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BY TOM BELL
MaineToday Media, Inc. 04/02/2008

MaineToday Media, Inc.

Some Maine fishermen are leading an effort to develop a $100 million buyout plan for New England's struggling groundfishing industry.

Fishermen would give up their fishing permits and destroy their boats in exchange for cash. The plan would reduce the fleet's fishing capacity by at least 25 percent, giving the remaining boats a chance to catch more fish.

The federal government would lend the fishery $100 million to buy fishing permits. Those who continue to fish would cover the loan by paying 4 percent of the value of all the fish they land for 30 years.

Representatives of Maine Sens. Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe discussed the plan with fishermen at two meetings in February. The two Republican lawmakers have yet to submit legislation because the industry has yet to reach a consensus.

The owners of large, Portland-based draggers support the plan because they believe it will provide remaining fishermen with a better chance of survival.

But Maine fishermen who have smaller boats that fish close to the Maine coast worry that a buyout would shrink the Maine fleet too much. They say fewer boats might not be able to support critical infrastructure, such as the Portland Fish Exchange and the state's last two ice suppliers. They also worry that they wont' be able to afford the 4 percent fee.

George Lapointe, commissioner of the Maine Department of Marine Resources, said he is reluctant to endorse a plan until there is consensus, but he wants the two sides to keep talking.

"I would hope that the industry members get together and help us work through the ins and outs of this," Lapointe said. This would not be the first time the federal government has been involved in a buyback.

The government in the mid-1990s spent $24 million to reduce the fishing fleet. A study later found that owners of most of the 79 boats that were bought used the money to buy new boats and re-enter the business.

In 2002, 52 Maine fishermen sold their groundfishing permits as part of a $10 million federal buyout.

The current plan is modeled after a 2003 industry-funded program that Congress approved for the West Coast groundfish industry. That program permanently retired 91 vessels.

The new plan has been in the works for two years. In November 2006, a referendum for a buyout plan won the approval of 73 percent of the region's fishermen.

Industry leaders did not move the plan forward at that time because other fishery-related issues were consuming attention and success in Congress seemed unlikely, said Jackie Odell, executive director of the Gloucester-based Northeast Seafood Coalition.

Since then, Associated Fisheries of Maine, a trade group that represents 35 fishing vessels and a dozen other shore-based businesses, has been working on the issue. The group began drafting legislation after meeting with members of the Maine delegation in Washington last spring.

The new effort has yet to gain much attention outside Maine, but Odell said the political atmosphere has improved, and it has a better chance for success.

"It needs to be considered," she said. "This is a ... different time, and we have different realities in front of us."

The industry is at the halfway point of a 10-year federal plan that seeks to rebuild fish stocks, mainly by limiting the number days boats can spend at sea. The average fishing boat in the region is now fishing for only 43 days a year, and total revenues from groundfish declined about 30 percent between 2001 and 2005.

Maine fishermen have been hit particularly hard. The Portland Fish Exchange, which sells 90 percent of the groundfish landed in Maine, sold 8.3 million pounds of fish in 2007, a 64 percent decline since 2003.

The number of Maine fishing boats declined from 159 in 2004 to 111 in 2006. In 2007, only about 70 commercial boats landed groundfish in Maine at least five times.

Chris Odlin, a Scarborough fishermen involved in the buyout effort, said fishermen who stay in the industry would be willing to pay the fee because there would be less competition for fish and federal regulators probably would allow them to catch more.

Odlin, who owns two large draggers that operate out of Boston, said the combination of high diesel costs and stringent federal regulations is making it hard for fishermen to make any money. Moreover, federal regulators are expected to enact even tougher regulations next year.

"I could be out of business and not even know it yet," he said. "A lot of my friends say that. It's pretty scary."

Proctor Wells, who owns a relatively small 46-foot boat out of Sebasco Harbor in Phippsburg, says he can't see how fishermen can absorb the 4 percent "surcharge" on the value of their fish. He and other midcoast fishermen worry that too many Maine fishermen would take the buyout.

The bigger boats are more mobile and can operate out of Massachusetts, he said, but the smaller boats can't.

Eventually, he said, only boats from outside the state will be fishing off the Maine's, 3,000-mile-long coast.

"I hate to see it coming," he said. "With every permit we lose along the coast of Maine, we lose a little more access to the fishery. I think what you see is the end of an industry."

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