THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, October 30, 1995 TAG: 9510300066
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: BY BETTY MITCHELL GRAY, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: MOREHEAD CITY LENGTH: Long : 183 lines
Fishermen and fisheries managers generally agree that changes need to be made in the way the state manages its coastal fish stocks and its coastal fishing industry.
But a consensus has not yet developed among industry participants about what should replace the previous management system when a moratorium on new commercial fishing licenses is lifted in two years.
Details of a new system will be debated in the coastal fishing community over the next few months, according to fishermen, university researchers and Moratorium Steering Committee members.
``The largest group of fishermen sees forces coming to bear on the fishing industry that point to the need to do something,'' said Michael K. Orbach, Duke University professor who is conducting a series of workshops on fisheries management practices for the steering committee. ``But they're really not sure how to approach it.''
``The question for fishermen is what's in their best interest in the long run and how they are going to fit into all of this,'' he said.
While many commercial fishermen support the steering committee's goals, some are beginning to question specific proposals before the panel.
``I would love to believe what Bob Lucas said the first day is what would be happening,'' said Mildred Gilgo, wife of a Carteret County commercial fisherman, referring to the chairman of the Moratorium Steering Committee. ``That the committee would be trying to put commercial gear in the hands of commercial fishermen and protecting us so that we can make a living.''
``But some of the committee's recommendations, we may not even need,'' she said.
Drafts of some committee proposals will be available for subcommittee review in January with some final proposals ready as early as May. Some subcommittees already have developed specific proposals for further review.
Here's a look at four of them - Licensing, law enforcement, gear licenses, and habitat and water quality protection:
Licensing: License agents, commercial fishermen and fisheries managers generally agree that the state's commercial fishing license system which is based on licensing commercial fishing vessels should be replaced with a system that licenses individual commercial fishermen.
They also generally agree that sports anglers should be required to obtain a license to fish in coastal waters.
Most committee members have agreed that the best licensing system may be a three-tiered system that allows commercial fishermen to buy a commercial fishing license. Access to most types of commercial fishing gear would be limited to holders of a commercial fishing license as would the right for fishermen to sell their catch.
Recreational license sales would be limited to those sports anglers who fish primarily with hook-and-line. Some access to a minimum number of crab pots could be included in this license.
The three-tiered system also creates a ``hybrid'' license that would allow greater access to limited amounts of some types of commercial fishing gear - such as gill nets - by sports fishermen who want to catch limited amounts of fish, shrimp or other seafood for their own consumption.
Central to the debate is the question of who meets the definition of a commercial fisherman and should qualify for a commercial fishing license. Fishing interests across the board generally agree that the answer to that question will be key to the committee's debate in the next few months.
``The kicker is going to be the definition of a commercial fisherman,'' said Jerry Schill, executive director of the state Fisheries Association. ``There are severe differences of opinion even among different groups of commercial fishermen.''
The definition before the committee would generally require commercial fishermen to earn 50 percent of their income from commercial fishing to buy a commercial license, but steering committee Chairman Robert V. Lucas said that requirement could change when committee-sponsored studies are completed.
``I want to keep an open mind and I want the steering committee to keep an open mind,'' he said. ``When the studies are complete, if those numbers come back and show that the part-time effort will not put a strain on the resource, then you can include them in your formula.''
Commercial fishing gear licenses: The Marine Fisheries Commission has the authority to implement gear or equipment license fees between $25 and $500 per license but has not done so since a system of gear licenses was implemented in the 1920s and revised in the 1950s.
Members of the fisheries Moratorium Steering Committee's subcommittee studying commercial fishing gear agree that all commercial fishing gear should be licensed and that charges for that gear should be sufficient to pay for the program, according to subcommittee co-chairman Peter West, a Greenville sports angler.
``We agree that all gear has to be licensed,'' said West at a recent moratorium steering committee meeting in Morehead City. ``Gear licenses would provide needed information about the amount of fishing effort as it relates to specific fisheries and it would also be a basis for further gear reductions, if needed.''
Some commercial fishermen disagree. They say that because fishermen can only use one type of gear at a time, gear licenses unfairly tax fishermen for gear even when it's not in use.
Others worry that the cumulative effects of fees for gear licenses in North Carolina, where fishermen tend to seek a variety of fish and shellfish during different seasons of the year, could drive some smaller commercial fishermen out of business.
``You don't have to ban fishing to get rid of commercial fishermen,'' said
Gilgo. ``All you have to do is make it too expensive to make a living at it.''
Moratorium steering committee members agree that gear license fees, if set too high, could place a difficult financial burden on some fishermen.
``We need to be careful how we put the fees on the gear so we don't hurt little people,'' Ocracoke seafood dealer and gear committee co-chairman Murray Fulcher said at one recent moratorium committee meeting.
Last week in Morehead City a proposal by Fulcher capped the fees for gear licenses at $500 while another plan capped the fees at $1,000.
Habitat and water quality protection: With the recent spate of algae blooms, animal waste lagoon spills and fish kills this summer on nearly every coastal waterway, there has been general agreement among all coastal interests that the Marine Fisheries Commission and the Division of Marine Fisheries needs to play a larger role in state water quality and habitat protection.
``This system is broken very, very badly and there do not seem to be people out there solving the problem,'' said Melvin Sheppard, a Snead's Ferry net shop owner and chairman of the steering committee's subcommittee on water quality and habitat protection issues. ``Our system is going to hell in a handbasket and the people who are supposed to be guarding our rivers and our fisheries habitat - that authority is so fragmented.''
The steering committee will likely recommend that the General Assembly should expand the ability of the Marine Fisheries Commission to participate in decisions by other state panels and agencies affecting coastal water quality.
One proposal would expand fisheries managers' current authority to comment on development and discharge permits to include either a permit appeal or a veto for fisheries officials. Another proposal would expand the authority of fisheries managers to develop regulations for lands that border primary nursery areas and other waters that are of central concern to fishermen.
The steering committee is also considering restrictions on some types of fishing gear and practices that are believed to hurt key fisheries habitat.
Sheppard's committee is considering recommendations to bar the use of some types of fishing gear such as clam kickers and shrimp trawls on marked oyster grounds and in seagrass beds and limit the use of other types of gear, such as hydraulic clam harvesters, to specific areas.
Law enforcement: Fisheries managers and fishermen generally agree that the state needs to improve its enforcement of fisheries regulations but they disagree as to ways the state can best accomplish this goal.
The Moratorium Steering Committee's subcommittee on law enforcement issues believes that a point system, similar to one imposed for traffic violations on the state's highways, should be part of the state's fisheries management program and when fishermen accumulate a certain number of points, they should lose their fishing license for a specific time, much like drivers lose their driver's license after a specific number of traffic violations.
Committee members generally agree that a point system should help protect fish and shellfish stocks by penalizing activities that hurt marine populations more severely than so-called administrative violations such as improperly marked pound nets.
Two plans under consideration by the law enforcement subcommittee, based on 10 and 18 points, impose the severest penalties for fishermen convicted of willfully violating fisheries regulations that either hurt fish and shellfish populations, endanger enforcement officers or affect public health.
Maximum penalties would be assessed for shellfishing in a polluted area at night, willful maiming of sea turtles, using prohibited gear in primary nursery areas, taking fish from fishermen's nets, resisting or obstructing and resisting an officer and similar violations.
Some commercial fishermen fear the proposed point system would give law enforcement officers too much control and prefer that law enforcement deterrents be based on increasing existing fines rather than a new point system.
Other commercial fishermen support the point system but want it to include violations aimed at sports anglers as well.
``The association supports a point system to deter violations, but we are concerned it addresses mostly commercial fishing violations,'' said Bob Peele, deputy director of the state Fisheries Association, at a recent steering committee meeting. ``Of 18 violations addressed by the Law Enforcement Committee, only one is aimed specifically at recreational fishermen.''
The steering committee is also likely to recommend that a volunteer program using interested members of the general public be part of the state's fisheries management system.
Discussions on the scope of volunteer activities range from auxiliary officers that would help law enforcement officers on patrol, that would form a crime-stoppers type network that watches for fishing violations or that would perform activities designed more to educate fishermen about fisheries rules. ILLUSTRATION: ROTATIONS
The Moratorium Steering Committee meets at 10 a.m. the second
Thursday of each month in locations throughout eastern North
Carolina, generally rotating among northern, central and southern
coastal cities.
by CNB