The Commerce Department and NOAA made the right call in shelving a needless job-killing plan aimed straight at Gloucester's and New England's fishing industry.
And in casting aside Sanctuary Superintendent Craig MacDonald's under-handed attempt to carve out a sweeping series of new zones that would bring new fishing closures within the lucrative Stellwagen Bank, those high-ranking federal officials may have finally recognized that, while President Obama is out talking about jobs, his administration can no longer endorse ill-conceived policies that are putting fishermen out of work and driving independent boats and waterfront businesses right out of the industry.
The burning question then is, when will the Commerce Department and even the White House admit it can no longer stand idly by while NOAA administrator Jane Lubchenco carries water for the Environmental Defense Fund and its corporately-backed catch share management system, which has been at the root of more fishery job losses than MacDonald's secretive, back-door Stellwagen proposal.
Thursday's meeting of the Stellwagen Sanctuary Advisory Committee — which drew a busload of Gloucester fishermen and industry activists to a hotel in Dedham — raised a number of questions, and shed some frightening light on how MacDonald and his cabal seem to operate.
After refusing last month to even tell committee members of the size and scope of his proposed Stellwagen research area — with bans barring trawling in 39 percent of the sanctuary, and all fishing in 14 percent — he brought the full plan for a vote Wednesday before members even had a chance to review the proposal. Even scarier — he got the support he needed. Committee member Priscilla Brooks of the Conservation Law Foundation embarrassingly expressing "frustration" because NOAA would dare to drag its heels implementing a devastating anti-jobs plan she had supposedly never seen.
Read the complete editorial from The Gloucester Times