I’ve
often been a critic of the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC).
I
don’t criticize the interstate compact that created the ASMFC, nor do I
have any bad words for the Atlantic
Coastal Fisheries Cooperative Management Act, which gave the ASMFC
the authority to bind East Coast states to its interstate fishery management
plans. Such interstate coordination is essential to the effective management of
migratory fish populations.
And
you will never hear me criticize the ASMFC’s
staff, as they are a group of dedicated professionals who do their
very best to assure that coastal fish stocks are properly managed.
Instead,
my criticism is focused on an overly flexible ASMFC process, which includes no
legally binding standards that compel fishery managers to end overfishing or
rebuild overfished stocks in anything like a timely manner. Such an excessively
lenient process has too often led ASMFC
commissioners, who sit on the various species management boards, to
follow the least controversial and most politically expedient path and adopt
management measures based on short-term socioeconomic concerns, rather than the
long-term health of fish stocks.
Thus,
at a time when the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act (Magnuson-Stevens)
prohibits the adoption of any federal fishery management plan that permits
overfishing, and requires most overfished stocks to be rebuilt within ten
years, the more permissive ASMFC process allowed its Tautog Management Board to dither for 21 years before
taking any meaningful measures to bring overfishing under control. And even when it finally adopted a more
effective amendment to its tautog management plan, the ASMFC
agreed to let fishermen continue to overfish tautog in Long Island Sound until
2029. The commission has established no rebuilding deadlines for that species
at all.
Even
when the ASMFC formally adopts a fishery management plan, it isn’t legally
bound to adhere to its provisions. For example, Amendment 6 to the Interstate Fishery Management Plan for Atlantic
Striped Bass contains five “management triggers” that
supposedly require the initiation of management action if any of them are
tripped.
One of those triggers
requires that “If the Management Board determines that the fishing mortality
target is exceeded in two consecutive years and the female spawning stock
biomass falls below the target within either of those years, the Management
Board must adjust the striped bass management program to reduce the fishing
mortality rate to a level that is at or below the target within one year.”
Another trigger
requires that “If the Management Board determines that the female spawning
stock biomass falls below the target for two consecutive years and the fishing
mortality rate exceeds the target in either of those years, the Management Board
must adjust the striped bass management program to rebuild the biomass to a
level that is at or above the target within [ten years].”
The benchmark stock assessment that was completed in
2013 indicated that both of those triggers had been tripped. Yet, when Addendum IV to Amendment 6 to the Atlantic Striped Bass Interstate
Fishery Management Plan was drafted, it focused only on the
need to reduce the fishing mortality rate. The other management trigger, which
required the Management Board to rebuild the female spawning stock biomass, was
completely ignored.
Concerned
citizens have little recourse when an ASMFC species management board chooses to
ignore an explicit provision of its own fishery management plan, or when such
board decides to permit overfishing or fails to rebuild an overfished stock. In
2010, a federal appellate court decided State of New York v. Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission,
and found that the ASMFC’s decisions were not subject to judicial review
pursuant to the Administrative Procedures Act. That decision made it
easy for ASMFC to avoid making the hard and often politically unpopular
decisions that are often necessary to conserve and rebuild fish stocks.
Thus,
while federal fishery managers have rebuilt 45 once-overfished
stocks since this century began, and have reached a point where 87 percent of all federally
managed stocks are not overfished, and 91 percent are not subject to
overfishing, ASMFC has a much poorer record. It has failed to rebuild a single
fish stock since the year 2000. Fewer than 40 percent of its managed stocksare
considered “recovered/sustainable,” while nearly 30 percent remain
“depleted”—that is, overfished—and another 17 percent are of “concern.”
But
there are signs that some ASMFC commissioners are growing uncomfortable with the
commission’s lackluster record. ASMFC surveys its commissioners on a regular
basis in order to solicit their views on ASMFC’s performance, problems and
opportunities. A survey released in 2016 already reflected some
commissioners’ unease.
In response to the
question, “What is the single biggest obstacle to the Commission’s success?”
such commissioners responded with comments such as, “Once a species is depleted
and overfishing is no longer indicated, the Commission has had little to no
success in re-building depleted stocks,” “Incomplete information about stocks
coupled with reluctance to make tough decisions without high level of
certainty,” and “We sometimes don’t have a good grip on the long-term
socioeconomic aspects of good management, and that a little pain now can yield
good fruit in the long run.”
Similar comments were repeated in 2017, when various
commissioners complained, “There seems to be less concern for the biological
needs of the stocks, and more concerns, among the states, with economic gains
from the stocks within the last decade,” “As soon as a fishery shows signs of
improvement the commercial interests immediately want amendments and motions to
harvest a greater portion of the stock,” and “Management measures need to be
measurable and achievable. Too often we do things that look good on paper but
don’t meet the necessary conservation requirements.”
This
year, such sentiments made it into a “Strategic Planning Workshop” held during ASMFC’s Annual
Meeting. One Rhode Island commissioner
attending the workshop said that, in his view, the management boards have “too
much flexibility” and needed some boundaries.
Another,
from North Carolina, said that management board decisions needed to be based on
science, noting that if decisions were science-based, he could defend them far
better than he could defend decisions based on other factors.
Such
concerns were also reflected in a document prepared by a Strategic Planning Workgroup ahead
of the meeting, which included “Two additional observations made by the
Workgroup: Focusing only on short-term gains creates long-term problems; and
without improved state cooperation there is the potential for Magnuson National
Standards to be applied to the Atlantic Coastal Act.” The latter was clearly a
reference to New Jersey’s 2017 decision to reject the summer flounder
conservation measures adopted by all of the other members of the Summer
Flounder, Scup and Black Sea Bass Management Board, and to seek the Secretary
of Commerce’s approval of less restrictive fishing measures, a decision which caused significant harm to the
cooperative fishery management process.
The
fallout from New Jersey’s action, and its impact on other fisheries
issues, particularly those related to Atlantic menhaden, poses
such a significant threat to the viability of ASMFC’s interstate management
program that the Strategic Planning Workgroup even suggested changing the commission’s vision
statement from “Sustainably Managing Atlantic Coast Fisheries”
to “Cooperatively Managing Atlantic Coast Fisheries,” to emphasize the need for
states to work together, instead of elevating their own parochial interests.
Although the
suggested change wasn’t meant to discount the need for sustainable management,
it was still gratifying to see the reaction of the commissioners at the
meeting; everyone who spoke on the issue was opposed to removing “sustainably”
from the vision, with one commissioner noting that without the goal of
sustainability, fisheries could be managed all the way to extinction. All
agreed that ASMFC’s vision should reflect the fact that cooperation and
sustainability were not mutually exclusive concepts, and that both had a role
to play in the successful management of Atlantic Coast fisheries.
Such comments are
encouraging, but even when taken as a whole, they don’t necessarily foretell a
sea change at ASMFC.
There
are still commissioners who oppose science-based catch limits and complain about an alleged “Failure to manage
stocks of black sea bass and summer flounder for harvest by public, causing huge
negative economic and quality of life issues,” or who decry “MRIP uncertainties and the binding of
ASMFC to federal law and national standards guidelines drastically reducing
ASMFC flexibility and the influence of individual state perspectives.”
If such commissioners
have the last word, the day may come when ASMFC’s fishery management plans are
made subject to the national standards set forth in Magnuson-Stevens, in order
to ensure that the commission will end overfishing and rebuild depleted stocks.
On the other hand, if
ASMFC heeds the more responsible voices that are now being heard, voices that
call for improving, and not discarding, the current process, so that fishery
management plans are based on solid science and the long-term health of fish
stocks, and not on states’ short-term economic and political concerns, ASMFC
can succeed without any change in the law.
But before it can
succeed, ASMFC commissioners need to acknowledge the fact that healthy
recreational and commercial fisheries require healthy and fully recovered fish
stocks. Some commissioners already have. It is long past time for the remaining
commissioners to do the same.
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This essay first appeared in "From the Waterfront," the blog of the Marine Fish Conservation Network, which can be found at http://conservefish.org/blog/
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