September 20, 2013 — U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren says she remains steadfast in her efforts to secure disaster assistance for Massachusetts fishermen, if frustrated by the very process that would deliver it.
“The way I see it, a disaster is a disaster and the federal government should be stepping up to help our hard-working fishermen,” Warren said. “Especially because this is a disaster that was, in part, caused by federal government policies.”
That was her first shot across the bow of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in the conversation. It was not her last.
“The fishermen distrust NOAA for good reason,” she said. “They learned the hard way. NOAA has not consulted fishermen in the way it promised. It has not worked with fishermen.”
That is as succinct a description of the current state of Capitol Hill gridlock and partisan angst as you’re likely to find. The blogosphere and punditocracy can go on forever, running the same ribbon of verbal asphalt over the same scarred foothills. Nine words seems to work so much better.
But there was real frustration in Warren’s voice — a resignation that as Washington grinds on, running on devalued currency of payback and posturing, the commercial fishing industry in Gloucester and throughout New England slips a little further over the horizon.
Warren said she was heartened earlier in the week when Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick certified the scope of the economic hardship that has ripped through Bay State fishing communities after NOAA’s drastic cuts in seminal groundfish quotas, thus opening the door to the possibility of low-interest loans to fishermen from the Small Business Administration.
Warren also understands why the same fishermen and shore-side businesses might be underwhelmed by the offer, given the advanced state of the industry’s demise against the backdrop of the immutable equation: no fish, no money to pay back loans.
Read the full story at the Gloucester Daily Times