From the Town Landing: Revise the quotas, not the rules

Congressional delegations, especially in New England, have a long history of intervening in the fisheries management process. The results almost always sacrifice the long-term economic health of the nation's fisheries for short-term political gains. Then NMFS gets blamed for failing to rebuild fish stocks.

In February, East Coast fishermen rallied in Washington, calling for an extension of rolling back the Magnuson Act's rebuilding timelines that drive harvest restrictions. In an unusual show of solidarity, commercial fishermen and charter captains stood shoulder to shoulder waving banners that read "United We Fish," "I Fish, I Vote," and "Fishing = Jobs."

Then in April, 23 members of New England's congressional delegation wrote a joint letter to Gary Locke, secretary of commerce, calling for emergency action to increase annual catch limits of New England groundfish. The letter looks like the usual Congressional meddling since it doesn't offer any rationale for increasing the annual catch limits (ACL) except that current limits pose a hardship for New England's industry.

The delegation has a point, however, especially with regard to pollock: the ACL for 2010 is a fraction of what it was in 2009. The limits are so low that a fisherman's entire allocation may be caught during a single two-hour tow - ending his fishing for the rest of the year. The New England Fishery Management Council recognized the problem with pollock last fall, when its Science and Statistical Committee proposed ACLs for the 19 groundfish stocks.

Because pollock occur throughout New England, the drastic drop in the ACL threatens to shut down the fishing year almost as soon as it starts-a terrible way to kick off implementation of catch shares and sector management. The council asked for a new stock assessment and, to its credit, NMFS agreed.

The revised assessment, which incorporates data collected as recently as last fall as well as new information on Pollock growth rates, should be finalized by the end of July. And the secretary of commerce is likely to use his emergency powers to change the pollock ACL midseason-if the revised assessment indicates that the pollock stock is significantly bigger than previously indicated.

But no one should interpret this use of emergency action as the result of undue political pressure. The ACL will be changed if and only if the new stock assessment warrants such a change. The council will undertake the change itself-to ensure it is in place for longer than emergency action allows-but won't be able to get it into effect until late in the fall, too late to help most fishermen.

But asking for a rollback of the 10-year rebuilding target in Magnuson is a whole different kettle of fish than asking for flexibility on the pollock ACL.

The Magnuson reauthorization required years of negotiation-like any legislation that attempts to resolve usergroup conflicts. Some fishermen are calling for Magnuson itself to be revisited, assuming they would be successful in relaxing the rebuilding standard; the environmental community would disagree.

We need only look to the results of the last two major revisions to Magnuson to see how that might work out: The Sustainable Fisheries Act of 1996 and the reauthorization in 2006 both resulted in more regulation of fishermen, not less.

Sometimes it can be difficult to tell the difference between an appropriate agency response and caving in to political pressure. In the case of pollock, adjusting the ACL is the right call. It is the difference between an end run around Magnuson, likely to cause a pitched battle in Washington and the courts, and responsiveness on the part of NMFS to the needs of the industry.

Anne Hayden is an independent marine policy analyst based in Maine. Philip Conkling is publisher of The Working Waterfront and president of the Island Institute in Rockland, Maine.