Saving Seafood

$13M settlement proposed for Buzzards Bay oil spill

October 20, 2017 — BOSTON — More than 14 years after a barge spilled 98,000 gallons of oil into Buzzards Bay, state and federal officials have announced a proposed settlement that would require the transportation company in charge of the vessel to pay more than $13 million for the damage done to migratory birds and their habitats.

In April 2003, a Bouchard Transportation Co. barge traveling to the power plant on the Cape Cod Canal in Sandwich struck rocks south of Westport. The crash ruptured the barge’s hull and spilled thousands of gallons of oil into the bay, damaging salt marshes, beaches, and hundreds of birds such as loons, sea ducks, terns and shorebirds.

The settlement proposal by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and the states of Massachusetts and Rhode Island was filed in U.S. District Court, where it must be approved before being finalized.

If the settlement is approved, it would bring the total amount of money paid to resolve claims filed by the Natural Resource Damages Trustee Council, a group composed of several state and federal agencies, up to $19 million. Bouchard previously paid $6 million for claims on shoreline resources, piping plovers, and other damage recovery efforts.

Read the full story at the Cape Cod Times

MASSACHUSETTS: Governor Baker shakes up state fisheries commission

June 8, 2016 — When the administration of Gov. Charlie Baker announced a couple of weeks ago that seven of the nine sitting members of the state’s Marine Fisheries Advisory Commission were being replaced, many assumed the worst.

“This is strange and not well-thought-out,” said Phil Coates, of Sandwich, the retired former director of the state Division of Marine Fisheries. “It will have an impact that will go far beyond the new members.”

Coates, like many, wondered if the sacking of so many commissioners was retribution for the board not supporting Douglas Christel for Division of Marines Fisheries director last fall. Christel is a former NOAA Fisheries employee whose candidacy was backed by the Baker administration. Christel was the top choice of a screening committee to replace retired Director Paul Diodati over Division of Marine Fisheries deputy directors David Pierce and Dan McKiernan.

The commission selected Pierce, a longtime Marine Fisheries employee with many years working on state and federal fisheries issues, as Diodati’s representative on the New England Fishery Management Council.

Baker, Coates said, ignored the wisdom of replacing just three members at a time on the advisory commission to maintain institutional memory while managing a wide range of recreational and commercial fisheries that intersect with both federal fisheries management through the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration and coastwide species through the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission.

Read the full story at the Cape Cod Times