Area Fishermen and Shrimpers Meet to Discuss Proposed New Regulations
A meeting Monday night brought Red Snapper fisherman and shrimpers together to discuss proposed changes to federal fishing and shrimping regulations.
Not surprisingly, the meeting was highly emotional; but many participants came away with a better understanding of what was proposed. In the end the meeting focused on how recreational and sport fishermen combined with the shrimping industry might work together to meet these new challenges.
Some shrimpers, fishermen agree to oppose new federal regulations
A number of local shrimpers and fishermen, longtime enemies on the issue of red snapper overfishing, agreed Monday night to oppose highly restrictive regulations being considered by federal officials to reduce of the popular species.
Some others, however, appeared to be continuing the decades-old feud.
Federal regulators get "off the hook by keeping the various user groups at each other's throats," Pete Barber, president of the Alabama Seafood Association, said to the 70 or so people who attended a public meeting on the subject Monday night. "I'm glad to see that, with a few exceptions, the people here haven't taken the bait tonight."
Some of the more extreme new regulations on Gulf fishermen and shrimpers suggested by regulators include cutting red snapper quotas from four per recreational angler to one, and closing up to 50 percent of the Gulf to shrimping.
The regulations respond to recent studies concluding that, despite years of carefully negotiated limits on harvest and bycatch, the snapper population isn't recovering at the rate fisheries biologists predicted.
Chris Dalton, a recreational fisherman from Dauphin Island, said that from his own experience and from the information provided by the National Marine Fisheries Service, the red snapper population is actually recovering. It's just not recovering fast enough to suit the goal of restoration to historical levels by 2032.