Recap of Marine Resources Committee activities

First published in Landings, July, 2015.

The first session of the 127th Legislature has been relatively uneventful in the Marine Resources Committee. The committee has passed technical bills on such things as spat collection, elver exporting and elver quota transfer for medical reasons, as well as LD 98, which increased trap limits in the Swans Island Conservation Zone to 600. We enacted a measure that increases the penalty for “scrubbing,” removing the eggs from a female lobster, to a permanent license revocation. It was the unanimous vote of the committee to increase the penalty, which indicated an understanding of the severity of this offense and its effect on the sustainability of the fishery.

Of note is what we didn’t do. We did not enact any reforms to our licensing system, but that is a priority for our next session. Commissioner Keliher, Governor LePage and the entire committee are committed to a thoughtful, comprehensive review of access to our resources. The Commissioner is planning extensive outreach to the industry later this year that will likely result in a department bill being submitted for the 2nd session that begins in January 2016.