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Commercial Fisheries News
Volume 37 Number 7
March 2010
NE council adopts higher scallop target of .24
PORTSMOUTH, NH – On Jan. 27, the New England Fishery Management Council sat before a packed audience of industry members and elected officials to reconsider its November decision on Framework Adjustment 21 to the federal scallop plan. It was a time like no other in the council’s history, according to many who cast the deciding votes.
After hours of presentations and powerful, often poignant, testimony, the council did change its position. It endorsed a fishing mortality (F) target of .24, which would result in full-time scallopers being allocated 38 open-area days-at-sea for the 2010 fishing year.
Back in November, the council adopted a target of .20, leading to 29 open-area days. The Jan. 27 shift took place in a 10-to-5 vote with two abstentions.
The higher allocation still needs to be approved by the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) and, throughout the deliberations, NMFS Northeast Regional Administrator Pat Kurkul urged the council to be “very clear” about the rationale for reversing its decision.
“It is unprecedented to revisit a final action,” she said.
Furthermore, Kurkul reminded the council that it had already submitted Framework 21 to NMFS in December, and that the framework document contained “a very strong record” for the council’s previous .20 position.
The council took this advice to heart as it weighed all the arguments.
Rhode Island council member Frank Blount said, “This is probably one of the most difficult votes I’m ever going to have to make.”
The room was filled with tension throughout much of the morning – until the outcome seemed evident.
Here is how this very intense day played out.
Six turbulent weeks
Chairman John Pappalardo of Massachusetts started off by describing the progression of events that followed the council’s November meeting in Newport, RI (see CFN February 2010 for timeline).
Along the waterfront, the reality of the economic consequences of the .20 vote quickly sank in and triggered a united outcry.
With organizational support and leadership from the Fisheries Survival Fund, scallopers immediately called on US Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) for help. Numerous other members of Congress joined in, as did state representatives and officials, including, in a very big way, New Bedford Mayor Scott Lang and Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick.
For almost six solid weeks, nearly everyone in or even remotely involved with the scallop industry was immersed in the fray – writing letters, making phone calls, attending meetings, and sending e-mails.
It all culminated on Jan. 10 and 11, when Pappalardo sat down with Gov. Patrick on that Sunday afternoon and then, after careful consideration, announced on Monday morning that the subject of scallop Framework 21 would be the 8:30 am agenda item on Jan. 27 during the council’s Portsmouth meeting.
Detailed testimony
And so, on Jan. 27, after explaining his reasoning for allowing Framework 21 to be reconsidered, Pappalardo opened the floor to public comments (see pages 14A-15A for excerpts).
Speakers approached the mike in a steady stream, led by Garth Patterson, who spoke on behalf of Rep. Frank. Mayor Lang came next, followed by Massachusetts state representatives Bill Straus and John Quinn and, later, state Sen. Bruce Tarr.
Next, Drew Minkiewicz of the Fisheries Survival Fund (FSF) gave a PowerPoint presentation – to the council – to more fully explain industry’s case and its rationale for seeking an F target of .24 for Framework 21.
The privilege was extraordinary in terms of council protocol, yet FSF representatives made a strong case prior to the meeting that this method – allowing one, full-scale presentation – would best serve everyone involved and save dozens and dozens of individual scallopers from having to head to the microphone to drive home their points.
Mid-Atlantic scallopers traveled to New Hampshire in notable numbers, and Virginia-based industry leaders Bill Wells of Wells Scallop Company and David Gray of Chesapeake Bay Packing drove home the implications of the council’s decision on “real people” in terms of job losses and market impacts.
Yellowtail, process
In another remarkable development, Vito Giacalone of the Northeast Seafood Coalition told the council that scallopers and groundfish fishermen had worked out a deal on yellowtail, recognizing that the higher F of .24 would result in more yellowtail bycatch.
“The groundfish fishermen have decided to stand behind the scallopers on the yellowtail portion of the argument,” he said. “We don’t want to see yellowtail stop brother scallop fishermen from making an additional $40 million.”
Others spoke about the council process, fishing communities, and the economics of the seafood business. And many thanked the individuals and public officials who helped advance industry’s call for reconsideration.
Empathy, bitterness
After all was said, Pappalardo brought the discussion back to the council table.
Scallop plan coordinator Deirdre Boelke – through her own PowerPoint presentation – recapped Framework 21 and the council’s November actions.
Council members then began to deliberate. Some asked questions, some took stands, others verbally tried to think their way through the pros and cons of sticking with .20 vs. switching to .24.
Some expressed empathy for industry’s position, recognizing that both the .20 and .24 options were valid in the eyes of scientists with differing levels of risk.
Others expressed anger and even bitterness over what they called “personal attacks” on individual council members – and the council as a whole – and criticized what they described as bullying advanced by an “incompetent yellow press.”
Rhode Island council member Dave Preble was particularly offended.
Recounting the old adage, “Politics is a contact sport,” he said, “This one takes the cupcake. I’m having a hard time getting past that to look at this in a reasonable light, even though I know it’s not the way to do things.”
More complexities
The debate took a complicated turn when a third number was added to the mix – .37.
The current overfishing limit is .29. But last fall, the Scientific and Statistical Committee (SSC) updated that figure to .37 while determining the acceptable biological catch for the fishery. That number is being considered as the potential overfishing limit for scallop Amendment 15.
Massachusetts council member David Pierce, however, fiercely argued that .37 should be used immediately as the “best scientific information available” because it came from the SSC.
“We are ruled by the SSC,” he said.
Pierce argued that under a 2010 fishing mortality rate of .24, scallopers would be nowhere near the .37 level. He then made a motion for the council to adopt .24.
Northeast Fisheries Science Center Director Nancy Thompson countered adamantly that .37 was not yet a viable gauge of anything.
“It has yet to be peer reviewed,” she said.
Relative risk
Mid-Atlantic council Chairman Rick Robins, who serves on the scallop committee and sat in on the New England council’s meeting as the Mid-Atlantic’s liaison, said he didn’t think the council needed to “get ahead of itself” by using the .37 before it had been peer reviewed and officially incorporated into the scallop plan.
Instead, he thought the council had other justification for endorsing .24 over .20.
After carefully reviewing the audio of the council’s November deliberations – and having had participated in that discussion himself – Robins said one of the council’s primary reasons for going with .20 was due to the “perceived risk” of exceeding the F limit of .29 if it chose the higher .24 rate.
The council had adopted .20 as the target F for the 2008 and 2009 fishing years and exceeded that .20 target both times – possibly even exceeding the .29 limit in 2009.
The fear for 2010 was that .24 would have an even greater chance of exceeding .29, which would put the fishery in the condition of “overfishing is occurring.”
“I recognize that this was just one of the factors in the decision in November, but I think it was a very substantial factor,” said Robins.
However, things should be different in 2010, he continued.
That’s because the scallop plan development team (PDT) not only updated the actual number of vessels landing scallops in the limited-access fishery, but it also significantly revised the way it projected landings per unit effort (LPUE) for open-area days in developing the .20 and .24 alternatives.
Uncertainty diminished
Robins went back to the old Framework 19 document and compared LPUE estimates for open-area days with those used for Framework 21.
In Framework 19, the PDT estimated LPUE for open-area days at 1,172 pounds, while in Framework 21, the PDT used 1,700 pounds.
“So it’s 45% higher than the open-area LPUE figure that was used in Framework 19,” said Robins.
While questions were raised about the LPUE calculations during the November meeting, specific numbers weren’t available.
But now that the figures were on the table during this Jan. 27 meeting, Robins said, “I think we do have some additional information in front of us today … and that gives me significantly more comfort than I would have had in November.
“We’ve had this discussion before and said that if we account for the uncertainty associated with open-area days-at-sea catch, we’ve captured the bulk of the management uncertainty in this fishery,” he continued. “I think this point is relevant.”
Boelke confirmed that the PDT did have more “confidence” in its 2010 landings projections under the revised figures.
Mistakes all around
Maine council member Mary Beth Tooley urged the council to consider the new information along with what was already in existing PDT documents.
She said the council was on safe ground by adopting .24 as the 2010 fishing mortality target without bringing in any discussion of a higher overfishing limit such as .37.
As the debate wound down, audience members sensed that the tide had turned in their favor.
Massachusetts council member Rodney Avila said, “The best thing about being old is being able to own-up to your mistakes. Through this whole process, we’ve all made a lot of mistakes. Industry made mistakes. The council made mistakes.
“Now, knowing that you made a mistake, you’ve got to own-up and try to correct that mistake,” Avila continued. “If we go away and not try to correct that mistake, we will have done everybody an injustice. We will have done industry an injustice. We will have done this process an injustice. So that’s why I support this motion (for .24).”
Fellow Massachusetts council member Jim Fair had almost the final word, saying, “I think that if we had had this same debate at the November meeting the outcome would have been very different, or at least partially different.”
With that, the council voted and changed its position from .20 to .24.
Janice M. Plante
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