SSFFF Dinner Tickets/Speakers/Donors!

[CaptTB]

The deadline for purchasing your tickets for the March 6th SSFFF 2nd Annual Fund-raising Dinner is Tomorrow!!! (Wednesday, March 4th) as we have to give the final, final head count to Crystal Point!

I want to thank ALL of the people who donated gifts and prizes for our auction, in addition to all the people who purchased tickets!!

Guest Speakers will be Jim Hutchinson, Jr., new Managing Director of the RFA and Dan Furlong, Executive Director of the Mid-Atlantic Fisheries Management Council.

Hutch needs no introduction, and I worked with Dan Furlong for three years while on the Council and I am here to tell you that NO ONE knows more about how the system works, and more importantly what's wrong with it, then Dan. I was quite pleased to say the least when Dan re-worked his schedule so he could come up here and speak at our dinner. This is a guy who just plain "gets it" when it comes to the problems we all face and the roadblocks we run into when trying to fix those very same problems!!

Here's the short list of businesses and individuals who have sent us prizes/gifts for the auctions we will be holding at the dinner Friday Night:

Betty & Nicks, Burford Books, NJ Angler, Alan Robinson, Mil-Comm Products, Quantum, Capt. Seagull's Charts, Suggs-Nicholas-Shea Inc, C&B Tackle, Chesapeake Bay Lures, Fish Bonz B&T, Merrick Tackle, Dave c/o G&B, Outdoor Etc., Oyster Bay Tackle (MD), Fishbites, Tally's Chrysler, Gene Quigley, St. Croix, Pure Fishing, ----------, Misty Morn, Canyon Runner, Henry's, Don Coffey & Sons, Fishermen's Den, Folsom, Brielle B&T, The Reel Seat, Gambler, Jamaica, Paramount, Dauntless, The Fisherman, and The Fishermen! and too many damn party and charter boats to name 'em all right now!!!!

As I said, this is the short list so please no one get offended if you don't see your name, ALL of the sponsors/Donors will be listed on the website once we finish getting all the stuff in!!! (some more just came today)

I'll be honest, I did not expect to see a response like we did last year. The "shine" has worn off to some degree, and the economy is but a shadow of what it was this time last year. Boy was I wrong!! The gifts coming in have been tremendous and it looks like we are on target to hit or break the 150 person mark for the dinner. Please, we need money NOW to help pay for the scientific work going on and to garner support for the legislation.

There are a couple of excellent fishing tournaments/trips scheduled for the summer that will help tremendously once they are completed, but until then (over the next 3-6 months) we will need A LOT of support to help continue the fight.

This is the last chance to get tickets for the dinner, the clock is ticking!!

Thanks again to everyone who donated and/or bought tickets (quite a few of you can't make the dinner but donated anyway...thank you!) and I'll see you Friday night!!

Purchase Your Dinner Tickets Now!

[Luna Sea 5]

 

[Capt -Jerry P]

Capt Tony

Thanks for keeping us informed...

Great Cause Guys!!!

Just got a ticket and donated a trip.

Hope some of you attend this great event

[ped579]

First Welcome Aboard Captain Tony,

I would like to thank you for responding to my e-mail as it was posted as soon as I received it.  It helped clear up a lot on the goals of the organization.

Second I would like to welcome you as a senior angler to our site as we pride ourselves as being a learning site please feel free to post any information regarding saltwater angling.  We have many great Captains on here that love to share their knowledge to make fishing in NJ a little more pleasurable.

With all that is going on it is nice to know that there are voices that are speaking up for the little guy as we seem to be shrouded by clouds of bureaucratic double talk.  It is hard to make out if we are making any ground on what seems like a downward spiral of our freedoms and liberties.

Again thank you for all you and the SSFFF are doing on out behalf.

Happy Catching

Paul

[CaptTB]

Second I would like to welcome you as a senior angler to our site....

Hey, watch that "senior" stuff, I'm only 40!!

Seriously though, I will gladly answer any questions about what's going on with fisheries management. While unfortunate from my perspective, it's something I have had to devote quite a lot of my time to!

Fire away boys, my typing fingers are limbered up and ready to go! Start threads, ask questions, just don't forget I'm only the messenger, I don't actually set policy!

[IrishAyes]

Capt Tony, Paul was welcoming you with HIM being the senior angler. It was a senior moment for him.

I am planning on going to the meeting in Galloway tomorrow afternoon/evening. First one for me, what should I expect to see and hear?

[ped579]

Thanks Joe but who is the one that is retired...Huh, Huh, Huh...

 

[CaptTB]

I am planning on going to the meeting in Galloway tomorrow afternoon/evening. First one for me, what should I expect to see and hear?

A lot of the "North" vs. the "South" arguments, people asking for options that are not allowed or not even on the table, then getting pissed off and calling the whole thing "rigged" because they didn't get what they wanted even though this is NOT the meeting to come up with new ideas, plus a lot of very well thought out responses to the various options, a number of people (and the number unfortunately continues to grow) asking for some kind of relief or pleas for specific options because they are literally on their last legs as business men/women.

That's pretty much it in a nutshell.

Oh yea, and if the option I support gets chosen you'll hear (if you stay outside after the meeting) at least a few "Well, ya F'd us again Bogan" comments. Has happened every year for the last 5 or 6 with one exception, last year when I could not stay till the end of the meeting because we had a public meeting for SSFFF out in Brooklawn later that night!!

The idfficult thing to get across to people is this meeting is THE LAST MEETING in a process that started in August of lat year. You cannot (or at leat should not) expect to walk in at the last minute on the last day of the last month at the last meeting in an 8 month process and expect to change everything, throw out the options and start over, come up with options that were not approved or expect the NJ Marine Fisheries Council to make a decision on something they are not allowed to change by law.

In August the quotas are set for a number of our fisheries, Fluke included, at the joint ASMFC/MAFMC meeting (in Philly this past year) Then, at the December joint meeting (in Montauk this past year) the decision specifically for Fluke on whether to go coastwide or State by State is made. If coastwide is chosen, the process stops there because everyone would simply have one set of regs for the entire coast (this year that would have been 2 fish at 20" and a season from mid-May to mid-September with some sort of in-season closure)

If state by state is chosen, as it was again this year and has been for every year since 2001, the states will find out what percentage reduction they will have to take for next year, if any, or how much they can relax their regs for next year. Then the states go back and put together a range of options that meet the required reduction/relaxation. At the February ASMFC meeting (always in Virginia) the states will find out what options were approved by the technical committee (states will often put in options from just short of making it to way more conservative than needed and everywhere in between....some states will try to get creative with things not previously approved....etc.)
At that point, each state will then typically have some sort of council/dnrec/f&w whatever their council/commission is called meeting where the choice will be made.

In the case of NJ they first have an advisors meeting in Nacote Creek (which I went to on 2/24) to get input from the advisors (recs, headboat guys, charterboat guys, clubs, etc. are ll represented at the advisors meeting) From there the Council will usually pair down the options to 4-6 choices that will be presented at the meeting, in the case of NJ that's always the first Thursday in March, the one you and I are going to tomorrow.

This is not a popular vote of whoever shows up at the meeting. Public comment is taken to give the council further points to consider when making their decision. The council is required, by law, to consider the impact of their decision on everyone, not just whomever shows up at the meeting. The NJ MFC council is made up of 11 people. GO HERE to read a bit more about the NJ Marine Fisheries Council.

The council cannot turn around and approve n option that was not already approved by the ASMFC. The list is the list, period.

Hope that helps explain things, sorry for the long post!

[Hotrod]

Thanks Capt Tony..  Ugg.. I can only imagine the aggravation..

[Bucktail]

Things are always more complicated and involved then they seem.  Thanks for all you do Captain!

[IrishAyes]

Thanks for the thorough response Capt Tony. I am sure it will open a lot of eyes of people who are not very familiar with how these regs come to be.

We all appreciate all that is being done by anyone involved in getting us any kind of season with the silly rules and regs that are necessary only because of the lame MS Act.

Until this act is changed it is a hard fight to win. I hope more people jump aboard to fight for the cause.

[Hunter 2]

Thankyou Capt. Tony for all your time and effort spent fighting for our cause.