Entitled Truth: Fishing Crisis or Government Mismanagement, the 60 minute documentary presents indisputable facts about the fishing industry in New England and how current and planned regulations will affect area fishermen. The film is full of effective demonstrations of how some rules must be applied in the field, out at sea, and just how wasteful – or arbitrary – they can be. In the middle of one fishing run, Loftes and crew members struggle to toss a 300 pound swordfish overboard, citing weight quotas as the reason why. In another stunning example, once the boat catches 50 pounds of flounder, all other flounder – live and fit for market – are tossed as well. It sounds innocent enough until the question is asked: Does it make sense to buy the fuel and other expenses to catch 1,000 pounds per day for 10 days, or is it more practical to catch 10,000 in one day trip?
The Loftes family has been fishing out of Galilee for generations. They are well known, to say the least. For the last several years, however, the family has experienced significant difficulty in staying afloat, so to speak. Despite decades of experience, several factors are converging to push them – and other fishermen just like them – out of business for good. And it’s no secret, for all the fishermen across the state know it. They are threatened as well. They are also astounded that the national media at large has failed to inform the public that all along the Atlantic seaboard, half of all small fishermen could be soon forced to sell off their business. So Brian Loftes, one of Narragansett’s more vocal critics of the current state of fishing, decided it was time to take action, to spread the word to the public. “I just woke up one day and said ‘enough was enough’. There’s just too much going on here that is wrong. I have to make a documentary so that people will know the truth about what’s happening,” he said.
Read the full story in the Narragansett Times