Reacting to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s latest bullying effort to shut down his business, Gloucester Seafood Display Auction co-owner Larry Ciulla said Friday that, while he and the auction’s attorneys were still trying to get a handle on this new NOAA enforcement action, "I’m thinking this is more of the same of what’s been going on.
In one way, it seems, he’s right. Friday’s move by NOAA enforcement to issue a show-cause ultimatum requiring the auction to show — by tomorrow — why it should not be shut down over an alleged "probation violation" stemming from an earlier settlement is indeed more of the same heavy-handed tactics the auction has faced at the hands of an aggressive, dangerously runaway agency.
In another way, however, Ciulla’s dead wrong. The downright sinister execution of this attempted crackdown isn’t just more of the same — it’s far worse than the NOAA and National Marine Fisheries Service tactics local fishermen and the auction have confronted in the past. And it’s an action that deserves a swift response from our state and federal officials who must crack down on this renegade band of marine enforcers who act like a police force, prosecuting attorneys and judges with no apparent regard now for even our own federal court system.