July 18, 2014 — Maeve Vallely Bartlett, in a letter to NOAA administrators first reported on the website Saving Seafood, stressed the need for the federal agency to quickly complete its review of the Phase I plan that will distribute checks for $32,500 to an estimated 193 eligible permit holders in Massachusetts.
Massachusetts is urging NOAA to pick up the pace of its review of the state’s plan to disperse $6.3 million in direct financial assistance so that money can begin moving into the hands of the fishermen who have borne the heaviest financial burden in the current groundfish fishery disaster.
Maeve Vallely Bartlett, in a letter to NOAA administrators first reported on the website Saving Seafood, stressed the need for the federal agency to quickly complete its review of the Phase I plan that will distribute checks for $32,500 to an estimated 193 eligible permit holders in Massachusetts — including 53 in Gloucester.
“I urge you to expedite review of the Commonwealth’s Phase I direct aid so that we may distribute aid to impacted permit holders as soon as possible,” Bartlett, the state’s chief environmental secretary, wrote to NOAA Assistant Administrator Eileen Sobeck. “Our fishermen need this funding to offset declines in groundfish revenues due to deep catch limit reductions and to make investments to ensure their businesses survive this fishing year and into the future.”
Bartlett’s letter is the most recent attempt by the state to jump start the complex disaster assistance process that began in 2012 when the Secretary of Commerce declared a federal fishery disaster in this region.
Read the full story at the Gloucester Daily Times