Penny Pritzker, the U.S. Secretary of Commerce, is expected to appoint a new member to the New England Fishery Management Council before the council's January meeting.
NEW BEDFORD, Mass. (Standard-Times) — December 23, 2014 — We would urge the secretary to appoint New Bedford scalloper Charlie Quinn to the post, filling the seat vacated by Tom Dempsey.
Quinn has been scalloping for decades, dragging with his own boat since the age of 18, and has seen the scallop fishery under bad management, good management and great management.
The secretary has two other candidates to consider, but Quinn's experience and intellect make him the right fit for the council, which is responsible for conservation and management of fishery resources off the coasts of Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut.
Quinn was in Washington, D.C., Monday as the process moves forward. Parts of his resume suggest the appointment should be obvious. He would be the only scalloper on the council, which covers the major New England fishing ports of Portland, Point Judith and Gloucester, in addition to the biggest money port in the U.S., New Bedford, which derives most of its landings from scallops.
Quinn was one of the first in New Bedford to take the risk of dragging for bigger scallops, and said it took him a year to be convinced that leaving the small ones behind would be good for the business.
But it was. He went from 264 days at sea, harvesting scallops with 3-inch rings, to 31 days at sea with 4-inch rings and 10 times the haul. It took cooperation among gear developers, like himself, researchers such as those at UMass Dartmouth's School of Marine Science and Technology, Virginia Institute of Marine Science and Coonamessett Farm in East Falmouth, regulators, marketers, buyers and other scallopers, but it changed the fishery.
His open-minded, research-based approach on scallops is just what's needed in the troubled groundfish fishery. It will take different answers than those applied to scallops, for sure, but he has proved he knows how to cooperate, take reasoned risks and succeed.
Dempsey, who vacated the seat to become senior fisheries policy director with The Nature Conservancy in Monterey, California, was the policy director of the Cape Cod Commercial Fishermen's Alliance. One of the other names submitted to to Pritzker is that of another CCCFA member, John Pappalardo, the CEO. The alliance, much of whose funding comes from environmental groups, represents a constituency that is responsible for one-tenth of the landings New Bedford has – 7.6 percent versus 78 percent – in Massachusetts.
We are concerned about the environmental health of fisheries, but Quinn's experience includes the development, design and testing of gear now used that protects turtles. Environmentalists who consider that fishing families and communities are part of the environment should be satisfied that Quinn would provide pragmatic, sensible representation on the council.
Our hope is that the Commerce secretary sees the value of Quinn's experience, creativity and intelligence when she makes the appointment.
Read the editorial by the New Bedford Standard-Times