Community-based Sectors for the New England Groundfish Fishery

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3.1.1 Strawman Sector Structure and Operational Plan: The Port Clyde case study is based on a sector that includes 17 permits. The permits/vessels included were owned by the members of the Midcoast Fishermen’s Association at the time the case study was begun in July of 2006. All vessels are mobile gear vessels between 36 and 56 feet in length (Table 1). Two of the permits have been transferred to skiffs and the days leased to other vessels owned by those individuals. Several of these vessels undertake multiday trips at certain times of year, but they generally remain within 100 miles of Port Clyde and within the Gulf of Maine stock areas (i.e. they do not fish Georges Bank or Southern New England stocks). Most of these vessels also participate in the shrimp fishery in the winter and some participate in other fisheries such as general category scallops. The permit owners mostly live in the town of St. George which encompasses Port Clyde and Tenants Harbor. Port Clyde is one of the five villages that make up the town of St George. These 17 permits represent nearly all of the groundfish vessels fishing out of Port Clyde and the majority of active groundfish vessels in the Midcoast region of Maine. Table 1: List of Vessels Included in the Port Clyde Sector Case Study Permit Vessel Name Length Gross Tons Horsepower Built 250573 SKIPPER 49 48 360 1981 240185 TAYLOR EMILY 48 35 360 1972 230570 SUSAN AND JESSICA 36 16 210 1979 250558 LESLIE & JESSICA 51 34 400 1980 242567 CAPT'N LEE 48 33 230 1998 240423 MEGALTAY 40 25 250 1979 240125 LIBERTY 47 29 250 1949 250387 ELLA CHRISTINE 45 37 250 1975 310354 LAUREN DOROTHY II 47 55 365 1980 250728 ANNA LENA IV 56 73 400 1984 310554 ERIKA LYNN 50 64 330 1987 150043 ADREA & ERIC 14 1 10 1999 149551 FOXY GIRL 14 4 10 1997 121830 SARAH MACKAY 41 5 225 1986 240143 MISTY MAE 52 30 350 1969 240636 HIGH ROLLER 40 24 320 1981 250582 WINDSONG 51 47 360 1981 A strawman operational structure for the sector was developed through consultation with the Midcoast Fishermen’s Association. Under this strawman, the sector would receive allocations of all regulated groundfish species it regularly encounters as well as monkfish. The groundfish stocks for which allocations would be requested include: GOM cod, GOM haddock, Cape Cod/GOM yellowtail flounder, witch flounder, American plaice, GOM winter flounder, white hake, pollock, Acadian redfish, and northern windowpane flounder. Regulations state that sector allocations are to be based on the ratio of the Sector members’ total catch by species and stock relative to the total commercial catch of each species for the five years prior to the proposal of the sector. However, recent decisions of the Council suggest that the years used for allocation may be changed and fixed at the same years for all sectors. At the time this research was being undertaken, it was not clear which catch history years would be used for determining allocations. For this reason, the analysis of the allocation and economic feasibility of the sector is done based on sector and overall commercial catches for two different allocation periods: (1) from May 1, 2001 through April 30, 2006, and (2) from May 1, 1996 to April 30, 2002. The earlier allocation 16
period is that which was used to determine allocations of cod to the two existing sectors. The shares of total commercial catches landed by Port Clyde vessels for these species for these two periods are shown in Table 2 5 . With the exception of witch flounder and winter flounder, the “current” Port Clyde fleet landed a higher proportion of total commercial catch in fishing years 2001-2005 than in 1996-2001. Consequently their shares of TACs and ACE allocations would be higher if the 2001-2005 years were used to determine their allocation. It should be noted that the current regulations do not allow sectors to request allocations of monkfish; an amendment to the Monkfish FMP will be required to make this possible. Each year the sector would receive annual catch entitlements (ACE) for each species. These ACE allocations become hard TACs for the overall sector. The ACE allocated to the sector each year would be equal to the shares of the overall target TACs shown in Table 2. Table 2: Port Clyde Sector Vessels’ share of landings for two different allocation periods (FY01-05 and FY96-01) Stock and species Total FY01-05 Landings Port Clyde Sector Share Total FY96-01 Landings Port Clyde Sector Share GOM COD 42,105,000 1.3% 56,395,433 1.3% GOM HADDOCK 10,769,000 1.9% 10,209,311 0.7% GOM/CC WINTER FLOUNDER 6,072,000 0.7% 7,137,377 1.8% GOM/CC YELLOWTAIL 16,218,000 0.3% 20,140,336 0.1% GOM/GB WINDOWPANE 274,000 0.1% 3,416,338 0.0% PLAICE 27,593,000 7.8% 52,992,348 5.6% POLLOCK 52,853,000 0.8% 56,561,783 0.6% REDFISH 4,461,000 2.3% 4,061,337 1.4% WHITE HAKE 37,850,000 2.8% 38,320,463 1.9% WITCH FLOUNDER 32,599,000 5.1% 30,024,873 6.9% NFMA MONKFISH 142,821,000 4.1% 147,201,370 3.6% The actual number of pounds of ACE allocated to the Sector each year would increase or decrease in proportion to increases or decreases in the target TACs. Under the strawman operational plan, sector members would be required to retain all legal sized fish of regulated species for which the Sector received an allocation of ACE, and all sector members would be required to stop fishing once total sector catch of any species equaled the sector ACE for that species. The Port Clyde sector would restrict the operations of member vessels to the Gulf of Maine, specifically to statistical areas 511, 512, 513, 514 and 515. Because the catch of all managed species would be constrained by hard TACs, the sector would request that it be exempted from other regulations designed primarily to control fishing mortality. Specifically the sector would request to be exempted from: Northeast Multispecies Days at Sea (DAS) limits (including 5 The catches for sector vessels for estimating sector allocations reflect the catches in the allocation years of the permits associated with the current Moratorium Right ID of the vessel. The Moratorium Right ID is an the means of tracking the catch history of a permit that may have been transferred amongst vessels over time. The permit number changes with each change of vessel, but the Right ID does not. To calculate the catch history attributable to the current permit, I determined its current Right ID and then determined the permit numbers associated with that right ID historically. In some cases the catch history attributable to a particular current permit may have been generated by multiple vessels and permits over time. It may also be that the catch history for a current permit does not include all of the catches by that vessel in previous years since its current Right ID may have been associated with a different vessel in previous years and then transferred to the current vessel. 17
Page 1 and 2: Community-based Sectors for the New
Page 3 and 4: Table of Contents Executive Summary
Page 5 and 6: Community leaders in Portland and P
Page 7 and 8: of community-based permit banks. Th
Page 9 and 10: 1.0 Introduction The groundfish fis
Page 11 and 12: Although Amendment 13 effectively e
Page 13 and 14: somewhat vague on how the allocatio
Page 15 and 16: 2.2 Experience with Existing Sector
Page 17: me to explore the idea further and
Page 21 and 22: shown above in Table 2. Revenue pro
Page 23 and 24: Table 3a: Port Clyde Sector Revenue
Page 25 and 26: ecruitment and could be either high
Page 27 and 28: increased. They also have caught a
Page 29 and 30: 3.2.1 Strawman Sector Structure and
Page 31 and 32: Table 8: Portland Sectors A and B V
Page 33 and 34: discussed earlier these price proje
Page 35 and 36: Table 9b: Portland Sector A Revenue
Page 37 and 38: Table 9d: Portland Sector B Revenue
Page 39 and 40: Table 10b: Portland Sector A Revenu
Page 41 and 42: Table 11b: Portland Sector B Specie
Page 43 and 44: vessels would be leased to sector v
Page 45 and 46: is ostensibly to reduce excess capa
Page 47 and 48: Table 15: Projected Total Revenue,
Page 49 and 50: later. However, rolling baselines c
Page 51 and 52: 4.4 Communities without Catch Histo
Page 53 and 54: opportunities for consolidation of
Page 55 and 56: References Alexander, Yvette 2006.M
Page 57 and 58: Appendix A: Landings and revenue pr
Page 59 and 60: Appendix B: Groundfish Price Model
Page 61 and 62: Appendix C: Sector Proposals Submit
Page 63 and 64: Port Clyde Community Sector Glen Li
Page 65 and 66: Full Retention All fish caught 1. e
Page 67 and 68: Reasons for Existence: 1. end overf
Page 69 and 70:
Gloucester Fixed Gear Sector Peter
Page 71 and 72:
New Bedford Channel Trawl Sector Ri
Page 73 and 74:
Point Judith / Southern New England
Page 75:
Pier 6 Initiative Michael Walsh Req
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Community-based Sectors for the New England Groundfish Fishery

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