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Tom Hilton
Posts: 1,595 Captain
Gulf Council Meeting in San Antonio
Tom Hilton
Posts: 1,595 Captain
Howdy,
There is a Gulf Council meeting this coming week (starting tomorrow) in San Antonio. You may be interested to know that they are considering taking final action on the Charterboat and Headboat IFQ/PFQ system at this meeting and sending it up to the Secretary of Commerce for approval/implementation.
http://gulfcouncil.org/wp-content/uploads/B-6a-Draft-RF-Amendment-41.pdf
http://gulfcouncil.org/wp-content/uploads/B-5a-Draft-RF-Amendment-42-1.pdf
This is where they would carve out a % of the total recreational allocation of the following species; red snapper, greater amberjack, grey triggerfish, gag grouper, and red grouper, and give OWNERSHIP of these fish to a few for-hire corporations.
And you thought this was JUST about red snapper. This is just the beginning and it will not stop until every single federally-managed fish swimming out there is gifted to corporations and in the process, YOUR access is diminished. Next will be beeliners, cobia, dorado, king mackerel, spanish mackerel, etc.
If you do not agree with this action, you should show up in San Antonio on Wednesday to make the public comments portion of the meeting to voice your disapproval of this theft of our Public Trust Resources.
Public testimony will be held on Wednesday, August 9 from 1:30 to 5:30 p.m. at the Marriott Plaza in San Antonio.
Ask them why they are giving OUR fish away for FREE, and why they aren't considering levying royalties on these corporations for the privilege of profiting from the harvest of OUR Public Trust Resources like any other industry is mandated by law to pay.
It's time to say NO! to Catch Shares and return to REAL fisheries management instead of this fish grab to benefit the bank accounts of a few corporations. The future access to our fisheries for our children is on the line here.
http://www.Freedom2Fish.org
There is a Gulf Council meeting this coming week (starting tomorrow) in San Antonio. You may be interested to know that they are considering taking final action on the Charterboat and Headboat IFQ/PFQ system at this meeting and sending it up to the Secretary of Commerce for approval/implementation.
http://gulfcouncil.org/wp-content/uploads/B-6a-Draft-RF-Amendment-41.pdf
http://gulfcouncil.org/wp-content/uploads/B-5a-Draft-RF-Amendment-42-1.pdf
This is where they would carve out a % of the total recreational allocation of the following species; red snapper, greater amberjack, grey triggerfish, gag grouper, and red grouper, and give OWNERSHIP of these fish to a few for-hire corporations.
And you thought this was JUST about red snapper. This is just the beginning and it will not stop until every single federally-managed fish swimming out there is gifted to corporations and in the process, YOUR access is diminished. Next will be beeliners, cobia, dorado, king mackerel, spanish mackerel, etc.
If you do not agree with this action, you should show up in San Antonio on Wednesday to make the public comments portion of the meeting to voice your disapproval of this theft of our Public Trust Resources.
Public testimony will be held on Wednesday, August 9 from 1:30 to 5:30 p.m. at the Marriott Plaza in San Antonio.
Ask them why they are giving OUR fish away for FREE, and why they aren't considering levying royalties on these corporations for the privilege of profiting from the harvest of OUR Public Trust Resources like any other industry is mandated by law to pay.
It's time to say NO! to Catch Shares and return to REAL fisheries management instead of this fish grab to benefit the bank accounts of a few corporations. The future access to our fisheries for our children is on the line here.
http://www.Freedom2Fish.org
Replies
As some of you know I spend most of my time on international fishery issues at ICCAT. I have served with Pam Dana, former chairman of gulf council. I also serve with Anna Beckwith of SAFMC. and spent some nice time with both at ICCAT 2016.
I do not understand how this is happening in America!
**** is going on to let this happen before our very eyes?
i can tell you both names mentioned above are stand up people that I would trust, but how is this happening?????
Ron, First off, I respect your opinions. But I don't think Dr. Dana was ever Chair of the Gulf Council. She was a highly respected member of the Fla. representatives (I thought she did a great job), until apparently, someone got her removed from the Gov's recommendation list at the last minute. Her nomination was replaced by the Yamaha guy.
But, the action being described is to give headboats their own allocations. Charter isn't far behind, if it survives. To be honest, I think its a good thing to separate for-hire from private.
Keep in mind (as per the original post):
G. AJ is 74/26 rec/com
Trigger is about 80/20 rec/com
Gag is about 65/35 rec/com
Red snapper is a nearly even split and red grouper is something like 15/85 rec/com
Recs have the majority of catch or an even split in 4 of these 5 species. Only red grouper is allocated strongly to comms.
All of these commercial vs rec vs private rec and for-hire landings can be defined over time for allocations.
Each of these species has experienced massive rec overruns in recent years, resulting is reduced rec quotas because of "paybacks". For-hire want reporting and accountability. Why shouldn't they want their own allocation when the states won't support control of the private sector?
just sayin'
The commercial/enviro interests on the Council at this meeting tried to push through the vote for the referendum requirements for AMs 41 and 42 even though NOAA Counsel advised them that they had not been properly vetted and reviewed. New NMFS head Chris Oliver attended the meeting, and it was obvious that Roy Crabtree wasn't comfortable moving forward with AMs 41 and 42 with the obvious issue of 2 lame duck commercial/enviro reps on the Council being able to vote on this while they still have the votes.
The for-hire boats do not deserve ANY allocation to "own" as their assets - these fish belong to ALL Americans and the federal government, NMFS, Gulf Council simply do not have the right to give away OUR Public Trust Resources to individuals or corporations for their exclusive access/benefit.
The for-hire boats do not deserve ANY allocation gifted to them as their "assets" since that is a RECREATIONAL allocation reserved for RECREATIONAL fishermen. A recreational fisherman is a recreational fisherman regardless of what platform his feet is standing on, whether it be a shoreline, a pier, a jetty, his own vessel or a friend's vessel, or a for-hire vessel.
The ONLY reason for sector separation was to provide the mechanism to implement Catch Shares. Once AM 40 (sector separation) was approved, they IMMEDIATELY went into AMs 41 and 42, and proved that prediction that I made over 7 years ago. The proof is in the pudding today - the ONLY things on the table with these amendments are IFQs/PFQs, made possible by AM 40 (sector separation) and they have expanded to include 4 other species in addition to red snapper now.
The Gulf charter boats are no more "accountable" today than they were before sector separation. If you consider that in 2016, Alabama's 132 charter boats landed (according to NMFS figures) almost 700,000 pounds of red snapper, FL panhandle's 299 boats landed about 737,000 pounds, and Texas' 219 charter boats landed 20,063 pounds. Accountable? No. Yet, they falsely claim that they underfished their quota last year. If reasonable calculations were used, it would show that there is an extremely high probability that they OVERFISHED their quota by at least 1/2 million pounds last year. Yet, the Gulf Council gave them even MORE days this year.
Why the push to go to IFQs/PFQs for the for-hire fleet? This year's for-hire allocation = 2,278,000 pounds for red snapper. Last year, according to NMFS numbers, charter boats accounted for about 75% of the for-hire landings, and the headboats landed about 25%.
Assuming that this year is the same, 75% of 2,278,000 pounds = 1,708,500 pounds / 800 Gulf cfh boats = 2,135 pounds per boat per season.
2,135/100 pounds of red snapper per trip = 21.35 trips/year based on this year's allocation, yet they gave them 49 days. What? 49 days where the AL/FL panhandle boats are making multiple trips/day when there are only enough fish for about 21 trips per season?
Doesn't that invite overfishing? Where is the "accountability" here? There is none.
As a side note, Alabama charter boats average 130 pounds per trip, as well as 1.2 trips per day according to the Alabama DNR - plug those numbers in and it gets a LOT worse. The FL panhandle boats have a plethora or multi-passenger vessels in their charter fleet, yet there is no accounting of which boats are fishing, what the passenger capacity of each boat fishing actually is, or how many trips/day they are taking. Yet, they are more "accountable" and less likely to overfish their quota than private recs? What a joke.
It's time for AMs 41 and 42 to die. It's time for AMs 30B and 40 to be rescinded and the Gulf of Mexico recreational fishermen given EQUAL access. It's time for Magnuson to be changed to allow fisheries managers to manage their fisheries based on what THEIR ecosystems/biomass/effort can sustainably afford. It's time to put in the garbage management policies that promote segregation and discrimination as AMs 30B and 40 certainly do.
If the numbers show that there is enough fish for 800 charter boats to be able to take about 21 trips per season, then WHY are they pushing IFQs/PFQs when they already have 49 days access? Doesn't make sense.
Oh snap - I forgot. The Gulf for-hire corporations may get fewer days to provide the "millions of non-boat owning Americans" to go fish with IFQs/PFQs....(WAIT - isn't that contrary to the supposed purpose of sector separation?)....but they gain OWNERSHIP OF OUR FISH WITH IFQS/PFQS, along with the associated value of fish that are "reserved" for their exclusive access/benefit.
It's time to stop the proliferation of schemes designed to steal OUR fish (Catch Shares) and get back to REAL fisheries management.
Lastly, you do not need sector separation to implement ELBs (electronic logbooks), and I agree it is time to bring the charter boats into a more accountable situation. After all, the Beaufort Headboat Survey has been in place for many years without the requirement to be "separated".
Still the same old people who can make a difference seem to be the people who are secretly in back rooms selling us out..
how many years have you all been posting stuff when there is nothing accomplished but the worst..???
it's almost like Hillary Clinton has the rule on you..
If that's the case, you may want to look in the mirror first.
But when they start to split AJ's Gag's Triggers, etc, for the CFH and Headboats, where are the numbers going to come from, the Rec allotment,, thus reducing more fish for those of us with boats. Then, after our season is over, we will have to pay a charter boat to take us fishing for fish that were originally allotted to us. :banghead
Where will these fish come from in the TAC? Will they retroactively apply the overages/paybacks that most certainly occurred in recent years? Will the private recs be penalized by 407d due to this very probable overfishing by the for-hire sector?
I agree, how bout you?