Some fishermen complained that the required oversight is inefficient, overly bureaucratic, and could lead to increased penalties. They pointed out that — on the eve of the new fishing year — many didn't even have the software and other information they needed to fish legally. Some said mistakes in paperwork by fish dealers or the National Marine Fisheries Service had left them with a much lower quota allocation than they should have had, and that fisheries service officials told them it couldn't be resolved until next year.
"I think we're being set up to fail," Orleans fisherman William Amaru said.
As of yesterday afternoon, he still hadn't received the required software he needed to upgrade the satellite system that tracks his boat. He'd also disputed the amount of quota he received after he found that landings credited to him by NMFS were much lower than what his own records showed. That resulted in an allocation that was 25 to 30 percent less it should have been this year, but he was told it wouldn't be rectified until 2011.
NMFS spokesman Maggie Mooney-Seus said that the federal agency could not fix everyone's assigned quota amounts in time for the new fishing year.
"We would have to recalculate everybody, and that's not a simple thing," she said.
But that amount could be the difference in making or losing money, said Amaru, who felt there were enough glitches and unknowns that he would have liked to see this year be a trial period to work the bugs out.
Read the complete story at The Cape Cod Times.