This week Representatives Jon Runyan (NJ-3), Walter Jones (NC-3), and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (FL-18) introduced the “Saving Fishing Jobs Act of 2011", legislation which seeks to hold the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) accountable for fisheries management programmes called catch shares that have been detrimental to fishermen throughout the Eastern and Gulf Coasts.
The bill would require the Secretary of Commerce to terminate a catch share programme if it reduces the total number of fishermen in the programme by 15 per cent or more. It also would prevent the government from imposing new catch share programmes on fishing communities that oppose them. It would do so by requiring consideration of new programmes to be initiated only via a petition signed by at least 50 percent of fishermen in the fishery, and by requiring a two-thirds vote of fishermen for approval of new programmes.
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