In the wake of last week’s demonstration in Martha’s Vineyard by New Bedford Fishing vessels, XM/Sirius Radio’s show "The Young Turks" devotes a segment to fisheries policy. Richie Canastra is the co-owner of the New Bedford and Boston Seafood Auctions. He will be on The Young Turks to talk about how fishing may go the way of the food industry by being taken over by monied interests.
News analysis: ‘With fisheries, the first number you’d dial was Kennedy’s’
What now for the New England fishing industry?
Over five decades, nearly every dispute between bureaucrats and the boats of the New England industry found its way into the Senate offices of the late U.S. Sen. Edward M. Kennedy.
His death Tuesday leaves a gaping hole at the peak of the pecking order.
It leaves an uncertain interim: It may or may not involve a caretaker senator.
It also leaves an uncertain long-term future for the community and industry that leaned confidently on Kennedy.
There is no obvious successor ready to assume the mantle of the fishermen’s guardian angel.
Read the complete story at The Gloucester Daily Times.
See also: Kennedy championed fishermen’s causes,
and SALEM NEWS OPINION: Kennedy was passionate advocate for region’s fishermen,
and Senator Ted Kennedy, Friend of the Fisherman, 1932-2009.
Fisheries taking heat for enforcement actions
Imagine you’re out selling coffee and muffins every day and out of the blue you get a letter in the mail saying last September you sold a blueberry muffin without an authorization letter and will be fined $50,000.
Far-fetched and extreme maybe, but Caroline Geishecker, who owns Chatham Coffee Company, said as a businesswoman she was appalled at some of the “ridiculous” stories local fishermen were telling her about the enforcement actions of the National Marine Fisheries Service.
“It’s a really, really bad scene,” she said.
Lobster population decline prompts stricter protections
Gus Bertolf Jr. and his father returned to their Cos Cob dock last week with about $200 worth of conch, their new cash crop in the continued aftermath of a lobster die-off that began in the late 1990s, they said.
Since 1998, they have found few lobsters large enough to catch legally while trolling from the New York state line to the western end of Stamford. The futility sometimes causes them to question their investment in diesel fuel, bait and time.
"We caught one legal-sized lobster today, but we threw it back," Gus Bertolf Sr. said, standing on the deck of the boat Island Girl. "What’s going on is discouraging."
Read the complete story at The News-Times.
SALEM NEWS OPINION: Kennedy was passionate advocate for region’s fishermen
"There was never any doubt that he was out there watching out for you," Jackie Odell, executive director of the Northeast Seafood Coalition told a reporter last week. "He had your back."
Kennedy’s colleagues, Sen. John Kerry and U.S. Rep. John Tierney of Salem, have both supported financial aid to the industry. But Kerry, with his ties and sympathies more in line with environmentalists who continue to call for tighter regulation on fishing, has not had the visceral connection to the industry that Kennedy did. And fishing has not been the priority for Tierney that it was for Kennedy.
Read the complete story from The Salem News Online.
See also: Kennedy championed fishermen’s causes,
and News analysis: ‘With fisheries, the first number you’d dial was Kennedy’s’,
and Senator Ted Kennedy, Friend of the Fisherman, 1932-2009.
Kennedy championed fishermen’s causes
For the people of Gloucester, it was the equivalent of a death in the family.
It seemed fated to be that way in the sense that things Kennedy descend on history like things from no other family — in this case, the quintessential sailor adopting himself into America’s most seaworthy city.
From the pre-beginnings of his own political career — when a former Gloucester mayor was assigned to keep the Kennedy family’s dibs on the U.S. Senate seat of his brother John, who’d been elected president, until he was old enough to run for, win and secure it for the next 47 years — right up to the end, which came late Tuesday, Sen. Edward M. Kennedy treated Gloucester as his home away from home.
Read the complete story at The Gloucester Daily Times.
AUDIO: Richie Canastra discusses Ted Kennedy’s legacy in the Fishing Industry on the Montel Williams show
"What Ted has done in the past for us in New Bedford, especially in regard to the scallop industry, means he’ll be greatly missed." — Richie Canastra
In response to Montel Williams’ question "What is the industry’s biggest concern right now?" Richie Canastra, of the Whaling City and Boston Seafood Display Auctions replied "it’s the Catch Share program that NOAA has implemented in 2010. We’re concerned. We want to be allocated enough fish to be profitable. Ted would have been there right beside us, campaigning for us. He lives with us in spirit."
Fishermen target catch shares in protest
Catch shares were on the minds of the New Bedford fishermen and on the signs on the sides of their boats that made a convenient detour into Vineyard Haven harbor yesterday in a dignified protest aimed at President Obama.
The five draggers were on their way to Georges Bank, but the president was on the golf course.
Five other boats also intended to join the armada, but were delayed preparing for the fishing trip that was the purpose of the visit to the Vineyard.
After the tour of the Vineyard Haven harbor, the boats passed through Oak Bluffs harbor on the way to the fishing grounds at Georges Bank.
Read the complete story at The Gloucester Daily Times.
View a photo gallery of the New Bedford flotilla as it shared its message with President Obama
AUDIO: Captain Dicusses How Proposed Pollock and Monkfish Cuts Might Put Him Out of Business
"We need conservation, but it’s not as bad as they say".
Before leaving for the event at Martha’s Vineyard, Captain Antonio Pereira discusses his concerns about how proposed limit cuts in Pollock and Monkfish combined with the introduction of Sectors and Catch Shares may put even a fully paid-for vessel like his out of business. Interview by Don Cuddy of the Standard-Times.
Listen to the interview by Don Cuddy of the Standard-Times on South Coast Today.
City boats take fishing protest to Vineyard
Faced with an uncertain future and changing regulations, local fishermen cast out for the national spotlight Tuesday afternoon, sending a flotilla of boats to Martha’s Vineyard to coincide with the presidential vacation.
Five commercial fishing vessels based in New Bedford steamed into the harbor at Vineyard Haven, displaying banners with slogans such as "Fisheries Science not Political Science" and "Catch Shares Privatize the Sea."
The projection of New Bedford sea power over the horizon quickly caught the attention of local authorities, according to Richard Canastra of the Whaling City Seafood Display Auction, who helped orchestrate the showing.