It's fine if the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation wants to throw $2.7 million into a study purportedly assessing the long-term impact of the catch share fishery management program.
After all, the Moore Foundation — a nonprofit offspring of the giant Intel Corp. — has been among the biggest pushers of the catch share program, which, according to even NOAA's own data, is steering more fishermen's quota into the hands of large-scale businesses and killing jobs of smaller, independent businesses.
But National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration chief Jane Lubchenco and others should be well aware in advance that any such "assessment" can't be considered credible due to the many conflicts of interest being fueled to carry it out.
The Moore grant, you see, is backing an assessment to be largely carried out by a company led by former NOAA Northeast director Andrew Rosenberg — whose same company is making millions off the NOAA observer program mandated by Amendment 16. That's the regulatory framework that includes the catch share management system.
As noted in Richard Gaines' Page 1 story on Tuesday, Rosenberg and Lubchenco have worked together since their academic days; indeed, Rosenberg lists Lubchenco as a reference on a copy of his resume obtained by the Times. And both of them signed off on a pro-catch share paper crafted when Lubchenco was on the board of the Environmental Defense Fund — the real driving force behind both the job-killing catch share system and its clean air cousin, the now-infamous "cap and trade" program.
Congressman Walter Jones, R-N.C., says it's "laughable" to think any catch share assessment funded by the Moores and carried out by Rosenberg would be independent. And he's right.
But this type of rigged deception isn't funny with so many fishery jobs at stake.
Federal officials should be ready to put this study, when it comes, in its proper place — right in the nearest trash can.
