Congress approved the continuing resolution to fund the government for the rest of the fiscal year Thursday. Within the legislation is an amendment inserted by North Carolina Republican Rep. Walter Jones that fishermen will cheer.
Jones’ amendment blocks a proposal from the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) to put $36 million toward instituting new catch share programs, which would have imposed additional quotas on the number of fish each fisherman are permitted to be catch annually – a policy environmentalists argue is important to prevent over-fishing but which Jones says would have harmed the nation’s fishing jobs and communities.
“This is a shot in the arm for fishermen and a shot across the bow of the National Marine Fisheries Service,” said Jones. “The last thing our government should be doing in these economic times is spending millions of taxpayer dollars to expand programs that will put even more Americans out of work. NMFS would be wise to take heed of the opposition of fishermen, the public and the Congress to their catch shares agenda; we’re not going away.”
A large swath of the fishing community supported the measure including the Recreational Fishing Alliance, American Sportfishing Association, National Marine Manufacturers Association, Saving Seafood, Southern Shrimp Alliance, Commercial Fishermen of America, Southeast Fisheries Association, North Carolina Fisheries Association, Garden State Seafood Association, Florida Keys Fishermen’s Association, Long Island (NY) Fishermen’s Association. and Food & Water Watch.
Jones’s amendment had bipartisan support from the likes of Massachusetts Democratic Rep. Congressmen Barney Frank, New Jersey Democratic Rep. Frank Pallone, and Massachusetts Republican Sen. Scott Brown, and New York Democratic Sen. Charles Schumer.
“I’ve seen the names of several new advocates joining our ‘just say no to catch shares’ coastal chorus, and that’s a very good sign,” said Jim Donofrio, executive director of Recreational Fishing Alliance. “Now that we’re seeing some bipartisan unity in DC and stronger grassroots efforts to protect our American fishing interests, perhaps now we can build a broad- based coalition to support these same coastal legislators in getting our federal fisheries law reformed to the benefit of our coastal fishermen.”