July 15, 2013 — A few years ago, Outback Steakhouse called Bill Adler, executive director of the Massachusetts Lobstermen's Association, about a surf-and-turf problem.
In Massachusetts, the restaurant chain couldn't just buy a box of frozen American lobster tails plucked from New England waters to later prepare and plate shell-on beside a filet. Instead, the restaurants were forced to feature spiny lobster tails sourced from the Gulf of Mexico or South African or Australian waters, leaving Outback with a question for Adler: What's going on here in Massachusetts?
The answer, Adler said, was the law, which allowed for processing but not sales of American lobster tails within state lines.
That is, until Friday, when Gov. Deval Patrick signed a 2014 budget that includes an amendment allowing processed and frozen Homarus americanus — commonly known as "American" — lobster tails to be possessed and sold in Massachusetts for the first time.
State Rep. Sarah Peake, D-Provincetown, proposed rewording the law to allow sales of lobster tails in-state earlier this year, and it was later attached to the budget. In approving the $33.6 billion spending plan, Patrick used his line-item veto to slash $240 million in transportation funding and $177 million in aid for cities and towns, but the lobster tail proposal survived.
"This is really a jobs bill and something that, in a very real way, will help our fishermen," Peake said. "We think this will open up a whole new market for Massachusetts lobstermen, increase demand, the price per pound and put a little more money in their pockets."
The change comes after similar decisions in Maine and other New England states, which had bans in place but decided to allow for sales of American lobster tails in recent years.
Read the full story from the New Bedford Standard-Times