January 29, 2020 — Virginia moved to keep fishing for menhaden in Chesapeake Bay, but a legislative compromise that got its first nods this week means the big boats from Reedville won’t catch quite as much.
The reason is that the most political fish of all would no longer be regulated by the General Assembly, where state Senate and House of Delegates panels say the legislature should turn the job over to the Virginia Marine Resources Commission, the panel that oversees every other fish.
Virginia faced a moratorium on the Bay menhaden fishery because Reedville-based Omega Proteins exceeded a cap on the Bay catch imposed by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission in 2017.
That cap, of 51,000 metric tons, is 41.5% below the old limit, which is the one written into the Code of Virginia.