March 26, 2014 — From April 8 through 10, the Montauk Yacht Club will host a meeting of the Mid-Atlantic Marine Fishery Council, one of the nation’s eight bodies created in 1976 to oversee marine resources.
The Mid-Atlantic Council manages 12 species that include fluke (summer flounder), porgies (scup), striped bass, and tilefish, all important to Long Island fishermen. Montauk is homeport to New York’s most productive commercial and recreational fishing industries, businesses that pour many millions of dollars into the local economy each year.
For a few decades now, our local fisheries have been well represented by two Montauk women, Laurie Nolan, now a state delegate to the Mid-Atlantic Council who is active in Montauk’s tilefish fishery, and Bonnie Brady, executive director of the Long Island Commercial Fishing Association. Both are expected to be on hand.
Fishermen, especially commercial fishermen, go about their businesses in the background of the more trendy and real estate-based notion of the Montauk and East End lifestyle. This is a bit strange, because from an economic standpoint, Montauk’s commercial industry — despite its many challenges — has kept pace, or nearly so, with landed business. Its future is uncertain, however.
We seem to be consumed of late by what the sea takes with its rising. We tend to lose sight of what it provides. The setting, in Montauk, for the upcoming council meeting, and its agenda, serve as a reminder.
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