’t have the money to go home,” Scanlon said, over the phone. “We can’t go home til we pay our bills.”

Scanlon’s plight is reverberating across the Northeast. While meat, poultry and produce remain in demand, seafood, a once-reliable market, has been swapped for the whims of the home chef who has grown unused to, and perhaps slightly intimidated by the prospect of storing and preparing fish.

And it’s putting an $11 billion industry in New York and New Jersey on the ropes, with as much as a 30 percent drop in revenue since the coronavirus took hold in the region.

Scanlon and his crew aim to scrape 1,000 pounds of mixed swordfish and tuna each night, but it has become increasingly difficult to bear each trip’s financial costs in the face of dwindling profits, he said.

Read the full story at Politico

Orsted expects delays in South Fork offshore wind farm

April 30, 2020 — The South Fork offshore wind farm will “very likely” be delayed beyond its planned 2022 completion date, according to a top official for project developer Orsted, who cited a “prolonged” federal review of U.S. wind projects and the COVID-19 pandemic.

Denmark-based Orsted’s U.S. offshore wind projects were still advancing, said chief executive Henrik Poulsen in comments with the release of Orsted’s first quarter financial report, but at a “slower pace” than planned. He cited the South Fork wind farm as one of two projects that were the “most exposed to the risk of delays.”

A second project by Orsted known as the Skipjack wind farm off the coast of Maryland also will likely be delayed by about a year from its originally 2022 completion date, Poulsen said.

There are also “increased risks of delay” for another New York project known as Sunrise Wind, intended to connect to the Long Island grid in 2024, Poulsen said, as well two other East Coast projects. Sunrise Wind, awarded by New York State with a capacity of some 880 megawatts, has been hampered by an inability to complete offshore site surveys by vessels because of COVID-19 restrictions, Poulsen said. The company expects to have “more clarity” on whether the projects will meet 2023-24 completion dates “after summer,” Poulsen said.

Read the full story at Newsday

Coronavirus halts nation’s largest purchase of offshore wind

April 27, 2020 — The state’s Public Service Commission (PSC) authorised the New York Energy Research and Development Authority (Nyserda) to issue a new offshore wind solicitation for at least 1GW and up to 2.5GW.

The energy regulator has planned to issue the tender – which would be the US’ largest offshore wind auction to date – this summer, according to a petition filed with the PSC.

However, Nyserda has suspended its plans to hold the auction round indefinitely as government agencies prioritise New York’s response to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.

New York has recorded the highest number of cases and casualties in the US, according to statistics company Worldometer.

Read the full story at Wind Power Monthly

NEW YORK: Long Island butchers, fish markets and more pivot to delivery

April 20, 2020 — Man cannot live on takeout alone and, at some point, even the most stove-averse Long Islanders are going to have to start cooking. The good news is that some big-time restaurant suppliers, in an effort to shore up their flagging business, are now delivering to regular folks. Many local food purveyors are ramping up or initiating takeout services so you don’t have to go to the market, and some enterprising restaurants and caterers are even getting into the grocery game. In general, these companies offer quicker and more dependable delivery than regular supermarkets whose stock must be ordered through Instacart. But they are all overburdened in this new age of takeout so be prepared to be patient.

GENERAL GROCERIES

Baldor Specialty Foods: You’ve been eating Baldor provisions for decades without knowing it: it is one of the Northeast’s largest wholesale importers and distributors of fresh produce and specialty foods, a staple supplier of fine restaurants and markets. Now Baldor is making its vast inventory of specialty food available directly to consumers. All the staples are here, as well as foie gras, fiddlehead ferns and beef cheeks and pretty much anything you have ever eaten. Free delivery to all of Long Island with a $250 minimum. More info: baldorfood.com

The Chef’s Warehouse: One of the tristate region’s leading food service suppliers is now offering you 10-packs of frozen Neapolitan pizzas, 1-pound cans of jumbo lump crab meat, 5-liter tubs of gelato plus meats, produce, dairy and grocery items. Delivery takes up to four business days; trucks come to Long Island on Monday, Wednesday and Friday; free delivery for orders over $250 ($35 fee for smaller orders). More info: chefswarehouse.com

DiCarlo Foods (1630 N. Ocean Ave., Holtsville): You’ve probably seen DiCarlo’s trucks on Long Island’s roads and highways. The Holtsville-based company, founded in 1963, is one of the metropolitan area’s largest food distributors, supplying restaurants, pizzerias, hotels and institutions. But attached to the 5-million cubic-foot warehouse is a “Cash & Carry” open to the public that carries a wide range of fresh, frozen and packaged foods. Home delivery is available as well. More info: 631-758-6000, dicarlofood.com

Read the full story at Newsday

New York City seeks private support to keep crucial food distributors afloat

April 16, 2020 — New York City is seeking philanthropic support for its food distributors, raising some concerns about the viability of the merchants that sell fruit, vegetables and meat to groceries and bodegas in the epicenter of the United States coronavirus epidemic.

Food distributors are facing such “a significant liquidity issue,” that City Hall has asked the philanthropic and financial sectors to create a fund to support the merchants, according to a confidential memo acquired by POLITICO. While philanthropic dollars have been devoted to meals for the poor and vulnerable, the city is asking for donations to bolster a private industry crucial to the food supply of more than 8.6 million people.

“We’re completely dependent on the food distribution network,” said Kathryn Garcia, who serves as both the city’s Covid-19 food czar and its sanitation commissioner, in an interview Wednesday. “That’s how we eat. We need them to be resilient. We need them to be healthy.”

Read the full story at Politico

One month into coronavirus shutdowns, New Jersey fishermen search for new customers

April 9, 2020 — Weeks after the New York region’s fresh seafood market suddenly froze with government-mandated restaurant closings to control coronavirus, fishermen, docks and dealers are slowly finding new ways to get fresh fish to consumers.

“It’s a sustainable, natural, healthy resource,” said Richard Brecka, who owns the Shore Fresh Seafood Market at the Fishermen’s Dock Cooperative in Point Pleasant Beach, N.J. “We’ve got 13,000 pounds for tomorrow.”

Brecka’s crew was busily cutting black sea bass Wednesday afternoon, preparing for another open-air seafood sale near the dock, which was hit hard by the late March collapse of New York market prices. The first event April 4 attracted enough of a crowd – maintaining the required 6-foot social distancing among customers – to sell out 300 pounds of scallops in an hour.

“It’s coming back up” as retail customers seek out sources for local seafood, said Brecka. But the retail shop can handle only a portion of what the Point Pleasant fishermen can land during good weather, he added.

Read the full story at National Fisherman

Tensions build over menhaden fishing off coast of New York’s Long Island

April 7, 2020 — The timing of a recent crackdown on the use of purse seiners to catch menhaden off the coast of the state of New York’s Long Island is being questioned, the local newspaper News Day reports.

Some fishermen, who launched their boats from a ramp in Riverhead, were reportedly greeted Wednesday morning by Travis Wooten, a constable, who said they would be cited for using seine nets that stretch beyond the town’s 50-foot limit. Wooten said his stakeout was the result of complaints by residents who are concerned the fishing boats are damaging the bay bottom, depleting it of companion species such as striped bass.

The harvesters, who previously worked in cooperation with the town to prevent large die-offs of the menhaden, also known as bunkers, said they were surprised by the move.

Read the full story at Undercurrent News