here is a link to something the tribes want to do. scroll down to where it says "fishing unlimited"

click here

I read the article, and it had a bad spin on the subject. I think this will be a great
opportunity for the tribes and sport fishers, after all, sport fishing drives more
dollars into our economy.

Cigar

The big part of this is making sure all loop holes are closed. They must only take tribal allocation. This is going to be a tricky thing to set up. Things have to be changed at both the state and federal level. Need to watch this one closely.

I found the paragraph below just as interesting - "NMFS breaks law". A judge declared they were not properly taking into account the 'by-catch' of non-targeted species by ocean bottom draggers. Could this ruling have an effect on the 'by-catch' of sturgeon during springer gillnetting seasons? And visa-versa? I hope so!

This has not been the first time the NMFS has broken the law either! Both Treaty and Federal laws mandate an equal split of harvestable salmon and steelhead on the Columbia R. and NW Wash. rivers. Yet they have gone along with unfair demands by the Tribal Commissions who have pressured them with threatened lawsuits to get many times more allocation than sportfishers.

RT

[ 10-29-2001: Message edited by: RT i ]

ive been lurking here for quite awhile but this caught my eye, as mike says we need to keep an eye on this one. have a nice day.

i read the indian bashing thread with the wasted fish but this subject on this thread needs to be followed close as it could realy suck the big one for sports fisherman. most of the rivers in washington are open from a certain date to an ending date, what if the tribes demanded a quota of the fish that can be caught out of each river and when our quota is taken you could only sportfish that river from a tribal guide boat or pay a fee to fish on "there" quota of fish, they could even say our quota was taken in salt water and fishing in some rivers will be from a tribal guide boat only or a fee, this makes me sick. its plain to see they have realized there is more money in sportsfishing than there is is netting and they want to cash in on it.

Thats pretty wishfull thinking there RT. I am not sure that NMFS has any real input in the sturgeon fisheries as that is within Oregon/Washington waters and they are not ESA listed. NMFS only gets involved when there are ESA implications with the exception of Salmon.

On the subject of the allocation, politics, like allways, plays the dominant role, but in addition to that, the director of NMFS has directed all the managers to avoid any action that could result in lawsuits as the current lawsuits are creating havoc allready. (Kind of strange that the NMFS representative to the North Pacific Council voted for the Halibut IFQ program knowing that RFA was going to sue over it.)

What I find interesting is what you find when you dig into the the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act (Magnuson). The conservation policy outlined in Magnuson dictates that when a fishery is in trouble, all parties share equally in the conservation responsibility. I really don't like that logic. It does not seem right to hit sportsmen up equally for conservation in a situation where nets are responsible for the problem just as it would not be right for commercials to be reduced equally if sportsmen were responsible.

Magnuson was up for re-authorization last year. Congress did not get to it. It does not look like congress will get to it this year either with all the terorist action. Next year I guess. RFA is writing its own version. If anybody wants to read the current version its at
http://www.nmfs.noaa.gov/sfa/magact/magact.html#s301

There is some interesting stuff in there. I will also take any input if anyone has ideas about improvements to it.

Guys.... Please see my post on the tribes wasting fish thread...... It applies in this case also

the article didn't mention that for the tribes to run sportfishing charters, a change needs to be made in the boldt decision. right now, it is illegal for a non-tribal person to fish on a tribal boat. there was a couple articles printed about this by (i believe) bob mottram of the tacoma news tribune in late august of this year.

from the original article, the tribes are looking to avoid any state licensing for their charters (charter licenses for saltwater fishing).

i for one don't like this, especially if tribal charters have their own seasons and don't have to obey the state licensing requirements that all other charter boats have to deal with. i'm not opposed to some tribal members doing chartering, but they need to be under the same rules as all the other charter boat operators in washington state (seasons and licenses), especially since wdfw and the legislature have to change the law for this to be possible. hopefully they will make sure it's not a complete giveaway that harms existing license holders.

chris