Saving Seafood

Massachusetts: SMAST meeting brings fishing, offshore wind in same room

February 13, 2018 — NEW BEDFORD, Mass. — Offshore wind developers spent the majority of a 3-hour meeting Monday attempting to win over the local commercial fishing industry.

For much of the meeting, the fishermen in attendance rolled their eyes, scoffed at various PowerPoint slides and even went as far as to say offshore wind is unwanted.

“Nobody wanted this,” one fisherman out of Point Judith said. “Nobody wanted the problems. We were assured there would be none. And here we are.”

Twenty members of the Fisheries Working Group on Offshore Wind Energy sat around a table at SMAST East hoping to solve various issues between the two ocean-based industries.

The meeting, which featured representatives from Deepwater Wind, Vineyard Wind, and Bay State Wind and the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, was called to discuss a plan for an independent offshore wind and fisheries science advisory panel.

“It’s not too late,” said David Pierce of the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries. “As much as we’re working on, now, can be offered up to BOEM and to the different companies specific to the search of projects and specific search of scientific endeavors. We need the research. And we need research to help us address the questions that are being asked by the industry as well as ourselves.”

The science advisory panel would act independently to identify fishery-related scientific and technical gaps related to the future development of offshore wind projects. The panel could also identify offshore wind’s effects on the fishery within Massachusetts and Rhode Island.

The panel’s members have yet to be comprised. Debate regarding who should be on the panel began Monday. Everyone agreed experts from all backgrounds should have a seat at the table.

Read the full story at the New Bedford Standard-Times

 

New England Council: Massachusetts Offshore Wind Public Open Houses – November 27-30, 2017

November 22, 2017 — The following was released by the New England Fishery Management Council:

The following public open houses may be of interest to the New England Fishery Management Council’s stakeholders who are following offshore wind developments.  Four events are scheduled for the week following Thanksgiving, all in Massachusetts.  Here are the details.

WHAT’S GOING ON:  Bay State Wind LLC is proposing to develop a new offshore wind farm 15-to-25 miles south of Martha’s Vineyard in the area known as the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) Lease OCS-A 0500.

WHO’S INVOLVED:  The project is being developed as a 50/50 joint venture between Orstead (formerly DONG Energy) and Eversource Energy, which together make up Bay State Wind.

WHEN AND WHERE ARE THE OPEN HOUSES:  The four public open houses will be held on the following dates in the following locations:

  • Monday, November 27 – Somerset Berkley Regional High School, 625 County Street, Somerset, MA, 6 p.m. to 8 p.m.
  • Tuesday, November 28 – The New Bedford Whaling Museum, 18 Johnny Cake Hill, New Bedford, MA, 5 p.m. to 8 p.m.
  • Wednesday, November 29 – The Barn Bowl & Bistro, 13 Uncas Avenue, Oak Bluffs, MA, 5 p.m. to 8 p.m.
  • Thursday, November 30 – The Sea Crest Beach Hotel, 350 Quaker Road, Falmouth, MA, 5 p.m. to 8 p.m.

PROJECT DETAILS:  The developers stated, “In December 2017, Bay State Wind will participate in the first state-led procurement of offshore wind power in the United States in response to a solicitation led by the Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources and the Electric Distribution Companies.” More information about the initiative is available at http://baystatewind.com/About-bay-state-wind#0.

QUESTIONS:  For more information contact Bay State Wind Fishery Liaison Officer John Williamson at (207) 939-7055, john@seakeeper.net.

Marine Resource Education Program bridging trust gaps between fishermen, scientists and regulators

October 28, 2016 — In most coastal areas of the United States where fishing is a significant part of the economy, it’s taken for granted that fishermen and regulators don’t think fondly of each other.

Fishermen are convinced regulators don’t know what they’re doing. Regulators are frustrated that fishermen don’t put much stock in their scientific assessments.

This mistrust has real consequences. Fishermen begrudge – and sometimes flaunt – regulatory decisions. Regulators come off as vengeful or pedantic. Meetings between the two parties devolve into shouting matches. Scientific conclusions get ignored or flaunted, and opportunities for improving the accuracy of stock estimates through greater participation are lost amidst the acrimony.

About 15 years ago, two members of the New England fishing industry, John Williamson and Mary Beth Tooley, created the Marine Resource Education Program (MREP) with the goal of initiating a more positive era of fisher-regulator relations.

The program brought regulators –mostly senior officials – together with commercial fishermen and other representatives from industry for a three-day get-together. While the program has been fine-tuned over the years – most notably with the Gulf of Maine Research Institute taking over the management of the program in 2005 after several years as a pilot study at the University of New Hampshire – the key to its longevity has been a deep collaborative approach to program design and delivery, and a simple and wildly successful idea originally articulated by John Williamson: give all parties ample time to listen to each other’s perspectives and get to know each other on a personal level, and explain the process in plain English.

Today, there are three different regions with MREPs, including the flagship New England/Mid-Atlantic program, a program in the Southeast, and a program attuned to the specialized needs of recreational and charter-for-hire fishermen in the Gulf of Mexico, South Atlantic, and the Caribbean, plus a newly launched MREP for the West Coast.

Alexa Dayton and her staff, who support all of the MREP regional teams through the GMRI, said MREPs have been found to be most effective when a core team collaborates to develop the workshop agenda and host each of these events, creating a community atmosphere that welcomes newcomers to fisheries science and management.

Read the full story at Seafood Source