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Commercial Fisheries News
Volume 34 Number 5
January 2007
DMR clarifies nonresident lobster license intent
AUGUSTA, ME – The Maine Department of Marine Resources (DMR) and the Lobster Advisory Council (LAC) had a full slate of discussion topics when they met on Nov. 15, including proposed legislation, bay management issues, and lobster license plate grant funding.
The first of two draft bills DMR presented to the council initially provoked a heated response. This bill, titled “An Act to Create a Non-Resident Lobster and Crab Landing Permit,” would create a permit to allow nonresident lobstermen to land their legal catch as defined by Maine law in a Maine port, according to DMR Deputy Commissioner David Etnier.
Presently, state law says that dealers can only purchase lobsters landed in Maine ports from Maine-licensed lobster harvesters.
This issue primarily arose when established Maine lobster businesses, most of which straddle the Piscataqua River on the border that divides Maine and New Hampshire, were told by the Maine Marine Patrol about two years ago that they could no longer purchase lobster landed on their wharves by New Hampshire-licensed lobstermen.
A number of advisory council members were concerned that this draft bill would allow dragger-caught lobsters to be landed in Maine, but DMR staff assured them this was a different issue.
Col. Joe Fessenden, chief of the Maine Bureau of Marine Patrol, added that the Maine law prohibiting the landing of lobsters by mobile gear is on solid ground.
When advisory council member and Zone D council member Gerry Cushman asked Fessenden why he was so sure, Fessenden explained that it had been challenged in the past and the courts had made it clear that states can have more restrictive laws.
Effort reduction
The second draft bill DMR presented to the advisory council, titled “An Act to Amend Laws Pertaining to Entry into the Lobster Fishery,” incorporates effort reduction steps agreed to by the advisory council, including the following:
• A new zone option that will allow for the creation of a “parallel” waiting list for young people less than 18 years of age;
• A proposed statewide 17-year-old minimum age requirement to obtain a commercial lobster license; and
• A change in the exit/entry ratio that ties the number of trap tags retired to the number of trap tags issued.
Right now, DMR issues new licenses based on the number of retired lobster licenses and has allowed up to 800 trap tags to be issued per new license, depending on zone restrictions.
Regarding the new zone option, the waiting list now in use is for apprentices who have completed the program and are over 18 years old. The waiting lists are part of the entry/exit ratios for zones.
The DMR intends to submit the lobster bills for consideration in the state’s new legislative session, which officially gets underway in January.
Apprentice education
In the October 2006 issue, CFN reported that DMR and advisory council members were interested in requiring young lobstermen to earn a high school diploma or GED in order to be eligible to receive their commercial license.
The DMR has removed the high school graduation or GED requirement from the table after consulting with the Maine Attorney General’s Office.
To require a young person to graduate from high school or receive a GED could be considered unconstitutional or discriminatory, according to Mark Randlett, an assistant attorney general who attended the meeting.
When asked by Elliott Thomas, advisory council member and Zone F council member, why plumbers and electricians had to have an education to be licensed but lobstermen didn’t, Randlett indicated that different trades have specific education components and the licensing requires people entering some trades to be tested on those components before receiving a license. That situation is different than simply requiring a general education degree or high school diploma.
Although there were some early indications that the lobster zones might purse the education requirement through legislation on their own, that is viewed as less likely to happen now in light of the legal advice.
Bay management
Deirdre Gilbert, assistant to the DMR commissioner, and Vanessa Levesque of the Maine Coastal Program of the State Planning Office presented an update on the Bay Management Study.
In 2003, the Aquaculture Task Force was formed after some coastal residents became concerned with aquaculture leasing and siting. The task force identified a need to look at all uses and impacts in bays and recommended that the study be broad enough to cover more than just aquaculture.
The Legislature subsequently passed LD 1857. The bill, titled “An Act to Implement the Recommendations of the Task Force on the Planning and Development of Marine Aquaculture in Maine,” became law on July 30, 2004.
Part B of the law directs Maine’s Land and Water Resources Council to carry out a two-year study to explore and document potential new and innovative concepts for the management of Maine’s embayments.
The law required the council to submit a final report by Jan. 15, 2007 to the Legislature’s Marine Resources Committee. Staffers from DMR and the State Planning Office did the work assisted by a steering committee made up of public members with experience in relevant areas.
To clear up any confusion, the report that will be submitted to the Legislature will be titled “Managing Maine’s Near-Shore Coastal Resources (draft report of Bay Management Study).”
Levesque said that, among other things, the report will suggest funding or supporting regional initiatives for groups, such as municipalities or conservation-oriented groups, that want to organize. This could provide an opportunity for fishermen and others to work with landowners on land-based water quality problems or on coastal access issues.
“We hear a lot about water quality concerns,” she said, adding that there was no intention to interfere with any cooperative fisheries agreements.
DAM actions
On Nov. 13, the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) sent out permit holder letters announcing the two Dynamic Area Management (DAM) actions that began on Nov. 18 and were scheduled to end on Dec. 2.
While passing out nautical charts showing the two DAM areas to the LAC and audience, Fessenden pointed out that very large areas fell under these DAM restrictions.
According to NMFS, the southern Maine DAM totals approximately 1,549 square nautical miles and the eastern DAM totals approximately 1,809 square nautical miles.
On Dec. 13, NMFS announced it would extend the DAMs for a second time through Jan. 1, 2007. Up-to-date DAM information is available online at <www.nero.noaa.gov/whaletrp>.
Grant funding
In late October, DMR staff, with the assistance of the Lobster Research, Education, and Development Board, approved $382,784 in grant awards funded by the lobster license plate fee.
Three research projects and three development projects were funded. The funded projects are:
• Developing a user-friendly computer program for the new Bayesian size-structured lobster stock assessment model – Principal investigators Yong Chen, Carl Wilson, and Paul Anderson, $100,000;
• Research on lobster age-size relationships: developing regional specific growth from meta-analysis of existing data – Principal investigators Rick Wahle, Yong Chen, and Peter Lawton, $70,000;
• Temperature and Lobster-Aging – Principal investigator Sean Grace, $40,000;
• Optimizing lobster value through development of a value-added product manufactured from processing waste – Principal investigator L. Brian Perkins, $28,603;
• Marketing and development activities (specifically for the Marine Stewardship Council Certification assessment portion of the proposal) – Principal investigator Maine Lobster Promotion Council, $25,000;
• Optimizing the value of harvested lobster by developing a shelf-stable sausage from lobster mince – Principal investigator Alfred Bushway, $19,181.
Another $70,000 will go towards the cost of safety courses administered by Coast Guard-approved instructors for apprentices.
An additional $10,000 will be used to support travel by Maine lobstermen to the 8th International Conference & Workshop on Lobster Biology and Management in September 2007 on Prince Edward Island.
DMR will be working to get out information on how to apply for funding to attend the conference, said Gilbert.
Other business
Among other issues discussed at the Nov. 15 Lobster Advisory Council meeting were the following:
• The Maine Offshore Lobstermen’s Association presented its proposal for an Area 1/Area 3 overlap (see CFN September 2006 for details).
While advisory council members were supportive of the group, National Marine Fisheries Service is thought to be unlikely to take any action on this proposal at this time.
• Advisory council members voted Chad Dorr as the new member of the Maine Lobster Promotion Council. Dorr will represent the Downeast region as a dealer member. And
• DMR announced that the Lobster Seed Fund request for proposals would go out in December.
The next meeting of the Lobster Advisory Council is tentatively scheduled for Jan. 17, 2007.
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