Wespac backs controls for NMI fishery

[B]HONOLULU[/B]—The Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council has voted to set June 19, 2008 as the control date for the CNMI-based longline fishery and to work further on management measures for fish attracting devices in the exclusive economic zone of the Commonwealth.

These, together with other measures, were among the suite of recommendations voted on by Wespac during its four-day meeting in Honolulu that ended Thursday (Friday time on Saipan) for the management of offshore pelagic fisheries in the U.S. Pacific islands.

The Western and Central Pacific Network reported, though, that some of these decisions have been rendered null and void after Wespac failed yet again to issue a notice of the meeting to the public as required by federal law. The affected actions reportedly include the MHI bottom fish season opening and a hearing for the National Environmental Protection Act changes.

In a statement issued yesterday, the Network said that decisions made during the Tuesday (June 17) and Wednesday (June 18) meetings are null and void because the public was not given proper notice of the meetings. It said the Federal Register shows no notice for Tuesday, two Wednesday agendas, and March instead of June.

The failure to provide public notice also occurred during Wespac’s March 17-18, 2008, meeting in the CNMI and the decisions made there had to be reheard and voted upon during a makeup meeting in Honolulu on April 15, 2008. Wespac had blamed “a bureaucratic error” by the National Marine Fisheries Service for the mix-up.

The decision-making portions of last week’s meetings will need to be held again at an estimated cost of $50,000-$60,000, according to the Network. It said that official participants are flown in from as far away as the Northern Mariana Islands and Guam and “in addition to their annual salaries and benefits, officials attending the Wespac meetings are paid approximately $650-day per diem in addition to their airfare, lodging and ground transportation costs.”

The Network has been very critical of Wespac and its executive director, Kitty Simonds.

Scott Foster, the Network’s communications director, said, “We have no doubt that [Simonds] will again lay this mistake off on others—but the fact remains, Simond’s job is to provide steady management which she has not done. Simonds must have known about this before the four-day series of meetings even began. Why wasn’t anything said or the important bottomfish closure vote moved to later when it would have been legal?”

Foster noted, “It gives us no pleasure to again call this error to Wespac’s attention because this will require all interested parties to once-again attend or monitor yet-another meeting on yet-another day during yet-another month while our fish stocks move ever-closer to total collapse. Continued mismanagement by [Wespac] is driving the Main Hawaiian Islands bottom-fish stocks closer to collapse with the self-inflicted nullification of the few good rules they actually pass.”

“Wespac will have to do what they did after they botched the public notice of the last Wespac meeting and schedule a re-do that will end up adding to the already ridiculous costs paid by taxpayers,” Foster said. “Kitty Simonds’ derelict management of the Council would have resulted in her dismissal if she was employed in the private sector.”

Wespac is currently under two federal investigations for its expenditures.

[B]Recommendations for NMI[/B]

During last week’s meetings, the Council voted to set a control date of June 19, 2008, for the CNMI-based longline fishery. A control date may be used as a reference point when establishing a limited entry program. The measure recognizes the potential for this fishery to increase rapidly, as it did in Hawaii and American Samoa.

Two longline vessels currently operate in the CNMI. Both began operating in the last couple of years.

The Council also voted to continue work on management measures for fish aggregating devices, FADs, used by purse seine vessels operating in the exclusive economic zones of the U.S. Pacific islands.

The Council is looking to classify all floating objects that have been purposefully deployed as FADs by purse seine operations. All such FADs would be required to be marked with the owner’s name and vessel identification and be registered with the National Marine Fisheries Service.

The Council will also look at limiting all purse seine FAD fishing in the US EEZ to registered FADs and restricting the use of FAD sets in the US EEZ waters around American Samoa, Guam, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands and Hawaii.

However, the Council will not take a final vote on these matters until after the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission convenes in December 2008 in Korea. This international commission is expected to address FAD management during its negotiations on measures to end overfishing of bigeye tuna in the Western and Central Pacific Ocean.

[B]Other recommendations[/B]

Additional recommendations made by the Council include the following, among others:

-Remove the effort limit that has kept the Hawaii longline fishery for swordfish operating at half of its historical level of fishing for the past four years.

-Modify the sea turtle hard caps for the Hawaii longline swordfish fishery to 19 leatherback and 46 loggerheads.

-Develop draft measures for a limited entry program for the offshore handline and associated (non-trolling) hook-and-line fishery around Cross Seamount, weather buoys and private FADs in EEZ waters around Hawaii.

-Set a control date of June 19, 2008, for the Hawaii charter vessel fishery. Concerns were raised about significant declines in blue marlin catches by this fishery and the potential for this fishery to expand with the creation of new large harbors in Kona on the Big Island and in Ewa on Oahu. Recent information also indicated that one-third of this fishery does not meet license and reporting requirements.

-Develop measures to mitigate sea turtle interaction with the American Samoa longline fishery. Public meetings will be held with longline fishermen in American Samoa beginning in July. NMFS will also be requested to immediately undertake cooperative research with fishermen around American Samoa regarding potential measures to cost effectively reduce the longline-sea turtle interactions.

The Council is the policy-making agency for fisheries management in the offshore waters of the U.S. Pacific Islands. Recommendations made by the Council are transmitted to the Secretary of Commerce for approval.

Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council members include Ignacio Dela Cruz of the CNMI Department of Land & Natural Resources; Alberto Lamorena, Guam Bureau of Statistics and Plans; Laura Thielen, Hawaii Department of Land & Natural Resources; and Ray Tulafono, American Samoa Department of Marine and Wildlife Resources.[B][I] (Saipan Tribune)[/I][/B]