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FROM THE CROWE’S NEST
Not everyone sees it that way. The environment and many species are threatened today. That’s going to fire up a few crusaders to grab a sword and charge over the horizon. Fringe crusaders did not produce the endangered species act, it is a federal law, it carries a lot of weight, and it has a track record. The long grueling ordeal for Maine lobstermen dealing with the endangered species act, the right whale, and gear changes may seem to some like a nightmare they hope to wake up from. But it is not a dream. An ill or uninformed force can bear down with all its fears dressed in good intentions, while carrying the letter of the law. However senseless it seems to make an enormous and expensive change to gear for an effectively non-existent problem in Maine waters, the letter of the law has called for it. But the law also allows for those who will be effected to make their informed case. The two volume, 15 pound Final Environmental Impact Statement and the Endangered Species Act are formidable, but under the law so are the several thousand licensed fishermen in the State of Maine. After years of wrangling with details, the feds produced a statement and left about 45 days for input from those to be effected. The Maine Lobstermen’s Association and the Department of Marine Resources have both called for fishermen to make unified, cohesive comments to the feds about the final rule. It is now or never. The bottom along Maine’s coast has characteristics that make a one size fits all policy on lobster gear, in an effort to avoid the extinction of one mammal, a policy that could be the cause of the extinction of another. There are just three meetings, all in the last week of July. The window of opportunity slams shut on September 17th. |
