BOSTON — NOAA chief administrator Jane Lubchenco told Sen. John Kerry, state congressmen, other lawmakers and fishermen yesterday she had been advised against removing embattled director of law enforcement Dale J. Jones before the U.S. Commerce Department's Inspector General completed his case studies of possible miscarriages of justice.
But the chief of staff for the IG's office yesterday disputed Lubchenco's claim that she had been advised to hold off on any steps to put Jones or two key Gloucester National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration enforcement officials on leave.
"We don't advise them to wait or not to wait, that's their call," said Lisa Allen, chief of staff for IG Todd Zinser.
Earlier this month, Zinser had sparked calls for the dismissal of Jones with testimony to two U.S. House oversight subcommittees — telling those panels he found evidence that Jones and other agents charged foreign travel to an $8.4 million fund built on fines from fishermen, and ordered a mass shredding of documents while investigative teams from the IG's office were on the scene.
Those calls were renewed repeatedly yesterday by Sen. John Kerry and Congressmen John Tierney and Barney Frank during a closed-door meeting Kerry organized on the fish pier with Lubchenco, her top fisheries administrator Eric Schwaab, and about 65 commercial fishermen and industry representatives.
Tierney also urged that Andrew Cohen, agent-in-charge of the Gloucester NOAA enforcements office which polices federal waters from Maine through the Carolinas, and Charles Juliand, NOAA's chief attorney in the region, be removed from their jobs as well.
Both have been associated with the cases against the Gloucester Seafood Display Auction, which recently settled a number of administrative law charges without admitting guilt.
Zinser said in January he was looking into egregious specific cases of abuse by NOAA enforcement that came to his attention last year, but identified only the Gloucester auction by name.
Zinser's six-month national probe and preliminary report issued in January was a scathing indictment of the law enforcement system at NOAA. The probe found, among other things, agents allowed to work without standards or oversight, while the agency imposed excessive fines, especially to the fishermen and businesses of New England and the Middle Atlantic states policed from the regional offices in Gloucester.
Multiple attendees at the two-hour meeting yesterday told the Times that Lubchenco more than once deflected the requests for action against Jones, who has headed NOAA law enforcement since 1999, saying that IG Zinser advised her against moving to fire or suspend Jones while the IG's office investigations continue.
New Bedford attorney Pamela Lafreniere quoted Lubchenco as saying, "The IG has advised me against making personnel decisions until his reports are complete."
Lefreniere and others at the meeting reported that Kerry pushed back, expressing uncertainty why Lubchenco couldn't relieve him of his duties, essentially putting Jones on administrative leave.
Allen, however, told the Times the IG did not advise federal officials in agencies under investigation about management decisions. She described Lubchenco's problem with Jones as a "management issue."
Lubchenco's press secretary did not respond to calls.