Hello,

My name is J.R. Rogers and I was moved to write this letter to you after watching the story you aired last night. It was very upsetting to see that a station with KIRO’s reputation, air a piece that was more propaganda that FACT. The story you aired, unfairly portrayed impact the recreational crabbers are having on the Puget Sound Dungeness crabbing resources. This story had very misleading and incorrect information about the crabbing situation in the State of Washington and that information is miss-taken as fact by many of your viewers. This is VERY damaging to use recreational crabbers & fisherman, at a time when we are working very hard to just maintain our minimal access to this resource.

The crabbing piece stated that the recreational crabbers are to blame for the reduced allocation and stock for the treasured Puget Sound Dungeness crabs. I would have expected the person(s) preparing this piece to research this matter and make sure that this is truly the case.

If they had done any research, they would have found out that the recreational crabber has the least impact on the Puget Sound crab harvest and virtually no impact in the total overall Dungeness Crab harvest in the State of Washington. Of the THREE main user groups, (The Tribes, The Commercial’s and the Recreational Crabbers), that share the harvestable quota for Dungeness crab the recreational crabber are the largest user group with the least % of allocation.

The FACT is the recreational crabber is allocated only 3% of the total state harvest and just 16% of the Puget Sound Harvest despite the fact the fact we have a over 800 times more licensed crabbers than the commercials and have a much great positive economic impact to the economy per pound of crab harvested.

There are over 150,000 State of Washington licensed recreational crabbers, I am one of those, and only 250 commercial crabbing licenses. These 250 commercial licenses are held by 181 commercial crab fishers, those 181 PERSONS receive 34% of the Puget Sound harvestable allocation and 48% of the States total harvestable Dungeness crab allocation.


The WDFW and it’s commission, have and continues to be very biased to the commercial fisheries and unethical in their allocation of OUR resources they are entrusted with. The Recreational Crabbers & Fishermen have and continue to discuss, reason, protest and even plea with the WDFW Commission to re-allocate the resources in a fair and equitable percentages. The fact is the WDFW has not changed, we have asked, the crabbing allocation percentages for the last NINE years, even thou the population of the state has nearly doubled since then. Even when a Federally mandated court order gives the Commission very clear explicate percentage allocation of the sustainable and harvestable to distribute between the user groups, the recreational user group often finds it self on the short end of the stick/allocation.

I would like to see KIRO correct some the damage cause to the recreational fishing group. One of the ways KIRO can right the wrong is to do a story, a well research story that would have all the facts pertaining to the crabbing situation. The are Two groups that represent the greater recreational fisherman in the Puget Sound, the PSA ( Puget Sound Anglers ) and the RFA ( Recreational Fishing Alliance ). These organizations are for the education and preservation of the recreational fisherman. I would recommend that you contact either or both of the presidents for the PSA & RFA. They are fully aware of the crabbing situation as is stands now in the State of Washington and could provide you with accurate and knowledgeable information regarding this matter.

Washington State PSA President
Steve Sande

SSANDE1@aol.com


RFA Washington State Chairman
Mike Gilchrist
thinker@gamefishin.com

RFA Washington State Vice-Chairman
Clint Muns
Fishhog211@aol.com


Sincerely,

J.R. Rogers
Everett WA
425-754-3934



I thought you might also like to know the true economic impact the Washington sportsmen have in the great State of Washington

Hunters 227000
Anglers 938,000
Total Expenditures $1.4 billion

Total Jobs 23000
Salaries and Wages $600 million
State Tax Revenue $95 million

Ripple Effect on the State Economy $2.41 billion

STATE TAX REVENUE INFORMATION
Sportsmen in Washington annually pay $95.2 million in state sales and fuel taxes – this could pay 2,471 teachers’ salaries or fund the annual education expenses for 14,650 students.

JOBS
Sportsmen support more jobs in Washington than Microsoft Corporation
(22,766 vs. 20,000).


TAKE A CLOSER LOOK

Twice as many Washington residents hunt or fish each year as attend Seattle Seahawk games (1.02 million* vs. 508,367).

One out of every six Washington residents hunt or fish.

Washington sportsmen annually spend 10 times more than the value of the state’s commercial seafood landings ($1.4 billion vs. $134 million).

Washington sportsmen annually spend nearly twice as much as the cash receipts from the state’s apple crop ($1.4 billion vs. $806 million).

* The figure for sportsmen is less than the combined number of hunters and anglers because a respondent who is both a hunter and an angler is counted in each category above


FOR MORE INFORMATION PLEASE CONTACT:
THE CONGRESSIONAL SPORTSMENS FOUNDATION @ (202) 543-6850