Federal regulators urged to protect Maine lobstermen in crafting whale rules

(The Center Square) – Maine’s congressional delegation is urging the federal government not to approve new rules that would negatively impact the state’s commercial fishing industry as they finalize protections for endangered whales.

In a letter to Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, the lawmakers wrote that they have a number of concerns about the National Marine Fisheries Service’s proposed regulations and the plan’s “ability to meaningfully protect whales and its impact on those who depend on fishing, especially lobstering, for their livelihoods.”

The lawmakers, which included Sens. Angus King, I-Maine, and Susan Collins, R-Maine, asked regulators to illuminate several “hasty, late-breaking changes” to the final whale protection rules.

“These changes … add significant costs to the industry without corresponding gains in conservation and seriously underline conservation partnerships at state and local levels,” they wrote.

A major concern for the lawmakers is an addition to the final rules that would require lobstermen to mark their traps based on the locations of where they set them. The proposed rules are meant to determine whose gear might have caused an entanglement. But the lawmakers said it will force fishermen to have two sets of gear for both state and federal waters.

Another concern raised by the lawmakers is a proposed seasonal restricted area off the coast of Maine which they called “deeply troubling due to its lack of strong scientific basis.”

“An absolute closed area would be very costly, if not prohibitive, to the business models of numerous fishermen and in many respects would seemingly not provide additional risk reduction,” they wrote. “We strongly believe that fishermen should not lose access to fishing grounds unless whales are present.”

Lastly, members of the delegation said they believe that Maine’s fishing fleet should be allowed flexibility in the types of gear they are allowed to use under the new rules.

“A rigid one-size-fits-all approach will force dangerous and expensive actions upon fishermen with no benefit to whales,” the lawmakers wrote.

The request comes as the federal government finalizes new right whale protection rules that will require lobster and crab fisheries in the Northeast to reduce the number of vertical lines in the water.

A major target of the protection efforts are North Atlantic right whales, which were driven to the brink of extinction in the 20th century by whalers, and are more recently at risk from ship collisions and entanglement in fishing gear.

Scientists say the population of right whales has dwindled to about 360. The species has also been hindered by poor reproduction and several years of high mortality, research has shown.

Environmental activists are pressuring fisheries managers to ban commercial fishing nets and gear in state waters to prevent entanglements of whales and turtles.

But many commercial fishermen say the new whale protection regulations will doom an industry that is already struggling amid stringent regulation and closures of fishing areas.

In their letter, lawmakers called on fisheries managers to strike a balance between the two competing interests.

“We urge you to ensure that these new federal regulations on fisheries, critical to the Maine economy and definitive to its heritage, are reasonable, flexible and founded on the best possible science and information,” they wrote.

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