U.S. Sen. John Kerry says he will use "multiple pressure points," including mayors, the governor, the congressional delegation and the Obama administration, in an effort to halt the groundfishery management system that was created by the federal government and upheld — wrongfully, Kerry said — by a federal judge last week.
But the influential Democratic chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee declined to commit to taking any specific steps leading to a congressional nullification to the ruling, which Kerry last week said needed to be overturned.
Kerry was asked by the Times Tuesday what specific steps he would take to defend the industry from Amendment 16, which reorganized the groundfishery into a quasi-commodities market that has steered more catch quota to large businesses and investors, but is crippling smaller, independent fishing boats, and hurting the economics of ports like Gloucester.
The plaintiffs in the lawsuit — which include the cities of Gloucester and New Bedford — caucused Friday in a teleconference and decided to file a notice of appeal while also seeking congressional support for the Commerce Department inspector general to undertake an investigation into the process that produced Amendment 16, the regulatory framework for the catch share system.
Since the onset of the system, which began on May 1, 2010, the size of the fleet has been shrinking as small boat owners find themselves incapable of competing with more capitalized operations. Landings are stable, but the number of boats fishing has dropped, pushing ports into economic tailspins.
In such a system, with the fish stocks rebounding, the recovery will be had by the strongest survivors — but at the cost of many jobs lost, industry backers say, and with data already showing the New England fishery on that course.
Judge Rya Zobel last week rejected the arguments in a suit filed by more than three dozen plaintiffs from North Carolina to Maine, and led by the hub port cities of Gloucester and New Bedford. In her ruling, Zobel pointed to the requirement of the Administrative Practices Act that the courts give broad deference to agencies given statutory responsibility to implement congressional acts, in this case the Magnuson-Stevens Act.
She said the only "close call" was whether the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration needed to put the program to a referendum. Magnuson requires "stakeholder" approval of a program to regulate stocks in Northeast waters by any bonafide catch share system.
But she decided that, while the groundfishery had been allocated as a catch share system, because the participants in the allocation were in fishing cooperatives or sectors, the program was not a true catch share system, so no referendum was required.
Congressman Barney Frank, who wrote the amendment requiring the referendum, said the government's decision to introduce a back-door catch share system without a referendum was a tacit admission that the industry wouldn't have approved it.
Kerry, meanwhile, immediately denounced Zobel's ruling, calling it "doctrinaire," and urging the plaintiffs to appeal.
But when asked by the Times what specific steps he was prepared to take when and if an appeal was defeated, Kerry issued the following statement to the Times:
"I think you need multiple pressure points and you leverage every forum to get relief," he said.
"Obviously the courts are one forum, continuing to work for flexibility in the regulations is another," he said, "and the most immediate way there is to continue the dialogue and the meetings with the Department of Commerce that I initiated which have resulted in some progress."
He reiterated that he has invited the anticipated next Secretary of Commerce, John Bryson, to visit New England.
"Getting the new Secretary up to Massachusetts is part of that process because I want the Secretary to see what's happened on the ground," Kerry said. "Getting the regulators to look at new science and broader definitions of evidence matters too.
"The bottom line is, the way federal regulations are enforced is what led to this lawsuit, and it's put fishermen out of work and pushed others to the brink," Kerry said. "We're all frustrated and with good reason.
"So I'm going to keep working with the mayors and the governor and the congressional delegation to press the administration to increase flexibility in how regulations are implemented, and (in) what kind of help is provided to keep our fishermen afloat."
Richard Gaines can be reached at 978-283-7000, x3464, or at rgaines@gloucestertimes.com.
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