Congress Proposes Relaxing Sea Lion Protections

The Endangered Salmon and Fisheries Predation Prevention Act, a proposed amendment to the federal Marine Mammal Protection Act, could soon give tribal members and government fishery managers in the Columbia River Basin authority to kill sea lions threatening endangered salmon populations.

U.S. Reps Jaime Herrera Beutler (R-WA) and Kurt Schrader (D-OR) introduced the amendment on January 27.

The legislation is intended to improve the ability of Idaho, Oregon, and Washington State to manage growing sea lion populations because they are reducing steelhead and salmon stocks. The Nez Perce, Umatilla, Warm Springs, and Yakama tribes will also be eligible for expedited lethal take permits.

Nearly identical legislation introduced each year from 2012 to 2014 was never allowed a vote under the then-Democrat-controlled Senate.

Beutler says the voracious sea lions threaten the fishing culture and economy of the Northwest. “Salmon are part of the very fabric of the Pacific Northwest, which is why significant resources are spent making sure they survive and can continue to support recreational, cultural, and economic interests,” Beutler said.

Sea Lion’s Threaten Salmon

Sea lion predation of migrating fish has steadily increased since 2002. Before that, it was uncommon for sea lions to travel up the Columbia River. Now biologists estimate sea lions kill 20 percent of the fish traveling to their Bonneville Dam spawning grounds.

Since 1972, when the Marine Mammal Protection Act (MMPA) was passed the California sea lion population has grown 5.4 percent per year. The population now tops 300,000.Over the same time period, the Steller sea lion population grew between 3 and 5 percent per year, resulting in a current population of up to 78,000 animals.

The legislation would allow lethal take permit holders to remove up to 1 percent of the annual Potential Biological Removal (PBR) level, the total number of marine mammals that may be removed from the population while allowing the stock to reach or maintain its optimal sustainable population.

At present population levels, permit holders would be allowed to take 92 California sea lions and 15 Stellar sea lions.

Calls for Market Solutions

William A. Dunn Fellow Terry Anderson of the Property and Environment Research Center opposes the legislation, saying, “Maybe the only thing more stupid is shooting barred owls which are taking over the infamous spotted owl’s territory in the Pacific Northwest.” Although Anderson agrees conservation of the fish species is important, he argues underlying incentives created by various wildlife protection laws put marine mammals and salmon at risk and require a more comprehensive, market-oriented solution.

For now, local biologists and tribal fishery managers argue killing the right number of sea lions will restore ecological balance, thus protecting endangered fish.

John J. Jackson, chairman of Conservation Force, agrees safeguarding the steelhead and other salmon populations requires culling the sea lions.

Jackson said, “If vice-versa, imagine salmon eating too many sea lions. We would support control of the salmon. Same for the sea lion.”

Nate Wilson (nate.wilson@ncpa.org) is an editor and research analyst at the National Center for Policy Analysis.

Read the original post: http://news.heartland.org

Action Taken To Protect Fish At Bottom Of Ocean Food Chain

Preface:

The Council took action to prohibit new directed fisheries on a list of  currently unmanaged, largely unfished forage species this week which brings the following species and species groups into all four of the Council’s FMPs as ecosystem component (EC) species:
• Round herring (Etrumeus teres) and thread herring (Opisthonema libertate and O. medirastre)
• Mesopelagic fishes of the families Myctophidae, Bathylagidae, Paralepididae, and Gonostomatidae
• Pacific sand lance (Ammodytes hexapterus)
• Pacific saury (Cololabis saira)
• Silversides (family Atherinopsidae)
• Smelts of the family Osmeridae
• Pelagic squids (families: Cranchiidae, Gonatidae, Histioteuthidae, Octopoteuthidae, Ommastrephidae (except Humboldt squid, Dosidicus gigas), Onychoteuthidae, and Thysanoteuthidae)

The above species would be known as “Shared EC Species,” meaning that they are shared between all of the FMPs 

A new rule prohibits new fisheries on forage fish species including silversides, shown here.
Paul Asman and Jill Lenoble/Flickr

by Cassandra Profita OPB

West Coast fishery managers adopted a new rule Tuesday that protects many species of forage fish at the bottom of the ocean food chain.

The rule prohibits commercial fishing of  herring, smelt, squid and other small fish that aren’t currently targeted by fishermen. It sets up new, more protective regulations for anyone who might want to start fishing for those species in the future.

The Pacific Fishery Management Council unanimously voted to adopt the rule at a meeting in Vancouver, Washington. The council sets ocean fishing seasons off the coasts of Washington, Oregon and California.

The idea behind the new rule is to preserve so-called forage fish so they’re available for the bigger fish, birds and whales that prey on them. It’s part of a larger push by the council to examine the entire ocean ecosystem when setting fishing seasons.

Environmentalists who have been advocating for the rule for years celebrated the approval.

“If we’re going to have a healthy ocean ecosystem in the long term, we have to protect that forage base,” said Ben Enticknap of the environmental group Oceana. “These are the backbone of a healthy ocean ecosystem.”

Enticknap said many of the forage fish subject to the new rule are already being fished elsewhere in the world. Little fish at the bottom of the food chain are used to make fish meal for aquaculture, and they’re increasingly in demand as food for people as other fish populations decline.

Previous rules only required managers to be notified of a new fishery on non-managed forage fish species. Now, the council will require a more rigorous scientific review to prove that the new fishery won’t harm the ecosystem before it is allowed.

“Really, it’s being precautionary,” said Enticknap. “It’s getting out ahead of a crisis rather than waiting for a stock to collapse and then having to have serious consequences for fisheries after the fact.”

The rule has gained broad support — even from the fishing industry, according to Steve Marx of the Pew Charitable Trusts. Valuable commercial fish such as rockfish, salmon, halibut and tuna all prey on forage fish.

“The fishing industry support has been pretty strong because everybody understands how important these small forage fish are to the fish they like, that they make a living off of,” he said.

Rod Moore, executive director of the West Coast Seafood Processors Association, congratulated the council on moving forward with the rule.

“It’s rare to get this sort of consensus support from commercial, environmental and recreational sectors, and I think you have it on this one,” he said.

Before voting, council members discussed the best way to allow existing fisheries to catch some of the forage fish species incidentally – as they’re targeting other fish.

The council directed staff to continue developing the details of the rule so that it doesn’t constrain existing fisheries, but it does discourage fishing boats from targeting forage fish.

Councilors instructed staff to hold fishing boats accountable the forage fish they catch and consider discouraging development of at-sea processing of forage fish species into fish meal.

Read original post: www.opb.org

NBCNews.com Replaces Reality, Regulation and History with Hyperbole

Original post: AboutSeafood.com | © 2015 National Fisheries Institute | Published with permission.

A story this week on NBCnews.com about the state of the seafood industry is packed with sensationalism and hyperbole, yet absent much of the real science, facts and figures that drive actual sustainability.

To begin, U.S. fisheries are among the world’s best managed and most sustainable. Though not referenced by name a single time in this article, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, NOAA, regulates U.S. seafood with headquarters in Washington D.C., five regional offices, six science centers and more than 20 laboratories around the country and U.S. territories.

Author John Roach, however, perpetuates doom and gloom throughout this piece, asserting “voids” left by cod, halibut and salmon that need to be filled by other fish. We’re guessing Mr. Roach isn’t aware that salmon shattered modern-day records in 2014, returning to the Columbia River Basin in the highest numbers since fish counting began at Bonneville Dam more than 75 years ago. Could you tell us again about that void?

Mr. Roach also intones a narrative of sustainability disaster for popular predators like tuna but forgot to mention groups like the International Seafood Sustainability Foundation (ISSF), a coalition created through a partnership between WWF, the world’s leading conservation organization, and canned tuna companies from across the globe to insure the long-term conservation and sustainable use of tuna stocks. In an article that claims the sky is falling for species like tuna it’s odd that ISSF gets nary a nod or even a mention.

Switching gears, Mr. Roach goes on to blame giant trawlers “armed” with technology and massive nets as part of the reason we’re “running low” on fish. As in any industry, technology gets better by the day, creating more efficient ways to do business. However, new technology is by no means exempt from standing national and global fishery regulations, such as catch-limits, by-catch laws, compliance, and so forth. To suggest that enhanced technology or “bigger or faster” boats are causing our fish supplies to dwindle ignores the impact of technology on sustainability and even regulatory oversight. There are pros and cons to every catch-method and there is no one-size-fits all solution to sustainability challenges but to blame technology without recognizing its contribution to solutions is folly.

Hyperbolic rhetoric about sustainability continues to be discounted by legitimate fisheries experts in the scientific community. In fact, one “report” forecasting empty oceans by 2048 was challenged by a number of independent researchers who described the study that promoted the statistics as, “flawed and full of errors.” Including Ray Hilborn, a professor of aquatic and fishery sciences at the University of Washington in Seattle whose research into the study lead him to say, “this particular prediction has zero credibility within the scientific community.” After Hilborn’ s analysis the author of the original study himself explained that his research was not in fact predicting worldwide fish stock collapse at all but merely examining trends. Articles like this track along precisely with the discounted, overblown storyline that gave birth to the empty oceans by 2048 nonsense.

Whether you’re a “natural optimist” or not, there is no question that seafood harvested from U.S. fisheries is inherently sustainable as a result of NOAA’s fishery management process and global fisheries management is far from the wild west scenario bandied about.  Things aren’t perfect and there’s work to be done but the “game” is not “almost over” and those who suggest it is, willfully propagate that narrative not because it’s accurate but because bad news sells.

Sen. Murkowski Defines Goal of Commercial Fishing Discharge Exemption Bill

SEAFOODNEWS.COM | Published by permission

Congress will consider a new effort during the current session to take vessel discharge regulations off the books for commercial, fishing and recreational vessels that are less than 79 feet in length.

That’s S.387, introduced Feb. 4 and sponsored by Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska.

Co-sponsors are Senators Barbara Boxer, D-CA, Maria Cantwell, D-WA, and Dan Sullivan, R-AK.

“For those who need a little more graphic detail as to what we’re talking about, when you take a commercial fishing vessel out, your 45-foot commercial fishing vessel, and you have a good day fishing, you’ve got some salmon guts on the deck,” Murkowski said. “You’ve got a little bit of slime. You hose it off. That would be an incidental discharge that would be reportable to the EPA and if you fail to report, you could be subject to civil penalties. That’s what we’re talking about here.”

The senator said current Environmental Protection Agency regulations are so broadly written that they would penalize Alaska’s fishermen and more than 8,000 boats statewide simply for rinsing fish guts off their decks, or rainwater washing other materials off of their decks.

Alaska’s congressional delegation has been trying for several years to get a permanent exempt for these vessels through Congress. Last year Murkowski and former Sen. Mark Begich, D-Alaska, introduced similar legislation.

Copyright SeafoodNews.com | Read original story here.

With West Coast Port Talks Gridlocked, U.S. Labor Secretary Intervenes to Press For a Deal

Copyright © 2015 Seafoodnews.com | Posted by permission

With idled cargo ships piling up along the coastline, President Obama ordered his labor secretary to California to try to head off a costly shutdown of 29 West Coast ports.

Obama dispatched Tom Perez on Saturday to jump-start stalled labor talks between shipping companies and the dockworkers’ union. The move ramps up pressure to resolve a dispute that stranded tens of thousands of containers on cargo ships over the holiday weekend.

The Los Angeles and Long Beach ports account for some 40% of the nation’s incoming container cargo, with $1 billion in goods moving through daily. A prolonged shutdown could hobble some Southland businesses and ripple across the U.S. economy.

On Saturday morning, 32 massive ships were anchored outside the ports, unable to unload thousands of cargo containers filled with auto parts, electronics and clothes destined for store shelves across the country.

“Any company that imports supplies, inventory or parts is going to feel it,” said Ian Winer, a managing director at Wedbush Securities. “There are very few companies who don’t have something coming through those ports.”

That has businesses across the world focused on a dispute between a network of terminal operators and one of the strongest unions left in American industry.

After nine months of talks, the two sides agree on key issues including healthcare but remain gridlocked over rules governing the removal of arbitrators, who settle disputes on the docks.

At stake is a new contract for roughly 20,000 dockworkers at 29 West Coast ports. The International Longshore and Warehouse Union has been working without one since July amid negotiations with the Pacific Maritime Assn.

The association has accused union workers of slowdown tactics and has at times halted the unloading of ships, including this weekend. The local union denies the allegations. The unloading of ships is expected to resume Tuesday.

But the congestion has been building for months, because of the labor dispute and other factors. And the holiday weekend stoppage heightens fear of a longer-term disruption.

Some businesses have attempted expensive workarounds, rerouting goods via air or through Gulf and East Coast ports, analysts said. Items ordered by retailers for the spring probably won’t reach stores on time. Deliveries from Asian manufacturers could be delayed until after the Chinese New Year, which starts next week.

For now, retailers still have inventory left over from the holiday season, analysts said. But they will need shipments before the busy spring shopping season.

Communities close to the ports have been hit first and hardest. In Los Angeles, which has recovered slowly from the recession, truck drivers and warehouse workers are already seeing their hours cut.

Elsewhere in the state, the agriculture industry is in pain..

Ronald C. Leimgruber, namesake and owner of a farm in Holtville in southeastern California, said his small company normally exports two or three 20-ton loads of alfalfa hay and grasses a week . Now, he’s forced to stockpile it or sell it cheaper domestically.

“You do whatever you can to survive,” he said.

Customers have canceled orders, and Leimgruber fears they may never come back. His sister’s trucking company is also suffering. She usually sends 24 loads of goods to the ports each week, he said. It’s dropped to five. She’s laid off all but a few of her employees.

“All those wives won’t get a good Valentine’s Day, because their husbands aren’t working,” Leimgruber said.

Companies across the globe will also feel the effects. A shift toward “just in time” manufacturing means companies keep their inventories low, making them far more susceptible to supply chain interruptions.

Honda North America Inc. will slow production at factories in Ohio, Indiana and Canada because it can’t get crucial parts from Japan, said spokesman Mark Morrison.

The company has tried using air cargo and special truck shipments to obtain key supplies since January.

If labor disruptions continue, businesses may reconsider their reliance on shipping to the West Coast, said Mark Vitner, a senior economist at Wells Fargo.

“The longer we have disruptions at the ports, the more and more people say this is a reason to do business elsewhere,” he said.

An extreme example of what could happen came Tuesday, when South Korea’s largest shipping company, Hanjin, announced it was pulling out of the Port of Portland.

The shipper accounted for 78% of business at the port, according to the Oregonian newspaper, importing apparel for companies such as Nike and exporting apples and other crops.

Just last weekend, a Hanjin ship sat for four days without being unloaded amid walkouts and lockouts.

Another looming threat is the widening of the Panama Canal, which will allow much larger cargo ships to head directly to the Gulf and East coasts, where ports are racing to expand. That business now mostly flows to L.A. and Long Beach.

With the canal project scheduled for completion next year, this is a bad time for the West Coast to give “themselves a bad name in terms of reliability,” said Jock O’Connell, an international trade economist.

For now, the unions have a strong hand.

While globalization has hurt unions in many U.S. industries, it’s had the opposite effect at West Coast ports. Surging trade with Asia has nearly tripled traffic at the ports of L.A. and Long Beach over the last 20 years and given dockworkers here ever more clout.

Today, the dockworkers are among the best-paid blue-collar workers in the country, earning between $26 and $41 an hour. And their union — tied not to the fate of any one company but to a whole network of international trade — has been able to play hardball.

“These 20,000 workers occupy one of the central choke points of the entire U.S. economy,” said Harley Shaiken, a UC Berkeley professor who specializes in labor unions. “That gives them enormous power.”

It will be up to Perez and a federal mediator to craft a deal that satisfies the dockworkers, the shipping companies and the many industries watching the talks.

If an agreement comes in the next week, the aftershocks will be “a blip,” said Winer, the Wedbush managing director. But if it drags longer, the situation could be dire, he said.

“Six months would be a horror show,” he said. “Even if this lasts more than a month, it’s going to be a significant issue.”

Ken Coons | SeafoodNews.com | Read original article here.

Alaska senators hope to toss overbroad fishing-discharge regs overboard

Chris Klint, Senior Digital Producer, cklint@ktuu.com

ANCHORAGE –

Three U.S. senators, including both of Alaska’s, are pushing to gut the application of an Environmental Protection Agency discharge regulation to small fishing boats they say could punish cleaning up fish guts.

Sens. Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan, both Alaska Republicans, joined Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) Thursday in sponsoring legislation which would remove the expiration date on a three-year moratorium for commercial fishing vessels, as well as commercial vessels under 79 feet long. The incidental discharge regulation was part of the Coast Guard Reauthorization Bill, which was passed by Congress and signed into law in December.

“The flawed regulation is written so broadly that it would penalize Alaska’s fisherman and more than 8,000 boats statewide simply for rinsing fish guts off their deck, or rainwater washing other materials off their decks,” Murkowski’s office wrote in a statement on the 2014 bill Thursday.

In a December Senate speech on the proposed moratorium, Murkowski offered her colleagues a fisherman’s perspective on what the regulations meant.

“For those who need a little more graphic detail as to what we’re talking about, when you take a commercial fishing vessel out, your 45-foot commercial fishing vessel, and you have a good day fishing, you’ve got some salmon guts on the deck,” Murkowski said. “You’ve got a little bit of slime. You hose it off.  That would be an incidental discharge that would be reportable to the EPA, and if you fail to report, you could be subject to civil penalties. That’s what we’re talking about here.”

Murkowski Speaks on Senate Floor on Vessel Discharge Agreement — video

Murkowski spokesman Matthew Felling said Thursday that the sweep of the EPA regulations seemed to be a product of being overbroad, rather than an intentional effect.

“I think this was designed for big, huge fishing boats, and they just forgot to make the reasonable exception,” Felling said.

The Peninsula Clarion reported last year that leaders of Alaska commercial fishing groups had questioned the sensibility of applying the regulations to small fishing boats, noting that they would bar pumping rainwater overboard or returning parts of halibut removed from the sea to the sea.

With bipartisan support from Boxer, Felling said Murkowski is optimistic that a permanent version of the moratorium “is going to happen.”

“Sen. Boxer had announced that she’s not running again, and this has been a real priority for her,” Felling said. “We want to make sure this gets done this Congress, to give certainty and security and right a wrong that may not have been intended in the first place.”

Copyright © 2015, KTUU-TV

Read the original story here.

Dockside fish market lands Capitol ally

‘Pacific to Plate’ bill would help market grow by easing state rules – By Chris Nichols

August 2nd, 2014 San Diego, CA- Allison Roach prepares to bag a 16 lb. yellow fin tuna for a customer on the first day of San Diegos Tuna Harbor Dockside Market on Saturday downtown near Seaport Village. Photo by David Brooks/ U-T San Diego MANDATORY PHOTO CREDIT DAVID BROOKS / U-T SAN DIEGO; ZUMA Press. — David Brooks

SACRAMENTO — San Diego’s newest fish market has landed an ally at the state Capitol.

Assembly Speaker Toni Atkins, D-San Diego, has announced a bill dubbed “Pacific to Plate,” to make it easier for the Tuna Harbor Dockside Market, and others like it, to operate and flourish.

Located just north of Seaport Village on Harbor Lane, the venue offers an open-air seafood market that carries overtones of Pike’s Market in Seattle or Fisherman’s Wharf in San Francisco. Officials with the county and Port of San Diego worked with local fishers to get the market legally certified. It launched in August.

“Since the market opened, thousands of San Diegans have enjoyed being able to walk down this pier and choose their next meal from the fresh catch brought ashore by our local fishermen,” Atkins said during a press conference at the market this past weekend, according to a news release from her office.

“Though the market has been successful, there are still some barriers in state law that need to be overcome to ensure its ongoing operation. ‘Pacific to Plate,’ the legislation I am introducing in the Assembly, will help keep red tape from tangling up this boon to San Diego’s Blue Economy.”

The legislation proposes to:

• Allow Fishermen’s Markets to operate as food facilities.

• Allow fresh fish to be cleaned for direct sale at Fishermen’s Markets.

• Streamline the permitting process, so commercial fishermen can organize under a single permit — just like Certified Farmers’ Markets.

Currently, Fishermen’s Markets are not defined in state law as food facilities, complicating the permit process. Also, an exemption is needed to allow vendors to clean fresh fish for customers.

“San Diego was once the tuna capital of the world,” noted San Diego County Supervisor Cox, in the news release. “This bill can help us establish more fishermen’s markets, create more jobs for local fishermen and give San Diegans more fish caught fresh off our waters.”

The bill has bipartisan support from San Diego County’s legislative delegation, including Assemblymembers Rocky Chávez, Brian Jones, Brian Maienschein, Marie Waldron and Shirley Weber and state Senators Joel Anderson, Patricia Bates, Marty Block and Ben Hueso, according to the release.

Since it opened, San Diego’s Tuna Harbor market has drawn about 350 visitors a week, who together spend about $15,000 on fresh seafood brought directly to the pier by local fishermen, the release said.

Read original post here.

Official unveiling next week for North Coast marine sanctuary expansion

Kamilah Motley of Washington, D.C. takes in the sweeping view of the Sonoma Coast, north of Bodega Bay, Monday Jan. 20, 2015. The unveiling of the expanded Cordell Bank and Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuaries will take place next week. (Kent Porter / Press Democrat) 2015

Last-minute consultations were underway in Washington this week in advance of the expected publication Tuesday of final plans for expansion of two adjoining national marine sanctuaries off the North Coast.

Reports of a few lingering operational questions on the part of Coast Guard officials should not impede implementation of long-sought protections for the swath of wildlife-rich waters offshore of Sonoma County, federal sanctuary personnel said.

“So far, the information I have is we are not anticipating any delays,” said Maria Brown, superintendent of the Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary.

The proposed move, announced by the Obama administration in December 2012, will more than double the size of the combined Cordell Bank and Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuaries, extending federal protections north along the Sonoma Coast to Point Arena in southern Mendocino County.

The action will fulfill a four-decade quest to ban energy and mineral exploration and extraction off that stretch of coastline, extending federal protection to an additional 2,769 square miles of ocean.

The final rule on the expansion is expected to be published in the Federal Register on Tuesday, Jan. 27, triggering a 45-day review by Congress and California Gov. Jerry Brown before the area is officially included in sanctuary boundaries. Sanctuary officials earlier had said the rule would be published Jan. 20.

Matt Stout, communications director for the National Marine Sanctuary System, said the expansion is the agency’s largest undertaking of its kind short of creating a new sanctuary. But he said strong support for the plan among lawmakers suggested smooth sailing ahead.

“This expansion has grown out of the will of Congress to see something happen here,” Stout said. “We’ve had nothing but absolutely fantastic support from all members of Congress. And the local delegation is incredibly vocal and supportive, so we wouldn’t anticipate any challenge.”

You can reach Staff Writer Mary Callahan at 521-5249 or mary.callahan@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @MaryCallahanB.

Read original story: The Press Democrat

Speaker Atkins Announces “Pacific to Plate” Legislation to Boost Coastal Fish Markets

SAN DIEGO – Assembly Speaker Toni G. Atkins (D-San Diego) has announced that she will introduce legislation, “Pacific to Plate,” to clarify and streamline state laws to make it easier for San Diego’s Tuna Harbor Dockside Market, and other fish markets like it, to grow and thrive.

“Since the market opened, thousands of San Diegans have enjoyed being able to walk down this pier and choose their next meal from the fresh catch brought ashore by our local fishermen,” Speaker Atkins said.

“Though the Market has been successful, there are still some barriers in state law that need to be overcome to ensure its ongoing operation. ‘Pacific to Plate,’ the legislation I am introducing in the Assembly, will help keep red tape from tangling up this boon to San Diego’s Blue Economy.”

Speaker Atkins hosted a Jan. 17 press conference during the weekly fish market to announce the proposed legislation. She was joined by San Diego County Supervisor Greg Cox, Port of San Diego Board Chairman Dan Malcolm and local fisherman Peter Halmay.

The proposed state legislation would:

• Allow Fishermen’s Markets to operate as food facilities
• Allow fresh fish to be cleaned for direct sale at Fishermen’s Markets, and
• Streamline the permitting process, so commercial fishermen can organize under a single permit—just like Certified Farmers’ Markets.

Currently, Fishermen’s Markets are not defined in state law as food facilities, complicating the permit process. In addition, a special exemption is needed to allow vendors to clean fresh fish for patrons.

“San Diego was once the tuna capital of the world,” said Supervisor Cox. “This bill can help us establish more fishermen’s markets, create more jobs for local fishermen and give San Diegans more fish caught fresh off our waters.”

The bill has attracted broad bipartisan support from San Diego’s state legislative delegation. Assemblymembers Rocky Chavez, Brian Jones, Brian Maienschein, Marie Waldron and Shirley Weber are co-sponsoring the “Pacific to Plate” bill, along with state Senators Joel Anderson, Patricia Bates, Marty Block and Ben Hueso.

San Diego’s Tuna Harbor market has been a success since its Aug. 2 opening, drawing 350 visitors a week, who spend about $15,000 on fresh seafood brought directly to the pier by local fishermen.

The market was established following action by San Diego County and the Port District, which partnered to establish a place where local commercial fishermen could sell directly to consumers. The county and Port requested that the State become involved to ease regulations that could be obstacles to the growth of the Tuna Harbor market, and other coastal markets like it.

View original post: http://asmdc.org/speaker/

Federal appeals court backs restrictions on delta water deliveries

A boater plies the Sacramento River near the town of Rio Vista. A federal appeals court on Monday backed environmental restrictions on water deliveries from the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta to urban Southern California and San Joaquin Valley agriculture. (Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)

Ruling that water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta is important not just for people but also for the fish that swim in it, a federal appeals court on Monday backed environmental restrictions on deliveries to urban Southern California and San Joaquin Valley agriculture.

A panel of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals reversed most of a lower court ruling in a long-running legal battle over endangered fish protections in the delta, the hub of California’s water system.
The appeals decision was issued in one of two lawsuits filed by San Joaquin Valley irrigation districts — including the Westlands Water District — and the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California challenging federal protections that at times limit pumping from the delta to the big aqueduct systems that carry water south.

Though the water districts won at the U.S. District Court level in the two cases, the 9th Circuit has now unraveled both of those victories.
Monday’s decision upheld a set of environmental restrictions imposed in 2009 by the National Marine Fisheries Service to protect imperiled chinook salmon, steelhead and green sturgeon that migrate through the delta, along with a small population of orca whales that prey on salmon.

Noting that “people need water, but so do fish,” the 80-page opinion echoed another 9th Circuit decision issued this year that affirmed delta smelt protections adopted by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

As in the smelt case, the appeals judges concluded that U.S. District Judge Oliver Wanger overstepped legal bounds when he relied on thousands of pages of outside scientific opinion to invalidate many of the environmental restrictions.

Judge Richard Tallman, who wrote the opinion, said the three-judge panel agreed that the fisheries service “used the best scientific data available, even if that science was not always perfect.”

Major urban and farm water districts that get supplies from the delta have for years attacked the salmon and smelt protections in the courts and the political arena. The water contractors argue that federal fishery agencies focus too much on the effects of the delta pumping operations while ignoring other harms to native species, such as pollution and predation by non-native fish.

Bob Muir, spokesman for the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, which imports delta water to the Southland, said Monday’s decision was not surprising, given the ruling in the smelt case.

Metropolitan and a number of other agencies have petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to review the smelt decision. The high court in recent years has declined to take up other California water cases. A decision on the request is expected next month.

The appeals opinion “is likely to be the last word. But you never know,” said Drew Caputo, vice president of litigation at Earthjustice, which represented fishing and environmental groups that intervened in the salmon case.

Caputo called Monday’s opinion “a pretty resounding affirmation by the judges that the [fisheries service] did the right thing when it protected the salmon.”

In a departure from the detailed parsing of environmental law that made up most of the opinion, Tallman opened with a passage from “East of Eden,” John Steinbeck’s novel about California’s Salinas Valley: “And then the dry years would come … The land dried up and the grasses headed out miserably a few inches high and great bare scabby places appeared in the valley.”

“The same can be said for California’s Central Valley,” Tallman wrote, adding that the salmon case was about competing demands for delta water.

“This water is essential to the continuing vitality of agriculture in the Central Valley, and some 25 million Californians depend on it for daily living. But that water is also an important habitat for thousands of river and anadromous fish, many of which are endangered.”

Read the original story here.