The official publication of the Coastal Conservation Association Florida
SEAWATCH December 2003 Issue #98
- Stronger Penalties Needed to Curb Large-scale Illegal Netting in State Waters -- by Rick Farren
- CCA
Florida Represented on Major Manatee Steering Committee
- New Legislation Will Protect Anglers and Boaters’ Investments -- by Rick Farren
- Netters, Fish House Owner Charged With Fraud
- Net Ban Litigation Again in Court
- Illegal Netting Law Enforcement Excerpts -- by Rick Farren
- Netters Nabbed With Two Tons of Ladyfish
- BLUEWATER CAMPAIGN -- Management Plan Resurfaces for Dolphin
- West Marine Comes Through With Major Commitment to CCA Florida
- Central Florida Members
Complete Another Successful Year of Mangrove Habitat Restoration
Stronger Penalties Needed to Curb Large-scale Illegal Netting in State Waters
by Rick Farren,
Communications Director of CCA Florida
Under current state law, it’s a felony
to “molest” a crab trap, yet only a misdemeanor to illegally
harvest thousands of pounds of fish.
More than eight years after implementation of Florida’s net ban,
large-scale poaching with gill nets still continues in state waters. For
example, last year, 7,000 pounds of Spanish mackerel were found in an
abandoned net off Pinellas County. More than 1,000 pounds of illegally-harvested
mullet was discovered in September in Franklin County. In October, 4,000
pounds of ladyfish were released when a major illegal seine operation
was busted off Panama City. In addition, miles of illegal, monofilament
gill nets and oversized seine nets are confiscated every year.
The reasons for the continuing problem range from a paucity of officers
expected to cover large segments of the coastline, to weak prosecutions
and judicial remedies in local courts. Although progress has been made
on some of these fronts, and the Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission
has stepped up net ban enforcement efforts, poaching continues. That’s
in part because in each of the cases mentioned above, the violators can
only be charged with misdemeanors.
These large-scale, illegal netting operations could only take place if there is also a ready market for unloading and selling the illegally-caught fish. The profit in such operations is sufficiently high enough that getting caught becomes merely another cost of doing business.
This sign outside the town of St. Marks, in Wakulla County, leaves little doubt about the penalty for “molesting” crab traps.
CCA Florida, recognizing that stronger enforcement is needed if poaching
is ever going to be curtailed, has been petitioning the Fish and Wildlife
Conservation Commission to support an increase in penalties for large
scale poaching convictions from a misdemeanor to a felony. The change
in state statutes would require legislative action during the 2004 legislative
session.
“We’re not asking for stronger penalties for minor infractions,”
said Ted Forsgren, CCA Florida executive director. “But major violations
that involve hundreds or thousands of pounds of illegally-caught fish
with outlawed gill nets should be charged appropriately and at least as
harshly as the penalty for ‘molesting’ a crab trap.”
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CCA
Florida Represented on Major Manatee Steering
Committee
Appointment to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service committee reflects
respect for CCA’s fact-based, common sense approach to protection
of Florida’s manatees.
The Fish and Wildlife Service has decided to reconvene its Florida Manatee
Recovery Team. Composed of more than 100 individuals from 60 different
organizations, the overall charge for the team is to implement recovery
tasks identified in the 2001 revision of the Florida Manatee Recovery
Plan. CCA Florida’s executive director, Ted Forsgren, has been appointed
to the six-member Steering Committee.
Because of its large size, the overall team will be organized into 10
working groups and task forces. The Steering Committee will provide management
direction for the overall team, and the various working groups and task
forces will report to the committee.
New Legislation Will Protect Anglers and Boaters’ Investments
by Rick Farren
Florida Congressman Clay Shaw has introduced federal legislation
that would recover about $110 million per year of angler and boater excise
tax contributions under the Sport Fish Restoration Act.
“I’m pleased to be able to offer this legislation on behalf
of all people who love the water and water sports. This bill will ensure
that all of the tax money spent by boaters and anglers on fuel costs will
flow back to the preservation and restoration of the waterways they treasure,”
said Congressman Shaw.
Commonly known as the Wallop-Breaux Act, the Federal Aid in Sport Fish
Restoration Act provides around $450 million in grants to the states for
management and restoration of fish, wetlands restoration, boating safety
and aquatic education. Funds are derived from a 10-percent excise tax
on certain items of sport fishing tackle, a 3-percent excise tax on fish
finders and electric trolling motors, import duties on fishing tackle,
yachts and pleasure craft, and a portion of motorboat fuel taxes.
Money is parceled out based on the number of anglers in each state, and
in most states serves as a vital source of funding for fish and wildlife
agencies. Currently, motor boat and small engine fuel taxes make up $284
million of the amount distributed each year.
More than 10 years ago, however, Congress required the U.S. Treasury to
redirect about 25 percent of the excise taxes collected on motor boat
and small engine fuels each year—about $110 million—to the General
Treasury Fund, instead of channeling these revenues back to the states.
That means that out of the current excise tax of 18.3 cents per gallon,
only 13.5 cents is currently being used on behalf of boaters and anglers.
The new legislation, known as The Sportfishing and Boating Equity Act
of 2003, will ensure that the full amount of fuel taxes will be directed
to state conservation programs along with other Sport Fish Restoration
funds.
In separate legislative actions supported by the American League of Anglers
and Boaters, a coalition of conservation organizations, the Sport Fish
Restoration Act is being reauthorized by Congress, ensuring the continuation
of one of the nation’s most significant conservation programs.
Netters,
Fish House Owner Charged With Fraud
Five Lee County residents have been charged with first-degree felony fraud
by Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) investigators
as part of a 10-month investigation into the illegal harvest, purchase
and sale of saltwater fish. In an affidavit filed in Lee County on October
29, the group is accused of conspiring to defraud the state out of saltwater
fisheries products valued at more than $100,000.
The 10-month investigation was initiated after a commercial fisherman
was arrested in October 2002 by FWC officers for using entangling nets
in state waters. At the time his Saltwater Products License was under
a lifetime suspension because of numerous previous violations. Instead
he produced a license issued to his sister.
Investigators consequently conducted fish house audits related to that
license, and subpoenaed bank records. They were able to determine that
three netters have used the license to sell more than $100,000 worth of
saltwater products harvested with entangling nets between June 1, 2002
and June 30, 2003.
The fish were sold to four separate fish houses, three in southwest Florida
and one in Georgia. The investigators’ audit also confirmed that
the owner of one fish house in Ft. Myers Beach, who is one of the five
being charged, knowingly purchased unlawfully harvested fish and submitted
false landing reports to the FWC. The holder of the saltwater products
license that was used was the fifth person charged.
It may be hard to believe, but another lawsuit seeking to establish a
loophole in the net ban has staggered from Wakulla County courts to the
First District Court of Appeals in Tallahassee. More than eight years
after implementation of the net ban in July 1995, netting interests continue
to try to return gill nets to state waters.
As has taken place numerous times since passage of the Save Our Sealife
Amendment, CCA Florida is again defending the net ban and the interests
of the 72 percent of the voting public that put it in the constitution.
The latest case originated from a lawsuit filed more than a year ago which
claimed that a 500-square-foot nylon net with 3-inch mesh was legal under
the constitutional netting restrictions because it was a “rectangular
net” and not a seine net or a gill net. The Fish and Wildlife Conservation
Commission (FWC) defines a gill net, which is strictly forbidden in the
Florida constitution, as having greater than a 2-inch mesh. Prior to the
net ban, 2-inch or less mesh was the accepted definition of a seine net.
The Wakulla County Circuit Court ruled in favor of the netters and found
the “rectangular” net legal under the constitutional amendment.
The case was then appealed to the First District Court of Appeals in Tallahassee
by the state of Florida and the FWC. Earlier this year the appeals court
reversed the circuit court ruling, finding that the plaintiffs in the
case had failed to exhaust administrative remedies with the FWC before
turning to the courts.
That was followed in June by a Declaratory Statement issued by the FWC
which found that the net described in the lawsuit is an illegal gill net
under the Florida Constitutional netting restrictions. That finding sent
the case back to the appeals court based on the original finding in the
Wakulla County Circuit Court.
CCA Florida, in October, filed a brief, (known as an Amicus Curiae) and
has been accepted by the court in the case in support of the state and
the FWC. Since implementation of the net ban, CCA has been a party to,
or intervenor in, five major court cases that have risen to District Appeals
Court or Supreme Court level.
[return to Table
of Contents]
Illegal Netting Law Enforcement Excerpts
by Rick Farren, Communications Director of CCA Florida
The following excerpts were derived from weekly law enforcement reports provided by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission between September and mid-November of this year. These represent only a portion of the number of law enforcement actions taken by FWC officers during that time.
Officers in Brevard County located a monofilament gill net on
October 21 that was hidden in a bucket near the Indian River. The gill
net measured 585 square feet and had fresh grass in it, indicating that
it was recently used. Information is being developed about the source
of the net.
Also in Brevard County, on October 27, FWC investigators and officers
set up a task force to target illegal netting activities. Surveillance
was conducted on two commercial fishing vessels working in federal waters.
The suspects were observed violating three state and nine federal laws
including illegal harvest of Spanish mackerel over the 3,500-pound limit,
illegal gear, and net transit violations. National Marine Fisheries agents
seized the fish and portions of the net.
On September 3, a disposition was received by Bay County offices
for a shrimp trawler not having the bycatch reduction devices installed
properly. The captain was adjudicated guilty and fined $265 and six months
probation.
Three subjects in Citrus County were observed, on October 26, aboard
a net boat operating in a manner consistent with inshore net fishing.
An FWC officer then stopped to inspect their fish and equipment and discovered
four seine nets tied together—each over 500 square feet. Six charges
were issued including failure to transit, possession of an oversized net
in a vessel less than 25 feet, and seine nets tied together.
In Franklin County on September 4, officers stopped a vessel crossing
the St. George Island Causeway. Onboard the vessel were 200 yards of monofilament
net and 1,086 pounds of mullet. Also, on September 17, an officer located
a monofilament net hidden in marsh grass at Yents Bayou.
On October 20, officers conducted a search for abandoned nets with the
use of aircraft, an airboat, and a Go Devil boat in the Apalachicola Bay
area. Five nets were found, four of which were monofilament, in the areas
of St. George, Little St. George and St. Vincent islands. A similar net
recovery flight in nearby Wakulla County in September discovered
two hidden nets.
Also in Franklin County, on November 5, officers checked several
net boats working inside Little St. George Island, some of which were
parked up on the beach. The officers located a large net hidden in the
grass about 100 yards from the parked vessels. All the fishermen claimed
no knowledge of the net. After all the boats left, one officer stayed
on the Island and the other officer left. Shortly after dark, a fishing
vessel arrived and two subjects retrieved the net and loaded it onboard.
The officer stopped the vessel, seized the net, and issued a citation
for the possession of a monofilament net.
On September 5, officers in Indian River County staked out two
suspicious vehicles at the Oslo boat ramp. Two commercial net boats returned
to the ramp, and an inspection revealed two seine nets tied together totaling
more than 1,200 square feet.
In Levy County on September 14, officers responding to an abandoned
gill net complaint recovered a gill net with oversized mesh and a dead
100-pound sea turtle ensnared in the net.
An officer in Manatee County on September 9, heard a vessel operating
in Sarasota Bay and later observed the vessel heading toward the fish
docks in Cortez. Upon inspection, the officer discovered three occupants
in possession of a wet gill net along with fresh debris. Onboard were
several undersize snook and redfish, as well as bluefish, pompano and
mullet. Also in Manatee County, on September 19, an officer on patrol
in Terra Ceia Bay observed a fisherman deploying a large net which turned
out to be four seine nets tied together equaling 1,997 square feet. The
violator was also fishing in an aquatic preserve where nets are not allowed.
On September 7 in Taylor County an officer watched an airboat strike
a net approximately one-quarter mile from shore in the Hagens Cove area.
It appeared to the officer that the net was greater than 500 square feet,
and since it was low tide and no airboat available, he waded out to the
vessel and discovered two 500-foot seines tied together.
A law enforcement flight in Volusia County in early September discovered
and confiscated an oversized haul seine.
Netters Nabbed With Two Tons of Ladyfish
FWC officers conducted a covert detail in Bay County, near Panama City,
on October 21 that resulted in the arrest of nine individuals. Investigators
observed three vessels deploy a large purse seine just off of the beach
in Crooked Island Sound.
The officers then conducted an inspection during the retrieval of the
net. The net contained approximately 4,000 pounds of ladyfish and a few
Spanish mackerel. All of the fish that were alive were released and 400
pounds of dead fish were recovered. Three nets seized measured in excess
of 13,000 square feet.
The arrests were the result of information provided by concerned citizens
who had reported that violators were using four-to-five boats and an aircraft
to spot the fish and serve as a lookout for law enforcement officers in
the area.
BLUEWATER
CAMPAIGN
Management Plan Resurfaces for Dolphin
When CCA initiated its Bluewater Campaign five years ago, it had three
main components: reduction of longlines in federal waters off Florida,
protection for sargassum habitat, and regulations for dolphin that would
protect the recreational aspect of the fishery.
Although legal action by CCA failed to achieve longline reductions,
it brought the issue to the forefront. The National Marine Fishery
Service subsequently implemented longline conservation measures similar
to the reductions CCA Florida sought off state waters. Longlines were
eliminated from the waters off Florida’s East coast and placed under
strict seasonal closures in the Gulf of Mexico.
Earlier this year, again after years of support by CCA Florida, NMFS approved
regulations that severely restrict the harvest of sargassum seaweed. The
seaweed is used as a supplement in animal feed. The new rule sets strict
limits for the current harvesting operation and prevents any future expansion
of the harvest.
Now, after years of delay, NMFS has finished taking public comment on
the “Federal Management Plan for Dolphin and Wahoo” and is considering
the final rule. The next step is for NMFS to approve, disapprove, or partially
approve the plan.
The plan was developed in the late 1990s by the South Atlantic Marine
Fishery Management Council. At that time, CCA Florida, along with CCA
state chapters in North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia created,
and with strong grassroots support, submitted a “CCA Five Point Plan
and Recommendations for Dolphin” to the Council for consideration.
In September 2000, the South Atlantic Council adopted and sent to NMFS
for review, the first federal fishery management plan and regulations
for dolphin and wahoo. It included the majority of CCA’s proposals.
The primary objective of the CCA Recommendations was to stop commercial
longlines from directly targeting dolphin and protect the longstanding
status of the dolphin fishery as an overwhelmingly recreational fishery.
Key elements of the current plan, all of which were also a part of CCA’s
recommendations include:
- A commercial trip limit of 1,000 pounds off of Florida and Georgia,
and 3,000 pounds off of South Carolina and North Carolina, which will
stop the development of a directed longline fishery while allowing the
traditional commercial hook-and-line fishery to continue.
- A prohibition on the use of pelagic drift longlines to take dolphin
or wahoo in any of the areas previously closed by NMFS to swordfish
and tuna longlining. This measure eliminates the major loophole in the
NMFS area closures and will prevent longliners in the closed areas from
redirecting their fishing effort from swordfish to dolphin and wahoo.
- A recreational and commercial minimum size of 20 inches off of Florida
and Georgia. This minimum size measure is the least disruptive way to
regulate recreational take while providing enhanced resource protection.
Research shows that dolphin grow extremely fast and most are sexually
mature at 20 inches.
- A 10-fish bag limit or 60-fish boat limit—whichever is less—for
recreational fishermen, which will have little impact on recreational
landings because of current state bag limits of 10 in Florida and North
Carolina, 7 in South Carolina and 15 in Georgia.
- Prohibition of sale of dolphin by recreational fishermen. This provision would allow only charter boats that currently sell dolphin and have all required state and federal commercial permits to continue to sell.
West Marine Comes Through With Major Commitment to CCA Florida
West Marine, the world’s largest boating supply retailer, has teamed
up with CCA Florida members to raise support for marine conservation initiatives.
The company has generously committed to a major gift of up to $15,000
to bolster CCA Florida’s annual fall membership appeal. Every contribution
during the current fundraising program, up to $15,000, will be matched,
dollar for dollar, by West Marine.
“We’re very grateful to West Marine for their dedication to
marine conservation,” said Jim Gray, CCA Florida general manager.
“This type of program, which matches grassroots member support with
corporate business support, brings everyone into the conservation tent.
It’s a win, win for marine conservation because contributions from
both sources go twice as far.”
West Marine, which began in 1968 as a mail order rope business in the
garage of its founder and current Chairman, Randy Repass, is today the
world’s largest boating supply retailer. Through growth and acquisition
the company has expanded to more than 280 stores across the country. West
Marine also operates 62 BoatU.S. Marine Centers. The company now carries
more than 50,000 marine products, and includes mail order and Internet
divisions that service customers in 150 countries.
“West Marine is proud to support the conservation efforts of CCA
Florida,” said Susan Altmann, West Marine’s manager of donations.
“As part of the company’s mission we actively promote boating,
work to reduce our impact on the environment, improve and protect marine
habitats, and contribute to the social needs in the communities in which
we do business.”
To that end West Marine has contributed more than a million dollars in
the past six years as part of a commitment to youth, communities and the
marine environment.
A statement on the company’s website details that commitment to the
marine resource: “As boaters, we naturally have a vested interest
in maintaining our waterways and ensuring that they remain pristine and
ecologically viable for future generations. Working together with like-minded
organizations across the country, we’re helping to turn the tide
from exploitation to preservation of our fragile saltwater and freshwater
ecosystems. West Marine is proud to support several associations and organizations
that share this goal.”
marine.com.
[Return to Table of Contents] [Return to CCA Florida home page] [Return to list of SeaWatch publications]
Thank You
We are deeply appreciative of Mercury Marine for their continued support of CCA Florida
conservation initiatives. Mercury provides motors at a discounted cost for every CCA Florida banquet. The motors are used to raise significant and vital funds for the protection of our marine resources.
CCA Florida would also like to recognize:
WEST MARINE
COMES ONBOARD
CCA Florida would like to acknowledge a very generous gift of $6,000 from
West Marine in support of conservation initiatives. The donation has come
in the form of 30 $200 gift cards that will be used to support local chapter
banquets.
FLORIDA SPORTSMAN MAGAZINE and the WICKSTROM FAMILY for their generous support for our membership growth program and their work for marine conservation in Florida.
CALUSA CAST NETS and CRACKER CAST NETS for their consistent and longtime support of marine conservation through donated and discounted cast nets provided for every CCA Florida fundraising banquet.
THE ORVIS COMPANY who continues to make a significant annual donation of merchandise to CCA Florida.
OCEAN WAVES, our newest official sponsor, providing four pairs of sunglasses and a Guy Harvey Print to each of CCA Florida's fundraising banquets.
