Fix NOAA, Fix Catch shares!
Want our vote? Earn it!
Catch shares, MRAG, Departments of Interior/Commerce, EDF, Pew, NOAA
Mission Statement, Department of interior:
Protect America's Great Outdoors & Powering Our Future.
The U.S. Department of the Interior protect's America's natural resources (but not our fish) and heritage. NOAA, the 'protector' of our natural resource, or heritage, our fish, is under the Department of Commerce; not the Department of the Interior. As such, NOAA is in the process of diverting an American people's 'Natural resource,' our fish, into a commodity to be bought and sold. Enter NOAA's version on Catch Shares! Enter the Department of Commerce:
Mission statement, Department of Commerce:
"The mission of the department is to "promote job creation and improved living standards for all Americans by creating an infrastructure that promotes economic growth" Catch shares, under the Department of Commerce, wherever implemented, has destroyed the fishing industry, destroyed living standards, destroyed economic growth.
MRAG, Marine Resources Assessment Group (MRAG) Americas wrote the catch shares manual for the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), and NOAA's Administrator DR. Jane Lubchenco. As such, exactly whom does MRAG represent? MRAG received $500,000 from Pew, and, in the past MRAG's non-government clients have received $99,440,000 from environmental coffers. MRAG is preparing, for NOAA, an evaluation of how well catch shares is working in the New England & Pacific trawl fleets, an how well they will be working three to five years in the future. The outcome of this "Evaluation" is a far-gone-conclusion. It will supply EDF and NOAA the ammunition they need, 'the finest science money can buy,' to continue their catch shares SCAM of the American people, and to promote catch shares as a tool to also control recreational/commercial over-fishing.
The entire fishing industry is under siege. Millions of dollars are being lost in the tourist trade as well as the local environment. Within the last year Tampa lost Tight line & Blue Water outfitters, both well established fishing tackle stores. Bobby Alesworth, one of the oldest, most respected wholesale seafood suppliers in the nation, reports loosing a customer a week. This is being forced on the American people, across the nation, out of greed, not science. The method used is the misuse of a fishery management tool called, "Catch shares." Under the Department of Commerce, influenced by the billions of Pew & EDF, radial so called, "Environmental" Groups, fish will become a profit item to be bought & sold to the highest bidder; no longer a sport to be enjoyed but the fishermen of this country.
Pew & the Department of Commerce:
Holly Binns, a project director for the Pew Environmental Group, has just issues the following statement in response to U.S. Commerce Secretary John Bryson's approval of new catch limits on some species in the Gulf of Mexico. Our own Gulf of Mexico Management Council has approved the plan. "These plans are a proactive approach and are significant for the fish in the Gulf of Mexico." About two dozen species, from black grouper to gray (mangrove) snapper, are now protected under catch (Share) limits. The fact that gray, mangrove, snapper is included shows a completer lack of knowledge of the state of our fisheries. Mangrove snapper are very prolific and extremely abundant. However, an abundant, healthy, fishery is not conducive of catch shares.
Properly utilized, catch shares could bring accountability into all segments of the fishing industry; misused, disaster! Properly used, without the Department of Commerce's big money influence, without the "Environmentalist," EDF, Pew, etc., influence, catch shares could become a benefit to all salt water fisheries...both recreational & commercial. Properly used as an actual benefit to the entire industry, catch shares would, in all probability, then be supported by the American people; as such NOAA's diversion of science funds into the promotion of catch shares would no longer be needed. These funds could actually be used, as intended, for the betterment of our fishery. NOAA could then become a real team player; part of the solution, rather than part of the problem.
So where did we go very wrong?
In 1954, the US Congress passed the Saltonstall-Kennedy Act:
The Saltonstall-Kennedy Act, a multi-million dollar superfund created to promote and market domestic seafood. In 2010, the Department of Commerce, (NOAA is now under the Dept. of Commerce,) received $113,400,000 from the Department of Agriculture. As mandated by law Commerce was obliged to spend at least 60% of this sum, $68,000,000 on "fishing industry projects." Ever wonder where monies for the promotion, implementation, of shares/separation comes from? In addition to organizations such as EDF, PEW, PACKARD FOUNDATION, WALTON FOUNDATION (Walmart), etc., NOAA shifted $104,600,000 into operations. It takes a great deal of money to push (buy) shares/separation on the American peoples. Only $8,000,000 was distributed through competitive grants to congressionally mandated fishing projects. NOAA has been reallocating funds from research into administration of the catch shares programs, this means less money for stock assessments. NOAA, Lubchenco at work!
Dr, Jane (catch shares) Lubchenco is now head of NOAA. Dear Jane has a long history of interactions, money received, from the so called, "Environmental" groups.
PEW FELLOW: $150,000
MOORE FOUNDATION: (and PEW Oceans Commission member) $5,500,000
ENVIRONMENTAL DEFENCE FOUNDATION (EDF) Vice-chair: $10,400,000
GORDON & BETTY MOORE FOUNDATION: $13,700,000
The list goes on & on. Lubchenco took many of her associates, backers, with her to NOAA. To name just a few:
Monica Medina, former Senior Officer, PEW Environmental Group
Justin Kennedy, former Senior Public Affairs Officer at PEW Trust and Director of Communications for the PEW Commission
Lois Schiffer, former Vice President for Public Policy at the national Audubon Society
Clearly, Lubchenco has surrounded herself with so called, "Environmentalist."
Catch shares, the Government sponsored privatization of a National Resource, a billion dollar take-over of what was once our fishery, our heritage, is Lubchenco's legacy to PEW, EDF, etc. Her legacy to the American people, buy a share to catch & keep a fish. Simply put...No share, No fish! Catch Shares, under the Department of Commerce, fishing for only the rich.
So why is NOAA under the Department of Commerce instead of the Department of the Interior? Good question!
Mission Statement, Department of interior:
Protect America's Great Outdoors & Powering Our Future.
The U.S. Department of the Interior protect's America's natural resources and heritage, but not our fish!
Properly used as an actual benefit to the entire industry, under the Department of the Interior, catch shares could be supported by the American people. Want our support, earn it! Want our vote? Earn it! Fix NOAA; Fix Catch shares!
Bob H.
