THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, October 9, 1995 TAG: 9510090035
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: BY BETTY MITCHELL GRAY, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 124 lines
Fishermen and water-related businesses along the entire North Carolina coast probably will see their businesses suffer from a health warning issued Friday for part of the lower Neuse River, say coastal residents and policy makers.
And just as the state has sought help to reimburse its western residents for damage from Hurricane Opal, the state should help its fishermen and business owners recoup their losses expected from the health warning that followed a recent spate of fish kills, said Rick Dove, river keeper for the Neuse River Foundation, a Craven County environmental group.
``The health warning will have a tremendous economic impact on the fishermen and fishing industry down here,'' Dove said Friday. ``The governor needs to take immediate action, just as if a hurricane had hit, to help these folks out.''
But much more needs to be done in the next 30 days than simple reimbursement, say Dove and others, including Robert V. Lucas, chairman of the Marine Fisheries Commission; commercial fishermen; coastal business owners; and other coastal policy makers.
Suggestions include:
An immediate modification of the basinwide management plan for the Neuse River to include strict limits on the amount of nitrogen and phosphorus entering the waterway;
An immediate moratorium on environmental permits for new hog farms;
Daily water quality testing on the Neuse River and some other coastal waterways where the algae pfiesteria has been a problem in recent years;
More immediate power for the Marine Fisheries Commission to address pollution problems when a fish kill occurs on a coastal waterway;
A meeting within the next 30 days of the state Marine Fisheries Commission, Coastal Resources Commission and Environmental Management Commission to begin addressing some of the causes of water pollution and fish kills along the coast.
Lucas said: ``Fish kills like this have been going on for a number of years, and my question is `How bad does it have to get? How many millions of fish have to die?' Does it stop when there are no more fish?''
``The Marine Fisheries Commission doesn't have the answers, but there has got to be a management scheme where water quality, habitat and fish are brought together,'' he said. ``I believe the public and the policy makers are beginning to realize that we've got to go about managing these things in a different way.''
This is not the first time this summer that the state's fishermen have been hurt financially by bad management of the state's coastal waterways, Lucas said.
In June, July and early August, breaks in animal waste lagoons in central and southeastern North Carolina sent millions of gallons of untreated waste flowing into the New River and other coastal waterways, leading to fish kills and health advisories.
And in late July, flow reductions by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and Virginia Power Co. help deplete dissolved oxygen in the Roanoke River, killing nearly 10,000 striped bass, delaying the recovery of that fish in the Albemarle Sound and threatening this fall's striped-bass quota.
``The fishermen are the ones that will bear the brunt of this because the state will not manage its coastal resources - water quality, habitat protection and fish,'' said Lucas. ``The real answer is not to reimburse the fishermen. The real answer is to solve the problem.''
The health warning, developed by the state Division of Epidemiology and issued Friday, advises people on the possible effects associated with a toxic algae, pfiesteria piscimorte, that has been linked to a recent spate of fish kills on the lower Neuse River.
It warns people:
Not to eat fish with sores or other indications of disease during a fish kill caused by the toxic algae.
Not to catch for consumption fish that are dead or dying.
Not to eat fish, shellfish or crabs harvested in the immediate vicinity of any fish kill when its cause is uncertain.
While this health warning applies just to the lower Neuse River in the vicinity of the recent kills, similar advisories will be issued in the future when the algae causes fish kills on other waterways, say state health officials.
It's too early to know what the effects of the health warning could be on the state's commercial and sports fishing industries, say state fisheries officials.
``There will be an impact, no doubt about it,'' said Mike Street, head of planning for the Division of Marine Fisheries. ``And there could be an impact beyond the Neuse River area.''
Street said that publicity about health advisories, fish diseases and toxic algae affecting North Carolina in past years has devastated the fishing industry all along the coast, not just in the areas immediately affected by the incidents.
During the 1987-88 season, a toxic algae known as red tide drifted off North Carolina's coast, affecting only shellfish beds in south-central waters.
But consumers stopped buying most North Carolina seafood products, including most types of finfish sold by state dealers, Street said.
Economic losses from red tide were estimated at about $25 million.
As soon as Friday's health warning was issued, state fisheries economists began developing a plan to survey local seafood dealers to determine any effects the warning will have on the coastal fishing community, Street said.
While most coastal and fishing interests agreed that the state needs to act immediately on the health warning, one spokesman for the area's commercial fishermen opposed any reimbursement by the state for fishing losses.
``We have never advocated a bail-out,'' said Jerry Schill, executive director of the N.C. Fisheries Association, the state's largest commercial fishing trade group. ``We have never gotten anything from the government and don't want it.''
Millions of fish have died in the Neuse River this summer, including up to 5 million in the past 15 days, and some people who have come into contact with the water are reporting dizziness, rashes and sores.
JoAnn M. Burkholder, the N.C. State University professor who helped discover the fish-killing algae in 1991, complained last week that state officials had been under-reporting the severity of fish kills caused by pfiesteria and playing down the risk to humans.
While area residents worried that the warning will hurt a wide range of coastal businesses, those interviewed Friday also saw the health warning as a sign that the state is taking seriously questions about the effects of growing numbers of fish kills and toxic algae blooms.
``Good water quality in eastern North Carolina and the dollars that are generated because of that good water quality haven't been taken into consideration,'' said George Beckwith, a coastal fishing guide with offices in New Bern and Oriental. ``At least the government acknowledged that there is a problem by issuing a warning. That was a big first step.''
KEYWORDS: FISH KILL < by CNB