A federal judge has issued a mixed ruling in a suit brought by the environmental nonprofit group Oceana challenging the adequacy of the government's response in the New England groundfishery to requirements written into the Magnuson-Stevens Act in 2006 for annual catch limits and accountability measures.
Washington, D.C., District Judge James E. Boesberg last week dismissed Oceana's claims that Amendment 16 — the regulatory framework that includes the catch share management system blamed by many for the loss of jobs in the fishery over the last 19 months — failed to establish "an adequate system" for monitoring compliance with catch limits and did not take into account the environmental impacts of the management regimen.
The organization's suit was partially based on the argument that NOAA's National Marine Fisheries Service did not have a handle on bycatch — fish that are unintentionally scooped up in nets of fishermen who are targeting other species.
At the same time, Boesberg agreed with Oceana's claim that Amendment 16 failed to establish viable "accountability measures" or penalties for overfishing five of the stocks in the 20 in the groundfishery.
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