The major restriction, known as Framework 42, would count each day at sea as two days and each trip between three and 71/2 hours as 15 hours. The counting method is important because fishermen have a limited number of days they are allowed at sea to fish. The limits on days at sea, as well as the new counting method, have been imposed to rebuild species that had been overfished and which regulators believe have not recovered well enough under earlier restrictions.
Days at sea in a fishing year are not changed by the new rules and will still be limited to 55 Category A days and 45 Category B days. The difference in the days will be the kinds of permits required to fish on designated days.
Locally, double counting will apply from the tip of Chatham north to Portland, Maine, and out to sea for about 90 miles from Boston Harbor. Days will be double-counted in a long strip starting at Long Island and stretching east about 30 miles past Cape Cod.
Local fishing advocates and elected officials have campaigned against many of the new regulations. They have warned it will be disastrous for the fishing industry generally and vessels from Gloucester in particular.
"As we have stated in our public comments, we believe that Framework 42 should have been partially approved," Jackie Odell, executive director of the Northeast Seafood Coalition, said yesterday in an e-mail. "Although the framework relieves the unnecessary differential (days at sea) counting for the offshore fleet, which we have opposed, it is disastrous for the inshore fleet. ... And aside from putting small, family-owned businesses out of business, these regulations do nothing for conservation."
Mayor John Bell, speaking by phone yesterday from New Orleans where he is representing Gloucester on a federal panel to reauthorize the Historical Preservation Act, said the approval means the only course of action is to continue a lawsuit filed in May by state Attorney General Thomas Reilly.
"It's too bad, but I think it was inevitable," Bell said. "It was almost on autopilot in the regulatory scheme of things. It leaves us no choice but to move forward with the attorney general and the lieutenant governor."
Vito Calomo, executive director of the Massachusetts Fisheries Recovery Commission and chairman of the state Marine Fisheries Commission, said the stricter regulations add insult to injury.
"The fishing industry is on its kneecaps now, especially in the port of Gloucester and now they want to put it into oblivion?" he said.
Lt. Gov. Kerry Healey, who is running for governor, pushed Reilly to file the lawsuit and went to Washington in March to press the commerce undersecretary who oversees the National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration to consider an industry-supported alternative to fishing regulations.
"I was very disappointed that despite the extended comment period and heavy lobbying to try to get the Department of Commerce to entertain some very good proposals suggested by the Northeast Seafood Coalition, none of that showed up in the final draft of Framework 42," Healey said in a telephone interview yesterday. "I'm extremely worried that this will decimate 50 percent of the inshore fleet."
Reilly's office said he will continue to work with the federal government to keep the fishing industry afloat.
"The fishing industry has been a cornerstone of the Massachusetts economy and we will continue to do whatever we can to ensure the industry's interests are protected," said Meredith Baumann, a spokeswoman for Reilly. "We will review the approved regulations and discuss with the Division of Marine Fisheries what our next steps will be."
The Magnuson-Stevens Fisheries Conservation Management Act, which governs U.S. fisheries management and is under review for reauthorization, does not allow for an injunction to be filed in court to block regulations.
Reilly's suit alleges that the emergency rules, installed while Framework 42 was debated, violate guidelines written into the Magnuson-Stevens Act. They accelerate the use of days at sea distributed to groundfishermen under Amendment 13 and unfairly restricts their access to fish stocks that are not in immediate danger of being overfished, the suit says.
Healey said she would ask Reilly to file another lawsuit, this time targeting Framework 42 itself.
Emergency rules instituted in May will continue to govern fishermen until the Framework 42 rules take effect Nov. 22. The emergency rules count each day that fishermen spend at sea as 1.4 days.
Framework 42 will govern the fisheries until the New England Fishery Management Council decides to change it. The council is preparing to re-evaluate and adjust the framework based on a stock assessment conducted in 2005 and one that will be available in 2008. It hopes to have new regulations drafted and in place for the 2009 fishing year, said Teri Frady, a spokeswoman for NOAA in Woods Hole.
Last month, fishing industry advocates, legislators and fishermen gathered at the old New Bedford fish auction building to present a plan that would counter both the emergency regulations and the more permanent Framework 42 measures.
The first part of the plan focuses on the looming Marine Fisheries Service emergency action and seeks to change the way days spent fishing at sea are counted. Current emergency action plans call for a single day spent at sea to count as 1.4 days. Fishermen have said the result of this will be that they will spend longer days at sea and target fish that will bring in more money, such as cod.
The inshore fleet out of Gloucester, represented by members of the Northeast Seafood Coalition, backed an alternative to the emergency action, the much-discussed 24-hour clock. No matter how much time fishermen spend out at sea, they would lose 24 hours until the emergency action ends and more permanent action is approved.
While safety issues involving the 24-hour clock were raised by members of the coalition during the last New England Fishery Management Council meeting, Odell said the 24-hour clock is the lesser of two evils.
A pair of professors from Tufts University has interviewed fishermen, boat captains and fish processors for a statewide study on the potential economic impact of new fishing regulations, though the final economic analysis of the impact of the regulations has not yet been released by the Marine Fisheries Service.
Major Framework 42 changes
* Counts each day at sea as two days
* Reduces the allowable catch of 16 species of fish
* Restricts the allowed catch per trip for five species
* Requires boats to have a vessel monitoring system
* Prohibits recreational fishing of Gulf of Maine cod from November through April
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