HYANNIS — Cape and Islands fishermen told federal regulators Thursday that they needed greater protections to survive in a fishery where bigger boats with access to cash and fish quotas were outcompeting them on their traditional inshore fishing grounds.
"The implications are vast for individuals and communities," Martha's Vineyard fisherman Alex Friedman told representatives of the New England Fishery Management Council at a public hearing in Hyannis. Iconic fishing towns, small boats and fishing families are all endangered by a consolidation of fishing quotas into the hands of fewer and fewer fishermen, Friedman said.
In 2010, New England fishing regulations changed dramatically. Instead of rules that restricted the number of days they could fish and how many fish they could catch on each trip, fishermen were given a percentage of the annual fish quotas based on how much of each of the 20 species of groundfish they had caught over a 10-year period. Fishermen could also lease, trade or sell quotas.
Read the complete story from The Cape Cod Times.