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Commercial Fisheries News
Volume 32 Number 12
July 2005
DMR council approves limited entry for Zone A
AUGUSTA, ME - When the Department of Marine Resources (DMR) Advisory Council met here on June 15, they faced making a tough decision on whether to limit entry into lobster Zone A.
After an hour-long debate, the council passed a rule-making proposal that sets a 3:1 exit ratio for the zone, which includes the area between Schoodic Point and the Canadian boundary line.
The 8 to 4 vote immediately opened Zone A to the issuance of new licenses, eliminating the moratorium that went into effect when the zone council started the limited entry process last October. But lobstermen will be allowed in at the approved ratio, with one new Class I, II, or III license holder in for every three who failed to renew their licenses from the previous year.
The vote also means that anyone currently enrolled in the apprentice program will not immediately be entitled to a Zone A license when they finish the apprentice requirements. Instead, they will go onto the zone’s waiting list.
That consequence was the most controversial part of the limited entry debate. Many of the opposing comments at the March 24 public hearing on the proposed exit ratio focused on the unfairness to apprentices of changing the rules in mid-stream. There were many comments in favor of grandfathering any apprentices already in the program.
About 20 of the Zone A apprentices, who had been holding meetings since the public hearing to consider how to challenge the exit ratio rules, hired Bangor attorney Robert Sutcliffe and were present at the advisory council meeting.
Before the start of the discussion, DMR Commissioner George Lapointe explained that the advisory council would not take comments from the audience at the meeting because the public comment period was already closed.
Terry Stockwell, DMR resource coordinator, explained Zone A’s adherence to the process set by law for requesting limited entry and an exit ratio. It has involved over two years of zone council meetings, meetings within each zone district, a zone-wide questionnaire and an official survey that was mailed to every lobster license holder including apprentices and student apprentices, and, finally, a 7 to 1 vote by the Zone A council last January asking the DMR commissioner to approve the 3:1 ratio.
Stockwell said the zone council had followed the process to a “T.”
Lapointe explained a recently signed bill that grandfathers apprentices who had completed 92 percent of the apprentice program in zones with no exit ratio when the zone starts the limited entry process. That new law will help some of the 194 Zone A apprentices to be eligible for a license when it takes effect in late August, he said.
There was some confusion about the 194 number, if they would all go on the waiting list or whether some were students, who can get Class I licenses before they turn 18 if they complete apprentice requirements.
That discussion prompted council member Bill Sutter to ask if the advisory council could postpone the effective date of the exit ratio.
“I see that as a way to address the dilemma that affects a lot of people who entered the system in good faith,” he said.
But, after checking with the attorney general’s office, Lapointe said the postponement would be considered a substantive change, which can’t be done without another rule-making proposal.
Council member Glen Libby asked what happened to apprentices in the state’s five other lobster zones, when each went to limited entry.
Lapointe said that the process, which is spelled out in state law, has no provision for grandfathering.
Council member Susan Farady asked if the 39.5 percent response from the zone’s lobster license holders was typical of the other zones when they made the decision to go to limited entry. Lapointe said everyone had the chance to participate and that the discussion of limited entry had been going on in the zone since 2003.
“This came from the bottom up,” said council member David Turner of Perry, which is in Zone A. “There have been over two years of discussion. There have been many opportunities to change the votes of those eight people (zone council members).”
Council member Mike Danforth asked if the exit ratio would reduce the number of traps in the water, since the 52.6 percent growth in the zone’s trap tag sales was used by supporters as an argument for limiting entry.
Stockwell said that that was a hotly contested issue and two zones have seen net reductions in tag numbers. In other zones tags have been redistributed among the license categories.
Susan Jones
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