White House Council on Environmental Quality Archives - Page 2 of 3

East & West Coast Mayors Write White House on New Marine Monument Declarations

August 25, 2016 — New Bedford Mayor Jon Mitchell recently sent a letter to the White House Council on Environmental Quality expressing concern about the possibility of President Barack Obama issuing an Executive Order that would declare certain offshore areas marine monuments.

Bob Vanasse, the Executive Director of Saving Seafood, told WBSM News that one of the biggest complaints from members of the fishing industry is that, although they met with federal officials, they weren’t presented with any specific proposal.

“There was no actual proposal from the administration to be discussed,” said Vanasse “they were having this listening session but the listening session was something of a peculiar one way street, in that they listened to concerns, but they never responded.”

Vanasse says that if the administration issued the order, through the Antiquities Act, it could have a huge impact on the local fishing industry.

“The best estimate suggests that 20 to 25 percent of the fishing areas in these regions could be affected,” said Vanasse “the most affected fisheries are the red crab industry, lobster, and tuna but there are other industries.”

While stating that the fishing industry would be opposed to such a move Vanessee says including at least one concession would make it more tolerable for many fishing families.

Read the full story at WBSM

Coastal mayors join to oppose Obama administration’s ‘marine monuments’ plan

August 24, 2016 — The Obama administration is running afoul of transparency and openness as it prepares to create offshore marine monuments off California and New England, two mayors including Jon Mitchell are telling the administration.

Mitchell was joined by Monterey, California Mayor Clyde Roberson in sending the Obama White House letters expressing “serious concerns” about the potential economic harm to their ports from the use of executive action by the administration to create new federal marine monuments off the coasts.

A chorus of opposition has been rising from fishermen and fishing communities across the country opposing the creation of marine monuments outside of the existing ocean management processes.

New Bedford is the highest-grossing fishing port in the nation; Monterey is one of the most valuable fishing ports in California.

Writing to Council on Environmental Quality Acting Director Christy Goldfuss, Mitchell praised the successes of the current fishing management process, overseen by NOAA, a process that includes the voices of all ocean stakeholders in its deliberations, according to a release from the The National Coalition for Fishing Communities. “The process is far from perfect, but it affords ample opportunity for stakeholders and the public alike to review and comment on policy decisions and for the peer reviewing of the scientific bases of those decisions,” Mitchell wrote.

Read the full story at the New Bedford Standard-Times

Mayors of Major East and West Coast Ports Express Concern About Possible Economic Harm from Marine Monument Designations

August 24, 2016 — The following was released by the National Coalition for Fishing Communities:

WASHINGTON (NCFC) – In letters sent on Friday to the President and the White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ), New Bedford, Massachusetts Mayor Jon Mitchell and Monterey, California Mayor Clyde Roberson expressed “serious concerns” about the potential economic harm to their ports from the use of executive action by the Obama Administration to create new federal marine monuments off the coasts of New England and California. The mayors also emphasized the need for “transparency” and “robust stakeholder input.”

The letters reflect a growing movement from fishermen and fishing communities across the country opposing the creation of marine monuments outside of the existing ocean management processes. New Bedford is the highest-grossing fishing port in the nation, and Monterey is one of the most valuable fishing ports in California.

In his letter to CEQ Acting Director Christy Goldfuss, New Bedford Mayor Mitchell praised the successes of the current fishing-management process, overseen by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) – a process that emphasizes including the voices of all ocean stakeholders in its deliberations.

“The process is far from perfect, but it affords ample opportunity for stakeholders and the public alike to review and comment on policy decisions and for the peer reviewing of the scientific bases of those decisions,” he wrote.

The Mayor went on to contrast this with the much more opaque process that has governed the marine monument debate.

“The use of a parallel process, however well-meaning, which has none of the checks and balances employed in the NOAA process, could leave ocean management decisions vulnerable to political considerations in the long run,” he wrote.

On the other side of the country, Monterey Mayor Roberson’s letter to President Obama was similarly critical of efforts to declare new monuments by executive fiat. Mayor Roberson emphasized the value of the California seamounts to commercial fishermen and the need to strike a balance between environmental protections and fishing concerns. According to Mayor Roberson, reaching this balance requires basing decisions on science, rather than politics.

“[Monterey] supports publically transparent, science-based processes in making ocean management decisions – such as the mandate embodied in the federal Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation Act,” he wrote. “This proposal was developed without public knowledge or participation, much less scientific or economic review and analysis. Certainly there was no transparency. “

Both Mayors also expressed serious reservations about the potential impact monument declarations would have on their regions’ commercial fishing industries. In New England, a monument declaration would devastate the red crab, swordfish, and tuna fisheries, as well as the processors and shore side businesses that depend on them. In California, the albacore tuna fishery would be deeply impacted, as would that of the rockfish, spiny lobster, sea urchins, and white sea bass.

Mayor Mitchell also noted that while the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission has provided “coordinates of a line seaward of the canyons that is acceptable to the industry” the Administration has not provided a concrete proposal. He noted, “if a proposal actually exists, it has not been shared with any of the stakeholders.”

Fishing groups on the East and West Coasts, including many NCFC affiliates, whose members collectively produce the majority of the edible finfish and shellfish harvested from U.S. waters, have expressed opposition to the creation of a new monument via executive order. These organizations include:

Alaska Bering Sea Crabbers
Alaska Scallop Association
American Albacore Fisheries Association
American Bluefin Tuna Association (ABTA)
American Scallop Association
At-Sea Processors Association
Atlantic Offshore Lobstermen’s Association
Blue Water Fishermen’s Association
California Fisheries and Seafood Institute
California Lobster & Trap Fishermen’s Association
California Sea Urchin Commission
California Wetfish Producers Association
Coalition of Coastal Fisheries
Coos Bay Trawlers
Directed Sustainable Fisheries
Fisheries Survival Fund
Garden State Seafood Association
Golden King Crab Coalition
Groundfish Forum
Long Island Commercial Fishing Association
Midwater Trawlers Cooperative
National Fisheries Institute
New England Red Crab Harvester’s Association
North Carolina Fisheries Association
Oregon Trawl Commission
Organized Fishermen of Florida
Pacific Seafood Processors Association
Pacific Whiting Conservation Cooperative
Southeastern Fisheries Association
United Catcher Boats
Ventura County Commercial Fishermen’s Association
Washington Trollers Association
West Coast Seafood Processors Association
Western Fishboat Owners Association

Read Mayor Mitchell’s letter here

Read Mayor Roberson’s letter here

Opposition to California Offshore Monuments Mounts After Draft Proposal Leaked

July 14, 2016 — SEAFOOD NEWS — What do creation of national monuments have in common? A lack of transparency when it comes to discussing the potential access restrictions with stakeholders. That same closed-door effort is happening off of California, as effort mounts to create offshore monuments on both west and east coasts.

California sport and commercial interests first became aware of the proposal to establish monuments around nine seamounts, ridges and banks (SRBs) as rumors a few months ago. In June, the industry got a look at the first proposal draft. Washington State Sen. Kevin Ranker, D-Orcas Island, was urging California state lawmakers and West Coast members of congress in Washington, D.C., to support the proposal that could make the nine areas off-limits to commercial fishing but remain open to all recreational fishing, including charter boats.

Diane Pleschner-Steele, one of the signatories to an opposition letter, noted the proponents argue the nine areas are not significant commercial fishing areas.

“However, the fishermen I’ve spoken with hotly contest that,” Pleschner-Steele, Executive Director of the California Wetfish Producers Association, said in an email. “Those are productive fishing grounds and to lose them forever would be a huge economic blow to many fishermen, processors and local communities.”

Ranker is no stranger to proposed monuments. As a co-chair of the president’s National Ocean Council’s Governance Coordinating Committee, he is one of the advisers to the NOC that provide guidance on the development of strategic action plans, policy and research priorities. In 2013, he worked with Washington leaders to create a national monument in the San Juan Islands.

Nearly 40 people representing sport and commercial fisheries signed on to a letter opposing the designation of monuments that could include Gorda Ridges and Mendocino Ridge off of northern California; Gumdrop and Pioneer seamounts, Guide Seamount and Taney Seamounts off of central California; and Rodriguez Seamount, San Juan Seamount, Northeast Bank and Tanner and Cortes Banks off of southern California.

“We oppose the designation of California offshore marine monuments that prohibit fishing under the Antiquities Act because monument status is irreversible and the Antiquities Act process involves no public peer-reviewed scientific analysis, no NEPA analysis, no public involvement or outreach to parties most impacted – no transparency,” the opponents wrote in the July 6 letter to President Obama, the Council on Environmental Quality, the secretaries of Commerce and Interior and a number of senators and congressmen.

A joint letter from the American Albacore Fishing Association and Western Fishboat Owners Association further note that some of the proponents’ data about the economic importance of the seamounts, ridges and banks is old and outdated. Some fisheries expanded their use of the offshore areas when California imposed marine protected areas in southern California in 2012.

The groups also note the Council Coordination Committee that includes members of the eight regional fishery management councils recently made a resolution that says, “therefore be it resolved, the CCC recommends that if any designations are made in the marine environment under authorities such as the Antiquities Act of 1906 that fisheries management in the U.S. EEZ waters continue to be developed, analyzed and implemented through the public process of the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act.”

“in the even this proposal moves forward, we strongly support maintaining management of fisheries under the MSA, through the [Pacific Fishery Management Council],” AAFA and WFOA wrote.

The proponents state the sites are “for discussion purposes only; specific sites, boundaries and regulations will be determined through a robust public consultation process that includes tribes, fishermen and stakeholders. There is a full commitment to working with these interests to better understand the activities occurring in these areas and mitigate potential concern.”

Meanwhile, other groups also are preparing written comments in an effort to fend off the threat of limited access to the nine offshore areas as the opposition grows. It’s unlikely anyone from the seafood industry is fooled by some of the behind-the-scenes political maneuvering that is taking place to create the monuments.

“In our opinion, which is informed by the lack of any attempt at collaboration with industry, this proposal is no more than legacy, political ambition and preservation being prioritized over the best available science and a multi-lateral, collaborative political process in the design of marine conservation measures,” AAFA and WFOA said in their letter.

Click here to read the letter sent to Congressman Huffman.

Click here to read the letter by Sandy Smith of the Ventura County Economic Development Association.

Click here to read the oppositon letter from the National Coalition for Fishing Communities.

This story originally appeared on Seafoodnews.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission.

AP: Conservationists keep pressing for Atlantic Ocean monuments

July 11, 2016 — The following is excerpted from a story published today by the Associated Press. In it, representatives of the Pew Charitable Trusts and the Conservation Law Foundation (CLF) call for President Obama to use executive authority under the Antiquities Act to designate multiple national marine monuments off the coast of New England.

Last month, eight members of the National Coalition for Fishing Communities (NCFC) and the valuable fishing port of New Bedford, Mass., united in opposition to proposed Atlantic monuments. The groups agreed that fishing areas and resources should continue to be managed in the open and transparent manner stipulated by the Magnuson-Stevens Act (MSA).

Previously, many of the environmental groups calling for Atlantic monuments expressed support for fisheries management under the MSA. In December, Pew called the MSA “the bedrock of one of the world’s best fishery management systems.” In April, the CLF wrote that the MSA is “the primary reason why the United States can say that it has the most sustainable fisheries in the world.” In February, the Environmental Defense Fund said that the MSA “has made the United States a global model for sustainable fisheries management.”

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Environmental conservationists aren’t giving up on trying to persuade the White House to designate an area in the Gulf of Maine as a national monument.

In the final months of President Barack Obama’s term, they’re hoping he’ll protect an underwater mountain and offshore ecosystem in the Gulf of Maine known as Cashes Ledge. They also want him to protect a chain of undersea formations about 150 miles off the coast of Massachusetts known as the New England Coral Canyons and Seamounts.

The White House Council on Environmental Quality said in March, and reiterated last week, that while the New England Coral Canyons and Seamounts area is under consideration, Cashes Ledge currently is not. There are no marine national monuments in the Atlantic Ocean.

Robert Vanasse, executive director of the fishing advocacy group Saving Seafood, said environmental groups seemed to be “in denial and shock” after the White House first said it wasn’t considering Cashes Ledge in March.

“I think they overplayed their hand. They arrogantly seemed to think that they could dictate to the White House,” he said on Wednesday.

Vanasse said fishing interests are now taking the White House at its word that Cashes Ledge is off the table. The industry is already struggling with quota cuts and climate change.

Commercial fishing groups oppose creating any marine monument in the Atlantic under the American Antiquities Act because the decision is left entirely to the president, Vanasse said. There are existing procedures to protect areas where the public participates in the process under the top law regulating fishing in U.S. oceans, the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act, he added.

“We’re not the fringe nutcases here,” Vanasse said. “It’s pretty much every non-environmentally subsidized fishery organization that is opposed to the use of the Antiquities Act to create marine monuments. The Magnuson-Stevens process works. It could be better, but it’s working.”

Read the full story from the Associated Press at the Boston Herald

ERIC REID: Work on marine monument not done yet

July 5, 2016 — In June, House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Rob Bishop, a Republican U.S. Rep. Utah, visited New Bedford and spoke to several members of the industry regarding their concerns about a potential marine monument off the coast of New England. Following the meeting, I remarked to The Standard-Times reporter that a monument could potentially cost the industry up to $500 million in economy activity, in addition to countless jobs.

This estimate has been criticized for being far too high. But it is based on two premises — a conservative estimate of the economic impact of fishing in New England, and the lack of clarity surrounding the marine monument discussion.

Currently, the commercial fishing industry from Maine to New Jersey brings in an estimated $1.4 billion per year in landings. These landings support hundreds of millions of dollars more in economic activity for related and shoreside businesses, and employ tens of thousands of people up and down the coast.

Because no one in the Obama administration’s Council on Environmental Quality has put forward an actual, concrete proposal of what an Atlantic monument might look like, the industry considers all of this to be potentially at risk.

Read the full opinion piece at the New Bedford Standard-Times

New Bedford Standard-Times: Cooperation pushes fishery advocacy to next level

June 6, 2016 — Last Thursday, House Natural Resources Committee Chair Rep. Rob Bishop (R-UT) joined Rep. Bill Keating (D-MA) and Mayor Jon Mitchell in New Bedford, Mass., to discuss issues relevant to the local seafood and fishing industries. The National Coalition for Fishing Communities (NCFC), which helped organize Rep. Bishop’s visit, hopes to continue working with the Natural Resources Committee and its staff to arrange bipartisan visits to all the seaports where NCFC members conduct their business.The following editorial about Rep. Bishop and Rep. Keating’s visit to New Bedford was published yesterday by the New Bedford Standard-Times:

Geography is both a blessing and a curse for commercial fishermen in the U.S. They have access to rich fishing grounds along thousands of miles of seacoast, but the distance between the fish they catch and the American consumer prevents a full understanding of the lives of fishing communities.

The visit to New Bedford’s waterfront Thursday by the chairman of the House Committee on Natural Resources, U.S. Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah, was more than a step in the right direction, it’s proof of treading the right path. The committee is responsible for ocean issues, including the current reauthorization of the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act.

City support

The National Coalition for Fishing Communities was formed with city-directed grant money, and the Harbor Development Commission’s membership in the coalition emphatically states the city’s commitment and leadership. Their advocacy is often first to be heard, which means they’ll wait longest for remedy.

Advocacy

Saving Seafood’s years of advocacy in Washington on behalf of the Port of New Bedford and the East Coast has enabled the creation of the coalition. More than two dozen municipalities, businesses, and associations from around the country are represented: Alaska, Hawaii, West Coast, Gulf Coast and East coast. Members from Rhode Island, Long Island, New Jersey and around New England had their voices heard by the chairman on Thursday. An industry with such diversity had its voice heard on national issues and discovered new resources to address local issues more effectively.

The coalition’s website says: “We are committed to the tenets of National Standard Eight of the Magnuson-Stevens Act,” which is summed up in the balancing of the sustainability of both the ocean environment and the fishing community. For the record, The Standard-Times is similarly committed.

Good government

There seems little good to be done recounting the sins of either fishermen or government agents, but it is instructive when considering the case of an alternative for the monument designation proposed to protect corals in fishing grounds south of Cape Cod. Industry representatives cooperated at the White House Executive Office level, the Council on Environmental Quality, to produce an alternative that satisfies preservation and fishing goals alike.

In addition, the CEQ’s counsel can influence how frequently deference might be claimed by regulators, nudging court decisions more in line with the statutory balancing act of National Standard 8.

The chairman’s visit to New Bedford is a recognition that there remain injustices and inequities in the administration of Magnuson-Stevens; reaching out leads to better decisions.

Bipartisanship

Chairman Bishop’s congressional district in Utah borders on the Great Salt Lake, which sees millions of pounds of brine shrimp eggs landed each year. The industry can move more than a billion dollars through the economy annually, but its fortunes are fickle. The lake’s changing salinity affects shrimp reproduction, which can shut the season down if severe enough.

The chairman may have seen the workers in his district reflected in those at the display auction in New Bedford on Thursday, icing down Gulf of Maine flounder. Or at Northern Wind, where workers use machines to process vast amounts of scallops, the port’s signature harvest.

The only “politics” surrounding the chairman’s visit was of the traditional variety: How can we get the people’s business done? New Bedford’s Democratic U.S. Rep. Bill Keating could readily see eye to eye on the issues of fishing communities as they toured the New Bedford waterfront together.

Managing ocean resources may never be easy, but cooperation is what gets the people’s business done, moving toward National Standard 8’s goal of a sustainable balance between humanity and the environment.

Read the editorial at the New Bedford Standard-Times

ASMFC Urges Transparency and Public Input in Proposed New England Offshore Canyons & Seamounts Monument Decision Making Process

May 12, 2016 — The following was released by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission:

ARLINGTON, Va. — In a May 9^th letter to President Barack Obama, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (Commission) urged the President and the White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) for transparency and a robust opportunity for public input as the Administration considers designating a National Monument through its authority under the Antiquities Act. While details on the specific location of the monument remain unknown, one potential area discussed centers around the New England offshore canyons and seamounts.

Currently, the New England Fishery Management Council (Council) is drafting an Omnibus Deep-Sea Coral Amendment which considers protection of corals in and around the canyons of the Atlantic Ocean. At the request of the Council, the Commission conducted a survey of active offshore lobstermen to understand the potential impacts to the fishery should lobster traps be limited by the Draft Amendment. Preliminary results indicate a high dependence on the offshore canyons for revenue, with over $15 million in revenue generated each year by fishermen targeting American lobster and Jonah crab in the canyons. Given that input from concerned stakeholders is a key component of the Council’s decision-making process, the Commission strongly supports using the Council process to develop measures to protect the ecosystems within these deep waters.

If the President chooses to use the Antiquities Act to protect deep sea corals, the Commission requested the designated area be limited to the smallest area compatible with the proper care and management of the objects to be protected. Additionally, the Commission requested the area be limited to depths greater than approximately 900 meters and encompass any or all of the region seaward of this line out to the outer limit of the exclusive economic zone. Further, the Commission asked that only bottom tending fishing effort be prohibited in the area and all other mid water/surface fishing methods (recreational and commercial) be allowed to continue in the area.

Read this release and the ASMFC letter to the White House as a PDF

Scallopers to White House: Marine monument a bad idea

May 6, 2016 — A fishing trade group that represents scallopers from Maine to Virginia has joined Northeast groundfishermen in opposing the designation of any marine national monuments in New England waters.

The Fisheries Survival Fund (FSF) penned a May 4 letter to Obama administration officials stating its opposition to the establishment of the monuments while also criticizing the unilateral process — presidential decree through the Antiquities Act — being considered for designating them.

“A monument designation, with its unilateral implementation and opaque process, is the exact opposite of the fisheries management process in which we participate,” FSF legal counsels David Frulla and Andrew Minkiewicz wrote to Christy Goldfuss and Whitley Saumwebber, executives in the White House Council on Environmental Quality. “Public areas and public resources should be managed in an open and transparent manner, not an imperial stroke of the pen.”

The FSF letter comes almost two months after Goldfuss, the managing director of the White House environmental council, told fishing stakeholders at a March 24 meeting in Boston the White House has shelved the proposal pushed by environmental and conservation groups to establish a marine national monument about 80 miles east of Cape Ann in the area around Cashes Ledge.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Times

ASMFC Urges President to Minimize Potential Economic Harm from Atlantic Marine Monument Designation

ALEXANDRIA, Va. (Saving Seafood) – May 4, 2016 – The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) has taken a formal position on the possibility of a Presidential proclamation of an Atlantic Marine Monument.

The Obama administration, at the urging of major environmental groups, is considering creating a National Monument in the New England Canyons and Seamounts region via the Antiquities Act. Few specifics have been released about what the monument would look like, but it could have significant negative impacts on fishermen in the affected areas.

The ASMFC’s Interstate Fisheries Management Program (ISFMP) Policy Board unanimously (with three abstentions) approved a resolution today drawing a line in the ocean (see map), in close proximity to the Atlantic canyons and seamounts off of Georges Banks, and urging that the creation of a monument only take place in a region seaward of that line. The ASMFC resolution urges that management of waters under Federal control from the coastline to that line be managed under the Magnuson-Stevens Act.

The resolution states:

That it is the preference of ASMFC that the current New England Fishery Management Council coral management process continue without a Presidential proclamation on the issue;
That should the President decide to designate a deep-water marine monument off the New England coast prior to the end of his Presidency, it should be limited to the smallest area compatible with the proper care and management of the objects to be protected, as required by the Antiquities Act;
That the area be limited to depths greater than approximately 900 meters and encompass any or all of the region seaward of the line (see map) out to the outer limit of the EEZ;
That only bottom tending fishing effort be prohibited in the area and that all other mid-water/surface fishing methods (recreational and commercial) be allowed to continue to use the area;
That the public and affected user groups be allowed to review and comment on any specific proposal prior to its implementation.

The motion was initially crafted by members of the ASMFC Rhode Island Delegation, in consultation with other regional fisheries organizations. ASMFC’s Lobster Board, where the resolution originated, gave its unanimous approval to the proposal at its meeting on Monday.

In a letter this week to the ASMFC American Lobster Management Board requesting guidance on the monument issue, Board Chairman David Borden wrote about the potential consequences a monument would have for commercial and recreational fisheries in the area.

“The economic impacts of a potential Monument designation would undoubtedly be significant depending on where the boundaries are set. These economic impacts would be felt coast wide as the fishing fleets working in and around the canyons hail from ports across New England and the Mid-Atlantic.”

Specifically highlighted are the potential impacts on the offshore lobster and crab fisheries, which would be hurt by the prohibition on fishing in the monument area, or by being displaced into nearby fishing grounds. Lobster and Jonah crab revenue from Southern New England are estimated at $38 million per year. A monument designation could also hurt the lobster stock by pushing fishermen from areas where lobster is abundant into areas where lobster is more depleted. Concerns were also voiced about potential negative impacts of the proposal on whales and protected species.

Additionally, many of the States represented on ASMFC have major interests in finfish, pelagic longline, squid, and red crab fisheries, or have large recreational fisheries. “All of these fisheries could be directly affected by a closure or indirectly affected by a redirection of effort.”

According to ASMFC Chairman Doug Grout the ASMFC leadership plans to meet with representatives of CEQ next week to discuss ways to mitigate impacts on commercial and recreational fisheries.

About the ASMFC
In the early 1940s, recognizing that they could accomplish far more through cooperation rather than individual effort, the Atlantic coast states came together to form the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission. An Interstate Compact, ratified by the states and approved by the U.S. Congress in 1942, acknowledged the necessity of the states joining forces to manage their shared migratory fishery resources and affirmed the states’ commitment to cooperative stewardship in promoting and protecting Atlantic coastal fishery resources.

Read a letter from ASMFC Lobster Board Chairman David Borden to the ASMFC Lobster Board

Read a letter from Blue Water Fishermen’s Association Executive Director Terri Lei Beideman to the White House