Just Another Red Snapper fisherman regulated out of business

Captain Dale Perkins says,

Let me describe some of my experiences as a Charter Boat Captain to you.  In recent years regulatory activity in the recreational fishing industry has exploded.  Seasons have been shortened, regulatory agencies have been created and expanded, the burden on both private recreational fishermen and Charter Boat recreational fisherman has become so unbearable that boats are worth nothing.  Charter boats are being foreclosed on and it is no longer  affordable or worthwhile with  due to extreme catch restrictions  that one  cannot justify taking the family fishing.    This hurts our local economy in more areas than just fishing (hotels, restaurants, shopping outlets, bait & tackle shops, nightclubs etc,). 

When I started fishing it was still a free country.  I now have eleven governmental agencies overseeing me to take six people deep sea fishing.    It seems that regulatory bureaucracy is now more of an industry in our country than the industries they oversee.  With all the jobs to be had in that field the University of West Florida should offer an academic program in regulatory bureaucracy to provide jobs for area students.    To take someone fishing on my six pack charter boat I have to deal with and comply with:

• United States Coast Guard
• Florida Fish and Wildlife Conversation Commission
• National Marine Fisheries Service
• Gulf Council
• Army Corps of Engineers
• State Department of Environmental Protection
• Federal Environmental Protection Agency
• City of Pensacola
• Escambia County Board of Commissioners
• Federal Communications Commission
• Transportation Safety Association (TWIC card ..transportation workers identification card)
• Maritime Consortium (drug testing card)-Part of Coast Guard oversight

I had a local Judge tell me there was no way he would go fishing without a lawyer on the boat to provide legal advice.  It is a shame it has become so complicated.

On top of the volume of regulatory compliance is the insanity of the regulations.

Our area has an abundance of Red Snapper.  They are so prevalent that we can no longer effectively fish for other species due to the hordes of red snapper.  The National Marine Fisheries service has now limited us to only eight weeks of red snapper fishing.  What other business could survive on only eight weeks of business during the year (in the peak of hurricane season where we lose at least 2-3 weeks due to tropical storms in the gulf)?

In addition to the shortened season NMFS reduced the number of snapper I can keep from 32 to 12.  The State of Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission inexplicably followed along with this causing more harm to our local economy.  I had hoped that Governor Crist would intervene since sportsmen and fisherman supported him so heavily in his campaign for governor.  So far no help from him, perhaps he is just unaware of our situation in Northwest Florida since no one from Northwest Florida has been appointed to serve on the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission.

I caught my limit of 32 red snapper every trip, now that the limit is reduced to 12 customers cannot justify the price of a charter and business is way off.    My personal opinion is that the National Marine Fisheries Service wants to reduce the number of permit holders and drive people out of business therefore concentrating the fishing quotas into the hands of rich and powerful fishing interests.  We see this happening in the commercial sector of red snapper fishing with the implementation of Individual Fishing Quotas assuring that only the powerful can catch and sell red snapper.  It reeks of government corruption.  I sat on the Gulf Council red snapper advisory council and made a motion to ask for a congressional investigation into the mismanagement of the red snapper fishery by the National Marine Fisheries Service and the Gulf Council.  The motion failed (no one wants to have themselves investigated).  At a town hall meeting in Pensacola last year I asked United States Senator Bill Nelson about an investigation into mismanagement in the snapper fishery and he said a congressional investigation had been undertaken.  I have yet to hear anything from that investigation and perhaps it got swept under the rug.  I hear from local restaurants that they are buying red snapper caught in US waters off the coast of Louisiana and Texas, then transported to Mexico and sold by Mexican companies to US restaurants.  It's a hell of a world we live in.

Look at my situation.   The regulatory agencies made it impossible for me to operate at a profit.  I had to sell my boat.  A boat that I had $100,000 in sold for $20,000.  I have decided if you can't beat them join them.  I am using the $20,000 from the sale of the boat to get a second Masters degree from Florida State University.  I will become a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and hope to do Post Traumatic Stress Disorder counseling with the VA.  I will be doing something to help our troops returning from the war.  And hopefully I will get one of them nice, safe, secure jobs in an agency of Federal Government much like those of many of the regulators who put me out of business.  Or as my Uncle Bo used to say, "One of thim good  guvimint jobs", and "Boy, …thim who has, gits!".

My only hope in the meantime is the people making all the fishing regulations undergo mandatory drug testing like they require the fishermen to do.  Perhaps it will improve their judgment.