THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, May 30, 1995 TAG: 9505300076
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: BY BETTY MITCHELL GRAY, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: RALEIGH LENGTH: Long : 168 lines
Twenty-five years ago, much of the Atlantic Coast's striped bass stocks were near record lows.
By 1981, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission, composed of representatives from 15 states from Maine to Florida, devised a coastwide plan to help striped bass recover. Three years later, compliance with the plan by Atlantic Coast states was mandated by Congress, prompting stringent restrictions on striped bass fishing.
Not long after the striped bass recovery plan was implemented, the population began to improve and from 1990 to 1994, the striped bass stocks started growing at about 25 percent a year.
For some fishermen and fisheries managers, the story of the striped bass recovery is a lesson in the advantages of interstate fisheries management plans and mandatory compliance with those plans.
``The ocean fishery has seen a 3.5-fold increase in the commercial quota in 1995,'' said John Field, the commission's striped-bass coordinator. ``In the latter half of the 20th century that's a pretty remarkable feat in fisheries management.''
But for some commercial fishermen, it provides a lesson in what's wrong with the commission and its mandatory quotas.
``Across the board, there are still no provisions that suit fishermen because it still requires wasting of a resource to comply with a quota system,'' said Merry Hill commercial fisherman Terry Pratt. ``If I land five fish per day, that's counted against the quota. But that doesn't take into account that I threw away dead fish.''
Pratt said that not only is the striped bass quota wasteful, regulations imposed to protect that species of fish also make it difficult for him to earn a living catching other species of fish.
Dissatisfaction with the commission has been a topic of concern for more than a year among some commercial fishermen. But it has intensified in recent weeks.
As fishermen, fisheries managers and other coastal interests monitor the state legislature for final action on a bill to study withdrawing from the compact, they are continuing to debate the role of the commission and interstate fisheries management in North Carolina.
In North Carolina, fishing in the state's coastal waters is governed by legislation enacted by the General Assembly and by rules enacted by the 17-member Marine Fisheries Commission whose members are appointed by the governor.
But fish that migrate along the Atlantic coast - such as striped bass, Spanish mackerel, flounder and weakfish - are also under the purview of the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission, established in 1942.
``Our reason for existing is so that fishermen can go fishing,'' said Jack Dunnigan, director of the Atlantic States commission, last week from Washington, D.C. ``That's why we're in business.''
The ASMFC operates habitat protection and statistics-gathering programs, and distributes grants to its member states.
But its fisheries management program is at the center of the recent controversy.
The program, begun in 1980, develops cooperative management plans for marine, estuarine and migratory species of fish along the Atlantic Coast. The ASMFC is in charge of 16 management plans for migratory fish and is developing additional plans for black sea bass and scup.
Before 1993, compliance with most of these plans - which include weakfish, also known as gray trout, and summer flounder, North Carolina's two most valuable finfish -was voluntary. But faced with declines in weakfish stocks and under pressure from some of the northern Atlantic Coast states, Congress that year considered more stringent measures.
In 1993 Congress adopted the Atlantic Coastal Fisheries Cooperative Management Act, whichrequired states to comply with ASMFC plans or face sanctions - such as a moratorium on fishing for the species of fish in question.
The 1993 law led to a flurry of activity by the ASMFC and by the state Division of Marine Fisheries in early 1994 to develop fisheries management measures - minimum size limits, catch limits, seasonal restrictions and the like - to comply with about 10 fisheries management plans.
At the time, the N.C. Fisheries Association complained that it failed to involve fishermen in the development and implementation of these plans, some of which became mandatory in 1994.
The ASMFC did not do a very good job in the past of either communicating with the public or involving fishermen and others in the development of its management plans, according to state fisheries Director Bruce L. Freeman.
But with the recent implementation of a new public involvement guidelines, ``this has changed considerably,'' he said. ``I think the commission has made great strides to include the public.''
But some commercial fishermen say these steps are too little too late.
``The ASMFC has failed miserably to foster cooperation in interjurisdictional fisheries management by failing to abide by their compact in bringing the user groups to the table,'' said Jerry Schill, the North Carolina Fisheries Association executive director. ``Even though advisory panels are in place for a few species, those panels are not used for input prior to important decisions affecting our state.''
Schill and others say the ASMFC's governing body has operated too much like a private club in the past and its membership needs to be changed.
The ASMFC is governed by a 45-member commission with three members appointed from each state: A third of the commissioners are appointed by the states' legislatures, a third by the governors and the remaining third are state fisheries directors.
``We've got to get this organization away from directors making decisions,'' said Robert V. Lucas, who heads the state Marine Fisheries Commission and was appointed to the ASMFC by Gov. James B. Hunt Jr. ``We need to make it a real commission rather than a council of directors.''
Earlier this year, the Virginia legislature approved a measure calling for the state to withdraw from the ASMFC in 1996, giving North Carolina commercial fishermen a new impetus for their concerns.
Since then, some commercial fishermen have advocated a similar move for this state and have spent several days in Raleigh seeking legislative support for the move.
But withdrawal from the ASMFC is opposed by many sports fishing interests, most coastal legislators and most fisheries regulators and some commercial fishermen, who believe North Carolina's coastal fishing industry would be hurt if the state withdrew from the compact.
Most lawyers with expertise in fisheries and environmental issues generally agree that North Carolina would be required to comply with and implement fisheries management plans promulgated by the ASMFC even if the state withdraws from the compact.
They also generally agree that North Carolina would lose most, if not all, of its voting privileges if it withdraws.
But not all coastal fishing interests agree with or accept these findings.
In its recent newsletter, the N.C. Fisheries Association, a commercial fishing trade group in New Bern, cited a soon-to-be-published opinion from the Marine Law Institute that maintains the federal government is treading on thin ice by using the compact as a regulatory body. The article will reportedly say that legislation creating the ASMFC is unconstitutional and that North Carolina and other states do not have to comply with ASMFC mandates.
``This is one issue that I feel we are very, very right,'' said Schill. ``It's a states' rights issue. We don't need the feds telling the states how to manage their fisheries.''
Most fishermen and fisheries managers agree that interstate management of fisheries is the best way to protect fish stocks, but they disagree on how that management should be conducted.
``I think it's absolutely essential that we have some coordinated efforts,'' said Dunnigan. ``There are some serious problems that can only be addressed by having coastwide cooperation.''
Pratt agreed: ``We all want the same thing, which is a better management plan - one that works on the ground as well as on paper.''
For Pratt, the answer is voluntary participation in fisheries management plans adopted through more state participation.
``It would be better if you could rebuild the ASMFC so that it operates from the bottom up rather than the top down,'' he said.
Schill agreed: ``The most progressive steps have been without the hammer and with the cooperation of the industry,'' he said.
Some of the state's most effective conservation measures: Fish excluder devices and 5 1/2-inch tailbags for use in trawl nets and a 13-inch minimum size limit on flounder, are two examples, Schill said.
But others say voluntary management has not worked, largely because if one state fails to comply with a management plan, the system falls apart.
In 1992, when the ASMFC recommended a 10-fish catch limit for bluefish as a voluntary conservation measure, New Jersey did not comply. The state's action hurt fishing in New York and other neighboring states and led to a breakdown of the plan, said Freeman, who was then administrator of the state's fisheries programs.
All say the future of the ASMFC, and to some degree, the concept of interstate fisheries management, depends on North Carolina's actions in the coming months.
North Carolina is extremely important to a number of Atlantic Coast fisheries, because it lies at the juncture of the northern and southern fisheries and because the state's large estuarine system serves as a spawning ground for so many species of fish that ultimately migrate along the coast, Dunnigan said.
A second state voting to leave the ASMFC, particularly of with the weight of North Carolina, would seriously wound the compact.
``If we continue to have difficulties, it will cause us some concerns,'' Dunnigan said. by CNB