NEW BEDFORD, Mass. — August 25, 2014 — Willis "Bill" Blount calls himself "the poster child for struggling fishermen" in the hyper-regulated Northeast fishery.
His boat, the 77-foot stern trawler Ruthie B., for years has been the only boat fishing out of Nantucket, but for the last couple of months it has spent a lot of time in New Bedford harbor getting some necessary work done while the expenses continue to pile up.
Blount was the sole fishing permit holder to attend a three-hour help session in the city for those applying for a slice of the fisheries disaster money, according to Kevin Creighton, fiscal officer for the Mass. Division of Fisheries. Dozens of others have already filed their paperwork, he said.
Blount is 69, with absolutely no intention of doing anything but returning to fishing once all the work and inspections are done on his boat, which he built in 1979 at his family's Rhode Island boatyard a few years after he relocated himself to Nantucket.
For the last decade or so, he said, he has been struggling to adjust to ever-increasing restrictions. "You have to be creative to make it," he said.
For him, that meant figuring out ways to save on fuel and targeting fish such as monkfish, fluke and bay scallops that aren't so heavily restricted in the sector management system.
He also started landing his catch on the island, where he got better prices than the fish auction and built up a sort of celebrity status. Chefs across the island proudly list the fact that their fish came from the Ruthie B.
Read the full story from the New Bedford Standard-Times